Darkness and Light

‘But in those days, after that suffering,
the sun will be darkened,
   and the moon will not give its light, 
and the stars will be falling from heaven,
   and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. 
Then they will see “the Son of Man coming in clouds” with great power and glory. Then he will send out the angels, and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.

‘From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates. Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

 ‘But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.’

Mark 13:24-37

Throughout the semester on Sunday nights, our UKirk students have been doing a fascinating Bible study on Paul’s letter to the Ephesians—we’ve talked about everything from how to welcome new believers into our congregation to submission in relationships and marriage to our social media practices that can so easily lead to shaming to the many and varied gifts God has given us. As we read through the 4^th and 5^th chapters, one theme has really stuck with me—the image and descriptions of darkness and light: “Therefore be imitators of God, as God’s beloved children, and live in love as Christ loved us…For once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light.” You were darkness, but now you are light, the writer reminds us. You were darkness, but now you are people of faith, people who have been enlightened, people who have been illumined. I told the students that night that I was kind of bothered by this sentiment, that while lovely, it seemed to leave out and diminish people of very deep faith who sometimes struggle with the darkness of the world; that just because you are faithful doesn’t mean there won’t be bleak, hard times. I also suggested that, if you are a person of very deep faith, you can’t help but see the darkness, the sin, the brokenness of the world. Your faith compels you to see it.

As we talked more, we also talked about the idea of equating darkness with sin and brokenness and harshness and ignorance--and what that idea might mean to folks with dark skin, what it might mean in our country, a country who has struggled to accept people with dark skin, to see them as whole. That is certainly something we have been reminded of this past August and over the past few days as we have struggled with all of the implications and nuances of the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson. Does darkness have to mean something bad, something sinful, mean that something is broken? Does darkness always have to take the back seat to the light? And, on the contrary, does light always have to mean something good, something whole, someone faithful? And do these images of darkness and light imply that our vocabulary for our faith journey, our faith story, is terribly limited? So many questions.

So, I, we, come to today, this first Sunday of Advent, thinking about these images of light and darkness, these questions about darkness and light. I love that we begin each Advent Sunday lighting a candle, winding our way through these Advent days, waiting, hoping, yearning for our Lord to be born into the world. Waiting, hoping, yearning, for our Lord to bring his light to all of us. I love that we have lit a candle for hope and will soon light others for peace, joy, and love, one for Christ. But as our service today has begun with light, it’s fascinating that our Scripture passage from Mark begins in the darkness: “But in those days, after that suffering, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heaven will be shaken. Then they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.”

The world feels dark and bleary, tired and overwrought. There has been much suffering and it feels like there is nothing to light the way. And Mark uses images of darkness to describe how the world feels. Perhaps this image of darkness, of a night without starts, of a darkened sun is the best image he can think of because that’s how it feels to him; I think we all share the same struggle—about how to describe our feelings, our lives, our experiences during those bleak, overwrought, hard times in our lives, times when we feel like the sun will never come up again.

Author and minister Barbara Brown Taylor has written a new book about darkness and light, about these very same mixed feelings about the images, called Learning to Walk in the Dark. In her introduction, she writes:

…”Darkness” is shorthand for anything that scares me—that I want no part of—either because I am sure that I have the resources to survive it or I do not want to find out. The absence of God is in there, along with the fear of dementia and the loss of those nearest and dearest to me. So is the melting of the ice caps, the suffering of children, the nagging question of what it will feel like to die…The problems is this: when, despite all my best efforts, the lights have gone off in my life (literally or figuratively), plunging me into the kind of darkness that turns my knees to water, nonetheless I have not died. The monsters have not dragged me out of bed and taken me back to their lair. The witches have not turned me into a bat. Instead, I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.

“I need darkness as much as I need light,” she says. Don’t we all? Taylor suggests that we need those times that are hard and those times that are lovely; those times when we struggle mightily and those times when nothing seems a struggle at all. Perhaps we learn the most about ourselves, the most about the true people in our lives, the most about our world, the most about God, when times seem worst. As hard as it is to live in that space where there seem to be no answers, maybe we need to be in that space for a while where there are no answers. Maybe we need to stay in that space for a while, to dwell there for a bit. It is easy to look at ourselves during the daytime hours, when we can see everything in front of us, but perhaps we need to examine ourselves in the dark, when nothing gets in our way, when no one else sees us, when we are forced to look into the deepest depths of our being. As difficult as it is to face our fears and the things that hurt us and the things that challenge us most, perhaps this thin place is the place where we learn the most about ourselves and others, our world. The place where, most importantly, we learn most about God.

Our first Advent candle has been lit today, celebrating the beginning of a new Christian year, lighting and illuminating the way for a baby to be born into our world. As Christians, we celebrate a new year a little while before everyone else—not, of course, on our human time, but God’s. That new year, that advent, begins in the midst of that time in the year when the days are short, the nights longer. This advent time carries us through December, the month with the longest night of the year. We, naturally, are tempted to jump straight to Christmas, when the lights shine the brightest, when the Christ candle is lit as he is reborn into our world. But we can’t. We are called to live through this time where a candle is lit every seven days, forcing us to wait, encouraging us to take our time, just as it takes time for a baby to develop in the womb. During this advent time, we are called to examine ourselves and our lives even through the darkest and longest night.

That news is hard and great all at the same time, and maybe that’s the way it should be. The hard news of that deepest and longest night, that deepest and longest time, is that we often feel God is not with us, that God has abandoned us, that God couldn’t possibly see or understand. In the midst of that, though, there is always good news, the news that darkness is not dark to God, that nothing can get in God’s way of being with us in the very depths of our soul. I’ll end with more of Barbara Brown Taylor’s words, the good news about God we all need to hear, that

…even when light fades and darkness falls—as it does every single day, in every single life—God does not turn the world over to some other deity. Even when you cannot see where you are going and no one answers your call, this is not sufficient proof that you are alone. There is a divine presence that transcends all your ideas about it…whether you decide to trust the witness of those who have gone before you, or you decide to do whatever it takes to become a witness yourself, here is the testimony of faith: darkness is not dark to God; the night is as bright as the day.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

"You Did It To Me"

31 ‘When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. ³²All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, ³³and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. ³⁴Then the king will say to those at his right hand, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; ³⁵for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, ³⁶I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” ³⁷Then the righteous will answer him, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? ³⁸And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? ³⁹And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?” ⁴⁰And the king will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family,^* you did it to me.” ⁴¹Then he will say to those at his left hand, “You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; ⁴²for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, ⁴³I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.” ⁴⁴Then they also will answer, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?” ⁴⁵Then he will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” ⁴⁶And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.’

Matthew 25:31-46

“You Did It To Me”

It was wonderful to spend 10 days in London this past May while I was on sabbatical; a trip my dear friend and I had been dreaming about for 20 years since our days as English major classmates at Maryville College. We had dreamt about visiting Jane Austen country in bath, taking in a Shakespeare play at the Globe Theater, drinking a pint or two and sticky toffee pudding, visiting Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace and riding on the Thames. We did all of that and so much more. I loved all of it, and as the minister geek in me began to come out, I loved touring big cathedrals and walking through smaller sanctuaries the most.

Westminster Abbey was more than I ever imagined—grand in size and decoration, people all over the place looking at the markers and tombs, worship leaders and workers sharing the great history of the Gothic cathedral. I loved Poet’s Corner for it’s burial place Chaucer along with its markers and stones for Rudyard Kipling and William Wordsworth and Lord Byron. This part was so beautiful, but I have to confess I was a bit overwhelmed with the tombs and markers and ornate rooms decorated for so many members of the monarchy. I know Westminster Abbey is the place for the royal coronations of kings and queens and the weddings of princes and princesses, but I found myself surprised by the focus placed on the monarchy and began looking for images of Christ. This was a church, after all! The ministers were serving communion while we were there, and I sat down for a minute hoping to observe the Lord’s Supper. The invitation was certainly extended, but I starting thinking that I hadn’t really worshipped, that I really couldn’t take communion there because my heart wasn’t in the right place. What a weird feeling! I felt so much like the focus was on the kings instead of Christ the King, and it was a bit unsettling for me. I said a little prayer thanking God for the invitation, but I got up and quietly walked away.

A couple of days later, on Sunday morning, we happened to come across a beautiful little church as we were walking through London. There was a gorgeous open courtyard at St. James’s Church, and we strolled through to read a sign saying that the church was started by the poet William Blake. We looked around and saw lots of flowers in the yard, a sign reading “May Peace Prevail on Earth,” several children running around, and a few benches populated by homeless folks. We walked in a few minutes after the service had ended, and the worshippers were milling around, eating snacks and drinking coffee and tea. We saw all kinds of folks there, children running down the aisle with their parents behind, older men and women, a few folks in biker shorts and helmets who had parked their bikes outside. There were folks dressed in jeans and folks dressed in their Sunday finest and folks who were clearly homeless. There were several people there who were transgendered. And all were eating and talking and laughing and sharing. The minister was a woman, and she stopped to welcome us in, offering us doughnuts and coffee. As I do when I come across other women clergy (we lady ministers need to stick together, after all), I told her what I did. We had a great conversation, ending with her (half) jokingly asking me to talk to her governing board about this thing called sabbatical!

Even though I only spent about 30 minutes there, I left thinking that I had had a vision, a hope, of what Christ’s kingdom should look like—people from all walks of life, folks with very different stories and journeys, people who had been hungry and thirsty, had been imprisoned, had been strangers in search of a welcome, folks who had needed clothing and healing and shelter, seekers and sinners and saints alike—gathered in Christ’s church, no questions asked, everyone welcomed. After being in the sanctuary of the monarchs and kings and feeling oddly unworshipful, I felt the presence of Christ our King in this place where everyone was welcomed and invited without reservation, without hesitation. I felt the presence of Christ our King in this sanctuary where each person looked into another’s eyes and saw Christ in them, honored Christ in them.

In our Scripture from Matthew today, Christ our King shares this vision of sanctuary, this vision of the kingdom, with those gathered around him: “When the Son of Man comes in his glory…the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me…Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.’”

Christ our King reminds us here, tells us and commands us, that being a person of faith, that being a Christian, someone who reflects his name, is more than about simply having faith. Being someone who bears Christ’s name is about doing faith. He tells us that, if we have truly been blessed by God, we better go about the business of acting like it.

“For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink.” We are called to seek out those who are literally hungry and thirsty, those who go to homeless shelters on cold days for warm meals, those who are food insecure in our communities, those children who go to school counting on their only meal for the day. We are called to stock the shelves of our food bank and to welcome friends for meals. We are called to seek out those who are hungry and thirsty in other ways—hungry for companionship, thirsty for understanding, hungry for someone to listen, thirsty for a sense of belonging in the world.

“For I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” We are called to seek out the lonely, those who are lonely in so many different ways. Some of the lonely are folks who are on their own without family and friends, some lonely because they don’t know how to reach out to others, some because they have alienated everyone around them because of addiction or illness or problems unseen. We are called to welcome them, to give them a new name as Christ so often did, to give them the new name of “friend” instead of stranger. That welcome is not always easy, but it is necessary for forgiveness, for life.

“For I was naked and you gave me clothing.” We are called to literally give clothes off our backs if we need to, to clean out our closets and realize the excess we all have in our lives—Jesus calls us, after all, to give one coat away if we have two. That is a literal message for all of us, friends. I can imagine that 95% of us, including myself, have closets and rooms and storage rooms close to full if not overflowing. It’s time to do something about this. This also means that we are called to reach out to those who have been stripped naked by life, whether it be a break up or an addiction or a run of bad luck. There are times when we simply feel exposed and naked, times when we feel like we have been stripped bare to the bone. We are called to clothe, to surround others with warm, comfortable, safe clothing.

“I was sick and you took care of me.” We are called to reach out to those who are sick in so many ways—physical illness, mental illness, sick from stress or exhaustion, sick in ways we might never understand. The care can come in many forms—helping the sick person to eat or drink, walking around the hospital floor with them, helping change their clothes, or by simply asking them how they are and listening honestly to them; by sitting with them in silence when words simply won’t suffice.

“I was in prison and you visited me.” We are physically called to go to the prison and visit folks, whether we know them or not, not judging how they got there, but being the face of Christ for them while they are there. This call is especially important for us who live in a country with an incredibly overburdened prison system. There is lots of work to do. And for all of those who are imprisoned in a state prison, there are just as many of us who are imprisoned by our actions and assumptions, by our beliefs, by our prejudices and experiences. We are called to sit with them, to listen to their stories, to challenge them, to challenge ourselves as we listen, to forgive them as Christ has forgiven us.

I don’t know about you, but this seems to me like a lot, and it all seems like some pretty tough stuff. Any of these things, even taken on their own, seem impossible enough, but all of these together? Impossible. And maybe that’s by design. Perhaps Christ our King wants us to know that life in his name is not easy, nor should it ever be—that life in his name has been and will always be hard, a lifetime journey that will never end.

There is one more word we need to hear in this Scripture—that Christ’s call to us says absolutely nothing about merit, nothing about giving food and clothing and shelter and sanctuary to those few whom we deem worthy. We can’t say, “Well, I’ll just visit the prisoners who are there because of white collar crime. They’re more worthy than the ones who abused a child or murdered someone.” That is our tendency, to judge, to deem worthy, to justify our own goodness, to be petty and short sighted and judgmental—and Christ knows that. To deem someone worthy, to judge them and decide for them is God’s job, not ours. Worthiness is not our call, not should it be, and thanks be to God for that. “Just as you did it to one of the least of them who are members of my family [AND THEY ALL ARE], you did it to me.” Christ’s words to us, Christ’s call to us. We are all part of the body of Christ, every single one of us. Each of us is part of Christ, and as such, we are called to exhibit his kingdom on earth—as impossible as that seems.

John Buchanan, a pastor and past moderator of our General Assembly, says it beautifully:

Matthew 25 makes me very uncomfortable when I think about it much. I cannot help everyone…what can I do? What I can do and called to do is to remember what Jesus said: “When you did it to one of the least of these, my family, you did it to me”—not, please notice, just the certifiably hungry and truly deserving. The only criterion he set was “least of these.” So what I can do is not to ignore and overlook, but to look into a human face and to see there the face of Jesus Christ, because that it what he said.

God wants not only a new world modeled on the values of Jesus. God wants us—each of us. God is…a God of love who wants to save our souls…and redeem us and give us the gift of life—true, deep, authentic human life. God wants to save us by touching our hearts with love. God wants to save us by persuading us to care and see other human beings who need us. God wants to save us from obsessing about ourselves, our needs, by persuading us to forget about ourselves and worry about others. That is God’s favorite project: to teach you and me the fundamental lesson, the secret, the truth—that to love is to live.           

He’s right. To love is to live. To love is to live life fully as a part of Christ’s kingdom on earth, Christ’s kingdom in heaven. To love, to live, is to truly look into each person’s eyes and see the face of Christ in them. As Pope Francis asked on twitter this week: “When we meet a person truly in need, do we see the face of God?” Do we? Amen.

I Will Give You Rest

Leviticus 25:1-7

The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: ² Speak to the people of Israel and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land shall observe a sabbath for the Lord. ³ Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather in their yield; ⁴ but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of complete rest for the land, a sabbath for the Lord: you shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. ⁵ You shall not reap the after growth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your unpruned vine: it shall be a year of complete rest for the land. ⁶ You may eat what the land yields during its sabbath—you, your male and female slaves, your hired and your bound laborers who live with you; ⁷ for your livestock also, and for the wild animals in your land all its yield shall be for food.

Matthew 11:28-30

²⁸ “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

In his poem “Sabbaths,” American novelist and poet Wendell Berry writes these beautiful words:

                        Whatever is forseen in joy

                        Must be lived out from day to day.

                        Vision held open in the dark

                        By our ten thousand days of work.

                        Harvest will fill the barn; for that

                        The hand must ache, the face must sweat.

                        And yet no leaf or grain is filled

                        By the work of ours; the field is tilled

                        And left to grace. That we may reap,

                        Great work is done while we’re asleep.

                        When we work well, a Sabbath mood

                        Rests on our day, and finds it good.

The field is tilled, tilled and made ready, tilled so that we might step away and let God take over for the plants and crops to bloom. The field is tilled and we have worked well, and there is a new mood. A mood of rest. A mood of comfort. A mood of grace. And it is called and found good, called good by God. Wendell’s words reflect the words given to us by the writer of Leviticus—words of work and labor, words of rest and grace and Sabbath, words spoken by the Lord to Moses for the people: “For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune  your vineyard and gather in the yield; but in the seventh year there shall be a complete Sabbath for the land, a Sabbath for the Lord. You shall not reap or gather or prune. It shall be a complete year of rest for the land.” Work, work hard, God says, on the land that I have given you. Sow and reap. Prune and gather. Work for six years. But in the seventh year, you shall rest. There will be a break, for the land, for you, for everyone to rest in me. You have worked well. We have worked well, God says, and just as I rested on the seventh creation day, you shall rest in the seventh harvest year. A Sabbath mood will be created, and it will be good.

I love the term “Sabbath mood,” and I think we should use it more in churches and universities. Sabbatical leaves, moods, are usually given in the church after six to seven years of service, nine in my case (don’t get me wrong—you tried to give me sabbatical grace earlier, but two other ministers discerned that God was calling them to something new, causing me to delay a bit). Over the past several months, you all were so kind by gracing me with a sabbatical mood, a few months to rest and travel, think and discern, to travel for several weeks and stay still for others, a time to be renewed. You all gave me a leave from the fields I had been planting in partnership with all of you, a time to stay still and reflect and live off the yield from the planting. And although Leviticus suggests a year, three months is probably just enough time—ministers, after all, are doers by nature. It is a bit too hard to rest and renew and stay still for too terribly long!

And what I know now is that God has been at work all through this—although I had thought about sabbatical just as Lisa left and another as Frank retired, that God had created and sustained my sabbatical time for such a time as this. The past two years of my life have been an absolute whirlwind. When God called Lisa to a new place two years ago now, we all lost a minister and friend. I lost that, along with another female colleague in ministry, along with a family who invited this single girl into their own, a confidante. I also knew then what most of you didn’t know, that Frank would be announcing his much-deserved retirement only a few months later. That was a heavy burden to have, not at all his fault, but the reality of the situation. My beloved Aunt Linda was dying after years of chronic pain and debilitation. I was also in the midst of co-directing a conference for 1000 incredible college students. Hard and lovely work. And my aunt lost her battle just a few days before the conference started. It was hard leaving my family to go to Montreat the morning after the funeral, but lovely to be in a place I relish with people I love.

And, as most of you know, as soon as I got back from co-directing the conference, Frank retired 3 weeks later. It was incredible to be the interim head of staff in this place—all of you were so incredible and gracious; I learned so much about myself, and, with your help, I discovered so many new gifts I had for ministry. At the same time, I happened to meet a guy, a sweet, gentle, and kind man for whom I fell deeply and quickly, someone I thought I could spend my life with. It was a lovely time—me discovering new gifts here and really living into my ministry; the guy and I getting to know each other and reveling in being together. At age 40, I felt better than I ever had, on top of the world, more confident and strong and happy than I had ever been.

What I didn’t know then that I know now after sabbatical reflection is that it would be more difficult than I thought to step back into the associate pastor role once our transitional pastor got here. It had to happen that way, but I had no way to anticipate what a whirlwind of change that would be. Once God’s Spirit works through you to help you discover new gifts and new energy, it is hard to go back, hard to revert, hard to not preach and plan worship every week, hard not to do pastoral care with folks of all ages, just hard. What I also didn’t know then that I know now about my new romantic relationship was that his prior divorce was more hurtful and harmful to my boyfriend than either of us could imagine, and we spent the next year dealing with the implications of it, taking breaks, getting back together, trying to figure life out separately and together. I put every single bit of my heart and soul into the relationship, hoping for it, praying to God that it would finally happen, yearning—and it was deeply painful when it couldn’t work. I was hurt in ways I never could have imagined going into the relationship, something that was so hopeful and exciting in the beginning, something that ended up hurting me worse than I had ever been hurt before.

I spent last year in a whirlwind over so many things—missing Frank and Lisa terribly, feeling like I let our students down because I was weary but not really knowing what to do about it, physically hurting and in the worst pain of my life from a shoulder injury, trying to deal with change each day here, and confused, brokenhearted, and lost about my personal relationship. I walked away from him on my 41^st birthday, May 1^st. It was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done. I guess it’s just harder, different, in your 40s, to lose the love you truly believed you had finally found. Everything was so hard, and my heart and soul felt so heavy, so burdened. Finally, as most of you know, I woke up in an ambulance on my last day of work before sabbatical on May 14^th. The seizure was caused by stress, by a lack of sleep, but not eating well, by weariness and sheer exhaustion. I’ve never been so scared by anything in my life. I think my body and my brain just finally colluded and said, “Enough, Rachel. Enough.”

“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.” Come to me, Jesus says, when you are exhausted and weary, come to me when you are carrying burdens weighing heavily on your heart. Come to me. In Leviticus, we are invited by God to rest a while from our work, to live off of what has been sown, to just be; in Matthew, we are invited by God’s Son to come and rest in him, to let him carry our burdens for a while, to just be. And that’s what sabbatical season was for me—what it should be for all of us—a time just to be. A time to accept God’s invitation of renewal and rest. My sabbatical season, my Sabbath mood of renewal and rest, could not have come at a better time.

And I did the best I could! As soon as the cat and brain scans and the MRI came back clear after the seizure, I headed across the pond with my best friend. London was amazing in so many ways—we stood in the crowds at the changing of the guard; we looked for Mr. Darcy in Jane Austen land; we marveled in incredible architecture and rode to the top of the London Eye; rode a double decker bus and played in a red phone booth; geeked out as we stood at Poet’s Corner in Westminster Abbey (the perfect place for the English major and seminary graduate in me to come together); we rested in the Queen’s beautiful gardens as schoolchildren played; we saw “Antony and Cleopatra” at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre. From London, I went to New York with my nephew, where it was such a joy to watch a 17-year-old kid experience a huge city for the first time, watching such diverse and interesting people, marveling at how fast everything moved, being overwhelmed by the 9/11 Memorial, the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island; laughing and singing at the musical “Jersey Boys,” both of us moved by the beauty of the famous Gothic Riverside Church. We had such a great time. I was able to spend time at the Chautauqua Institute in a very different part of New York, a gorgeous, little quirky part of the earth where I listened to folks talk about the expansion of the American West—the people there, the influence of Mormonism and Scientology, how the West grew because of religious folks. All of these trips were renewal for me as I saw new places and met wonderful people, ate delicious food and saw different parts of the earth.

And then there was rest. You can’t get much more restful than spending two weeks at the beach, walking through the sand in the morning and watching dolphins roll through the water; sitting on the porch at night, reading, drinking wine, and waiting for the sun to set. My week at Montreat was cool and lovely as always, worshiping with 1200 teenagers and adults, sleeping and reading a lot.

During all of these weeks away, I tried to observe that Sabbath mood for myself, sleeping late when I could and taking naps when I felt like it, observing a much different daily schedule from my working one, reading a lot (some books about Jesus and faith, some the exact opposite), spending time with my friends and family, taking time to stop in new places as I traveled, knowing that I didn’t have to be anywhere at any specific time or hour. Heck, one of my Sunday mornings was even literally spent traipsing through a field of gorgeous sunflowers. Can’t get much more of a Sabbath mood than that!

But in the midst of all of that, I also spent a lot of time thinking, discerning, watching, wondering, reflecting about my life over these past many months. I spent a lot of time wondering what is going to come next in the next season my life, much of which I can control, much of which I cannot.

I’m not telling you my story today hoping for your pity or asking for your help, because I’m working that out. And I promise I won’t share like this very often because I think that can be dangerous for pastors. I’m sharing because this is the only way I know how to respond honestly to all of you. You all have been the face of Christ for me in granting me this sabbatical time, sending me off and guiding me through it with prayer, with words of love, with hugs and kind words, with lots of work you did in my absence. It struck me each time I saw one of you throughout the summer, forgetting that I hadn’t seen you since the seizure, reminded of that as you asked me how I felt, if I knew why the seizure happened, telling me that you prayed so much for me. What a kind gift.

You all have so kindly asked me, “Are you rested and renewed? Are you ready to go?” The most honest way I know how to answer your questions is, “In some ways yes, in others no.” It was such a joy to travel to new places and revel in friends and family, lovely to eat what I wanted and drink what I wanted and take time just to be without any kind of schedule or calendar in front of me. It was refreshing not to have my Presbyterian planning calendar in front of me, getting away from a schedule filled with committee meetings and Bible studies to plan, lunches to attend and people to meet. It was incredible to observe the Sabbath mood of rest in so many ways. I rested as I tried to wrap my head around the seizure, truly coming to understand the power that stress can have on a body and a mind. It truly is amazing to discover how much a season of rest can lower your stress level! And, in the end, I was ready to come back, ready to fill my planning calendar with those meetings and planning times, ready to plant and sow again, so ready to see all of you.

But I also come back knowing there are still a lot of questions, still a lot to deal with. Things will continue to change here in the upcoming months as God calls a new pastor to be with us—this means more change, change in things that happen every day, change that comes with having to discover someone new, the way they do things, their hopes and expectations for me and our staff and our congregation. It will be lovely, but also hard, a whirlwind n many ways. And I come back knowing that I am still grieving over folks who have left my life in different ways, grieving deeply over a lost relationship. As so many of us know, grief is a strange animal, popping up at different times in different ways, some of which we never expect. I wish that my grief had been dissolved over that sabbatical time, but I know that it is still there—and I know that I will just have to deal with it when it comes, however it comes.

But I know, more than ever before, that all of these things are best dealt with in community, the community of a congregation, the community of people who were created by God and belong together in Christ. I am profoundly thankful that you are my community, that we all belong to one another in Christ. I was reminded Thursday how powerful our community is as I left spent time talking with several members at the church, with Catherine at the hospital as she sat with her mom, with several students in my office that afternoon. My throat was hoarse from talking and laughing, and it was lovely. It was community. And because you are my community, I pray for all of you as I always have, pray that you will be able to establish a sabbatical mood of your own, a sabbatical space in all of your lives, a space for rest a renewal, a space in which you can ask big questions and deal with the things for which you grieve, a space for play and discernment and honesty. I hope we can all find this place, a space where we can find rest for our souls, a space where we can rest in the God who created us all. Thanks be to God.

The Nicodemus In All of Us

John 3:1-21

Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. ²He came to Jesus^* by night and said to him, ‘Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.’ ³Jesus answered him, ‘Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.’^{* 4}Nicodemus said to him, ‘How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?’ ⁵Jesus answered, ‘Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. ⁶What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.^{* 7}Do not be astonished that I said to you, “You^* must be born from above.”^{* 8}The wind^* blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.’ ⁹Nicodemus said to him, ‘How can these things be?’ ¹⁰Jesus answered him, ‘Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things? 11 ‘Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you^* do not receive our testimony. ¹²If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? ¹³No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.^{* 14}And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. 16 ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.17 ‘Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. ¹⁸Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. ¹⁹And this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. ²⁰For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. ²¹But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.’

The Nicodemus In All of Us

It all happened in the shadows, in the darkest time of the night. There was a man named Nicodemus, a Pharisee, a Jewish leader who made sure everyone strictly followed the rules of the Jewish law, made sure everyone followed them to a t. He was a member of the Sanhedrin, the highest council of the Jewish leaders, the Supreme Council who made sure people followed the laws, the council with the power to make arrests and persecute people. Nicodemus was the one who was supposed to find the people who were a threat to the establishment, find them and make sure they were taken down so that they couldn’t be a threat, couldn’t cause a stir, couldn’t cause anyone to think outside the law. And, as we all know so well, Jesus was a threat to that establishment with his new law, new orders to the kingdom.

Nicodemus, as one of the highest priests in the land, wasn’t supposed to be associating with Jesus or his lot. He was the one, after all, with the right answers to all the religious questions. But he was curious. He, like everyone else, had heard the stories about this man named Jesus, heard about the healings and the lessons, heard about his followers and friends. Despite his best efforts not to be, Nicodemus became curious about this Jesus. And so he came to him at night, in the deepest darkest part of it so that no one would see him, came to ask and listen, came to learn. It was certainly a dangerous venture, one that could’ve cost Nicodemus his livelihood, perhaps even his life. But he still came, came in the darkness curious about the light, came ultimately to be transformed into a new life in Christ.

The first exchange was fascinating, with Nicodemus challenging Jesus with questions, and Jesus answering them in his own way designed to make Nicodemus think, to challenge him. Nicodemus said it pretty bluntly, calling correctly calling Jesus “teacher” from the very beginning: “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher from God; no one can do these signs apart from the presence of God.” Instead of saying, “You’re right, Nicodemus,” Jesus instead reminded him that no one could see the kingdom of God without being born from above, born from heaven, born from God. Nicodemus kept his questions going, still standing in the darkness the whole time, not knowing how to come to the light, not knowing how to turn his life upside down to follow Christ.

And Christ answered him, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.” Christ’s response was beautiful as he spoke about God in the world, God who wants to give us life and celebrate with us, God who wants us to come into the light of life instead of living in the darkness, God who is a God of salvation instead of condemnation. Christ’s response was also challenging as he told Nicodemus that being reborn meant being baptized not just by the water that welcomes into the kingdom, but also by the spirit, the spirit who enables and inspires and works through us as we are called to do some pretty hard work in the world. Christ’s message to Nicodemus meant that Nicodemus would not just have to believe, but also go and work in the world—to give up his prestige and wealth and power, to give up his family and his presumptions, to give up all of the material goods he had fought so hard to gain. It meant that he would have to give them away to the poor, the needy, the helpless—and yes, even to the sinful ones upon whose backs he had gained his power and prestige. Christ’s message meant that he would have to turn his world upside down, to come out of the shadows into the light.

Sadly, the text doesn’t give us Nicodemus’ response, but I can imagine the text would tell us if Nicodemus decided to change right then, to leave his life and follow Christ right then, to come out of the darkness. But he didn’t—at least not then, anyway. Perhaps he simply didn’t understand what Christ was telling him. Perhaps he thought he had too much to lose and nothing to gain. Perhaps he didn’t want to give up his job that provided so much wealth and prestige and power. Perhaps he didn’t want to leave his family as Christ demanded of his disciples. Perhaps he wasn’t ready to give up the things that made him comfortable. Perhaps he found it easier to live in the black and white world of condemnation than the very grey world of listening to people’s stories, histories, and experiences. Perhaps the life and the way of Christ challenged him way too much. And Nicodemus slipped quietly back into the shadows of the night, the shadows that hid him away from the world, away from the light of Christ.

Have you ever stopped to think that there just might be a little bit of Nicodemus in every single one of us? Nicodemus was curious about Jesus, wanted to know who he was, curious about all that he had done. He wanted to be a follower, to believe in this man who had come to bring light in the darkness, and we are very much the same way. But Nicodemus came in the night to ask the questions. He had too much to lose, to much power to give up, to much prestige to mess with if he were to truly come out of the dark and follow. And aren’t we the same way?

We have heard the stories, read the gospel, celebrated the resurrection of Christ and the love of God. But don’t we ultimately have too much to give up to truly be followers? We are all Americans, and just by that very blessing, we have much to lose if we truly follow simply because we have so much more than most everyone else in the world. We have power. We have prestige. We have wealth. And what would it truly look like to take Jesus’ message to heart—to give one coat away when we have 2, to leave our families and friends behind to follow, to visit the hungry and naked and sick in prison, to give what we have to make sure each person’s most basic needs for health care and shelter and food are met? What would it look like for us to truly welcome each child as Jesus did, children of different skin colors and religious preferences and nationalities? What would it look like to truly not stand in judgment for once, to realize that each person indeed is a sinner like we are, but most importantly, to look in their eyes to see and treat and love them as a child of God? What would it look like to give up our power and standing in the community to become truly humble, to become one of the least and the last? What would it look like to put down our weapons just as Jesus commanded in the garden—our weapons of words and insults and presumptions, our weapons of fists and guns and bombs—to put them down and truly turn the other cheek? What would it look like for us to model Christ as people who don’t condemn so easily without a second thought?

Simply put, our lives would be turned upside down. We, like Nicodemus, would have to come out of the shadows of the darkness to live new lives as people of the light, as people of Christ. We would have to give up everything we have—everything that we think truly matters, to really gain the truth, to gain everything, to gain the love offered to us by God through Christ. Let’s all admit it. We do have a little bit of Nicodemus in all of us.

Nicodemus went back to his home that night, his home that was probably big and warm and way more than sufficient, because he wasn’t ready to truly come out of the darkness to Christ. But luckily, for his sake and for ours, he wasn’t done with Christ. He may not have been completely ready to come out of the darkness of his world, but he didn’t shut himself off to the possibility. I can imagine that he went on a journey of his own where he prayed a lot, tossed and turned when he should’ve been sleeping, struggled with anxiety, unable to shut his brain down thinking of his encounter with the Lord, yearning for the hope, for the new life, that would come with proclaiming Christ.

You see, there is a bit of Nicodemus in all of us. Nicodemus spent some time in the wilderness, and so are we. Just as he spent some time on a journey of reflection and prayer and wondering, we are doing the same right now during these 40 days of Lent—during this journeying time, we are called to realize the darkness of our world, to spend our time praying and fasting, to spend some nights losing sleep thinking about the heaviness of our lives and the heaviness of the cross, to spend a little time in anxiety as we examine ourselves and our lives, to spend some time thinking about how we are truly baptized by the water that cleanses our brokenness and the Spirit that enables and inspires us to work in the world. We are called to spend some time yearning for the hope that will come in a few weeks when we celebrate and come out of the darkness of the tomb into the light of resurrection and recreation. During our Lenten journey, we are called to ultimately think about the fact that God gives a Son for us because of such great, unfathomable, unexplainable, unconditional love.

There is a bit of Nicodemus’ story in all of us, but luckily—for him and for all of us—thanks be to God, the story of Nicodemus does not end on that night when he first encounters Christ in the shadows of darkness. Listen to more of John’s gospel, from the day of crucifixion:

³⁸After these things, Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, though a secret one because of his fear of the Jews, asked Pilate to let him take away the body of Jesus. Pilate gave him permission; so he came and removed his body. ³⁹Nicodemus, who had at first come to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds. ⁴⁰They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews. ⁴¹Now there was a garden in the place where he was crucified, and in the garden there was a new tomb in which no one had ever been laid. ⁴²And so, because it was the Jewish day of Preparation, and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.

Nicodemus, who at first had come by night, was there in the day. He was there in the day not just watching everything that had happened, but there in the day, preparing Christ’s body, anointing it and wrapping it up, making it ready for burial. Nicodemus was there in the middle of the day, toiling for everyone to see, risking his life and his livelihood, giving up his life in order to celebrate all the love that Christ had shown to him. He had truly come out of the shadows, come out of the darkness, ready to give up his own life—EVERYTHING—to tell proclaim the love, the life of Christ. Nicodemus went on a journey of his own. Are we ready to do the same?