If Love Be True

A poetic sharing from Michael Young

If the forest is my mother

The river my father

If the tree my brother

The leaf my sister

If the dandelion is my cousin

The grass my auntie

If the lake is my neighbor

The creek my teacher

If the hungry is my father

The stranger my mother

If the thirsty is my brother

The naked my sister

If the sick is my cousin

The prisoner my auntie

If the giver is my neighbor

The receiver my teacher

If the Holy is crying

Creation weeping

If the Holy speaks in love

Creation yearning

If the Holy is divine

Creation smiles

If the Holy is within

Wind blows joy

If the Holy rains grace

Creation blossoms

If Love is our parent

Creation our family

If the Spirit moves among     

Caresses all hearts

How can I deny

The spark in the tree

Humanity in the stranger

Grace in the prisoner

Holy in the hungry

Joy in the naked

Strength in the leaf

Yearning in the river

Teaching in the creek

Neighbor in me

If Love be true

Who am I to deny

The heart of the Divine

Alive in all of creation

If love be true

Who am I

But lover

Of the One who loves

If Love be true

Who am I

But a poet of the spirit

Singer of the song

Teller of the story

If love be true

Who am I

But love alive

The Room of music

Within the home of our heart are many rooms, castles, mansions, places that we can reach by contemplation, prayer, or other kinds of meditation. Or just by listening to the sights and sounds of life that surrounds us.  

Here on Pastor’s Porch, we are discussing this notion as the home in our hearts. We are moving through this home and exploring these different rooms within our soul.  

Our journey began in the base of this home where knowledge resides within our own innate wisdom and the wisdom of our faith elders. The base of our spiritual home is our faith that sustains us. Faith that can be deepened through exploration, much more than certainty. 

Our next room is the music room. Where we are invited to listen and maybe even sing a song as a vehicle to realize how tuned we can be to the vibrations of creation.  

The strings of the guitar are struck, and the vibrations make a sound that is pleasing to our ears. The singer comes in and shares a story from their soul. Other instruments join in and make music together. All the sounds that make up our favorite songs are vibrations that spread out for us to hear, reverberating in our ear drums.  

In the room of music our favorite songs can be called up just by a fleeting memory. I know that for me Rubber Band Man by the spinners takes me back. I can still remember the little white radio with a Chewbacca sticker affixed playing on WLS radio in Chicago Illinois.  

This room is a bit different.  

The room of music in our hearts helps us sing of the goodness of God in our lives. It offers us the opportunity to learn how the vibrations of creation echo throughout time and place. 

This room helps in two different ways. It helps us to match the vibrations of creation by offering music of our memories and invites us to sing.  

When we really break it down all sound is vibration.

All of creation has a song to sing.

In this room we are free to join in the singing and add our own song to the world. We can sing of joy, lament, pain, sorrow, laughter, and even anger. We are free to sing the songs of our soul and listen to the vibrations of our spirit.

For in this room we are reminded that we tune in to the sounds of our lives and we can join in the chorus of humanity and sing of God’s presence deep in our soul.

Can you hear it?

Can you hear the harmony of God?

Can you hear the song of God?

Take a seat in the room of your spirit.

Listen.

God is singing the song of our hearts.

The Room Of Wisdom

In the home of our heart are many rooms, castles, mansions, places that we can reach by contemplation, prayer, or other kinds of meditation. Or just by listening to the sights and sounds of life that surrounds us.

Here on Pastor’s Porch, we are discussing this notion as the home in our hearts. We are moving through the home and exploring these different rooms within our soul.

Our journey began in the base of this home where knowledge resides within our own innate wisdom and the wisdom of our faith elders. The base of our spiritual home is our faith that sustains us. Faith that can be deepened through exploration, much more than certainty.

As we move through the home the stairs creek with the knowledge of old bones. But these stairs take the creaking in our bones and give us peace and strength to move about the inner dwelling of our soul.

In this home of many rooms, we began in the room of relaxation.

The next room we will explore is the room of our ancestors.

This is the room where the veil is lifted between the physical and spiritual realm. This is the room of deep listening for the wisdom of our elders, which echo off the walls and reverberate back to our soul as the voice of those we love, who have passed, share their eternal spirit. The tears we may feel in this room within our soul remind us that our loved ones come to say hello in many and varying ways.

This is a room of deep listening. It does not take anything away. Instead, it reminds us that we are eternally sitting within the presence and spirit of God’s love and care.

Some, as I do, find comfort that we can enter the depth of our soul and feel the peace of a conversation with someone on the other side of the veil (traditionally what we’d call heaven), even if their voices or touch are no longer a regular part of our lives.

In this room, within our souls, we are free to sit quietly through the tears of sorrow and loss until we get to the other side of the veil and hear the wisdom of our loved one’s echo in our hearts. In this room we don’t sit in the sadness, we sit beyond the sadness and let the voices of our elders speak into our existence. Even if it may be through tears of loss.

In this room our hearts are tuned to the vibrations of life that may be expressing themselves as the movement of the wind, a voice, a tingle in our fingers, a line from a song, memories, tears, a sense of leaning in for deeper listening, or the feeling of peace, even a smile.

Even if it may be true, even comforting, that the wisdom of our elders is eternal, death is so very hard. And in many cases it may feel too soon and too final. This may be how the spirit of our loved ones lives on in us and how our spirit will live on in our families and communities, through the sharing of wisdom, on both sides of the veil.

Just as the stairs receive the creaks of our aching bones and return strength, this room takes our sorrow, stirs in a little grief and returns spiritual wisdom.

This room teaches us to sit in quiet patience until we can hear with our hearts and listen to the eternal vibrating wisdom of our ancestors, elders, and loved ones.

This is the room where we learn:

In the wind is the spirit of our ancestors.  

In the sunshine is the smile of those we miss.

In the thunder is the voice of wisdom.

In the tears is the knowing of our soul.

That our loved ones say hello.

In more ways than we can ever know.

A Chair in the Room of Relaxation.

In the home of our heart are many rooms, castles, mansions, places that we can reach by contemplation, prayer, or other kinds of meditation.

Here on Pastor’s Porch we are disussing this notion as the home in our hearts. We are moving through the home and exploring these different rooms within our soul.

Our journey began in the base of this home where knowledge resides within our own innate wisdom and the wisdom of our faith elders. Here is where we tap into our life experience as well as that of those who share their wisdom through art and writing. The base of our spiritual home is our faith that sustains us. Faith that can be deepened through exploration, much more than certainty.

As we move through the home the stairs creek with the knowledge of old bones. But these stairs take the creaking in our bones and give us peace and strength to move about the inner dwelling of our soul.

In this home of many rooms, we begin in the room of relaxation.

In this room there is play list of our subconscious. Music from our life that holds meaning for us plays on a constant loop. Whatever music that relaxes our heart rate vibrates throughout and helps us simmer down and deeply chillax. (chill out and relax)

This is the room we can enter that will push the worries of life and world aside so that we can deeply relax.

A place of authentic serenity.

In this room is a chair. But it is a different kind of chair. This chair envelops us. We sink into its softness, and it relaxes us. This is a sinking chair.

As we take a seat in this chair, we sink deeper and deeper into its softness. It folds around us and pulls us deeper into relaxation. It wraps us in care and takas all our anxieties and stresses that we carry as body aches and pains. It remains supportive even as it pulls us deeper into its softness.

With every breath we take in this room within our hearts, the chair helps us deepen into peaceful living.

With every breath we take we sink deeper and deeper into our own peaceful existence in the world.

With every breath we take God, the Divine, the Great Spirit beckons us.

Come into the many rooms of your heart and soul.

Chillax and just be.

We will carry you and support you.

You are in our care

Always and forever more.

Come.

Sit with Us.

Let us hold you in Our care.

Coming Home Within

As we begin to explore the many rooms of our internal, spiritual mansion we must remember that this house is different. In this house the Divine Spirit meets our spirit., the Divine knows our pains, our joys, our smiles, and our frowns. God, the Divine, the Great Spirit, YHWH feels what we feel.

So, it would make sense that the stairs in this house are different because they creak with the sound of our presence. They know what it is to feel the crackling of old bones and bones that carry the weight of oppression, and trauma. They feel our pain as we make our way up and down, from floor to floor.

They carry not only our body’s, but they also carry our pain as well. These stairs feel the pain that we sometimes carry throughout our lives. However, in this house, on these stairs our lives feel free of burden, despair, trauma, and grief. This house and these stairs carry burdens for us.

With each crackle, creak, and screech our lives become more peaceful as the sorrows of life reside. Our own bones become silent as we no longer carry the load of life’s burdens that sometimes make our bodies creak and our spirit moan.

This home built in our soul helps us to let go and give all things over to the God who takes our sorrows and resurrects us to new life in Love.

This home, which is built on the strong foundation of our faith, contains many rooms that help us navigate the ebbs and flows of life. These stairs, that will help us move from the highs and lows of life, are a spiritual reminder that the home in our heart is a place that we may come and journey deep into our souls and find the peace of Divine Presence, within.

This home is a place to come, let go, and let God carry us when life feels to heavy, and our bodies ache and feel weary.

God beckons us.

Come to the home in your heart.

Allow me to feel your pain.

Allow me to carry your burdens.

Come journey with me to the depths of your soul.

Come home and find deep peace within.

Coming Home Within

In the Gospel of John Jesus invites us to understand that God has built a place for us within Their Presence deep within. He tells us that in the home of our soul, God has implanted spiritual spaces that we can access through quiet contemplation.  

This place that Jesus talks about, expressed as, “in my Father’s house are many rooms”, can mean the deeper spiritual truth: through the in dwelling of the Holy Spirit, there is a place located deep in our soul where we can go and find peace within ourselves and walk in a more peaceful way in the world.  

Theresa of Avelia describes this as the Interior Castle. 

Jesus invites us, come, journey with Me to a place of absolute peace within the heart of all that is, located deep inside the heart of who you are: “Where I am, there you may be also”

For the next few weeks Pastor’s Porch will take a tour of this home built into our soul. We will explore these rooms in the mansion of our being.

We begin our journey in the basement of the home. Most basements are places of storage or a place more akin to a family room. This basement is different.

This is where the foundation of the home is. This is the place where we start the tour of our house. This base of the home is where all the knowledge is stored. This is where we bring all of our questions and continue to build our home on a strong foundation of faith.

We start this tour deep within the home of our hearts, the deep soul of our being. All of our spiritual resources are stored here: wisdom of our elders, biographies of our faith ancestors., books of the prophets of justice of every faith tradition, all of the wisdom of time and space, most importantly this is the room where our life experiences are stored, our own innate wisdom.

In this room of enlightening, the most important part of ourselves that we bring with us are all those deep questions about life, God, and faith. We can even ask whether or not God indeed exists.

The base of our home is a place of strength. A fortress that is impenetrable by the ways of self-doubt or self-loathing. This is why we start in the base of the house, within the foundation of a faith that supports all of who we are: made in the image of the Divine, born into the blessed eternal relationship.

The Christ in Jesus bids us, come, explore these many rooms of who you are.

The journey begins with the simplicity of quiet, stillness, and presence in the moment.

Called Towards Advocacy

Prior to his conversion to the Paul who wrote letters to various churches, Saul, who would become Paul, stands and holds the robes of the ones who are stoning Stephen to death as he cries out to God, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” This is similar to Jesus’s last words on the Cross, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they are doing”. 

58 dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. 59 While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” 60 Then he fell on his knees and cried out, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

Even as Stephen is being stoned to death, even as Jesus is being crucified, they both advocate for those who are killing them. What a lesson for us. What a difficult example to follow.  

I mean seriously!  

As they are being killed by the empire of greed and power, they are asking God to forgive those who are killing them. Whew! 

What these two scenes help us realize is that we are called to advocacy. We are not supposed to stand by and hold the robes of those who are oppressing, and or killing in order that the system of the status quo remains and the empire of greed and power flourishes.  

We are called towards advocacy.  

We are not supposed to stand outside a burning building only to ask if the people inside are worthy of our help and resources.  

We are not called to stand by and hold the robes of the killers. We are called to stand and take the stoning sometimes. We are called to stand beside someone when they need a partner. We are called to stand for those who cannot stand on their own.  

We are being called to scream at the top of our lungs to a world that is falling deaf to the lament of those who are being oppressed, bullied, traumatized and killed because they don’t fit neatly into the system of the status quo, that simply grows stronger as those in power begin to lose their standing. The more that sinful empire of greed and power begins to lose it’s grip on power the more hateful and violent it becomes.  

Think of Shirley McLaine in Terms of Endearment as she screams for her daughter's medication to be given. As that iconic scene unfolds, we can hear and see the anxiety rising until the character must scream, “GIVE MY DAUGHTER HER MEDICATION!!!!, multiple times before the nurses begin to move.  

Again, we can all understand sticking up for our own. Bruce Springsteen even wrote and recorded a song, We Take Care of Our Own. Some would even say that we don’t truly take care of our own much less those we don’t consider our own.  

Jesus and Stephen expand our understanding of ‘our own’ to include all of humanity. We are challenged to realize that we are all, each of us, to advocate for those we may not even know. Jesus helps us understand our calling as humans and as Christians when we witness Him coming along side those who society would label as less than and not worthy of attention or love.  

Jesus Christ advocates by presence among and within folks that society leaves behind.  

I will advocate for my own child. I will advocate for my friends and family. That comes naturally. Not an easy act by any stretch. But it comes naturally to want to stick up for, advocate for, my child and loved ones.

I have learned that following Jesus means the sometimes uncomfortable act of advocating for those I do not know personally. This means challenging all systems of oppression that deny the full humanity of those deemed as “others” or those outside of so-called societal norms.

It may seem to be quite a daunting task to become and advocate and an oppressive system breaker. It is hard to be the one who stands up and calls truth to power and say this is wrong. It can cause anxiety and worry when we think about how our community will react.

It ain’t easy standing up to a bully. Especially when that bully is an entire system.

But stand we must and stand strong.

Even if our church, family, or community is telling us to sit down and shut up.

Maybe advocacy begins with the knowledge that at the end of the day we are all connected by the indwelling Spirit and Breath of Love: God.

In a sense the church must be loud and clear.  

We will not stand by and hold the robes of oppressive systems any longer.  

Instead, we will stand with Jesus and advocate on behalf of those who society is telling us are less than and unworthy.  

Hope!

Hope

We all want the Good News of the Gospel. We all want to have hope, to dream.

As we enter into the middle of of Holy Week it is easy to forget that the week begins with Hosanna!!!, then quickly turns to Crucify Him, Crucify Him!!!

It is a difficult task to hold these two realities together in our hearts. Our human inclination is to hold onto the Hosanna and the hope of Resurrection without the truth of the Cross and the Crucifixion. It is natural for us all to want to move from the palms of Hosanna to the empty tomb of resurrectin.

We miss the lessons of betrayal on the part of Jesus’s closest friends, the lesson in humility in the washing of feet, and the violent retribution of the empire when we jump from Sunday to Sunday and miss the opportunity for spiritual growth and transformation that Holy Week offers. It is a time of invitation for each of us to look honestly towards the human predicament and the Holy work of God. It is a time when we hold in tension the palms, the cross, and the empty tomb.

To hope is to dream and hopefully we are not done dreaming because God is not dreaming for us to be one human family.

John17: 20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

If we can lose the eyes of our dualistic, extremely binary way of seeing the world, then we may move from believing, to knowing, to understanding, and experiencing the deep meaning of Holy Week. With the gaze of that indwelling Holy Spirit, we may come to understand that hope without lament and truth, becomes empty prosperity.

As we gaze upon the cross with our spiritual eyes, we may be able to see the sins of humanity in the body of Jesus that was crucified.

You see Resurrection Sunday without the truth of the Cross becomes nothing but an Easter bunny. The empty tomb sits in the shadow of the cross and in the tension of the human predicament as a symbol of the paradox of humanity: beautifully created within a loving relationship together with the ability to do great harm to one another.

Just as the ideal of America, which is still being realized, sits in the shadow of our violent history. The hope of America becomes empty and sinful prosperity for only a few when we fail to hold in tension the dream of our nation and the truth of our actions towards the first nations people, (the indigenous first inhabitants of the continent)’, and the original sin of slavery. The hope for America is only found when all know and can see and realize the hope of a new day, the freedom to thrive, and the ability to dream. We cannot slogan our way towards the one human family that Jesus prayed for in the Gospel of John, nor one united America. We cannot jump from the palms to the tomb, no more than we can leap over our honest history to America the Beautiful.

We all must face up to the truth that we, humanity, did that to the person of Jesus. We all hold the ability to seek new life or crucify. We all hold the ability to shout both Hosanna and Crucify Him. We all hold the ability to tear down or build up the Beloved Community. We all hold the ability to build walls and barriers or work to co-create the new Kingdom that Jesus tells us God is working on in our current time and place in history.

This is the lesson of Holy Week.

Hope without lament, without truth, becomes empty prosperity.

But alas!

The Tomb sits empty, and God has taken the violence of the crucifixion and has put the Body, which humanity broke, back together.

The body is broken,

The spirit has been spilled,

The Tomb sits empty.

Even in the shadow of the cross.

God says NO!!

You cannot take My love out of this world.

Holy Week is not a jump, or a leap, but yet another invitation into and within the journey towards transformation and spiritual awakening. It is the journey from the Cross to the Tomb. Within the journey is the deeper experiential knowledge of the expanding God of the universe who knows us by name and will never leave our side. Even if we think They look like the gardner.

Now that is hopeful! That is Good News, which we all carry within ourselves.

May we all know the voice of God who calls us, who beckons us forward towards our most beautiful selves.

Most of all we carry the message of hope for all those who feel forgotten and unheard.

May we all know that in the middle of the pain of the Cross, the healing has already begun.

Two Words: This Sucks!

This sucks!

I have uttered those two words on more than one occasion, and it seems freeing for the listener, almost permission giving to let down a guard of some sort. “Yeah…this does suck”!! Most are almost surprised that a pastor would utter such words. But in a lot of circumstances, especially in times of grief, loss, and trauma, it seems like those two words are a decent way to describe the situation.

Quite honestly, scripture, prayers, words, songs, and useless quips won’t do anything to take away our grief, especially during times of death or emotional turmoil. These aspects and traditions of our faith may help us navigate life during our grief. But they cannot take our grief away.

This sucks! Period.

I thought of this in the context of multiple recent pastoral visits with those who are facing death themselves or helping a loved one care for their dying family member or friend.

If life is a journey of the spirit, as I believe it is, or if life is a process, and with death being an inevitable natural part of life, then death becomes a process and grief becomes a byproduct of the process of life. Grief is a natural way and spiritual process of dealing with death.

Grief is not something we read about, deal with, or really let go of. I still miss my daddy, my grandparents, and other family members and friends that have ended their time in this spiritual place we call earth. Where and when people’s souls go after our time here, I do not know. I can’t begin to answer that question. I have spiritual ideas that hold comfort for me, but no answer that I can find will take my grief away.

I am in that particular time of my grief process that it doesn’t knock me down often or as deep. But when the spirit of my loved ones slips into my consciousness in those thin places of the spiritual plane, that place between the material world and the spiritual realm, I am saddened with both a smile and a tear. A smile that they came to say hello and a tear that I cannot really see them. I can only feel their presence and I am reminded that I truly miss them and the finality of death.

When we do church well the faith community becomes the ones who walk alongside the grieving and the dying. Not to take anything away. But to bring the presence of God to those in need during theirs or their loved one’s transition to the next spiritual place of our soul. Our job, our calling, our vocation as members of a faith community of support, pastor, and church alike, is to help carry the grief so that no one feels alone in the world, especially during those times of transition.

A dear and wise pastor once told me that grief is like a tornado of sorts. It comes around with differing levels of power, but never truly leaves our spirit. We continue to miss those we have lost over the years. This concept was eye opening for me as it helped me realize that on some days, I may be sad or even angry for no apparent reason. With that analogy of grief and that image of coming around every so often I was able to see that I was angry or sad because I was missing someone close to me who is no longer in this material realm of life.

This is commonly known as the different stages of grief. It may help as a reminder that grief is a process that we all go through in multiple ways at multiple times in our life. During the process if we are lucky, we have loved ones, a community of faith, or just a community of friends that can walk alongside us and help us carry our grief. Not to take it away but to help us carry the load.

In some instances, it may help to simply offer spiritual space, a listening ear and someone to help us say…This Sucks!! But I’m here with you and we will walk this process together.

Jesus taught them so that they may teach us, ‘And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.’

God is holding us, and we are holding each other.

Faith Is Our Come Along Friend

Very often we want something to take our grief away, our sorrow, our heart aches, and the difficulties of life. It is natural in our human nature to ask in difficult times that whatever we may be dealing with be taken away. In these times many of us turn to our faith and God. All too often we have been taught that prayer or our faith will take away our pain. Believe enough, pray enough, have faith strong enough and all will go away and all will be well.

That sounds fine in some instances. It even may work for a while and it may be what we need to hear. However, it will end up ringing hollow, or false, when sorrow, grief, sadness, and just plain crappy days take over our spirit and our cup overflows with sadness that faith and prayer can’t take away. When we are told that our faith will make everything ok, take away all of our pain and it doesn’t, we blame God and faith withers.

I was reminded of this on a recent pastoral visit to the hospital. All around was the grief of physical trauma to a loved one’s body or the difficulties of dealing with the illness of a family member. All the downtrodden faces behind the masks in the ER. And I thought…

Faith is our come along friend.

That morning I drove past a school just as parents were dropping off their children. One of those parents was a father who carried his little one in his arms and then put the child on the ground and held his hand as they walked to school. With a little hick in my throat, I remembered the peaceful and comforting feeling of my own daddy’s hand holding onto me along with the memory of holding my own child’s tiny hand. Hand holding, especially between parent and child, is both a physical and spiritual connection, a connection of comfort and love.   

Both instances struck me in the spirit as I thought of faith as our come along friend. It seems to me that sometimes we want our faith to be a receptacle where we can put our heart aches, sorrows, grief, and worries of life. If we could only pour ourselves out enough, then we could find a place for all that grief to be taken away. 

Some have been taught that all we need to do is believe enough or pray enough and God will take it all away. That is sometimes what we think of when we think of faith, especially when we think of faith in some traditional understandings of life and God. I have heard this explanation of faith and prayer used as a weapon: You are here because your faith and or prayer were not strong enough. 

It may help to think of faith as our come along friend, much like the parent holding the hand of the child. Then we may begin to see our faith is actually in an all-encompassing, all consuming, eternally present God who will never let us go. A relationship born in love and care. A relationship that can never be taken away. 

A faith that feels like an eternal come along friend who walks with us in the valley of the shadow of death as well as walks with us, hand in hand, heart in heart, love in love, in the warmth of the sunshine as well as that shadow. This is a faith that may sustain us through all our days to come as well as the eternity of the time unknown in our minds, but present deep in our spirit: beyond eternity. 

This idea of holding on creases a smile on my face as I picture God as a friend who is always reaching out to hold onto us with a heart born of empathy and the simple blessing of presence.  

May we all know this faith in our hearts so that our spirit may never forget:

Faith is our come along friend. 

“We’ll be friends forever won’t we, Pooh” Asked Piglet

“Even Longer”, said Pooh.

Stand With Me On The Arc of the Moral Universe

I sat at the table in that old church as we planned the new ministry that would take place on Wednesday evenings. We would gather for a meal, open the church for the community, provide a place for young adults to come and mingle, maybe even play basketball, and a space for adults to talk about life and such things. As the meeting moved along in its planning stages I piped up and said I’ll provide the meal. Weeks later the pastor told me that if I hadn’t step up to cook, we may not have had meals. I remember expressing back to the pastor that I knew I would not be alone in the work of planning and cooking the meals. Just as I expected, the cooks of the church stepped up with me and helped cook most all the meals.

When I think of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. expressing his belief that “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice,” I’m reminded of that feeling that I don’t step into this work alone. That this work of co-creating with God the beloved community is communal work and I stand with all those who are looking out into the world, gazing with an eye towards the spiritual, and feel the need to do something better than what we cannot unsee.

For you see we must take our place on this arc in order that collectively we stand and put our full weight and that we do our part to bend our collective morals towards justice.

Let us read that again: the universe is calling us all to put our full weight and do our part to bend our collective morals towards justice.

We are not talking about vengeful justice or justice that is based on retribution. We are not talking about a justice that begins with anger, punishment, or an economic growth model. We are talking about Divine justice. A way of ordering the universe so that all have a piece and place. So that all have the sustenance to live, and all have the freedom to thrive as fully human. A world that, a God, that is concerned with matters of abundance and enough for everyone instead of a worldview or a theology based on hoarding for our own gain at the expense of others.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. may not have thought of the moral arc of the universe the way that I am describing it. I do believe that in a spiritual sense, a real-world sense, Martin stood strong and tall on that moral arc and helped bend it towards racial and economic justice.

Much the same way Jesus stood with the full weight of His divinity and His life in order that a new way of ordering the systems of the world would be born. One based on God’s abundance instead of a theology of scarcity that only serves the empire of greed and power.

Jesus may be, I dare proclaim that He is, God’s example of standing on the arc of the universe and bending our collective morals towards justice. We must ask ourselves in our own time and place in history, is the church going to take a stand on this arc so that we do our part to make sure that in our lifetime it bends. Too many times the church has stood idly by as the arc stays flat and anchored in the status quo of scarcity, oppression, and violence. We can think of the German church during the time of Hitler and our own churches in the United States during slavery as two examples of the church standing idly by instead of putting the full weight on the arc to bend our morals towards justice.

I wonder if God is calling each of us, beckoning us all, come, stand with me. Let us break the levy of greed and hoarding so that the rivers of justice flow and nourish the entirety of humanity. I wonder if we, the church, can consider ourselves standing hand in hand with Jesus in order that we bend the collective morals towards God’s justice.

I invite you to come and stand with me on the arc of universe in our time and place in history lest it stay flat, always heading towards the status quo, anchored in the false and sinful idols of economy and self-centeredness. 

Sometimes it may feel tiring, depressing, soul crushing even. But I promise you we are not alone. We are standing on the shoulders of our ancestors of justice, with Jesus, with Martin and others and that there are more of us standing tall and strong to create something better than what we cannot unsee.

When God invites us, we are not alone in this work. God puts people and entities in our path so that when we say here, I am, standing strong, we know that we are not alone. The Divine Presence, in all its images and forms, is not just calling us, it is standing with us to create a more just world for all of humanity. When we decide to step with strength and intentionality, we are deciding to be carpenters and co-creators with the God of this expanding universe. We are doing our part create a more just world for all of God’s children.

Come.

Stand with me on the collective moral arc of the universe as we bend it towards justice for everyone.

Trust me.

The good cooks will show up and help.

Most important: God shows up with us.

Weeping with compassion

In the wake of yet another act of senseless violence, how do we heal and how do we move forward?

I have attended many events on that campus, and I know people who knew two of the victims personally. The tragedy is heart wrenching, too real, and too close as the pastor of a church located only a few miles away and a member of the larger Green n White community of MSU.  

The reality is still settling in for many professors, students, and staff of returning to that splendid campus on the red cedar, only to remember the events of February 14th. The reality of that traumatic and violent evening will be hard for many to forget. I am confident that the staff at MSU will take all precautions and provide the much needed mental health services that many will need.

What of us? The ones who are in charge of caring for our loved ones and community members. What do we do with our emotions: anger, confusion, worry, sadness, and so on. How do we respond?

Jesus began to weep is one of the shortest versus in the Gospel and it may help us discern a way forward for us all.

Lazarus, a good friend of Jesus and a member of His larger community has died.

Jesus weeps.

You see in the thin places of scripture, as well as our own lives, in the spiritual space between and around the words on the page is the treasure of Divine connection and Godly presence.

It may be hard to see, and it may be hard to find. In the midst of great tragedy and senseless violence, where is God’s goodness? In this tiny little verse that is contained in the larger Gospel story of Jesus is one such treasure.

It is said that as Jesus was walking with this community he saw them weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. There it is. Jesus began to weep. (John 11:35)

John doesn’t say it, but if we listen really close to this story, we can hear the compassion of Jesus. Before he weeps, he feels compassion deep in his spirit and is disturbed. A deep compassion for all of humanity is how Jesus walked the earth and it is God’s compassion for us, and our compassion for our neighbors that we now carry in our hearts, into our own time and place in the history of humankind.

Compassion begets tears for the loss of life. We are all disturbed in our spirit and deeply moved with compassion for our loved ones and community members who were affected by yet another act of grotesque violence and loss of life. Soon after the news broke, the events ended as the shooter took his own life, and we began to hear about who it was that had been killed and we began to see the goodness of God in the midst of this tragedy.

We began to hear of the first responders, the medical staff at the area hospitals, and our social feeds began showing pictures of people simply showing up to lay flowers at landmarks around the campus. They gathered in churches, community centers, and on the campus to console and care for one another. The community wept, together and showed us all the goodness that exists during tragedy.

Jesus weeps with compassion for what humanity is doing to one another. (Luke 19:41)

When the tears dry up, if they ever really dry up completely after an event of this nature, our compassion must remain. If we live into this story of Jesus’s compassion for all of humanity, not just his buddy, we may be able to heal our own wounds and care for our entire community, all of Creation, not just today but all of our days.

If we lead with compassion, we can be part of the healing process, instead of playing the unhealthy blame game.

Yes, there is time for action. Yes, we need to fix our violence problem and our gun problem. No, we must not accept this as just another difficult part of life like a snowstorm, which we must endure. There is good work to be done and good trouble to be made.

In the action, in the good work, and in good trouble making, it will be of the utmost importance that we don’t let our anger at the senseless loss of life ruin our compassion or take over our hearts. We must not let the circumstances of the world, no matter how senseless they are at times, ruin our soulful, soul filled spirit of love.

Jesus’s tears did not turn to revenge or violence. His compassion remained. He led with that same compassion all the way to His day on the cross. (Luke 23:34)

In our tiny little verse, we hear of the presence of God’s compassion for all who may be hurting. A compassion we all carry with us.

Let our tears fall.

Let the anger in our hearts turn to voices for change.

Let our energy turn towards building up our communities instead of tearing down one another.

Let our hearts remain compassionate.

Carrying the burdens of life: Together

Matthew ends his Gospel story with a mountain top appearance of Jesus. Typically, we call what Jesus expressed to his disciples as the Great Commission to make disciples of all nations, baptize them in the name of Trinity.  

This final commissioning and reminder, I am with you always, to the end of the age, can help us understand that we are never alone in this life and that the burdens that we endure sometimes are not ours alone to carry. 

I thought about this in the context of people who are in relationship with one another. These relationships can be in marriage, community, or friendship. Many times, I have heard one person lamenting that they don’t want to be a burden on the loved one or friend who is filling the role of caretaker.  

Just like the disciples in their work of bringing all nations into the love of God as made known to them in Christ Jesus, we all face difficult circumstances in our lives. If we are lucky enough to have a loved one caring for us during these times, it may feel like we are helpless, and we don’t want to be a burden on anyone.  

I wonder if we could understand this, I Am with you always as a wonderful piece of wisdom that is contained in Gospel of Matthew.  

The burden is real, and we may want to admit this out loud in situations that become difficult for any number of reasons. If the person being cared for can say I don’t want to be a burden and the caretaker can honestly say, this is a burden, not you, but yes this is a difficult situation we are in. 

If the two people can speak honestly to one another, “this situation is a burden for both of us, but we will navigate it together and I am with you.” 

Then the burden falls on both the one being cared for and the one taking care. The situation becomes the burden that both are carrying together instead of one needing care and one giving care.  

Jesus’s words may help us in these difficult situations. We are with each other until the end of the ages. We are here to care for each other during these burdensome times. We are here to share each other's burdens. The situation may bring us closer to each other, love and our faith. The situations in life may sometimes just simply suck, but we are not alone.  

If we can take the spiritual reality that Jesus speaks of and experience God as the eternal partner in life, then we can mirror that sentiment in all our relationships, “I am with you, we are here for and with each other”.  

Maybe we can even take the words of Jesus, incorporate them into the relationships in our homes, communities, and churches. Maybe our relationships will be healthier. Maybe our society will be healthier for everyone when we realize that the burden that we are all carrying is creating and maintaining a society and culture where everyone has the freedom and means to thrive.

Our relationship with/within God, our churches, our homes, our personal relationships can teach us how to be caretakers of each other.

Paul tells us in his letter to the Galatians that the law (way, life, teachings, wisdom, understanding, spirit) of Christ is to carry the burdens of our neighbors.

We are called to be here for one another until the end.

Church

Church is such a small, single syllable word, but a huge undertaking. Historically churches have been places of great comfort, strength, wisdom, and love. Churches have also been places of great pain, ridicule, division, and difficult conflict. Churches have been places of both selfishness (self-centeredness) along with selflessness (other-centeredness). 

From the time of the ancient church, the first followers of Jesus, the people of the Way, gathered in local homes instead of a central building after the death of Jesus, up until now there has been long discernment about what church is. 

When we think of church in modern times, we may hold onto an image in our minds of Christians gathering in a building that involves some sort of traditional worship service. What is church, how do churches operate in the world, and what value does a church hold for a community are all questions that are as ancient as the first “home churches”. 

What if.

What if “church” isn’t Christian at all? O boy and a little uh oh.

What if churches are simply people gathered in a common faith community, exploring the world in which we all live, following a common deity or spiritual leader. What if churches are places of exploration, spiritual discovery, and transformation, walking hand in hand along this common journey we call life. What if exploration is the key component of being an effective church for the people in the gathered community as well as the community at large. 

What if we don’t come to church. What if we create church together and then take the church out into the world. Not to judge the world with a set of holiness codes in order that we set ourselves apart as better than, but instead to walk with and within the world, as a people of faith. What if our faith is the place we enter into our hearts and the church is the communal invitation, working towards spiritual transformation. 

What if that is the point of any faith community, no matter what we call ourselves, Christian or otherwise.

What if we are all on the same journey of life working to create a place where our commonality of understanding and yearning, not beliefs, brings us together in a certain place in a certain time. 

See, what if church is not Christian at all? Can we imagine a different way of seeing that word lived out in our lives?

What if all faith communities gather for the same exploration reaching towards the same goal of understanding our soulful relationship with the Divine and one another.

O boy!! 

That means that the Divine has no earthly boundaries. The Divine is free to reach out to all who explore this relationship throughout time, place, and space.

Church then becomes a place of welcoming and exploring. A place of openness and invitation. A place of love and acceptance. 

Church becomes a place that Jesus would be welcomed, no matter the location or faith practice. 

I know. That sounds non-Christian. 

Maybe Jesus is bigger than Christianity.

Stubborn Faith

My faith is stubborn.  

When the world is on edge, or systems are teetering, secular or religious, our faith must endure, become stubborn, bullheaded, and insistent on the goodness of God.  

Faith is in hoping and dreaming for a better, more just world, where everyone is treated with love and offered grace. I’m not done dreaming or hoping and my faith is even more stubborn in the belief that God’s goodness cannot be taken out of this world or my heart and soul. I find myself stubborn about this. You can’t tell me that goodness has been taken out of this world and evil is in charge, no matter what the world is telling me or us.  

It has become an important spiritual practice to look for, seek out, and share the goodness of God that is in the world through word and deed.  

In my Christian faith tradition, I hear Jesus asking, dreaming, and praying that we all be one. I hear the dream of God that we may all live as one human family. My faith is stubborn in the belief that God is listening to our collective praying within all faith traditions. I believe further that deep within our soul is the yearning for peace. Unfortunately hate and anger sells and has inundated our news and social feeds.  

Part of what is driving us apart is external yes. However, a larger part of what is driving us apart is the belief that this is how the world is and or supposed to be: divided, angry, hateful, and selfish to a fault. When this is what we hear and see every day it becomes an unconscious belief and way of being in the world.  

Angela Davis says, I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change. I am changing the things I cannot accept. 

I no longer accept that the world is run by anger, contrary to all evidence of our current predicament, with a lingering pandemic and political brinkmanship, all for the love of power.  

I am changing my heart, listening to my stubborn faith so that I am the goodness in the world that I need and seek. Maybe we can change a small part of our world by being the goodness our local setting needs.  

I am the goodness in the world that I need and seek. 

My faith is stubborn and bullheaded in a God who stepped into history in the person of Jesus to show the world that the goodness of God and the abundance there in fall on and incarnate within all of creation. The goodness of the God of abundance lies within each heart. The world does all it can to snatch that inherent goodness from the soul of humanity. The world tells us that division must exist, and God is the one who divides between the have and have nots. No!! 

My faith is stubborn, and my spirit is bullheaded. 

Goodness exists and there are more people united and working towards the inherent goodness than we are being told about because nuance and kindness don’t pause our scrolling or encourage us to tune in.  

Gandhi gifted us with the wisdom of being the change in the world that we want to see. 

The more we find and witness that goodness, the more it becomes not just a part of our faith, it becomes who we are in the world.   

May your faith be stubborn: May your spirit be bullheaded

May we all know the goodness of God:

May we all know the goodness of humanity.

May we all seek that goodness.

May we all witness to that goodness through word and deed in our local settings and faith practices.

I am

You are

We are all

The goodness that we seek.

Church

Golden rule or the Golden Truth: All of life, for everyone, is better when we all live into this truth.

Leslie Congregational UCC: TheMightyLCUCC

What kind of church do I want and what kind of church is God calling us to be in our current time and place in history? Do we get those two things mixed up sometimes? Do I yearn for a church of my own making? What kind of church do I want? How can I lead a church towards what I want it to be?

Some may say that as the pastor I’m not supposed to be pondering these two things. I’m supposed to know, beyond a shadow of doubt, how to lead a church, free of worry and my own agenda.

I let you in on a little secret though. Pastors ain’t perfect. We have both internal and external expectations and pressures of near perfection. Both must be addressed to make room for healthy growth for pastor and congregation, together. As such, both pastor and congregation must wrestle with the tension between what kind of church do we want and what kind of church is God calling us to be.

What kind of church do I want: self/inside/ego.

What kind of church is God calling us towards: other/outside/divine.

When we truly understand the spiritual importance of our human vocation, we realize that God has built a church in every heart. If church is the dwelling place of God, and I hope that churches do their best to be that, then church can be thought of as the place of divine presence, a sanctuary for the hurting, lost, lonely, in need of care and grace.  

When we truly understand what “church” means, we are invited to live into the vocation of being love in the world. By golly you don’t even need to believe in God to partake in that holy, universal vocation of all of humanity: to be love in the world.

You see here’s the thing. You don’t have to be a pastor to build and or sustain a church. You don’t have to be a Christian to build a church. You don’t even have to go to church to build a church.

Whichever deity you interact with, or don’t interact with, God is calling all of humanity to the same work of building a more loving, caring, and just world for all people. Not through any faith or any church, or any religion. But through every heart. Sometimes, I hope often, the church reflects this Holy Vocation in word, study, and deed.

The great Mystery, the great Truth, God, Christ, Jesus, Allah, Buddha, nature, are all calling to our hearts through invitation to embark on the work of creating loving communities where every single person is given space and freedom to thrive. That can be done at a family dinner table, the Communion table, or at a board room table. This work can be done in a church building or in any heart.

When grace is given, when forgiveness is offered, when love leads our lives, when wisdom leads us towards that great love, when any community comes together, or any person embarks on a journey to make the world a bit better for having us in it, then “church” is being built and sustained. Building or no building, religion, or no religion.

In essence, in my view, church is a place to awaken ourselves, pastor and congregation, personally and communally, to the presence of Divine Love.

Call it what you want.

For this pastor, that’s church anywhere, everywhere, by and for everyone.

O For a Theology of Relationship

In the opening chapters of Genesis, the origin story of our Christian faith known as the “bible”, we hear the presence of God hovering over a creation in chaos (read “was a formless void”).  

One note to make here is the tension between science and faith, literal truth, and spiritual truth. Marcus Borg says something so simple but so deep, “the truth is in the meaning not their factuality”.  

The truth is in the meaning of the opening chapters of Genesis, not whether it was ever meant, I don’t interpret it that way, to be a scientific book. I understand that our Christian Old and New Testament that make up the Christian “bible” were meant as a narrative about humanities spiritual journey while being in relationship with/within God and one another, and the struggles there within. Our origin story, or as some refer to it, the Sacred text, is one experience of this mystery we call God, but not the only nor final experience of God.  

O for a theology of relationship 

Only a few lines into of the beginning chapters of our spiritual creation narrative we hear God say it is good. We hear about, if we listen with a spiritual ear instead of a literal scientific ear, the beginnings of God’s relationship with and within creation. God says this, this here is good stuff. 

Our origin story is one of relationship: light and dark, land and sea, stars, moon and sun, day and night, roaming creatures, and finally humankind made in the image of the Divine, “Let Us make humankind in Our image, according to Our likeness”. 

All the proceeding stories are stock full of God’s reaction - to humankinds' - reaction to God. We miss that sometimes, or most times, don’t we, living in relationship with one another while being a full part in all of creation and how our faith ancestors interpreted God’s action in history.  

If we can understand the long arc of history that is contained in our “bible” we yearn for what God yearns for, relationship. Sometimes we get our part wrong and we miss the opportunity to see the Presence as relationship. Through it all God yearns to stay close and in relational proximity with humanity. Read the story of the snake, humankind, and the two trees. God is not done.  

In that story we see the problem, or sin, of putting our own ego ahead of God’s presence. We reach for power instead of a healthy relationship with God, self, and one another. God tells us, no you don’t. That is not healthy with yourself or the rest of creation. Eat of the tree of power and your soul will die. When we eat of the tree of ego and selfishness, we are eating the poisonous and ruinous apple of power over instead of relationship with and within. 

We yearn for what God yearns for, don’t we. Don’t we, in the end, truly yearn for a relationship that will help us get through the rough patches of life. Don’t we yearn to know unconditional love forever? I know that I want the peace that I feel in my marriage to last forever. I also know that I have a responsibility to do all that I can to be a healthy part of the relationship so that it does continue to be one of love and mutual respect, for as long as we both shall live. .

What if that is how it is with God. We do our part in this blessed relationship, that began in goodness and blessing, by treating all of God’s family as God treated us, loved each of us into being and breathed life into our souls, continues to walk with us, caring for all of creation.

O for a theology of relationship 

I wonder what that would do to our collective psyche? To know that we were born into a loving, blessed, and eternal relationship instead of imagining a God who is vengeful. A God who sends us away instead of inviting us in.

Maybe instead of us thinking of a God who steps away or sends us away we can think of a God who eternally is by our side and will never leave us.  

If we can expand our theology from one of vengeance to one of relationship, maybe we can begin to treat one another as God treats us. Relationally connected for ever and always.  

O for a relationship that never ceases.  

O for a God of our own heart  

All made in the image of the Divine  

In the image of the Divine, we remain 

An All the Way Journey

An excerpt from Pastor Mike’s Sermon given on September 4th at LCUCC 

Jesus tells us to let go of our possessions. In other words, let go and let God lest we hold on to our worry and our fear instead of knowing that the presence of God is for all of eternity and that the Love of God is eternal as well.  

We are being directed by the living teacher how to live a fully human healthy life, how to become a disciple of the Way by the teachings of Jesus. If we follow the one who shows us not by words or creeds but by life and deeds. Shows us not by vengeance and punishment, but by invitation and grace. Jesus shows us what it is to give up and die, so as to rise and live a fully human experience all the while being carried and cared for by the God of the temple and the God of the lilies, the God of Moses and the God of LCUCC, the God of all time of every place and of every heart of every soul 

But it is an all the way journey instead of a one and done. It is a journey all the way to the cross and the grave of our soul.  

This week I was looking through some books in the office and found one by Barbara Brown Taylor: An altar in the world. In it she shares a story:

Years ago, a wise old priest invited me to come and speak at his church in Alabama. What do you want me to talk about I asked him. Come tell us what is saving your life now he answered. It was as if he swept his arm across a dusty table and brushed all the formal china to the ground. I do not have to try to say correct things that are true for everyone all I had to do was figure out what my life depended on, all I had to do was figure out how I stayed as close to that reality as I could.

This sparked that same question in me as I thought about our sermon today. 

In the gospel of Jesus, we hear a pastoral perspective. We hear about the stories of healing and paying attention, of love and care that Jesus Christ showed by his life. As a matter of fact, Jesus Christ taught more by his life than his words. Follow me could mean follow my example in your life.

We also hear the prophetic voice of Jesus Christ that calls truth to power of that human sin of building an empire of greed and power instead of caring about the entirety of God’s creation. Today we hear that strong prophetic voice, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions 

In an answer to the earlier question that Barbara Brown Taylor brought up; How am I staying close to that reality of the God of all time and of every place and of every heart and of every soul. The very breath that we, that all of creation, breathe. How am I staying close to that God, the one who loved us into creation and breathed us into being. Yes!! That God.  

How am I staying close to that reality which is both out there and within us. That reality that is breath and sustenance. That Spirit of the living God who has been and will be with us as we travel this all the way journey with Jesus Christ towards personal and communal transformation, all the way with the one who calls us give it all up lest we create false idols and a God who only beckons a select few instead of a radical God who invites all of creation to come live within the divine presence and come home to the dwelling place of My grace and strength. 

I want to really zero in on that last statement that Jesus shared, give up your possessions and follow me. Because I stay close to that spiritual reality by looking for the invitation from Jesus to come and live. Sometimes it might be hard to find that invitation in some of the harsh words of Jesus. But in the end Jesus Christ is the universal invitation to a transformational faith journey all the way towards new life.  

What is the possession that is degrading the collective soul. You see that is the deeper spiritual truth that Jesus is getting at. Jesus may be getting at the possessions that we feel are a need instead of a want. 

I may not want to give up what I find important to me. But are these things important to the God of justice and abundance that Jesus speaks of?

Goodness is how I stay close to the reality of the world that we are all connected even though we may not be united. 

It seems to me that finding the goodness in the world is a much-needed spiritual practice that can save us from being drowned in the negative and hateful world. 

We are being inundated with that negativity and a sickening world view that the entire world is divided in two. That the universe is aligned, even set up by God, in some divinely inspired perpetual us versus them. We do, don’t we? Don’t We value that old us versus them world view. That zero-sum way of looking at the world. This may be what possesses our collective soul at times. Jesus is inviting us into a much more radical, different world view. 

In his book Saving God from Religion, A minister's search for faith in a skeptical age, Robin R. Meyers, a UCC pastor serving in Oklahoma City, helps us understand a world view that speaks of our connectedness: You cannot tap the tuning fork of existence anywhere without changing the music of spheres everywhere”.

When speaking of Benedictine Monks teaching lay people about centering prayer, he expresses this center as sounding like a God who is grounded in this world, revealed in human hearts that show compassion and kindness. A God who is both someplace and everyplace.

Jesus is helping us understand this notion today that this isn’t a five-minute trip to a corner store for some Kleenex. This journey towards knowing God revealed in everything and everyone is an all the way journey towards our own selves. It’s a lifetime of death and resurrection: of letting go of our possessions, grappling and grabbing onto another possession and then letting go of that thing we cling to so that instead of lurching from one thing to the next we keep our eye on the one who shows us the way towards being our most fully human selves. With Jesus, the Gospel, as our guide we give up that which holds us back from realizing our own fullness and humanity. We make room for all to realize their own full humanness.

So that we may hear Jesus talking literally about our economy as the possession or the material things of this world that become an idol. For we can certainly make the economy the god and the idol. We can make the nation or the country the idol. We can make our way of life the idol and hoard all the resources for our own gain at the expense of others.  

Again, how do I stay close to the reality of the God? I stay close to that reality by listening to this person of Jesus who teaches me not what to say, but how to be in the world so that the goodness of God is what I put into the world 

I hear the emotional intelligence of Jesus in his talk today as he prepares those who are following him to know that it may cost the giving up of those things that stand in the way of becoming a disciple, or from joining Jesus on this all the way journey towards personal and communal transformation.  

One quick definition Emotional Intelligence: the ability to understand, use, and manage your own emotions in positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome challenges and defuse conflict. 

That's what Jesus Christ may be saying. Is that these things will hold you back from seeing that we are all connected. It is that connectedness which can become counter cultural in a way that will divide families and communities. Possessions, or what possesses us will keep us from spiritual, communal, and personal transformation. This is much deeper than giving up a few cups of coffee.

Possessions can become the things that hold us back from seeing our connectedness to all others. If we are guided by this Gospel story, we will come to understand how possessions can become the idol and draw our attention away from God’s presence and the innate goodness that we are all born into.  

It has become clear that the most destructive aspect of our shared and connected lives is the extreme world view of individualism. This notion that we are all not connected, that our own individualism is the idol, and it is what possesses us to the point of separating us from that reality of God’s presence in everything under creation and everyone within creation.

It is an all the way journey towards personal transformation so that God can transform the world through our involvement in sustaining the beloved community that Marting Luther King Jr. spoke of, that Jesus spoke of as the Kingdom of heaven, Kin-g-dom God, the realm of God, the Essence of God. It can become difficult to see our connectedness in a world that promotes the individual at the expense of everyone. It can become difficult to see the good in the world when everyone is caught up in the individualism of our current time and place in history.  

If the last two years have shown us anything is that we are all connected. A single cell, in a single body, in a small region on the other side of the world spread and brought the entire world to a standstill. All in the matter of a few months the world grinded to a halt and millions of people lost their lives.  

The wildfires a few years ago are another example of how connected we are. Those fires that started about two thousand of miles away affected our climate here in Michigan. Do we remember how the sun had a haze for a few days while the smog from those fires made their way across the continent? 

We are all connected to everything under the sun and within God’s creation.  

I have heard pastors say I’m still in the Gospel story here. We know that sometimes we can get a little bit ahead of ourselves as pastors. Occasionally, we need to remind ourselves and the audience of that by saying, I’m in the Gospel story here. It may be hard to hear but I’m in the Gospel story. Give up your possessions and follow me.  

Give up those things that will hold you back from the all the way journey towards personal and communal transformation. Give up all that holds you back from realizing that we are all connected. All of creation is connected, intertwined to each other. You cannot tap the tuning fork in California without it affecting us here in little old Leslie MI.  

When we want to understand the goodness of God in our lives, we can rely on our connection to one another and all of creation to remind us that God is with us on this all the way journey. We are not left alone in our work or our lives in promoting the Kingdom of Heaven right here, right now. Looking for the goodness of God means looking for the goodness in our lives in this here place, here and now.  

Jesus Christ doesn’t tell us, go and do without me. He says, follow me to the kingdom here and now as well as the Kingdom to come.  

With Jesus as our guide and our teacher who is walking among us, we are being shown the connection between the material, the Bread, and the spiritual, the Cup of our Communion Table. 

With Jesus Christ as our guide on this all the way journey towards transformation we can see the goodness of God in all the times and all the places of our lives.  

Guided by this Gospel that has been laid upon our hearts the goodness of God guides our souls and we are all connected to that goodness.

Give up your possessions and follow the Word of God incarnate

Incarnate in all of creation

Alive in every heart

Give up that which possesses you

Make room in your heart for the goodness of God

Here

Today

Now

Forever more

Amen

If you were touched by this sermon, you may say the Amen out loud in your home, office or wherever you are reading. ;-)

The thing is, it's not about the thing

At Leslie Congregational UCC we are an Open and Affirming congregation. As we say each and every Sunday as our welcome: Welcome to Leslie Congregational UCC. We believe that all humanity is united and declare ourselves to be an open and affirming congregation that welcomes all people into the full communion of our church and our friendship. We strive to demonstrate in all ways that “no matter who you are or where you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here!”

Recently we were challenged, by a young adult member of our church, that we may be falling short of that welcome unless we make a bold public statement to the community by way of a pride flag.

Discussion ensued and an appropriate flag was chosen with the understanding that it would be displayed in a prominent place attached to the front of the church. This would be our bold public witness for all who may need an ally to see that we are here, and you are welcome here, in this place.

The discussion turned to a taller flagpole and that conversation turned to talk about an American flag, if we were going to put a pole on church grounds it would make sense that an American flag would be raised.

Is anyone feeling nervous about how this conversation went?

It was beautiful actually and it’s why I appreciate serving in a church that is open and exploring. Not that we all agreed about the particulars of the discussion. This congregation talked about the differing views about the separation of church and state. Most importantly we were all able to listen to one another.

It was not about the flag, pride or otherwise, it was, and is, about how we treat each other. It was, and always will be, about how we are in community, relying on our ability to have a conversation and not belittle each other.

The thing is, it’s not about the thing.

It’s about treating each other with respect, compassion, and care.

It’s not about the flag, the bible, the church, the music, the creeds, the worship, and so on. It’s about building healthier community in our places of worship, in our homes, in our communities, and in our world

The thing is, it’s not about the thing.

In this day and age, it was quite a nice respite from angry, hateful rhetoric, to see a community talk amongst themselves in a healthy way. What actually happened was the discussion turned to how can we expand our outreach to the community in which the church resides. How can we, Christ’s church located in a small town, help those in need: veterans, suicide prevention, food/clothing shortage, people of all ages, and so on.

Instead of dividing the congregation the “flag” thing brought us together in an exploring way, asking ourselves how we can be allies in our community and how can we reach out to those in need?

When the thing creates space for discussion, compassion, and care, the thing becomes the spiritual invitation to healthier community living and healthier living for everyone: the Beloved Community.

If we can realize that every-thing can be a conduit to healthy conversation instead of an opportunity for division then we may be able to witness the inbreaking of God’s presence in all aspects of life and peace, instead of division, anger, and hate, may prevail.

May peace become the thing that draws us together.

We must Say It Loud! One young adult's call towards a bold public statement.

Written by Chelsey Wiltse

As a young adult serving in a local UCC congregation I believe whole heartedly that churches run the risk of failing as open and affirming congregations, unless they decide to make a bold public statement such as a Pride flag or other public display of safety for the LGBTQIA+ community.

It might seem harsh, but it is true. Without the public statement many members in many congregations are asking, what have we done or changed since they voted to become and Open and Affirming congregation? For many the answer becomes, nothing as a whole congregation. Facebook posts are not enough.

Some may live in communities that struggle with the idea of accepting others as they are, but this should not stop any congregation from voicing their support for those who need it with one united voice of support and care.

When I voted, in my local church, to be an Open and Affirming church, I did not do it for myself. This vote and decision were made for those who feel lost and alone. Some may be worried and scared about how their local community will respond, but that fear is 1,000 times worse for the kids in school who are afraid to come out to their friends, the kid who was shamed by their family for finally being their true selves, for the people in the community who feel like they have nowhere to go, for those who feel like they will never be accepted. A churches choice to not make a bold public statement means that all these people are still scared and believe that they have no place of safety to go.

At this point, our choice to not make our decision known and to make a proud public statement feels selfish to me as an ally in my community. It is time for any Open and Affirming church to publicly proclaim themselves as a safe place for those who feel unsafe and ashamed, it is time to be a proud ally and stop allowing worry and fear about what a closed-minded community may think guide any decision, because the only thing that matters is making those who feel lost, found.

I am not 100% sure what a public statement looks like in any community, but a pride flag of some sort would be a great place to start and is the most recognized, straight forward sign for those who are looking for a safe place that will support them.