THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT

Exodus 20:1-17

Psalm 19

I Corinthians 1:18-25

John 2:13-22

Prayer of the Day: Holy God, through your Son you have called us to live faithfully and act courageously. Keep us steadfast in your covenant of grace, and teach us the wisdom that comes only through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

 “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a market-place!” John 2:16.

Jack was one of the most faithful people I have ever known. He had a zeal for Jesus that was unmatched. I will never forget the day he came down to the church on the day of our rummage sale and expressed his outrage. “Junk for Jesus!” he nearly shouted. “If Jesus were here, he’d knock over these tables the way he cleared the temple.” Jack was not simply being a killjoy. He felt very strongly that the church should be supported by committed giving, not by hawking everyone’s cast off junk. He believed that sales of the kind we were holding discredited the church and compromised its witness.

I tend to agree with Jack in principle. If a congregation is going to hold bake sales, rummage sales or raffles, the proceeds should go toward some community service such as the local food bank or to some larger church ministry beyond the congregation. The congregation’s operating costs and ministries should be supported by congregational stewardship. Yes, membership is shrinking in our churches and placing a greater burden on fewer people. Still, in a middle class congregation of twenty-five members, a congregation can still be viable if each of its members value their church and its ministry as much as they do a cruise or a trip to Disney World with the grandkids.

All that being said, I don’t think that is the issue for Jesus in our gospel lesson for this Sunday. In order to appreciate what is happening, we need some context. The temple in Jerusalem would surely be one of the world’s architectural wonders if it were still standing. Jesus’ disciples, who were perhaps seeing the temple for the first time after following him to Jerusalem, could not help but admire it. But the relationship of First Century Jews to their temple was complex. The temple was built by none other than Herod the Great of Holy Innocents fame. Herod was installed by the occupying Romans as “the King of the Jews,” though he didn’t have a drop of Jewish blood in his veins. For this and other reasons, he was not greatly loved and that is putting it mildly. The temple was as much a monument to Herod’s outsized ego as anything else. Still, the temple was the successor to that built by Solomon in the Eighth Century B.C and rebuilt following the return of the Jews from exile in Babylon in the Fifth Century B.C. As such, it had a claim to legitimacy, regardless whose power and money built it. Moreover, the arrangement with Herod made it possible for the Jews enjoy a minimal degree of autonomy in comparison with other colonized peoples and freedom to practice their religion without having to deify the emperor.

Of course, Rome did not grant these privileges free of charge. It retained the right to appoint and depose the high priests of the Sadducean party who oversaw the temple’s operations. That left the priesthood little choice other than to collaborate with its Roman overlords. Naturally, Rome took a substantial cut from taxes levied by the Sadducees in support of the temple and profits made by the “money changers” who sold animals for sacrifice to pilgrims coming to worship in the holy city. The temple was therefore a valuable cash cow for both Rome and the priestly families though which the empire exercised its control. Whatever else the Temple might have been, it had become under the operation of the Sadducees an instrument of imperial exploitation. Thus, Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple was a stark political protest, a frontal attack upon the ruthless and oppressive regime crushing his people.

It is far too easy to vilify the Sadducees and their supporters for their collaboration with Rome and for being complicit in Jesus’ crucifixion under Pilate. Yet however much we might criticize them, the Sadducees found a way to navigate the demands of an occupying power while preserving their religion, culture and the most precious symbol of their faith. In so doing, they were forced to make compromises that I am sure they found distasteful. They were compelled to meet Rome’s demands for revenue which resulted in their “devouring widows’ houses,” but our capitalistic economy has done much the same on a far greater scale and for less noble reasons than preserving faith and culture.

Most of us have lived our lives in a culture that is highly protective of religion in general and Christianity in particular. The church in the United States enjoys substantial tax benefits and immunity from laws against discrimination governing all other entities. It seems to me, therefore, that our complicity in our nation’s sordid history of enslaving Africans, exterminating indigenous peoples and discriminating against people of color is all the more egregious. For generations, those of us serving as clergy have been called upon at civic events to sanctify a false and sanitized version of American history and give our blessing to its wars. We benefit from and are slow to take meaningful action against systemic injustice keeping millions in poverty. I think that Jesus probably has plenty of tables to overturn in our sanctuaries. Living as we do in a glass house, we ought to be careful about casting stones at the Sadducees.

Jesus does not give us what we want and expect from this gospel. But he gives us exactly what we need. We need for our comfortable existence to be shaken up, for the furniture to be rearranged, for the tables to be turned over and our comfortable coexistence with systemic injustice disrupted. This isn’t the “tender Jesus meek and mild” who simply loves us as we are. Yes, Jesus comes to meet us exactly where we are and accepts us in any condition. But he loves us too much to leave us there.

Here is a poem by Phil Ochs reflecting, I believe, the shocking and disturbing side of Jesus and the reaction he frequently elicits.  

The Crucifixion

And the night comes again to the circle studded sky.
The stars settle slowly, in loneliness they lie
‘Til the universe explodes as a falling star is raised.
Planets are paralyzed; the mountains are amazed
But they all glow brighter from the brilliance of the blaze
With the speed of insanity, then he dies.

In the green fields a-turning, a baby is born.
His cries crease the wind and mingle with the morn.
An assault upon the order, the changing of the guard.
Chosen for a challenge that is hopelessly hard.
And the only single sighing is the sighing of the stars
But to the silence of distance they are sworn

So dance dance dance
Teach us to be true.
Come dance dance dance
Cause we love you.

Images of innocence charge him to go on
But the decadence of destiny is looking for a pawn.
To a nightmare of knowledge he opens up the gate
A blinding revelation is laid upon his plate
That beneath the greatest love there is a hurricane of hate
And God help the critic of the dawn.

So he stands on the sea and he shouts to the shore
But the louder that he screams the longer he’s ignored.
For the wine of oblivion is drunk to the dregs;
The merchants of the masses almost have to be begged
‘Til the giant is aware that someone’s pulling at his leg
And someone is tapping at the door.

To dance dance dance
Teach us to be true.
Come dance dance dance
Cause we love you.

Then his message gathers meaning and it spreads across the land;
The rewarding of the fame is the falling of the man.
For ignorance is everywhere and people have their way.
Success is an enemy to the losers of the day.
In the shadows of the churches, who knows what they pray
And blood is the language of the band.

The Spanish bulls are beaten; the crowd is soon beguiled.
The matador is beautiful, a symphony of style.
The excitement is ecstatic, passion places bets;
Gracefully he bows to the ovations that he gets.
But the hands that are applauding him are slippery with sweat
And saliva is falling from their smiles.

So dance dance dance
Teach us to be true.
Come dance dance dance
Cause we love you.

Then this overflow of life is crushed into a lie;
The gentle soul is ripped apart and tossed into the fire.
It’s the death of beauty, the victory of night;
Truth becomes a tragedy limping from the light.
All the heavens are horrified, they stagger at the sight,
And the cross is trembling with desire.

They say they can’t believe it, it’s a sacrilegious shame.
Now, who would want to hurt such a hero of the game?
But you know I predicted it; I knew he had to fall.
How did it happen? I hope his suffering was small.
Tell me every detail, I’ve got to know it all
And do you have a picture of the pain?

So dance dance dance
Teach us to be true.
Come dance dance dance
Cause we love you.

Time takes a toll and the memory fades,
But his glory is growing in the magic that he made.
Reality is ruined; there’s nothing more to fear;
The drama is distorted into what they want to hear.
Swimming in their sorrow, in the twisting of a tear
As they wait for the new thrill parade.

The eyes of the rebel have been branded by the blind.
To the safety of sterility the threat has been refined.
The child was created; to the slaughterhouse he’s led;
So good to be alive when the eulogy is read.
The climax of emotion, the worship of the dead
As the cycle of sacrifice unwinds.

So dance dance dance
Teach us to be true.
Come dance dance dance
Cause we love you.

And the night comes again to the circle studded sky.
The stars settle slowly, in loneliness they lie;
‘Til the universe expodes as a falling star is raised.
Planets are paralyzed, mountains are amazed.
But they all glow brighter from the brilliance of the blaze
With the speed of insanity, then he dies

Phil Ochs (1940-1976) was born in El Paso, Texas. He was a folk singer/songwriter and contemporary of Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie. He wrote hundreds of songs in the 1960s and 1970s and released eight albums. He performed at numerous anti-Vietnam War, civil rights and organized labor rallies. Ochs’s mental health deteriorated in the 1970s owing to what is now known as bipolar disorder and alcoholism. Tragically, he took his own life in 1976. You can find out more about Phil Ochs and his music at this website. If you would like to listen to the above song as performed by Phil Ochs, click here.

   

Kierkegaard’s Ghost

(News that’s fake, but credible)

The Ghost is pleased to offer this editorial opinion by its staff investigative reporter and commentator, Phucker Sharlitan.

Many so called conservative Republicans and pretend evangelical Christians are applauding the Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling that frozen embryos are persons under state law. For my part, I will acknowledge that this decision is a step forward. But it does not go near far enough. Human life will never be fully protected until we recognize each individual sperm as a unique human person. I want to emphasize that my view, not the court’s, is fully supported by the Holy Bible. The learned Alabama Justice cites in his opinion the first chapter of the prophet Jeremiah to the effect that “Before I [God] formed you in the womb I knew you.” The operative term here is “before.” Where was Jeremiah before he was in his mother’s womb? Clearly, he existed at that point as a single sperm that would one day be implanted in the body of his mother. I would also point out that in the Book of Hebrews the writer notes that the Israelite, Levi, was in the loins of his great grandfather Abraham two generations before he was born. That being the case, what else can we conclude but that the sperm is a complete human person in the image of its Maker?

My critics are greatly mistaken in their belief that human life begins at conception and that living beings prior thereto are expendable. God obviously takes a different view. The Lord went so far as to strike dead Onan, son of Judah because, rather than impregnating his wife, he “spilt his seed on the ground.” The implication is clear: human sperm have a right to implantation in a womb. The wonton killing of sperm by use of contraceptive devices or noncoital sex is no less than homicide. Masturbation is mass murder.

Given these unambiguous scriptures and indisputable facts, it is obvious to me that legislation seeking to regulate woman’s wombs is too little and too late. What we need is legislation strictly regulating men’s penises. I am sure that my male colleagues will protest that their bodies are their own and the government has no right to regulate them. But their bodies are not their own. Their bodies are vessels of precious human lives which we, as a Christian nation built on biblical values, are duty bound to protect. They will complain that such legislation will invade their privacy and involve the actions of government in their most intimate of relationships. Perhaps, but that is a small price to pay for protecting millions of human lives from indiscriminate slaughter. Thus, while I applaud the justices of Alabama’s supreme court for expanding the definition of human personhood to embryos, I would urge them, along with all jurists, legislators and voters, to go further and protect human life in its totality.

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FAKE NEWS ALERT: The above article is satirical. The events it describes didn’t happen.  “There are people who will say that this whole account is a lie, but a thing isn’t necessarily a lie even if it didn’t necessarily happen.” John Steinbeck

 

SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT

Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16

Psalm 22:23-31

Romans 4:13-25

Mark 8:31-38

Prayer of the Day: O God, by the passion of your blessed Son you made an instrument of shameful death to be for us the means of life. Grant us so to glory in the cross of Christ that we may gladly suffer shame and loss for the sake of your Son, Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“…the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” Mark 8:31.

This week it was announced that Alexey Navalny, the Russian opposition leader died in a soviet style prison colony under highly suspicious circumstances. It did not have to end that way. Navalny was well known globally. He had a strong support base in his own country and powerful friends abroad. He could have remained in western Europe. He could have continued his opposition to the bloody reign of Vladamir Putin from the safety of exile, employing social media, lobbying world leaders for support and encouraging his supporters within Russia. I have no doubt that his friends, family and supporters urged him to do just that. Putin has proved repeatedly that he has no qualms about murdering anyone he deems a threat to his regime. Two nearly successful assassination attempts had been made against Navalny by the Russian government. Nevertheless, Navalny was not content to carry on his struggle from a safe distance. He chose to return to his homeland, knowing well the danger he faced. He chose to confront the powerful systemic evil in his country head on.  

“Why,” I can hear his friends asking. “Why do you want to throw your life away? We need you alive, not dead.” I am sure Saint Peter made much the same arguments in his rebuke of Jesus following Jesus’ declaration that he was destined to undergo great suffering, rejection and death. I am sure Peter pointed out to Jesus that he was walking into a trap, that he was playing into the hands of his enemies, that no matter how much popular support he might have, his movement was no match for the raw power of Rome and the religious establishment in Jerusalem facilitating it. “Stay here in Galilee, Jesus. Be the gadfly in the wilderness. Foment opposition from afar and wait to enter Jerusalem until the time is right.”

All of this sounds entirely reasonable. And it is, in terms of human survival instinct. But human survival instinct is not an ally of God’s reign. The life God desires for us is so much more than mere survival. The shape of that life is spelled out in the Sermon on the Mount. As I have said before repeatedly, the Sermon is not a set of ideals unattainable in the real world and meant only to convince us of our sin and our need of God’s forgiveness. To the contrary, the Sermon is a blueprint for the life of Jesus as it unfolded in the gospel. Jesus lived the reign of God he preached in the real world and he graciously invites his disciples to participate in that abundant and eternal life. Jesus had no illusions about what living under God’s reign means in a world hostile to it. He understood that the life of humility, peacemaking, pursuing justice and practicing radical generosity would lead to persecution. But he also knew, and would have his disciples know, that the reign of God is well worth surrendering all the rights and privileges the world has to offer. Indeed, God’s reign is more precious than life itself.

It might sound counterintuitive that one should gain one’s life by losing it. But that is the logic of the cross. One who seeks to preserve life at all costs wastes it. The notion that life can be preserved is a delusion. We all know that life is finite and will end one way or another. The obsession with preserving life, extending it and fleeing the shadow of death at every turn only robs it of its sweetness. The fear of death prevents one from focusing on what matters, from spending life’s precious moments on those things that are important. The choice is not between living or dying. The choice is between pouring out one’s one life loving God, loving one’s neighbor and being formed into a creature capable of living under God’s gentle reign, or having one’s life pried out one’s futile grasp without ever having learned what it was for. To put it in the words of Martin Luther King, Jr., “If a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.”

For Jesus, the reign of God was more real than the tyrannical reign of the Roman empire. Only God knows how much Jesus knew about the particulars of what awaited him in Jerusalem. Suffice to say, he knew enough to understand that his confrontation with the empire there would likely, perhaps certainly, lead to his death. Yet he went to Jerusalem anyway. He went because his dying at the hands of his enemies was the only way to prove the extent of God’s passionate love for the world. He went because he needed to demonstrate the ultimate futility of tyranny, violence and terror. He went to show the world that death, the most powerful weapon of evil, cannot kill what is true, beautiful and good.

Rome surely did not believe that Jesus had been raised from death. But it knew his disciples believed that he had. Rome understood that the church, the congregations of Jesus’ disciples, had lost their fear of death. That is because Jesus took the cross, Rome’s most powerful symbol of imperial terror, and turned it into a sign of victory, driving it like a hollywood stake into the heart of the imperial vampire. Like every other kingdom, empire and modern nation state, Rome’s control over its subjects depended upon its power to inflict death. Rome knew well how to deal with hostile armies. It knew how to punish dissidents and crush violent insurrections. But its powerful military machine was impotent before a people who feared neither death nor persecution. It was now becoming clear to all the world that the people who worshiped Jesus as Lord would never recognize Ceasar as lord-even when threatened with death. And there wasn’t a damn thing Ceasar could do about it.

I have not seen much in the way of persecution for expressing my faith.[1] I have certainly never been threatened with bodily injury, imprisonment or death. I would like to believe that is because I live in a country that respects religious freedom. But I think folks like Martin Luther King, Jr., Father Daniel Barrigan, Clarance Jordan, Rep. John Lewis-all of whom encountered violence and/or threats of violence for their faithful witness to God’s reign proclaimed in Jesus Christ, might beg to differ. They know that praying for God’s will to be done on earth as in heaven means, as Luther’s Small Catechism reminds us, praying that it be done among us. It is a prayer that God might make our lives instruments of justice, reconciliation and peace in the shadow of oppressive empires and nation states trading only in the coin of violence. If we are not experiencing the weight of Christ’s cross on our shoulders, could it be because, like Peter, we are hell bent on avoiding it?

I believe that disciples of Jesus know the joy of living only after they learn that living is more than just survival. I believe ministry becomes an exciting task rather than a burden when ministers are inspired by faith in Jesus and the promise of God’s reign rather than driven by fear arising from all the uncertainties we face personally and professionally. I believe that renewal comes to the church when it ceases to fret about the viability of its institutions and its long term sustainability and turns its attention to opportunities in the present moment for witness in word and action to Jesus and the reign of God he proclaims. I believe fear is extinguished when we become convinced that the world’s worst day is behind it, namely, the day it killed the most precious gift God had to give-and instead of retaliating, God raised up this rejected gift and offered it to us again. The truth cannot be silenced by killing its messengers, banning their books, kicking them off social media and attempting to erase their names and faces from the public square. Alexey Navalny understood this. How much more so should disciples of the one called the Way, the Truth and the Life.

Here is a poem by Nikki Giovanni about some people who lived by faith and not by fear.

Rosa Parks

This is for the Pullman Porters who organized when people said
they couldn’t. And carried the Pittsburgh Courier and the Chicago
Defender to the Black Americans in the South so they would
know they were not alone. This is for the Pullman Porters who
helped Thurgood Marshall go south and come back north to fight
the fight that resulted in Brown v. Board of Education because
even though Kansas is west and even though Topeka is the birth-place of Gwendolyn Brooks, who wrote the powerful “The
Chicago Defender Sends a Man to Little Rock,” it was the
Pullman Porters who whispered to the traveling men both
the Blues Men and the “Race” Men so that they both would
know what was going on. This is for the Pullman Porters who
smiled as if they were happy and laughed like they were tickled
when some folks were around and who silently rejoiced in 1954
when the Supreme Court announced its 9—0 decision that “sepa-
rate is inherently unequal.” This is for the Pullman Porters who
smiled and welcomed a fourteen-year-old boy onto their train in
1955. They noticed his slight limp that he tried to disguise with a
doo-wop walk; they noticed his stutter and probably understood
why his mother wanted him out of Chicago during the summer
when school was out. Fourteen-year-old Black boys with limps
and stutters are apt to try to prove themselves in dangerous ways
when mothers aren’t around to look after them. So this is for the
Pullman Porters who looked over that fourteen-year-old while
the train rolled the reverse of the Blues Highway from Chicago to
St. Louis to Memphis to Mississippi. This is for the men who kept
him safe; and if Emmett Till had been able to stay on a train all
summer he would have maybe grown a bit of a paunch, certainly
lost his hair, probably have worn bifocals and bounced his grand-
children on his knee telling them about his summer riding the
rails. But he had to get off the train. And ended up in Money,
Mississippi. And was horribly, brutally, inexcusably, and unac-
ceptably murdered. This is for the Pullman Porters who, when the
sheriff was trying to get the body secretly buried, got Emmett’s
body on the northbound train, got his body home to Chicago,
where his mother said: I want the world to see what they did
to my boy. And this is for all the mothers who cried. And this is
for all the people who said Never Again. And this is about Rosa
Parks whose feet were not so tired, it had been, after all, an ordi-
nary day, until the bus driver gave her the opportunity to make
history. This is about Mrs. Rosa Parks from Tuskegee, Alabama,
who was also the field secretary of the NAACP. This is about the
moment Rosa Parks shouldered her cross, put her worldly goods
aside, was willing to sacrifice her life, so that that young man in
Money, Mississippi, who had been so well protected by the
Pullman Porters, would not have died in vain. When Mrs. Parks
said “NO” a passionate movement was begun. No longer would
there be a reliance on the law; there was a higher law. When Mrs.
Parks brought that light of hers to expose the evil of the system,
the sun came and rested on her shoulders bringing the heat and
the light of truth. Others would follow Mrs. Parks. Four young
men in Greensboro, North Carolina, would also say No. Great
voices would be raised singing the praises of God and exhorting
us “to forgive those who trespass against us.” But it was the
Pullman Porters who safely got Emmett to his granduncle and it
was Mrs. Rosa Parks who could not stand that death. And in not
being able to stand it. She sat back down.

Source: Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea (c. 2002 by Nikki  Giovanni, pub. by HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. 2002) Nikki Giovanni is one of the best-known African-American poets who reached prominence during the late 1960s and early 1970s. She was born 1943 in Knoxville, Kentucky and attended Fisk University, a prestigious, all-black college in Nashville, Tennessee from which she graduated in 1968. From there she went on to attend graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University in New York. Giovanni authored several volumes of poetry for children and adults. She is the recipient of multiple NAACP Image Awards, the Langston Hughes Award for Distinguished Contributions to Arts and Letters, the Rosa Parks Women of Courage Award and over twenty honorary degrees from colleges and universities around the country. You can read more about Nikki Giovanni and sample more of her poetry at the Poetry Foundation website.

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[1] Of course, as a pastor I have experienced opposition, some loyal, well meaning and often constructive. Some not so much. I have experienced bullying, threats by members to leave the congregation or withhold their financial support and factious groups annoyed with me because of things I said in my preaching and teaching. But I don’t equate this sort of thing with persecution. It goes with the territory of shepherding a church which is and always has been the work of urging a less than perfect community to live into the Body of Christ that it truly is.

FIRST SUNDAY IN LENT

Genesis 9:8-17

Psalm 25:1-10

1 Peter 3:18-22

Mark 1:9-15

Prayer of the Day: Holy God, heavenly Father, in the waters of the flood you saved the chosen, and in the wilderness of temptation you protected your Son from sin. Renew us in the gift of baptism. May your holy angels be with us, that the wicked foe may have no power over us, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.” Mark 1:12-13.

Mark’s account of Jesus’ temptations is brief, terse and short on detail. Still wet from the baptismal waters of the Jorden, Jesus is driven into the wilderness. To what end? Mark doesn’t tell us. We know only that he was “among the wild beasts,” “tempted by Satan” and “ministered” to by angels. But want was the Spirit’s purpose? What was the nature of the temptations Jesus faced? And what about the wild beasts-the one detail Mark gives us that is not found in the parallel accounts of Matthew and Luke? It is tempting to fill in these lacunae with information from the other gospels. But, this being Lent, we ought to be on the lookout for temptations of all kinds-including laziness of intellect. I believe the better course is to sit with Mark’s gospel as the Evangelist gives it to us and apply our imagination to the questions it raises and pray for the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Temptation is a subtle creature. Seldom am I confronted with stark choices between good and evil. The most difficult decisions I have had to make in life are between one good and another. The demands and responsibilities of my job pull me in one direction while the needs and requirements of my family draw me in another. I have always considered the financial support of my church a priority-but so was saving money to provide a college education for my children. The most bitter church dispute I have ever witnessed grew out of a substantial undesignated bequest to the congregation. Some felt that the money should be used to make the century old sanctuary accessible for persons with mobility issues. Others felt that it should be used to open a drop in center for homeless teens. Those favoring the drop in center accused those supporting renovation of being selfishly fixated on the building instead of focused on mission. Those wishing to renovate the sanctuary insisted that the drop in supporters were excluding the most vulnerable members of the church from worship by failing to take the opportunity to make it fully accessible. Both proposed uses of the bequest were reasonable, compassionate and well intended. They were both good. But discernment requires ascertaining the highest good. Perhaps temptation can actually help us here. Rather than simply resisting temptation, maybe we need to listen carefully to the numerous desires calling us and reflect on how each of them might help or hinder us in loving God and our neighbor.

Saint Augustine of Hippo, one of the church’s greatest theologians, teaches us that what we call “sin” is not a matter of breaking rules. It is basically a matter of disordered desires. We were created to love God with all the heart, with all the mind and with all the strength. Thus, we are most genuinely human when God is the primary focus of our love and devotion. That does not mean that we are to love our families, friends or homes any less. To the contrary, love for God liberates and enables us to love them rightly and well. Problems arise when we begin to love things, people and God in the wrong order. The greatest temptations we face entice us to love people, pursue noble goals and strive for honorable positions with zeal, devotion and dedication to which only God is entitled.

There is nothing wrong with loving one’s spouse and children-unless that love becomes possessive, controlling and smothering, which is likely to happen when one looks to one’s family for the deepest love that only God can provide. There is nothing wrong with loving one’s country. But when loyalty to one’s country is elevated over faithfulness to God and love for our neighbor-wherever in the world that neighbor might be- patriotism degenerates into idolatrous nationalism. There is nothing wrong with desiring to serve Christ as his faithful minister, unless one’s ministry becomes a means for satisfying one’s own needs for recognition, importance and self worth. When love is disordered, it can become toxic, hurtful and destructive. The wilderness is a good place to go in order to sort out one’s many “loves.” It was the place to which Jesus went to figure out what it might mean to be God’s beloved and how he was to live as God’s Son in the world.

I get that. I spend a lot of time these days in the wilderness. As with walking on the beach, an hour in the woods is worth a month of therapy. It is the place I go when I need to re-order my loves. In the forest, surrounded by trees that sprouted before I was born and will likely be growing still when I am gone, it is hard to escape the reality that I am dust and to dust I will return. Coming upon centuries old stone fences in the midst of the woods that once demarcated the boundaries of someone’s farm, I am reminded how fleeting are the works of human beings on the land and the land’s remarkable ability to heal itself and erase the scars we inflict upon it. Those same stones hauled from some distance to build makeshift walls were formed before the dawn of humanity and sometimes bear the marks made by indigenous peoples sharpening their tools. If they could speak, I can only imagine the stories they could tell. I do not know how much Jesus knew or did not know about the particulars of his messianic destiny. But I am sure he came away from the wilderness knowing that, after pouring out his brief life in love for God’s world, he would be committing it back into the hands of the One from whom it came.

And then there are the beasts. I don’t know which animals Jesus encountered. The woods in which I walk these days are not home to any animals dangerous to human beings. I meet only coyotes, racoons, foxes and deer-the usual suspects. The only beast that strikes terror into my heart is the deer tick, bearer of lyme disease and other nasty ailments. Yet even dangerous animals, deer tick or grizzly, bear us no malice.  They seek only to live and take only what they need to that end. They do not strip forests, pollute rivers or foul the air, wasting the earth in an insatiable lust for more. They do not seek to dominate anyone or anything outside of their territory. I can see in their balanced existence within the biosphere echoes of Jesus’ sermon about the birds of the air and the lilies of the field. The wilderness is a parable of childlike trust in the Creator.

Every year as the season of Lent approaches, I can count on someone asking me what I plan to “give up” for Lent. In recent years, it has become fashionable to “take up” rather than give up something for Lent. That might be a spiritual discipline like reading a psalm per day, or spending an hour volunteering at a food pantry or forming a healthy habit such as a daily walk. I have nothing but praise for anyone taking up any of these things. There is certainly something to be said for the discipline of abstinence as well. Nevertheless, I have always been leery of both giving up and taking up things for Lent. To me it smacks too much of what Luther would call “works of the law.” They are promises we make to ourselves that bind rather than liberate. Like New Year’s resolutions, these Lenten commitments too often set us up for failure and guilt. Lent is not about being “guilted” into becoming a better person. It is about making space in your life for the Holy Spirit to form in you the mind of Christ.

With all of this in mind, I would like to suggest that, for this Lenten season, you make it a point to spend some time each week in the wilderness. Of course, I know that I am privileged in that respect, living as I do on the edge of the forest in the Cape Cod National Sea Shore. But even when I lived in the urban landscape of northern New Jersey there was wilderness to be found. There were wildlife sanctuaries, parks and wooded “green spaces” where wild things were given free reign. Spend an hour under an ancient tree, listen to the chatter of sparrows and the raucous screams of crows, run your hand over the soft, green moss and enjoy the scent of decayed leaves. Let these ministering angels school you in what is true, beautiful and good. No doubt the devil will attempt to distract you, reminding you of everything else that you should be doing and what you might be missing by disconnecting from your computer or cell phone. Do not give in to the temptation of rushing through your time in the wilderness. Be still, listen and allow what matters, what is genuinely important and the One who alone is worthy of your deepest devotion to come bubbling up to the surface.

Here is a poem by Wendell Berry about finding an island of wilderness in the shadow of urban wasteland. His reflections might very well have been those of Jesus during his time in the wilderness. I believe our gospel lesson invites us to find Jesus in the wilderness where our loves will be re-ordered.

The Wild

Source: The Peace of Wild Things, (c. 1964 by Wendell Berry; pub. by Penguin Random House 2018). Wendell Berry (b. 1934) is a poet, novelist, farmer and environmental activist. He is an elected member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, a recipient of The National Humanities Medal and the Jefferson Lecturer for 2012. He is also a 2013 Fellow of The American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Berry was named the recipient of the 2013 Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award. On January 28, 2015, he became the first living writer to be inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame. You can read more about Wendell Berry and sample more of his works at the Poetry Foundation website.

TRANSFIGURATION OF OUR LORD

2 Kings 2:1-12

Psalm 50:1-6

2 Corinthians 4:3-6

Mark 9:2-9

Prayer of the Day: Almighty God, the resplendent light of your truth shines from the mountaintop into our hearts. Transfigure us by your beloved Son, and illumine the world with your image, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“And [Jesus] was transfigured before [his disciples], and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them. And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus.” Mark 9:2-3.

As I enter upon my sixty-nineth year, it is beginning to dawn on me at last that the time I have left and the bodily vitality remaining to me are insufficient to do all I imagined doing with my life. There are books I will not get around to reading, places I hoped to visit/revisit that I will never see, friends with whom I have been meaning to get together but won’t, skills I meant to acquire at some point that will never be mine-and the list goes on. But I am happy to say that I have been able to pursue at least one activity on my rapidly diminishing bucket list, that being photography. When Sesle and I retired and move up to the Cape, I decided it was finally time to follow this one desire of my heart. So, I purchased a Panasonic Lumix and the rest, as they say, is history.  

I have been interested in photography since the age of eleven when I inherited my older brother’s Kodak Brownie box camera. It was a big black box with a primitive view finder, single lens and a leather holding strap on top. It took grainy, black and white photos using bulky rolls of film. It had no flash attachments and so most of my pictures were taken outdoors. I did not take many pictures back then. Film was expensive and getting my shots developed even more so. On my allowance, photography was simply not a sustainable hobby; thus, I soon lost interest. Though I upgraded to a Kodak instamatic that I used throughout the 70s and early 80s, my picture taking was sporadic and infrequent. Film, flashcubes and the cost of developing photographs were still deterrents.

Shortly after my first daughter was born, Sesle and I invested in a high end Minolta complete with an adjustable flash attachment and telescopic lens. It was as far removed from the Brownie as was the space shuttle from the Wright brother’s first airplane. With it we were able to document our family’s growth through events like baptisms, confirmations, birthdays, vacations and instances when I felt inspired to capture endearing moments in our lives. The price of film and the cost of developing it was still a limiting factor. But by this time, we were both working and felt that the preservation of our most precious memories and the images of our children throughout their years with us was well worth the cost.

I faithfully preserved the photos we took in albums, numbering in the double digits, which are now sitting in our attic. I take a volume down to the coffee table every now and then. I find that pictures are a little like icons. They are portholes into our past-and only portholes. They do not tell the whole story of our family. Photo albums never do. How many families take pictures of their two year old having a tantrum? How many parents have pictures of their surly teenagers being surly? How many couples photographically document their fierce marital spats? Like a porthole through which you can view only a limited amount of the horizon, a photo gives you only as much as the camera can take in and whatever the photographer wishes for you to see, all compressed within a couple seconds. The space outside the reach of the lens, the ages before and the years to follow are not included in this one dimensional slice of life.

A photograph is a brief instant in the vast ocean of eternity that the photographer deems worthy of preservation. What is preserved can tell you a lot about what the photographer deems true, beautiful and good. It might be the carefree play of children at sunset on the beach. It might be a butterfly settling on a golden blossom, an osprey breaking into flight or just a mosaic of smooth stones spewed onto the sands by the ocean waves. These fragments of time, preserved like insects in amber, have a story to tell. They challenge us to apply our imaginations in order to hear what they have to say.

I think the gospels are rather like photo albums. They are not histories-nor were they intended to be. We can best understand the gospels as albums of preaching, stories and parables by and about Jesus woven together into a narrative illustrative of his faithful life, obedient death and glorious resurrection. They do not tell the whole story. As the closing remarks in John’s gospel remind us, if all that Jesus said and did were written down, “the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” John 21:25. But what is written has been preserved “so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.” John 20:31.

That brings me, at long last, to this week’s Transfiguration story from Mark’s gospel. Mark is deemed by most scholars to be the first gospel composed and the one upon which Matthew and Luke relied in composing their own gospels. The prevailing opinion, with which I agree, is that Mark’s gospel ends at the eighth verse of the sixteenth chapter, where we read that the women who came to the tomb on Easter Sunday find it empty. A young man dressed in white informs them that Jesus has risen and is going before them to Galilee. The women then flee from the empty tomb in terror and say nothing to anyone about what they have seen and heard. There is, therefore, no encounter with the resurrected Christ in Mark’s gospel.

Or maybe there is. The renowned New Testament scholar, Rudolf Bultmann, is convinced that the Transfiguration story is an ancient resurrection account transposed in the gospel for literary reasons. Bultmann, Rudolf, History of the Synoptic Tradition, (c. 1963 by Basil Blackwell, pub. 1976 by Harper & Row) p. 259. However that might be, there is no denying the story has a resurrection glow to it. We are told that Moses, Elijah and Jesus appear “in glory.” In some manner beyond our capacity to comprehend, eternity is impinging on time, bending it into a single point where the beginning is fused with the end, the promise meets fulfilment and the line of demarcation between life and death dissolves. We get a foretaste of the Resurrection and a fleeting glance at what it means for God to be “all in all.” I Corinthians 15:28.

This is what Hollywood would call a “spoiler.” The Transfiguration of Jesus betrays the climactic end of creation’s story in the middle of the narrative. It is as though Mark had taken a photo from the end of history’s album and stuck it smack dab in the middle. A photograph misplaced within an album is disorientating. It disrupts the orderly flow of chronological time by projecting an instant from the future into the settled past.[1] Of course, the Resurrection is nothing if not disorienting and disruptive. It compels us to re-evaluate our understanding of the past, shatters our expectations for the future and opens our eyes to new possibilities for our present day lives.  

If my reading is correct, Mark is turning our observance of Lent, Holy Week and Easter on its head. He is placing the Resurrection before the cross. Maybe that is where it belongs. After all, that is where we are all living. The guns of war, the ravages of climate change, the rise of fascism and the daily occurrence of gun violence in our communities remind us that we live in a creation that is, as Paul would say, “groaning in labor pains.” Romans 8:22. Those of us on the far side of sixty cannot help but know that “our outer nature is wasting away.” But the story of the Transfiguration, this snapshot from the future, reminds us that such pains as creation is enduring are indeed “labor pains,” not death throws. So, too, we take comfort in Paul’s assurance that, even as our “outer nature” is wasting away, we are nonetheless being transformed into something altogether new. II Corinthians 4:16. We who follow the messiah who poured out his life in love for the world are on the right side of history. We who are called to bear Christ’s cross are destined to share in Christ’s resurrection life. In this case, the camera doesn’t lie.

Here is a poem about the iconic power of pictures to invoke memories.

Taking Pictures

Two swings hang from the arms of the old oak,

perpendicular to the ground,

motionless unless by chance a breeze should come

to shatter the stillness

and cause them to sway

be it ever so slightly.

Yet another reminder, these,

that you are gone, though only for a little while.

The day is coming

when these swings will launch you,

my children, up into the air

and fill it with your laughter

as you plunge toward the turquoise sky

glimpsed through a matrix of ancient limbs

laden with jade green foliage.

And I’ll keep that moment,

along with so many others,

holding it against the day

when this yard is healed

of its scars from little children’s feet,

the weary oak has rest from bearing your weight

and every other trace of you has gone away.

Source: Anonymous  

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[1] The New Testament uses two words translated into English as “time.” There is the Greek word “chronos” denoting chronological time. This is time as we typically experience it. It can be measured in minutes, hours, days, years and centuries. The other word for time is “Chiros.” This word refers to a time within which transformative events take place. One example is in first chapter of Mark’s gospel where Jesus proclaims: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near” Mark 1:15. The Transfiguration clearly qualifies as Chiros time.