June 26, 2022 3rd Sunday After Pentecost

Luke 9:51-62 (The Message) 

51-54 When it came close to the time for his Ascension, he gathered up his courage and steeled himself for the journey to Jerusalem. He sent messengers on ahead. They came to a Samaritan village to make arrangements for his hospitality. But when the Samaritans learned that his destination was Jerusalem, they refused hospitality. When the disciples James and John learned of it, they said, “Master, do you want us to call a bolt of lightning down out of the sky and incinerate them?”

55-56 Jesus turned on them: “Of course not!” And they traveled on to another village.

57 On the road someone asked if he could go along. “I’ll go with you, wherever,” he said.

58 Jesus was curt: “Are you ready to rough it? We’re not staying in the best inns, you know.”

Jesus said to another, “Follow me.”

59 He said, “Certainly, but first excuse me for a couple of days, please. I have to make arrangements for my father’s funeral.”

60 Jesus refused. “First things first. Your business is life, not death. And life is urgent: Announce God’s kingdom!”

61 Then another said, “I’m ready to follow you, Master, but first excuse me while I get things straightened out at home.”

62 Jesus said, “No procrastination. No backward looks. You can’t put God’s kingdom off till tomorrow. Seize the day.”

Whatever else it means, to follow Jesus, it is a radical departure from what has been to what is yet to be.  

It is an all consuming adventure which is full of uncertainty, vulnerability and openness to God’s surprises as they come upon us at the most unexpected moments, in unconventional ways and ask us to be ready to  “proclaim the Kingdom of God” in the very essence of our being. 

It means being a servant, a steward, a slave.  We cannot do it our way - we have to do it His way.  We cannot consume one another, we are to serve one another in love.

“True religiousness, in whatever faith, functions not to enslave but to free, not to injure but to heal, not to destabilize but to stabilize.”

True religion lives by grace which sets people free.  Free to be who we are.  Free to struggle with our purpose in life.  Free to choose without fear of reprisal, yet with responsibility for our choices.  Free to live knowing that I will always be loved, and also knowing that I have to choose how I am going to use my freedom - as an excuse to indulge in self-gratification at the expense of others; as a license to destroy myself and others;   or as an opportunity to love my neighbor as myself, to love as I have been loved!  Hans  Kung 

“True religiousness,              

in whatever faith,                            

functions not to enslave 

but to free, 

not to injure but to heal, 

not to destabilize but to stabilize.”

Hans  Kung

Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, help my “religiousness” to be life giving, proclaiming your Kingdom of grace and love for all.

  

June 19, 2022 Pentecost 2

Luke 8:26-39  (The Message)

26-29 They sailed on to the country of the Gerasenes, directly opposite Galilee. As he stepped out onto land, a madman from town met him; he was a victim of demons. He hadn’t worn clothes for a long time, nor lived at home; he lived in the cemetery. When he saw Jesus he screamed, fell before him, and bellowed, “What business do you have messing with me? You’re Jesus, Son of the High God, but don’t give me a hard time!” (The man said this because Jesus had started to order the unclean spirit out of him.) Time after time the demon threw the man into convulsions. He had been placed under constant guard and tied with chains and shackles, but crazed and driven wild by the demon, he would shatter the bonds.

30-31 Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”

“Mob. My name is Mob,” he said, because many demons afflicted him. And they begged Jesus desperately not to order them to the bottomless pit.

32-33 A large herd of pigs was browsing and rooting on a nearby hill. The demons begged Jesus to order them into the pigs. He gave the order. It was even worse for the pigs than for the man. Crazed, they stampeded over a cliff into the lake and drowned.

34-36 Those tending the pigs, scared to death, bolted and told their story in town and country. People went out to see what had happened. They came to Jesus and found the man from whom the demons had been sent, sitting there at Jesus’ feet, wearing decent clothes and making sense. It was a holy moment, and for a short time they were more reverent than curious. Then those who had seen it happen told how the demoniac had been saved.

The casting out of demons and the resulting peace in the man’s life announces again the mission of Jesus - to set us free from the evil which so easily possesses us.  It is a strong reminder that Jesus seeks too bestow wholeness, peace, and belonging to our lives.  

Our greatest challenge is not to try figure out why Jesus did this to the pigs,

but having to courage to name the powers which seek to enslave us and keep us from living free, joyous, compassionate lives.  And to let them be cast out!

   

The powers of evil are still at work in our world and in our lives.  Prejudice, indifference, blasphemy, hypocrisy , bulling, judging, name calling, excluding, etc. etc. etc.  We may not be able to  change the world but we can let our hearts be changed from evil to good.  And that means that we let go of what sometimes seems to be so important for our own welfare, and live so that love will prevail in our world of hate.  

Perhaps we all need too hear again the words of Scott Peck who describes this evil which is in all of us and needs to be cast out.   

"It is no accident that people who commit

 the most evil in this world see no power 

higher than themselves.  The evil are very 

strong-willed men and women.  And 

because they are narcissistic, self-absorbed, 

and their will is supreme, they are the ones 

who are most into inappropriate and 

destructive blaming.  They are the people 

who cannot - who will not - take the beam out 

of their own eye."

                       Scott Peck

Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, it is easy to see evil in others.

Help me see where I have that which needs to be cast out, lest I be evil too.” 

June 12, 2022 Holy Trinity Sunday

John 16:12-15  (The Message)

 12-15 “I still have many things to tell you, but you can’t handle them now. But when the Friend comes, the Spirit of the Truth, he will take you by the hand and guide you into all the truth there is. He won’t draw attention to himself, but will make sense out of what is about to happen and, indeed, 

out of all that I have done and said. He will honor me; he will take from me and deliver it to you. Everything the Father has is also mine. That is why I’ve said, ‘He takes from me and delivers to you.’”

If I go fishing in Canada,  I want a guide with me but I do not want the guide fishing for me.  Even if I lose the big one.

Life is like fishing - we often need a guide but the guide cannot live for us.

For life is something we discover in the process of living.  

We learn as we live.

We have to experience what we know before we can know it.  

We often have to be vulnerable to discover what we don’t know.

Faith is like this too.  The Friend (Holy Spirit) guides us into the truth of that which we could never discover by ourselves.  As we live by faith,  we discover something of what it all means - yet the mystery is far beyond our wildest  imagination.  It is always ‘yonder’. 

 “She was a believer and knew - 

so much of what she believed 

was yonder - always yonder.”  

Carl Sandberg on Lincoln’s mother 

Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, guide me into that which is beyond my wildest dreams, so I can discover something which is ‘always yonder’.”

June 5, 2022 Day of Pentecost

John 14:23-27 (The Message) 

25-27 “I’m telling you these things while I’m still living with you. The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you. I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace.

We humans have the great capacity to remember, which both enriches and empowers our lives. “Remember when…” begins a journey into the past which carries with it either great pain or great joy.  Even when it is pain,

it enriches our lives.

The last words my brother spoke to me, as we were saying goodby -

he was going back into the Army, recalled for Korea;  I was going back to college - were, “You should think about being a Pastor.”  There was no reason for him to say it.  We had not been talking about it.  He just said it

as we parted.  And I quickly forgot about it.

Following his death due to wounds in combat in Korea, I remembered his words.  I could not get them out of my memory.  They empowered me, painful though they were, to begin the journey which has led me where I never dreamed I would go.  I remembered and lived out the memory.

This is what Pentecost is all about.  The Holy Spirit makes things plain to us.  Helps us to remembering what has been so we can be more alive in what is yet to be.  We are not to live in the past; we are to remember it and be empowered to live in the present, doing what we are called to do in our day, living creatively, daring to try new things, even change old things.

Indeed, God’s spirit works in and through our capacity to remember.  God calls to our remembrance that which we have known in the past so we can be better equipped to live in the present. 

 

“This is what Pentecost is all about.  

Remembering what has been so we 

can be more alive in what is yet to be.”

Prayer for the week:  “Lord, help me to remember what has been so I can be who I am called to be.”