Our Brother Sam

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

January 31, 2022

The Feast of Samuel Shoemaker, Priest

Isaiah 51:17-52:1

Psalm 130

1 Corinthians 5:6-8

Luke 4:40-40

Our Brother Sam

Although our celebration is not as grand as I had hoped, I’m glad that we can be together to honor our own local Episcopal “saint,” Samuel Shoemaker.

As you all know only too well, I’ve gotten very interested in Shoemaker – both because of his deep connections to our church and also because I think of him as a prophet, one who has a lot to say about the challenges and opportunities of today.

Shoemaker was born on December 27, 1893 in a rented house in Baltimore City.

He was baptized here at St. Thomas’ on February 25, 1894.

When he was two years old, his family moved from the city to the Shoemaker estate, Burnside, not far from here.

He enjoyed a privileged upbringing in that beautiful setting.

When he was 14 years old he was uprooted from that rather sheltered life and sent to St. George’s School in Newport RI, which was challenging for him, culturally and socially.

Later, he followed in his father’s footsteps to Princeton.

It was while he was at Princeton that Shoemaker met Helen Smith, who became his wife and partner in ministry, and is also an important figure in her own right.

  It was also at Princeton where Shoemaker became interested in the topics that would shape the rest of his life and ministry:

Personal evangelism: bringing the Good News to the world, one person at a time.

Missionary work: bringing the Good News both to faraway places and also to our own neighborhood.

And, ecumenicalism: working to minimize differences among Christian denominations, moving toward Christian unity that would help us share the Good News more convincingly and effectively.

After Princeton, Shoemaker went to China where he started a branch of the YMCA and taught in the “Princeton-in China” program. It was in China that he met Frank Buchman, founder of the “First Century Christian Fellowship,” later known as the Oxford Group.

As you can tell by its name, Buchman and his followers wanted and worked for a spiritual reawakening, a return to the fervor of the early Church, focusing on passionate evangelism and small group ministry.

Buchman taught what he called the “Four Absolutes” – absolute honesty, absolute purity, absolute unselfishness, and absolute love.

Those “absolutes” would become a theme that ran through Shoemaker’s entire ministry – and would help shape AA.

After returning from China, Shoemaker attended the General Theological Seminary in New York City. (He deliberately chose General because its Anglo-Catholicism was quite different from his own evangelical “Low Church” sensibility.) He was ordained a priest on June 11, 1921 and celebrated his first Service of Holy Communion the following day, right here at St Thomas’.

Not long after, with only brief ordained experience, he was called to serve as Rector of Calvary Church in New York – near Gramercy Park which had been a well-to-do area and is again now, but by Shoemaker’s time the neighborhood had declined and the church was struggling.

Well, the new rector threw himself into his work, and Calvary Church grew a great deal.

He famously greeted people at the church door and also held outdoor services in Madison Square Park.

He built Calvary Mission, which could house up to 57 homeless men and served many thousands of meals – and where the Oxford Group hosted meetings for “drunks.”

I’ll come back to that in a minute.

In 1926, Shoemaker established “Faith at Work”  - a ministry for lay people who would gather each week and share how they had evangelized in their everyday life, how they had been good Christians at work.

An amazing example of “Faith at Work” that Shoemaker often recounted was Ralston C. Young, the “Red Cap Preacher” of Grand Central Station.

Three times a week, Young – who was a “red cap,” a porter - hosted a lunchtime service in a railroad car on Track 13 of the station. These services attracted an economically and, unusual for the time, racially diverse congregation.

Faith at Work.

The Oxford Group was always somewhat controversial and over time it changed, losing some of its Christian focus, and eventually Shoemaker broke with Buchman – although the basic ideas of the Oxford Group continued to influence Shoemaker, and AA.

So, Sam Shoemaker and AA is a complicated topic.

But in a nutshell, both Bill W. and Dr. Bob, the future founders of AA, visited Calvary Mission in 1934 and attended Oxford Group meetings there.

After finally getting sober, Bill W. made it his life’s mission to both stay sober and to help other alcoholics – and he attempted to do that by following one of the key Oxford Group and Shoemaker ideas: the best way to hold onto something is to give it away.

There was a rift between Shoemaker and Bill W. in the early days of AA, but eventually they patched it up and Shoemaker, although not sober himself, spent the rest of his life as an avid and vocal supporter of the group.

Shoemaker was the primary spiritual influence on the development of the Twelve Steps, especially the ideas of self-examination, acknowledgement of character defects, restitution for harm done, and helping others achieve sobriety. 

Shoemaker himself was modest about his role in the Twelve Steps, giving credit to God for inspiring Bill W., but there’s no doubt that Bill was deeply influenced by what he had learned from Shoemaker.

After 25 years at Calvary Church New York, Shoemaker accepted the call to serve as Rector of Calvary Church in Pittsburgh.

There he started the “Pittsburgh Experiment,” which aimed to make Pittsburgh as famous for God as it was for steel.

The “Experiment,” which still exists, was essentially the same idea as “Faith at Work” – helping and encouraging people to live out their faith and share their faith in their everyday lives.

Throughout his life and ministry, Shoemaker was tireless. In addition to his pastoral duties, he conducted many thousands of one-on-one meetings, hosted radio programs, conducted preaching tours, and wrote 28 books.

Whenever I think about him, I feel like a total slacker who should be doing a whole lot more!

He was probably the best-known Episcopal priest of his day, his influence reaching far beyond our church.

In fact, Billy Graham once said that no one “in our generation has made a greater impact for God on the Christian world, than did Samuel Shoemaker.”

That’s quite a statement, quite a legacy, isn’t it?

Shoemaker’s health began to fail and in 1962 he retired to Burnside, but continued to write and broadcast until his death, in 1963.

As you know he was buried here, joined by his beloved wife Helen, thirty years later.

So, what does Shoemaker’s life and work say to us here today?

A lot, I think, but I’m going just highlight three points.

First, just like in his day, we need to bridge the gap between what we say and do here in church and what we say and do out there in the world.

We have to find ways to live our faith at work, at school, at the club, at the train station, in the supermarket, on the Internet - everywhere.

Second, we can no longer assume that people are just going to find us on their own and come to church. We need to go out and meet people and share our story and personally invite them to join us.

I know that’s hard for most of us, but as Shoemaker said over and over, there is just no substitute for personal Christian witness.

Finally, we need to be who we say we are – just like Shoemaker’s Calvary Mission, we must really be a servant church, offering God’s love to people in need, welcoming them as best we can, as if we were welcoming Christ himself.

And, with God’s help, when we put our faith to work, there is no limit to the difference we can make, no limit to the number of lives we can touch.

Just look at what our brother Sam was able to accomplish! 

Amen.

Home Can Be a Painful Place

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

January 30, 2022

Year C: The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany

Jeremiah 1:4-10

Psalm 71:1-6

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Luke 4:21-30

Home Can Be a Painful Place

Because of the many horrifically tragic cases of abuse that have happened in churches, all clergy and other employees, lay leaders, and volunteers – especially those who work with kids - are required to participate in various trainings designed to help us spot the signs when something wrong is going on, and to know how we should respond.

These trainings are both necessary and depressing, but over the years they’ve become sort of routine – just another unfortunate thing that we have to do in this fallen and broken world of ours.

But, last Saturday I participated in a required training that was a new one for me.

It was specifically focused on domestic violence.

Unfortunately, this kind of at-home abuse - both physical and emotional - is more widespread than we might hope or suppose – yet another epidemic in a land that seems to be just full of them.

But, even if the trouble doesn’t sink to the level of abuse, we know that all too often home can be a painful place.

One of the worst flaws of human nature is that we are very good at hurting the people closest to us.

We know their histories and insecurities, their hopes and fears.

And, in a moment of anger or frustration or tiredness, we can so easily wound the people we love - with a cutting remark or a quick insult, or even just with a withering or disgusted look.

And the wounds inflicted by those closest to us are the hardest to heal, aren’t they?

Those deep scars remind us of betrayal, leaving us forever unsure of just where we stand.

Last week I talked about the joy of homecomings, but, sad to say, it’s also often true that home can be a painful place.

Last Sunday we heard how Jesus had been traveling throughout Galilee, teaching and healing.

It seems that Jesus’ good words and amazing deeds had made a wonderful impression on the people. 

Jesus “was praised by everyone,” Luke tells us.

And then after his successful tour, Jesus returns home to Nazareth.

On the Sabbath, like all pious Jews then and now, Jesus attends synagogue. There, surrounded by people he had probably known forever – his family and neighbors - Jesus recites a passage from the Prophet Isaiah:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor…”

After he’s finished, while everyone in the synagogue looked at him in silent anticipation, Jesus says:

“Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

And that’s where we pick up today.

Before I get to the disturbing and kind of confusing second half of this story, let’s remember what the gospels are and are not.

Although they contain history and biography, the gospels are not exactly histories or biographies.

No, they were written to tell the story of Jesus in ways that would help us to know and understand what is most important about his life and message. The gospels were written so that we could and would place our trust in Jesus.

As the Evangelist John writes near the end of his gospel:

“Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.”

So, because the four evangelists have a somewhat narrow focus, there is a lot about Jesus’ life that we just don’t know, including the long stretch of time from his infancy to when he presents himself to John for baptism.

I often wonder about those years, about Jesus’ childhood and young adulthood in Nazareth.

Of course, we do know about the goodness of Mary and Joseph – and we can be sure that their love and faithfulness and courage shaped the man Jesus became.

But then there’s everybody else in that small town.

I wonder about the rest of his family and his neighbors, the people who would have heard the rumors about the strange circumstances of his conception and birth, the people who might have gleefully gossiped about this boy who was “Joseph’s son.”

Later, we know that Jesus’ relatives did not support his ministry – in fact, they wanted to restrain him and bring him back home.

Home can be a painful place.

And so I wonder how this sense of being an “outsider” affected Jesus.

And I wonder if Jesus’ own experiences at home made him even more sensitive to the plight of other outsiders: the lepers, the prostitutes, the tax collectors.

And might Jesus’ own painful experiences at home help to explain what happened on that Sabbath day in the Nazareth synagogue?

Because, as you might have noticed, it’s Jesus who goes on the offensive - maybe because his divinity gave him the power to read the minds of his family and neighbors or, more likely, it’s simply that he knows these people. Jesus knows that they are not going to accept his message. They are not going to believe that the Scripture is in fact fulfilled in and through him.

And so, Jesus makes the first move, anticipating that, like prophets before him, he will not be accepted in his hometown.

And then Jesus reaches back into Israel’s past, reminding everybody of times when it was the outsiders who were blessed by God.

Well, that does it.

The people of Nazareth have heard enough. Enraged, they drive Jesus out of the synagogue, wanting to be done with him once and for all.

Home can be a painful place.

So, that’s a really sad ending for a Sabbath that had begun with so much anticipation.

There’s no doubt that Luke includes this incident in his Jesus story because he wants us to know that Jesus was rejected by lots of people, including by at least some of the people closest to him.

And we know that later, Jesus’ chosen family – his disciples – they will mostly deny him and abandon him, too.

And, as we know, people today continue to reject Jesus’ message of good news for the poor and liberation of the captive.

We know all that, but even more important, this story gives us a painful but also poignant glimpse of Jesus our brother.

In this memory from his hometown synagogue, we see Jesus our brother – Jesus who knows the pain of being an outsider – Jesus who knows what it feels like to be rejected, to be hurt by the people closest to him.

But in this sad story there is good news for us:

In our hard moments when we feel like outsiders – when we are rejected – when we are hurt by people close to us – we can pray to Jesus with confidence – we can take Communion with confidence – and receive comfort and healing from a Lord who is not above our suffering but who really knows what it feels like, a God who who really gets it.

Jesus knows that home can be a painful place – which is good news for us.

Amen. 

Homecoming

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

January 23, 2022

Year C: The Third Sunday after the Epiphany

Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10

Psalm 19

1 Corinthians 12:12-31a

Luke 4:14-21

Homecoming

As we continue working on the possibility of welcoming Afghan refugees here to St. Thomas’, I’ve been reflecting on what it must be like to flee one’s homeland.

What must it be like to have no choice but to seek refuge in a faraway land where people have different customs and speak a foreign language?

What must it be like to be in exile?

Have our Afghan sisters and brothers reluctantly said goodbye to their native land forever, resigning themselves to their fate?

Or, do they still harbor some small hope for a return – holding onto a dream that they will one day hear the familiar sounds and smell the comforting smells of home? 

What must it be like to be in exile?

It just so happens that the experience of exile and return forms the backdrop of today’s Old Testament lesson from the Book of Nehemiah.

In the Sixth Century BC, the Babylonian Empire defeated the Kingdom of Judah. The Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem, including Solomon’s Temple, and drove a large number of Judeans into exile in Babylon.

Decades later, some Judeans were able to return to their wrecked homeland, a place where many of them, probably most of them, had never been.

All they knew were the homesick stories told by parents and grandparents.

Back in their homeland, under the leadership of Nehemiah, they rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem.

That was difficult and dangerous work, but even more challenging was the spiritual rebuilding that was required after all that time away, after living for so long among people with different customs and different gods.

We heard the beginning of that spiritual rebuilding in today’s lesson.

With the walls of the old city restored, the people ask to hear the word of God.

Hungry for God’s word, the people – men and women – all stand for six hours as Ezra, a scribe and a priest, reads the Scripture to them.

We’re told that priests make their way around the crowd, translating and explaining the unfamiliar words, helping to make sense of the old stories.

And how do the people respond?

Well, they weep.

They weep - maybe because they’ve never heard these words before, or maybe not for a long time.

They weep – maybe because they had nearly forgotten God, nearly forgotten God’s love and faithfulness.

They weep - maybe because they are just overcome by it all – overwhelmed to be back home.

That long ago day in Jerusalem, exile had finally ended.

The people had come back home, free at last.

And then in today’s gospel lesson we hear about another homecoming.

Luke tells us that Jesus has been busy teaching in the synagogues of his Galilean homeland, where he has been making a most favorable impression.

Jesus was praised by everyone, Luke says.

And now, after his successful tour, Jesus is back in his hometown of Nazareth.

And, like all pious Jews then and now, on the Sabbath Jesus is in the synagogue. 

Jesus stands to read the Scripture. In this case, it’s some powerful words from the Prophet Isaiah:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

I can imagine the silence and anticipation in the synagogue as Jesus recites Isaiah’s words – silence and anticipation because, yes, the congregation esteems the prophet’s words but also because the people of Nazareth have heard that Jesus, one of their own, son of Joseph and Mary, has been teaching and wowing the crowds in other synagogues, in other towns, and they wonder what will happen here at home.

And then, as “the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him,” Jesus speaks for himself.

Jesus speaks about himself:

“Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

Without the people of Nazareth at first realizing it, Jesus has used Isaiah’s words to announce his mission.

Jesus is bringing good news to the poor. 

Jesus is releasing people enslaved by the world’s forces of wickedness, restoring vision to the sightless, freeing the downtrodden, freeing them at last.

And through the centuries it has been the work of Christians to continue and extend Jesus’ mission.

In our own relatively recent history, it’s hard to think of someone who took that mission more seriously – someone who lived that mission more courageously – someone who sacrificed more for that mission - than Martin Luther King, Jr.

Last week was his birthday, of course, and every year around Martin Luther King Day he is often watered down to just a kind man who had a very nice dream.

But, of course, Dr. King was much more than a dreamer.

He made Jesus’ mission his own mission, announcing good news to the poor.

Remember, on the last day of his life, he was in Memphis as part of his Poor People’s Campaign, supporting sanitation workers who were on strike, protesting unfair wages and treatment.

Yes, like Ezra long ago, and our friend Samuel Shoemaker, and so many other holy women and men through the ages, and like Jesus most of all, Martin Luther King proclaimed God’s liberating word.

At the start of my sermon I asked, what must it be like to be in exile?

But, you know, in a lot of ways we are living in a time of exile.

The pandemic is definitely part of it, but just a part.

People all around us are living in a kind of exile – exiled from others, or at least exiled from people with different backgrounds and ideas.

People all around us are exiled from faith, exiled from the old stories that inspired and sustained our ancestors, exiled from the liberating word of God that too often is sort of kept under lock and key in churches and synagogues, exiled from the word of God that is too often distorted into a cruel message of hate. 

But, I am convinced that just like the long ago people of Judah, people today really hunger for the word of God, really want to know that there is still good news for the poor and the imprisoned.

And, if they really heard the word of God – maybe if we really heard the word of God - well, there just might be a whole lot of weeping.

This exile has gone on for a long time, but I see signs that our spiritual rebuilding is underway.

Spiritual rebuilding is welcoming absolutely everyone who walks through our doors or who tunes in on YouTube. 

Spiritual rebuilding is lovingly giving truckloads of help to the folks at Paul’s Place and the Community Crisis Center.

Spiritual rebuilding is bringing the word of God to anyone who zooms into a Bible Study or who joins us at noon on Wednesdays.

Spiritual rebuilding is working hard to open our church home to exiles from a faraway, ruined land – people who may very well weep at the beauty of our welcome.

So, right here and right now:

Exile is ending.

Spiritual rebuilding is underway.

The homecoming has begun.

Amen.

A Holy Refilling

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

January 16, 2022

Year C: The Second Sunday after the Epiphany

Isaiah 62:1-5

Psalm 36:5-10

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

John 2:1-11

A Holy Refilling

Well, as some of you know by now, this week I finally had to face reality and postpone the events we had scheduled at the end of the month to honor Samuel Shoemaker. 

We have rescheduled for the end of April when, hopefully, the pandemic will have eased and we can more safely gather together.

No surprise, at first I was very disappointed but I’ve also recognized that it would be much, much better to be able to attend an event about recovery and healing without worrying about catching a life-threatening illness!

The other day, just before I decided to postpone it, someone asked me why I am so excited about this program, why I’m so interested in Shoemaker.

Most of you have heard some of the reasons: I think it’s really cool that he grew up here and was baptized here and celebrated his first Holy Communion as a priest here.

And, it’s an honor that an Episcopal saint rests in our cemetery.

Although, like all of us, he was complex and imperfect, I’m in awe that his contributions to the Twelve Steps have saved countless lives – and I also think that many of his other insights about faith and the church have a lot to say to our own time and place.

But, there’s something else, too.

I have a very close friend and mentor, a priest, who is a recovering alcoholic.

I didn’t know him back in his drinking days but the bottom line was that eventually alcoholism took over his life. Eventually he lost his church and some of his family. He was out of the church for a number of years while he attended AA meetings and worked on his recovery.

By the time I met him that was all in the past, but of course it continued to shape him and his priesthood.

Because he had lost so much, and also because he knew God’s grace – because he had been refilled by Jesus - he was a humble person, willing to show us his scars, willing to say that he was just another guy on the road, willing to reach out his hand to me and many others and say, let’s walk together.

And the experience of meeting him and learning from him changed my life, and eventually led me here, to you.

And none of it would have happened without AA.

Which means none of it would have happened without Samuel Shoemaker.

So, you know, I kind of feel like I owe him a lot.

Over the past few Sundays we have been hearing about a series of epiphanies – manifestations of God’s presence and power.

First was the Epiphany itself, when the Magi followed the star to the newborn King – a sign that Jesus is King not just for Israel but for the whole world.

And then last week we heard the story of Jesus’ baptism. This time, at least the way Luke tells the story, the epiphany is at first just for Jesus.

The heavens open and the Spirit descends like a dove. 

And Jesus hears the voice from heaven say, “You are my Son, the Beloved. With you I am well pleased.”

And now in today’s lesson from the Gospel of John, we heard our third epiphany – our third manifestation of God’s presence and power.

But, this time the epiphany flows directly from Jesus himself.

The setting is a wedding at a place called Cana – a wedding attended by Jesus, his mother, and his disciples.

Then, as now, weddings were very important events. 

In this case, wedding celebrations would last for days, with lots of guests coming and going. 

The wedding was a celebration for the couple, yes, but also a party for the whole community.

Many of us no longer value or practice hospitality as much as we used to, but in much of the world and certainly in ancient times, hospitality was very important.

So, for the horrified wedding hosts at Cana it would have required humility to admit that the wine had run out.

And, for the guests the last of the wine would have been a big disappointment.

  It sure must have seemed like the party was over.

Jesus’ mother tells him this unfortunate news, but Jesus seems to dismiss her.

“Woman, what concern is that to you and me? My hour is not yet come.”

But, for whatever reason, Jesus’ mother trusts that her son is going to do something about this problem.

“Do whatever he tells you,” she says to the servants.

And what Jesus tells the servants must have sounded strange indeed: fill the six giant jars – each holding twenty or thirty gallons – fill them with water – fill them to the brim.

Well, you know the rest: the water is transformed into wine – and not just any wine but the best wine – the jars are overflowing – and the party is just getting started.

A holy refilling.

John never describes Jesus’ wonder works as “miracles.” 

Instead, for John, turning the water into wine, and all of Jesus’ other wonder works are signs - signs pointing to a deeper truth.

The wine is not the point of this story.

No, the point is that when we’re feeling empty, when it feels like the party is over – Jesus offers us a holy refilling.

During a week when I’ve been thinking about a story in which wine plays a starring part, I also read an interesting and enlightening book called Why Can’t Church Be More Like an AA Meeting?

It’s a question that I’ve asked myself.

I’ve seen the commitment that AA members like my friend have to the program, how they just don’t miss meetings, no matter what.

And, let’s be honest, church does not seem to inspire that same kind of urgency in very many people.

Anyway, the author suggests that one of the reasons why church can’t be like an AA meeting, or at least why it usually isn’t, is because church people are not too keen on showing vulnerability and humility – that we like to present ourselves as having our act together – that we’re here not so much for ourselves but to pray for those poor “other” people who don’t have their act together like we do.

I confess that before I knew you, I wondered if that’s what you were like.

But then I started getting to know members of the Search Committee and I was touched by their willingness to admit that the church they love so much was facing many challenges – people drifting away to other churches or no church at all, the absence of children from our Sunday School – and a pandemic that just won’t quit.

There were unsettling doubts about the future of this old and holy place.

For some of you, maybe it seemed like the wine was beginning to run out, that the party was winding down.

So, really more than anything else, it was your humility that drew me here, convinced me to accept your invitation to walk the road together.

Now, while it is true that all of the challenges I mentioned remain, I see a holy refilling taking place here at St. Thomas’.

On Monday evening, an online Bible Study that used to attract just a handful of parishioners was bursting at the virtual seams with 21 participants, including a significant number of people new to our church.

And, an idea that started with one parishioner wondering if we might use an empty house on our property to offer hospitality to Afghan refugees has gathered momentum, attracting other parishioners who know what’s needed to fix an old building and others who are skilled at navigating bureaucracy.

And, some people who had drifted away have been returning home and others are discovering us for the first time – finding a place where all are welcome, a church where having your act together is definitely not a requirement.

I believe that all of this and more is happening because of humility.

It’s the same humility that led my friend to attend his first AA meeting – the same humility that led horrified hosts at a long ago wedding to face the fact that the wine was running out.

It’s the same humility that gives Jesus all the room he needs to get to work, giving us a holy refilling.

So, my friends, here’s the good news: the party that began in 1742 is just getting started.

Amen.

Plunging Into the Depths

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

January 9, 2022

Year C: The First Sunday after the Epiphany – The Baptism of Our Lord

Isaiah 43:1-7

Psalm 29

Acts 8:14-17

Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Plunging Into the Depths

In the Episcopal Church and in many other faith traditions, one of the requirements for ordination is a program called Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE).

In most cases, CPE means spending a summer as a hospital chaplain trainee, visiting and sometimes praying with patients and their families and friends, and then reflecting with the others in the program on all that we had seen and heard and said.

So, about 15 years ago, I spent a memorable summer at Christ Hospital in Jersey City.

Since, I guess like most people, I try to avoid the hospital as much as possible, I can’t say that I was excited about fulfilling this particular requirement. I dreaded facing all the fear and pain that we encounter in the hospital. And, I was not sure at all that I would be able to offer much comfort to people in distress.

It felt like being tossed into the deep end of the pool before my first swimming lesson.

Well, one of the many things I learned that summer is that there is a real sense of community in hospitals.

There’s community among many of the people who work there, who help each other get through some really hard stuff, and I’m sure that’s especially true these days.

And, even more surprising, some patients are part of the community, too - especially people who are in for long stays, and chronically ill people who are frequently in and out of the hospital.

That summer in the hospital I got to know many members of those hospital communities, including a few people I’ll never forget.

One was a longtime patient named Paula.

At first I was really uncomfortable with Paula. 

She was about my age and she was very sick.

Despite the heroic and often very painful efforts of modern medicine, cancer was slowly but inevitably getting the better of Paula.

After a few awkward and fumbling visits, she and I began to relax together, sharing our stories, praying together, sometimes crying together, as she acknowledged her fate, grieving for all that she would be leaving behind.

Yet, despite so much pain and sadness, for the most part Paula was at peace. One time she said, “When I first got sick, I asked, ‘why me?’ But, after seeing all these other sick people, now I ask ‘why not me?’”

Amazing, right?

It was hard to be with Paula in the depths of her disease and suffering, but being close with her was also a great privilege and even, maybe strange to say, a gift that I will always cherish.

If you have been around here over the past few weeks, you know that we’ve heard a lot about John the Baptist.

John called people to live ethical lives – don’t steal from others – if you have a second coat give it to someone who has none – don’t think that just because your ancestors were holy that everything is OK between you and God.

Most of all, John preached repentance – he called on people to change their ways – to change direction – to head back toward God – and, of course this dramatic change was symbolized by baptism, a ritual washing in the River Jordan, presided over by John himself.

Despite – or maybe because of – his harsh message, John attracted big crowds.

It seems that lots of people recognized that they were on the wrong path, and realized that John offered them a way to change direction – a way to new life.

Actually, John was such a remarkable person that at least some people, maybe a lot of people, thought that he must be the long-awaited messiah.

So, it’s surprising that Jesus the Messiah presented himself to John for baptism. 

Jesus surely did not need a baptism of repentance, right?

So, what was he doing there?

Well, there is a sense that John’s work ends with the baptism of Jesus. Luke says that all the people had been baptized, including Jesus. Now it’s time for John to make way for the more powerful One.

And, Jesus’ baptism is also an example of his obedience. Jesus was baptized because the Father wanted him to be baptized.

But, on a deeper level, it’s in and through Baptism that Jesus discovers who he really is. The voice from heaven says to Jesus, “You are my Son, the Beloved. With you I am well pleased.”

It’s by plunging into the depths, that Jesus finds out who really is.

It’s by plunging into the depths, that Jesus fulfills God’s will.

And, for the rest of his life, Jesus will continue to plunge into the depths.

Immediately after his Baptism, Jesus is driven into the wilderness, where he will be sorely tempted – driven into the wilderness where Satan knows how to quote the Bible and is able to come up with temptations specially designed for Jesus.

Jesus survived that experience, but for the rest of his life, Jesus will plunge into the depths of human life – hanging around with the wrong kinds of people, being close to lepers and tax collectors, offering new life to people broken by guilt, fear, disease and grief.

Jesus will plunge into the depths, eventually rejected and abandoned by just about everybody.

Into the depths, Jesus went – into the depths of the tomb, which sure looked like the end, but just as Jesus came up out of the baptismal water, he will rise again on the third day.

And now, on the day we remember the baptism of Jesus, I have the honor of baptizing Jackson.

Like at many churches, Baptism here at St. Thomas’ is a quite lot different from plunging into the Jordan, but don’t let the beautiful baptismal font and our sharp outfits fool you.

It may look like I’m just pouring a little bit of water over his head, but, in fact, Jackson is about to plunge into the depths.

And then, after the spiritual swimming lesson, Jackson will be brought back up, now with an indissoluble, unbreakable, bond that will keep him close to God forever.

In baptism, all of us are plunged into the depths and brought back up.

In baptism, all of us discover who we really are – beloved children of God.

And, for the rest of our lives, all of us are invited to plunge into the depths with God and one another – plunging into the depths to uphold each other during the hard times – plunging into the depths to face suffering and fight injustice – plunging into the depths to respect people with very different ideas and beliefs – plunging into the depths to love even the people we may not like or don’t trust one bit.

In a time when, for lots of reasons, so many of us have grown apart, remembering Jesus’ baptism, and our own baptism, is more important than ever.

So, like Jackson, let’s plunge into the depths, trusting that God will not let go of us no matter what.

Let’s plunge into the depths, knowing that this is the way of God – the way of community, the way of love – and the way of new life.

Amen.

Building Bridges and Bigger Tables

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

January 2, 2022

The Second Sunday after Christmas

Jeremiah 31:7-14

Psalm 84:1-8

Ephesians 1:3-6, 15-19a

Matthew 2:1-15, 19-23

Building Bridges and Bigger Tables

Well, Happy New Year, everyone!

And, Merry Christmas, too!

Although the world has definitely moved on to the next thing, here in church it is still Christmas, for a few more days, anyway.

This past week was relatively quiet at St. Thomas’, giving me a chance to reflect on all that we experienced during Christmas – all the many ways that we have been so richly blessed.

Although the ongoing pandemic definitely dimmed our celebrations, it was still one of the best Christmases of my life.

So many parishioners and our church staff worked very hard to make Christmas beautiful for all of us.

Everyone who was here seemed so excited and joyful.

The music was over-the-top fantastic.

And, as many of you know, my parents were here with Sue and me.

So, I mean, really, what more could I ask for?

And, on top of all that, we got to hear the Christmas story.

On Christmas Eve we heard the Christmas story according to Luke – the story of Joseph and a pregnant Mary journeying far from home, unable to find a an appropriate place to give birth, placing the child in a manger, a pretty word for the harsh truth: the Son of God spent his first night on earth in a feeding trough meant for animals.

We heard about angels appearing to startled shepherds, and Mary pondering all these amazing things in her heart.

And then on Christmas Day and last Sunday we heard the Christmas story according to the Gospel of John – a cosmic Christmas, taking us all the way back to when God’s Word created all things – and now that Word has come among us in a flesh and blood human being, Jesus.

There is just one last missing piece of Christmas, and that’s the story according to Matthew.

It’s Matthew who tells us about Joseph.

When Joseph learned about Mary’s pregnancy, we can imagine his hurt, his sense of betrayal, his disappointment and anger.

But rather than publicly disgracing Mary, Joseph chose to quietly end their engagement – that is until he dreams of an angel telling him the identity of the holy child.

And then, at great cost to himself – you know how people are, they all would have heard the rumors that the child wasn’t his – they all would have gossiped about who the real father might be – at great cost to himself, righteous Joseph sticks with Mary and the holy child.

Both Luke and Matthew emphasize that Jesus was born in a particular time and place – these events did not happen on some heavenly plane but here on earth, when Augustus was emperor and Quirinius was governor.

These events happened when the brutal Herod was king of Judea – a king who was ready and willing to crush any would-be rival, even a newborn child.

Today we pick up Matthew’s Christmas story with the arrival of the Magi. Studying the sky they had spotted a new star, which they interpreted as announcing the birth of a king. And, with their gifts, the Magi made their way to greet this newborn king, who would surely be found in the capital city, born among all the comforts of a palace.

Eventually, of course, the Magi find the newborn King, far from royal splendor. They present him with their gifts – gifts that were maybe not so appropriate for a child but perfect for a king, for a god, and for one who will die.

Death – the Cross - is never far from this story.

The ruthless and wily Herod was eager to eliminate his newborn rival, giving orders to kill all the young sons of Bethlehem – and forcing Joseph and Mary and the holy child to flee for their lives.

They fled to Egypt, once a place of captivity and now a land of refuge.

In telling the Christmas story, Matthew makes important theological points:

Right from the start the authorities will be hunting Jesus.

The Good News is meant not just for Israel, but for the whole world, including the Magi who know enough to pay homage to the newborn King.

And, the story of Israel is retold in and through Jesus. Just as the Israelites had gone down to Egypt, Jesus goes to Egypt. And just as the Israelites returned home, so will Jesus return home.

These are important points, but let’s not miss the harsh truth that, like so many others, past and present, political violence forced Joseph and Mary and Jesus from their home, made them run for their lives.

Joseph and Mary  - and Jesus the Son of God - were refugees.

You may have heard that some of us here at St. Thomas’ have been thinking a lot about refugees lately, specifically the many thousands of people who fled Afghanistan - the many thousands of Afghans who assisted our country and have now arrived here needing our help.

We have been looking at the possibility of using the Assistant’s House as a home for a refugee family.

As you’d guess, it’s a big project – the house needs a lot of work, and refugee resettlement is definitely complicated, and it would be a very heavy responsibility to care for a family that has traveled far from home.

But, as I’ve been thinking about Joseph, Mary, and Jesus as refugees, I’ve wondered about the people who must have helped them along the way – the people who offered hospitality to a young family far from home – the people who shared what they had with no guarantee of payment – the people who welcomed God’s Son without even knowing it.

The names of those generous people are lost to us, but of course God will never forget the help that they gave.

Along with reflecting on Christmas and thinking about refugees, this past week I’ve also been reading some of the many tributes to Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who died last week, and whose funeral was yesterday – his small, simple pine coffin one last lesson in humility.

One of my favorite tributes to Tutu was a wonderful memory shared by the journalist Michelle Norris.

She told the story of spotting Tutu one morning at a hotel where he was having a quiet breakfast with two other people. She worked up the courage to go over to his table, to say hello to one of her heroes.

Unlike many celebrities who crave privacy, Tutu didn’t mind the interruption. In fact, he tells her to pull up a chair. 

When she politely declined, he asked a waiter to bring a chair for her.

So, there she sat as other people also approached the table and each time Tutu said, pull up a chair. As Ms. Norris put it, “What started as a two-top is now a buffet with more than a dozen people.”

She saw the experience as a metaphor for how Archbishop Tutu lived his life:

“Building bridges and bigger tables.”

And, my friends, isn’t that what Christmas – isn’t that what our Christian faith - is all about?

Building bridges and bigger tables.

At Christmas, God builds a bridge to us – a bridge that overcomes our sins and failures – a bridge that joins heaven to earth and earth to heaven.

At Christmas, God builds a bigger table – a table not just big enough for Israel but a table big enough for the whole world.

And, over and over, God invites us to build bridges, to build bigger tables.

Joseph the carpenter had to build a bridge from what he thought his life would be to the life God called him to.

Joseph the Carpenter had to build a table far bigger than he ever dreamed, a table for Mary and the Son of God, a table that will surely cost him, but a table that will change everything.

Long ago, the Magi were welcome at the table.

And, today’s visitors from faraway lands are welcome at the table, too.

Now, with all of our troubles and responsibilities, we may feel like our table is already pretty crowded, but Archbishop Tutu and so many others teach us there is always room for more.

So, in the new year, with God's help, let’s build more bridges.

With God's help, let’s you and I build a bigger table - and invite everyone to pull up a chair.

Merry Christmas to you all.

Amen.