Seeker in the Fog

Blessed Thomas -- A sermon on John 20:19-31

2011-05-01T16:23:00.000-04:00

You may recall last week’s gospel reading, in which Mary and Mary (Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James and Joseph; Matthew 27:61n) came across the open tomb. They encountered Jesus on the road after that, and he told them, “Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.” You might then imagine the apostles’ reactions to what Mary and Mary would have told them. It’s not in Matthew’s gospel, but John spells it out in the verse just before this week’s gospel reading. Mary Magdelene announces to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord” (John 20:18). With this, John foreshadows them telling Thomas, but even John doesn’t write the disciples’ response to Mary. Do we really believe they accepted Mary’s statement without question? Or do we believe they needed Jesus to appear to them—because that’s exactly what happens next.

While Episcopalians rarely, if ever, go through the process in which Roman Catholics select a patron saint, I suspect that--after a fashion--my patron saint might have been the apostle Thomas. Orthodox Christians call the second Sunday of Pascha, “Thomas Sunday,” in remembrance of the main supporting actor in this gospel episode, and they understand Thomas’ doubt as a blessing, since it leads to the truth which Jesus brings. Thomas is as close as we see in the Holy Scriptures to a scientist, and it’s easy to see him as the eternal skeptic. Nearly every time Thomas is mentioned in the gospels, he is the person who says he does not understand or who questions Jesus so that Jesus can explain some cosmic truth. This is a scientist--always asking, always questioning—and this is why I like him. But there is something deeper at stake here in Thomas’ actions today.

Thomas gets a bad rap when we call him--as we often call him--"Doubting Thomas". Thomas questions and admits his lack of understanding. Here, though, we find what I believe to be the core reason why we call him Doubting Thomas. Jesus appears to the rest of the disciples the first time, and Thomas is not with them. What would you say if you had missed church last Sunday, came back this Sunday, and people started telling you that Jesus Christ had appeared bodily last week in church? Madness, you'd say. You would dismiss these claims as decisively as Thomas did when the other disciples told him that Jesus had appeared to them. That Thomas asks to see the wounds of Christ tells us how decisive his dismissal was. But we have the benefit of two thousand years of hindsight!

It's also interesting that in this passage Thomas does not believe, while in earlier passages we find the other apostles failed to believe when Mary and Mary tell them that Christ is risen. It is only when Jesus appears to the apostles and shows them his wounds that they truly believe Mary’s account. Susan Hylan, a New Testament scholar at Vanderbilt University, suggests that the other disciples were similarly untransformed by their first experience with the risen Lord. She writes that the disciples’ proclamation to Thomas that they have seen the Lord “suggest[s] their belief in the resurrection. However, a week later they are still hidden away in the same house and with the doors locked. Whatever belief the disciples have found does not appear to be immediately transformative.” Whatever the case, the disciples are not terribly convincing, and their actions betray their fear.

Here we have quite a few things going on in this passage near the end of John's gospel account. The first appearance of Jesus parallels his appearance in the other gospels. In particular, we see John's version of the great commissioning, in which Jesus breathes the Holy Spirit upon his disciples, in the same way that God breathed the Spirit to grant life to Adam. At the end of Matthew's gospel, the apostles are given the Holy Spirit and sent forth, as Jesus says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Here, John boils the commissioning down to what he probably saw as its mystical core--after all, John's gospel has the reputation of being the most mystical of the gospels, and it is the most different from the other gospels. Here, John finds two things of primary concern in the commissioning: the granting of the Holy Spirit, or the breathing of life into the disciples, and the "keys to the kingdom" (v. 23) that in other gospels Jesus gives to Peter. This is the statement about forgiving or retaining sins.

But why doesn’t Thomas believe the disciples’ testimony? Why would any of us believe or disbelieve? Thomas probably wasn’t afraid in the way we might think, since John gives us an account of Thomas as one of the braver apostles. When Lazarus died in John 11, it was Thomas who spoke up: “Let us also go, that we may die with him.” In that passage, Thomas’ rallying call is almost a stand-alone statement in the middle of the tale of Lazarus, but it speaks of Thomas’ character that he is not afraid to die for the right reasons. Orthodox scholar Lawrence Farley gives us another possible answer: Like the other disciples, Thomas had been so close to Jesus that he was emotionally scarred by Jesus’ death on the cross. Like the other disciples, Thomas really didn’t know what to do next, or what to believe, since the gospel to this point tells us that none of the disciples really understood Jesus at the time. And like the other disciples, Thomas didn’t want to believe so deeply again without seeing for himself the risen Lord. Thomas was not afraid to die. But he was hurt, and he was afraid to believe.

We see in this passage, as we often see with Thomas, that Thomas questions at first, but once he gets an answer he follows wholeheartedly. He doesn't believe it when the other disciples tell him, "We have seen the Lord." Madness, he probably says, though John finds it sufficient to say that Thomas doesn't buy it. Then Jesus appears the second time and offers Thomas an answer. Once he gets his answer, what does Thomas say? Not madness, but "My Lord and my God!" Even Jesus' appearance is enough of an answer to convince Thomas, and then he is so fully on board that he issues perhaps the strongest statement of faith about Jesus. And as usual, Thomas’ questioning of Jesus provides the window through which we see Jesus once again revealing cosmic truth.

We also have near the end of this passage the last of the Beatitudes. You probably know of the famous Beatitudes we find in the Sermon on the Mount, early in Matthew's gospel. These are the famous "Blessed are they that..." statements. Well, in this passage we find Jesus issuing one final Beatitude, "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe." This Beatitude is unlike those we find in the other gospels in that, as biblical scholar Michael Coogan points out, this is a blessing of belief rather than of suffering or action. Here John gives us the mystical approach; for him, belief is what’s important.

I'd like to think that this Beatitude is aimed at us. I don't want to speak for anyone else in the room, but I have not seen Jesus manifest, or appear bodily, in front of me and offer to let me stick my finger in his wound. But I have come to believe, as I am sure all of you have come--or are coming--to believe. Part of this is about the journey with our belief, but blessed are we who take this journey with the risen Lord, for as John writes, through believing we have life in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

An Inconvenient Sacrifice: A Sermon on Luke 10:25-37 (Proper 10C)

2010-07-11T21:56:00.002-04:00

Nearly every person who has heard about Christianity—and perhaps even every person who hasn’t—has heard the parable of the Good Samaritan in one form or another. We know the familiar story of the victim beset by bandits and left for dead, the religious authorities of the time passing by without helping him, and finally the outcast, the Samaritan, reaching forth his arms in love for the victim—just as Jesus Christ reached out his arms on the cross to save each of us. The catch, however, is that Jesus not only saves each of us, but he also calls each of us to help complete his work in the world. Likewise, Paul reminds the Colossians in today’s epistle that they are called by God, who has enabled them to “share in the inheritance of the saints in the light.” As with Jesus’ call to all of us, this inheritance is both a great gift and a great responsibility, just as the saints were called to duty, and just as many of the saints were called to sacrifice their lives for their faith and for other people.

In today’s readings we see examples of people who betray their vocations to satisfy their own needs. The priest Amaziah lives out a life of luxury as King Jeroboam’s priest by telling him what he wants to hear rather than what he needs to hear, that God intends for his kingdom to fall. In Luke’s gospel, the priest and the Levite look at the waylaid victim but barely acknowledge his existence as they cross the road to pass by him.

On the flip side of the coin, we see examples of people who are called by God and who step up to live out their calls, despite great personal risk. The prophet Amos is sent by God to call the priest Amaziah to account for his failings as a priest, and Amos receives only death threats for his trouble. The Samaritan stops to help the victim, despite being alone in a bandit-infested land. He then goes the greater step of paying for the stranger’s housing at an inn, handing over two denarii to the innkeeper. So that we can understand what this must have cost the Samaritan, the Oxford Study Bible tells us that, “two denarii would provide approximately two months of lodging at an ancient inn.” So let’s do the math: At today’s prices, even a very modest inn would cost about $50 per night so, for 60 days, this good Samaritan would be handing over about $3,000, not including meals! How many of us would be willing to throw down $3,000 in cash for a stranger? This is definitely a financial sacrifice for the Samaritan.

Now, on the coin’s edge, we find the lawyer, likely a Scribe or someone well-versed in the Torah. We often forget the lawyer in Luke’s gospel because we are so caught up in the parable of the Good Samaritan, but the lawyer provides an intriguing perspective which for many of us probably hits close to home. Here, we have an educated person, able to articulate the letter of the law to Jesus. After all, in Luke’s account, it is the lawyer who recites the great commandments. But this lawyer seems intent on circumventing the spirit of the law to suit his own agenda, as we read that he tries to weasel his way out of responsibility by asking Jesus to specify who his neighbor is.

Here, the lawyer sheds light on our own preference to make things convenient for ourselves, sometimes even at the expense of other people. The self-preservation instinct is very strong in all of us, so it can be difficult to execute a conscious decision to hurt ourselves to help someone else. Jesus refuses to accept this, though, and he tells a parable whose moral is that the vocations to which we are called are often inconvenient. At our core, we are called to vocations which include self-sacrifice, and sacrifice is not sacrifice at all if it’s convenient or pleasant. Jesus’ answer is that the lawyer’s neighbor is not the priest or the Levite but rather, as the lawyer grudgingly admits, “the one who showed him mercy.”

Jesus tells the lawyer to “Go and do likewise.” But Jesus also says this for our benefit, since we have all received the great commandments: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” We have already seen that love requires great sacrifice, given the personal risk and expense to which the Samaritan goes. But more than that, it requires that we make inconvenient choices on a regular basis.

At the 1993 Commencement Address at The Citadel, President Ronald Reagan remarked:

“The character that takes command in moments of crucial choices has already been determined. It has been determined by a thousand other choices made earlier in seemingly unimportant moments. It has been determined by all the little choices of years past—by all those times when the voice of conscience was at war with the voice of temptation—whispering the lie that it really doesn’t matter. It has been determined by all the day-to-day decisions made when life seemed easy and crises seemed far away—the decisions that, piece by piece, bit by bit, developed habits of discipline or of laziness, habits of self-sacrifice or of self-indulgence, habits of duty and honor and integrity—or dishonor and shame.”

In our Baptismal Covenant, we vow that, with God’s help, we will seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves. The core of our vocation, then, is that we are called to sacrifice for others, but it’s the kind of sacrifice which must be practiced. Like professional athletes, we have to train regularly—and painfully—to make ourselves capable of doing that to which we are called. Those day-to-day decisions prepare us and make us who we are. In turn, who we are determines not only how we will perform when called to sacrifice, but also whether or not we’ll be willing to sacrifice at all for someone else.

Luke portrays the lawyer as wanting to justify himself. This lawyer claimed to be righteous because he believed the letter of the law to be everything. But righteousness is not about the letter of the law. It’s not about who we claim to be. It’s not about who we become on camera. Righteousness is about who we are when the words go away and what we do when we don’t have time to think about it. It’s about who we are when no one else is watching. It’s about what theologian Douglas John Hall calls an “impulse to kindness” which every human being shares—even if we sometimes choose to ignore it. It’s about the universal call of love that is God’s call to us. Being Christian is just that: not just believing Christian or confessing Christian—though this is asked of us as well—but being Christian, being an instrument of God’s love in this world.

Amen.

Eucharist and coffee hour?

2009-10-11T19:23:00.003-04:00

In the early church, the Eucharist took place as part of a common meal. The early model for the Eucharistic feast was shaped to follow the example, in anamnesis of the Last Supper. While the Greek word anamnesis translates (weakly) as 'remembrance,' and that's the word used in English translations of the words of institution during the Eucharistic prayer, the word means so much more than that. Anamnesis also means 'reliving' an event, and can include an expectation of something that is to come. In a full Eucharistic experience, we remember Christ, we live in the life of Christ, and we live in the expectation that Christ will come again. In the Book of Common Prayer, we proclaim this when we recite, as a congregation, "We remember his death, we proclaim his resurrection, we await his coming in glory." However, the contemporary church--at least, the denominations who still celebrate the Eucharist--has dropped the meal in favor of a wafer and a sip of wine, or even less, given the current panic about H1N1.

One purpose of the Eucharist in the early church was to feed the congregation, not only spiritually (through the Eucharist) but also physically through the food that was served at the Eucharist. While it has become expedient for the contemporary church to serve only the bread and wine (or wafers, grape juice, nothing at all, or whatever) as the Eucharistic meal, such has not always been the case. The Last Supper was indeed a supper; "While they were eating [emphasis mine], Jesus took a loaf of bread" (Matthew 26:26).

I find it intriguing that most contemporary churches that celebrate the Eucharist use only bread and wine (or permutations thereof), and many of those will go to great trouble to have coffee hour or a lunch afterward. I can see perhaps a desire to shorten the service, or preserve the cleanliness of the church building, as a reason for this. I think, though, that one response to our current economic problems--and an attempt to connect with God and with our community--might be a return to this part of early church practice. As much as we may not admit, some in our congregations could do with a good meal and good community. Encouraging a regular common meal in the form of Eucharist, in which congregants contribute food as they are able, might help ensure that all in the congregation are fed, it might serve to deepen spiritual practice as we connect with God throughout the meal, and it might deepen the relationship of the church community.

Drowning in living water?

2009-07-07T20:44:00.003-04:00

My last post might read like the flailing of a drowning man. I'd been testing the waters for many years in my early spiritual life, then I jumped into the pool a few years ago. Soon--and some might argue too soon--after I joined my church here in Dayton, I began exploring a call to the priesthood. Being dismissed from that call, I struggled and finally was led toward the vocation of theologian. But I still felt like I didn't belong, and it was exactly like the first time I tried to swim. Only today did I realize that--my spiritual director has always been helpful!

When I was about ten years old (I think), I went to the pool at Bomberger Park, near downtown Dayton. I went up on the slide, and slid into the pool. I had never really learned to swim, but I went down the slide anyway. Into the water I went. Under the water I went. I flailed about, surfaced, and went under again. Finally I came up a second time, and I was able to relax and stop flailing.

So it has been with my spiritual vocation. Over the last year, I've been flailing about in a pool of living water (or the Holy Spirit). I've been trying to grasp for anything I could reach, to support me spiritually. All the while, the water has been there, waiting for me to stop flailing about, to stop resisting and just allow the water to support me. In learning to swim spiritually, I have to let go of whatever I've been trying to grasp, let myself float in the Spirit, and then finally take the first tiny stroke of swimming.

What does this mean for me? Well, I've been grasping for the ordination process for a while, first in trying to become a priest and later in arguing with my bishop about the process. While I think there is still something seriously wrong with the process, it is the nature of an institution. I really feel through this vision that it's time to let go, to stop flailing about, and to allow myself to be supported by the Holy Spirit.

I am being called to the vocation of theologian. That means I'll sometimes be at odds with my church--but if a voice speaks in the wilderness and no one hears, does the voice really speak? So yes, that may mean I'm called to be the outsider voice that reminds the church what it means to be the church.

If you're swimming by holding onto the bricks in the side of the pool, are you really swimming? The bricks form a home for the water, but they are not the water. Likewise, the church buildings and hierarchies form a home for the Holy Spirit, but they are not the Holy Spirit. Like the mystics of the early church, I am called toward the spiritual core of my faith, not to the hierarchy that forms its boundaries.

Realizing that, I also realize that in the father's house of many dwelling places (John 14), my ministry takes me far more often outside into the fog than even in the foyer. What a perfectly vicious little circle I brought myself into when I titled this blog... :)

A theologian, a centurion, and a voice in the wilderness

2009-07-01T21:42:00.000-04:00

It’s almost like one of those jokes: “A priest and a rabbi walk into a bar…” Such has been my ecclesiastical life, if not my spiritual life, of late.

It’s bad enough that I haven’t found the motivation to blog in the last couple of months. But I’ve felt a distinct sense of being an outsider, of not quite belonging, in my church since I returned from Iraq.

My spiritual director makes a point that perhaps my greatest fear is abandonment, since it’s something that has happened to me a number of times in my life, from the breakup of my family (though at a very early age), to being without a spiritual home for many years, to living alone, to my current situation.

I feel abandoned by my church. There, it’s on the web now, it’s out there. I feel betrayed by a church that does not seem to care for its military ministry, denies that there is even a problem, and seeks to deflect all discussion of the issue entirely.

A little background:

Those who really know me also know that I once sought to become a chaplain. You will also recall that that particular dream died rather suddenly just before I deployed to Iraq last year. Finally, you’ll recall that my vocation morphed into that of a theologian. What you may or may not know as well is that my dismissal from the ordination process broke my heart, and I’ve been struggling to pick up the pieces since I returned to Dayton.

The letter from the Commission on Ministry (COM), from about a year ago, makes only two statements regarding discernment of my call:

1. “Our discernment focused on a possible call to ordained ministry in general, rather than a call to a specific context in which one might serve as an ordained person.”

2. “After careful and prayerful deliberation, we do not believe that further exploration of the ordained ministry is called for, but want to be certain that you have an opportunity to receive the church’s blessing and affirmation of your baptismal ministry, and to explore additional resources to enrich that ministry.”

And that’s it. After two years of discernment, pain, and work, that’s the response, essentially saying, “We don’t want to bother with you.” Not even any sort of dialogue or serious spiritual guidance, just a slap in the face after a round-robin interview session that took less than half a day.

I’ve since learned to be wary of any statement which begins with anything like “prayerful deliberation.” I’ve seen and heard it far more frequently in connection with bad things than with good things—and that in itself is a very bad thing. I see the phrase as something of a cop out; to put it bluntly, a turn of ecclesiastical doublespeak meant to distance oneself from the harmful decision one has made.

I have two major theological issues that still have not been sufficiently addressed:

1. I believe that a call to ordination ought to be linked to its purpose. What is a call without its associated context? We are not called to stand at the altar and look pretty in robes but rather to perform some particular facet of God's work. I have felt called to ordained ministry, not ultimately in the context of parish ministry but to the congregation of the military. Without considering the context to which we are called, the COM--by its very nature and design--is necessarily biased toward the typical parish context and biased not only against ordained ministry to the military but also against all other particular contexts.

2. The tone—and words—of the response indicate that the COM is not interested in further discernment on this matter at all. Without further feedback, and in combination with my first point, this indicates to me an outright refusal in this diocese to explore a calling to military ministry. As a military member, I saw this even a year ago as a frightening turn of events. The outright refusal to take seriously a new call to military chaplaincy (as it is a “specific context in which one might serve as an ordained person,” as the COM’s response states) makes me feel like the diocese has taken a stance to turn its back on those parishioners who have answered the call to wear the military uniform.

What only a few of you might know until now is that I’ve been emailing about this to my bishop, and I’m no closer to any serious attempt to do anything other than sidestep each issue. So in addition to a theologian and military officer (centurion), I feel a little like John the Baptist, the voice in the wilderness who challenged the hierarchy of his day and lost his head for his trouble.

So now I’m left with some hard choices to make:

· Where does my ministry fit into the church?

· Am I called to live in the fog outside the “father’s house,” or is there a room where I can once again find a place to lay my head?

· Can I continue attending a church in which I feel like an outsider?

Well, it’s not much of a joke, but it does have a punch line…

Alleluia, Christ is risen!

2009-04-12T07:52:00.000-04:00

This year, my Lenten experience has been...interesting. Of course, by 'interesting,' I don't necessarily mean in a good way--I mean both terrifying and exhausting.

I struggled during this Lent with a host of time management issues that have arisen from a perfect storm of my own desire to study theology (in my spare time, mind you), reintegration from deployment, everyone wanting to spend time with me, and my difficulty saying "no." While each is a good thing on its own, I've been swamped by what has become "too much of a good thing."

It all came to a head during Holy Week, when I was getting up at about 2 or 3 in the morning to write papers for school, then heading out to get to work by 7, then doing other stuff after work. By Maundy Thursday, I was exhausted, crushed, and ready to just drop everything and walk away.

I stayed in the church after the Maundy Thursday service. I watched and prayed for an hour--something that I'd done once during my first Holy Week, when my church had organized a rotating watch for the night, in remembrance of the disciples at the garden at Gethsemane, whom Jesus chided, "Could you not keep awake one hour?" (Mark 14:37). The activity died down gradually, and after about twenty or thirty minutes I found myself alone in the church. I prayed as Jesus revealed his vulnerable humanity, "Let this cup pass from me; yet not my will but your will be done" (paraphrase from Luke 22:42).

I "slept in" on Friday morning, until 6am. I returned to the church to pray for an hour before the Good Friday service. The Good Friday service was more to my mood at the time--very somber and solemn. Then I was jarred when Father Jim slammed a wooden cross onto the stripped altar. It was as though I was struck by something. It was a reminder--or perhaps anamnesis (a Greek word that translates weakly as 'remembrance' but also includes a reliving and a present experience)--of the nails being driven through Jesus and into the cross.

Incidentally, this is also a special time for all those who have served in the military. It was a centurion who, at the foot of the cross of a condemned rabblerouser, confessed, "Truly this man was God's Son!" (Matthew 27:54). And the guards posted by Pilate have their own empty tomb experience, albeit in a very different way (Matthew 27:65-28:4). (A good novel that deals with the aftermath is The Centurion's Wife, by Davis Bunn and Janette Oke. The centurion of this story is the one whose faith is praised by Jesus (Matthew 8:5-13) and who (in this novel) is assigned by Pilate to investigate the disappearance of Jesus' body from the tomb.)

I thought Easter Vigil was a bit early in the day this year, since the sun was still up after the service, but that's not important. What's important is the anamnesis of Christ's incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection, all done for us in accordance with God's will.

Alleluia, Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Fear of God? Or fear of our friends?

2009-02-09T20:34:00.000-05:00

Last week, I attended a meeting at church (and those who were present will remember this). At the beginning of the meeting, it was appropriate that we would have a prayer. There was one problem: no one would volunteer to lead the prayer. I'm as guilty of this as anyone else; after all, I was there, and I failed to step up, at least for the opening prayer. But something occurred to me later during the meeting: This is not the first such instance I've witnessed (and thus, been a part of).

So why is it that we don't step up to lead a prayer? Now, I'm not asking why we all don't enter ordained ministry and lead a congregation, since ordination is a different issue entirely. Why don't we want to be the person to pray in public, or not even in a small group of close friends?

Now, clearly I was multitasking during this meeting, since I was taking notes at the same time as I was examining myself about this. Here's what I came up with, at least for my own experiences:

I'm an introvert. Say what you will about small group vs. large group, but being put on the spot for extemporaneous prayer is a tough one for an introvert, regardless of group size.
I'm not accustomed to extemporaneous prayer. As an Episcopalian (even a non-cradle one), I've grown into the Book of Common Prayer and away from the prayer for the moment (or further so). While I can pray from memory a number of the prayers in the BCP, I'm not as good at letting the Spirit move me in prayer. It's certainly a failing, because, to some extent, I'm not surrendering myself to God in prayer.
To some extent, I'm more afraid of people than of God. A scary thought, and certainly a failing, but it's not to say I'm not a 'God-fearer.' What it does say is that I have always feared the judgment of other people.

Ultimately, though, there is hope. There is room in the introvert for change, and there is room for the acknowledgement that no matter how much our friends love us, God loves us more.

Re-integration by parts

2008-12-30T06:02:00.000-05:00

My name is Bob, and I've been a bad blogger. (Hi, Bob.)

I've finished what the Air Force calls "reintegration time," a period of downtime in which I'm supposed to "reintegrate" with my normal life. Now that I'm "reintegrated," I returned to work yesterday to a mountain of obsolete emails--stuff that was relevant months ago but has since expired. My job yesterday was to sift through all that to find the correspondence that actually remains relevant. If you've ever returned to an office job after a time away, you know this process.

An additional task was to sort out my calendar for the next eight months. Ordinarily, an end-of-year task like that would be to sort out the next year, but I know one thing is both set and fluid at the same time (gotta love those quantum metaphors!)--my upcoming physics PhD program, which starts in the fall. I know that I'm starting that, but the course schedule is not yet set.

One item on my calendar--and one of the "parts" of my "re-integration by parts" (a bad but favorite math joke) is a much-needed trip to visit my godparents. It seems I only get to see them about once a year--a reality of living so far from them.

I'm still taking classes at United toward a Master of Theological Studies--in fact, I'm taking a heavier load in the spring semester than I have taken in past semesters, just so I have enough done that I can conceivably finish that degree part-time while I begin work on my physics PhD. Yes, I've already been called crazy for that call...

Back from Baghdad...

2008-12-06T15:50:00.000-05:00

I returned to Dayton yesterday afternoon, after a four-day trip from Baghdad.

I've noticed a few differences in Dayton:

What's with all the white stuff falling from the sky?
I didn't drive a vehicle during my deployment, so I was a little leery about getting out today. But I managed.
It seems strange to see all the bright colors people are wearing. For the last four months, I've seen little more than bland earthtones, whether in clothing or in the environment.
And it's quite nice to be able to wear regular clothing again.

Now to (re)build a life for myself...

Happy Thanksgiving from Baghdad!

2008-11-27T21:32:00.000-05:00

As I close in toward the end of my deployment, I have quite a bit for which to be thankful. In addition my previous personal inventory (see “The Golden Ticket,” below), I’m thankful for the outpouring of support I’ve received from back home. You all really have made this experience a better one.

Anyway, lest you think this is all about being mushy, I’ll try to answer the question: So what is Thanksgiving like for a staff officer in Baghdad? Well, it was actually pretty good, or maybe I’m going a little insane—it’s a short trip. There’s still a little work, but I got to get a little of a late start—a little breakfast, then a run that turned into more of a leisurely walk. I really should take a leisurely walk more often.

Thanksgiving dinner (or ‘linner,’ as we were calling it, since it was at lunchtime) was pretty good, if crowded. There were all the normal Thanksgiving foods; I had the Cornish game hen for the first time in several years. I must have missed the cranberry sauce in another crowded line, but I also didn’t notice its absence until well after dinner. I’d had the pumpkin pie several times in the last week, so my friends teased me for having gotten the same dessert again.

After ‘linner,’ it was back to the office for a bit, then outside to play dominoes under a marvelous sunset. I didn’t get to call home, though—all the phone circuits were busy, indicating that I had chosen to call home at about the same time as everyone else on the base.

All in all, it was a pretty good Thanksgiving, and much better than too many people get, especially in these hard times. Too many people are going to have trouble making ends meet, and too many people will lose their lives. Thanksgiving should be about giving thanks, especially for having the ability to celebrate a nice Thanksgiving.

Thanks be to God for all the blessings of this life.

Amen.

The Golden Ticket

2008-11-17T20:31:00.000-05:00

A few days ago, I got what deployers call the ‘Golden Ticket’.

The Golden Ticket is the letter that releases one from the deployed position and starts the ball rolling to go home. I got mine, in its final form, a couple of days ago, so I’m going home sometime in the near future, and about eight months ahead of schedule. As it turns out, my position was identified as one of those to be cut when President Bush announced troop reductions in September.

Well, it’s not quite Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. But it will be good to go home.

Anyway, what does this mean for me?

What have I lost from the time I’ve been in Iraq?

Well, I’ll have been here about four months. Actually, that’s not such a big deal, since I’ve served with a lot of people who are serving in twelve- to fifteen-month deployments—and, in fact, my own deployment was originally set for a year.

What have I gained for the four months in Iraq?

I’ve gained several great friends whom I never would have met otherwise.
I’ve gained a little perspective on some of the luxuries I take for granted in the U.S.. For example, fast internet service.
The time away from my normal commitments has been—as someone put it—a sabbatical. It has given me the chance to figure out my own path, with less influence from what I think others might think. (Here, I’m reminded of the late physicist, Richard Feynman, “What do you care what other people think?”)
That sabbatical has given me the opportunity to explore my call in more detail, as you’ve seen in previous posts. I’ve decided to pursue a Master of Theological Studies degree, rather than the M.Div., and later on go for a Ph.D. in theology. The initial call I felt toward the priesthood, I think, was a little push from God to explore theological education.
And, for a couple of purely practical gains, I’ve managed to sock away a little money from not paying for stuff in the U.S.. I’ll also have a few more awards to wear on my service dress, including my first individual military decoration.

I’ve definitely come out of this deployment in the ‘plus’ column.

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!

2008-10-23T21:35:00.002-04:00

Back in June, I sent out my application for a PhD program in physics at the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT). I found out last week that I got picked up for that program, and I’ve been puzzling through the ramifications since then. The current outlook is that I’ll start probably in Fall 2009 and study at AFIT—at Wright-Patterson AFB—for three years. I’m then committed to stay in the Air Force for five years after that, at least four years of which will be as a professor at the US Air Force Academy. So I’ll be an Air Force physicist until 2017, which puts me at 12 years of service, more than halfway to retirement (assuming I at least make Major).

I say try again because I attempted a PhD program once before. Although I had some really good people supporting me in that program, I really felt the need to get out and stem the tide of rising student loan balances. Now, the Air Force wants to pay me and send me back to school at the same time, in a program that is extremely focused toward quickly and efficiently shaping students into researchers. (That’s not to say that civilian institutions are good or bad; they just function differently as far as funding and carrying out research programs, which translates into a significant difference in the normal time required for a student to complete a PhD degree.)

Where does that leave me with respect to a call to ordained ministry? And where does that leave me in my attempt to discern what God wants for me? Well, as I’ve said before, God is more subtle than many of us would like. There’s plenty of room to be indecisive in life, especially if one stands around waiting for God’s purpose to become clear. Meanwhile, life (and God!) keeps going on. In the end, I can wait around, beating my head against a wall (figuratively, of course, though I sometimes have the appropriate headache…) as I continue to ponder my purpose in a place where I probably won’t be ordained anyway. Or I can make a decision, take a leap of faith, and pray that God has placed me where I can do some good.

In any case, as I’ve mentioned before, the first call I experienced was more of a long-term call, in which I would seek ordination after finishing my military career. In my current context, I feel like the more urgent call may have been what was needed to prod me toward what I needed. I enjoy the theological education I’ve had so far, and I find that it feeds both my mind and my soul. So I still intend to complete my Master of Divinity program. In the future, depending on where I am, relative to appropriate schools, I can pursue a Doctor of Theology degree. And there’s still plenty of life left for me to live—with God's grace, maybe I’ll answer the original call after all.

Lord, keep my eyes, heart, mind, and soul open to new possibilities!

Amen.

Other Plans: A Sermon on Matthew 22:1-14 (Proper 23A)

2008-10-10T21:05:00.000-04:00

How many of us have been lonely on a Friday night, or just felt like having people over for dinner, or wanted to go out with friends to a show? How many of us have had those plans frustrated by the answers of our friends, “I have other plans.”?

How often that happens in today’s culture! With all the activities, with all the work, with all the possible things to plan to do, perhaps it’s more amazing that we can actually find time to invite others to spend time with us in the first place!

The king in Jesus’ parable must have felt a little like that. He’d gone to all this trouble, spared no expense, so that his son’s wedding banquet would be something worth remembering. But when he sent out the invitations, those invited had other plans. And some went so far as to seize and to kill the messengers.

What a terrible time to be a messenger!

God must have felt the same way. After all, God has gone to all the trouble of creating the world in which we live. God has spared no expense so that Jesus’ wedding banquet will be something to remember.

Of course, Jesus’ wedding banquet is not a wedding as we understand weddings, but another way of seeing the end times, what theologians call the eschaton, what we see in today’s reading from the prophet Isaiah, as the eschatological banquet. At this banquet, as Jesus says in John’s gospel, “I will draw all people to myself.” The eschaton, from the Greek for ‘ending’, is the final consummation of the community of God, so the parable from today’s gospel reading is especially appropriate.

At the time, God had prepared all this for the chosen people, and sent out messengers to invite them to the banquet. But they had other plans, and so they went off to those plans. But some stuck around, just to seize and kill the messengers—The prophets.

Like the king, God has sent out another call. This call has gone out to the whole of humanity, just as the king sent his messengers out to the thoroughfares and the main streets to invite everyone they found. God has invited us into the hall for the banquet.

God’s invitation is real enough, as we all probably know, at least somewhere in our hearts and souls. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be in church early on a Sunday morning, when a nice warm bed tempts us to sleep in. But, although God’s invitation is real enough, God is a lot more subtle about inviting us in.

Or did I miss the engraved invitation?

The LORD our God invites you this day

To a celebration of the wedding of Jesus Christ,

The only Son of God,

To the one holy catholic and apostolic church.

Who among us, upon receiving such an invitation, could possibly ignore it?

Or would we drum up an excuse? Would we find that we have other plans, that something else is keeping us from going to the wedding banquet?

We also find that we have work to do, to prepare ourselves for the banquet. After all, we would prepare ourselves for an ordinary dinner party. We would probably shower, and we would dress appropriately, just as did most of the guests at the banquet of the king in Jesus’ parable.

Everyone except the one guy who was not wearing a wedding robe—that guy, who came as he was, with no thought about what might please the host who had gone to all the trouble to have a banquet. That must have been a grave insult, for the king ordered that guy to be bound and thrown out. In the Air Force, we have an expression that fits especially well here:

“Don’t be that guy!”

We generally do quite a bit to acknowledge the host of a dinner party in our culture today. We generally groom and dress appropriately, and we generally bring a gift, some small token of appreciation, or something to share with the rest of the party, like a nice bottle of wine.

If that’s a lot of preparation to attend an ordinary dinner party, how much more preparation do we owe to God, for the invitation—engraved or not—to share in the eschatological banquet? Answering God’s call requires much more than just saying, “Here am I,” more than just saying yes.

We have to commit ourselves to God’s call, we have to clear our calendars of other plans, we have to prepare ourselves for God’s call, and then we follow in the words of the prophet Isaiah, “Here am I; send me.”

Amen.

The fog is outside, so why wouldn’t the seeker be an outsider?

2008-09-27T12:01:00.000-04:00

As the title of my blog should imply, I am exploring my place in God’s kingdom. I’m not always good at that exploration, or at doing God’s will even when I discern it, but that’s another story...

As part of my exploration, last night I attended the RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) class hosted by the base chapel. It’s the class intended to introduce newcomer adults to the Roman Catholic Church (RCC), and generally the yearlong course of study is a prerequisite for baptism or reception into the RCC. I was in a particularly down place, so I thought I’d try something new to give my spiritual life a little shake.

Anyway, I arrived about a half-hour early. Normally, I would be early anyway, but I was a couple minutes late—for the time I’d seen advertised. I waited in the classroom, looking at the handwritten poster of church history that stretched halfway around the room. After about ten minutes, the priest entered the room and welcomed me. I filled out a two-page application (the second page ended up being blank save for one check box, since I’ve never been married and have no kids), and he and I sat at the middle of opposite sides of the classroom’s long table.

One by one, other students arrived and took their seats, beginning with the ends of the table. The class eventually began.

It’s interesting to explore the differences in how denominations view specific events in church history. For example, the RCC has a somewhat different view of the European Reformation than do many of the Protestant churches. Additionally, the 1054 split with the Eastern church was scarcely mentioned during the class—and not at all by the priest. These differences still plague ecumenical relations, and they likely will be factors in my ministry, should it ever get off the ground.

About a half-hour into the class, I came to the sudden realization that every seat at the table was filled—except for the seat to either side of me. I’m pretty sure I’d showered that morning, so what was up?

Was it my uniform? Doubtful, since most of the class was in uniform. I’m an officer, but the room was a mix of ranks.

Was it being the new guy in the room? Again, doubtful. I was one of two newcomers to the group, and the seats next to me were the only empty ones.

Whatever it was, it became a reminder for me that the RCC probably would never be quite the home for me that my own church has become. My ministry is outside the great hall of many rooms, so why wouldn’t I be an outsider? Maybe that was the point of the exercise...

In the fullness of time...

2008-09-27T11:54:00.002-04:00

I’ve spent some time in the last few days thinking about the commitments I’ve gotten myself into, and where they put me in relation to the exploration of my ministry path.

Earlier this year, I applied for a PhD program at the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT). The results of that application should be out in about a month. If I get picked up for this program, I’ll start probably in Fall 2009, finish in Fall 2012, and I’ll be on the hook for staying in the Air Force for five years after that.

That commits me until Fall 2017, by which time either I’ll be a Major or I’ll be out of the Air Force. (My first look at Major should happen in 2013, and Fall 2017 would put me at 12 years of service.) Once I pin on Major, I’m committed to my career field and can’t switch to the chaplaincy.

Here are some possibilities:

First, the Air Force is experimenting with a new career transition program to switch from overstaffed career fields to understaffed ones. Although it’s too early to tell, this might allow the switch.

Second, there’s an interservice transfer, with the possibility of becoming a chaplain in another military service. The Air Force is more stringent with age requirements than other services, and I’ll be 44 years old in 2017.

Now, there are issues with either of these. For example, it’s pretty clear that I’ll have to drop out of active duty at some point to get the two years of ministry experience that will be required for me to become a chaplain.

Another possibility is the first idea I’d had when I began discernment, to seek ordination after finishing my military career. I’ve had some spiritual tugs toward chaplaincy, but I have to face the possibility that God was just calling me to the road toward some other vocation. To discount that possibility does an injustice against the vocation and against God. If I refuse to think about it, I’ve made a decision already.

I still intend to pursue theological education, at least to a Master of Divinity. There’s also the possibility of a Doctor of Theology degree, depending on where I’m stationed (if I’m to continue part-time study). I want to keep up and expand on what I’ve learned so far.

There are still outlets for my ministry along that path. I’ve been very happy serving as a verger in my church. I’ve been very happy devoting what little voice I have to the choir. There’s also room for my ministry to grow, especially with the recent announcement in the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Ohio of licensure processes for Lay Preaching and Lay Catechesis, in which I’m very interested.

What I’m left with is a mess of—as I talked about before—chains of my own making. So the road to ordained ministry will be somewhat longer than I’d anticipated. Here, perhaps God is making some strides toward helping me develop patience, humility, and vigilance. Unless I’m overlooking something, which is entirely possible given my life...

Faith manages...

In the beginning…

2008-09-22T22:01:00.000-04:00

First, a bit of background on the beginning of my spiritual life. Those who have seen it will recognize a portion of the most recent version of my spiritual autobiography:

I grew up in the Dayton area, but I moved around a lot. My parents divorced when I was very young, three or four years old, so I have no clear recollection of my parents being together. I lived with my father during the week and spent weekends with my mother. My parents didn’t go to church and weren’t religious at all. However, sending the children to Sunday school was a way for my mother to get us out of the house for a few hours. Given this background, I didn’t have much of a concept of God when I was a child, not even as some “out there” entity. I’d been taught about Jesus, but only through Sunday school activities that emphasized the memorization of Bible verses rather than seeing any meaning in them. Ultimately, I had no real sense of what faith was at that time, so trying to overlay a religion didn’t do anything within me.

When I was about ten years old, the tiniest mustard seed of faith sprouted within me, and I felt the need to express it. Without understanding it, though, I couldn’t really do much with it. Since I had no foundation in the faith, there was nothing there to nourish the mustard seed. Finally, since it was all I’d known about, I told my Sunday school teacher that I wanted to be saved. She passed my request on, and one of the pastors came to see me that very day. While the rest of the class was doing their activity for that Sunday, the pastor and I sat on the steps at the side entrance to the church. I was shy, especially near this authority figure, so I spoke very little. I let him go on about what being saved meant: that I’d let Jesus into my heart, and that I’d go to Heaven when I died. He talked for probably fifteen or twenty minutes and then asked me if I agreed and wanted Jesus in my heart. When I agreed, we bowed our heads and he led us in a short prayer, maybe fifteen seconds.

Then I felt nothing. I noticed no difference in my heart, mind, or soul, which struck me as painfully inadequate given the theological buildup. Maybe it was because I wasn’t ready for my particular relationship with God. Maybe I was being saved for the wrong reason: I was concerned with fitting in with the rest of the class, most of whom had been saved, and I felt pressure to become part of the accepted community of the church. Maybe I was standing at the wrong door in C. S. Lewis’ “hall” of Christian faiths, about to open the door to a faith that wouldn’t fit my soul. Maybe I was too young to be expected to fully comprehend what was being asked of me. Maybe it was that I didn’t have a clear concept of God at that time, and part of the free will that God gave us is the requirement that we understand at least a little of what we’re getting ourselves into. In any case, I took it on the word of that pastor that something had happened, even though I hadn’t perceived it myself. Incidentally, “being saved” was emphasized at that church more than was the sacrament of Baptism, so even though I’d gone to Sunday school, I had no clear understanding of baptism, other than it being some ceremony that adults went through.

----

Now, I’ve recently started reading Total Ministry: A Practical Approach, by CI Jones (Helena, MN: Archegos Publishing Co., 1993) – thanks to Father Jim Larsen, my priest, for sending a copy to me!

In the second chapter, “The Foundation for Ministry,” Jones writes about his experience at Young Life Camp in Colorado. After hearing the conversion stories of others, Jones says to himself, “Although you’ve been an Episcopalian all of your life, you have never given your life over to Christ” (p. 21). He then decides that the next morning he would do just that.

The next morning, Jones goes out on his own to pray, and says, “Okay, God, here I am” (Ibid). Nothing.

Then he says it louder. “I give my life over to you, Jesus” (Ibid). Again, nothing.

As Jones says, “I was expecting a lightning bolt such as Paul encountered on the road to Damascus—or at least some feeling for the presence of God changing me. What I didn’t realize at the time was that my conversion had taken place the night before when I made the decision to commit myself to Christ—to give myself over to him” (p. 22).

In some way, Jones and I had similar spiritual experiences. At age ten, I asked to be saved, and then the pastor and I prayed about it. But the pastor’s prayer didn’t have anything to do with being saved.

Committing my free will to God was the critical act.

As with Jones’ experience, I had already committed myself to God in the initial act of asking to be saved.

The duality of good and evil

2008-09-22T21:54:00.000-04:00

What was created was good. But God created in us (and, apparently, in the serpent) something that was very dangerous: choice. Did sin enter the world because the serpent chose to influence humanity's choice, or because humanity chose to turn against God? Or does the serpent speak to us only in demonstrating how sneaky our own ego can be?

I think we are basically good (for we are created in the image of God), but we are terminally flawed because the sin of human ego--whether the original sin, passing through the generations, or our own, or something in between--has impaired our connection with God. So one could paraphrase the quantum physics concept of duality: we are both basically good with the ability to do evil AND basically evil with the ability to do good.

It's strange (or maybe not), but with my physics background, I find frequent opportunities to use the language of science--and quantum physics in particular--in discussions of Christian theology.

Eleventh-Hour Workers: A Sermon on Matthew 20:1-16 (Proper 20A)

2008-09-12T13:41:00.000-04:00

This is about a week early, but Proper 20A happens to coincide with the 61st birthday of the US Air Force. I thought I should at least attempt a response…

The primary text is the gospel reading (Matthew 20:1-16), though there is a small piece of the alternate Old Testament reading from Jonah (3:10-4:11).

----

When I was getting ready to deploy to Iraq, I was told that the area where I’d be was about as safe as Dayton, Ohio.

You’ve probably heard the recent news stories that tell of a much-changed Iraq, very different from the Iraq of 2004.

As we’ve all no doubt read and heard about the Iraq of 2004, that was a place in which it seemed—at least from the media coverage—that helicopters were shot down every few days, and bombs exploded hourly.

In the Iraq of 2008, we hear talk of a new government, and of a country becoming secure enough for 60,000 people to attend a soccer match without incident.

In the language of Matthew’s gospel account, I have gone into the field late in the day, perhaps close to the eleventh hour. I didn’t come in at the beginning, when violence waited around every corner and under every rock. I didn’t come in even at the third, sixth, or ninth hour, when the Iraqi government was reforming, the Iraqi people were rebuilding, and our people were regrouping.

In Matthew’s gospel, the hours were counted from sunrise toward sunset, much like the hours of our Daily Office. Jesus’ parable almost certainly refers to the time of the harvest, since there are so many laborers needed for the vineyard. And, if we recall, Jesus often uses the metaphor of the harvest in his parables. The harvest would have occurred near the time of the autumn equinox, when the day would have twelve hours of sunlight. So the first workers would have come in the early morning, and the landowner went out to hire more as the day rolled on, hiring the last at the eleventh hour—only an hour before sunset.

The eleventh hour is an especially appropriate metaphor for my arrival in Iraq, given the talk of our presidential candidates, that the work in Iraq is nearing completion, with so many workers in the field. As with myself, and the latecomers to the vineyard in Matthew’s gospel, we all sometimes find ourselves coming to work at the eleventh hour. Indeed, if we think of our own spiritual journeys, many of us have come to work for God at what might feel like the eleventh hour.

Do we deserve the full rewards for the work that all have done, given the lateness of our call?

The easy answer to Matthew’s account is to agree with the laborers who have been there all day, who have borne the heat and the burden of the day.

But the easy answer isn’t always the right one. God warned Jonah about worrying about that for which he did not labor and which he did not grow. Likewise, in the vineyard, both the eleventh-hour workers and the all-day workers reap what they did not sow.

We come to God’s church, and we find that it is already built. We have only to find our place in the church, to do the work we have been given to do, just as the eleventh-hour workers came to the vineyard to find that much of the work was already done. The challenge for those eleventh-hour workers probably would have been to find the work that still needed to be done.

Even though we come to the church at the eleventh hour, there is still work to do, not only in the church, but in the world as well. Among other places, we find our work laid out for us in our Baptismal Covenant, as well as the two great commandments of our Lord Jesus Christ:

First, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.”

Second, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Even though we come to the church at the eleventh hour, God’s grace still waits for us.

Just as with the workers in the vineyard, we all receive rewards for working. But those rewards, those payments for working, whether for just the eleventh hour or all day long, are given by the grace of God, not for any particular thing we’ve done. God does not have to pay us. God is not required to give us anything.

Rather, God has given us our gifts out of divine love, through the breath of the Holy Spirit, and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. As with a parent and a child, God gives us love, God provides for us, and God teaches us, not for anything we have done, but because we are God’s children and God loves us.

In a sense, we are all eleventh-hour workers. But there is still work to do in the eleventh hour. Otherwise, the harvest about which Jesus teaches would be complete.

As in the vineyard, it’s not too late for us to begin working, nor is it too late for us to receive the fruits of labor. Until the last great harvest, it’s not too late to work for God’s kingdom, nor is it too late for us to receive God’s grace and love.

Do we deserve the full rewards for the work that all have done, given the lateness of our call?

There are two ways to answer that question.

First, we realize that there is nothing we can do that earns God’s love, for God is not an object that can be bought or sold.

Second, we realize the value of community, that together we accomplish what separately we could not.

Those who came to work before us built the church, in structure, in doctrine, and in community. We who have come after them have additional duties. We maintain what they have built, we carry the church community into the world, we bring the world into the church community, and we continue to prepare.

For the kingdom of heaven has come near.

Amen.

Last Chance on a Rooftop: A Sermon on Matthew 16:21-28 (Proper 17A)

2008-08-31T10:47:00.000-04:00

A man was stranded on his roof, trying to escape the rising flood. He desperately prayed, “God save me.”

A few minutes later, a boat pulled alongside. The boatman offered the man a ride to safety. He refused, “God will save me.”

As the waters continued to rise, he prayed again, “God, please save me.”

A bit later, another boat pulled up, and this boatman offered another ride to safety. Again, he refused, “God will save me.”

The waters continued to rise, and again he prayed, “God, please save me.”

This time, a helicopter arrived, and the crew offered him a ride to safety. Again, he refused, “God will save me.”

As the waters left only the tip of the roof for him to stand on, he prayed again, “God, please save me.”

And just then, the heavens opened up, and a voice from heaven proclaimed, “I’ve already sent two boats and a helicopter! What more do you want?”

In this familiar story, the man on the roof seems a lot like us at times. We have a little faith in God, but we reject the help that God provides. We want the glowing hand to come down from heaven and smack around those who vex us. That’s especially true in our contemporary culture, which values independence over relationships.

We recite—and live out—the mantras, “I forge my own destiny, I am the master of my domain, I am the captain of my ship.” In doing so, we reject God’s help every day, since it comes in the form of the simple things that people do to help each other.

We are unable, or unwilling, to see that God is manifest in humanity, striving together for common good.

God is a great deal more subtle than that. When God wants something done, we feel the call to action. That call can be toward the start of a long journey, or it can be a single step. That call can be toward a lifelong vocation, or it can be a single action to help the person next to us.

This world is a suffering world, and there are enough small things for us to do, just as there is enough suffering for us to have our share. Jesus’ call was to a suffer for humanity, to be stripped, beaten, mocked, and finally crucified. This was the will of the Father, that Jesus suffer for the sake of humanity.

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus tells his disciples exactly what he must do. He is to suffer and die, and on the third day rise again.

When Peter rebukes him, Jesus tells him that he has put his mind on human things, when it should be on the divine. Jesus’ suffering is the will of God, but Peter wants Jesus to turn away from that call. He understands only the status quo, and not the salvation that Jesus has been called to bring through his own suffering. Peter essentially tells Jesus that he should ignore the divine call and obey his own human call.

Jesus’ response seems harsh: “Get behind me, Satan!”

But Peter’s call to Jesus is the temptation of sin that has plagued humanity. It is the temptation that the human will can overcome the divine will. It is the temptation that we can do what we want, and ignoring what God wants, without consequence.

But, as with of the man on the roof, God answers our prayers in the way God wants, and not necessarily in the way we might want. Just because God doesn’t send twelve legions of angels to our defense doesn’t mean God doesn’t love us. And it doesn’t mean God won’t help us. It means God is more subtle than that, and that God acts through the everyday actions of people—just like you and me—whom God has called to help the person next to us, and to commit our lives to God.

That’s what Jesus teaches his disciples after he rebukes Peter. “Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Through his words to Peter, Jesus reiterates his call to us, down through the ages, to remember that God comes first.

When we try to save our lives, we tend to put ourselves first, at the expense of everyone else. We keep those human things at the front of our mind, and our spirituality, our relationship with God, becomes little more than a lifestyle accessory.

We become more like the man on the roof, who thinks that God will reach down with a giant glowing hand and move him to a safe place. We become more like the man on the roof, who, though desperate, still thinks of God as being at his beck and call.

Instead, we ought to follow Jesus’ teaching, not to throw our lives away, but to give ourselves—body, mind, and soul—to the service of others.

In this way, we become less like the man on the roof, and more like those in the helicopter, who have given of themselves, and are saved from the flood.

Amen.

Re-entering the craft of writing sermons

2008-08-24T21:56:00.000-04:00

After a couple of weeks in Iraq, I thought it time to try to start writing sermons, in an attempt to maintain the skills I learned in my preaching class last semester. I wasn’t quite successful this week, but it’s all about making progress, right? (As a very good friend recently reminded me.)

This Sunday’s gospel lectionary is from Matthew 16:13-20, in which Jesus asks his disciples who others think he is and then who the disciples think he is. The separate questions bring me to the first of three moves that I considered outlining for a sermon: What do you care what other people think? The late physicist Richard Feynman asks this question in his book of the same title. It’s been too long since I’ve read that book, so I don’t recall the circumstances behind the question; only that Feynman is serious when he asks the question.

The second move is something I’ve continually struggled with on this blog: Concentrate on the will of God, not the will of humanity. It’s probably something with which I’ll continue to struggle for the remainder of my life. This move is closely linked with the first, since caring too much about the judgment of others often causes us to change who we are. Sometimes this can be a change for the better, but in changing who we are simply to change appearances, we risk committing a grave injustice against both God and ourselves. We commit enough injustices against each other and against God already—that’s what sin is.

The third move concentrates on the statement by Jesus to Peter: The gates of Hades will not prevail. To me, this is reassurance that God is always with us. Jesus essentially says here that death (Hades) will not prevail over the church. The faith community is always there, and God is always there—not even death can change that. And the statement is a foreshadow of the idea that Jesus conquered death.

Well, that’s all for now, I think. Now, to work on a sermon for next week! Not that I expect to actually preach it, but it’s still good practice. It’s also good to dig really deeply into the scripture once in a while.

Radical faith...and taking notes during sermons!

2008-08-21T21:45:00.000-04:00

I’ve listened to two sermons (or “messages”, as the chaplains here call them) since I’ve arrived in Iraq. And I’ve taken notes at two sermons. Since I bought it nearly three years ago, I’ve carried around a 3”x5” Moleskine book, almost wherever I’ve gone. So far, it’s about 3/4 blank.

So what’s in this book? And why do I carry it? I’ve taken a few notes, mostly little bits of insight or questions along my spiritual journey. I carry it because I never know when those insights or questions will come, or how long I can keep them in my head. That little pocket in back is useful for storing anything smaller than a 3x5 card—like a business card or a small note. It’s easier to carry when I’m in my utility uniform, since it has so many pockets. I carry it less often when I’m in civilian clothes, for no other reason than pocket space.

While I sat in my first sermon in Iraq, my hand went to the pocket where I keep the book. I remember thinking to myself, “You’re really going to take notes during a sermon?”.

Yes, I am going to take notes during a sermon. Especially when I’m in a purposeful path of exploring and examining my faith and vocation. Especially when the sermons seem to speak directly toward my exploring soul.

Last Sunday, the sermon addressed the Canaanite woman in Matthew 15:21-28. In the Matthew’s gospel, the Canaanite woman “puts the full-court press on Jesus in demonstrating her faith” (as the preacher put it). When Jesus apparently dismisses her by saying that the children’s food ought not to be given to the dogs, she persists, responding that even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table. Then Jesus praises her for the persistence of her faith and gives her what she has asked for.

Radical faith, as the preacher put it, places dependence on God. In that case, I can’t help but think: Isn’t all faith radical? Faith really is dependent on God.

Faith is much more than belief in God, though belief is a part of it. In some way, faith rejects the demands of this world. In the words of an earlier posting, faith is the breaking of the chains with which we have bound ourselves in this world and the taking on of God’s work. Again, as Jesus says, “my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Persistence of faith, as the preacher goes on, is allowing yourself to say (and mean), “Lord, not what I will, but what you will.”

The humanity of doubting

2008-08-16T20:41:00.000-04:00

I’ve been in Iraq for just over a week now, and I managed to attend a chapel service last Sunday. The sermon, titled, “Do not doubt in the darkness what you have believed in the light”, dealt primarily with the presence (and purpose) of doubt in our lives. It was an eerily appropriate sermon for my particular circumstances.

Oddly, though I’ve flown nearly halfway around the world and into Iraq, I’ve felt less fear than in my normal life. Sure, I’ve struggled with doubt as I explore God’s call. And I’ve struggled with the loneliness that necessarily comes with this sort of social disconnect. But the irrational primal fears—those feel strangely absent.

Since I’ve arrived here (and before that, if you’ve read before), I’ve struggled with my own doubts. I’ve had doubts about God’s call to me, what shape that might take, and the timing of the call. I’ve had doubts about my job here and what I might do when I return. I’ve had doubts about my personal life.

But doubts, by themselves, aren’t bad things. As the preacher goes on to say, “To deny your doubts is to deny your humanity.” As with free will, God gave us the gift of reason. With those gifts, we struggle through this world as best we can, not always knowing exactly what to do. If we ignore our doubts, we ignore the possibility of being imperfect that comes with being human.

Doubt gives us opportunity for spiritual growth. Elijah (in last Sunday’s Old Testament reading from 1 Kings) suffered doubt, but he stepped out of the cave to see God. Peter (in the reading from Matthew’s gospel) suffered doubt when he was walking on the water with Jesus. Likewise, we all have doubts, but we have to struggle through them so that we can walk toward God.

In this way, perhaps Thomas was the greatest of the apostles. I’m sure all of them had doubt, but Thomas continually had the courage to face his doubts. He had the courage and the faith to admit his lack of understanding to Jesus. History remembers only a “Doubting Thomas”—what a compliment!

Collars (and chains) of our own making -- part 2

2008-08-03T21:54:00.001-04:00

Now, I’m at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, waiting for my very-late-night flight out of the country. The tension has worn off, mostly replaced by exhaustion, but I found myself thinking a bit more about my previous post.

“You don’t need a collar to do my work. But you are already bound by a collar of your own making.”

What is a collar? Priests in most of the sacramental traditions (Episcopal, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, perhaps a few others) wear the well-known white collar. The collar is a reminder of servanthood—priests are servants of God. Now, we’re all servants of God (to various degrees, of course), but priests have been set apart and marked differently. The collar is a mark of the priest’s commitment and servitude to God.

Now, what does it mean that one does not need a collar to do God’s work? Again, we are all servants of God, but we all have different works to complete in this world. Many are called to do God’s work. But just as not all of that work requires a priest, not all are called to wear the collar of a priest.

If I haven’t been called to wear the collar of a priest, what have I been called to do? And why have I been called to make deeply personal sacrifices to pursue the priesthood?

As I’ve said, we all have different works to complete in this world. Perhaps the work I’ve been called to do has required me to go through some of the same preparation as would a priest. I do feel a call toward theology (and perhaps preaching as well), but is that a call from God, or is it a call based on my academic and scientific training? Clearly, I have a great deal of exploration to do.

Or is the collar I wear presently made of my own fears and doubts? In my time discerning a call to the priesthood, I’ve learned some significant things about myself, and I’ve had some great experiences, but I’ve suffered for it. What does the future hold? That’s the scary part—but that’s where faith comes in…

Collars (and chains) of our own making

2008-08-03T12:42:00.000-04:00

So here I am, sitting in the airport, less than an hour from boarding my flight out of Dayton. I’ve been running like a headless chicken for at least the last couple of weeks, so I haven’t been able to do much for relaxation (last night’s City of Heroes session notwithstanding).

I’m remembering something that came to me one morning as I was laying in bed.

“You don’t need a collar to do my work. But you are already bound by a collar of your own making.”

It’s always interesting when God speaks. It’s sometimes painful. It’s like I’m a teenager in God’s family, trying desperately to do my own thing in my own way, when God wants what God wants. It’s like I’m the teenager who’s just been told by Dad that I “don’t need the car to go to work” (how many of us have had a similar experience).

As I roll the whole of that one around in my head, I have to think about how much I’m bound by my commitments. While I thought about it then—but never had time to blog it—it’s especially poignant now as I sit in the airport at the beginning of my journey to Iraq. I expect my deployment to be a good experience, but the fact is that, in volunteering for deployment, I’ve attached another collar (or chain) to myself.

We all have these chains, most of which we attach to ourselves—whether by action or inaction, or, as we confess in the Book of Common Prayer (BCP), “by what we have done, and by what we have left undone” (BCP, 360). As I’ve written before (or you can no doubt gather from it), we commit an injustice against God when we allow ourselves to become so bound by these chains that God doesn’t fit in any more.

I think this is what Jesus hopes we’ll realize when he tells us that his yoke is easy and his burden is light.

Well, I guess I’ll have to work some more with this later on. It looks like they’re getting ready to board my flight…

The Tao of Jesus -- Seeking and Letting Go

2008-07-19T22:10:00.001-04:00

I've cited a couple of sources at the header that strike close to home in my search:

"Those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it." (NRSV, Matthew 16:25)
"The Tao abides in non-action, yet nothing is left undone." (Tao Te Ching, chapter 37)

While these might seem to have only passing relation, scripture is a funny thing. It says different things to different people. That's not to say that the words are different--unless, of course, you care about different translations--rather, I mean that scripture is a means through which the Holy Spirit speaks to us. The Holy Spirit says different things to each person because (as I've said before) we need different things. But I digress...

In my discernment process, I've made plans. Admittedly, I'm slightly obsessive-compulsive--somewhere between what the Air Force calls "attention to detail" and a control freak. I've been trained to solve problems, to overcome obstacles, and to plan my life. And this is where, I'm afraid, my scientific education and my Air Force training come to odds with the formation of my ministry. Both Jesus and Lao Tzu write about the folly of struggling with the details at the expense of the big picture, of not being able to see the forest for the trees.

Jesus warns us that too much attention to the details of our plans (overanalysis) can make us lose sight of why what we're doing matters. We are all called by God to some vocation. What do we say to God: yes or no? Do we cling to what we want for our life--and lose it--or do we let go of what we want and reach out to God's embrace--and find it?

Lao Tzu's "non-action" is often interpreted here as inaction, but that's not entirely correct. Instead, "non-action" is action that flows from the Tao rather than from the personal will. The personal will is flawed, only the Tao is perfect.

See any similarity? Here you see--and I rediscover--a piece of my theology.

God has given us the gift of free will. Yes, God wants our love, but it's not love unless we give it freely. If we don't want to love someone, then we don't love that someone.

But it's a dangerous gift that God has given us. Armed with this seemingly insignificant portion of God's power, we (humanity) has done immense harm to the world and to ourselves. It all began with one human placing personal will above God's will--the original sin of eating the forbidden fruit. It grew into a darkness in the human psyche--so dark that humanity could scarcely see God's will, let alone follow it.

Finally, Jesus came as the light of the world, saying, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life." (NRSV, John 8:12) But we have to make a choice: Do we follow Jesus or not? Do we try to save what we want, or do we lose our life for Jesus' sake?

Coming back to my own search, I have to remind myself of this from time to time. And I've been reminded of it by others as well. I have the same weakness as the rest of humanity--imagine that! I want to do what I want, when I want, and how I want. But--to put it bluntly--that is the essence of sin. God calls me to do what God wants me to do, in God's own way and on God's timetable. What I'm doing by trying my own way is not only the essence of sin, but it's an exercise in futility. After all, in a contest between me and God, who do you think would win?

My second sermon -- 1 Cor 4:1-5

2008-07-09T23:19:00.000-04:00

This is my second sermon, written for the Preparing to Preach course. I intended my first sermon for St. George's Episcopal Church, Dayton, Ohio, for the second Sunday after Pentecost (Year A), which fell on 25 May 2008.

I did not preach this sermon at St. George's, however, as it ended up being the first Sunday after Carol Hull's retirement and the first Sunday of Jim Larsen's ministry at St. George's. I did preach it as my final sermon for the course, however.

The primary text is 1 Cor 4:1-5, though I pull in a bit from the Gospel reading, from the Sermon on the Mount.

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A few weeks ago, I attended a training class for work. The class began by breaking up into small teams, with each team having a set time period to build a tower out of index cards. At the end of the exercise, our tower was the only one not standing.

Ultimately, the problem with our tower was similar to the problem in the church in Corinth. In today’s reading from Paul, we have a fight within that church, involving the followers of leaders such as Apollos.

In the case of our tower, each member of the team had an idea how we wanted to build it, and we argued about that until our time was nearly expired. We were still divided even as we built the tower, and that division made for a very shaky foundation.

Now, the division in the church in Corinth isn’t a over how to put together index cards, but over more serious matters, like what work the church will do, or what theology the church will believe.

As biblical scholar William Orr writes, this is a church in danger of schism. And there certainly have been schisms in the church since then. Schism is a word we’ve heard quite a bit recently in connection with our own church. The news media have swarmed about that word, like sharks smelling blood in the water. With headlines like “Division looms for Episcopal Church,” or “Church leader battles division,” the media pronounce the impending schism of our church. And many of the controversies of our secular society become controversies within our church.

Like the members of my tower-building team, we almost hear the threat: “Time’s up.”

But the Christian church has often been controversial, even from the very beginning. Christ’s earthly ministry was a litany of challenges to his culture and the hierarchy of the time. One only has to read the Sermon on the Mount for a few examples. We often call Christ ‘counter-cultural,’ for that very reason. Can we expect to be both Christian and part of worldly culture? Jesus challenged his own culture, why shouldn’t we challenge ours?

As Paul writes to the church in Corinth, we are “servants of Christ and stewards of God’s mysteries.” Following our baptism, the priest or bishop chrismates us, smearing oil in the sign of the cross on our foreheads and saying, “You are sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism and marked as Christ’s own for ever.” With this, we are bound to Christ.

And being bound to Christ makes us one.

As with my tower-building team, sometimes we just have to acknowledge our differences, so we can get something out of the class, and move on to more pressing challenges, even if we never finished the tower.

Great things can come of our differences, if we can weather them and learn from them, and let the Holy Spirit work through them.

For example, the differences in the early Christian church led, in large part, to the meeting of the council of Nicaea. Out of that came the Nicene Creed, which forms the statement of our core belief that we recite each week.

In her Pentacost letter, our Presiding Bishop writes, “None of us is alone. We cannot engage the fullness of God’s mission alone, nor know the fullness of God’s reality alone. Together as members of the Body of Christ, we can begin to try.”

As stewards of God’s mysteries, we have work to do.

We have changes to make—both in the world and in ourselves—if we are to be found trustworthy.

In this week’s gospel reading, from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, “Strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”

Although my team wrote off our tower, we still became a team. We learned from our differences, finished the remaining team exercises, and completed the class.

Victor Paul Furnish, professor at Southern Methodist University, writes that the Corinthians are a “congregation ‘called’,” and that “God’s call is to be a holy people, ‘sanctified in Christ Jesus.’” Likewise, we should think of ourselves as a congregation called by God.

As we say responsively at the beginning of our baptismal liturgy,

There is one Body and one Spirit;

There is one hope in God’s call to us;

One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism;

One God and Father of all.

Amen.

My first sermon -- John 14:1-14 (Easter 5A)

2008-07-09T22:51:00.000-04:00

During the Spring 2008 semester, I took the Preparing to Preach class at United Theological Seminary. As the main part of that course, I wrote and preached two sermons to develop my homiletical abilities.

I intended my first sermon for St. George's Episcopal Church, Dayton, Ohio, for the fifth Sunday of Easter (Year A). I preached the essence of this sermon at the Cornerstone service on 19 April 2008. The primary text is John 14:1-14.

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When I was a child, my mom sent me to church as a way to get me out of the house for a few hours. I attended Sunday school, but I was taught about Jesus only through activities that emphasized memorizing Bible verses. Finding meaning was irrelevant. And I’m fairly sure one of those Bible verses wasn’t this week’s gospel reading.

At about age 12, I had a run-in with an overzealous Sunday school teacher. I’m sure she meant well enough, but her brand of faith didn’t feel right for me. Instead, it made me want to leave. When I had the opportunity, I ran out the door.

And I didn’t stop there. I left the church entirely. And I kept running.

In the eighteen years since that time, I entered a church but one time, and only because it was required of me.

As I grew up, I felt a tug at my soul now and again. It grew into a longing that I couldn’t identify, let alone satisfy. God was calling, but I didn’t recognize the sound of the phone. So how could I possibly answer it?

What I hadn’t understood as a child—or as a young man—was exactly what Jesus says to his followers in John’s gospel for this week.

“In my Father’s house are many rooms.”

C. S. Lewis paraphrases this in the preface to his book, Mere Christianity, that Christianity is a house with many rooms, and each person is suited for a particular room.

The trick is finding that room.

By the time I became an adult, I’d stopped running, but I was lost on a dark and foggy road. Like someone driving in the fog, I didn’t really know where I was. Even worse, I didn’t have a clue what my life meant…or what that ringing sound was in the back of my soul.

During that period spent outside the church, I tried to satisfy my longing by reading about other religions and philosophies. In other words, I tried to find myself. Many of us have an idea how well that normally works. I was still lost in the fog.

When I began graduate school at the University of Texas at Dallas, I made some new friends. Among those new friends were Mark and Abby, a married couple with whom I became very close. We all worked away the days and nights in our physics classes. And they were quite happy. While I didn’t have too much difficulty with the class work, or the spent days and nights, I wasn’t quite so happy.

And, as always, there was that phone ringing in the back of my soul.

But there was a ray of hope. As it turns out, Mark and Abby are members of the Episcopal Church. Through them I finally recognized the sound of a phone. I respected them and the lives they led. And I respected them more that they weren’t the same overzealous people I’d fled so long ago.

I still didn’t know if I’d like their church, so I planned a visit while they were out of town so there wasn’t any pressure on either side. Imagine my surprise to find that God was leading me, through them, back to the same church. Of course it wasn’t the same physical building, but it was the same household of God that I’d fled as a child. I kept going in, but I found myself being led to a different door. This new door led me into the Episcopal Church. By the end of the service, I knew that God had called me home, and I was baptized at the very next Easter Vigil, with Mark and Abby as my godparents.

As Episcopalians, we live in one room in the Father’s house. And the Father’s house includes the entire Christian community.

In this passage from John, I have found words for God’s call to me. “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.” These are the words I hear when I finally pick up the ringing phone in the back of my soul.

As a child, I fled one such room that didn’t fit my soul, and I ended up running away from the Father’s house entirely. I’ve since found my way back to the house, and I’ve found my dwelling place. But what about those who haven’t found their dwelling places? What about those who wander in the darkness outside the household of God?

In John’s gospel, Christ promises that he goes to prepare a place for each of us. We receive the Holy Spirit, just as the disciples receive the Holy Spirit when Jesus breathes on them after the resurrection. In receiving the Holy Spirit, through Jesus Christ, we enter the Father’s house, and become members of the household of God.

As Jesus promised his disciples, so he promises us, he has gone to prepare a place for us, and he has come again to take us to himself. When Jesus tells his disciples about his Father’s house, he’s not talking about an earthly house. Maybe he’s not even talking about a house as a physical structure, but rather, he’s talking about a social structure—the Father’s home, or the Father’s family, as one might refer to a house of nobility.

Wes Howard-Brook writes that the house of God “is not a building but a relationship among those who hear God and do God’s will.”

The Father’s house is the “one holy catholic and apostolic church,” as we say each week when we recite the Nicene Creed. It represents not just our church, but every church, the whole of the Christian community.

Just as Jesus Christ is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, the Father’s house is the House of Houses.

The single point that both Thomas and Philip miss in this passage from John’s gospel is: How do we enter a relationship with God? Or, how do we enter the Father’s house?

As Jesus responds to Thomas, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me.” This is not a statement that any particular church is the right way to God. Rather, it is a statement of Jesus’ status in the Father’s house. Jesus is the only Son of God and therefore acts on behalf of the Father and the Father’s house, much as would the eldest son of any family in Jesus’ time.

As with any family or household from Jesus’ time to the present day, being a member of the household of God, or living in the Father’s house, is a commitment that brings both obligation and benefit. And we can ask for Jesus to do things on our behalf. We bear obligation in Jesus’ words that, “He who believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I go to the Father.” We gain benefit as well. As Jesus promises, “Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”

We are called to perform Jesus’ work. In our Baptismal Covenant, we promise to seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as our self. Jesus calls us all into the Father’s house. But God’s call isn’t a one-size-fits-all form of generic spirit. The Holy Spirit gives different forms of nourishment to different people because that’s what we need. So we can’t assume everyone will fit in the same room in the Father’s house. But, even though we have differences, we are many faiths living in one house—the Father’s house.

Having been the person alone in the dark, I find that part of the promise I’ve made in my own Baptismal Covenant is to try to help people to find their own dwelling places. My promise is threefold:

First, I’ve promised to be a butler, so to speak, to greet those entering the house, to help them find their own dwelling places.
Second, I’ve promised to help those fleeing wrong rooms, so that—with God’s help—they don’t flee the Father’s house entirely.
Third, I’ve promised to be a guide, to go back outside, back into the darkness, to help the lost find their way toward the house of God.

This time, even going back into the darkness and fog, I’m not lost any more.

Amen.

Who are you?

2008-07-08T23:00:00.000-04:00

"A dangerous question. There's never a good answer." --Lorien, Babylon 5

Like many of us, I'm seeking the answer to the question, "Who are you?". Hence the title of my blog.

The basics:

I received my B.S. in physics from the University of Dayton in 1994, and my M.S. in physics from the University of Texas at Dallas in 1998.
I worked for the Transportation Security Administration, from 2002 to 2005, as a screener at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.
I joined the United States Air Force in September 2005, and was commissioned in December 2005. I was promoted to the rank of First Lieutenant in December 2007.

Seeking:

I joined the Episcopal Church in September 2004, and I was baptized at the Great Vigil of Easter, 26 March 2005.
I feel a call from God to the priesthood, and specifically to service in the military chaplaincy. I have been exploring that call since May 2006.
I'm almost 1/3 of the way through the M.Div. program at United Theological Seminary.
I am about to be deployed to Iraq.

My primary aim for this blog is to record my spiritual journey in preparation for, during, and after, my deployment as I continue to explore God's call to me. To that end, a lot of this blog will be spiritual/religious in nature.

I also aim to record, to a certain extent, my physical journey for my friends. To that end, the balance of this blog will likely describe my personal life as I travel away from them for a one-year deployment.