TRINITY SUNDAY 2019

Today the church celebrates the Feast of the Holy Trinity or Trinity Sunday. Many a well-meaning theologian has tried to explain away the Trinity of God throughout the centuries only to find themselves caught by philosophy, reason, or nature. The best we can hope to do is say the Trinity is a mystery, folks, and that’s okay. For it is often in mysteries, that we gain the most wisdom and find new knowledge every day.

I may not be able to explain the mystery of the Holy Trinity but there are other triune mysteries whose stories can teach us much about ourselves and about God.

Once upon a time very long ago,
there were three sisters who lived together in a field.
These sisters were quite different from one another in their size
and also in their way they dressed.
One of the three was a little sister,
so young that she could only crawl at first,
and she was dressed in green.
The second of the three wore a frock of bright yellow,
and she had a way of running off by herself when the sun shone
and the soft wind blew in her face.
The third was the eldest sister,
always standing very straight and tall above the other sisters
and trying to guard them.
She wore a pale green shawl,
and she had long, yellow hair
that tossed about her head in the breezes.
There was only one way in which the three sisters were alike.
They loved one another dearly,
and they were never separated.
They were sure that they would not be able to live apart.

After a while,
 a stranger came to the field of the three sisters,
a little Iroquois boy.
He was as straight as an arrow
and as fearless as the eagle that circled the sky above his head.
He knew the way of talking to the birds
and the small brothers of the earth,
the shrew, the chipmunk, and the young foxes.
And the three sisters,
the one who was just able to crawl,
the one in the yellow frock,
and the one with the flowing hair,
were very much interested in the strange boy.
They watched him fit his arrow in his bow,
saw him carve a bowl with his stone knife,
and wondered where he went at night.

Late in the summer of the first coming of the boy to their field,
one of the three sisters disappeared.
This was the youngest sister in green,
the sister who could only creep.
She was scarcely able to stand alone in the field
unless she had a stick to which she clung.
Her sisters mourned for her until the fall,
but she did not return.

Once more the boy came to the field of the three sisters.
He came to gather reeds at the edge of a stream nearby
to make arrow shafts.
The two sisters who were left watched him
and gazed with wonder at the prints of his moccasins in the earth
that marked his trail.
That night the second of the sisters left,
the one who was dressed in yellow
and who always wanted to run away.
She left no mark of her going,
but it may have been that she set her feet
in the moccasin tracks of the little boy.

Now there was but one of the sisters left.
Tall and straight she stood in the field
not once bowing her head with sorrow,
but it seemed to her that she could not live there alone.

The days grew shorter and the nights were colder.
Her green shawl faded and grew thin and old.
Her hair,
once long and golden,
was now tangled by the wind.

Day and night she sighed for her sisters to return to her,
but they did not hear her.
When she tried to call to them
her voice was low and plaintive like the wind.

One day when it was the season of the harvest,
the little boy heard the crying of the third sister
who had been left to mourn there in the field.
He felt sorry for her,
and he took her in his arms
and carried her to the lodge of his father and mother.
Oh what a surprise awaited her there!

Her two lost sisters were there in the lodge,
safe and very glad to see her.
They had been curious about the boy,
and they had gone home with him to see how and where he lived. They had liked his warm cave so well
that they had decided now that winter was coming on
to stay with him and his family.
And decided to do all they could to be useful.

The little sister in green,
now quite grown up,
was helping to keep the dinner pot full.

The sister in yellow sat on the shelf drying herself,
for she planned to fill the dinner pot later.

The third sister joined them,
ready to grind meal for the boys entire family.

And the three were never separated again.
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This is a story well known to many of the ancient tribes of North America. Although each telling has its variants the tale is meant to give us knowledge and teach us to respect the mysteries of the land. The Three Sister’s are the basic crops of native life.

The youngest sister, the one in green who only crawls, She is the squash, whose great vines shield the soil as she creeps along the ground spreading her fruits around the mound.

The second sister, the one who moves with the wind and the sun, she is the bean, who spreads her tendrils toward the sun climbing whatever sturdy stalk she may find.

The eldest sister, the one with flowing yellow hair, she is the maize, or corn, who stands the tallest, unbending in the wind.

They were always planted together because they always helped each other, Grown from one mound,  they formed the basis of native cuisine.

The corn provided a stalk for the beans to grow on. This kept the beans from growing along the ground where they were susceptible to being eaten or moisture rot. The vines of the beans also helped support the corn, keeping it from bending too easily in the wind and providing much-needed nitrogen to the soil. The squash was shaded from the scorching heat by the shadow of the stalk and leaves growing skyward. It only crawled, but as it spread it’s leaves kept weeds from growing up and choking its sisters and the shade it provided kept the soil moist and fertile.  Although they were three very different crops in the field, they formed one living being always supporting each other by their love and helping each other to grow.

In the harvest, they become the sustainers of life. The squash can feed in the early months. The beans are dried and cooked in the winter. And the corn is ground to meal,
providing daily bread for the whole year long.  Together in the field, they give life to each other, and out of the field, it is only together that they give life to the family. This knowledge was a mystery sustained by myth and legend and only recently understood by science.

So is it with the Trinity, three in one an example to us of the community in love. The God who stands tall and sturdy when we are in need of strength to live by faith and hope and not to be so easily tossed by the winds of change. The God who teaches us to climb toward the sun and to be lead by the breath of God following in the steps of Jesus, the boy who came to the garden to teach us how to live. The God who shields us “hiding us under the shadow of His wings” as the psalmist says and protecting us from danger, And the God who becomes our sustainer, providing for us through our darkest times. God giving of Godself in sacrifice to feed our weary souls.

It may be a mystery, but that’s okay. We can see this mystery move throughout creation and continue to show us how to live the sacramental life with each other and invites us to dig into the soil of this mystery to find the fruits of wisdom.

Each day there is an opportunity for a new harvest. Come and learn Come and see Come and be fed.  AMEN.

THE SONG OF THE SPIRIT

PENTECOST 2019

Something I understood from a very early age was that music is the one thing in this world that can cross nearly every border and tear down every barrier.  It may sound a little different, the instruments may be strange and the beats may be unusual but music is the only truly universal language.

Music transcends both time and space. It can muster whole armies to battle and aid in the grieving of the lost. It can calm the savage beast and turn our passions to thoughts of peace Music tells us when to be afraid (Jaws theme) there be sharks in those waters;
and when to think on love (Bridal March). Music has the power to unite even the fiercest of enemies. Have you ever been to a ball game when the DJ begins playing Sweet Caroline? It doesn't matter what team you're rooting for, everyone's going to jump up and (bum bum BUM) at the chorus. Music unites the world. Music is the universal language.

This last week I had the opportunity to attend a Preaching Conference. There is nothing more fun and more nerve-racking, then to spend a week with talented preachers from across the country and watch as we all try to bum ideas off each other on Thursday night for the Pentecost sermons, we all have yet to write. As I stood in conversation and reviewed the scripture I began to recognize the song of the Holy Spirit in the various tongues spoken by the peoples gathered in Jerusalem but I had yet to understand the lyrics. If you stick with me this morning,  we might be able to learn them together.

Luke’s account tells us that as the people were gathered in one place there was a sound of a mighty rushing wind. An echoing whirlwind as if the doors of heaven had suddenly been flung open and a new breath of God had come crashing into the room. A flame appeared above each head as if the Divine spark was ignited anew, and the light of creation was being birthed in the universe for the first time all over again. And they began to speak in strange tongues just as creation began with a word.

The marketplace outside had been filled with babble and chatter that morning as visitors from all around the known world were looking to buy their breakfast. Each with a different dialect, a different culture, a different language. As the Spirit moved over the followers of Christ like the waving hands of a great conductor, they began to hear the same song. The disjointed fervor fell into harmony and suddenly all became one. The story of Christ; the story of God was now for all. 

Back in the summer of 2008, I was living in Michigan working as a counselor at Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp. One of the many benefits of working at Blue Lake besides inspiring a love for music in the lives of young people was the opportunity to perform some really wonderful music with some exceptionally talented musicians. That year I sang with the staff choir and we had invited a chorus from Germany for a very special performance late in the summer. Beethoven’s 9th Symphony was on the bill and I was super excited.

Even if you’ve never listened to classical music or known it was from Beethoven’s 9th and final symphony I am fairly certain that you know the driving theme of this masterwork. It pervades our collective psyche. From the radio to tv commercials,
movies to hymns, you have heard this simple melody at some point in your life.

Although he was far from being the only composer in 19th century Vienna, Beethoven’s music was a cut above the rest and often far ahead of its time.  Hundred’s of symphonies had already been written and there were choruses upon choruses in operas and sacred oratory, but there was nothing written before that was quite like this new work by Maestro Beethoven. For starters, at the time of its performance, the composer of the work was nearly completely deaf only hearing the music playing in his own head. AND this audacious musician was including a choir and lyrics into the fourth movement of his symphony a style of music usually reserved for instrumental circles alone. –––––––––

The day finally came in late July for us to perform this greatest of works at the end of season concert. The two choirs and a huge orchestra took our places on the outdoor stage in the center of camp. The wind blew through the trees and songbirds called to their mates as the horns held a single note over pulsating cello’s and the symphony began. For forty-two minutes the orchestra flows through the first three movements transporting the audience through a myriad of emotions, opening on a risky gambit, followed by a confusing dance,  and then the listener is lulled into a pastoral scene
and a false sense of security. All the while the choir is sitting on the risers, breathing together and waiting. The serenity of the third movement is as if the bustle in the market has calmed. Everyone has their breakfast and sits to enjoy the warm morning sun. Suddenly, the fourth movement literally breaks in. The drums are beaten, the strings vibrate with violent fervor and all the horns blast in discord. It is like the sound of a mighty rushing wind ripping through the plain as shutters flap and trees come crashing down.

On the day of Pentecost, Peter stood in the market to preach to the masses. He tells all who are able to hear that the prophecies have been fulfilled. Jesus who was crucified has been raised from the dead and on this day God has poured out his Spirit upon all flesh. There is no need to fear. Instead, rejoice! The barriers that separated humanity from the Divine have been torn down and the joy of salvation is now gifted to all of creation.

For his fourth movement, Beethoven chose a text by the poet Schiller. I think the ‘Ode to Joy’ fits very well with this theme of Pentecost and is almost like the sermon of Peter has continued and is proclaimed anew out of the pens of a 19th-century poet and composer. After the initial crash, the strings begin the common theme then enters a solo tenor like Peter in the marketplace gathering the audience and literally preaching to the choir.

Oh friends, not these sounds!
Let us instead strike up more pleasing
and more joyful ones!

Suddenly the choir and a quartet join together with shouts of Joy! Joy!

And in harmonies old and new they sing the message for all to hear.
Joy, beautiful spark of divinity,
Daughter from Paradise,
Heavenly being, we enter your sanctuary,
burning with fervour.
Your magic brings together
what custom has sternly divided.
All men shall become brothers,
wherever your gentle wings hover.

Every creature drinks in joy
at nature's breast;
Good and Evil alike
follow her trail of roses.
She gives us kisses and wine,
a true friend, even in death;
Even the worm was given desire,
and the cherub stands before God.

Be embraced, you millions!
This kiss is for the whole world!
Above the canopy of stars must dwell a loving father.

On the day of Pentecost, we might wonder if the disjointed babbling ceased because all the sudden they were no longer speaking AT each other but singing together. Whatever cause there was to divide themselves was now gone and all were filled with the same spirit. Their hearts beat as one as they sang out the common refrain, God’s love is for all and God’s abundant joy has finally broken through and become available for all to hear.  The Spirits power did not stop on that day of Pentecost but continue still to vibrate the air around us and set our hearts ablaze.

When the performance at Blue Lake came to a close the campers and the visiting audience sat in silence for a brief moment. On the wings of the wind, the final notes continued to ring in echo across the waters and through the canopy of trees. It felt as if our song would continue forever had it not been interrupted by the shouts and applause that broke out from the floor below.

Like that ringing, our song of Pentecost can still continue. Millions are welcomed to sing the theme as we join the song of creation. We hum the tune of God’s love and joy whenever we uphold each other in prayer and give ourselves to service. We teach others the lyrics when we share the simple truth that God’s love is available to everyone we meet. If we live by faith and follow the Spirit we may be blessed to hear the whole of creation singing all because we shared our tiny bit of the chorus.

In a world disrupted by evil and riven by strife where many ears fall deaf to the love of God and can only hear babble where harmony should dwell remember that music is the universal language remember to evangelize and keep the melody going.   

RESTRICITON AND LIBERATION!

EASTER VII, 2019

Restriction and Liberation! These are the themes we sit with this week. Last Thursday was forty days after Easter, when the church around the world celebrates the Ascension. Christ’s leave-taking of this world to the Father.

More than a missional proclamation and a long goodbye, the ascension is in itself an example for us of liberation from restriction. The great theologian William Temple, who served as Archbishop of Canterbury from 1942, until his death in 1944, described the Ascension of Our Lord as liberation in this way,

“The ascension of Christ is his liberation from all restrictions of time and space. It does not represent his removal from earth, but his constant presence everywhere.”

In leaving the confines of the temporal, and entering the space of the spiritual, Jesus is true with us, always and everywhere. There is perfect freedom.

Luke’s account in the Act’s of the Apostles gives us other accounts of restriction and liberation. They may not always be found in the obvious.

Paul, and his new mission companion, Silas, have answered God’s command through a dream, and traveled to Philippi of Macedonia, now a coastal Greek town on the Adriatic. It was a fairly large city in the first century. While on their way to the diaspora community of Hellenised Jewish families, they meet a girl with a spirit of divination, meaning she can see into the future. A fortune teller. This “gift” is being exploited. She is enslaved. And the way her master’s are treating her is a prostitution of the mind. Her powers are being sold and all the money is going to the men who oppress her. She is enprisoned by this spirit and more importantly by the system that uses her for the economic gain of others.  As they pass her by, she begins to follow them and shout out to the people I think by her words, she is the first evangelist to the Macedonians.

“These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.”

Notice the interplay of themes. “These men are SLAVES who proclaim SALVATION”

Well, this goes on for a while, many days in fact, and without being asked Paul does something radical. And I love how Luke puts it, Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit,  “I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” In that very hour, this spirit left her and she was free. Not from any pain caused by the spirit, but from the chains of her master’s who were becoming rich through exploitation.  The slaves of the Most High God have set her free.

Now our themes continue. The businessmen of town do not like how Paul and Silas through there preaching have stirred up the establishment, changed the economy, and begun proclaiming liberation. 

What do we do to such liberators? We cast them in prison throw chains around them and clamp fetters of iron to their feet. These slaves of the Most High are now prisoners of the state. But this has little effect on Paul and Silas. Because they are slaves to God, they have perfect freedom. Their liberty is not bound by temporal restrictions but is free in the spirit because their freedom is in the Christ who died rose again, and ascended to the Father.  So while in the midst of prison, with chains and fetters and iron bars, Paul and Silas are still able to sing. Their bodies may be bound but their souls are free to soar.

It makes me think of that old hymn by Robert Lowry,

My life flows on in endless song;

above earth’s lamentation,

I catch the sweet, though far-off hymn

that hails a new creation.

Refrain: No storm can shake my inmost calm

while to that Rock I’m clinging.

Since Christ is Lord of heaven and earth,

how can I keep from singing?

Mr. Lowry is said to have written this text  because of the influence of another prolific hymn writer,  Fanny Crosby, who was famous for such well-known texts as  Blessed Assurance and To God be the Glory. You see, Fanny Crosby was blind. She never saw the beauty of creation but she could capture God’s Glory and works through her words. She was restricted by the temporal, but her spirit was always free.

So what happens while Paul and Silas are singing? For one, the chains mean nothing because their souls are free. But then while they are singing  the earthquakes, the chains fall off, and the prison doors are open. Through there song, the guard at the prison has also found freedom of the soul and brings the two to his own house, where they proclaim the good news of salvation and the guards entire family is baptized. For letting the prisoners escape, it is possible that the guard could be executed and his entire family sold into slavery. But that is only temporal, they have found perfect freedom through Jesus Christ. Even when things seemed at their bleakest, the storms rage and this world began closing in, it was in their song that Paul and Silas lifted others out of slavery and into the glory of God.

The last few days I was in Ohio attending a conference on Food and Faith, exploring the role of ministry in the time of climate change. The week had begun with me hiding with my cat beneath the stairwell as tornado sirens whirled throughout the county. There was destruction all around us in Delaware, Ohio. And on the last day, I sat in the humid morning air, waiting for the day to start, and seeking from God some type of hope in the days to come.

As I looked up, I noticed that there was no wind. The kinetic art piece was perfectly still  and the leaves on the trees lay flat as ever. And then I heard the birdsong and the Spirit filled my heart. Sometimes in life, there is no wind to rustle the leaves or turn the whirligigs. Sometimes there seems to be no evidence of the breath of God, no presence of the Creator, no hope in the thick heaviness of our current age. But still, the birds will sing. And on their notes the entrapped spirit is freed to take flight and all of Creation is lifted to the Glory of God.

We need not be bogged down by the changes and chances of this world. Because our God is Alpha and Omega the beginning and the end the Creator and Fulfiller of all things. We are slaves, given wholly over to the source of our salvation. And in our song and the song of creation, we are liberated from the restrictions of this world and free to move about proclaiming the good news of salvation. Go and listen to the bird song. Sing the notes that are in your heart. And proclaim freedom to all of creation. AMEN. 

HAVE SOME FISH & GET TO WORK

Easter III, 2019

A lot has happened. Jesus was arrested, crucified, buried, but three days after the rushed funeral his tomb is empty. Peter has denied that he even knew who Jesus was, Judas Iscariot has hanged himself out of grief, this band of friends has scattered to the winds for fear that they might be next. Then two disciples are walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus when they are joined by a stranger. He quietly shares a conversation with them before sitting down to some supper at their behest. As he breaks the bread they recognize him to be Jesus, raised from the dead. Then just as quickly as he appeared, he is gone from their sight. After sharing this story with their friends, the remaining group starts to come back together. They lock themselves in a room because they are still afraid of what all this means, when Jesus appears in the midst of them, and quietly offers them Peace, instead of fear. After he leaves again, the group realizes they are one man short. Thomas was off visiting his twin sister perhaps, so when he returns to Jerusalem, Jesus comes again, this time moving the resurrection beyond words, to touch. Showing himself to not be a ghost but sanctifying the human body even with all its wounds and scars. After all, why should it not be holy? The human body was molded by God and made in the image of God. They don’t know how to deal with resurrection. Jesus just keeps showing up, eating some food, and going away again. I’m sure the question crossed their minds, “what do we do now?

A lot has happened and it is a lot to handle. All this ordinary suddenly becoming extraordinary is almost too much to bear. So what do the disciples do? They try to go home again. Well, as anyone who has endured a transformative experience can tell you, you can never really “go home” again. They try to find some sense of what they knew before. They try to “return.” So just as my father and grandfather would do to figure things out, a way to untangle the messy nets of the mind, they put out a boat and decide to go fishing. Night fishing in fact. I don’t know if in their stress they are casting the nets too hard, or they have spooked the fish with all their talk about the last week's events, but for some reason, they don’t catch a thing. The first ribbons of the dawn are peeling over the mountains and they have no fish.

In the haze of morning light, Jesus is standing on the shore. As they are bringing the empty boat back in, he calls out, “Didn’t catch anything, did you?” “Why don’t you try throwing the net on the other side of the boat?” Being raised by avid fishermen,  I know exactly how the unwritten reply would have gone. It’s unwritten because John doesn’t know how to translate Aramaic cusses into Greek. I am sure a little grumbling took place under their breaths, “Don’t you think we tried that already?” Nevertheless, they cast their nets one more time. Suddenly the net is bursting and they can hardly pull it into the boat.

This is a bit like the breaking of bread in that roadside tavern. The scene should have been a familiar one to most of those in the boat. But Peter, so deaf to the now after the grief of his denial is a little slow on the upbeat, till one of the others points out to him, “look, its Jesus.”

Suddenly the memories come flooding back in. The scales have fallen from his eyes, his ears are unblocked, and Peter remembers that first day so many years ago. He was in a boat with his brother and partners, possibly this very same boat. They had been out all night fishing and not caught a thing, when this strange guy from Nazareth, a landlocked town, says “try casting the nets on the other side.” It is after this first miraculous catch that Jesus says, “Come follow me, and I will teach you what it means to fish for people.” Being someone who finds comfort in food and cooking, I love these post-resurrection scenes because nearly all of them involve food. The men in the boat have been out all night and not caught a thing, but here is Jesus on the shore, charcoal fire on the beach, with some fish already cleaned and roasting. “Come have some breakfast, and let’s talk.”

They still struggle with what resurrection means. They still have no idea what they are supposed to do next. So Jesus takes them back to where it all began, in an almost Wizard of Oz-like moment, to show them that they knew what to do all along.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 
“Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” 
He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” 
Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.” 

A second time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” 
He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” 
Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.” 

He said to him the third time, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” 
Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” 
And he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” 
Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.

Here we have another hearkening back. For three times Simon Peter denied that he even knew who Jesus was. Now, three times he makes his contrition, three times he is forgiven, and three times he is told what to do. So now the scene comes to a conclusion, Not with any earthquakes or trumpet blasts, not with any great moment of ethereal enlightenment, but with Jesus and his friends sitting around a campfire, as he whispers those familiar words through the smoke, “Follow me.” Maybe that is where you find yourself. We all still struggle to understand what resurrection means. We forget that we are a resurrection people and we allow ourselves to be bogged down with worry because we have trouble seeing the signs all around us.

Yesterday morning a dear friend, and a beautiful Christian soul left this world. Rachel Held Evans, through her books, her humor, and her personality had such a profound impact on my life, as she did on many that I know. In the first moments after receiving the news, my heart broke. I was stunned, and I didn’t really know what to do next. I needed a trumpet blast to wake me from the fog. I needed an earthquake to shake me back into existence.  In the darkness of this news, I needed a little light. So I began looking back to quotes of hers that I had underlined. I began scrolling through pictures my friends had with her and Dan as I read their memories and transformations. I still hadn’t fleshed out this mornings sermon and I didn’t know what to do next. I didn’t go fishing, but instead walked inside to the Diocesan Camp Planning meeting I was attending, and I worked with my friends to prepare for the work of the Kingdom.

When I got home last night, I got some food and began re-reading my favorite book by Rachel, Searching For Sunday. It was this book that had helped me through my summer of hospital chaplaincy. It was this book that had confirmed my transformation in God. It was this book that had solidified my calling into ministry  through my experiences with God. Still thinking of this morning's Gospel, and recognizing my own struggle with resurrection  in the darkness felt at the loss of such a bright and loving light, I read the final page and heard a whisper, “her work may be done, but yours is just beginning.” So I will let her words on the role of this post-resurrection church close us out.

Sunday morning sneaks up on us––like dawn, like resurrection, like the sun that rises a ribbon at a time. We expect a trumpet and a triumphant entry, but as always, God surprises us by showing up in ordinary things: in bread, in wine, in water, in words, in sickness, in healing, in death, in a manger of hay, in a mother’s womb, in an empty tomb. [And I would add, in a campfire and some fish]. Church isn’t some community you join or someplace you arrive. Church is what happens when someone taps you on the shoulder and whispers in your ear, ‘pay attention, this is holy ground; God is here.’

God is truly, and is always here. So let us recognize the holy ground and resurrection. Let’s go fishing. Let’s feed the sheep. Let’s get to work.

AMEN

BORROWED TIME TO BORROWED TOMB

EASTER SUNDAY 2019

Alleluia! Christ is Risen! The Lord is Risen Indeed! Alleluia!
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What a week?

We rode with Jesus into Jerusalem, waving palm branches and shouting Hosanna! Hosanna! SAVE US! You are the promised King! The Messiah! Save us! Save us! As he did not bring military might but rather showed us a way of love in remembrance of God and service to each other we had the realization that this salvation did not fit into our molds. So we turned on him. Handed him over to Pilate. Called for his crucifixion! And followed him out of town to the wood of the cross.

After he died at the place of the skull his body was taken down laid on the lap of his mother, who opened her heart and offered him to all of us. Two faithful members of the council Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea saved his body from being thrown into the garbage heap. Nicodemus brings one hundred pounds of oils and spices to anoint the body and Joseph gives up what was meant to be his tomb. So great was there love for this Rabbi that they went to extraordinary lengths making an extraordinary financial and physical sacrifice to care for his body. Perhaps they didn’t quite understand resurrection yet either. After all, Nicodemus is still reeling over the idea of being BORN AGAIN. Anyway, Jesus body is placed in the tomb of another. The stone is rolled over the door to protect it from wild animals and to mask the smell of decomposition. Then Jesus is left alone

So now we come to the in-between. the moment of tension between death and resurrection. The part often skipped in our Easter celebrations. For that part of our story, I offer you this Icon of the Anastasis (meaning - the raising) It is also often called The Harrowing of Hades or The Conquering of Death.

As with all icons, there are many aspects and lessons they try to teach us through the metaphor. First, we are drawn to the figure of Jesus. He is dressed in dazzling white and often surrounded by a mondorla of light representing the Glory of God. This part of the image should draw our memories back to the scene on Mt Tabor, where Christ is transfigured to his Glory in front of Peter, James, and John. Beneath his feet are the Gates of Death itself. They do not look like normal gates because they have been broken by Christ. Death can no longer contain creation forever. As fourth-century Spanish poet Prudentius painted the scene,  “The door [of hell] is forced and yields before Him;  the bolts are torn away;  down falls the pivot broken; that gate so ready to receive the inrush,  so unyielding in face of those that would return,  is unbarred and gives back the dead. . .”

On either side of Jesus are those who have died. The crowd surrounding Christ seems mostly unfamiliar in iconography besides John the Baptist with his memorable camel hair tunic. These others are the righteous of the the passed. Those who have given us our heritage.

 In the most basic icons, on Christ’s right hand we see Christ’s family including John the Baptist, as well as King David and King Solomon with their crowns. on Christ’s left-hand we see those who prefigured him:  Abel (the firstborn human, who was slain by his brother Cain, and was thereby the first human dead), along with the prophets from the Transfiguration, Moses, and Isaiah. They have all been awakened from their long slumber, likely at the sound of those gates crashing down. They now stand ready for what is to come, the hope the prophets promised for generations.

Underneath the gates of Hades,  which have been broken and now lie in the form of a cross,  we find a figure that is tied up in the dark area where the keys and locks are found;  this represents Death,  being bound up he no longer has dominion over us.

Lastly, our gaze is drawn to the two figures below. They are a much older man and woman. They have been lying in stone boxes these are their sarcophagi.  The two figures are Adam the ‘adam or dust and Eve the ‘chava or life giver Together they are the dust given life the first of humanity. They have been so long in their shame that they are almost reluctant to leave death. Therefore Christ is literally yanking them from the tomb.  Often you will see Eve’s hand covered, the hand, so the story goes, with which she plucked the forbidden fruit.

In the totality of this image we see that Christ as taken control of the grave. Not only his grave but all graves. Death for Jesus was only a borrowing of time. And Jesus burial is only in a borrowed tomb. Because Christ has conquered death and brought the Resurrection. As with Joseph’s tomb, Jesus makes all our graves his own.

The three women with their spices were the first to witness this fulfillment. And in their joy, they do not keep this news to themselves. We are the inheritors of this Gospel, the GOOD NEWS. Christ has made our graves his own. Christ has conquered death, therefore we need not fear death. So go and tell your sisters and brothers, the tomb is empty. Tell the world that it is life, not death, which will come to us all. ALLELUIA!

REMEMBER THE GARDENER

The Triduum - The Great Vigil of Easter

Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him.”

☩ May I speak to you in the Name of Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

At the beginning of Lent in 2018, my friend, Charlie Edholm, visited from Tenessee and gave a lovely concert of Classical Guitar here at St. Davids. As part of that concert, he showcased a song he had just composed for the new album. It was inspired by a painting he had seen while visiting the Museum of Art in Atlanta. The words are beautiful, poetic, and fit well with the Feast of Easter, especially this year. You see, the story begins just as our story begins . . . In the beginning . . . The Creator brought order to the chaos. And filled this new creation with light. We re-created this drama tonight with the lighting of the new fire.

Then the Creator separated the waters of the chaos and held them in their place. The dry earth brought forth became known as land, and the separated waters became the sea. We show this in the waters of baptism, still dangerous to us but ordered by God.

And not by coincidence, these are the first to things you had to pass in order to enter this place tonight. Into this new creation, the Creator planted a Garden which was called Eden, and into this garden the creator placed humanity, the ‘adam which He had formed from the dust of the earth, so that this ‘adam might tend to creation, cultivating its fruits, and guarding its fragility.

So we find the first stanza of Charlie’s song:

Two lovers in the garden holding close,
The breeze in her hair and his winter coat,
With nothing but a care for love in the air
Each had the other to keep them warm.

But then something goes wrong. Humanity falls short on our job and we are banished from the beauty of the garden.

Two lovers left the garden close to dawn
Never to return once they had gone
Eternity had passed, each shot a glance back
And left the garden they called their own.

But here there is a promised hope as God never leaves humanity and reminds us time and again through the prophets that He will come and help.

Restless hearts, find peace from your wandering,
One day we will return to the garden.

At Christmas and in the Passion, we look to that promised hope. God comes to us to be with us. God puts on human flesh, human frailty, human pain, human grief, human suffering, human shame, All to show us how to love God by truly caring for each other and for creation. Jesus points us back to our original relationship. Back to the garden.

Charlie puts it this way:
A man came to the garden on his own,
He took off his jacket far from home,
With no one to notice where he had gone
He wonders if he should carry on.

We remembered this on Thursday night. Jesus gives his final lessons of love to the Apostles and charges us all to remember what this looks like. He gives us towels and water, bread and wine, ordinary things found in ordinary homes so that every day we might be drawn back to God and to each other.

After supper and the final lessons, Jesus goes to one of his favorite places. John says: “as was his custom” He and His followers go out to THE GARDEN. In this Garden of Gethsemane, he wrestles with what is to come. He must dig deep to where the roots of love are buried in order to have the strength to continue.

God must follow humanity’s course all the way to the grave. It is a pattern the Gardner knows well. The grain must first be planted, taken into the darkness of the earth and broken before the green blade can rise again.

The agony is real, but still, the refrain returns to remind us,
Restless hearts, find peace from your wandering,
One day we will return to the garden.

Then because we could not accept the love of God, because we are unwilling to do the work necessary to live in The Garden, we called for the death of Jesus. He is taken to a stony hill, opposite Gethsemane and is raised up on a dying tree. Naked as Adam he looks down from the cross at the mockery and into the garbage pit of Jerusalem, another sign of our reluctance to cultivate and guard creation. From this vantage, he still offers hope and shows us, LOVE. In the fullness of grace, he looks down from the cross and says a small prayer advocating for the humanity he loves and still has hope for. “Father forgive them, they do not know what they are doing”

It is said that the bones of the old ‘adam are buried in this rocky hill, giving it the nickname “the place of the skull” In a moment of deepest pain and deepest sorrow, Eden is slowly returning. The gospel writers tell us  that near the place he was crucified there was another Garden. In this Garden is a brand new tomb. The broken flesh, the dried up grain of our Lord’s body  is taken down from the cross prepared with oils and spices, and just like at his birth, wrapped in bands of cloth. It is then placed in this tomb, buried in the darkness of the earth. Tonight we find ourselves in the story. We entered a darkened tomb in which we heard the story’s of God’s great deeds for humanity beginning with the story of creation.

We continue to dramatize the great and ancient story. Into this early morning scene comes Mary, finding the earth has been opened, the stone has been moved, and the tomb is empty. Forgetting for a moment what Jesus had taught her, she runs to tell the others of this news. They come to see for themselves, but not understanding fully what resurrection means they return home, back to the safety of their current situation. But Mary remains . . . and weeps. She sees the garden all around but does not understand what all this means. The buds are beginning to bloom as new life breaks from the ground.
The trees stood in the garden watching all,
Many came and went as their leaves did fall,
Though branches are bare, the sweet springtime air
Restores the garden to life of old.

Soon she hears a mans voice “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?”  Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him,  “Sir, if you have carried him away,  tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” When he calls her by name “MARY” she suddenly recognizes him as her Teacher, who just three days ago was very dead, buried in the earth, but now is alive and standing before her.

Now we find ourselves in the early hours of resurrection. Jesus has taken on the roles of the ‘adam.
Christ is the new Adam, now placed in a garden to cultivate and guard it. He is easily mistaken as the Gardner because that is who he truly is. The Head Gardner, raised from death to new life to continue the lessons and draw us back to the garden. But this is not the end of the story.

The services of the Christian story are elemental by nature. (pun intended) Earth is placed on our heads at the beginning of Lent Remember that you are Dust, and to Dust, you shall Return Water and Fire permeate the Triduum And Pentecost, at the end of Eastertide, will bring wind to the forefront of our minds. The Air brought forth by The Word, The Spirit and the Breath of God. All of these point us to . . . our Creation, our Birth, our Life, our Death, and our Resurrection Used in this way, the elements point us toward a vision of a God revealed in creation and to our own origins in the dust of the Earth, a dust (an ‘adamah) which is being cultivated and guarded by the New Adam. This very Jesus Christ our Lord, who established the garden in the beginning, who worked in the garden at his resurrection, and who will one day bring us all back to The Garden.

Restless hearts, find peace from your wandering,
Lift your weary eyes towards the sunset skies,
When morning dawns that day, darkness fades away,
One day we will return to the garden.

So sing your Alleluia! Get your hands dirty as you learn from the garden. And always remember the Gardner. AMEN.