What Jesus knows, we need to understand. Sometimes (maybe lots of them), you gotta get lost in prayer to get found in this life. This real life. Not the pretend one of microchips and megabits. The real one, of mayhem in the high school hallway and medicine bottles on the kitchen counter. O, our Jesus lived in a mighty real world. His country invaded and occupied by a foreign army. No medicine as we know it, from antibiotics to aspirin; no jobs, by and large as we know them; no cash in hand or social safety net standing by. But plenty of hunger, anger; sickness, suffering; bigotry, suspicion; religion, rules. Into all of this (which should sound so familiar to us) steps Jesus. According to Mark, in chapter 1 alone, after his baptism, Jesus wrestles with Satan, he calls disciples, casts out demons in the synagogue, heals his best bud’s mother-in-law (…and they’re still friends!), and has both the creepy sick and curiously crazed at his doorstep lookin’ for a hand out and a lift up! Now that’s real life, real world, vital need, not just virtual reality (which is rarely real at all). Well, come sundown, Jesus beds down for the night, but come sun-up, he ain’t nowhere to be found. Holy Simole, we done’ lost us our Savior. No wonder, says Mark, every

one’s out lookin’ for him. Well, we’re told, “a great while before day, Jesus rose and went out to a lonely place, and there he prayed.” Whenever I read this, I personally am cut to the heart! Jesus doesn’t get up and get away so God can hear what Jesus has to say. O no, Jesus is out there alone and apart, so he can hear what God has to say! In the first place and case, prayer for Jesus (and… may it be so with us) is all about listening. But is it? Me, I’m so often about stating my case, citing my needs… and yours… makin’ my complaints, askin’ why and askin’ please and insistin’ on soon. (‘Course that’s just me, couldn’t be you… or could it… honestly?)

Well. Jesus has another way. He goes out early in the morning. Translation: Christ makes listening for God the first thing. That way, serving, pleasing God becomes the primary thing! (Can you say that about your days?) Second. Jesus is more a listener than a speaker on his early morning walk with God. And how is it we know? Because of what he reports to Simon Peter and his own. “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also; for that is why I came out.” We know the fruit of Jesus’ prayer. It can be ours too, if only we will listen. Here’s the first fruit. God will speak to us strength for our weakness and courage for our challenges. Next, God will give us the will to do that which we otherwise would not. Remember: Jesus has already and repeatedly, even in these opening verses of Mark, sought rest and relief from the needs around him. Look where he looked. Some: the same places as we. In his baptism. In his church (the synagogue). Among friends. All well and good. But in the end, there is nothing like a first hand, personal, even intimate relationship with Heaven. ‘Nothing quite like Holy conversation. God the speaker. We the listener. Notice I did not say we the hearer. [We often hear what we want: especially in prayer. That’s because of how we ask and what we speak. But when we simply listen, God’s words come to us unconditioned and unshaped by our will versus his. Often, what we receive is contrary to what we desire. And when it merely confirms our desires, we should wonder if we have it right. (E.g.s)] O, and don’t miss this, when Jesus listens, eagerly, fully, God answers his “Why” questions. Jesus is confirmed in his purpose. “‘On to the next towns, that I may preach… this is why I came out!” Tell the truth. Don’t you wonder why sometimes? I do. Why me? Why do I have to do this, bear this, be this, think this, feel this, go this way or that? I’m not always happy when God answers. But I have a better shot at hearing when I’ve made a better time for listening. I believe that by example, that is Jesus’ discovery too.

We began with a nod to the virtual in our lives. In Jesus’ name we can only conclude with the vital. Here is what Jesus shows and tells:

Prayer is vital.

‘Best done by listening. Use words only when you can’t

listen anymore, and then, as few as possible. Give God the

airtime and God will give you the time of your life!

Pray to begin with. (It’s not enough to make it your last resort.)

Pray regularly. Make it a habit. Jesus needed to and did. You?

Prayer gives strength, courage, will and purpose.

When you feel you must use words, use them first and best for others. Jesus did. “Simon, Simon. Look! Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” (Jesus to Peter only hours from the cross.)

When you pray, remember…

“Haven’t you heard? [Have you listened?] The Lord is the everlasting God, Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary, his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint; to the weak, strength. Even the youth shall faint and be weary, and fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, mount up with wings like eagles, run and not be weary, walk and not faint!      Isa. 40: 28-31.

Prayer is vital. And the virtual will never be its substitute.

But alas, this is a story we will never read. Instead I’ll continue to get notes like these, actually come across my desk. “I’ve noticed a trend watching kids, hearing stories from teachers/relatives. Kids are less respectful, don’t understand the value of family as much. In faith, what can we do? How do parents ensure these values in children?” And a little broader, this. “What’s discipleship for the modern era?  Dusty vagabonds are rounded up more aggressively now than 2000 years ago.”  Hmmm… let’s go back to the holy family’s story and see if we can get a little help with our own.

What’s the first lesson here? Boys will be boys? Parents are up against it? Jesus was just like us, or hardly like us at all? No. How about we try to remember this! It’s faith that forms families, and families that form faith. True then/now, Nazareth to right next door. Mary and Joseph attended to their faith! How are we doin’ with ours? Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem every year at Passover. Twelve years Jesus saw, heard, tasted, smelled, touched and was touched! It was custom, duty, devotion, ritual (like OC), joy! All this shaped the young Jesus. And the family. Because that’s how they chose to have their family take shape. You’re here today, others not. We don’t need to chide you. But we can absolutely invite you to invite others into this shared experience of guiding faith. [I’m reminded of the couple who came to me with multiple matters. They said, “We’ve decided to give faith a chance. We know that’s what we need.” Two weeks here. Gone six. Called, they report. “We gave up on it. We tried two weeks and were no better!” … Mary and Joseph with JESUS, mind you (and no daily dysfunction), at it 12 YEARS! ‘Nuff said! Family forms faith. But faith also forms family. The Proverb is right. The holy family knew it. Child, keep your father's commandment; don’t forsake your mother's teaching. Bind them upon your heart always; tie them about your neck. When you walk, they will lead you; when you lie down, they will watch over you; and when you awake, they will talk with you. For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life. Of course, if Jesus is your first born, you’re not just the McGillicotti’s from Manikee! ‘Not just like us. But one of the richest parts of this story is that we can be a lot more like them (Holy Family). There IS tension as Jesus is missing. There IS distress when Mary confronts Jesus at Temple and he her. There are confused parents and a child who will need to grow in compliance. What gets them through all of it can and will get us through! And it’s Jesus who best puts the question so all of us can find our focus. “Why did you come looking for me?” he asks. [He still asking: us.] I invite/urge you to ask yourself in your devotions. ‘Around the dinner table with your kids and grands. On the way to or from church. At bedtime prayers. Why do you come looking for Jesus? What do you suppose of him that will change your life?

Do look, especially at home, for what God has hidden in plain sight, especially in Jesus. I love this. All those gurus of God gathered in the Temple were amazed at Jesus. The same ones who’d read the Prophet’s words many times, “And a little child shall lead them.” Jesus sitting (hmm, a 12 yr. old sitting, how refreshing!), listening, asking. They were amazed at him. Mary and Joseph were astonished! I mean bowled over! Here they’d hourly fed and led him, but could not see him as these total strangers saw. Familiar?

“My child/spouse/friend/church/family… do/know that, succeed at that? Where’d this come from?” I love the Bible line that says of God (in Christ), “He does not judge by what the eye sees…”, but, in effect, by what the Holy Heart knows. How often we miss what is right in front of us… in each other. And how often we miss of Christ what is right before our eyes. [Invite others to cite a story. E.g., Ben Carson, who once struggled just to read, blessed with Christ’s healing touch… mother induced.] What would we and ours look like if seen through the eyes of possibility even when we can not see any more than faint likelihood?

Do take this to heart. What we can merely hold, God can greatly grow. I like to underline the contrasts in this story. Mary “holds these things in her heart.” On the other hand, Jesus goes home and “grows in wisdom, stature, and favor” with God and with us. Whatever else oughta strike us about this story, this we dare not miss. God is not done with Jesus at 12. Nor with us, now. Mary cannot understand it all. But she can hold on. Hang in. Hang around. Wait and watch and see. And then believe and bear witness. This is our story, too. We’re not expected to come here and go away understanding every thing. Or unreservedly committed as though we did. We’re just to carry what we can, knowing God can provide the increase. [DM. SS Teach Story. Nothing/everything with Christ.] You see, ahead of Jesus there are children to be lifted up. There are parables to be posited. There are souls to be comforted and to be challenged. There is laughing and living and suffering and dying to be done. And a stone to be shattered. Mary can’t see it. Maybe, not even Jesus. Almost certainly, not those doctors and lawyers in the Temple.  But God will grow it all into being. I ask you to hold on to those who surround you in Christ. Who knows what God will grow in them and in you? All I can tell you for sure is: as we shape our faith together, our faith will shape us. Mary and Joseph and Jesus would say “Amen.” I can tell you, much of what waits is hidden in plain view. Keep a sharp eye for God’s possibilities. I can tell you for sure: Jesus wants to know, “Why do you come looking?” It will make all the difference in what you will grow to see and say, in your life and in Christ’s way.

And you know what? Whether driven by the Spirit, like Jesus, or seduced or compelled by the Tempter, many a soul in these seats knows full well. It’s back to the wilderness tomorrow.

But friends, dear friends, don’t miss this. Always, always, in between us and the wilderness, there’s the water! Just as for John and for Jesus. Praise God!

How’s your imagination? I mean I can just see John, down in the river, dippin’ in the waters of life! I see him with a box o’ bubble bath sudsing up the Jordan. ‘Back brush in hand. ‘Scrubbin’ every underarm and back-o-the-neck square inch of body and soul. No fleas or flaws unattended while this Camel-wearin’, locust lovin’ prophet gets ready to baptize Israel-and-everybody into repentance. (‘Turnin’ our life around to God!) ‘And to make straight in the desert a highway for our God. And then comes Jesus. ‘Himself having walked the wilderness, just like we do all week, just to get to the shoreline of the Jordan. And to take the waters. And to set the soul to sparkling. And to see the dove settle down. And to hear the very voice of God lift up. “You are my beloved! With you I am well pleased!” BUT GET THIS. DO GET IT. Jesus doesn’t tarry. Or go off on his own. The SPIRIT drives him. The devil doesn’t draw or call him. The SPIRIT drives him out into that desert. Why? Why? To demonstrate to Jesus and to us, that once you’ve been to the waters, bathed in the blessing of God, you’re not the same! Neither is the wilderness you face. It’s lost its power. Its temptations can be toppled. Our devils and our demons can be put to flight. (Just like Jesus’.) Self-centeredness (feed yourself) can’t be your diet. You no longer have a need or a desire to make a big show and then dare God to break your fall when you do. (And you will.) Jesus can tell you, “Your arm’s too short to box with God.” But best: when the world offers you all it has (a good job, great family, real security, even others’ admiration and affection), you still say, “No.” And you sing, loud enough even the devil can hear. “Jesus is all the world to me, my life, my joy, my all; he is my strength from day to day, without him I would fall.” Or maybe this one, “My GOD is an awesome God, he reigns with power and love, my God is an awesome God.” Or maybe just this, “Give me Jesus; give me Jesus. O, when I’m ‘bout die, give Jesus.”

At the Jordan, in the waters, Jesus glistens. And gathers in the voice of God that speaks to his soul. Friend, whether you can remember your baptism or you can’t, the same has come to you! Come from the wilderness as we do, just like Jesus, return to it as we will… just like him, he and we go away, fortified and equipped.  Can you feel it? Won’t you remember it? Fortified & equipped! I tell you the truth. We can only imagine what might have happened with Jesus in the desert, had not God offered him the waters first. Only then, the Spirit, not the Devil, drives him into that wily wilderness. And Jesus is utterly equipped to deal with it, even defeat it.  Jesus is himself a New Creation, confirmed at his baptism. We are too, through ours! An awful lot o’ souls in church on Sunday end up wilderness wanderers (or warriors) on Monday. You might be one of them! I urge, empower, implore you. Do not be one of those who somehow forgets or behaves in morning as though you’ve not been at the waters on this sacred day before!!! Don’t be diminished in your ability to deal with the wilderness and the beasts it’s set-in-wait for you. Oh no. Remember your baptism and be thankful. Courageous. Contrary to sin. And committed to Christ. What a sweet victory God has set in store… for you… and for me… tomorrow… and for ever more.

‘Twas the week before Christmas and all through the town,

Every creature was combing the streets up and down.

For the church was reporting a theft off the lawn.

From the manger, it’s infant, baby Jesus was gone!

It was true! We were childless, with just days to go.

And where Jesus was lodging no soul seemed to know.

There was weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth,

Folks said, “Absent this child, who needs lights… or a wreath?”

‘Come 6 Christmas Eve came the year’s live Nativity.

The church all abuzz with expected activity.

When someone came running with news newly learned

Strangely, but surely, the child had returned!

It was wrapped as it left us, in blanket and cloth,

No harm, it appeared, not from robber or moth.

Only one thing was added, just tucked in its coat.

Jesus-returned came back with a note.

Now, here’s where the cute poetry just has to end

And poignancy takes up the message to send.

The note: “I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to take your Jesus. I just wanted a dolly for my girl. What I needed was right on your grass. A long time, I don’t have a job or money. I am ashamed. I pray, but why would God or Jesus come to me?  Last night, the Captain [Salvation Army] came. With presents. There’s a dolly! Now we can both have our Jesus back. This year he came to my house. A stranger brought him. Love did it. It must be Christmas!

I am sorry. But thank you.

All true. But truer and better, Christmas’ perfect gift has always come by home delivery. Love in an infant. Love in the flesh. Do look to Mary. A simple girl, likely in her early teens. She lives in a village where hardly any real jobs are, as we think of them today. For that, you have to walk 4 miles or so to Sepphoris. Over there’s where things are happening. Jews and Greeks. Commerce, trade, money, culture, excitement. Important people live there, certainly not in Nazareth. And not girls. And not 13! The whole place sorta reminds me of that dolly-less household in that W. Md. town. But get this!  Nazareth is where angels come to call. “Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you!” In this is the 1^st miracle for Mary and for us. God notices. Notices her. Us! Unremarkable to the world’s eye. Undistinguished. Even lowly. And still God chooses our like as vessels for God’s purposes and pleasure. Mary’s a little spooked. Who wouldn’t be?! The angel says to her, "Don’t be afraid, Mary.” You know, maybe that’s the 2nd Christmas present, ever. 1st, God notices. Next: don’t be afraid!  “The power of the most high will overshadow you!” The message is not just for Mary. Nor only for the announcement that God is conceiving something new… with our help! That unemployed Jesus thief years ago feared to be giftless, feared to be hopeless. ‘Feared to be directionless. And yet, in the quiet love of a stranger, experienced a new birth. A second-coming, if you will. If you’re afraid, for yourself, maybe for your child, maybe for your work or health or for someone you love, that old angel still bears the same promise, the Spirit that overshadows. And the promise, “With God nothing will be impossible.” God still gifts us, as Mary, with home delivery of the perfect gift of love.        A son, his name: Jesus. He will be great, Son of the Most High, reigning over the household to whom he’s promised. And of his kingdom there will be no end.” Here’s the perfect gift, indeed!

This year he came to my house. A stranger brought him. Love did it. It must be Christmas! The shepherds can tell us. They do every year. Generally, shepherds are no-accounts. Once in a while, we all know the feeling. These herders tend the flocks to be used as the sacrificial lambs up at the great Temple at Jerusalem. Their charges are literally born to die for the sins of the people. Imagine that.  For shepherds and sheep alike, their only real home is in the unmarked hills of Bethlehem. So once again a home delivery is in order. Cue the Christmas angel(s). “Love come down at Christmas, love all lovely, love divine… hear the angels give the sign.” (Alt.) don’t miss this. These angels announce on the open air. From the highest heaven. How come everybody else in town doesn’t get the word? (Wouldn’t that be a little like swimming in the unchlorinated section of the pool?) It seems, this is a home delivery! ‘Specific to the ear and heart of those who expect birth to bring sacrifice, a certain giving everything for the sake of sinners all. It’s what the sheep do. ‘What Jesus will do. It’s not the kind of message you can just put out on the airwaves. O, I know, we try to every year. Earlier and earlier it seems. Christmas carols, Christmas ads, Christmas decorations, Christmas cards and shows.  But from the first, something very different is required to receive the gift, the perfect gift of Christmas: the love of God in Jesus Christ. The shepherds go with haste, find Mary and Joseph, and the babe in a manger. And then they make known the saying told them concerning this child! They make house calls! They tell everybody! All who hear wonder at what the shepherds tell. And glory finds a voice and praise a song for the ages.  It’s like, this year the Infant Savior came to my house. A stranger brought him. Love did it. It must be Christmas!

O, what a relief. The perfect gift is already selected. It’s wrapping is the loveliest, and most unexpected. AND HOME DELIVERY IS AVAILABLE… to you and to me! And we have a Christmas calling to be deliverers ourselves. Person to person, house to house. No one needs to steal our Jesus. He is ours, not just to receive, but to give away. May this be the year YOU and I deliver Him… at some unexpecting door… to some unsuspecting heart!

1. God is not mocked, we reap what we sow.

2. Do not grow weary in well-doing, in due season we reap, if we do not lose heart.

3. As we have opportunity, let us do good to all, but especially to the household of faith.

4. Count it all joy, when you meet various trials.  You know: testing your faith produces steadfastness.

5. Give, and it will be given to you. Good measure: pressed down, shaken together, running over, right in your lap. The measure you give, the measure you get back…PLUS: forgiveness, as you forgive.

God is not mocked, we reap what we sow. My dear friend, Preacher Bobby Bishop used to say it with gusto like this. “Every farmer knows it so: You can’t sow corn and expect to reap beans!”

This is, I can tell you, a kind of double blessing. First off, life is reliable. We can trust the world God has given us. We can rest in the gospel Jesus has laid out for us. That’s very good to know, especially these days. So much all around makes us wonder if we can count on any thing or any body. [The Penn State news, the wobbling of a worrisome economy (is there any security in Social Security), the relations that surround us (BK/Br.)] So is there any reason to believe, any payoff to believe? God says yes. Jesus shows yes. God loves us. [FH/cross] Of course, there is another side to this blessing. God is watching, and waiting to work God’s wonders through us! So faithfulness, consistency is required. We act like it’s a revelation sometimes, a big surprise. But it is not! We can’t “raise hell” and expect God to “let down heaven”! ‘Can’t speak evil and expect to hear praise, ‘Can’t put down our kids/parents/partners/friends and expect to be upheld with kindnesses. ‘Can’t live like a state or a nation or a world with no moral compass and expect to find our way to the safe harbor of the good life. Sooo… Scripture offers us a second blessing to help us receive the first.

Do not grow weary in well-doing, in due season we reap, if we do not lose heart. We can’t find blessing if we give into the temptation to lose heart. God’s blessings are a reliable promise. But it will take living toward them, not away from or despite them. And it will take patience, a certain “holy doggedness” (there’s a phrase) to get there. The Africans are right to sing the song of the prophet Isaiah, “Those that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings, like eagles. They shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint; help us, Lord; Help us, Lord, in our way.” I cannot come to Thanksgiving this year without thanks for our newest and nearest neighbor, the Welcome Center. If, as Beverly and I, you watched it rise out of the ground and grow up before your eyes and take on its form and begin its function, it becomes an almost living thing. So long in coming. So many meetings and turning points and trials-before-triumphs. And so many times we all thought nothing would ever happen. But we learned along the way. God’s time for the blessing, not our own. We learned waiting does not mean doing nothing, it means actively placing yourself at the service of the Master and making ready for the moment you receive the call. I ask our couples, are you doing that in your life with each other? Are our students doing that in their classes? Are our workers doing that at their work? And when you get tired, really tired, do you wanna throw in the towel? Or will you wrap up in trust… that when you get tired, God will be the busier… even for you?!

Sometimes to receive a blessing, we are to be a blessing! As we have opportunity, let us do good to all but especially to the household of faith. Here’s a twist on Thanksgiving you can talk about around the table come the Thursday Feast. Take time to thank God for all the places in your life God offers you the chance to be a blessing to others! Here is our purpose. Here is our sense of

mission and meaning. I invite you to inspire the youngest souls around your table with tales of taking care, with and for others! Lift the places, be creative with the people you can serve and let each person, youngest to oldest do the same [7yr. old doing fresh water in Africa, 9 yr. olds Cider for Srs., Sr.s > call ministry, fisher tournament for city kids in Indianapolis, etc.]  Watch the joy on the faces and give thanks for the joy. And DO take note. Scripture singles out the joy of being a blessing to the household of faith itself. What better time, with thanks at hand and the Christchild-coming-soon to ask: what am I doing with and for those who call on his name? [Hospitality ministries of the season.]

Count it all joy, when you meet various trials. You know: testing your faith produces steadfastness. Among the blessings for which we can count our blessings, this one’s pretty cool. If there’s anything that saps the soul, it’s the question what for! What’s the point? Is there some purpose or good that comes from challenge and distress? God in Christ offers an affirmation. Testing your faith produces steadfastness. [Hesed… the mark of the Holy] The amazing truth of trial is it can bring us near to God, both in our relationship and in our person. [The Bradford story.]

Give, and it will be given to you. Good measure: pressed down, shaken together, running over, right in your lap. The measure you give, the measure you get back…PLUS: forgiveness, as you forgive. Here is the last best blessing we can lift. When we give of faith, person, material or in our bonds to each other, we do not become less, but more. We don’t get emptied we get filled. We get what we deserve AND MORE.  So much more. Pressed down and overflowing. 40 years in ministry and marriage have shown me it is so. [E.g.s] 30+ years a parent confirm the report. And a lifetime a believer has taught me to sing over and over, “Blessed assurance Jesus is mine. O, what a foretaste of glory divine!”  How many of you can sing the same song?… Lift your hands! (Friend, if you’re not sure you can lift your hand, go and sit and talk with one of these who can. Do it right after church. Don’t waste a minute!)

When you plant simple joy…YOU can gain a generous harvest.

A handful of blessings for an eternity among the blessed, in Jesus name. Thanks be to God.

I’m all noise, with no music in my soul or in my life. I can be a Know-It-All and a Right-Believer, even (no, especially) in Jesus, but have not love, do not do love, share love, I’m like a song without a beat, a symphony without rhythm, a poem without rhyme!  More or less, that’s what Paul wrote centuries ago. Not to couples, or families, but to the Church at Corinth. There, folks claiming to follow Jesus’ way were stuck on having their own way. Folks were so hung-up on everybody else believin’ and behavin’ their way, they couldn’t find Jesus’ way. Some folks said, “Let’s just add the Jesus Way to all our old ways. Embrace them all. It’s so much easier, what with tryin’ to live in this modern day!” Why, you couldn’t tell the Christians from the vaguely religious or the pretty much ungodly. So Paul wrote them and said. “Let me tell you about the LOVE WAY. IT IS The JESUS WAY!” Little wonder that when we want to share a Family Day, a Marriage Day, a Faith Day, we’d try to learn what love has to say.  It won’t make us perfect. ‘Won’t make family or faith-life easy. ‘Won’t root out every wrong or evil. But it WILL shine a light that shows us how our hearts and our feet might go. Go to love. Love. LOVE.

Russian novelist Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (The Gulag Archipelago) says something about us and our world that applies to our personal world and our most intimate relationships. “If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them.  But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.  And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” Jesus. Perhaps, only Jesus. Here’s the rub. Love and unloving are inside us. Dreams and dreads. Fulfillment, disillusion and disappointment. If we are ever to be filled with God, filled with love, like Christ, we will have to empty it all out. What anger or envy would you need to set aside in your marriage, your family, your soul? What hurt or pride would we need to dismiss? What insistence on our own way would you need to give up or give over? What security or misplaced affection in things or people would we need to surrender? But who here’s willing to destroy a piece of his/her own heart? Anyone else but Jesus? No wonder we are saved to follow him! Now, our Holy God can’t long abide the presence of the unholy. A law of physics applies here: no two objects can occupy the same space at the same time. A spiritual law: Holiness and sin can’t both rent the apartment of your soul at once! The cross of Christ is heaven’s way of showing us to clear-the-soul, to make room, to choose the holy. “My Body broken,” says Christ:  uncluttered. The Cup, “poured out for… many:” emptied. It is to such a personal life we are called. And to relationships that reflect and reveal this every day. DO take heart. That doesn’t mean your every day will look like the cross on Jesus’ last day. We’re not aiming to be crucified, but sanctified. Not martyred but MADE NEW. O, we can describe what it might look like. Paul gives us the words! For him, for us, in Christ, here’s what we’re aimin’ for.

We wait for each other to come-around, like Jesus waits for us. And with the same gift: kindness. In Christ, you see: at home, in the car, even when the kids act-up… or your in-laws… love is patient and kind; love wastes no time worrying about being #1, or showing off like you are. ‘See, love is not jealous or boastful. All arrogance is out.  And manners? No problem. Afterall, real love lives in the manner of Jesus. Brace yourself. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful. OK, that’s not easy. But both really stem from holding onto what’s wrong, instead of what’s right, “what’s up”, instead of who God let down from heaven to lift us up.  Love “puts up with” sometimes, because “Those who wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles!” Here’s a thing to remember in marriage and family alike. Love won’t fall for just anything because it knows enough to stand up for something… for those we love, and Christ above all! ‘Turns out, as long as we have Christ in our hearts, well, we never run out of hope, or the chance to choose to ‘hold on”. ‘Truth is, we don’t know everything, just now. We don’t need to. We know the ONE thing that really matters above all else. “God was in Christ, hugging the world and still hugging us to Himself!” That’s not ever going to change. So even when that day comes when we stand before the One who knows our secrets, our private ones, our family ones, our best and worst ones, why, Faith will last, and Hope and Love (when we love Jesus and love like him) That’s the BEST! So, put love first and you’ll be SOMETHING, in this world of friendship, marriage, family and faith. And you’ll be something in the next world, too!

Consider Joseph, Papa Jacob and the boys. You remember. Dad plays favorites, or is thought to. Little Joe gets the Technicolor Dream Coat. And all those dreams. We read today about the one where Joe gets to lord it over all his brothers, even mom and dad. The brothers get lethally jealous of Joe. Even Pop resents the arrogance of it all. And he does not forget it. (More about that in a minute.) There are a couple of useful lessons here. No.1. Not all dreams are holy! And not all dreams are to be shared. It’s good to be honest and forthright. But you don’t have to let out everything you think. ‘Say everything you know. ‘Blurt out every feeling. Some stuff cuts. And Jacob can tell you after hearing Joseph’s dream; some cuts are a long while healing! I suppose wants are a step down from dreams, but I think they’re probably in the same family. Wants and dreams need to be shared thoughtfully. Or they can crush a relationship. And have a long chain of unintended consequences. This Bible family’s tale of woe is not the only one. I think of teens and parents in the college hunt. Disputes are often more than a test of wills; they are a demolition derby where dreams collide. The same when changing jobs moves families. And more. Whenever you reveal your dreams, do whatever you can to get and stay in touch with all the other dreams and dreamers in the room. Oh, here’s dream lesson No. 2. God’s dreams ARE holy, and he invites us to STAR in them. ‘Turns out Joseph will dream the dreams of God (not just his own). He’ll save Israel for God’s saving work on earth. Now, your role might be a bit more modest. But Heaven has a purpose and a dream for you. Just for today. But also for your life! [Right place/time to say/do the right thing: FB tks for start/ Flan…VIM shelter, C Hope; Call M Gor lttr.] The point here: dreaming gets a lot more complicated and a lot more important when there are others in your life to whom to say good night. If you doubt it, ask the Waltons!

The Jesus in the Temple story has some lessons to teach as well. True, Luke writes the story to tell us about Jesus. ‘Who he was. ‘How special from the start. ‘How he got from childhood to Suffering Servanthood. But the story is so human and revealing it speaks to our own daily round. How about a hand full of pithy pointers Mary and Joseph could swear to on a stack of Bibles. 1) Pay attention! It seemed to be a problem on leaving Jerusalem. Maybe Mary was talkin’ women’s talk with the women. Joseph, literally talkin’ shop. Likely, they were traveling with extended family, and all their tales of woe. Does your journey ever include these things? Then when Jesus came up missing, can’t you see each pointing to the other? Here’s the lesson. Pay attention. Don’t let the urgent and the small overwhelm the important and the vital in your family. Count safety and security first. Love like there’s no tomorrow. (After all there are no insurance policies on tomorrow.) And take time with each other. The notion you somehow have to make time is false. God’s already done that. All WE have to do is manage time! Watch your kids and grinds and what they do, home/school/w-friends. They’ll absolutely be looking… to see if you are. Offer your help. If you don’t they’ll find it elsewhere. (Web-worries!) Lesson 2) Give each other space. Kids need room to grow and learn their (Heavenly) Father’s business. Spouses too. It’s tough to share up-time with folks who never get down-time.  No. 3) Give an example, give a direction. When Jesus asks, “What shepherd wouldn’t leave the 99 to find the lost 1, he had more than sheep tenders for an example, he could remember when Mary and Joseph pitched the family to poke about 3 days in search of him. What example have you for your family? When Jesus says, “Come and follow me,” he knows all about direction. Written on his heart is Psalm 32: 8. “The Lord says, “I will guide you along the best pathway for your life. I will advise you and watch over you.” What’s written on your heart for your loves, and do they know it as a word from God? Lesson No. 4. Fashion good boundaries for you and yours.  Spouses: beware friends at work and play with whom you lodge words and feelings only your partner should hear. Cheating emotionally is as/more damaging as cheating physically. And one can lead to the other. (Teach your kids this.) Kids need borders to grow upright. When anything goes, few values come to stay. (M E Pool). Discipline, don’t just punish. Guide consistently and in advance. Jesus knew the line, “Don’t ignore it when the Lord disciplines you, or be discouraged when he corrects you. For he corrects whom he loves, like a father the child in whom he delights.”  Lesson No 5. Give the young, and yourself, the gift of God’s Word. Don’t forget to get the GOOD outta the Good Book!  (‘Nuff said! how else did Jesus go back to Nazareth and grow “in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and mankind.”

Permit me one last word. ‘Not a lesson, but an insight. Our life needn’t be a circle, an endless Merry-Go-Round. God is drawing a line through it: with a purpose and a destination “made in heaven for you!” Portions of the Bible flirt with a common notion across cultures and times we too have heard. Its not just Disney’s Lion King theme song that sings of the circle of life! Ecclesiastes: 1: 9 exclaims, “What has been is what will be, ‘has been done…will be done; there’s nothing new under the sun.” Yet, elsewhere we are taught, “Behold, the Lord doeth a new thing.” Jesus rejects the circle idea in favor of the line. He is on his way to Jerusalem. ‘Sets his face for the journey. 'Tells us to follow. ‘Insists if we go up the hill, we must come down and heal and feed. He doesn’t come back at the end, having defeated the cross, only to linger and do it all over again. He rises to make a place for us. Another place, that where he is, we can be also. And he will return, but only to take us there. You and yours, believers all, are NOT condemned to a treadmill. You have a ticket on the Glory Train. Life’s not easy, or undistracted. But in Christ it offers saving grace. Goodnight everybody!

It’s a Bible thing, don’t you know! Maybe John’s Gospel gives us the best glimpse. At the start, Jesus greets, invites welcomes. Don’t miss this. These are not all the same thing. Then or now! Christ greets. Only come near him and he will see you, really see you. See your wants, hurts, hopes, doubts, your faith as-it-is. (He hopes we’ll do as much for each other, strangers or friends.) ‘Member what Linda just read? Jesus welcomes Philip to follow. Phil gets so excited he can’t keep Jesus a secret. He goes & tells Nathanael. Nat’s havin’ none of it. A Savior outta Nazareth? Pshh! Why that’s like a lotta help outta Washington. Not! Like us, Phil’s got no argument for Nat. ‘Doesn’t know all the doctrine. ‘Flops at the fine points about Jesus. All Phil’s got… is an experience! Now, nobody can quarrel when you share your experience. It’s yours! Phil just gives what he’s got. That’s all anyone, even Jesus, can ask of you. “Come and see,” he says. Watch how this works. Jesus sees Nat comin’. ‘Sees him, through and through. ‘Speaks to him in a way that says, “You’re no mere stranger to me.” That’s greeting. When Nat marvels, Jesus invites, “Come closer, I’ll show you more. Friends, this is still the message we need to share. Real invitation always says, come closer. Then comes the best. Welcome! Jesus says to Nat, “You’ll see heaven open, and the angels comin’ and goin’ with me.” Now that’s welcome. That’s what we’re to go tell.

Why’s that so scary? Maybe we just don’t wanna look or sound odd. Afterall, “Nobody else’s doin’ it!” (97% aren’t!) Maybe we’re afraid we’ll start an argument/discussion and be in over our heads. Not to worry. You never need to tell ALL about Jesus. ‘Explain him in full. ‘Know all the answers. ‘Meet someone else’s objections. Just share what it’s like for you to walk with Jesus. That’ll be enough and to spare. You don’t have to be Billy Graham, Joel Osteen, or Joyce Mayer. Just be you: the person Jesus calls friend. …Does the thought of speaking up for Jesus kinda freak you out? Maybe it’s because you’re turned off by the way others do it. Pushy folks. Rude folks. Know-it-all folks. Narrow-minded, often downright mean folks. Not to worry. You can’t be counted in that crowd if Jesus is willing to keep company with you! Remember: God knows even Jesus is known by the company he keeps. For you to be you, while speaking of him, lets others know they can be themselves with him… because they can be themselves with you.

How might this work? Here’s another great Bible story from John.

‘Ever get the feelin’ God just put you someplace? Right place? Right time? Philip used to swear an angel put him on the road from Jerusalem to Gaza. Comin’ on: this eunuch in a chariot, the Treasurer of Ethiopia! And he’s readin’ his Bible ‘cause traffic is light and handhelds for distracted drivers are not yet a crime! He looks confused. This’d be like you in a ’95 traffic jam, lookin’ over to see Sec. Treas, Tim Geitner outta his chauffered limo. He’s pitchin’ his Ipad update from Wall Street and ponderin’ a portion of Scripture. What would you do? What would you do? Well, Philip hops the chariot, asks if he can help. “How can I get this… without a guide?” Phil… sits down, fills in this important fellow up to the good news of Jesus. The man believes and is baptized. Great story. And should you meet Tim Geitner on Rt. 95, I’d hope you’d offer him a little religion too. I imagine he can use it about now! But if Tim never comes near, there might be another for whom you could be just like old Philip, climbed up in that chariot. Here’s what and here’s all Philip does. 1^st, he just goes where he feels/hears God call him to go. We can do that, you and I. No chariots, eunuchs, important or rich folk required. 2^nd, even when he sees a soul in trouble, he has the good sense to wait to be asked to help. Good advice. Wait for the moment to listen and to witness. (Be wise as an angel in knowing when and where to tread.) 3^rd, Phil sits down. He’s willing to spend time. Hit and run is never a good strategy, on the road, or along the way with a soul in need. Not then. Not now. always give yourself time to give Jesus space in another’s heart. 4^th, Phil tells what he knows, Jesus the Best. That’s all we need to do. 5^th, at the last, he seized the moment. He blessed the decision. You and I, we may not be baptizing at home, on the road, in the class or on the job. But we can certainly claim the moment to encourage others to claim the name… of Jesus.

Dare to share, we urge two weeks ago. Come and see, we invited last week. Go and tell, we commission you today. It’s as natural as exclaiming to a friend on a hike, or in a corridor at the mall, “Hey, come ‘ere. You gotta see this!” You don’t have to wait for a chariot to come rollin’ by. Somebody’s gonna say to you, “I wonder why life’s like this,” or, “It all seems so hard.”  When possible, offer a response from a Christian perspective. What a great time to sit close and say, “I don’t have all the answers, but I believe…” Be yourself. What’s good enough for you should be good enough for you and for everyone you meet. Watch for a chance to take the conversation deeper. Don’t you just know old Philip was lookin’ at that seeker’s facial and body language? If someone’s closing down, wait up… for another time. If he or she tunes in and perks up, be prepared to continue. Open up. Own up. Admitting we’re weak and imperfect too helps bond us to those feeling even more so, in the moment. Follow up. Encourage others to do something with the conversation. Offer them the places where you yourself are guided and fed: the Word, prayer, the Church, even this church… where Christ is our foundation, welcome is our heart, and service is our passion. Go and tell!

O, we ‘been sayin’ it. ‘Messaging it. ‘Meaning it, for sure. Come and see. Go and tell. Dare to share. Here is radical hospitality, deep welcome. GOSPEL: Good News! Last week we saw/heard how some 40 of our youth/adults dared to share the love of God in Jesus Christ by restoring homes and renewing spirits this summer. But it all begins with an invitation from Jesus. COME and SEE. If the entire Gospel of John were a hymn, the refrain, the chorus, the repeated line would be just this. Come and see. First Jesus says it. ‘Then the disciples, over and over. And it sounds so lovely, simple, clear. Until you really try it. And most of us have been tryin’: for a little while, or a lifetime. Here’s the thing…

If we’re gonna come to Jesus, we gotta leave where we are. We gotta leave behind alotta what we ‘been luggin’ around, maybe for a long time. And we gotta get goin’, knowin’ we gotta long way to go. O, I admit it, coming along with Jesus is not easy! Still, the Savior beckons, inviting and insistent. So what will you do? You can’t just stay put and come along with Jesus. Change will be required. Ay, there’s the rub! Isaiah, the old-prophet-Jesus-so-favored had the hang of this long before Christ. Here’s his first word on the subject. “HO, EVERY one who thirsts, come to the waters….” Too many of us miss the “HO” before trying to “Hightail after Jesus.” I mean, we just keep doin’ what we’re doin’. ‘Bein’ who we’re bein’. Relying on whom/what we’re relying… and so on. Isaiah puts a stop sign right in our spiritual, behavioral, attitudinal path.  “HO!” If you fret, quit fretting. If you doubt, quit doubting. If you fib, quit fibbin’. If you fear, stop running. If you drink, quit drinking. If you lust, stop leering. If you indebt yourself, quit charging. GOT IT? HO! Stop. Then let go. Put down your anger. Release your resentment. Trade in your catalogues-of-wants for a little Bible-talk about blessings. Teach your kids to get a kick outta soccer, but the sign of salvation outta Christ. Get a start on getting’ close to God through Jesus. …How many? How many in this room & around this old world on World Communion Sunday are thirsty. Not Coke or Pepsi or Perrier thirsty, but soul thirsty? And, as the prophet says, drinking from somewhere, or something that just leaves you, well… thirsty?! Isaiah invites, “Come to the waters.” Jesus says, “Come unto me… I …am the water of life. Drink of me and you’ll never be thirsty. (Let this bread be my body and my body your bead …and you’ll never be hungry, ever again!)” …I love it that on that shoreline-of-the-Jordan where John was baptizing, two of his disciples were still thirsty, and a might peckish in the passion of their souls. They were hungry for God. And John said to them, “Why, just look… over there, the Lamb of God.” And they heeded the “Ho” sign. ‘Stopped doin’ what they were doin’ (hangin’ out with John) and followed Jesus. He turned, saw them, asked their hearts’ desire. And he invited, “Come and see!” And they followed. What about you? Jesus is still inviting. In fact, he’s set a fine table in the Spirit. ‘Wants you to step out, step up and come! But should you do so, he will ask, “What do you see?”

Coming to Jesus doesn’t quite get it done, friends. Come and see, says he! It is time. ‘Well past time.. to open our eyes. Those earliest followers got an eye full. And it took them ‘til well past the Resurrection morning to see. But at least they began, early on, to open their eyes. Come, yes. But look, too. Open your eyes and see. This Jesus has something different to show for this world… and the next! In that day as this, the world is intent on an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth… ‘til all the world is blind and dark and gummy! Jesus shows, “Love your enemies and pray for those who spitefully use you.” In a world of snooty, self-righteous, self-absorbed souls, where many a prayer, whispered if not spoken starts, “Lord, I thank you that I am not like that other soul…”, in such a world, Jesus hears the prayer of the sinner who signals, “Lord, have mercy on me, a stray person in need of stern pardon.” At a time when so many strive for crowns of influence and crescendos of praise, Jesus will bow for a plat of thorns and a cross that pardons. At a time when we spy kids with no hope, marriages with little certainty, and illnesses without comfort… Jesus breaks out of a rock-solid tomb, offers at least one relationship (with him) that redeems, and sets a table that silences every suffering of body, mind and soul. So should you accept his invitation to COME… open your EYES…. For surely Christ will want to know… WHAT DO YOU SEE? … & then, I assure you, he’ll be praying, GO & TELL.

I mean, some stuff’s just no laughing matter. O, how many of us love to laugh. The good kind. The fun kind. The kind that makes you wanna fall down or fall over, makes your nose wanna show everybody what you just drank, or the tears run down like rollicking-rivulets-of-relief from boredom or distress. A good laugh is a great gift, and God knows I myself love it so. But… did you know?… It takes the Bible 12 different words in 2 languages used 39 times to cover the subject. And more than ½ are not so good. They tell us how laughter can lash out at the human soul or lacerate the bond between ourselves and God! They all come down to this: scorn. Putting down, not lifting up. Raising doubt, not raising hope. Pointing, sniveling, snickering. Hence command 11. O, don’t do that. At school this week. (Yea, I know it’s coming.) Not at work. Not at the table over some family member or friend. Thou simply shalt not snicker! … But especially, profoundly, positively… not at God. For God’s sake not. Or for your sake. Or for the sake or in the name of Jesus Christ!

Abraham and Sarah can help us here. In today’s lesson, we meet up with Abraham, sittin’ on his front porch, so to speak. He spies these three guys. Like a good western cowboy, he over-the-shoulders to Sarah, “Somebody’s comin’!” (Apparently, Sarah doesn’t hear. Maybe she was using her hair dryer.) Now old Abe senses there’s somethin’ holy afoot. Afterall, just verses earlier, he’s had a visit from God! At 99, he’s been told he and Sarah are gonna have a baby! And you know what Abraham does? He laughs. ‘Laughs at God! Abraham falls on his face and laughs. “COME on, Lord. I’m soon to be 100. A child?! NOT!” It’s like first Abe snickered, then outright laughs at GOD! In that instant, Abraham’s certainty outweighs God’s authority! In fact, he tries to help God out. “Why put yourself to the trouble of making a miracle?” he asks. “You know, I’ve got Ishmael. Do your thing with him!” But God insists. NOW, here’s Abe with these 3 visitors. He senses somethin’s up. And it’s holy.  So he welcomes his visitors with the required extravagance. But it’s a man world in that day. So he puts Sarah doin’ much of welcoming work. The messengers ask, “Where’s Sarah?” “In the tent.” The Lord pipes up, “I’ll surely return to you in the spring, and Sarah shall have a son.” Sarah is listening at the tent flap. Sarah laughs to herself. “Are you kidding me? Pregnant at 89? NOT! (That’s ridiculous! I’m quite certain.) Well, God hears her laughter, feels her snicker, even though she does so to herself! There’s a lesson there for us, you know! When God confronts her, she says, “I never….” God responds, “O yes, you ever!!!” he asks her this question. It puts her certainty to the test. He asks, “So… is there anything too hard …for God?”

Now there are three lessons here, suitable for a first week in school, a new week in our families and a new day in our world.

First, making welcome for God in our lives is no laughing matter. Perhaps one thing to the good marks Abraham. He’s willing to welcome God. ‘To sense the presence of the Holy in the ordinary. If it doesn’t sound too goofy, put it this way. Abraham seems keenly aware he could be entertaining angels unawares! He’s into holy hospitality! He beckons toward him every opportunity to be in touch and in conversation with God! Do you do that? Do you really believe God might be coming your way, just to speak /visit with you?! [Examples… calling by the shore >>> conversations with the Lake… Jesus would have understood. Wilbur… I always stop and listen to the quiet (5 AM) before I start to make a lot of noise. Teacher… I always greet my kids at the door. It tells them somebody can hardly wait to see them, just like God. And I always tell them, “We’re gonna have a good day today.”]

Second, making light of what God can do is no laughing matter either. Abraham experiences 1^st hand what Jesus says in the first person. “With human beings this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”  Mtt. 19: 26. And again, to the dad of an ill child, who believes, but wonders (don’t we all). “What do you mean, heal him if you can.  don’t you know, “All things are possible to him who believes.” Mark 9: 23 God keeps telling us just as he tells sarah, “Nothing’s too hard for God. Not even a baby shower for a ninety yr. old!” [I understand, after watching a building rise over these last 9 months, “God has begun a new work in you. And he is eager to complete it! This is a snicker free zone! I like what MEH tells the kids: Mexican, not Mexican’t! I am moved by RB/Sct. Sud… & others who have more than endured, they have triumphed over illness and limitation… not on their own, but by the grace of God.] What are you facing that looks just, well, impossible? Ask yourself… do you really believe it is bigger than God’s power to be bigger in you? O, Sarah can tell you. Don’t laugh. Not even to yourself. See, God is always near enough to hear. And you have no need to laugh in doubt… or shrink in fear!

Third, whatever and what all God has set before us, God’s promises, if you will, are a snicker-free zone. I read that famous passage from Eccelsiastes last Thursday at Grill and Chill. It’s the one about to every thing there is a season. Back to school, work, the challenge of kids/parents, good economy or bad, war & peace. You know the real words. But then we read from this sage, this wise, holy soul who gave us this marvelous Book, these words. “God has made everything beautiful in its time. He has put eternity into [our] mind, so [we] cannot find out what God has done from beginning to end. Whatever God does endures for ever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it; God has made it so, in order that [we] should hold God in awe. What is, already has been; what’s to be, already has been; and God seeks what/[who] has been driven away.”  Ecc.  3: 11, 14-15 So when God gives you a calling [SS teach, choir, Council, Mission, etc.], don’t laugh. In God’s mind and in God’s power and time, why, it’s already been accomplished! All we need to do is do it. When you read/or your kids read the course outline, don’t snicker, “No way!” Just do it. When you hear the doc say the treatment, don’t snicker in your innards. Surely God will hear as though you laughed out loud. Naa. instead, try this, “I can do all things in him who strengthens me.”

Friends, this is God’s time with you and with me. And I tell you earnest andi n truth. This is no laughing matter!

Drone, drone, drone along grumpy as can be.

Verily, verily you’ll be switched by what you will not see!

(2nd time, all singing!)

Here, here, here’s the thing, Jesus teaches me

Verily, verily ev-ery thing ain’t what it seems to be.

(2nd time, all singing!)

All, all, my friends, has not the same import

Verily, verily you’d be wise all wrangling to thwart.

(2nd time, all singing!)

Last verse…

Praise, praise, praise the Lord, and hold your God the Most

Cling-to-him, Look-for-him, in his son & through the Holy Ghost.

Methodists have known all about rancor and wrangling 'way back to John Wesley, founder of our clan. He was often “on stage” with folks who disputed him. He had a wonderful way of engaging, but disarming them. Once, he found himself in trouble with a pesky Presbyterian over the notion of predestination. Finally, he just quits arguing, crosses the platform, extends his hand (gesture), and simply offers, “If your heart is as my heart [in love with Christ for salvation], give me your hand.” It was a kind of signal moment we could use today in many places. In spirit, it’s the 2^nd leg of that great Wesleyan teaching we’ll be exploring this month. “In essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty, in all things charity.” O, let’s take a walk with this misunderstood understanding, in non-essentials liberty!

Jesus never spoke the words, in non-essentials liberty. Yet, he taught the thought, often, deeply, and in a couple of forms. Mark’s Gospel gives a glimpse on an especially busy teaching day. The general message in easy terms. Figure out the difference between the big stuff and the small stuff. Then: don’t sweat the small stuff! O, and measure with God’s ruler, not your own! Here’s the gist of Mark’s report. Christ hears his clan fussin’ and fumin’ on the way up the coast to Capernaum. Once there, he asks, “What was that all about?” Well, now they get quiet. Embarrassed. They’re caught. BUSTED… by Jesus. (‘You ever been that? I have. And whenever you are, you just got nothin’ to say!) The argument, I’m more important than you are. (Singsong) How UNJesus! And they know it. Hear what Jesus says. “It’s not essential to be 1^st, but faithful; not served, but in service! It’s downright freeing.” (In recognizing non-essentials, there is liberty.) If you belittle others, lookin’ down your nose, you place them lookin’ up your nostrils. Gross! Not a pretty sight. What’s unlovely in you is revealed. Even Heaven can see!

Now Jesus goes farther. ‘A child in his lap. “Just believe like the little ones. That’s enough. Remember: the littlest ones always see the biggest picture!” Many a Church Council across the ages has gotten too big for its britches. ‘Tried to parse the mysteries of God. And then enforce its opinions. ‘Like the dear souls who tried to solve how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. Mercy! Christ treasures the adventurous believer… who wants to know more. ‘Thirsty for truth, loving to learn… like a child. And willing to see old things in new ways. Too often, we insist on our own view, only to admit no new truth. We play the game, “Yes That’s Nice, But.” No matter what the other says, we throw up a wall of rejection and retort. I know a head doc whose patient insisted there was nothing the therapist could do for him. ‘Claimed he was already dead! The therapist asked, “Do dead men bleed?”  The doc produced a little lance, gently poked the man’s finger. Of course… a drop of blood. The fella was ecstatic. “Look doc,” cried this troubled soul, “Dead men DO bleed!” Wow. Make our own opinions essential, or exclusive, and we are imprisoned, and the other souls around us are likewise enchained. In NON-essentials, liberty. Perspective. Openness. No wonder Wesley proudly says, “Our people think and let think!” He does not mean we are wishy-washy or unprincipled. He means we are liberated and liberating in the name and cause of Jesus Christ!

O, the Lord’s not done with us or the 12. They fuss of a healer not one of them. Say’s Jesus, “He who is not against us is for us.” While my friend Eric Byrd IS right, “ ‘Ain’t everybody saved, ya know,” there are still believers in unexpected corners and good souls in other companies than our own. There are parties in households, and businesses, and churches, and congress, and communities who need to understand, ‘cause we can’t agree on everything, doesn’t mean we can’t agree on anything. Jesus is no friend to sin, but sinners are the love of his life. You and I can be kinder to each other and to all. “Whoever gives a cup of water in my name will by no means lose his reward,” says Christ.

In non-essentials, liberty. Jesus never says that. But he teaches it in a way Wesley didn’t mean when he spoke up. John’s was not a consumer age like ours. Consumerism wasn’t epidemic… as today.

Luke’s Gospel gives us a glimpse of Jesus’ twist on liberty that frees the soul. Ours. Everyone’s. Jesus appeals to us. Get unstuffed!

He tells the story of the guy who builds barns to store his stuff. (Nobody’d thought up those EZ Storage pods and businesses yet.) He keeps on getting’ and buildin’ til finally God tells him, “Forget about ‘eat, drink and be merry’ with all that stuff, stuff.” “Silly soul, you’re comin’ home to me tonight! I’m all you need! What a waste was all your worry and pilin’ up stuff!” Says Jesus, “Be rich toward God. It’s the only treasure you need to treasure!”

Imagine what your life and mine would be. How freeing. If only we would set aside our passion for the latest gadget, the next big get, the cool next notion. If only we learn to separate the unnecessary form the indispensable. Somethin’s jacked-up, so long as we spend more effort to get the flat-screen TV than on givin’ our kids a picture of heaven on earth. VBS was right this week. We gotta Shake It Up. ‘Get our heads right. ‘Our hearts right. (Thanks to all, kids, parents, teachers & staff for the reminder!) This week, our Camp Hopers will get a little lesson from on high. “Live simply, that others may simply live!” Jesus says it this way, “Consider the ravens (in the air, not the ones locked out or on strike, which ever): they neither sow nor reap, have neither storehouse nor barn, yet God feeds them. How much more value are you than birds!”

In NON-essentials… liberty! Also priorities and perspective. Humility. Kindness. Openness. Generosity. Assurance. Blessing!

In fact, let’s start here. In the longest prayer Jesus says, at the end of Jesus’ days, for this very thing, he prays! “I do not pray for these [12] only, but also for those who believe in me through their word, that they may all be one; even as you, Father, are in me, and I in thee…that the world may believe you sent me.”  Jn. 17: 20-21 Christ commits his life to a body of believers who are ONE. He knows one voice, one life & one faith convert souls and consecrate lives like nothing else! Every kid who wants to stray knows this simple game to play. Tell mom dad said yes. (Vice versa.) Pit them against each other and the day is yours to do what you want. Truly, the Devil knows the same trick and has had more practice. Let believers take note. Unite in faith & let the devil take the back seat.

So what are these essentials? Wesley began with the 39 Articles of Religion. By the time he was done, Methodists were down to 27 (25 + 2). Me? I’m down to 10 minutes to complete this message, so I’m going to re-work the list to just 6! (Yes, I know we’re used to just three points in a sermon, but live a little, double your devotion this week!)  On these 6 rest all we are, all we have, all we are called to do! Whatever else we wanna fuss about, these can make us ONE!

A heart for Christ. It all starts here. We don’t all know the same, or as much about Jesus. All I can say is: we do well to have a passion to know more and more! We may not agree about Jesus in some particular or other. (I do pause to caution: beware those who claim to know the unknowable or require what Christ called unattainable.) But this is essential. That we know JESUS. That we experience Jesus. That we feel him give up heaven and put on human form. Humble. Servant. Come to save. That we see Jesus with our own eyes. Teacher. Miracle maker. That we are touched by Jesus. His cross lifting our sin. His death dying our death. His rising shattering all that keeps us from living. Despite the fact the hymnal dropped the tune, I still love the song that sings, “I know not how that Bethlehem’s Babe could in the Godhead be. I only know the manger child has brought God’s love to me. I know not how that Calvary’s cross a world from sin could free. I only know its matchless love has brought God’s love to me.”

A mind transformed. If a heart for Christ is essential, a mind made new is inevitable! #1. A Believing heart. #2 A brand new brain! We don’t think alike as women from Venus and men from Mars… or so it feels. Right and left in America today can’t seem to agree on a thing. East and West, north and South in the world may not seem to live on the same planet. But here’s the thing. See everyone as someone for whom Christ died and nothing will ever be the same again! Understand your life and living require Christ’s death and dying and you’ll never feel like a big shot or a loser again! With Christ in mind, you can’t ever have your heart set on the ungodly again. Your body becomes a temple where Christ is your altar! Your kid can’t tell ya, “It’s my body; I’ll do what I want with it.” You’re thirstier for him than for anything a bottle, can, vial, pill or plunger can provide. You can/must love ‘cause you are loved. Case closed.

Are you keepin’ track? Essential # 3. Arms for love. Put your arms out. Wide. Now bring your fingers together and lace your hands like this. (Gesture) Notice something? As long as your arms extend there’s no particular urgency to love anything or anyone in particular. But bring them together and there’s a hole there. Just look down. It’s right there. In that space there lives Christ himself. And the only way you can see his face to fill that space with another’s face. Love some one. Love as many as you can. And the more they look less like you: the better. The less anybody else is loving them, the more you can love them for the sake and in the name of Jesus. I thank my God in Jesus Christ every day for the Jims and Teds and Evas and Kens and Charleses and Gingers and Eleanors and Harveys at least one Florence, Ed, Beverly, Micah and Meghan who have shown and taught me this over and over! I pray someone does the same for you! I’d like to sign up to try, myself!

What are the essentials that unite us? Jesus! New minds! Open arms. O, and Christ insists, good knees! Prayin’ knees. That’s #4. (Only two more!) He teaches us how. (Our Father….) He shows us how often. Constantly. Ceaselessly. He shows us how humbly. On our knees. He shows us for whom. For others than just ourselves and our loved ones. He shows us how deeply. In tears, in the Garden; in forgiveness from the cross! He shows us others who can show us the way. (Fr. Roger.)

A voice to speak Good News. Here’s essential #5. It’s better and sweeter smelling than that famous Channel #5. The Good News of Jesus Christ perfumes the earth like nothing and no one else. Truth be told. How often do we say, “This stinks?!” My life, world, job, boss, marriage, parents, kids, school. The news. The modern world. Whatever. Friends, just speak the name. Tell the story. Point out when and where you see him. And all can be an incense to Heaven. God doesn’t want a burnt offering, but a love offering. That’s what brings God joy. Just speak the name of Jesus!

We’re down to Essential 6 to do the trick! A servant spirit. A steward’s spirit. We cannot speak Good News and not be good news, give good news. Giving is agreed. Embraced. It never diminishes. Always increases us, body and soul. (Casper Nannes.)

A heart for Christ. A mind transformed. Arms for love. Prayin’ knees. A voice to speak Good News. A servant spirit. Essential! One! Us! YES!

There is, however, another and even greater freedom in which to rejoice. It is not declared by Congress, but by Christ himself. “Good news to the poor, release to the captive, sight to the blind, liberty to those oppressed. The acceptable year of the Lord.” And all that, “fulfilled in our hearing” in Jesus Christ. Fireworks are great. Freedom is greater. And Jesus is and offers the greatest freedom of all. You see, our Jesus offers us the freedom to embrace his very own mission. To make earth like Heaven. To throw off every petty king and lesser kingdom. To reject every rule that is not God’s rule, and every ruler that is not God. ‘Not that Jesus wanted to govern, mind you, or confuse faith with the federalism of any age or place, even our own. No, Jesus is simply and unimaginably deeply committed to break the power of cancelled sin and set us sinners free! And when he crucified sin on the cross and shattered death from the tomb, he left us with a plan to carry on the mission. Here’s the plan he left us with. “You are the salt of the earth. You are to give God’s whole creation here its flavor. So don’t ever lose your saltiness. You are to keep the earth from going bad, rotting, so never lose your preserving strength! You are the light of the world. Be like a shining city set on a hill. You can’t hide a thing like that! Never be so foolish as to hide your light under the table. Instead, light every corner of your house. Let your light shine so brightly, everyone all over will see your good works and give glory to our Father in heaven.”

Now confession is good for the soul. So let’s own up. Yes, John Robinson, pastor to the pilgrims at Delft Haven did stand on the dock and promise that brave, tiny band, “God has more light yet to break forth from his holy word.” Jonathan Winthrop did challenge that same Mayflower family to build its own version of “a shining city on a hill,” as Jesus said. But then those folks by themselves were 11 years too late to found the nation-we-know. Jamestown 1st, don’t you know! Complete with the 1^st European women, tobacco and slaves, many moons before the Pawtuxet Indians (way longer here) missed their chance to station their customs and immigration agents at Plymouth Rock! Other boats came too. ‘Sad, sin boats… holds full of souls in chains. Still more ships later, from China and Saipan, Ireland and Europe, West and East. And, they’re still walking, crawling, leaping, tunneling and smuggling in, just to get a piece of whatever their version of America-the-Dream. Not everybody’s into Jesus’ mission or the Pilgrim promise. ‘Never have been. In 1776, only 1 in 10 were church folks; we’re still just 1 in 3. Many signers of Jefferson’s declaration were Deists, believers yes, but not in the way we hold tight to Christ. Thank God, literally, we sing our vision of alabaster cities gleaming, undimmed by human tears. But few of us have seen them. Nevertheless, what blesses us uniquely as a people is this vision, this mission-on-the-loose, to be better than we are and more what we were meant to be. And for those of us who cling to Jesus, there’s a clear picture of what this look is like, drawn by Christ himself. It’s ancient, and it’s future; now, and not yet.

Consider Jefferson and Jesus talking to each other…

Dear, dear friends… in this good land of great ideas, bedrock ideals and earnest striving for better tomorrows, anyone can and everyone should light fireworks. Whoop it up. It’s our birthday! But we believers have a deeper, brighter cause for celebration. Ours the vision, ours the mission… of Faith Works. Faith Works OVER Fire Works! We are to hold the Vision of Christ before one another and even the nation. We’re to be the example, the willing witness… the light that shines so everyone may see and give God the glory… on earth as in heaven!

A fella wants to know about eternal life. (Not just any fella, a lawyer… with an attitude.) Jesus invites him to answer his own question. “Love God, neighbor, self.” “Yep,” says Jesus. Now it gets sticky. “Ahh, but who’s my neighbor?” weasels the lawyer. In effect, “Who’s he [or she]?” Jesus counters. “That’s not the question. The question is, ‘Who are YOU?’ Look, let me tell you a little story.” We all know the rest. It’s the Good Samaritan…. The dude in the ditch. The problematic passers-by. The hated-turned-hero… what’s up with that? Answer: It’s not what the ditched guy deserves. It’s what a good-heart, a GOD-Heart makes happen! So… if you wanna know about your neighbor, you gotta know your own heart.

Can your heart perceive the possible in the face of the undesirable? Can you tend folks you find livin’…way-round-the bend? Can you reject that broken somebody-so-in-so, but cling to the soul of a soul-with-a-ways-to-go. We’ve got 1 set of work campers out, and another and larger group waitin’ to head out. The stated agenda: fix a house. The real work: repair a soul. I’ve been work camping almost 30 years, on site, or administering. ‘Seen some characters. Our kids have too, ‘will again. Some are memorable. O, you get the sweet granny who hasn’t had indoor plumbing in 92 years. Your heart moves, your knees melt. There’s a potty and a sink in place by week’s end and you feel great about it. But then there’s the hoarder. How could anybody live like that? Why should I clean up the mess? Ew! Yuck! Gross! Then there’s the “Chaw guy!” This fellow’s been spittin’ tobacco on his wall so long he’s rotted out the wall at the floor boards! DOUBLE Ew! Yuck! Gross! There’s that family that appears it could work out of its mess but doesn’t. And there’s the kids of the mom who just seems “zoned out.” And you just don’t know what to make of it all. Jesus says: the spiritual matter here isn’t them but you! In all their crazy, cussed calamity, can you see their sanctity? Can you see someone Christ loves enough to die for, that you can care enough to work for? Can you see something is possible in someone, at the very moment it seems the most unlikely? Not just at work camp, but at school, at work, in the neighborhood, or, yes, even across the breakfast table? I know the church calls this grace. I know it’s not easy. And I know that one day, many days ago, while contending with a local lawyer, Jesus called it heavenly. And we’ve been talking about it ever since.

Wanna know about your neighbor, know your own heart. Does your heart pump life-blood, faith-blood as far as your hands and feet? Did you know there’s this nasty condition known as PAD? It means Peripheral Artery Disease. That’s Doc-speak for the good stuff in your heart don’t [sic.] ever get as far as your fingers and toes.

Just as surely as this is a malady of the body, it’s a disease of the Christian soul. All too often the faith and the love-of-Christ in our hearts doesn’t make it to our hands and feet. We just don’t want to get involved. Our schedule won’t allow. All the Purell we can pour won’t clean up the problem or person at our door. [8/MEH: Mag. Man/porch] What so sets apart the Samaritan in Jesus’ story may well lie right here. A) He’s willing to tend someone who’s a bloody mess. But B) He’s willing to give his attention to a Jew who would define him as unclean, unworthy, unholy, unacceptable and unimportant! Our choices are rarely so graphic or stark. But we do make choices. Hands and feet choices. Will our faith-blood flow to our feet if asked to go out of our way, not for someone we know, but someone we don’t? Will our fingers suddenly go numb in the voting booth if the choice is share the cost of some public service or palm it off on those who can’t help themselves or defend themselves? What’ll happen when things grow leaner? Will we get more gracious, or just get meaner? This fall, in mid–October, we’ll be invited to “Change the World”, to Re-Think Church OUTSIDE the walls. The BWC is shooting for 15,000 UM’s sharing some community ministry that touches others for Christ’s sake. (We choose the ministry.) And among those ministries, some with folks we’d rather not be with, but will become bold to work/care with. Our COM has identified ½ dozen+ such opportunities we’ll invite you to share. [New CAP Soup Kitchen to Suds for Duds] Friends, I know your good hearts. Now we need to test the circulation of our souls by the outreach of our arms and legs.

One more thing. Maybe a new thing we find in an age-old story. Have you the heart to invite another into the saving work of Christ?

You know me. My eye always seems to fall where few others look in the Bible’s stories. Well, here too. I love it that Jesus redeems the Inn Keeper by having the Samaritan entrust the wounded one to his care. The Samaritan gets the credit, yet his blessing is brief. It’s the Inn Keeper he invites to be merciful who’s in it for the long haul. It’s the Inn Keeper who must believe this, this Samaritan of all people, will return to settle-up/reward him for his trouble. ‘For his compassionate, faithful life. He has to trust in a promise-deferred. In that way, the Keeper of the Inn is just like those of us who keep the faith, waiting… with costly kindness… for the time to come. In the end, the Samaritan both salves the wounded, and widens the circle of those who do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God. … Exactly what the Lord requires. (Micah 6: 8)

That ol’ lawyer doesn’t ask Jesus what he has to believe to inherit eternal life. He asks what he must do. When he tries to make it all-about-his-neighbors (and their worthiness), Jesus says, “It’s not all about them, it’s all about you! Have you a good heart, a GOD HEART? ‘For the possible in the face of the undesirable? For pumping lifeblood/faith blood all the way to your hands and feet? Have you a heart for inviting more helpers and trusting believers in the promises of God, and in the sweet, sweet mercies of Christ, entertaining angels… often unawares?

Acts 2. They were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and filled all the house. [Not 1 corner, not one soul was UNfilled, much less missed!] They were [as never before] able to speak each other’s language. Even Peter. Especially Peter. The one who, weeks before, insisted he didn’t even know the man, now spoke Jesus. And everybody understood. From now ‘til Kingdom come, “wonders in heaven above and signs on the earth.” God saving… at the mere mention of Jesus. Ours to embrace and to share. Whatever else today-is-to-you, it’s your day to accept this invitation. SPEAK JESUS! So everyone can understand. Last fall, RB was with us. We were feeding the workers both here and across the street at those new town homes. They didn’t exactly get it over there. O, sandwiches are multilingual. But when Rick began to speak with them in Spanish, eyes lighted. Smiles broadened. The cross and flame on some of our shirts came alive to them. The Spirit flowed. SPEAK JESUS! So everyone can understand. You needn’t know another tongue to speak his name. Only an open spirit to the Spirit. That’s it. Many of our confirmands will go to Rock this year like their older siblings. There, the music speaks teen-speak. And Jesus speaks through it all. Kids meet friends/strangers and fall on each others’ shoulders. Laughs erupt and tears cascade like waterfalls, often without a word. And the Spirit fills all the house. SPEAK JESUS! So everyone can understand. In an elevator at Hopkins, getting off at the Pediatric Floor, parents are getting on. I happen to be in clerics with this cross. The sniffling mom reaches out, nearly clasps it. No word exchanged. The doors start to close. Her arm still reaches. “Thank you,” she says. I don’t know what happened. She does. God does. In a language I can’t speak but the cross can. So we need to take it with us. In our gestures, in our behaviors, in our hearts-for each-other. And whenever we can, however best we can, in our words. And the Spirit will make-due with us, as with them so long ago. God’s gift. And saving wonders will overflow.

Scripture teaches, “They were amazed when each heard in their own tongue, the wonderful works of God.” I ask you. ‘You who’ve been here as long, or nearly so, as you can remember. And you who have come in recent years. And [those of] you who are coming today. Can you feel it? The Spirit blowing again on all who are gathered in this house? I tell you, we have the chance to put Berlitz and Rosetta and the language school over at the Odenton Junction to shame. See, there’s no language-of-the-heart the Spirit doesn’t speak. Or can’t/won’t teach us. No communication’s foreclosed to those who call on the name and cling to the Spirit of Christ. Friday night, an 11 yr. old boy met me in the lower hall, both of us leaving for the evening. Outta nowhere he enthused. “Rev. Ken, I can’t wait to see that new building opened. I wanna see what God’s gonna do in there! …‘With me and you.” I was taken aback. All I can tell you is something over there’s speaking his language! And, I confess, I have a little different question. “What is God going to do with us from there? Where will the Spirit send us in the community to speak somebody’s language? ‘Whom we don’t yet even know? Whom will we welcome to Christ, just by speakin’ their language? Maybe the building will speak to them. (The Cleaners guy, says, “I wanna see it when it’s done.) Maybe the Praise Band’ll do it. (Is there any way we could set ‘em up at OSC or the station?) Maybe the youth and their clowns (next week) will do it at Odenton Day or OFD Carnival. Maybe we can get the Spunk Gym to let us do a little Bible Study (Faith for the Fit, Fit for the Faith). A soccer field’s behind us. In season, 100’s of families. What if we spoke their language? Who knows?

All I know is, from Day 1, God’s been calling creation in its own tongue and time. ‘Naming us and calling us by name. Us too, by the Spirit, in Christ. And inviting us: Now you do it for each other. Now’s the time. Today’s the day. It’s a new day!  It’s our birthday! Happy Birthday, all!

I’ve got one thing to say. YAHOO!!! Congratulations, all. For me, Annual Conference marks another full year served and another new year… beginning today. Taken together, O such joy! So much to be thankful for! But I come here today so very aware of two other souls and an entirely other kind of passing. Chris Catron, 15, gone. Together we baptized him. We confirmed him just 2 years ago. I was the one who held his round face in my hands, looked him in the eye and with the anointing oil told him, “Christopher Allen, you are hereby sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism, and marked as Christ’s own forever.” Just two weeks ago, we preached the last sermon he ever heard. Then there’s Elwood… Myers. 87! The official NBUMC Eveready Bunny! He’d help with anything! Tote CAP Food. Shovel snow. (+6”, please, “That’s when it’s really fun.” He’d be the 1^st one here!) 6 guys under 60 staring at the postholes to dig to put up the NB Manger. Quick as a wink, ELWOOD-our-elder ahead of us, digger-in-hand. I loved him. I just loved him. 10 minutes before 11 last Sunday, the call: Elwood has passed. I preached the last sermon he ever heard. Passings, joyful and mournful alike, remind us, as the sweet song sings,

In our end is our beginning; in our time, infinity;

In our doubt there is believing; in our life, eternity.

Our richest ritual is right, “We know not what a day may hold, but only that the time for serving God is always near at hand.” So today, when worship-time seems a little short, and the joy of the Celebration-Table-of-all-Celebration-Tables is so very near where we sit or stand, I have this thought. Waste not. Want not. Say the most important things. Time’s a passin’. Souls ‘a waitin’. (To use an old tradition, what would you say if you had to say it all, standin’ on ONE FOOT?!) Here goes:

In Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself…

So we urge you, be reconciled to God. II Cor. 5: 19, 20

God has done his work for us on the cross.

God does his work in us by the Spirit.

Taken together, by these two we are saved,

Beginning TODAY on earth, and in heaven TOMORROW.

The saved life looks like this. (Shift feet.)

God gifts us with amazing love.

God assigns us to tell what we’ve received.

God waits for all of us to say “Yes” to God’s “Yes” to us.

Now, at last and forever, we can be who we are!

If I can say it on ONE foot, surely we can say it with one voice.

In Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself…

So we urge you, be reconciled to God. II Cor.  5: 19, 20

God has done his work for us on the cross.

God does his work in us by the Spirit.

Taken together, by these two we are saved,

Beginning TODAY on earth, and in heaven TOMORROW.

This what the saved life looks like.

God gifts us with amazing love.

God assigns us to tell what we’ve received.

God waits for all of us to say “Yes” to God’s “Yes” to us.

Now, at last and forever, we can be who we are!

Be it your 1^st or last,

that’s the message we have received

and give with joy… to you.

We might not take our PB & J sandwich up the hill and wait for the world to end, like a few folks did just days ago. But we do look at the crazy from Capital Hill to Conway St., Balto. and wonder, how much longer can all of this go on? We look at our ends that just won’t meet in our accounts. ‘At our relationships that don’t seem to satisfy like they used to, or aren’t quite what we expected. (Cf. Jacob w/Leah/Rachel) ALL our kids really aren’t “Above average”, grades notwithstanding, and sometimes our kids can’t stand us, and shouldn’t have to settle for us. (You know who you are!) So, like the believers long ago, we too ask the Risen Jesus, "Lord, is now the time the kingdom’s comin’?" And still, he says, "It’s not for you to know. But you’re gonna get all the power-for-livin-and-servin’ you need when the Spirit comes; and it’ll be up to you to tell your neighbors, your neighborhood, your state (in whatever state it’s in), your nation, even the whole world what I’ve done for you and am doing for them in Jesus Christ It’s your mission… and your reason for being!" and God will still lift him up, right before our very eyes, just as way back when. That way we’ll know Jesus time is fulfilled and our time under heaven is NOW! Oh, I know. We too will be prone to wanna stand around. ‘Have a committee meeting or a discussion group about it. That’s a Methodist thing, you know. But thank God, the lord always provides a couple of angels to ask (as in that ancient day), “Why are you standin’ around, gazing into heaven? He’ll be back. And he’s comin’ for you and everyone you’ve called in his name. So get to it. It’s time for grazin’ not for gazin’. ‘Time to bring everyone you possibly can to His table to feast on the Bread of Heaven. "

It’s confirmation season. We ask folks to be interviewed by our kids and respond to the questions, “Why Jesus, for you? Why the church/this church? Why will it matter for me, in my youth, to be a part?” We expect you to tell the kids good stuff. But I can relate to the adult who answers [II Willimon, Who Will Be Saved?], “Sometimes Church is a bummer! I was doin’ fine. Happy. Then the Church took me to ____, and had me stand next to people who [Don’t know Jesus/hunger/suffer/are dirt poor/etc.]. Yet, some have more hope, more faith, more kindness than I and mine, despite all we have. They’re family to me. Now I can’t get those folks out of my mind, outta my life. I’ve got the church to thank for that!”  Mmph!

Not a year, not a month, sometimes not a week goes by somebody doesn’t ask me, “Who on earth will be saved?” In the Fall, I’d like us to spend some considerable time together with this question. But these last few days, between graduation celebrations and funeral preparations, the thing has been especially keenly on my heart. This is what I want to ask and say. “Well, in Christ, God is working at reconciling the world to himself… so I ask you, are you at peace with God… in the name of Jesus? The crosswork was for you. And you are still the homework of the Holy Spirit. Whom have you welcomed with the welcome God in Christ has given you? By no other name will they be saved than Jesus name. And with no other voice than yours may some be welcomed! TODAY on earth. And in heaven TOMORROW. This what the saved life looks like. God’s amazing love. Ours: to show and tell. God’s “Yes” seeking ours. Ours seeking others’.  It’s who/whose we are!

Ahh, though I speak in the tongue of men and of angels…

Maybe that’s what it would sound like…

if we spoke this message backwards!

I mean, suppose we said what we want you to remember FIRST,

not last. ‘First the point, then the details. What would it sound like?

Sevol susej ekil evol annaw I. Em sevol susej. Susej evol I.

Who could forget those words? Who wouldn’t wanna remember them?

Oh! It might help if we said frontwards, not backwards:

I love Jesus. Jesus loves me. I wanna love like Jesus loves.

Say them with me!

I love Jesus. Jesus loves me. I wanna love like Jesus loves.

Remember this. It all starts here. I love Jesus! And Jesus teaches us how to love. The hymn has it just right when it sings, “In Christ alone is love full grown, and life and hope begun.” I’m sure there are a thousand thousand ways to love. And they are all wonderful. But I am most sure of this. Best of the best: love Jesus! Now I know it’s not the longest story. Maybe not the most well known or oft’ repeated. But the Easter story of the risen Jesus on the fishers’ shore may help us love Jesus as never before. You remember. We just read it. Jesus crucified. The disciples crushed. Jesus returns, appears to them risen. Their hopes rise. Then Jesus is gone. They wait as instructed. And wait. And wait. No Jesus. Finally, Peter says to the rest, “I’m goin’ fishin’!” (‘Goin’ back to what I knew before Jesus.) At least six of them join him.  All night. No fish. Dawn. The stranger on the shore. “Try the right side!” The catch. “It’s the Lord!” The scramble to shore. Nets bursting, but not breaking. Breakfast ready already. Jesus revealed! Wow. Just look at this Jesus. He’ll invite you to come with him. ‘Live with him. ‘Stay with him. How many others do you know who invite you like that? There’s just a welcome in Jesus as in no other. He doesn’t ask for credentials, a character reference or proof of where you came from. At the start, he doesn’t ask you to promise to reform to come along. (‘Though he’ll surely transform you, all along the way.) This Jesus will lift you up at your lowest (just ask the sinners).

He will heal you at your sickest, mind or body [Ask (MO’s) Legion… crazy in the tombs; NB’s or Lazarus, up form the tomb]. He will forgive you when you are least deserving (E.g.s) and late in asking. (Ask Peter his friend; or the thief, his companion on the cross.) Oh, this Jesus! Who else do you know who will defeat death for you”,  [Apostles’ Creed] ‘go through (yes) Hell for you? ‘Bust outta solid rock for you? And then, then come to you when you’re empty-handed [DS w/o job] or empty hearted [Fbg 2 kds out] and fill you up full? I’ve seen it ALL. I received it all. So I need to say, I love Jesus! And I hope you can and will say it, too. Love is nowhere and with no one, fuller than with him. If you don’t know that, can’t say that, haven’t felt that, two things. Get with and be around folks who have and will share. Read the stories: [Bible] here.

Susej evol I. Don’t get it backwards. Say it right/often. I love Jesus!

In Christ alone is love full grown, and life and hope begun! Whenever you get the chance, sing it. Sing it out. Sing it out loud. It’s not just that I love Jesus. It’s that JESUS LOVES ME! Boy, O Boy, my soul always sails with Peter on that fishers’ boat. Who knows, maybe you’ve signed on with the crew! Peter has disappointed Jesus. Peter has distressed Jesus. Peter has denied Jesus. And Peter has been impatient for Jesus. All I can say is, “Me, too!” How about you? But Jesus loves Peter anyway, in exactly the way Peter needs to be loved. 3 times he asks, “Peter, do you love me?” It’s not that the Risen Jesus is hearing impaired. It’s that Peter’s love is wounded and scared. I know that feeling. So do many of you. So Jesus gives Peter as many ways to say yes as he has said maybe or no. Jesus is always giving extra chances. Only the most mature love does that. When children play, when lovers meet, everything seems absolute. Either wonderful or awful. (Ask the kids about their dates to the prom!) Newly weds are narrow in more dimensions than their measurements. But love matures as it learns to give second chances. And thirds. And, if we believe Jesus, 70ths all the way to 490ths! It spreads out (as we usually do). It learns not just to accept apology and repentance, but how to help them along. This is how Jesus loved Peter. And how Jesus loves me! Peter gets a mission. “Feed the sheep.” (Preach.) He gets a calling. “Tend my lambs.” Stay near. Keep the flock together. Defend them, each one. (Shepherd.) Peter gets a vision. “Feed my sheep.” (Nourish the faith!) Jesus loves you in the same way. With a mission, a calling, a vision. Friend, do you know yours? If not, get closer to Jesus. Breakfast with him… right at the start of your day. O, what a perfect way to be loved. Em sevol susej. O, don’t get this backwards. The word to say is, “Jesus loves me!”

‘Only one thing left to say, when Christ is on your heart and you know your place in the heart of Christ. I wanna love like Jesus loves. The church has a right to ask. ‘A need to know, especially on what some believe is the day AFTER the End of The World. We need to know, what on earth does it look like to love as Jesus loves. After all, we really are living on borrowed time!

Well, our Scripture paints this picture of those who love Jesus, know he loves them, and want to love and be …just like him.

Jesus-Love is patient and kind; not jealous or boastful,

not arrogant or rude. Jesus-Love does not insist on its own way;

it is not irritable or resentful. How you doin’ so far?

Jesus-love does not rejoice at wrong, but in the right. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Jesus-Love never ends; it just keeps on keepin’ on in spite of everything!

Jesus-Love wears neither rose-colored glasses,

nor blinders to God doing NEW THINGS

in the same old people and circumstances.

Jesus-Love celebrates the love in a child’s eyes

and doesn’t surrender to the hurts and angers in a child’s heart.

Jesus-Love knows we don’t get it… u n t i l …we know we’ve been got-by-God.

So trust in God steadily, without veering off course.

Don’t ever lose hope… you can’t… unless you let go of God.

Love extravagantly, like you’ll never run out…

because Christ never runs out of love for you.

Go after a life of love like your life depended on it,

Like Christ is depending on you.

Because your life does depend on it, and Christ is leaning on you!

O, let’s DO get this straight. Let’s say whet we live and live what we say. I love Jesus. Jesus loves me. I wanna love like Jesus loves.

In Christ alone is love full grown, and life and hope begun.

On the radio last Friday morning, I heard a few offerings.

I love you, anyway!

I brought you into this world… and I can… take you out.

From the womb to the tomb… that’s how long I’ll worry over you.

You just wait ‘til … your father gets home.

Looking at your outfit, Is that …new?

Can’t you/we all just get along?!!

Can you name a few mom lines you remember? (Congregation.)

In every household, culture, time and place, there’s stuff we all remember mamma said. But better still, there’s the stuff moms in particular and women in general do. There’s what they have to give. And what better day than today to give thanks for them and commit to live in them. The gifts of love to be honored here: an eye that does not turn away, a heart that does not turn aside, a faith that always turns to God. Today, we honor every mother and woman who gives these gifts! And we pray them for ourselves

Thank God there’s somebody in your life whose eye just does not turn away. Not ever. Good times or bad! This is a holy gift. And more often than not, moms and women-all are the givers of it. No surprise, it all starts with Eve!  Eve conceives Cain, saying, “I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord.” She bears Abel. Abel’s a sheepkeeper, Cain a farmer. Eve witnesses the difference. She sees with a mother’s eye: when God accepts Abel’s gift over Cain’s, Eve knows trouble won’t be far behind.  Eve gives birth again… to the truth that somehow mother’s always know! (Just ask them!) I suspect God was not the first to ask Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen?  Do well; do good; don’t you know your gifts will be accepted? Neither mother-on-earth nor God-in-heaven wants you to be who you aren’t or what you’re not. ‘Only the best you! That’s the thing. Do less and ‘sin is couching at the door’; its desire is for you, but you must master it.” You know the rest. Cain kills Able. And God asks what Eve asks (and all moms do) “What have you done?” Cain is banished by God… with a mark for his protection. God will not turn away, you see. Now it is not in Genesis

But maybe it could be. Should be. Eve did not turn away either. I suspect Eve did as my mom has and would. Yours too. Eve prayed for Cain! Eve knows, you see, what it is to substitute sin for paradise, a bit of heaven for a mere bite of over-ripe fruit. She too, like Adam her husband and now Cain her son, knows what it means to live an exile’s life. In full grief at her loss of Able, and full understanding of the sin of Cain, still she prays, “Lord, mark my child; protect my child; do not turn away. Let our love for him somehow overcome the sin in him. May there not come a day some day, when we are each other’s keeper? Can’t we all just get along, and come along home to you?” Thank God for the women, the moms in our lives, who do not turn their eyes away, and will not cease to pray!

A heart that does not turn aside. This too is a mother’s gift. A sister’s too. An aunt’s, a granny’s. Your Cousin Ethel’s and your neighbor Naomi’s. Doubt it? Look to Mary. Jesus’ mom. Just as her eye never turned from Jesus, neither her heart. (Womb to tomb, a mother worries, don’t you know?!) Mary, the quintessential stay-at-home mom! She grasped the glory of rearing a child of God. Even THE child of God. Our age celebrates multi-taskin’ moms and madams. Me too. But I do like Tony Campolo’s wife’s story. A mom-on-duty, she rarely travels with famed preacher Tony.  When she does, she needs a response to the world-class famous women she meets. Asked (condescendingly), “Well, dear, what do you do?” she replies. “I am nurturing two Homo Sapiens into the dominant values of the Judaeo-Christian tradition so they might become instruments for social transformation to the eschatological utopia God envisioned from the beginning of time.” The other women say, “O, my, I'm just another lawyer/doctor/diplomat.” Praise the woman’s heart that never turns aside! Mary’s never leaves Jesus. Matthew notes Mary gets wind her Jesus is in trouble. His sayings sicken Sadducees. His healings play havoc with the Pharisees. He’s gettin’ in real hot water! While still preaching, his mother and his brothers stand outside, asking for him. (They want him home. Rest up. Cool down. Chill.) But Jesus asks, “Who is my mother; who are my brothers?” Gesturing his disciples, he says, “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother, and sister, and mother.” Poor Mary! But even so-stung/disappointed, she clings to Jesus. Thank God for those in our lives who hold on, even when we hurt their lives, or trouble their hearts, or challenge their faith. Woman or man, elder or youth, I ask you, “Can you learn to love like this?” It is a gift! Do give it to SOMEbody!

Today, we honor every mother and woman with a faith that always turns to God. Again, Mary shows the way. There… at the foot of the cross. Even there, she can turn neither her eye nor heart from Jesus. But she will do one more thing. She will turn her faith toward God. She has no faith in the nails to hold him on that cross. ‘Or in the authorities that mock him. ‘Or in the friends that abandon him. She places her faith entirely in the God who announced and called him. ‘The God she taught him to know and love and follow. He will caress her in the only way he can. He will honor her! (Ahh, the 5^th Commandment… he entrusts her to his best friend, John.) Thank God, no other mom has known quite what Mary did. But many a woman has stood the night or the morning or the mid-day at the foot of some pain that pins their belov-ed on some sorry tree from which they cannot free themselves. And they have done as Mary. Not giving up. But giving over… all to God! What a gift. Do you have it… as a mom, a woman or man, a youth, just a believer? Permit a story as we close. West Va., though it could have been W. Md. A mom most reluctantly allows her son to work in the coal mine in hard, hard times. The rookie does OK two weeks. But he gets lost in the hive of mineshafts, failing to stay close to the others as instructed. He wanders in search of his way. Don’t we all? His light finally fails. In the dark. Alone. Frightened. Night falls above ground, as on this lost young soul. His mother stands above. Not knowing his place, she just falls to her knees and prays. “Lord, let him do as I have taught. Far down below, this young soul finally just stops. He knows he’s at his end. He drops to his knees to pray… just like his mamma taught. His left knee clunks on a solid iron bar. “Jesus!” he cries. (Not quite the way his mother said) It was the iron rail of one of the cart tracks that would take the coal, and take him to the top! To light. And to life. All because of a faith that ALWAYS turns to God, even in the darkest, or loneliest of hours. An eye that does not turn away, a heart that does not turn aside, a faith that always turns to God. Today, we honor every mother and woman who gives these gifts! And we pray to live and give these gifts ourselves.

If last week was Holy Week, this was an ungodly week! We lived in a virtual valley of dry bones. That’s where Tornados turn the terrain topsy turvey and toss lives into limp lumps of loss and pain. We could call the roll of trials and tribulations, wounds and woes right in this room [J/JG, RH, OB, LA, FRH] But maybe we ought not. Better to ask, what in you is bone-dry? Parched? In your family, school, friendships; purse, pocket, job or judgment? That old prophet Ezekiel spoke and wrote to a people booted from their homeland, enslaved by their captors, perplexed by promises they had heard from God and from which they had been exiled in their everyday lives. Some of us get out of our own beds every morning yet feel homeless by breakfast. Increasingly, we work against-our-will for the cost of a week’s worth of gas. And by Tuesday, we wonder whatever happened to the help and hope we heard on Sunday. SOOO… we’d better listen up.  We wanna hear the sounds of bones a rattlin’. O, to feel the breeze begin to rise! ‘Not from some sorrow-filled twister. No, we pray for the sighs of the Spirit of Christ. We Resurrection People desire the stir of grace beyond measure.

Ezekiel has his vision; we have our angels, ever since Mary and her faith-sisters stepped out t’ward the tomb. Our angels still ask, “Do you remember how he told you, while still in Galilee, that the Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinners, be crucified, and on the third day rise?” They remembered. Do we?  And what do we make of these repeated reports that God has raised up Jesus from the dead? Will we simply discount them as idle tales? Permit me a few pointers.  A few little lessons on leaning forward into the resurrection, rather than backing away. What the prophet heard and the women saw can guide us. ‘Especially when these bone-weary, spirit-dry days wanna leach the life out of us. ‘Or leave us believing that not even God can outdo what is dead in us, much less death itself.

Just 5 little lessons, 1 for each day of the week.

• Monday: Go and stand where you can’t stand to go! Zeke has to go down into the Valley. The women have to go up to the Tomb. Where must you go? All Scripture and I are saying is you really can’t run away, so you don’t have to. Engage your troubles. Look your demons in the eye. Face your frustrations. (Even if they have family names!) No place you’re gonna stand will God in Christ not stand with you.
• Tuesday: Remember to go with open ears, open eyes, and hands prepared to hold onto holy things. Prophets and early-rising women alike teach us. Keep your eyes and ears open. Literally: watch out; listen up. Whatever bums you out/winds you up tight, God’s got surrounded. God’ll give you a new way to see it: Zeke never expected to see the valley quite like this. God grant you an unexpected Word to hear: “Mary, why do you seek the living among the dead?” Come to your day, even a dreaded day (like you got to “embalm Jesus”) prepared to give God and give Christ honor. (Come like you’ve got spices in your hands!) It will make all the difference!
• Wednesday: Travel with the Word. Seek the company of the faithful. I hate speaking clichés. But repeating great truths is an occupational hazard. Ezekiel heard God because he already knew his voice! He’d immersed himself in the Word/Bible, even when most had turned away. (Times too bad; work days overwhelming; too many competing news networks… just like our day!) Mary didn’t go to Jesus alone. Even on Easter. She took church with her. Friends, why would we try to be faithful with less help than the prophets and the saints?
• Thursday: Don’t focus on the messenger. Focus on the message. Don’t get fascinated by the bones you see out there every day. The dry and the dead. Don’t get hung up on what angels really look like, or how they get around. (I’ve seen plenty. They look just like, well… YOU!) Oh no, focus on the faith-message: God can and will breathe life into what is dead in your life. God will resurrect YOU, as surely, as certainly, as God’s Son Jesus Christ.
• Friday: Trust the Spirit without expecting the spectacle. (It may be as simple as skin and bone or bread and cup.) These Bible accounts we read seem pretty spectacular sometimes. They read like the Royal Wedding appeared before our eyes. But I was struck by a spoken word at the Abbey on Friday. “All weddings are royal, especially in the company of Christ the King!” We don’t need an Amazing Vision like Ezekiel. God breathes Holy breath into the flesh and bone of the saints in this room to show us Hope-is-Real and Help-is-Coming! We don’t need Inside Edition or the ladies on The View or Eye Witness News at an empty tomb to tell us death is swallowed up in victory. All we need is a table, a loaf and a cup, actually to experience the living presence of Christ in our lives. Redeeming. Renewing. Resurrecting.

What the voice said to the Prophet and the Angels to the women, the risen Christ says to us… today!!! “Your bones shall live! I will meet you, just as I said. I will come again and take you to myself… so where I am you will be also!!! Sure enough, it’s EASTER. For us, it’s EASTER EVERY DAY WE BELIEVE!

Let’s go back to Jesus’ last 24 hours. He’s heard the disciples squabble at his own table over who’s best. They nap as Christ is about to be nabbed. There’s still a cruel kiss on Jesus’ cheek, planted by Judas, who betrayed him. He’s been tried by the priests, denied by Peter, paraded before Pilate, and lashed to the whipping post. He is not a mere victim of this cruelty. He seems determined to receive it, endure it, defeat it. That will not be easy. Two lectors (as these soldiers were called) use their flagrum (whip), knotted with fish hooks, bits of glass, metal or bone fragments to exact terrible pain, literally tearing the flesh from their prisoner.  Dear Jesus! Looking on, at least a compliment of 300 soldiers, some mocking, taunting, spitting on him. Like young Isaac in the OT, asked to carry the very wood on which his Father Abraham will nearly sacrifice him, Jesus, carries his own 100 lb. cross(beam) the 1/3 mile uphill to Calvary. So weak is he now, Simon will be pressed to complete the journey. (The moment so shatters, yet reconstructs Simon, he’ll become a believer, and both his sons. Simon will become Christ’s 1^st missionary to N. Africa!) The guards will affix Jesus to the cross, nails through the wrists to the bar, nails through the sides of the ankle, upright of the cross between the knees. (This is new arch’l/info.) The scantest of seats will afford but a moment’s relief. It stretches the torso, suffocating the sufferer, who must then push up off those spiked ankles to breathe. It would go on like this hour after hour. (Six for Jesus, for most many more.) All this while naked, taunted by his adversaries, and literally barely above eye level of his own mother and dearest friend. (They could have touched his tormented cheek!) At his feet, his captors gamble for his meager cloak. But one, one “soldier of the cross”… STOOD… facing Jesus! That’s who I want to look at with you now. That soul, and the souls who rolled the dice (cast lots) and can’t or don’t cast their lot with Jesus!

Here is Jesus suffering on this cross. And his executioners, those responsible for his suffering, are paying no attention! Imagine. Dying on the cross, Jesus lifts up just 1 commandment. The 5^th. He honors his mother. “Mother, behold your son, “he says of John. So doing, he sees to her care, and cares for her breaking heart. Those not looking never (dice rolling in can) hear. Are we looking, you and I? Literally, ‘at our own parents (no matter our age), in our choices, behaviors, in how we care for them, whether in memory or in daily life? “Father, forgive them,” he says, “They don’t know what they’re doing!” The mockers don’t hear because they disbelieve. His friends don’t hear ‘because they’re too pained and would prefer revenge to reconciliation. (That’s still the way. Try to invite an eastern presence into a 9/11 celebration. Or ask the dems. or repubs. in congress just now.) But maybe worse, those not looking never (dice rolling in can) hear. Are we looking, you and I? “Today, you’re with me… in Paradise,” he says to the thief. You see, the thief is looking intently at Jesus. And he says to that other robber, “Now that I see who this Jesus really is, I want to follow, even if it’s the last thing I ever do!” You know what? That’s the starting point for all of us! SO IF YOU HAVE EVER FELT THIS, OR FEEL IT NOW AND HAVE NEVER SAID THIS… TODAY’S YOUR DAY. THIS IS YOUR HOUR! BUT, those not looking never (dice rolling in can) hear. Are we looking, you and I? “My God, why have you forsaken me? Jesus cries, quoting Ps. 22. As for me, I’m so glad Jesus says this from the cross. I’ve set with some of you (and many more) in some seemingly God-forsaken moments. ‘Had some all my own. And I am glad that Jesus knows. ‘Knows the pain and sorrow. And says it out loud. So we can fess up too. You see, it gets us ready for the very last thing Jesus ever says on that cross. Those not looking never (dice rolling in can) hear. Are we looking, you and I? “I’m thirsty,” he says. And only one soul on that hill responds, and at that, with vinegar! This word really crushes me sometimes. You see, I also remember how he says, “In as much as you have not done for the least of my brothers and sisters, you have not done for me.” What better season than this to ask …CHURCH, FRIENDS, whom have we left thirsting, for a simple sip, or a sterner faith? But, those not looking never (dice rolling in can) hear. Are we looking, you and I? “Father, into your hands, my Spirit,” Jesus says. …After all this, for Jesus, God really is the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega. For Jesus, it is because GOD lives, he can face tomorrow, even in a tomb, in the dark, apparently alone; because God lives, all fear is gone. Because Christ knows God holds the future… yours and mine that Jesus is determined to save… the cross is worth the dying, just so we may all live!” Those not looking never (dice rolling in can) hear. Are we looking, friends? Finally, Jesus declares, “It is finished. I’m done. ‘Done living and done dying, ‘done what I was born to do, and rising for those I’m dying to save. Those not looking never hear. (Empty dice from can). Now, I want to be done with these (dice). I don’t wanna be among those who neither see nor hear.

It is written that on a far-away hill on that fateful, far-away day, a number were present. But at least among those too willing to sacrifice Jesus and too consumed by themselves to pay attention, real, hear-changing attention, there was ONE who stood facing saying, “THIS IS the Son of God.” I want to be THAT One this Day. And I want you to want be One too. O, there will be others to honor. Start with those who gave you your start. You’ll have forgiving to do. But then, you yourself have been forgiven. Brace yourself. Somebody’s gonna get Paradise you wouldn’t give the time of day. Deal with it! (Even if they are a dem., or a repub.) Admit it, to God, should you have a God-forsaken situation on your hands. God will still take it, and take you, in his hands. Quench the thirsty, body and soul. Let go. Let God this week. You were born for that! And whenever you waiver, or want to, just STAND UP AND FACE THE CROSS. YOU SEE, Jesus is there… for you… and me.