Getting Jesus

St. Paul’s Church in Bergen & Church of the Incarnation

March 29, 2018

Maundy Thursday

Exodus 12:1-14

Psalm 116: 1, 10-17

1 Corinthians 11:23-26

John 13:1-17, 31b-35

Getting Jesus

            As most, if not all, of you know, before I was a priest I was a teacher.

            I’d like to think I was a good teacher but, as hard as you and I may find this to believe, sometimes, probably for a bunch of different reasons, my students just didn’t “get” what I was trying to teach them.

            That was often very disappointing and frustrating for all involved – and at the end of each semester this “not getting” became a pressing issue when my students faced their exams.

            In a last ditch attempt to help them out, like most teachers I’d offer an exam review where I’d try to squeeze a whole lot of material into just a couple of hours, when I’d make one last ditch attempt to help my students “get” what I thought was most important.

            And, probably thanks to all of those years in the classroom, that’s how I always think of the Last Supper.

One of the most consistent themes throughout the Gospels is that most of the time the disciples just didn’t “get” Jesus.

            Although they clearly spent a lot of time with Jesus – although they must have heard the same parables and teachings over and over – although they saw with their own eyes so many signs and wonders – although all of that and more – very often the disciples – Jesus’ closest friends and followers – just didn’t get him and what he was trying to teach.

            This failure to “get” Jesus must have been frustrating all around.

It probably wasn’t surprising to the Lord – but in the gospels we can hear his exasperation slip out from time to time.

            Now, it’s easy for us to stand in judgment of those first disciples who didn’t get it, but, let’s be honest, Jesus was and is often hard to understand, his teachings were and are mysterious, difficult to accept – and after two thousand years much of it we still clearly don’t get, or maybe just choose to ignore.

            Those who love their life will lose it and those who hate their life in this world will gain eternal life.

            In the Kingdom of God, it’s the poor and the hungry and the mourners and the hated, who are blessed.

            Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

            Forgive not seven times, but seventy times seven times.

            Got all of that?

            Out of all the disciples, it’s lovable but oh-so-flawed Peter who messes up the most. Ironically, it’s the leader – the Rock – who fails to get Jesus – and, say what you want about him, he’s consistent right to the end.

            Tonight we heard the story of the Last Supper as found in the Gospel of John – different in many ways from the other gospels. It’s John alone who offers us this powerful image of Jesus washing the feet of his closest friends.

            When Peter realizes what Jesus is proposing to do, he is highly offended by the idea of his Lord stooping to a task as lowly as washing feet and, as we heard, he wants none of it.

            Still, even after all this time, Peter doesn’t get that Jesus has come into the world not to lord it over us but to serve us.

            But, who can blame Peter for not getting that, right?

            So, like a teacher straining to be clear, Jesus is blunt with Peter, using language that sounds a lot like Baptism:

            “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.”

            That stark warning seems to work – the light bulb goes off above Peter’s head:

            “Lord not only my feet but my hands and my head!”

            At least for the moment, Peter “gets” Jesus.

            Foot-washing is a seemingly simple act, but it represents the kind of service that Jesus offers to us and models for us, it represents the love that we are meant to share with one another, the love that is supposed to be the hallmark of our Christian faith, and it reminds us also of our Baptism, when we “get” Jesus in a deep and permanent way.

            At the Last Supper in the other gospels there’s the story we retell week after week: Jesus takes and blesses the bread and wine and tells his friends that this is his Body and Blood and we are to gather forever in remembrance of him.

            Each time we gather at the Lord’s Table we “get” Jesus.

            We know that the Last Supper is not the end of the story.

            We know that despite having their feet washed and despite eating the bread and drinking the wine – despite “getting” Jesus, the disciples are about to fail Jesus terribly – Peter most of all when he denies three times even knowing Jesus.

            And, of course, we fail Jesus all the time, too.

            And yet, the Good News for Peter and the first disciples - and the good news for us - is that despite our failures, despite not always passing our tests, once we’ve gotten Jesus in Baptism and once we’ve gotten Jesus in the Bread and the Wine, we get him forever, no matter what.

            Amen.

Time to Stop Being a Bystander

St. Paul’s Church in Bergen & Church of the Incarnation, Jersey City NJ

March 25, 2018

Year B: The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday

Mark 11:1-11

Isaiah 50: 4-9a

Psalm 31:9-16

Philippians 2:5-11

Mark 15:1-47

Time to Stop Being a Bystander

            One of the ways I often approach Scripture – whether I’m preparing a sermon or just reading and reflecting – is by trying to use my imagination – trying to imagine what it was like to have been there as the events unfolded.

            Depending on the Scripture text, sometimes that’s easy and sometimes it’s really hard, and sometimes even nearly impossible.

            But, today it’s easy to imagine. In fact, our whole service is designed to help us imagine these momentous events that changed, and continue to change, everything.

 So, go ahead, imagine the faces – the faces of people amazed, confused, or even frightened by the presence of God in their midst – imagine the sounds, the sounds of a bustling first century city as people went about their business buying and selling, arguing and making peace, trying to get through the day – try to imagine the smells, the smells coming from animals and cooking and all of those people living in close quarters without running water – try to imagine the sky, is it clear or cloudy – try to imagine the atmosphere, is it hot or cold, peaceful or tense?

And, today’s service is designed not just to help us imagine these scenes, but to encourage us to imagine actually being part of these events.

And, so imagine ourselves there – imagine that we’re right there, seeing and hearing and smelling and sweating or even shivering, either from the cold or, more likely, from wonder, fear, grief.

            This exercise is kind of like how Renaissance artists often painted themselves into scenes drawn from the Bible.

            Now, I’ve talked to enough people about this imaginative reading and hearing of Scripture to know that it doesn’t work for everyone – some people just aren’t blessed with visual imaginations – but if ever there was a day when we can use our imaginations – when we are invited and almost forced to use our imaginations, it’s today, this most disorienting day, a day so confusing it even has two names:

            The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday.

            We began with a parade, clutching our palms, maybe imagining ourselves at the long ago parade in Jerusalem as the city rejoiced, waved, and sang, welcoming its king.

            And, then without much warning, we played our part in another, very different, parade, as King Jesus is led from the garden to the cross.

            Were you there?

            Where were you?

            One of the things I can never quite settle on in my imagination is how big a deal all of this was for the people of Jerusalem two thousand years ago.

            Sometimes I imagine the triumphant arrival of Jesus and his quick arrest and death as the top news story that weekend – the events that everybody in the city was talking about, had an opinion about.

            But, other times I imagine it all as a very small event – as something that, actually, most people had no idea about – that these two parades were pretty small and maybe even almost routine in a city that attracted a lot of would-be messiahs, in an occupied city where the cross of Jesus would have been just one of hundreds, all standing as clear warnings about what happens when Jews challenge the powers that be.

            Were you there?

            Where were you?

            As for me, sometimes I imagine myself in that crowd tossing palms and spreading my cloak and shouting “Hosanna!” I imagine myself part of the crowd, smiling and so excited that at last, at last, the King has come to set us free!

            And, I can also imagine myself being so disappointed when this Jesus of Nazareth turned out to be not much of a king – or, at least not the kind of king I wanted, the kind of savior I thought I needed.

            I can even imagine myself swept up into furious frenzy of the crowd, shouting, “Crucify him!” Kill this fraud already!

            But, lately, as I’ve imagined this scene, I’ve seen myself off on the sidelines, minding my own business, wrapped up in my own anxieties and hopes, overwhelmed by all the noise and the many distractions of the world, barely noticing the people with the palms, paying no attention to yet another criminal being led to a cross, ignoring the Son of God as he passes by.

            Were you there?

            Where were you?

            In her sermon last week, Jill mentioned one of my favorite people: the twentieth century monk and spiritual writer, Thomas Merton.

            And, that mention reminded me that Merton titled one of his books Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander.

            A guilty bystander.

            And, you know, that’s how I see myself back in Jerusalem two thousand years ago – a guilty bystander, one who’s barely watching, barely even noticing, as Jesus passes by first in triumph and then, not long after, in great suffering.

A guilty bystander: certainly not feeling able, or even willing, to be much help at all.

You know, when those Renaissance artists painted biblical scenes, they didn’t make much effort to be historically accurate. Instead, the artists just painted the characters wearing contemporary styles of clothing, surrounded by contemporary architecture, looking just like the people and places the artists would see and know in their own time and place.

In the same way, when I imagine Jerusalem two thousand years ago, sometimes I imagine Bergen Avenue or Journal Square – these sometimes seemingly god-forsaken places where Jesus continues to suffer in the people drunk or high or insane, the people without shelter, the people hustling for a few bucks, the people with grim faces lined up waiting for the bus, quietly resigned to their lives, their fate.

Wrapped up in my own anxieties and hopes, overwhelmed by all the distractions of the world, these are the people – this is the parade - that I sometimes notice, but more often choose to ignore, not feeling able, or even willing, to be much help at all.

A guilty bystander right here in Jersey City.

Today, on this most disorienting day, we begin Holy Week, a time when we are invited to remember - and maybe even imagine - long ago events that changed, and continue to change, everything.

Holy Week is a time to stop being a bystander.

For some of us, Holy Week this year began a day early as we participated in the March For Our Lives, either in Washington or closer to home. Even if we weren’t doing much at this parade, it was nearly impossible to look away, impossible to ignore what was happening – these beautiful and passionate and determined young people saying “Enough is enough.”

At last.

Holy Week is a time to stop being a bystander.

It’s a time to get our feet washed on Thursday and to walk in yet another parade on Friday – this one through the streets of Jersey City, where some bystanders will join in, some will look on in wonder or just plain confusion, and others will barely notice – or choose to barely notice – as Jesus passes by once again.

Will you be there?

Where will you be?

Amen.

            

The Sure Foundation

St. Paul’s Church in Bergen & Church of the Incarnation, Jersey City NJ

March 4, 2018

Year B: The Fourth Sunday in Lent

Exodus 20:1-17

Psalm 19

1 Corinthians 1:18-25

John 2:13-22

The Sure Foundation

            One of the things I like most about being an Episcopalian – about being an Anglican – is that we are part of a community that spans the globe.

            We get reminded of that community when at each of our services we pray for Anglican churches around the world and for bishops with their often hard to pronounce names!

            All around the world there are Anglican churches worshiping in more or less the same way that we do: the service has basically the same shape – we sing many of the same hymns – and in many cases even the architecture of our churches is similar.

            St. Paul’s, for example, was built back in the 1800s to resemble a church you might find in an English village.

            We’re part of something much larger than just this little community.

That’s one of the reasons why I’m always hesitant to make too many changes to the way we worship – what we say, do, and sing here is one of the most important ways that we are connected to millions of other Christians, past, present, and even future.

            And, I’m also aware that our Anglican identity here at St. Paul’s – which I often describe as traditional but not stuffy (which is what we strive for, and I hope is true) – our Anglican identity is also one of the things that has drawn many of our parishioners to St. Paul’s – a little taste of the church back in Antigua or Nigeria or England…

            You know, although I’ve dropping some pretty strong hints for the past five years, not one of our West Indian parishioners has invited me down to the islands! I’ve never been there or to Africa, but I have been fortunate enough to visit England a few times.

            The last time was more than ten years ago now, back when my love of Anglicanism was in full bloom.

            Sue and I spent most of our time in London, where I insisted that we visit plenty of historic churches. Although skeptical that this was a good way to spend a vacation, she’s a good sport, so off we went from church to church.

            In one case we arrived at a historic church before it opened for the day, and, to our surprise, there was a line of tourists waiting to enter.

            I said something like, “See, look at these people – this isn’t such a weird thing to do on vacation!”

            Sue gave me a skeptical look and, sure enough, it turned out that this particular church – called the Temple Church - was the setting for a scene in the hit book and movie, The Da Vinci Code. All of these people weren’t Anglican fans after all.

            Of course, no trip to London would be complete without a visit to St. Paul’s Cathedral, that iconic symbol of not just the English church, but of England itself.

            When we visited there was some kind of special service going on. A choir was singing and the Bishop of London himself was officiating, dressed in all his finery.

            At one point in the service, the organ and choir struck up a familiar hymn, one that we sing here fairly regularly and will sing at the end of today’s service - maybe the most Anglican hymn of them all – and I saw the bishop smile when he heard the first few notes of:

            “Christ is made the sure foundation.”

            St. Paul’s Cathedral is a magnificent place but I’m also kind of partial to our more modest St. Paul’s right here – they are both places that over many years have been bathed in innumerable prayers.

As important as this building is to us, it’s nowhere near what the Jerusalem Temple meant to the Jews of the first century.

For them, it was the center of life, it was the holiest place in the universe, the place of prayer and sacrifice, the place where, in a sense, God lived – and knowing that helps us appreciate the power of today’s gospel lesson.

We heard the story of Jesus acting in a kind of un-Jesus-like way, as he angrily drove out from the Jerusalem Temple those who were selling animals and those who earned their living exchanging Jewish coins for Roman coins, which couldn’t be used in the Jewish temple since they bore the idolatrous image of the Roman emperor.

            All four gospels tell this vivid and important story, but in Mark, Matthew, and Luke, it happens near the end of Jesus’ ministry – his attack on the religious establishment is, in fact, probably what got Jesus into the most trouble – more than anything else, it’s probably what got him arrested and killed.

            But, today we heard the version of the story found in the Gospel of John, and in this take Jesus is angrier and even kind of scary, since we’re told he made and used a “whip of cords.”

            And, John’s chronology is different than the others. He places this story near the start of Jesus’ public ministry – you could even say that, for John, this is Jesus’ first public act – it’s quite an entrance – and signals the importance of what Jesus did that day in the Temple.

            For much of Christian history, Jesus’ so-called “Cleansing of the Temple” has been used to knock the Jews and their worship in the Temple – this system of sacrifice that required the selling and buying of animals and the exchange of currency.

            But, in more recent times, we Christians have remembered that Jesus of Nazareth was a faithful Jew – and so it seems to me that his dramatic action was not so much a critique of temple worship and sacrifice but much more a call to remember what’s most important – an urgent and even angry call to remember what’s essential – a call to remember the foundation.

           

            By the time the Gospel of John was written, the Temple – what had been believed to be the center of the universe - had been gone for decades, destroyed by the Romans in the year 70, with its treasurers carted off to Rome. Today pretty much all the remains is a retaining wall, what’s called the Western Wall or the Wailing Wall, where Jews continue to gather, leaving written prayers in cracks between the large stones.

            The destruction of the Temple was a catastrophe for the Jewish people, and along with their eventual eviction from their homeland, raised real and urgent questions about their continued survival.

            But, the rabbis gathered and studied and prayed - and what they came to understand was that, actually, the Temple wasn’t the foundation – no, instead, for Jews the foundation was and is God’s covenant with them – the covenant which is fulfilled by following God’s Law – so, God’s people were meant to study the Law, to love the Law, and, most of all, to obey the Law not just in a house of worship but in every aspect of their lives.

            Meanwhile, as the early Christians drifted away from Judaism, they also gathered and studied and prayed and concluded, long before the familiar hymn was written that, for us, Christ is the temple and the priest and the sacrifice – they came to understand and believe that Christ is indeed the sure foundation.

            And, so, as much as we love our beautiful old buildings and as much as we love our traditions, as much as we love our comforting and comfortable ways of doing things – they are not the foundation – Christ is the sure foundation.

            And, sometimes, as our brothers and sisters from Incarnation are modeling for us these days, as difficult and as sad as it is, that means we have to leave behind our temple, leave behind many of our ways and much of our stuff.

And, although we will continue worshiping in this beautiful old temple, at least for a time, the truth is that in our quickly changing and oh so hungry and lost world, we all will have to leave behind at least some of our old ways, leave behind our fears, leave behind our complacency and prejudices, and step out – step out from the temple – step out in faith, trusting – knowing – that the sure foundation of Christ will always support us, no matter what.

“Christ is made the sure foundation, Christ the head and cornerstone, chosen of the Lord and precious, binding all the Church in one; holy Zion’s help forever, and her confidence alone.”

Amen.