Rock, Paper, Scissors and the Way of Wisdom

Proper 15 - Cycle B

Solomon wants to be wise. He shows that he already has some level of wisdom when he acknowledges his need for wisdom, For who indeed can govern this great people? Truly, couldn't we say that to anyone who aspires to public office, Good luck with that!

But the pursuit of wisdom is what all human beings do, not just leaders. Every world religion, every philosophy, folk lore, most conversations over coffee ultimately are about how to live well, how to have a life that has meaning, now not to waste it. if we don't aim for wisdom, at least we want to know how--not to be foolish.

I have a story for you this morning. It's a Japanese contribution to the world's wisdom literature.

"There once was a stone cutter who lived alone. Though he was highly skilled, he was still poor. He lived in a tiny bamboo  hut, and his clothing was tattered.

You called me? Here I am

[Helen Keefe preached this sermon on January 17. The lessons for the day included the call of Samuel and the call of Philip and Nathanael. The occasion was the Annual Meeting of our congregation. It struck me. I wanted to share it.]

Well, here I am.

Here I am - in this place, at this time, through the grace of God.

Here I am, because God's voice calls me - through your voice.

Thanks be to God, here I am.

I have thought about that phrase for weeks now.

Here I am. We all say it:

You called? Here I am. You asked for volunteers? Here I am.

You're taking roll? Here I am.

Beyond the simple statement of fact, it is a declaration of presence and alertness. Here I am. Ready.

Then I thought what if I added a comma? Here, I AM. Here. In this place, in this time. I am. I exist. I can't be in the past or in the future. Just here, now. I am who I am, shaped by my life this far, honed by this time, this place, these people. I am who I am because I am, Here. We spend so much of our life trying to figure out who we are. Let's concentrate on the fact that we ARE.

What Will That Ringing Bell Proclaim?

We're going to get a bell!

Our congregation bought a little church building with a cupola but no bell and no apparent way to install one or ring it. It's been a matter of ongoing discussion. A member who lives nearby wants to hear a church bell. There are none in town. Another is appalled at the notion of an electronic solution. A third repeats the architectural difficulties.

And then - the way these things happen - an out of town member who can attend the Advent study group because it's on Zoom said I've got a bell.

And a spouse with a history of not being particularly supportive was waiting in the truck outside the building, looking the place over, and said, This church needs a bell. But... Oh I know how to get that bell to ring.

So, what will this bell ring?

It will ring faith - The faithfulness of a people who, when our voices get old and our way uncertain, still persist in the faith that God has a purpose for us. The faithfulness of a God who makes us ever new and keeps sending us forth.

It will ring hope - The endurance born of hardship, the experience that builds character - We do not fade. We know that God is waiting for us in the darkest night.

It will ring love - When the virus closed the doors of the building, it opened new ways for us to love our neighbors. And love is contagious, too, just as contagious as the virus. Others have joined us in new ministries. 

Our mission statement is born of love: We, being in love with Christ, are ministers of God's love. We are called to share that love by caring for one another and reaching out to all. Our bell will ring love.

And it will ring joy.

Joy to the world, my friends! Joy to all.

What is the Worst Christmas You Ever Had?

True confession: I have stopped "making Christmas." All those years as a priest and single mom, making Christmas for a congregation while trying to make up to my son his lack of the Hallmark Christmas family home, I figure I've done my time.

Besides, I have noticed, whether I do anything about it or not, Christmas comes.

Christmas came the year it came sandwiched between the funerals of my father-in-law and my stepfather. We almost didn't buy a tree that year, since the time between the flights to California and to Utah was so short. But we reconsidered. On the 23rd we bought the last one in the lot, a pile of needles by the time it was decorated, no lights that year for fear of fire.

Christmas came the year I spent it alone after dropping my preschooler off at his father's.

Christmas came the year we ended up in the ditch on the way to church eighty-five icy miles away, and the whole congregation was glad that services were cancelled because they didn't feel safe crossing town.

Christmas came the morning after thieves broke into our house. They stole a laptop and my wife's heirloom jewelry. A handprint on a wall revealed that they had peered into where we lay sleeping with an open bedroom door. While we stood in line at the police station, waiting to file our report, we heard the lady in front of us say, They told me to come here to claim the body.

I think that one was my worst.

That afternoon I said mass for a motley gathering of ex-patriots in my sister's bar in Costa Rica. Somebody was nursing a beer in the back.

And Christmas came.

And they all were holy. Honestly, I think these Christmases revealed more about the miracle of the Incarnation than those occasional ones when the tree was decorated on time and we sat around in our jammies with hot cocoa and cookies for breakfast.

Because our worst Christmases are the world into which God decided to be born, vulnerable to all the worst the world could and would throw at this precious child, poverty, homelessness, exile, foreign occupation, torture, and death.

This child makes it all holy.

We grieve this year with the families of 1,725,000 people worldwide who have died of COVID. We grieve with the families of 323,000 who have died in the United States. We grieve for over 1700 health care workers in the US who died of COVID while people claimed they were faking the seriousness of the virus to make more money.

We grieve for prisoners, for the homeless, for refugees, for the unemployed. We grieve for parents who worry about their children and for children who miss their grandparents.

These are the ones for whom he came. This is the world that he makes holy.

Where Is the One Who Is Wise? Not in the Stimulus Package

The big guy knows the ways of the world. He cuts to the bottom line. It all comes down to the bottom line.

My question is, if it's the bottom line, how did so many real people come to lie beneath it?

I wrote about Mary and the mystery of the incarnation yesterday. Let's go back to her for wisdom today.

Who goes to a pregnant teenager for wisdom? Well, um, God.

And boy, does she deliver.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,

my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; *
for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.

From this day all generations will call me blessed: *
the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name.

He has mercy on those who fear him *
in every generation.

He has shown the strength of his arm, *
he has scattered the proud in their conceit.

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, *
and has lifted up the lowly.

He has filled the hungry with good things, *
and the rich he has sent away empty.

He has come to the help of his servant Israel, *
for he has remembered his promise of mercy,

The promise he made to our fathers, *
to Abraham and his children for ever.

Cast down the mighty, lifted up the lowly. In other words, God takes that bottom line and flips what is above and what is below.

Filled the hungry with good things. What is the means test here? Hunger. If you're hungry, you get to eat. Period.

The rich he has sent away empty. Whoa - this is a different universe.

People who say they struggle to live on $174,000 just passed a stimulus package and said that working families would find $600 to be generous. Too generous, in fact, to give to dependent adults - did you know that dependent adults, people who are disabled, get bupkis in this deal?

What does the stimulus package have to do with wisdom? Well, it depends on your timeframe. If you're playing the long game, then it is a negative example. It is the wisdom of a world that the Incarnation flips.

Has God not made foolish the wisdom of the world? (1 Corinthians 1:20)

So what's with the sketch of the onion? 

First, to remind me that the bottom line, the wisdom of the world, runs skin deep. For the wisdom of God, you have to peel some layers.

Second, to warn me that as I peel, I will weep.

Why Is Jesus Not Enough? Why Do We Want Mary?

Here is an observation. The forms of Christianity that have all the answers do not do devotion to Mary. The forms of Christianity that dive deep or even just play around the edges of Mary embrace mystery.

Have I got that right?

I like detective mysteries. But they are not really mysteries, are they? They are puzzles. Maybe out of the chaos of my childhood comes this deep satisfaction when I can solve a puzzle, when something makes sense.

But when somebody explains a theological question, solves a God puzzle, I immediately think they have missed something. As far as God goes, I really don't know much about it. Oh, I understand the God-talk. I can recognize a heresy when I see it and can follow the logic to its behavioral consequences. But answers kind of bore me.

There is another way of expressing two different kinds of Christianity.

The first views redemption as a transaction that took place on the cross. Lots of words go into explaining this view. When so many of them are spent defending God's own character, I grow suspicious.

The second identifies redemption with the Incarnation. That's something that happened inside a girl's belly. Ponder that! Not much to say - we just have to sing it.

Okay, now my brain is swinging over to a current theme on mental health Twitter. Mental health students and professionals with lived experience (meaning that they themselves have a mental illness) are viewed with suspicion by professionals whose experience is lacking. Is this the same thing that's going on in religion? That women, who have lived experience of the Marion mystery of incarnation (bearing another life in our own bellies,) are viewed with suspicion by men, who do not?