Tuesday, December 13, 2011

I Am Not--Bonnie


3rd Sunday of Advent
John 1:6-8, 19-28
Grace and peace to you from the one who was, who is and who is yet to come
When I was in middle school I had a friend named Bonnie. We looked alike, very much alike,
We had the same skin tone, the same hair color and we even styled our hair the same way; we had the same eye color; we were the same size and had some of the same features. When we were together many people thought we were sisters, some even thought we were twins. When we were together it was all right, but if we were not together it was a little awkward. I would inevitably have a teacher ask, "What do you think about that Bonnie?” or a fellow middle schooler call out in the hall “hey Bonnie!”And I would have to tell them, I’m not Bonnie. I was often caught in a case of mistaken identity.
………
No one mistook Eboo Patel for anyone else. He stood out as an American Muslim from India in the suburbs where he grew up. Although, as a visible minority everyone thought they knew who he was Eboo struggled with his identity. In his book, Acts of Faith, he tells stories of the difficulties of being Muslim and American. He believed the two were not congruent. You were either a good Muslim or a good American. Like many of all religious backgrounds, he was raised in a home that became more and more secular as his parents obtained the American Dream. Trips to the Mosque, as his parent carrers took off, became less and less frequent. Nightly prayers became mixed with stories of being sent to the Y during the summer where he learned Christian songs. 
His father worried that the people at the Young Men’s Christian Association were trying to turn him into a Christian. But his mother was glad that he was learning the values of good Christians and commented that he should also learn the values of good Jews, and good Buddhist… because these values were values that made a good Muslim.
In his days of middle and high school Eboo’s struggle intensified. He rejected most of what it meant to be a Muslim as he excelled in academics. This was his attempt to fit in. Eboo even dated a girl who was Mormon and …. realized that at some point their differences would become an issue. When he went off to college his search for identity continued. This quest took many twist and turns..... not all good....He became interested in the struggle for civil rights around the world and had Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. as his heroes but his studying and experiences awoke a deep rage in him. America, the country of his birth he discovered was full of inequities and hypocrisies! And yet the discovery of rage did not equiate to the discovery of identity.
He began hanging out with those who believed in social justice, and reading about Dorothy Day and the Catholic workers movement. Eboo lived in community, taught in the inner city and even sat in meditation and prayer with Christians. Eventually he realized that these were not his prayers. He begin to define himself as who he was not. I am not a Mormon, not a Christian, not a Jew. Though he held values in common Eboo could proclaim --- this I am not!
………………………………………………………………………
John spends a lot of time in this gospel writers rendition of the story, telling people who he is not. Again we hear the beginning of the good news about Jesus the Christ. We still have not heard of angels or shepherds or trips to Bethlehem. That all has to wait. Again John plays a starring role. Yet, today we get no description of his clothing or diet, but we hear the priests and Levites questioning him.
They want to know who this strange man is who keeps pointing to another event, to another person. They want to know who this mann is who has all these people coming out to the middle of no where to hear him and be baptized. They want to know who he is and what he is talking about. When asked,
“Who are you? He confessed, “I am not the Messiah.” And they asked him. “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the prophet?” He answered, “No.”
No he is not the Messiah, the one who the scripture promises will come to rescue the people. He is not Elijah who was fed by the widow and who was taken up in a chariot to heaven. He is not a prophet. Nothing about him resembles Moses who lead his people out of the wilderness. John has not come to fulfill the law or guide the people. John has come to witness to Jesus.
..........
Eboo Patel discovers who he is and claims his identity as a Muslim -- a Muslim that does not resemble those we hear about in the news. He is not a Muslim like those who seek to destroy everyone that does not believe as they do, Eboo is a Muslim who has made his life’s work....religious pluralism and helping youth to discover their identities whether Muslim, Jew, Christian and to live into those identities as those who want to make an impact in the world for good. He founded the Interfaith Youth Core which, “Builds mutual respect and pluralism among young people from different religious traditions by empowering them to work together to serve others.” An activist and scholar Eboo Patel knows who he is and wants all who believe, no matter what religious tradition, to be better witnesses of their faith.
................................
Using the words of Isaiah, John proclaims: “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord.” John is clear that even though he is not the messiah, not Elijah, not the prophet he has a role in this story. His role, his identity is as witness, one who points to the one who is to come.
This one will come proclaiming liberty to the captives, comfort to those who mourn. He will be the one who will come preaching, teaching, and healing. He will give up his life on a cross, and be raised from the dead for the forgiveness of sins.
John’s role and identity is as witness, as one who points to Jesus the one who gives us reason to rejoice.
................................. 
I would laugh when people called me Bonnie. It used to drive me crazy because it was though my identity had been lost. Today I can say, “No I am not Bonnie.” But I too can claim the identity of one crying out in the wilderness---he wilderness of our lives where there are economic uncertainties, sickness, death and disease, heartbreaking and suffering. I am one who points to the coming light that dispels all darknes and promises that destruction, hardtimes and trouble do not have the last word in our lives but light and life do. Jesus does!
Yes I can claim my identity and as John cries “Make straight the way of the Lord." He cries out for all of us to be witnesses. For us to remember that all of us are Christians because we have heard this good news! Someone has witnessed to us the great things that God has done, can do and will do in the lives of those who believe. And after hearing this good news from the mouth of John, grandmom or our childhood preacher ... all of us are invited to bear this good news, to be witnesses to the light--the light that dispels the darkness.
As the Advent of the Messiah draws near, we tell the story, and we rejoice in all that God has done even while we cry out …. Come Lord Jesus come!




Just Rambling!

Thursday, December 8, 2011

December Expectations

Come thou long expected Jesus,
Born to set thy people free;
From our fears and sins release us;
Let us find our rest in thee.
Israel’s strength and consolation,
Hope of all the earth thou art,
Dear desire of ev’ry nation,
Joy of every longing heart.      (LBW, 30)

I remember about twenty six years ago when my son, Jawon, was about six. Christmas was coming and he made a list of all the things he expected. His list included -- GiJoe, HeMan and the Thundercats action figures, Hot Wheels cars and a whole host of other things.

When I saw the list, I panicked. You see, financially -- that year was a particularly bad year for me. I was just getting used to being a single parent. I was saving to buy a car. Money was tight. Yet, here was this child waiting, anticipating, expecting a wonderful Christmas. There was not much I could promise him.  I  promised him a Christmas Tree, that we could decorate together, and a turkey dinner with all the trimmings.

Christmas approached and all I had in my pocket after the Christmas decorations and the Christmas dinner was five dollars. On my way home from work, on Christmas Eve I walked into the local  chain drugstore to look for something for my son. I bought Jawon a 12 inch long red and white plastic airplane, that cost $2.99. On Christmas morning, his eyes lit up and to my surprise he loved it. That airplane spurred hours of imaginative play. 

Our lives are so full of uncertainties. Our expectations are not always met.  What we hope for does not always come to past.  Life does not always work the way  in which we would have it work.

Yet, in the midst of our unmet hopes', dreams and wishes come the unexpected. We look to what we are able to do and we do it. We look at not so much what is missing but what we have. On that Christmas day so many years ago, $2.99 is all that was needed. I will always remember that Christmas, especially, the smiles and the laughter of a mother and son that had each other.

In this season, would you look around you and thank God for all that you have -- be it little or much. Please remember, there is one hope, one expectation that is always fulfilled, God’s grace, mercy and love are always available to us -- always present for us, in this season and in every season.

Just rambling.
(This blog was revived from an article written in 2004)


Sunday, December 4, 2011

Just the Beginning of the Story




Grace and peace to you from the one who was, who is and who is yet to come.

Did you realize that Thursday was World AIDS Day? December 1, marks the day every year---the day to commemorate, the day to pray, the day to raise voices in solidarity with those affected and infected by this virus. This year is the 30th Anniversary of the naming of this disease. This year also begins the 'Getting to Zero' Campaign. With more than 34 million people living with HIV/AIDS the goal is that there will be Zero new HIV infections, Zero Discrimination and Zero-AIDS related deaths world wide by 2015.

World AIDS Day is a day that could pass without much notice. But it was noticed this year; Vicar Brian and I drove to Philadelphia to commemorate World AIDS day with a friend. Some of you probably have heard me talk about Rev. Andrena Ingram. She is the pastor of St. Michael’s Lutheran Church in Germantown and she is living HIV positive.

I met Andrena while I was an intern with Heidi Neumark at Transfiguration in the Bronx. Pastor Ingram has quite a story.....She was abused as a child; served time in the army; she ended up on the streets with a drug habit and a few kids. Life was hard and tragic, but fortunately she found herself in rehab.
There she met Warren and fell in love. Both of them were on the way to recovery and a good life......They get married; she gets pregnant and he finds out he is HIV positive.

She told us the other night that she is so vocal about the fight against HIV and AIDS because Warren was so silent. He was embarrassed, ashamed and afraid to go into a drugstore to pick up the medications that could have, would have prolonged his life. And so --- afraid, and ashamed twenty years ago under the stigma attached to being HIV positive he died with full blown AIDS.

As we open the bible we read all kinds of stories---stories of famines and floods, stories of infidelity and passion, stories of plagues and destruction
stories of people who wondered in the wilderness, who have been exiled,
who have been oppressed, who suffered---those who need, who want, who long for God’s comfort.

Then good news comes!

On the working preacher podcast one of the scholars from Luther Seminary gives this imaginative explanation: The good news consisted of three words. Someone comes running along yelling, “he is risen,” and the people ask “who?” The speaker answers, “Jesus of Nazareth?” They ask, “who is he?” And the first speakers answers, “he is the one born in the manger, the one who suffered under Pontius Pilate, the one who was crucified, died and buried.” They ask, “How’d that happen?” So the gospel writer sets down an  answer, so that people might hear and know. 

He writes: “This is the beginning of the good news..... Just what the people needed to hear, because--well --they needed some good news. Let me draw you a picture. 'In Galilee around 70 CE. There is a war. Upstart Jews are starting to revolt against Rome, and Jerusalem has been taken over. The word is that things in the city are bad. The citizens are of two minds. Some are waiting for God to raise up leaders to move those who don’t think , or believe as they do from the Land. Still others are pushing for  submission to Rome as a road to security and peace. Everyone is afraid, life is unpredictable and the price of olive oil is astronomical.'*

No wonder people gather at the edge of the wilderness to listen to a man dressed in camel’s hair, eating wild locust and honey. They need a word---some hope, so they go see this wild man crying out. “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.”

They have heard this before; these are words of scripture. This is the long promised messenger, who signifies a turn of events, who points to the Messiah.

Mark begins his telling of the story, not with a birth announcement or a discussion of lineage but with a prophet who speaks in the words of prophets of old-- words of Isaiah and Malachi. This gospel writer wants us to know that this story has connections with all the other stories told about the people’s experiences with God.

This prophet, called John the Baptist, also points us to the one the people have been waiting for, the one who will speak mercy, comfort and peace into their suffering, into their oppression, into their sickness, disease, and forgiveness into their lives.

John points to the one who has the power to speak new beginnings in our lives, and invites the people, invites us into repentance, invites us to turn around. And we know: this is the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ the son of God. Even if at first it doesn’t sound like it.

Andrena heard this good news, she became a member of Transfiguration in the Bronx as a result of bringing her son Brezlan to vacation bible school. One day Pastor Neumark and I were knocking on doors in the neighborhood and we knocked on Andrena’s door. She invited us in for conversation.

She would later tell me that I was the first African American woman she had ever seen wearing a collar and she was curious about why I thought I could be a pastor.

Through attendance at Transfiguration, Andrena heard the cry of John to prepare the way of the Lord, the call to repentance and amendment of life. She became more involved in church and by the time I finished my internship, she was studying the bible regularly, she even studied through the Metro New York synod’s Diakonia program and subsequently felt a call to ordained ministry.

She did not have a smooth road toward ordination---many on the candidacy committee wondered ten years ago how she would hold up and in a meeting someone asked her “what if you die?" Wait, isn’t that all of our fates? Of course, with Rev. Heidi Neumark as an advocate she made it through the system and has been ordained for over five years.

Yes she heard the beginning of the good news of Jesus the Christ the Son of God and she knows that story has not yet ended; her story becomes part of God’s story and so does ours! Andrena’s story is added to the biblical story and countless other stories of how this good news has the possibility to change lives. 

This story has the possibility to change lives and compel us to move out into the world witnessing to this good news, taking up a cause and advocating for those who are poor, hungry, hopeless, sick and suffering.

Pastor Ingram’s cause is those infected with the virus that causes AIDS, because she knows that story too. And she would like for us to take up that cause, pausing not just for one day to commemorate but committing to Getting to Zero--Zero new infections, Zero discrimination and Zero AIDS related deaths. She also wants us to tell the good news that Jesus the Christ makes a difference in this cause and in our lives.That’s what she teaches and preaches through words and deeds. 


Because of her experiences she refuses to keep silent!

All of us are not expected to take up this cause or even to be preachers, yet we all are invited to be witnesses to the good news of Jesus the Christ the Son of God -- not just like Andrena but in our own way. We are invited to spread the good news, in our homes, at college, at work, in those areas of life that mean so much to us. Perhaps we are to spread this good news to those we love or maybe to those disenfranchised, or those with low self-esteem,
or young people, or those who are lonely, those who need, want, long for God’s comfort.

And our story, our experience of God’s forgiveness, of God’s love in our lives
becomes for another the beginning of the God news of Jesus the Christ the Son of God.This good news for someone may mean hope, acceptance, love it may give someone for the first time the opportunity to say thank you. 

As we wait for the coming of Christ, let us remember that what God was doing all along in Israel, what God has done through Jesus the Christ is what God is doing in our world today making God’s love visible.

In this Advent Season, may God's love become visible through you...... As we watch and wait with expectancy and cry, come Lord Jesus, come!

Just rambling!



*Paraphrased from Christopher R. Hutson, "Second Sunday of Advent, Mark 1:1-8. Feasting on the Word: Year B, Volume 4 p,44

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Sermon For All Saints


Christine, our church administrator, made a comment in the office the other day referring to marriage. She said, “the kids are the best part.”
There are many of us who would agree wholeheartedly and some of us who would just sigh. What she said is most certainly true, but I suppose what stage our children are in would determine our reply.
When they are first born they are cute and cuddly and though some of us wouldn’t know what to do with a newborn -- who doesn’t love a cooing baby?
However that stage doesn’t last long. Soon babies are crawling, then walking and then getting into everything. Yet it is wonderful watching them discover their environments, learn, achieve and develop their own little personalities. Then we arrive at that heart wrenching moment when we take them to their first day of school. We let them go to begin making their way in the world apart from us. Another stage done but then we move on. Certainly some of you don’t want to be reminded of what happens in those teenage years. These are the years when children start to think and behave as though parents don’t know anything, the time when they develop the ability to roll their eyes and smack their lips, slam doors and perfect that don’t bother me pout.
They get a little better in those pre-adult years, but you have to expect those phone calls from college to say that they are out of money. You guys know what I’m talking about--right?
Even when they are over twenty-one, when they are thirty or forty we are still their parents and they are still our children.
We were having a conversation in the office about children and I was talking about my son. I began describing what I love about him and what about him drives me absolutely crazy. I love that at thirty two he still calls to talk to me about everything--somethings I don’t want to hear. He asks for advice and even gets his friends to call me if he thinks I can help them. I love that he now thinks I am a pretty cool mom.
But you all can guess that wasn’t always the case. I remember a particularly rough time in our lives when the stuff of inner city life---mischief, drugs, gangs---threatened to pull my son under. We got into a heated argument when he was about fourteen and I just wanted someone to come and get him. I remember thinking that this is not who I want him to be, or the direction I want him to go. This is not what I taught him! He doesn’t resemble anyone I know or want to know. Sometimes I just wanted to strangle him and one day I found my hands around his neck. At that moment he looked at me with his big brown eyes and he started laughing. This brought me to my senses; I joined him in laughter and I thought--what am I doing? This is my child...
John addresses those who are listening as “children,” in our second lesson for All Saints Sunday. If we read the entirety of this first letter of John, we hear about God’s unconditional love for us. John was writing this letter to quell the tensions and schisms that were rampant at the end of the first century between a number of churches.
The conflict arose as the older generation was trying to pass on the faith to the younger generation. It was as though parents were attempting to teach their children -- the traditions that they held, the ways they related to God and the truth about Jesus the Christ.The whole book reads less like a letter and more like a testimony or a  passionate plea from an elder for those around to hold on to the faith, to live as those who believe.

And how hard it must have been for that second generation of Christians, they were being influenced by those big city folk and being influenced by Greek and Roman philosophies. This new generation was questioning Jesus’ humanity. They were buying into the gnostic belief that God couldn’t possibly have come in the flesh because flesh is evil.
And to top that off they believed that anything that they did, however they behaved, whatever mischief they got into or sin they committed didn’t matter because the flesh was going to be destroyed.
 And so the writer, using a conversational and loving tone like a father talking to wayward children says, “See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God: and that is what we are.”
 On this All Saints Sunday, we remember that we are children of God. We are children that have been named in the waters of baptism even before we knew our own name, or even before we could say or spell it. But we can be wayward and let the stuff of life, greed, dishonesty, apathy pull us under.
We can be like those second generation Christians those who don’t resemble at all their parents.
As a society we often behave as if what we know about God isn’t real or if God is real, God isn’t relative to our lives and we certainly don’t live as children of God. Living as children of God certainly isn’t the first thing that comes into our minds as we wake up in the morning is it? How often as we go through our days do we think today I will behave as a child of God?
Today I will drive along the expressway, order my lunch, treat my co-worker not only as if I am a child of God but as if she is also. I will help feed the hungry, love the unloveable and do what I can for others. We go through stages of holding God close and pushing God away, of needing God and believing we are self sufficient.
I can imagine that we human beings--we who are called saints but behave as sinners--can infuriate God, enrage God so, that God might want to once again send a flood. Or perhaps send fire to get rid of such disobedient children. Instead, God sends Jesus who gives his life on a cross, is buried in a grave
and raised on the third day, so that we might understand just how much God loves us.
So what exactly are we celebrating today? What does it mean to be a saint? Well I believe being a saint means to acknowledge, to realize, to affirm that God has called us by name, in the waters of baptism, claimed us before the creation of the world, and set us apart to do great things. Not just for our sake, but  for the sake of all the other saints God loves so much.

We are children of God and we are blessed when we are like those in the fifth chapter of Matthew--who mourn, are persecuted, poor in spirit; blessed when we are those who pray forgive us our sins....
blessed when we are those who try to get it right but can’t.....We are the most unlikely of characters and yet we are the children God loves.
My son will be 33 tomorrow and I still remember that day over 19 years ago. After we finished laughing about my hands around his neck, my son and I talked. I told him I was so angry because I was worried about him, and I wanted more for his life because I love him. He didn’t quite understand then but he has learned through good times and bad I will be there for him. And though he struggles, he lives as though he has a parent who loves him in how he parents his son. For sure I know how to exhibit the love a parent has for a child but God’s love is so much more. So much more all encompassing--unconditional.
So what about thinking about how much God loves us on this All Saints Sunday, about the promises of God: the promises of grace, forgiveness, and mercy; about the promise that God will be with us always--through good times and bad-- even to the ends of the age, the promise that the loved ones we remember today have received--the promise of eternal life. 
And how about living as though we are God's children! That’s what John was trying to say to that second generation of Christians and to all of us. He believed our identity is inseparable from how we live as God’s children. And so he wrote:
“What marvelous love the Father has extended to us! Just look at it—we're called children of God! That's who we really are. But that's also why the world doesn't recognize us or take us seriously, because it has no idea who he is or what he's up to. But friends, that's exactly who we are: children of God. And that's only the beginning. Who knows how we'll end up! What we know is that when Christ is openly revealed, we'll see him—and in seeing him, become like him. All of us who look forward to his Coming stay ready, with the glistening purity of Jesus' life as a model for our own.” (1John 3:1-3 The Message)

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Reformation


You should hear the conversations around my dinner table. You have a life-long Baptist, arguing the merits of justification by grace with a Lutheran who became Lutheran on the basis of this foundational doctrine. According to Luther this is the article on which the church stands or falls. Someone should have told my husband that it is a little useless arguing with someone who wants to jump up and shout everytime she hears “they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” This was so contrary to what I heard all my life about being good and working out my own salvation. I have said many times that this little idea changed my life.

Of course my Baptist husband believes in God’s grace, I wouldn’t have him otherwise....but every now and then this idea that grace has to be conditioned on something—creeps in. He thinks that simply to say we have been justified is too easy, too simple. For him there has to be more; for him justification is proceeded by right living, right behavior and right action. But who can get it right? 

For Reformation Sunday our gospel lesson comes from the eighth chapter of John. As we begin reading at the 31st verse Jesus stands speaking to "the Jews who had believed in him.” We hear Jesus once again engaging in rhetorical gymnastics with those around him. This conversation is slightly different than the conversation we heard in the 22nd chapter of Matthew’s gospel. Different in that Jesus is not speaking directly to the Pharisees and Scribes who seek to trip him up and find some fault in him, he is speaking to those who are eager to listen and learn, those who have perhaps heard of him and want to see what he is all about. They hear his statement, “You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free,” and they are offended--and so are we. How often have we heard this statement taken out of context? Did you know it is even plastered on the side of the CIA Building in Washington, DC?

But what truth? When asked this question we stick out our chest and talk about the truth that Jesus rose from the dead so that we might be free. And though modern day theologians would whole heartedly agree with the statement “the truth will make you free.” Many of them believe we skip too rapidly to this freedom, this grace, we jump right to the end of the story and forget everything that comes before.
Those listening to Jesus certainly had forgotten. “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone.” Certainly they seem to have forgotten that at one time or another in their history they were slaves to the Egyptians, and lived under Assyrian, Persian rule and now as Jesus is speaking with them, they still live in oppression and in conflict with the Romans. So their conversation with Jesus is surprising. Jesus reminds them, “. . . everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.” And we think that this must be one of those rhetorical devices because we have no idea why he says it that way.

Conversations about sin can be tricky. I remember a few years ago having two telling conversations about sin. The first was with a young mother who wanted her baby baptized. She had grown up in another tradition and decided that she wasn’t going to have her baby baptized in that tradition because the priest kept talking about original sin and she just knew her baby wasn’t sinful. So she asked me what we Lutherans-- what we at St. John’s ---believe because she thought we were a nice bunch of people. It was though she were interviewing me for the most important task. I told her that here at St. John’s we believe all are born into sin, and that through the waters of baptism we rise to newness of life in Christ Jesus. Yet we remain, throughout our lives -- saint and sinner at the same time. She wasn’t satisfied; she didn’t want to hear about sin and we don’t want to hear about sin either.
The second story is of Confirmation class a few years ago when we began to study the Catechism.
We were talking about the fifth petition of the Lord’s Prayer: “Forgive us our sins” and we read the explanation “. . . for we daily sin much and indeed deserve only punishment." Some members of the class were offended at the idea that they deserved punishment for something they had not done. They didn’t appreciate being named sinner. 


"I’m not a sinner," a student told me. "I’m good, I treat people well, I help those who need help, I don’t lie, cheat or steal." And of course she didn’t. What we don’t seem to understand is that sin is more than those big things that we don’t do. Sin is also those smaller things like not forgiving our family member that hurt us, not loving our neighbors as ourselves, believing that the way we look at things and want things is the one right way and making everyone’s life miserable when we don’t get our way. Sin is gossiping and ignoring the new kid in school. Sin is “the fabric of our lives,” or as Paul tells us “We all sin and fall short of the glory of God.” That’s a fact.
Sin is also so much bigger. It evades our lives in so many ways. No, we may not kill or murder or commit adultery, yet almost everything we do makes us complicit in the sins of this fallen and broken world. Think about it....where we live, how we live, what we eat, the availability of goods and resources means that someone goes without. What we wear, the cars we drive in some way or some how harms the planet and harms someone whose health is destroyed by hard labor or lack of those things we take for granted.

This grace sets us free to love, to give, to serve as unconditionally and wholeheartedly as we are able---free to care for the poor, the lonely, the lost---free to share our abundance with those who know lack--free to not only continue in the word of God but to witness, to proclaim that good news.
Conversations with my husband about theology, and doctrine can get heated, but what we do agree on is the fact that we all sin and it is by the grace of God through the death and resurrection of  Jesus the Christ we are saved.

Just Rambling

Reflections on a Commemoration

I have very mixed emotions about the commemoration of 9/11. Some would say I am a person that likes to leave the past behind. I do however, realize that this is an occasion that has changed the world forever and has even changed me. So commemorate, ten years later, we must.

I remember very clearly where I was and what I was doing the moment I first heard of the events of the day. I was sitting in my decorated in pink (not by me) bedroom of the parsonage at St. John's Lutheran Church in the Bronx. I was reviewing the guest list of an event that was supposed to take place on September 21. I was watching, as I still do when I have time, Good Morning America. At first I thought it was a prank or some fancy camera illusion. I soon found out it was real -- happening right there as I watched.

Before the hour was up, my phone began ringing first my son, then members of the congregation. One member's very young child had gotten on a bus to go to school in downtown Manhattan; another member called to say a cousin worked, if not in the towers very close by. Still others called to ask could we, should we pray. In all our helplessness that is what we did-- pray.

That night on the concrete steps of the church that was built in the early 1800's we prayed and those who walked by joined in. A firefighter from the neighborhood walked by and said, "thank you." He told us that in this most awful tragedy the people of New York City had pulled together to help each other.

I thank God, that the tragedy of 9/11 bought out the best in people. I mourn with all those who lost loved ones. And I continue to pray, never again!

Just rambling.

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

God's Love Song

I was in a meeting in Minnesota and had the priviledge of hearing an amazing young singer. She is a little tiny thing, with pale skin, long dreds and a powerful voice. Her name is Heatherlyn; she came to offer a few devotional moments before our long day of meetings began.

She introduced herself and began with some fun sing-along stuff that she had written. The mood then turned a little more serious, more contemplative as Heatherlynn talked about reading Zephaniah 3:17. The idea was that we always are singing and praising God, but who knew that God also sang to us. She was amazed when she read this and so wrote a song called God's Love Song. Heatherlyn strummed a tune and sang this chorus to us: "Im singing loudly over you, gladness from my heart; rescue and peace are yours, nowhere else to be found." She helped me hear in these lyrics the all encompassing care of God.

Zephaniah declares "The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love; he will exult over you with loud singing." I, like Heatherlyn, am awestruck by this idea that God would actually sing. Yet, God does not simply sing but raises God's voice in exultation over us puny human beings.

Of course, it is not the concept of God's love that surprises me. Although the way God's love is made manifest is always a surprise. It is the idea that we have a singing God! While Heathelynn has put into words exactly what she believes God is saying, I have been thinking about this ever since.

I suppose this song, this exultation, would sound different for each of us and would vary according to the circumstances we find ourself, or our need. In The Message, the end of the verse is translated, ". . . he'll calm you with his love and delight you with his songs." Just imagine, when in pain we might hear a song of comfort and love in audiable but soft tones. When happy and celebrating, God's song of love might be cheerful and full of joy. When in need of encouragement, a love song of God's could be a gentle but loud and persistant nudge, sung out in an ever increasing crescendo
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Our world is so hectic and full of disasters both natural and manmade. Can you imagine if everyone heard God's love song in their ear how might our world be different?

I don't know about you, but from now on, I will hear God's love song in my ears and rejoice in a God who sings loudly over me.

Just rambling!