A Gut Feeling

Matthew 9:35-10:4

During the sermon on Holy Trinity Sunday last week, we heard through text and sermon about how God’s activity through the Holy Trinity is God’s living out the divine promise of “I’ve got you covered.” The Trinity’s ongoing presence and work as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit functions to show us who God is and how God operates throughout the universe. We acknowledge that though the Trinity is a mystery, and we don’t fully understand exactly how it is possible, it is through in Trinity that God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, has us uniquely covered – simultaneously creating, redeeming, and making us a holy people.

So, last week’s “I’ve got you covered” text and sermon addressed the how and what of God. This week’s gospel starts out by telling us the why of God. 

Today’s gospel text begins by telling us how Jesus went about the cities and villages – in other words, how he went to every type of people and every kind of community. Then, we come to verse 36 we read: “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”

Here we have it – this is the why of God. God has compassion.

In and through Jesus, God responds to our suffering out of compassion. Jesus brings God’s comforting Word, teaches people who need to hear that Word about the true nature of God, and heals their sicknesses out of compassion. But the thing is, this word as we read it here, compassion, is truly a watered-down version of what the word written in Greek really means.

So, for instance, when you hear the word, “compassion,” what do you think of? What does it mean? <accept responses> To feel for? To take pity on? To want to help?

Good answers. It’s a good start. Yet if you look at the etymology of the English word, compassion, it goes a little further; ‘compassion’ comes from the Latin cum, meaning ‘with’ and passio, meaning ‘suffering’. So, when we have compassion, we are suffering with another person, or feeling their suffering.

To go a step further,  we have the Greek word actually written into this text; splanknizo, or, in this case, splanknizomai, since it is in verb form, means to “feel in the viscera.” In plain English the closest way I can put that is, ‘to feel in the gut’ – to feel to your very core – to have a gut-wrenching reaction to something - to feel it so deeply in your insides, that you literally feel something within you move.

God sees the helplessness of God’s creation and God acts out of compassion. God doesn’t simply feel badly for the people who are suffering, God acts because God feels our pain and is moved to the very core by the plight of humankind. God knows how harassed – how out of sorts, beleaguered, and overwhelmed we are - how much we suffer from depression, oppression, and suppression; that is what affects God, moves God so much that God sends Jesus Christ to us as the Word incarnate, to heal our pain and brokenness, and save us from our sin.

That is the truest meaning of the word translated here, and it reason for God’s action; it is the reason that Jesus reaches out and heals and cures the people he encounters on his journey through the cities and towns and villages; through the city streets and along the country lanes through which he passes. Jesus doesn’t simply feel badly for the people, pity them or judge them as pitiable, rather, Jesus sees their humanity, and he is moved to ease their pain.

But Jesus cannot do this work alone, because he knows that one day, he will leave this earthly plane and will need workers to carry on the work he has begun. He will need apostles who will likewise speak the Word, teach, and heal.

So, in a touch of irony, Jesus summons these early disciples, and instructs them to ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into the harvest.

Now, when I was in seminary, a very wise professor told us, “when you pray, be sure that you do not pray for something, for which you are not willing to be the answer.”

In the very next verse of our text today, Jesus calls twelve of these disciples and gives them the authority – read this as marching orders – to do the same as he has done. So, on the one hand, Jesus says, ‘pray for workers to help with the harvest’ – on the other hand he says, ‘now, you are to be first among those workers.’

Jesus calls his disciples – those who learn from him, not only to pray for the solution but to be part of the solution. And Jesus asks the same of us today, as community together with and for each other, and as harvest workers for the world around us. Jesus calls us to be moved to the very core of our being for the suffering ones – the harassed and helpless ones, the grieving and hurting ones, the hungry and homeless ones - and to respond; to reach out with compassion and heal those we encounter along our journey.

As the disciples go, they will proclaim the good news of the kingdom of heaven, and they will do this not for pay, nor for their own glory or benefit, but only for the sake the other, and the fullness of God’s kingdom.

I recently had a conversation with a woman who told me this story: she, along with her husband, had just joined a new church, but were not yet well known there, when an unbelievable tragedy befell their family. They were devastated, grieving, and suffering great pain and loss.

The incredible tragedy they had suffered was announced to the congregation in several forms of communication that went out, and members felt deeply sorry for anyone who would suffer such a loss, and they dutifully prayed for her family.

But what the woman told me was that not one person from that church called, sent a card, or reached out to her and her husband.

She and her husband had joined that church seeking to be part of a faith community. But perhaps because they weren’t all that well known yet, it seemed like the compassion of the members of the church was only skin-deep.

While prayer is very important, that family needed to know by the actions of their faith community that they were moved to the very core of their being by the pain and loss the family had suffered. Instead, the silence they experienced was deafening and only served to increase their pain; they felt betrayed and isolated by the community they thought would stand by them in their hour of need.

The result? The woman told me that though her faith in God was not shaken, her faith in the community of the church was shattered. They now felt it futile to belong to a church. What was the point? The community had failed them. The lesson for us all: our compassion needs to be more than skin-deep and it needs to be evident in our words and actions.

Whether the need comes from someone within the community itself or comes from one of our neighbors, Jesus calls us to know gut-wrenching compassion for those God places on our path and along our journey.

As a church, we’ve been doing a lot of talking about numbers. We talk about the numbers of people who come to worship. We talk about the numbers of people in the community around Easton whom we would like to bring into the body of Christ at Grace.

Jesus calls us to look past the numbers and see the people who are hurting, harassed and helpless. Jesus calls us to reach out to those in need of hearing the good news of God’s “I’ve got you covered” in a believable way – through our words and our actions. The best way to tell others about God is to show others about God, by modeling the love and compassion of God not only by what we say, but also by what we do.

The compassion of Jesus described in this text is a model for all of Christ’s disciples. Our text names those disciples whom Jesus sent out, even names some who failed him in some ways. Yet even in their failure, they have served the larger purposes of God.

In our baptism, we were each named as well. We were named children of God and workers in the new community to which we were joined, along with all the other laborers needed to serve the harvest of God.

The work is not easy. It is taxing. It is emotionally exhausting, it will not always be successful by our measures of success. But faithful service to God serves the larger purposes of God’s kingdom, to heal the hurts and feed the souls of those who most need to experience the love of God through the care and fellowship of the followers of Jesus.  It matters not whether we are able to discern “success” or not. We may never know the difference we have made in a person’s life – the reward is not ours to enjoy. But showing compassion through action in the name of Jesus Christ is our purpose in life and in this community for the ministry we share in God’s kingdom here on earth.  

Jesus sends us out in mission: to be the heart and guts of Christ for people. Jesus urges us to pray not only for our work but that more workers may join us, for the sake of the mission of God. Jesus models loving, compassionate caring that is more than skin-deep, but is demonstrated as well in faith through action.

Through the Holy Spirit, God grants us gifts of ministry for healing, and blesses us with the apostolic mission of the church. God grants us fellowship with all the workers who are sitting in the pews beside you here today, plus other workers who are sitting in pews in other churches hearing the good news of the compassion of Jesus and our commission to follow in his ways. This fellowship includes those who have yet to join us.

So today we go from “I’ve got you covered” to “Feeling it in the gut: the mission and ministry of Christ”. How does that work as a title for this message? It may not be very catchy, but it’s pointed. Christ’s love and presence are real, and he calls for ours to be, as well. May God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, grant that it may be so.

Amen.

A Shocking Thing to Do

John 13:1-17, 31b-35           

            Here we are, gathered together as Jesus and the disciples were that night. It is the night in which Jesus was handed over to die. He knows what’s coming. He knows he will be leaving his disciples, going to his passion and death.

            There is so much that he must have wanted to say to them. There must have been so much he still wanted to pass on. We know about the feeling that there is never enough time in our lives, that there is always more that we want to do, more that we want to say, more wisdom, or experience, or instruction that we want to leave behind..

            If you knew that you were about to go on a journey, or about to die, leaving “your people” – whoever constitutes that group for you – what is it that you would want to say? What is the final message that you would want to give? And what would you do, if you could, to make your final commands, directives, instructions – whatever you might want to call them, memorable?

            I can imagine Jesus thinking about this. After all, his disciples have at times proved themselves to be pretty dense – misunderstanding his actions, missing the point of his teachings, a little too self-centered at times, a little too distracted. Just like us.

            But then comes this night, and Jesus knows that he is going to leave them. In a few hours he will be arrested; in less than 24 hours, he will be crucified. And his disciples will be left to carry on, to carry forth the message of God’s incredible mercy and love, to proclaim the greatness of God, embodied in Jesus and experienced through him. What would you say or do?

            Despite all their fear and confusion and blundering, these disciples will have an enormous mission before them. While there will be some who embrace their mission and the message of forgiveness, new life and salvation through Jesus, there will be many others who will feel threatened by it, who will want to destroy this fledgling community and the message they carry just as they will have killed Jesus himself. The subversive, counter-cultural message of strength and power demonstrated through love will receive mixed reactions after Jesus’ death and resurrection just as during his lifetime.

            Jesus knows that the stress on this community will be enormous.  They must learn to live and work together, loving and supporting and serving each other, so that they will be united in the work they do as they love and support and serve those whom Jesus places in their path.

            And so, Jesus chooses a way to convey the message in such a way that it will be memorable, that it might survive and thrive among them when he is gone.

            As the supper ended, Jesus got down on his knees in the middle of his disciples. Jesus knelt at their feet and, one by one, he washed them.  Jesus washed the feet of his disciples! It was a shocking thing to do. Shocking, and memorable.

            As middle-class American Lutherans, we get pretty squeamish about people washing our feet, or touching our feet, or even, in some cases, just looking too closely at them. Just imagine if we lived in first century Palestine where most of the time simple sandals are the only footwear worn, as we walked everywhere along the dirt roads and fields. Miles of walking done each day along dirt streets and pathways, creating dirty, calloused, gnarled feet. You can imagine why, then, when you entered someone’s home, your feet would be washed by a servant if the household had any, or you would wash your own feet.

            But tonight their leader, their teacher and, as at least some of these disciples were beginning to understand Jesus, the Messiah, the Anointed One, their Lord knelt in a position of servitude and washed the feet of every disciple there that night. Jesus demonstrated humble service. And as he did so, he gave them a new commandment. That they love one another just as he had done.

            For the kind of love that Jesus came to share is love in action. It is love that is expressed in so many ways, often ways that challenge us and call us out of our comfort zones. It is extreme love. It is the Jesus brand of love, the way Jesus loves us and now calls for us to love one another.

            It is love without regard for class, or gender or age. It is a fierce love that is blind to difference. It is love that embraces the marginalized, serves the poor, feeds the hungry, comforts the stranger, cleanses the body and the soul, provides life-giving water, and welcomes the outcast.

            Jesus’ kind of love is love that knows no boundaries and is delivered in memorable acts that are heroic, as well as everyday acts of kindness, acceptance, forgiveness, love and mercy.            

            The message is still counter cultural. It exactly the message we need to hear. We, who are gathered together in this sanctuary tonight as the disciples were gathered around Jesus; we who will receive the Body and Blood of Christ in a meal that was instituted that night and fed to those disciples first; we who will gather again tomorrow to contemplate the life-giving cross of Christ, on which was hung the Savior of the world; we need this message.

            Love one another: by this you are known. Love one another: by this everyone will know that you are my disciples. Love one another, and do not despair. For the Lord is with you.

            You do not understand now, but later, you will understand.

            Tonight, so that everyone can participate, we will deviate slightly from the traditional foot washing of which we read and in which we have engaged in the past. Tonight, we will each come forward to have our hands washed, and cleansed for service – for loving action in Jesus’ name. And then, two of the leaders of our congregation will anoint each hand, marking it with the cross of Christ in whose name and by whose love we serve.

            As Jesus has given us a new commandment, may his Spirit guide, empower, and bless the hands, feet and tongues that show forth his love.

Amen.           

     

The Good News for Perfectionists

Matthew 5:38-48

“Be perfect therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

I don’t know about anyone else here, but I have to confess that I really have a problem with certain parts of our gospel this morning. For instance, just look at those sending words from Jesus for us today. “Be perfect.” I’m sure there are more than a few therapists who have gone on lovely vacations with the money they have earned counseling wounded people who have spent their entire lives striving – and failing – to “be perfect.”

Perfectionism is defined as “a disposition to regard anything short of perfection as unacceptable, and to regard failure to achieve even impossibly difficult goals as unacceptable and a sign of personal worthlessness. Perfectionism has often been applied to various doctrines holding that religious, moral, social, or political perfection is attainable and anything less should be rejected. It is said that aside from genetics, perfectionism is the strongest predictor of clinical depression in people. And the sometimes insistent demand for perfection has turned many imperfect and wounded people away from the church.

Yet in our gospel today it seems Jesus is telling us we need to be perfect – we need to be like God. Now, aside from all those other problems with perfectionism, isn’t that heretical? After all the Bible also tells us that no one can be perfect as God is perfect. And really, if we were truly capable of being perfect or acting perfectly, there would have been no need for Jesus to come to save us, right? So that cannot be correct. What is Jesus is saying really here?

Let’s remember that the text this morning, once again, comes from the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus has been using verbal building blocks in this sermon, to create a picture of what the community of his disciples should look like – how they should behave – how they should engage with one another, live together and of course, how they should work together. Jesus, the consummate teacher, has developed a solid lesson plans designed to teach his followers how to exhibit behavior that is just, yet goes beyond simple justice, in keeping with God’s merciful kingdom; teachings that will stick; teachings that make this community relevant and consistent with the characteristics that mark the Kingdom of God.

So, Jesus begins with the basics – describing what it means to be blessed in terms that no one had ever considered before. Then, Jesus said that by God’s grace we are salt of the earth and light for the world. God made us salt and light so that we can make a difference, transforming the world around us by reflecting the goodness of God, and revealing the ongoing presence of God everywhere.  

Finally, Jesus began urging his disciples to look more deeply and broadly than they ever had before at how the commandments and the laws of old help shape community so that we more faithfully reflect the justice and mercy of God.

In last week’s Gospel, for instance, Jesus urged us, don’t lash out in anger, but be reconciled with your brothers and sisters. Don’t swear by God’s name but be honest in your dealings, then you’ll have no need to invoke the name of the Lord.

And, in today’s Gospel Jesus says, “you have heard it said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, but I say to you, if someone strikes you on the right cheek, let them have your left, also. If they take your coat, give them your cloak too. Love your enemy, and pray for those who hate you.”

            Jesus takes age-old law that was given to limit vengeance and acts of retribution, and says that now there is an even better way – the non-violent, non-retaliatory way to deal with insult. The old law, good as it was in keeping people from going off the deep end of vengeance – think of road rage as a contemporary example of over-zealous retribution - is no longer necessary.

For in Christ there is a new freedom, and it is freedom from the kind of desire for self-interest and self-preservation that drives such acts of pay-back; instead we are freed and commended to act lovingly. Even in the face of insult and injury; even when you have suffered great humiliation. That is when as a disciple of Christ, we fulfill God’s desire for us.

            Jesus urges us to not be tossed to and fro by the actions of others, but to respond with our best selves, not falling prey to the little and low ways people try to pick at us, but showing them that there is an alternative way, a Kingdom way of engaging with each other even in the midst of conflict. Even those who hurt you.

Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of the Bible, The Message, puts it this way:

“You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’

I’m challenging that.

I’m telling you to love your enemies.

Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst.

When someone gives you a hard time,

respond with the energies of prayer,

for then you are working out of your true selves,

 your God-created selves.

This is what God does.

God gives God’s best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to

everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.”

            Peterson highlights the active nature of Jesus’ commands: Living the Kingdom Way does NOT mean acting as a door mat and letting people walk all over you. Living the Kingdom Way means actively taking control of a situation and taking initiative to respond affirmatively with love.

            Responding rationally and calmly might not make the problem go away—refusing to fight might very well lead to frustration, but it will ultimately get us further down the path of understanding and, perhaps, reconciliation. 

            Patterns of violence and retaliation get us nowhere. We see in our world today that such reactions to injustice only perpetuate the problem. Jesus was all about peaceful protest. There are times when protest is a good, healthy response to injustice. But it must remain peaceful and non-retaliatory to be in accordance with Jesus teaching of the Kingdom Way.

As Gandhi said, in the Spirit of Jesus,

“An eye for an eye makes the world blind”

It is love that transforms,

            Redeems,

                        And creates new life.

“Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
            The Greek word translated here as “perfect” is “telos”, which denotes not moral perfection, but the idea that something has grown up, matured, and now reached its perfect end – the intended product. Telos is the goal or intended outcome of something—for instance, a fruit tree’s telos, we might say, is to grow mature and tall so that it can bear fruit. In this way, Jesus is not simply commanding something of us…Jesus is also commending something in us.
            It might be easier to understand this instruction from Jesus within its context as meaning, “Be the person and the community God created you to be.”
My brothers and sisters, we are created children of God, empowered and equipped by the Holy Spirit, and Jesus knows we have more to give when it comes to our relationships with one another—even those people with whom we disagree, than to be bound up in “an eye for an eye” kind of living. Jesus knows that we can be and do more than we often settle for.

We can absolutely make a difference in the world when we trust that we are created in the image and likeness of the almighty,

ever-loving, abundantly gracious God who gives us the power,

will, and courage to live the Kingdom way.

Jesus knows this is possible because God sees more in you than you see in yourself.  Jesus well knows that it may be challenging to love, especially those people who just seem to pick and pick and pick and pick at us. But God has plans and a purpose for us. God intends to use us to achieve something spectacular. That something comes as a product of precisely who God were created each of us to be.

God created us to advance a different world, what Jesus calls the Kingdom of God – where violence doesn’t always breed more violence, and hate doesn’t kindle more hate.

Martin Luther King, Jr understood and reflected this truth when he said:

 “Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that.

Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”

By his teaching and healing, and by his death and resurrection, we know that Jesus is absolutely serious about this manner of being in the world, he showed us that through him, the Kingdom of Heaven is already here among us and within us, and living in the Kingdom entails a different way of life.

            With these lessons taught on the mount, Jesus invites us to be the people God created us to be so that we might not just persevere through this sometimes challenging life, but will flourish, nourishing Christ’s love and light in the world through pathways of peace and love, understanding and acceptance, mercy and forgiveness.
            Through the Holy Spirit God enables us to both hear Jesus’ message and to follow his teaching. And through the Grace of God we are forgiven for those times when we fail to live into the path that Jesus has set before us. Through the blood of Christ we are forgiven for the times we backslide. That is good news for all of us perfectionists, who see our failures to always live up to these teachings as convicting and shameful. The overarching message of our salvation is that we are forgiven and strengthened to try again, to live the Kingdom way. And so, we are bold to embrace the words of Jesus today:
 “Be perfect, Kingdom people, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Amen.

           

Building a Bucket List

Luke 12:13-21 and Colossians 3:1-11

If I actually had a bucket list, two items that would be sure to be on it would be taking a hot balloon ride, and going on an African safari – the kind where the only shooting that takes place comes from a camera.

So, when I came across this story, it really appealed to me.

A man named Danny and his wife took a hot air balloon trip early one morning while visiting Africa. Perfect!

As the balloon rose gracefully, they saw a herd of wildebeest running frantically across the vast expanse below. 

          As they watched, the herd suddenly stopped and began looking around as if they were confused. Danny asked their pilot why the herd had stopped so suddenly; what were they looking for?

          The pilot told them that the wildebeest, which migrate by the millions across the grassy African plains, are not good learners.  An entire herd will take flight at the slightest indication of danger. They run wildly for a short time, and then stop, forgetting why they began running in the first place.

          Meanwhile, lions, who are good learners, simply follow the stampeding herd at a leisurely pace and wait for them to stop. When the wildebeest forget why they are running, dinnertime arrives.

So I wonder, are we more like the wildebeest or the lion?

          Can you imagine running and running and running and then forgetting why you are running at all? 

          The truth is we all fall prey to this cycle at times, running here and there and back again, busy in our work or school, busy in our family, busy with our social and financial obligations, busy running to something, busy running away –  eventually overcome with our busy-ness, only to forget what it is we are running after to begin with, and why it was so important to us to be. So. busy.

This forgetting is more than the experience of walking into a room and failing to recall why we went there to begin with.

          Rather, in all our running and chasing after things that ultimately give way to confusion, we forget the things Christ has taught us about trusting in God, and about how we should live.

We forget the ways Jesus showed us about living in community, loving our neighbor, and forgiving those who have trespassed against us. We forget the priorities that God set before us – love me, love neighbor, love yourself.

We sometimes forget that caring for the outcast, the marginalized, and the sinner was at the top of the list of what Jesus taught us to do. Those were the things that were important to Jesus – connecting with, and caring for our neighbor. Sadly, when we forget this core instruction from God, our attention and focus naturally turns inward.

          The parable from our gospel today, shows us what happens when a rich man forgets that it is God who gives us all we need. We see what happens as he is consumed with running, running, running – amassing more than he can possibly use up himself, so that his “running” turns into building, building, building.

So, there is this telling conversation he has with himself, when he realizes that he has run out of storage space for his hoard.

The man thought to himself, “What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops? I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’” 

It is all “I, I, I, I, I, and my, my, my…..” This is his focus and his mantra – it is all about me, myself, and I.

          The writer of our first reading, from Ecclesiastes, calls this ‘vanity’ –it is “meaningless,” “useless,” and “absurd.”

          In the parable we see the vanity of the rich man who is obsessed with what the epistle to the Colossians refers to as the “things that are on earth”. These are fleeting things that we have a tendency to place importance on—everything from material wealth, to status, to power over others – the writer of the Epistle names the pursuit of all these things idolatry.  

While it is sensible stewardship of the resources God gives us that we save and reasonably plan for our future material needs, a component of stewardship as Jesus teaches it, is to trust that we are given ample resources to share and to use for the betterment of others.

Knowing that God provides for our daily needs, we are freed to trust that God also provides enough for us to share.

This message is at the core of all the stewardship stories in the bible, from manna daily given to the people of God in the wilderness, to Jesus teaching the Lord’s Prayer, which comes just before this text.

God carefully and lovingly gives us all we need. It’s the same message our own stewardship team diligently establishes in their messages to our community throughout the year.

However, there is more to this text than a message for the stewardship of material goods, as important as that is. For if we look at the beginning of the passage, we will see that this entire story begins with someone asking Jesus to settle a property dispute within their family. So this is also a message for the stewardship of human relationships.

Maybe you’ve known or witnessed the pain and turmoil that families sometimes experience when huge battles erupt over the inheritance of property upon the death of a loved one, whether a will had been left or not. Bitter divides form over such arguments, and lifelong scars and estrangements often result. So we can understand someone coming to Jesus and wishing for him to speak with authority on this matter.

But note Jesus’ response; “Be on guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” Instead, in Christ we have been granted abundant life to share both now and in a future we cannot yet see.

So, according to Jesus, greed includes not only those things that we yearn for that we do not have, but also those things we already possess but would do just about anything to keep.

Greed is indeed a deep pit into which we fall and cannot, on our own, climb out of.

The epistle lists so-called earthly things that we run after. I wonder what other things we can name? Living in a consumerist world, what are some of the earthly things that we chase after, long for, and amass for ourselves? I suppose such a list would include

·        winning the lottery

·        money

·        food

·        clothes

·        jewelry

·        the latest technology

·        beauty

·        youth

·        travel

·        power

·        land, property

·        ‘toys’

·        popularity

In contrast, Paul’s letter to the Galatians picks up this theme and reminds us of the good gifts or fruits of the Spirit, which God provides; gifts that build human relationships, gifts that are godly. That list looks quite different. It includes things that reflect on the love of God in Christ Jesus and the things he modeled for us, which help us dwell in authentic Christ-like relationship with our neighbors:

·        love

·        joy

·        peace

·        patience

·        kindness

·        generosity

·        faithfulness

·        gentleness

·        self-control

The good news of the gospel is that as life in Christ truly includes a radical reorientation of our values as individuals and even more as community, we are freed by the grace of God in Jesus Christ from the need to run in circles, consumed with worry after the things that are on earth.

We are freed by the grace of God through Jesus Christ to know that as the love of God is limitless, we will always have enough to share, and are already forgiven for the times when we struggle to do so.

As followers of Christ we find joy when we willingly and happily share with our neighbor the material, physical gifts we have – food, clothing, shelter, money for utilities and gas but also of this grand pool of love and welcome that we have been given.

As we are freed to let go of the things and the greed that has previously driven us, we are enabled to reach out to our neighbor in authentic love and invitation.

Let us therefore embrace Jesus’ word, that we might be rich toward God who, by the power of the Spirit promises to give us eyes to see that all we have is a gift from God’s gracious hand.

Let us know the gift of this community of faith that reaches out to share the gifts we have first received – time, talent and treasure, that all may know the abundant life of Christ.

Through the Spirit and in community, undistracted by the vanity of pointless running, let us see and hear the very people Jesus saw and heard; the lonely, the disenfranchised, the weak, the poor, the powerless – our neighbor – all those we are empowered to love and embrace.   

Let gratitude and grace define us and define our lives. May we have ears to hear God’s call to remember that our lives are not rich because of what we have accumulated or done, but because of what God has done for us in Jesus, on the cross, and through the abundant life that begins in our baptism and never, ever, ends.

Let us remember that in this God-given abundant life there are always more people to invite in and to embrace with the love, joy, gentleness, patience, kindness, and generosity and all the rest with which we are gifted.

Let us pray that Jesus will continue to show us the way, for surely Jesus’ own bucket list must include his desire that this abundant life of richness toward God be the single possession and treasure that all people will one day share.