What grace is that to you?

      I had one of those weeks where God was preaching a sermon to me, even as I was trying to prepare a sermon for all of us gathered.  It is not much of a surprise around here that there has been a good bit of pastoral conversations around death.  We have had a couple funerals, and I traveled back to my last parish for another tough funeral.  And, yes, for those who ask, my successor succumbed to the cancer a couple weeks ago, so that community is still in mourning.  I spent a good bit of time in Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth and was focused a bit on both the agrarian and astronomical illustrations that Paul uses to explain the glory of the next life.

     A few Adventers are disturbed that I do not teach a great deal about the next life, other than to say it will be greater than I or you can ask or imagine.  For my part, I hope it is more like the life after life after death described by N. T. Wright.  How cool would it be to do the things we love truly for the glory of God?  But, if God gives me a new heart and a new mind, I expect I won’t mind sitting in church for eternity—the description of some of my pastors in my youth.

     The agrarian image is great because we are all getting ready for spring planting.  We “plant” bodies in the ground and try to predict what the bodies of the next life will resemble.  Those of you who plant tomatoes or cucumbers or carrots or radishes or corn or whatever in your garden, is there any way you can predict the fruit or vegetable that will come forth from those seeds you plant, absent your knowledge of having learned what each seed looks like?  Does a tomato seed look like it will produce a tomato?  Are you good enough to distinguish the different variety of plants by their very seeds?  No.  Most of us are not.  In a sense, Paul is similarly reminding us that these bodies we plant at the time of death will likely not even point to, or give the barest hint, of the bodies we will inherit in the kingdom of God.

     All Paul knows is that the life in the kingdom of God will be glorious.  What does that mean?  Again, he points to our experiences of glory.  We understand the universe a bit better than the contemporaries of Paul, but we should still get the idea and even understand a few new ones.  The sun, the moon, and the stars are all glorious, though in different ways.  They are predictable and valuable.  And they are unique.  Paul writes in our lesson today that the stars differ from one another in their glory.  He did not know they sang, like our astronomers now do.  He had no concept of the distances between them and us, like we and our astronomers do.  And there is no way he understood the sheer size of those stars, like we do.  Yet, he recognized the fact that the Lord, the Creator of heaven and earth, fashioned each of them and called them by name, much in the same way that He fashioned each one of us and calls us each by name.

     See?  It was a good sermon I was getting early in the week.  But, while the week went on, I was nudged in a different direction.  I have been doing this long enough to know that feel.  God wanted me preaching to you on the passage of Luke, instead.  To be sure, Paul’s letter will touch individuals who need to see or hear it, but the bulk of us needed to focus on Jesus’ question today.

     Our story from Luke’s Gospel immediately follows Jesus’ teaching on the Beatitudes and Woes.  Jesus has been describing to all those in earshot of behavior that God will bless and of behavior that will cause human beings to experience woes.  Now, he begins the address of those who are really listening, those who have heard His teaching thus far and really want to know and follow God.  Jesus gives some instructions that some of those commentators I read are certain they are hyperbole, that Jesus could not have really meant what He taught here, or that Luke clearly misunderstood the words of Jesus reported to him by the early disciples and Apostles.  They argue there is no way that Jesus expected His followers to be punching bags for their masters.  They argue there is no way Jesus expected His followers to allow themselves to be extorted by the soldiers, let alone go around naked in a society for which that would have been a shameful experience.  And there is certainly no possible way that Jesus expected His followers to give when asked.  They would have run out of things to give long after they did not have enough for themselves.

     The problem with discounting these words as recorded in Luke’s Gospel is that they forget the work and person of Christ Jesus.  When the soldiers come to arrest Jesus under the cover of darkness and Peter leads the fight to keep his Master free, does Jesus instruct Peter to quit chopping off ears and to aim for heads?  When the soldier punches Him for supposed disrespect of the High Priest, does Jesus smite the soldier?  When the soldiers mock Him and pay false homage to Him and punch Him repeatedly as they tease Him to “prophesy who hit You,” does Jesus ever fight back?  Of all the human beings ever to walk the earth, Jesus of Nazareth experienced the greatest of injustices.  Given how we like to lash out at others when we suffer just a little bit, can you truly imagine how you would have faced that which Jesus faced?  I’m certain I would have called down lightning bolts to give them a foretaste of that hellish eternity they would soon be experiencing.  You laugh, but how many of would act like Jesus acts? 

     One of the benefits of being Episcopalian/Anglican is that we have yet another prayer for that protection against such mis-teachings.  We have that lovely Collect we hear once a year where we remind ourselves that Jesus was not just the Savior, but a pattern for holy living.  I see the nods.  You and I are called to live lives like our Master.  God does not want us claiming Him as Lord and then setting out to exhibit characteristics that do not mirror Him, however dimly.  And in that understanding, you and I are not just counter-cultural in our calling, but even counter “western church” cultural.

     What do I mean?  Think of the representations of God in the highlighted church culture.  Make no mistake, there are far more anonymous Christians like ourselves, than there are headline makers and click baiters promoted by the press and social media.  Pick your favorite prosperity gospeller, those who convince followers that their lack of material blessing in this life is evidence of their lack of faith.  Nowhere in their preaching and teaching is there anything about cross-bearing, about redemptive suffering.  Pick your favorite headline grabbing “pastor.”  Colleagues from around the country had to tip me off to whatever the heck is going on on the east side of Nashville in Mt. Juliet or Lebanon, where the pastor kicks out (their version of ex-communication) those who wear masks, burns books, and threatens to shame women in his congregation he is certain are witches.  Or consider your favorite “Christian” leader who has taken it upon himself or herself to raise money to make sure the right politicians get elected to support the right causes.  Their attention to a flock or the build up of Christ’s Body, that is the Church, is mostly absent.  This list can go on and on, and they seem to have a greater impact or imprint because of the coverage they get.  Nobody knows about the church that packs weekend meals for kids’ backpacks.  Nobody knows about the church that plans sit down meals for the homeless in their community.  Nobody knows about the church that offers ESL to immigrants in their community.  Nobody knows about the church that offers mentorships to youth.  Nobody knows about churches who offer mom’s a chance to go to Starbucks or to the store without a baby attached.  Those last examples are not divisive.  Those last examples do not create buzz.  But which examples better reflect the heart and character of God?

     Jesus continues His teaching with a reflective question.  Now, y’all know I am having to pay a bit more attention to my Greek because Joshua was sad he’d not yet learned Greek like his brothers and sisters.  But have no fear, my cross bearing is your cross bearing!  As I was reading the passage for the week in Greek, I stumbled upon an interesting word.  Each time that Jesus asks those listening to Him, which now includes us, what credit is that to you? in our translation, He is really asking His followers and hears to think about grace, and God’s grace in their own life.  What do I mean?

     The Greek word that our translators rendered as credit is actually charis, grace.  The literal question that Jesus is asking us is what grace is that to you?  Now, I am pretty sure most of us have been to Confirmation classes and other catechesis classes over the course of our religious educations and our faith walk with God.  What is grace?  I heard it!  Say it louder!  That’s right!  Giving without expecting anything in return!  How do we often describe the heart of God?  He is full of grace.  God gives and expects what from us in exchange for what He gives us?  Nothing!  Absolutely nothing!  In fact, when Israel argues “But we give the appropriate sacrifices,” how does He answer them?  That their offerings are a stench!  What He really wants are people committed to doing His will and to repenting when they sin.  To put it in the language of the Gospels and Jesus, what can we give God to redeem our souls?  Nothing.  To put it in the language of our worship, what does God demand from us?  A sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving.  That’s not exactly a lot of hard work on our part, is it?

     Actually, of course, it is incredibly hard.  We know that God does not expect anything exorbitant in return for our deliverance from sin, but how often do we fall short?  If we only love those who love us, what grace is that to us?  Evil doers love those who love them.  If we only do good for those who do for us, what grace is that to us?  The world is often transactional.  Human beings tend to be nice to those from whom they want something, but dismissive of those whom they think have nothing to offer.   And, boy, that last question really ought to give a spiritual wedgie to those who think capitalism is God’s chosen economic system.  If we lend only to those from whom we expect to be paid back, what grace is that to us?  Each of the examples that Jesus gives are not examples of grace.  Each expects payment of some kind.  And Jesus will teach against this throughout His life and live it in His suffering and death.  Take the seat of least honor, invite those who cannot return an invitation to their own dinner party, don’t pray flowery prayers to make people think you are holy, love your neighbor as yourself.  All these are done to reflect the heart and character of God.  In this season of Epiphany, we remind ourselves that Jesus was the manifestation of God’s grace in the world.  We also remind ourselves that we, too, are called to manifest God’s grace in the world around us.  And so these teachings of Jesus are not hyperbole.  We know because He lived them when we could not!  He reflected the heart and character of God perfectly, and it cost Him His life.  Yet for His faithfulness, what did the Father do?  He raised Jesus and exalted Him and gave Him authority over all things.  Now that work falls to us, being empowered by the Holy Spirit.

     My real struggle in this sermon was the modern application and illustration.  I know most of you want to know how a teaching or understanding is meant to impact you today, in your context.  All that I could think of, the only image popping into my mind when I prayed to God for examples, was our work with those food insecure, those experiencing homelessness, and those with limited resources who need mental health care.  Most of you know I have had two to three dozen questions about our pantry that assure me we are doing the right thing, but convict me how many are misled.  Nancy and Hilary and Sarah and other volunteers have had some version of it, too.  I get asked why we don’t id, why we don’t limit visits, why we don’t only serve a particular zip code, and why we take the pantry on the road.  In the Church, there is a worry that we are being taken advantage of.  If we feed families every week for a year or two or more, they never learn to feed themselves.  If we serve people not in our neighborhood, we will run out because of the demand.  Are we not encouraging people to be lazy by taking the food to them a couple times a month?  When we live and ask those questions, what are we saying about our Father in Heaven and our Lord Christ?  What testimony about them are we giving?  God has limited resources?  God expects us human beings to judge what’s going on in one another’s lives?  That God’s grace is really more like worldly transactions?  What grace is that to you?

     And what does the world see and hear when Christians properly model Christ’s and God’s heart?  How many times have I been told Father, man, if other Christians acted like y’all, I could worship your God, I could get behind the teachings of Jesus.  So distorted is our worship by the world, which is always fighting God, that people are surprised when we act as God commands us.

     Make no mistake, brothers and sisters, this is hard work.  Giving and giving and giving is challenging, especially in a world that always expects something in return.  That is why you and I and all Christians are taught, by virtue of our baptisms, to continue in the fellowship of believers and the prayers.  That is why you and I, as Episcopalians and Anglicans, are called to come to this meal as often as we need it.  Those of you who paid close attention to charis probably wondered if it was related to Eucharist.  It is.  What is the result of God’s grace to us?  Good thanks!  You and I are invited by God to return and return and return to this meal not just to give good thanks to God for what He has done for us in Jesus Christ our Lord, but to be fortified by His Word and His Sacraments, to be sent back out there to do the work He has given each of us to do!  Along the way, we will confess our sins, we will remind ourselves of His promises, and we will drink of His Body and His blood, the One who truly showed each one of us the grace of God, trusting He will give us the nourishment, the strength, the determination, the whatever we truly need, to do His will in the world around us.

     I do find it kind of a cool God-incident that we are reminded to ask ourselves constantly this question posed by Jesus, what grace is that to you, on a day when one of our younger sisters will, for the first time in her young life, eat that bread and drink that wine.  Our Lord constantly reminds us to come to Him as trusting children, and so we are reminded a bit more intently of the eyes and wonder we should all have when we come to this, His Table.  With childlike faith we are called to remember the grace that has been extended to us, that we might be those heralds of grace that he desires us to be, trusting that our Father will use us to His redemptive purposes and, one glorious day, raise us to share in His Son’s glory for all eternity!

 

In Christ’s Peace,

Brian†

Our most famous manifestor of God's grace . . .

          So, before we begin, let’s talk about what we are doing and what we are not doing today.  I have competing interests that need a bit of satisfying.  Most of you probably came to church today expecting the Beatitudes, since it is the 6^th Sunday after the Epiphany.  Those who pay that close attention to the rhythms of our worship life were no doubt confused to see the Collect of the Day, where we admit our weakness to God and our desire to follow all His teachings, but the wrong readings.  This was intentional, and I will explain in a moment.  Our seminarian will have different concerns, though.  On the holy mountain we call Sewanee, he is learning that minor feasts NEVER trump the Lord’s Feast Days, right?  And Casey is also learning there is sometimes a conflict between pastoral application and theological understanding.  Right?  So, I had an issue this week.  How do I remind us all of the Feast of Bishop Charles Todd Quintard, sum up the unexpected sermon series that has focused on our charisms and our evaluation of their use and success, and not set a bad example for Casey?  To be clear, we are celebrating the Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany, but I used the rector’s prerogative to use other readings from Scripture.  It just so happens I selected the readings that are appointed for our church’s observation of Quintard’s feast day.  In other words, if I prayerfully discerned correctly, y’all will get the preaching and teaching you need, and Casey will not be misled!  More likely, I know, some of you are wondering who is this Quintard dude, and why does the priest think we need to talk about him?  I’ll explain that in a few minutes, too!

     Our Gospel lesson I chose today leaps ahead to chapter 14 of Luke.  Jesus is at the dinner where He famously watches how people seat themselves at the dinner and then teaches on it.  Jesus encourages those who truly love God to sit at the seats of least honor, promising that those who are exalted will be humbled and that those who are humble will be exalted.  Jesus goes on to encourage His dinner party to invite those who can repay by means of invitations of their own to these kinds of dinner parties.  In response to Jesus’ teachings, one of the men at the party declares that anyone who eats bread in the kingdom of God will be blessed.  It sounds a bit innocent to our ears, but it reflects one of the teachings regarding Messiah and a warped sense of no obligation.

     I have explained enough that you may be sick of hearing it, but one of the threads of teaching surrounding Messiah was that He would be God’s steward on earth.  Messiah would be like David and Solomon, but far more grand.  As good as life was under those to messiahs, other small “a” anointed men of God, the Messiah would establish a long reign of peace and prosperity.  Enemies would be put down.  Persecution would be put down.  Israel would be glorified by the nations because of God’s obvious provision.

     The sad part of this understanding was that it assumed that one lived a lottery life.  What I mean by that is, if one was not alive when Messiah came, one missed out on all the blessings of His reign and rule.  In that case, the best that one could hope for was the knowledge that one’s descendants would participate in Messiah’s reign.  Now, please understand, I am oversimplifying some of this.  I want you to understand one reason why faithful Jews did not understand Jesus and did not see Him as the Messiah of God.  I also want to simplify your understanding so you can see why this dinner guest’s proclamation is, at best a cop out on his responsibilities as a son of Abraham, or, at worst, a societal/socio-economic belief that the poor get what they deserve in this life.

     Jesus responds to the declaration of this other gift with yet another famous parable.  We are two years into a pandemic and do not do dinner parties like we used to in the old days, so I struggled with a modern example.  Today is Super Bowl Sunday, and I understand that, perhaps the most famous Tennessean ever, Dolly Parton, will be in a couple commercials this evening during the game.  So, imagine Dolly Parton invited you to her Super Bowl Party today.  I won’t ask for a show of hands, but if her party started during church, how many of you would be skipping church for that party?  Lucky for all y’all, we have confession and absolution in a few minutes, huh?

     I get it.  We’d all go.  Those who felt really guilty might even ask me if we could do church at her party.  As hostess, Dolly is planning quite the event.  There has to be enough food and drink.  People need to be seated at places in order to foment conversations.  There needs to be enough televisions.  And there needs to be diversions for those who do not like football but love parties.  Maybe she has a room with the puppy or kitten bowl on in there.  And maybe, because it is a pandemic and we think better of these things, she makes the party available online to those for whom a gathering would be a bit too dangerous.  Think of all the planning she has to do if just the 80 of us at the two services agree to show up.  Now, imagine the big day arrives, and we start giving Dolly lame excuses.  How mad and disappointed do you think she would be?  If we were hosting a smaller dinner party, how disappointed would we be?  We all understand emergencies, but these excuses are the very opposite of emergencies.  The host rightly interprets the rejections as being blown off.  He went to all the planning and expenses, and nobody can be bothered to come, after all of them first accepted his invitation.

      So, the man sends his slave into the lanes and streets of the town and instructs him to bring in the undesirables of life in civilization.  “Bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.”  The slave is obedient and does as he is instructed, but the dinner party was huge.  Even with all those undesirables present, there is space for more.  So the host sends the slave to go to the roads and lanes and compel people to come in to fill his house.  Then comes the horrible pronouncement: “For I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.”

     We can certainly understand the host’s anger, can we not?  If you have ever gone to the work of hosting a party and had people forget or blow you off, you may know this anger even better.  The problem for those whom Jesus is addressing is that they are treating God the very same way those invited to the feast in Jesus’ parable are treating the host.  At best, the man who makes the pronouncement is blind to God’s teaching on how faithful Jews are called to treat their fellow sons and daughters of Abraham.  At worst, he is kicking the can down the road and saying, in effect, “well, at least those undesirables who eat bread in the kingdom of God will be blessed.”  Jesus, who is invited to this party because He is a famous Teacher and a worker of signs, is being ignored, much like His Father in heaven.

     All that, of course, leads me back to both our own struggles with our responses to God’s gifts in our lives and His invitation and, just as importantly, our recognition of His heart and His desire that we invite everyone to His feast on His behalf.  It’s a lot, isn’t it?  I mean, if the wrong people start accepting His invitation, we might be perceived as one of them!  And what if, heaven forbid, they start coming to our church and our party?  What will the neighbors think?

     Thankfully, we Adventers have a wonderful manifestation of Christ’s love for the world in our midst.  At the beginning of this, I reminded us all that we celebrate the Feast of Charles Todd Quintard this Wednesday.  Quintard is famous in the liturgical church world for a number of reasons, but he is famous around here because he was the second rector of this parish.  He inherited a parish that had jettisoned pew rents because its members thought such rents excluded the poor.  If you have ever been mad about stewardship, you have your spiritual forebears at Advent to blame.  Before we and a couple of other churches burst on the scene in the early to mid-1800’s, churches rented pews to families to figure out their budgets.  The problem, of course, was that if you could not afford a pew, or all the pews were rented, you could not sit on a pew during the service.  Now you know why pew boxes look eerily similar to box seats at old baseball stadiums.  For my part, I sometimes wish we could go back to that system.  Can you imagine what I could charge for those pews in the back rows today?

     We laugh, but our reputation was already that we were a congregation that allowed “those people” to sit among them.  We were willing to go into the lanes and streets and invite those who normally would not be invited.  We added to that reputation by becoming the first parish to let our slaves join us in worship.  Again, just to remind us of the context, they lived in Nashville. . .  in the 1850’s.  Civil War was brewing.  Livelihoods were threatened.  And we crazy Adventers, led by then Rector Quintard and our Vestry, voted to let our slaves come to church with us.  To be clear, we are not talking about full integration in any sense of the word.  The slaves were expected to sit off by themselves among the other slaves.  And we declined to allow the slaves of slave owners who were not members to attend our church and sit with our slaves.  But, in the middle of 1850’s Nashville, there was a church that had blacks and whites worshipping together.  Imagine that scandal!  Now we were a church that allowed poor people and slaves to come worship God with us!  Talk about living the Gospel lesson we read today!

      Our reputation was that we were “Yankee Sympathizers,” lead by our known “Yankee Sympathizer,” Charles Todd Quintard.  Such was his reputation, and ours, that he was rejected by the 1^st Regiment when he applied to be surgeon and chaplain.  Just to remind those of us who know his story, Quintard was a medical doctor before he met Bishop Otey, who convinced him he was called by God to be a priest.  Quintard began serving a group of what you and I would call irregulars or mercenaries.  I thought of Mary-Clyde this week as I read that detail for the first time, they were called something like the Rock-City Warriors, so I laughed about the Rockhounds who meet here monthly.  That group was eventually merged into the 1^st Regiment, and they led the charge that Quintard still be their doctor and pastor.  Eventually, despite the mistrust of the officers, Quintard was given a commission serving as both surgeon and chaplain of the 1^st Regiment.  The rest is, as they say, history, but is a history worthy of several human beings rather than just one.

     After serving the 1^st Regiment, and POW’s, faithfully.  Then rector Quintard was elected the second bishop of Tennessee.  In part, because of his work with POW’s, northern bishops came to his consecration.  It was a momentous occasion for the country.  For the first and only time, the Episcopal Church appeared on page 3 of the New York Times.  The authors wrote that if the Episcopal Church, which had been seemingly torn asunder by the advent of war, could reconcile and come back together, maybe, just maybe, there was hope that our country could do the same.  Imagine, New York Times authors hoping the church, our church, could lead the country toward reconciliation and finding hope in our own!

     One of then Quintard’s ministries was appointed by the House of Bishops.  He was tasked with the effort to stem the flow of freed slaves into what would become the American Methodist-Episcopal Church.  Quintard’s reputation as a known “Yankee Sympathizer,” made him the man to lead that effort on behalf of our church in the South.  He began the process of planting what would become, and still are, cardinal black churches in Georgia, Mississippi, and Alabama.  In his discussions with those men (sorry, ladies, we did not ordain women in those days), he realized it was the very opposite of pastoral to force freed salves to train for ministry with the sons of their former masters.  Although these men were of great faith and full of forgiveness, and eventually ordained to the priesthood, forgetting was another matter.  So, Bishop Quintard commissioned the creation of the first seminary for freed slaves and their descendants on what we think of as the Fisk University campus.  Was it ideal?  No, Quintard lamented that in his writings.  Was it segregation?  Not in the sense our 21^st century ears hear the word.  The freed slaves had to have an experience apart from their former masters and their sons.  Quintard likened it to God’s work with Israel during the Exodus.  And it was his hope and expectation that, one day, those called to ordained ministry would be gathered back into one seminary flock, where the students would, as they always have, been drawn into true fellowship and collegiality by the Lord Jesus Christ.

     I see some expression of wow.  I intended to end with this part of Quintard’s life, but I think we could all do with a quick, but fuller, reminder.  Although all of that was enough in that day and age for us to consider Quintard a saint, it was not nearly the end of his work.  In his spare time, Quintard became vice-Chancellor of Sewanee and began the rebuilding process required after its destruction during the war.  Adventers provided the seed money for what would become the vice-Chancellor/bishopric on top of the Holy Mountain.

     Once his task on top of the mountain was completed, Quintard moved the bishopric to Memphis.  He invited a convent of nuns to move into his former residence.  You and I know those faithful ladies as “Constance and her Companions.”  In truth, many more Companions of Constance than her fellow sisters died in answer to Quintard’s requests.  When Yellow Fever broke out in Memphis, a former medical doctor turned overseer of the church was in residence.  We live in a pandemic and so likely understand all the anxieties that the people in Memphis felt during their plague far better now than we did three years ago.  But, Bishop Quintard mustered the church to minister to the community of Memphis.  Former Yankee soldiers, who knew Quintard from the war, answered his call for help and provided essential sacramental services, even though it cost some their lives.  Constance and her fellow sisters answered the call, though it cost most of them their lives.  Other Christians, whose names and work are known to God alone, answered the call.  Some responded by writing checks to support the work being done especially for the newly orphaned and newly widowed.  Others fervently prayed that God would protect His servants and ensure they glorified Him in their work and ministry.  And now you are reminded, or have learned for the first time, why we remember Bishop Quintard each February 16.

     We have been speaking for some weeks about the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and their exercise to the glory of God.  Adventers have wrestled with the Scriptures and with me over things like whether they even have them, whether their use has been faithful enough based on the results, and whether they really are one of those benefits of His passion, as we remind ourselves in one of our weekly Eucharistic prayers.  We have even wrestled a bit about whether we really are called to fight insurmountable evils in our communities or lives, knowing that we will likely fail “to make a meaningful difference” or “meaningful change.”  We have been having this conversation and teaching and wrestling in the midst of the season after the Epiphany, when we intentional remind ourselves that God manifested His grace in love in the face of Christ Jesus, our Lord and Savior, and that He promises to continue to manifest that same grace in us for the benefit of those around us.

     For us, we have an amazing example!  Each and every one of you who attend this church regularly know the challenges and rewards and everything associated with being an Adventer.  You ruefully laughed when we joked about the Vestry making good and bad decisions because you have been on Vestries that did the same thing.  You struggled between guffawing and getting rid of that spiritual wedgie when I remarked that the word “slave” could easily be replaced with “teenager” and capture the sentiments of the arguments in favor and in opposition to allowing them to worship.  Some of you cringed at the idea of trying to live in Nashville in the 1850’s and being known as, or a close associate of, “Yankee Sympathizers.”  You know these things because you are the inheritors of those decisions.  It is, to speak loosely, in all our spiritual DNA’s.  We understand that our Father calls all human beings to the Wedding Feast, and we ruefully understand that faithful witness to His calling on our lives means the world will not always esteem us or even respect us.  Yet we also understand that we are called to be obedient to the One who created us and called us to be His children, the same One who called us and empowered us to love others into His kingdom, especially those whom the world will not love.

     Unlike other parishes, though, you and I know the people who preceded us in this parish.  They were just like us.  They had glorious successes and terrible failures, but look what happened when they let God lead them in their lives!  If you read the excerpts of Quintard and our parish in A Cloud of Witnesses, or Lesser Feasts and Fasts, or Holy Women, Holy Men, you would think the Church esteems Quintard and Adventers for their work to rebuild Sewanee because of their commitment to an Episcopal education.  I mean, it was a good work.  Our spiritual ancestors at Advent made it possible.  But that is the wrong focus for our church and for ourselves.  I have only shared the barest summary today regarding their work.  Those of you in Bible studies and other groups know there is so much more to the stories.

     In the end, Quintard’s life, and the lives of those Adventers and others for whom he shepherded, taught, and cared, are determined not by their competence or excellence or supernatural morality.  The measure of their lives was determined by God, who blessed their faithful obedience in ways that exceeded anything they could have asked or accomplished on their own.  And those choices and God’s blessing served not only as a light in the mid -1800’s, but even to us.  You see, like that song we should always sing on All Saints’ Day, where we sing to God that we want to be one too, we know that God can take a normal Adventer and create an example for righteous living in the darkest of times.  That is not to say that our forebears were holy and perfect--far from it!  But they trusted that the One who was perfect, the One who loved them to His death, was the One who would see to it that they had everything they needed to glorify Him in their midst.  If He can do that for an Adventer then, we know He can do it for us!  If He was faithful in His promises to our spiritual ancestors, we know we can trust Him to be faithful to His promises to us!

     I would end the sermon there, as it is a great place to stop, but I remind us all of these stories today for a couple other purposes besides encouraging us.  Those of you who work with others who attend other Episcopal parishes may find yourself in the midst of passionate discussions over whether what Quintard did was worthy of inclusion in our canon of Episcopal saints.  If all we measured was his work at Sewanee, there is far less to defend him.  In a time where we are considering the appropriateness of certain saints, let us encourage folks to consider the contexts and all the accomplishments.  Should Adventers have allowed other slaves to worship with them?  Should they have intermingled with the slaves that came to worship?  Of course.  But place yourself in that time in that place, and look at the outcome of their decisions.  Do you think they or Quintard expected the work after the Civil War?  Do you think those Adventers in 1850 could have ever imagined their first steps would lead to a seminary to form freed slaves and their descendants for the priesthood in our Church?  Like all the saints in the Scriptures and in the wider canon, they were flawed human beings.  They were grasping at those things they saw dimly, but that they saw so much better than those around them in Nashville.  When they failed, like us, they repented, and asked God to guide them, lead them, and empower them.  In return, God asked for their faithful obedience, for them to go into the streets and lanes of Nashville and invite those they found to His feast, and they obeyed.  That faithful obedience cost them.  It was cross-bearing in ways you and I cannot understand with 21^st century eyes and hearts, but it was faithful.  And their faithful obedience blessed not just who sit here now claiming their mantle, but it blessed this city, it blessed a rebuilding section of the country, and it even blessed those in our state who would face an existential plague some years later.  And through it all, they trusted and bore their crosses, knowing they would be redeemed by the One who called them.  Few can argue that His love was not manifested in their obedience.

     The other reason I share the story is that some of you will be participating on Zoom in the various Liturgy Committee meetings for General Convention.  Among those discussions will be what figures should be included and what figures should be excluded.  In some places, there is a desire to waive all waiting periods.  In other places, there is a desire to judge past figures with modern sensibilities.  For some odd reason, people in our church think we are necessarily better and smarter than those who came before.  In one sense, I really could care less whether the effort to remove Quintard is successful.  He has gone to his reward, and I am certain he has not only won the crown of glory, but that pastoring Adventers earned him an extra gem or three!  But, it has always fallen to those local to the saints to be the ones who shared their stories, who memorialized their work, to teach the rest of the Church about their lives.  It therefore falls to us to remind the Church in which we minister of the work Quintard and Advent did in those days.  Might they ignore our stories and determine their opinions are more important than the facts?  Of course.  But, who knows what seeds will be planted, what faithful obediences will be encouraged, what glory to God will come from something so simple as sharing the life of our parish?  We, better than many parishes, can testify to God’s blessing on faithful obedience.  He blessed Advent in its effort to include the poor.  He blessed Advent in its effort to include slaves in worship.  He blesses Advent in its work to fight food insecurity.  He blesses Advent in its work to care for those struggling mental illnesses.  And, as He has always done, He will bless all who are faithfully obedient to His calls!

 

In Christ’s Peace,

Brian†

She was there because He is there . . . On the witness of our sister in Christ, Nancy Hitt Parrish

      On behalf of the family, I would like to thank all of you who attended the service in which we remind ourselves intentionally of the promises God has made to each of us who call upon the work and person of Jesus Christ.  I would also like to thank those folks who came to the visitation but skedaddled before the worship service began.  From a preacher’s perspective, those visitations can be invaluable.  We get to hear lots of stories about those who died.  Often the stories range from great humor to admiration, though I have found it also common to hear some stories that those deceased might not find flattering, were they able to speak up.

     I must confess that, although I am the rector of Adventer, I never had the pleasure of meeting Nancy.  She left about eighteen months before I arrived, heading south to Florida to avoid this wonderful winter weather we have in Nashville and to be closer to her daughter, Teresa.  When Scott called me about the funeral, I am guessing it seemed awkward, or at least, he expressed that it was.  For my part, I was really only worried about the answer to my question about the “family friend” being able to celebrate and preach Nancy’s funeral.  Scott did not know it, but we clergy get lots of inquiries about “internet” ordained friends doing services in our church.  Since many of you are Episcopalians, you likely understand it is not allowed in our church.  But, those conversations are usually with people who are inactive Christians, at best, and those who are looking for an appropriate setting for weddings and funerals.

     Imagine my surprise though, when Scott said it was Fr. Polk.  Episcopalians and Anglicans do not believe in Purgatory, and to be fair our Roman brothers and sisters no longer accept that doctrine either, but any woman who can remain a great family friend of Polk for decades has done an incredible work of supererogation.  Those of you wondering if you missed a great joke can ask those laughing after the service.  Polk served the diocese for many years and did great work in Murfreesboro, but we still like to tease our brother and sister clergy from time to time, especially when they are retired and rubbing it in on us active clergy!

     The reason Scott wanted Polk to bury Nancy, though, stemmed from that perceived awkwardness.  Polk knew her and her family very well.  It would make sense he would be a great pastor in this.  Unfortunately, though, we clergy are doing more and more funerals for people whom we never knew, as more and more people quit remembering the reason they were called to attend churches in the beginning.  Having heard a number of your stories, I wish I would have known her.  I am fairly certain we would have gotten along well.  In fact, I bet we would have gotten along better than that, as she seems to have been a woman who took her faith and her life seriously.  At heart, I am an evangelical.  I believe that we are taught and equipped to go forth into the world loving others into or inviting others into God’s kingdom.  I shared with Scott and Teresa at the burial of Nancy this morning that I thought I would be preaching on Psalm 121 this afternoon.  There was a bit of teasing about “you think?” I shared how I thought the sermon was of God, and your stories have only confirmed it for me.

     Now, before I get too far down this, I need to do two things.  First, the illustrations are from Nancy’s life.  Even though we mourn with the family over their loss, over the fact that the woman they knew and loved is no longer with them, their mourning is not without hope.  Nancy has been teaching her family, her friends, her patients, and probably more than a couple doctors with god-complexes about her faith for the vast majority of her life.  She has been preparing her children all their adult life for this horizon.  So, if I have done a decent job, I am simply putting to words the preaching and teaching she has done as she lived her life!

     The second thing is that I will be preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ from Psalm 121.  Seeing the confused looks, I will remind us all this afternoon that everything in Scripture is about Jesus.  Jesus Himself said it, and the Father’s Resurrection of Him that Easter Morning reminds us that He told the truth.  Everything in Scripture is about Jesus.  Everything.  The Gospels, the histories, the prophets, and even the Psalms are about Him.

     Now, unknown to Teresa and Scott, I had a built-in affinity for Psalm 121.  They did not know it, but my second daughter graduated from Hollins a couple years ago.  I am a stitcher, and my daughter had requested that I stitch her the Hollins seal for a framed office hanging.  None of you likely have ever heard of Hollins.  It is a small, all-female, liberal arts college not too far from Roanoke, VA.  Think Harpeth Hall, but on steroids.  The college was founded and nestled along the foothills of the Appalachians range, and the Blue Ridge Mountains more specifically.  And their motto, chosen in the 19th century is levavi oculus—Latin for “I lift my eyes.”  If you look in the back of our Psalter in the BCP, that is the title of the psalm!  Every time I have gone to drop off or pick up my daughter, four times a semester for eight semesters, I was confronted with that psalm in that setting.  Like Nancy, who may have only looked out the back windows of her house on Forest Acres, the very environment reminds me and you of the observations of faithful Hebrews.

     The psalm, as some of you may know, was part of the Psalms of Ascent.  In fact, when you go home, if you check your Bibles, and especially your annotated Bibles, you will learn or be reminded that faithful Israelites would say these Psalms of Ascent as they pilgrimaged from the bottom of the hill up the Holy Mountain to the Temple.  The psalms served an obvious function.  Imagine climbing the hill up Lakemont.  Most of us could do it, but few of us would enjoy it.  Add stifling heat or bitter cold or rain, and such climbs are just yucky.  But even in great weather, like we are experiencing today, the climb would not be a “walk in the park,” by any stretch of our imaginations.  The Psalms of Ascent helped distract climbers much in the same way we use music to distract ourselves during exercise or driving our cars or doing our work.  Just as our favorite tunes help us accomplish what we are doing, the psalms helped the faithful pilgrims climb the hill.

     Typical of God, of course, the psalms also served more than one purpose.  Not only did the psalms help faithful Israel climb the mountain physically and mentally, but they also reminded Israel of God’s faithfulness.  Through their singing, Israel pilgrims would remind themselves of God’s faithfulness to His Covenant people.

     Psalm 121 does this in both an overt way and in a more subtle way, at least to our modern musical and theological sensibilities.  The overt way, as only poets among us might see, depending upon the English translation, was the author’s use of anadiplosis.  Sounds like a medical word, doesn’t it?  Maybe a good rash on our bodies?  Maybe an immune response issue?  It certainly sounds like a word Nancy might have used when talking to other healthcare workers about patient care.  At its core, though, anadiplosis is a fancy way of describing stair-step poetry.  Anadiplosis is the name of the practice of ending a line of poetry and beginning the next line with the same old, or close synonym, in an effort to build to something.  Think of it as the lyrical working toward a crescendo.  Poets use the lines effectively to build to an important message or teaching.  As readers and hearers read or listen to the poem, they are elevated to the truth or teaching or emotion that the poet wants to explore.  I see some impressed looks of comprehension.  Yes, the psalmist wrote a psalm whose teaching elevated faithful pilgrims even as they physically climbed a hill to go to Temple.  Yes, now you know why we Christians believe all of Scripture to have been inspired by God.

     The conveyed truth of this psalm was the reminder that God would care for them, through all life’s joys and vicissitudes, in the very same way that He cared from Israel through its dangers, beginning with the Exodus, but including any number of other challenges to their existence, until the reigns of David and Solomon. More importantly, perhaps to the psalmist, God would be there in the midst of their trials and sufferings. In this psalm, in particular, the psalmist reminded Israel repeatedly of the Hebrew word shamar.  We translate shamar as “protect” or “watch” or “keep.”  Those of you looking at the psalm now may notice it is used three times in the last two verses.  To put it in the language of anadiplosis, the elevated understanding that the psalmist and God want readers and hearers to understand is that God shamars His people.  The psalm begins with the reminder of Creation and the shade and light of the Exodus and speaks specifically of battles.  But the final teaching of the psalm is that God watches over everything in His peoples’ lives, not just corporately, but individually.  He watches over our coming and going both now and ever more.

     God is so attentive to the needs of His people, God is so paying attention to what befalls us, God is such a loving Father to us, we should know that He is always paying attention to us, even when we think or hope He is otherwise distracted.  Those who knew Nancy and wonder where this wonderful God was when she died might rightly challenge us, or her, where He was in this last great challenge of life.  If God is so loving, so caring, so good, why did He let her die?  More perplexing would be the question of why she believed?  After all, she was a nurse.  She better than most understood the ravages of disease, the nearness of death, and the dysfunctions of families exacerbated by the stresses of dealing with disease and death.  Her love of this psalm convinces me that Nancy understood that God’s faithfulness in her past, and in the past of those who came before her, was that God would shamar her even in the face of death.  How could she be so confident?

     Nancy rightly understood that our Lord was a God of redemption.  So often, we think so much is up to us.  Our healthcare system likes to think and teach that a right procedure or right medicine or a right “lifestyle” change can postpone death.  But in those wars of life and death, Nancy realized the truth that life is truly a fragile gift.  Doctors and nurses can labor with all their expertise; no matter how hard they work and how much they know, however, death is ultimately unconquerable . . . for us.

     In our tradition, we remind ourselves that Jesus was not just a Savior but also the Teacher of how we should live, that His life provides for us a pattern for holy living, to quote the Collect.  Though He lived a sinless life and should have been recognized as the Anointed One of God by the various signs miracles that pointed to the fact He was the One predicted in the writings and teachings of the Prophets, and rabbis, and even the priests.  For His faithfulness, they put Him to death, even as the crowd, those whom He came to save, cheered them on.  Thankfully, in the midst of such defeat, God was not done.  He raised Jesus from the dead and gave Him authority over all.  Now, by virtue of our baptism, we have a share in both His death and Resurrection.  And so we remember that hope in the midst of such seeming finality.  The same God who raised Jesus from the dead has promised each and every one of us who proclaim Him Lord that we, too, will share in that Resurrection.  That promise, and God’s persistent faithfulness, gives us hope.  His promise and faithfulness through generations who came before us allowed us to stand at her grave and make our alleluias, trusting that God would keep His promise to her, that even death could not separate her from His love.

     How do I know Nancy share such hope and determined faith, even if I never met her?  The easy way is the stories that have been told.  Yes, family members and Adventers have shared some wonderful stories about Nancy, but it goes deeper even than that.  No doubt some of you will look around and notice that some who were sharing stories about Nancy, some of those who in their way mourn her loss as do we gathered here, are not with us for this Eucharist.  They, too, though, came to pay their respects.  In an age when people can post “I’m praying for you” at the losses of our loved ones, they showed up in the Parish Hall, told their stories, and asked their questions.  Their willingness to do in person something that the rest of the world does with scornful posts and tweets, tells us all something about her witness.

     As I was working on the Order of Worship last week, Scott and Teresa sent me a number of her favorite Scriptures and songs, as well as that lovely Nightingale liturgy.  In truth, I had not thought much about it since seminary.  For those of you unaware of her faith, Florence Nightingale was an Anglican.  Had she been living and worshipping in the United States, she would have come to an Episcopal Church like this one.  In our church, she is what we call a lesser saint or a holy woman.  She is not quite at the level where all Christians around the world celebrate her faith and witness as we do a Valentine next week or the life of one of the Apostles.  But we celebrate her in our church on August 12 each year, reminding ourselves of her mystical faith, and her willingness to live her faith in the world around her, bringing not just God’s kingdom to her profession or calling, but even to the wider world.  By all accounts, Florence had a mystical understanding, an unfailing certainty that God was there in the midst of everything she did to care for the patients entrusted to her care.  From learning new techniques or procedures to dealing with their extreme attitudes to everything in between, Florence was certain that God was there for the suffering.  She ministered and cared for her patients as if she truly believed and understood that she was caring for one created in the image of God.  Looking back at her radical behavior, we might see that she perceived herself to be caring for Jesus, or for someone created in His loving image.  Over time, she was recognized as “being there” for her patients, and we see that observation recognized in the litany read by Erin, herself a NICU nurse and, given her understandable difficulty getting through the litany, a nurse cut from the same cloth and faith as both Florence and Nancy.  As all nurses recognize, it is not the time spent in the career, but the difference that their presences, and the difference those presence made in each peculiar circumstance, that we and they remember when one of them dies.

     As beautiful as the tribute is—and we acknowledged some of the circumstances in our reply “she was there”—it pales in comparison to the truth that Nancy clearly understood, and the faith by which she lived her life as a mom, as a friend, as a colleague, and as a caregiver.  She was there, because she knew He was there.  In the midst of a patient’s suffering, He was there.  In the midst of trouble with teenage smart mouths and attitudes, He was there.  In the midst of watching her husband precede her in death, He was there.  In the midst of telling a doctor to do his job right, He was there.  In all her comings and goings in life, in all her life’s joys and sadness and madness, He was there.  And now, even as we, her brothers and sisters at Advent, her family, her friends, and even her colleagues lament her passing, He is here.  Better still, we give thanks that now she is there, with Him, her Saviour and her Redeemer, and that where they are, one day, we who proclaim Him Lord and trust in His promises like Nancy, may one day be!

 

In Christ’s Name,

Brian†

Did he just compare our evangelizing to Chuck Norris' hunting?

      Earlier this week, I found myself in the Family Room alone with Hannah.  I was flipping channels and came across a great 1980’s action flick called Delta Force.  I see some nods.  Yes, this is a Chuck Norris flick.  Of course, I had not seen a good roundhouse kick in some time, so I stopped on the movie to instruct Hannah on the virtues of Chuck Norris.  Hannah, for her part, has heard all the jokes.  She just does not have all the background of his movies or television show.

     Now, based on the age of many present today and some of the confused look on your faces, I am going to assume you do not know much about the cult of Chuck Norris jokes out there on the interwebs.  I was introduced to them more than a decade ago playing World of Warcraft.  Sometimes, a good Chuck Norris joke was required to join a raid.  Sometimes, people just told jokes in the cities and pubs.  It was a thing.  My personal favorite was: The last thing the boogeyman does before going to sleep is to check under his bed for Chuck Norris.  Ah, I see that’s a new one for some of you.  There were other good ones:  Chuck Norris makes onions cry.  Chuck Norris does not read books; he stares at them until they give him the information he needs.

     One of the more popular ones, though, was Chuck Norris only goes killing.  Hunting allows for the possibility of failure, and Chuck Norris never fails.  Good, everyone is mostly laughing but with a confused look on your face.  In the background, everyone is wondering what in the heck this has to do with spiritual gifts and our readings today.  Bear with me.  It might make sense later.

     Our story from Luke is fairly famous.  If you have ever travelled to the Holy Land, it is even more famous than we think.  I think folks from St. B’s told me after their last trip to the Holy Land that there were maybe 6 sites that claim to be the place where this event took place.  It sounds like anywhere along the coast there was a natural amphitheater, people decided to try and make some bucks off Christian tourists.

     Jesus is preaching and teaching, as He often is doing.  His preaching and teaching, we were reminded last week, were full of grace.  His hometown friends and neighbors were shocked by His eloquence and wisdom, even as strangers were drawn to Him.  Unsurprisingly, as he teaches and preaches, the crowd grows.

     If you have ever been in a crowd and tried to hear someone talking, you know the difficulty.  Add a kid or three, someone reaching into their pockets to unwrap candies, sneezes and coughs, and, well, y’all get the idea.  The more people present, the greater the distractions.  Naturally, everyone keeps pressing in on Jesus to hear Him better.

     Jesus spies the two boats and asks one of the fisherman, whom we learn is Simon Peter, to put out into the lake with Him in it.  Simon does as he is asked.  This gives Jesus a boundary from the crowd and allows them to hear Him better.

     Jesus preaches and teaches for some time.  When finished, He commands Simon to toss his net out in the deep water.  Simon, for his part, knows fishing.  Luke shares that the fishermen were out the night before and caught nothing.  Simon is humoring the Master, at this point.  He has zero expectation of catching anything, based on his lifelong experience fishing this lake and the recent experience of the prior night.

     Imagine his surprise, though, when his net is filled to near breaking!  Simon has so many fish, he calls to his partners to come and help get the fish out of the net and into the boat.  Peter has caught so many fish, Luke shares, that both boats nearly sink!

     Simon Peter recognizes that what has happened is miraculous.  He begs Jesus to go away, because he, Simon, is a sinful man.  Jesus, as we all just read, tells Simon not to be afraid and further instructs him that from now on He will be catching people.  For their part, Simon, James, and John all lay down their equipment, abandon their boats, and follow Jesus.  What has all this to do with gifts?

     One teaching I want us to notice is really counter-cultural to us living in a post-Christendom Protestant United States.  What do I mean by that?  We are too individualized for our own good, even those of us who claim to be active Christians.  Christians are called to live in community.  We gather as a group of people to encourage one another and be encouraged, to pray for one another and be prayed for, to instruct one another and be instructed, and to faithful obey God His effort to draw the world to Himself through us.  Think of our vows at Baptisms.  Our first vow, after the Creed, is the promise to continue in the fellowship of Christians.  Yet how often, how easily, do we fail to keep that vow?  I mean, in the grand scheme, it’s a pretty easy vow, right?  But sometimes it seems so hard to drag ourselves to church.  Ugh, I am tired.  Man, Brian is going to put me to sleep anyway, why not just stay in bed?  I can get through this on my own; I don’t need help.  Things are great; I don’t need God right now.

     For my part, and I get I am the “professional” Christian here, I have that conversation over and over and over with people in our community.  As long as I have the Bible, I have God.  I don’t need to go to church.  I don’t need to write checks to church or take Communion or pray with others to be a real Christian.  We get so myopic that we miss the point that God calls us into community.  We have talked more about that on Trinity Sunday, but you and I are called into right relationship with the Trinity through the work and person of the Son.  The Son restores us through His death, Resurrection, and Ascension; and the Holy Spirit empowers us to accomplish God’s will in our midst.  Even when people are called to a life of a prayerful hermit or hermitess, that vocation is acknowledged in community.  The Body affirms and commissions the called.

     This focus on individualism, though, affects every effort to evangelize.  How many of you, before this question, knew Jesus was telling Simon that Simon would be fishing for people?  It is not a statement found in Luke.  But what happens?  We hear that we will fish for people and we become like the great fishermen that we know in our lives.  We look to the weather, we look to the sky, we consider the fish we are trying to catch, and we consider the water in which we will fish.  Then we place a reflective lure in sunny weather or a red lure in murky waters or the tried and true worm and bobber and cast our rod.  Then we hope to catch a fish.  Most of us do it singly, hoping to catch fish one at a time.

     We think evangelism must work the same way, right?  If I have the winsome words; if I do the right service; if I have the answer to their questions; they will choose God.  Hopefully, many of us are vaccinated against that attitude thanks to last week’s reminder that Jesus was rejected by people, and He had all the knowledge and answers and the power to miraculously cure or provide or cast out.  If He can fail, what are our chances of guaranteed success?

     Notice, though, the two communities present in this story.  On the one hand, there is the crowd.  Jesus is teaching and preaching to a crowd of people who want to hear what He has to say.  He is not standing on a street corner condemning passerby’s.  Jesus is teaching about God and God’s love for all humanity.  It is almost like He is casting a net . . .

     The other group, of course, are the fishermen.  We know fishermen, so these men seem relatable to us.  They probably knew every inch of that lake.  They probably told tales about the big ones that got away.  We assume they drank some; they likely cussed.  You are laughing, but understand that when I talk about fishermen, you already have an image in your mind.  You know men and women like Simon and James and John, or you have seen them on Deadliest Catch, right?  And, yes, Jesus switches the bait, so to speak, but it is clear He is fishing among two distinct groups in this pericope, tossing a net to catch as many as possible for God.

     Think of our ministries around here, and the communities in which we fish for the glory of God.  We just served the homeless in our community last night.  Our community came together to fish in another community.  Sitting there you might say, well, I’m not like Dale or Larry or Betty or Anoosh or Gregg or Lynn or whoever.  You are correct.  Betty herds the cats.  Anoosh washes and prepares the bedding.  Gregg & Lynn cooked the pork butts.  But, do you contribute faithful to the parish and the work that God has given us to do?  Do you pledge or offer financial gifts?  Do you pray that the ministry will glorify God?  Do you tell your friends about it?  Then you are a part of that work.  You are part of the Body that we call Advent that is seeking to serve those without a roof over their heads and to remind them that God loves them dearly, even if the world seems to have forgotten them.  What about those who are food insecure in our midst?  It’s the same thing, but we add some strong backs for unloading on the third Thursday each month.  What about those in need of counseling for mental health but who lack the resources necessary to pay for what it is worth?  Again, through our support of Insight, which we all make possible, we are reaching into another community to honor God, to remind them we think mental health is as important to God as physical health.

     I see some looks of understanding now.  That’s right.  We are intentionally casting nets into communities we believe God is calling us to fish.  We are not in search of a single fish.  We are not looking for a lost lamb, those God goes after them to.  We are a community ministering to several communities in our midst.  And what does Jesus have to say about our faithful obedience to His calling on our community?  Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.  Like the Chuck Norris joke about killing, we have no chance at failure if we are obeying God.  Now, success from God’s perspective may not align with our own or that of the world, but that’s our problem.  We know that when we obey God faithfully, He accomplishes His purposes.  Heck, we know that when we disobey Him, He is going to accomplish His purposes without us; but He desires that we all choose obedience and remember repentance when we disobey.  But the glorious news is that we cannot fail.  He has called us to catch!

     One last lesson I want us to notice here in Luke’s lesson.  We are in the season of Epiphany, the manifestation of God in the work and person of Jesus Christ.  What is the sign that manifests to the fishermen that Jesus is of God?  Right, the full nets.  Place yourself in the crowd on the shore as you see this unfold.  Would you recognize the catch for what it is?  Or would you assume Simon saw a school and cast his net over it?

     Jesus gives the community of fishermen the very sign they need to identify Him.  It is incredibly specific.  They failed to catch anything the night before.  Now they have so many fish that their boats are sinking!  Against all their wisdom and experience, that cast of Simon should have been as worthless as all their casts throughout the night.  And yet  . . . Simon immediately recognizes he is in the presence of someone from God.  Simon has zero idea at this point that Jesus is the Anointed One of God, be he knows without a doubt Jesus is from God.  His address of Jesus changes from one of Master to Lord.  He bows at Jesus’ feet and begs Jesus to go away because he is a sinful man.  What does Jesus do?  He tells Simon not to fear and invites him to follow Him.  Such is the confirming sign, that the fishermen leave everything behind to follow Jesus.

     Adventers talk a good deal about our desire to see great miracles in our midst.  Some go so far as to tell me that the lack of big miracles hinders their ability to do God’s work in their lives.  The problem with “grand” miracles is that they are almost too big.  Certainly, they did not cause everyone to follow Jesus, as did the three fishermen in this story.  How many in the crowd turned to God when Jesus fed the 5000 men plus women and children?  How many in the crowds turned to God when Jesus called Lazarus out of the tomb?  Over and over the so-called big miracles do not seem to cause mass repentance and more determined faithfulness.

     Notice, though, the responses of those who benefit from the healing, the casting our, the unplugging of ears, or the cure in a synagogue.  How do the recipients often respond?  They often, not always, but often recognize the healings, the provisions, the miracles for what they are.  And they become those who catch the people in their respective communities. 

     Brothers and sisters, each of us have particular stories, particular experiences with God in our lives.  We are called into a community we call Advent to share those experiences, to test those experiences, to exhort and encourage others in the same situation to trust God, who is incredibly faithful to each and every one of us, and to take what we have heard, what we have learned, what we know of Him into the communities in which we work and play.

     So often, we think this process we call evangelizing is complex, that it requires a specific set of words or actions or who-knows-what to be successful.  Yet all it requires is faithful obedience on our part.  All we have to do is to listen to God, to attune ourselves to His nudges or guides or whispers, and then to act accordingly.  We are each involved in who knows how many communities out there, beyond these walls.  And it is our involvement in those communities that makes us fit ambassadors for His efforts to redeem them.  Yes, we might risk our reputations?  Yes, we might be perceived as not entirely fitting in.  But our job, as His sons and His daughters, is to draw others into the only Community that truly matters, the only Community that will exist long beyond our time in Nashville or even this world.  All He asks is that we cast the nets which He has provided each of us, into the communities in which He has placed us, and to fear not!  He is in the business of catching people into His saving embrace, and we know, thanks to how He caught each one of us, what a great catcher He is, and the amazing love we feel in that embrace!

 

In Christ’s Peace,

Brian†