Dec. 6, 2015 - Advent 2

            This is a season of preparation. There is so much to anticipate. There are gatherings of family and friends. There are all the logistics involved in figuring out who will be where and when. What will we eat? What presents will we buy? How will we get there? It’s no wonder we think so little of the journey of Mary and Joseph to Jerusalem. All they had to do was find a place to sleep.

            How will we get there? Do you use online services like Kayak or Expedia? Airplane tickets become evermore mysterious in how they are priced. If you drive, GPS sometimes doesn’t work when it’s cloudy or you find yourself in a tunnel or under forests – and the cell phone cuts out when there are no cell towers.

            I hope you don’t have to drive through Waterbury – and they have just begun construction. We can see the hope in the words of the prophets to make the highway straight and level all that is uneven. It’s easy to write poetry. It’s a much more difficult things to carve through rock and build bridges over rivers. Sometimes that’s how it seems when we make our way to God. All we see are obstacles that are difficult to navigate.

            This is the promise of Advent. God doesn’t promise peace and quiet and an easy road. God finds us along the hard ways and offers a new way. Maybe that’s our trouble. We don’t take God’s short cut because we’re convinced we know the way. We plod through the obstacles because it’s the hard way we know.

            Baruch is the secretary of Jeremiah (who was probably a hard man to work for.) Baruch writes down a vision of a highway of return. One day all the children of God will find their way back to Jerusalem. They will be restored and renewed. Jerusalem will have joy instead of sorrow. The highway is for the return trip.

            It’s not that the people of God didn’t know how to have a relationship with God. They already knew about God and they had faith – and they also failed to live up to what they believed. They were living in exile because they couldn’t live with God. Baruch holds out hope that God would find a way to welcome them back.

            Zechariah was a priest in temple when an angel promised that he would have a son. Like many other older persons who were promised children, Zechariah couldn’t believe the news – so the angel made him speechless until it came true.

            When John is born, and he gets his voice back, Zechariah sings his own song of hope and promise. The first half of the canticle praises God for God’s faithfulness and the many ways that God has saved the people in the past. Then Zechariah sings about how John will prepare the people for salvation in a new way.

            John grows up and begins his work. He preaches in the wilderness – the desert really. He prepares the way of the Lord in the arid and God-forsaken wilderness of Judea. Perhaps John is showing people that there is no place that you can go that God isn’t already there. Perhaps John is showing that God meets us in our own wilderness places. Just when we think we are lost and too far gone, we hear the voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Prepare the way of the Lord!”

            In all of our preparations, we are offered a new way. We already think we know the way, even though we often get lost and confused following the path we think we know. John urges us to repent – to change our minds – to think differently. God offers a new way, where the rough is made smooth and the crooked straight.

            I know we have the route all planned out. We got our trip-ticks from AAA. We mapped it out on MapQuest. God wants us to set our itinerary aside and look for the salvation from our God.

            It’s a new way. To find it we have to forget what we think we know and listen and look for what God is showing us now. It doesn’t look like what we remember. God is making a new way, a new path. God is making a straight and wide highway in the wilderness for us to find our salvation.

            The hardest thing we have to give up is our certainty that we know the way (I hear some men are like that.) It will take us places we haven’t been. It will take us by different path – a shortcut to home.

Nov. 29, 2015 - Advent I

            I have a t-shirt that says, “Jesus is coming. Look busy!” The humor behind this is that we have a sense that there are a set of expectations and we know we can’t meet the. Maybe if we keep our heads down, no one will notice. Is this what we really believe? We know that God has exacting standards. We know all the ways we fail. Do we really believe that we can hide or evade? Or do we believe that God will choose to not notice? It seems to be a pretty thin hope.

            What is God’s promise? Jeremiah declares that someday an offspring of David will come and we will call that one “the Lord is our righteousness.” How can this save us?

            Since the exodus and the covenant on Sinai, righteousness has come from God. We acknowledge that God alone is just, or righteous, or correct in all things. We know we are invited to live according to God’s ways. We know we fail. We don’t like to think how that turns out – but what happens over and over? God continues to uphold the covenant even if we fail to do so. God does not forget us even when we forget God.

            Does this mean that God is foolish, or naïve, or easily manipulated? God’s righteousness is woven with God’s loving kindness and faithfulness. God is always seeking a loving relationship with us. God pursues us. God woos us. God finds us and seeks to convince us. God is always seeking to restore us to whom we were always meant to be.

            This is the promise of the coming of Jesus. He will judge the world. He will judge us. Nothing will be hidden – no matter how busy we look. Jesus will also find us as we are. We are beloved children of God. We are seeking to follow in the path of Jesus. We have died (to sin and death) and we are being made alive as we participate in Jesus’ resurrection.

            God does not require simple obedience to rules. There were lots of rules on Sinai. These were given to show a new way of life, not a strict measure of behavior. God only gives the rules to get what God really wants. God wants our love. God wants us to seek a true and just relationship with God.

            “Righteousness” is about more than rule-keeping. Righteousness is about being in right relationship. It is about being in right relationship with God, about being rightly ordered within, and about being in right relationships with everyone around us. Of course this is difficult. Perhaps the hardest thing is to live a life freely given. God desires that we freely give ourselves back to God, and that we freely give our whole selves (and hold nothing back.)

            We hear a lot of nonsense about the war on Christmas – as if there were a right way to celebrate the birth of Jesus. It seems to me that our culture is already at war with Christmas. Our culture seeks to make money off of God’s gift. If you want a rule, what about celebrating Christmas at Christmas – and not for three months before and never the twelve days after!

            When I was a child, we never decorated until Christmas Eve – and later perhaps the Sunday before. With all our decorating, baking, buying, and feasting – how are we preparing? By the time Jesus comes, we’re worn out and stressed.

            I won’t give us more to do this advent. I think we need less. I won’t stop you from listening to carols or buying a few presents. I will urge you to create some space in your busy day. For five minutes, light a candle. Be silent and wait to hear what God is promising. Listen for God’s hope and God’s yearning, for our commitment to God and to one another. Give yourself time to savor God’s love. Give yourself the gift of knowing God’s deep and constant love.

            We can’t change the business of the season. We can control our response. We can seek different gifts. We can listen. We can respond to the deep needs of those around us. We can allow ourselves to be changed. We can discover new ways to grow in love.

November 22, 2015 - The Feast of Christ the King

                  David gives us a little verse at the end of his life. He sounds as if he brags; with the list of all the things God did through him. This success is not because of David. He is successful because he follows God. David is a beloved king, not because he earns it. He is beloved because he seeks to be in right relationship with God. This is David’s legacy – he is a man after God’s own heart. This means he has endeared himself to God and that he seeks always to maintain and enlarge that relationship. The lasting image of David is not in his military or his leadership skills. It is in his dancing before God. It is in his songwriting. It is in his faith that grows out of a lifelong relationship with God.

                  The promise that gives David hope is that the kingdom will prosper as long as future kings also seek this divine, life giving relationship. The warning (and the sad result) comes about when the leaders sought their own riches and glory and wisdom. They did not know God the way that David knew God.

                  This is difficult for us to imagine in our modern era because we no longer have leaders with an anointed relationship with God. No president or world ruler is specifically chosen by God. Heads of state who claim divine inspiration frighten us. We seek a world where no religion claims authority over all. We cannot find a leader who lives out such a personal and direct connection with God – at least one that we can trust.

                  What do we make of this for our time? Are these merely quaint memories? Is this a vestige of some superstitious past? We are reminded only too well of the failure of our supposedly advanced way of living in this modern age. We speak of tolerance and we live in isolation. Our religion seems to have nothing to say to the violent extremists except that we are right and they are wrong. In our own country, our faith is held in suspicion that we will act in intolerant ways or we insist that others believe as we do.

                  Can we ever find a new David to walk with God and show us the way to live right?

                  I believe that Jesus has come for just this reason. He does not try to usurp the authority around him. He doesn’t even assert his basic human rights, let alone his right to divine respect. Jesus faces our cruel and fearful world by submitting to it. He does something we have neither the courage nor the strength to do. We know he saves us through death and resurrection. He also establishes his true relationship with us and with the whole world.

                  We know that Jesus is the Son of God. We know that God loves us. In our fear and powerlessness we have become estranged from God. Jesus completes a way that restores us into life again. We are able to walk with God again in freedom and in joy. Jesus does not replace our failed and human and sinful leaders with himself – as a perfect version of what our leaders might be. Jesus takes on an entirely different role. He gives up rule. He gives up power. He gives up control. Instead, he invites us into participation. He will accomplish his work with us.

                  We are invited to enter into our royal prerogatives. Jesus makes us children of God – then we are heirs and heiresses. We are part of the new royal family. We are welcomed into something quite larger than forgiveness and acceptance. We are called to live out our faith everywhere we are with everything we do. All of it carries the possibility of walking with God. All of it carries the possibility that we might accomplish God’s works to save the world.

                  We may be lucky to look back on our lives at the end of our lives and be able to recite a poem like David. Perhaps we will rejoice at how God guided us and how God fulfilled promises as we walked in faith and joy. We may also be called to enter dark and hard places where the light of God is dim and people are afraid. We may not be able to tell whom we have reached or who has gained courage to follow where God has led us. Not many of the faithful get to live in palaces on this side of the resurrection.

                  That is not our reward. Our reward is knowing the truth of God’s love. The reward is living by faith (and we know it is often difficult.) The reward is being a companion and a friend of God. The reward is walking along the path that leads to life and rejoicing on the way.

November 15, 2015

                  We live in a time of anxiety. We are so surrounded by it that we have to make a great effort to avoid it. Only a little more than a year ago, we went through the worst of our financial crisis. No one knew if we would have any money or any jobs. We continue to be at war. We are under threat from terrorism and mysterious viruses. My children are finishing college and not only do I have to figure out a way to pay for it, there seems to be no guarantee that they will find a career once they finish.

                  Given our situation, we don’t know whether to be comforted or alarmed by Jesus’ words this morning. His dark vision seems a little bit of a non-sequitor after the harmless opinions of the disciples. They are impressed by the majesty of the temple. Jesus answers that the world will end. Where did that come from?

                  The early church had its own share of anxiety and uncertainty. The gospel of Mark was written down very soon after the city of Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans. Perhaps it is a little comforting to know that other Christians in other times have had to live with impending disaster. We are assured that our task is not to figure out the answer but to remain faithful when all our familiar supports seem to be failing.

                  The early church had the hindsight to look at the destruction of Jerusalem as a kind of judgment of the disbelieving Jews as well as an affirmation of their faith in Jesus. But I think Jesus was speaking about something else besides cosmic events. Jesus was judging the very life of the temple and all the things that were done there in the name of God.

                  This reflection about the temple from Jesus and the disciples comes as they are watching all the people stream in and leave their contributions for the temple. The rich and powerful leave their very public gifts and Jesus notes that a poor widow gives all that she has (even if it only a few pennies.) I think this is part of Jesus’ declaration that this whole system will have to fall down. The temple may look impressive, but it had lost its purpose. Instead of freeing people to worship God, the temple had become an impersonal bureaucracy that used people and kept them from God.

                  The gathering of people in God’s name should be an occasion of joy. As we gather we should support each other and have the ability to draw in others to the love of God that we are experiencing. Our fear today is the future of this institution. We may not fear the apocalyptic vision of Jesus, but we wonder if we will still be around in the near future. We share the more personal and emotional anxiety of Hannah we heard about in the first reading. Her husband loved her but she was childless. We might have some understanding of the grief of a person who wants children but cannot have them. Hannah lived in an age when women were judged by how many sons they gave their husbands. Hannah was shamed and taunted by her rival Peninnah.

                  The extended family gathered to offer sacrifices to God and celebrate in thanksgiving. How many people do we know who will gather on thanksgiving with their families to face the shame of their failures. We are not unfamiliar with how families keep their pettiness for years. Siblings keep score and keep old grudges alive. Hannah was tormented at a time when she should have been celebrating. After the feast she goes off by herself to pray in the holy place. The insensitive priest tells her to stop drinking and get out. Even when she begins to open her grief to Eli, he still dismisses her with a curt “God bless you.” But God hears her. Hannah has a son. She gives him back to God as a nazarite. He becomes the prophet to anoint Saul and David.

                  You could say that her theology is deficient. She sort of bargains with God – “If you give me a son, I’ll give him back to you.” Her song of praise is sort of vindictive, crowing at the suffering of her tormentors. However, she is honest. She pours out her heart to God. She expects to be heard. Once she asks, she leaves her burden with God. Finally, when her prayer is answered, she keeps her end of the bargain. What she lacks in theological subtlety, she makes up for in faith.

                  Perhaps we can learn this from Hannah. We find ourselves in difficult time. The church is no longer in a place of respect. Our losses and failures have left us in a place of shame. We fear that we will lose our place of relevance in the life of this community. We deeply desire to be in a better place. There seems no easy answer.

                  Some sort of nifty gimmick will not save us. We won’t succeed by praying harder or working faster. We have to begin with our honest desires. We need to be open and sincere with God. We need to speak our hearts desire and we need to voice our deepest fears. Then we need to stop and let God work in and through us. Instead of telling God what to do, we need to seek what God wants to do in us. Finally, we need to walk in faith. God has shown us the next smallest step. We need to take that one step until we know the next.

                  This is not a blueprint of certainty. We have no idea what God has in store for us. We only know that God loves us. That has to be enough for us now.

November 8, 2015 - Stewardship Ingathering

                  Today we hear stories of generosity. We are challenged by examples of people offering themselves far more completely than we are often able to ourselves. What should we do with these examples? Can we give everything? Can we pick up everything and move to a new land?

                  Consider the story of Ruth. We have only heard the end of the story this morning. Naomi has two sons who each marry a woman from the country of Moab. So they all go to live there. The two sons die before they have any children, so heartbroken, Naomi decides to return to her people in Israel and hopes to be taken in by relatives. She tells her two daughters-in-law to go and find new husbands. Ruth stays loyal to Naomi and will not leave her. She says those familiar words that are often read at wedding ceremonies, “Wherever you go I will go, your people will be my people and your God will be my God.” (We all know that mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law don’t usually get along this well!)

                  Ruth cares for her mother-in-law and Naomi helps her to marry Boaz. The story ends with Ruth giving birth to Obed, who is the grandfather of David. Ruth is remembered for being extraordinarily faithful. Why would she leave her people? Why would she work so hard in poverty among strange people in a strange land? She did everything because she loved Naomi.

                  Our motivation should begin with love. Instead, we often are often motivated by fear and worry. Jesus is preaching against false religion that controls people instead of empowering people. The religious authorities had all sorts of rules and regulations. They would run the estates of widows and take a healthy share of the wealth. They made sure that they looked good to everyone, requiring strict adherence while living quite comfortably themselves. So Jesus sits down and watches the spectacle of people parading into the temple and putting their money into the treasury. The rich come with lavish gifts and great fanfare. It’s quite a show. But Jesus only makes note when a widow puts in a couple pennies. He praises her because she has given everything, while the rich only gave whatever they wouldn’t miss.

                  What do we make of this? Is Jesus praising a poor woman for starving herself? Is Jesus rejecting the rich? I think we have to listen to what Jesus is saying instead of what we want to hear. Jesus isn’t preaching a stewardship sermon and trying to get all the stubborn disciples to increase their pledge. Jesus is talking about true worship, true devotion to God. The religious authorities had all the answers, but they had lost the spirit of what they were living.

                  We are quite capable of turning this teaching on its head. Jesus commends the widow for giving everything. Do we then insist that everyone hands over everything they can – even the truly poor – in order to show proper devotion? I think that Jesus was seeing the devotion of the crowd expressed in what they gave from what they had. The large gifts from the rich were really quite poor. To paraphrase the beatitudes, the praise they received from others was all the reward they would ever get. The smallest gift from the most insignificant person was really quite lavish. This is what Jesus wants us to learn.

                  It’s not just about tithes and percentages. I could give you standards and principles, but in the end what we give to God comes from our hearts. For some of us, a gift of thousands of dollars is no sacrifice and requires no act of faith. For others, a few dollars is huge sum and a large part of what little they can control. I live by the discipline of the tithe because it gives me joy and it helps me be free. Each of us here has to open ourselves to what God is calling us to do. We have to follow the desire that God has placed in us. How has God challenged us to offer ourselves?

                  Think about it. We make all sorts of sacrifices for the people we love. When I was a child, my parents used to give us some money so we could go out and buy Christmas presents for each other. I would buy my dad aftershave or something. It was a completely different experience once I was earning my own money. The small present I gave was really from me and it cost me something. But we don’t mind buying presents for people we love. We want the Christmas tree to be surrounded by piles of presents. We make other sacrifices as well. We take on another job to pay the bills. We take out another mortgage to finance our children’s education. We stay up all night in the emergency room when someone is sick. When someone calls we say we’ll be right over.

                  None of you need me to preach a sermon or give you a lecture to do any of these things. You want to do them. You need to do them. It’s time we stopped talking about money as if it were a dirty thing about which we must be ashamed. Our money is part of what we have. It’s part of who we are in the world. We should use it to do God’s will. How we use our gifts is how we show our love. And how we love is how we truly worship.

October 25, 2015

                  I spent a great deal of time with the healthcare system this week. I am happy that things went well, and I am grateful for the excellent care we received from the hospital staff. What was most healing was the many ways that people showed compassion. I know that it was the skilled hands of the surgeon and the wonderful use of modern medicine that brought healing to my wife. I also know that it was the kind words and attention of staff that made a great difference.

                  The modern hospital is a complicated system of service. There is a steady parade of people coming and going. There are the primary providers of care – the doctors and nurses. There are also whole hosts of support people: receptionists, security officers, cleaners, cooks, aids, and nursing assistants. Adding to this crowd are all the family and friends of those who seek healing. I counted at least thirty people who had direct contact with us during my wife’s surgery. I’m sure there were many I never saw.

                  The challenge of this complicated system is to keep it human. My wife is more than a number or a scanned barcode. In the rush to make medicine efficient and cost-effective, human feelings can get lost. We spent quite a lot of time waiting. The complicated system did not always work effortlessly. I know I helped move things along simply because I was there and I could pay attention and I could ask a question.

                  It is easy to lose sight of what is important. We get sidetracked from the important things because we are engaged in equally important other things. It is laudable to offer excellent health care. In the rush and complication of modern medicine, we can lose the humanity of the patient. Things are much better than when I was a chaplain twenty-five years ago. Doctors have better training in communicating and in understanding feelings. There is still a little reluctance to acknowledge our common human challenge. We are mortal, and no amount of excellent medicine will change the fact that we will all die.

                  We avoid uncomfortable reminders of our mortality. This is why we often shun the sick or push them away to the margins. We recognize the crowd’s response to the calls of Bartimaeus. “Be quiet! Keep your problem to yourself.” Even in scripture, we treat the sick as if they are only their symptom. He is the blind beggar. He is only known by his physical limitation. (He doesn’t even really have a name, since Bartimaeus means only “Son of Timeaus.”) Of course, we know he is much more. He is stubborn. He is determined to see Jesus. He is unafraid to speak his mind. He has great faith.

                  Jesus accepts the interruption of Bartimaeus, even as others would hurry Jesus along with much more important things to do. He accepts the title pronounced by Bartimaeus, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” (If we change the title to Son of God, he is almost saying the Jesus prayer.) Jesus does not name him by his illness. Jesus doesn’t even assume that he knows what he wants. Jesus asks, “What do you want me to do for you?”

                  In this asking, Jesus is lifting up the man. Bartimaeus is no longer the beggar sitting by the roadside, easy to ignore and look down upon. Bartimaeus is standing before Jesus, speaking freely what is on his heart. Jesus gives him respect and a voice. In the asking, Bartimaeus is healed. There is no complicated incantation offered by Jesus. “Go; your faith has made you well.” Then Bartimaeus follows Jesus on the way – the way to Jerusalem and the work of death and resurrection and new life.

                  Bartimaeus shows us where faith resides. We are tempted to seek faith in the courageous and the accomplished. We want to hear perfect words and easy steps that lead us to some better place. Bartimaeus shows us that faith can begin when we are at our worst. He does not wait until he is healed. He does not care that he is looked down upon. He cries out what he believes and what he wants even as things are not going well for him.

                  Bartimaeus asks exactly what he wants. We are often timid in our asking. Maybe we are afraid we’ll get it wrong. Maybe we are afraid of looking foolish. We are invited to ask. Perhaps our first words will not be perfect. In the asking we continue the process of learning just where Jesus is calling us. Maybe in the asking we will change what we know and what we need. So we ask anyway and trust that God will use our intention.

                  Perhaps we don’t ask because we fear that we will not be heard. We often ask for things that do not turn out the way we wish. The sick get sicker. The job doesn’t work out. Our loved ones die. We don’t know what to do with prayer that seems to fail. Our prayers are only the beginning of a conversation. In asking we open our hearts and make ourselves ready to listen to the voice and will of God. We are invited to speak and listen – even when we don’t hear what we want to hear – even when we hear no answer at all. This, after all, is the work of faith: to ask and believe not what we know but what we hope.

                  The boldness of Bartimaeus humbles us. We don’t really know what someone else needs until we ask them to tell us. The crowd was content to hurry along and ignore the need right beside them. What do we miss in our hurry? It is a loss when we can’t help someone right at hand because we aren’t paying attention. The greater loss is losing whatever that person on the margins has to offer. Who knows what great gifts are lost because we think others are helpless or broken or sick – and that’s all we let them be to us.

                  Bartimaeus is a witness. He alone among the important crowd knew Jesus for who he is and believed what he could do. All this encourages us to look beyond what we think we know. This makes us look beyond what we think of as our health and power and agency. Who do we miss at the edge of the crowd who has wisdom and blessing for us?

October 18, 2015

                  Fall is a time to gather in the harvest. We take stock of all that we have. Most of us do not depend on the success of the harvest and we have lost our connection with the land. We can still marvel at the colors and the smells of autumn. We can drink cider and crunch leaves underfoot. The natural world is approaching the end of seasons and a long winter’s sleep. Our liturgical calendar follows the agricultural rhythm. We are approaching the end of things and taking stock.

                  We continue to follow the story of Job. He is wrestling with the question of why people suffer. He is a good man. He was once richly blessed and now he has lost everything. Either God is cruel and unloving or God is powerless to protect Job from the terrible losses he faces. Job knows he is a good man, so he is even more perplexed. His friends answer that he must have done something to deserve his fate. There must be some secret, hidden blasphemy. Job wishes to see God and set out his case.

                  God answers Job. It is not what he expects. Eventually, God does tell Job’s friends that they are way off track, but to Job, God pretty much says, “I’m God. What do you think you’re talking about?” We marvel at the beautiful poetry about God’s creative power and God’s power in sustaining the universe. Does this answer the problem of suffering?

                  Many Christian apologists, including C. S. Lewis, follow just this line of reasoning. We believe in an all-powerful God. We believe in an all-loving God. We wonder why God permits (or seems to cause) suffering. The pain we feel is real. It is not an illusion. The injustice is real. What do we mean by all-powerful or all-loving? Do we mean that God should do exactly what we want? Our idea of love is so far from Gods that we hardly mean the same thing. I think this is shown in how God gives us Jesus to show us love and we hardly understand what Jesus is saying – and we object to what Jesus asks of us.

                  Jesus has just had an encounter with a rich young man. He seems to do all the right things. Jesus tells him to sell everything and give his money to the poor, then come and follow him. He can’t do it. We are scandalized. It’s entirely impractical. Jesus said this because he loved him.

                  Jesus again tells the disciples that he will suffer and die and rise again. The disciples hear doom and revolution. James and John assume that this will mean a new order of things and they want to make sure they have good jobs – so they ask Jesus, “Let us sit at your right and left side when you come into your kingdom.” Maybe there was a sort of piety in this request. Maybe they sought to be with Jesus through the toughest battles. Maybe they had no idea what they were asking.

                  We see a need and we want to help. We see a group of people trying to accomplish something and we think, “I could do that better.” It is not unheard of for people to seek positions of power in the church. We know how to get things done. (We certainly couldn’t do any worse than those idiots who are running things now!) We would expect that Jesus would thank them for their offer. Maybe he should gently remind them that he hasn’t made up his mind or that he needs to explain the position a little better.

                  Jesus doesn’t deny their request. He promises that they will drink from the same cup as him (is that what they really wanted?) He promises that they will be baptized with the same baptism with which he has been baptized. He is promising suffering and death – and resurrection. The new order of things will not be the same old ways with different leaders. Jesus is promising a completely different way of being together.

                  Whoever wants to be a leader must be servant of all and a slave of all. We think of a leader as one having power over others. We think of charismatic gifts that persuade and win others over. We think of a compelling message or even raw power that makes people do things. Jesus is telling these would-be leaders that they have to serve.

                  This involves suffering. So not only are we puzzled when an all-powerful and an all-loving God allows suffering. It seems that God is inviting us to take on suffering: not as a kind of abuse but as a willingness to risk loss and status for the sake of something else. Job catches a glimpse of God, who is bigger and more mysterious than he had imagined. Jesus is offering a larger vision of what it means to be gathered in faithful community.

                  It’s not enough to be a nice church. There is much we could do to be popular and successful. We could be friendly and convenient. We could put on a nice show that makes everyone feel good. The truth is that we all suffer loss and we all have questions that are not easy to answer. We don’t need an escape from the troubles of life. We need to make sense of what it means to live. We need a community where we can seek meaning together.

                  Jesus is not setting up a perfect church that will make us happy and fulfill all our needs. He is promising loss and brokenness and death. He is not setting up a new order of things where his chosen few get all the rewards. He is sending us out into a broken world to lose ourselves for the sake of the good news. From close up we will wonder why it is so hard and why we see so little reward. At that moment we are closer to being who Jesus wants us to be.