June 2, 2019 (The Seventh Sunday of Easter)

Indian Hill Church

Cincinnati, OH

Acts 16:16-34

Psalm 97

John 17:20-26

Reverend Dr. Stephen Caine

17:²⁰ “I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, ²¹ that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. ²² The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, ²³ I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. ²⁴ Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. ²⁵ “Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me. ²⁶ I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.” (John 17:20-26, NRSV)

Let us pray: God of boundless grace, you call us to drink freely of the well of life and to share your love. May the glory of your love, made known in the victory of Jesus Christ, our Savior, transform our lives and the world he lived and died to save. We ask this in his name and for his sake. Amen.

I believe one of the hardest concepts to achieve or feel will ever come to reality, is unity.  We live in a world that has so many different opinions and cultures and ever-changing points of view, that it is impossible to think that we would ever achieve or experience unity.

We are bombarded every day with countless examples of just how fractured our world, our nation, our city, the church and even our families truly are.  Red States, Blues States, Traditionalists, Progressives, Skyline, Gold Star, UC, Xavier and the list is never ending.  Division and opinions are not bad in and of themselves but considering Jesus prayer for unity that we read today it seems a long way from ever becoming reality.

Which begs the question, is unity – in our world, in our nation, in our community, in the church – a realistic goal anymore?   Let me begin by stating that unity in the sense that Jesus is praying for is not that everyone believes exactly the same thing or in the same way; living in lock step with one another.  Instead, Jesus is praying for oneness and unity as say a well working team or a healthy functioning body. Where all the parts work together for a common goal.  So, to reframe my question in a more positive way, how are we the church, the body of Christ, called to show unity to a world that is full of fractures and brokenness?

In our passage from John today, Jesus is keenly aware of how important unity is, both for his disciples’ faith at that time, as well as for the future faith of the church.

In this passage Jesus is praying for his disciples and he is also praying for each of us.  It is called the High Priestly Prayer.  Again, we are hopscotching our way through John’s Gospel and we are back in the Upper Room on what we know as Maundy Thursday and we overhear Jesus praying.  It is a prayer that looks to the future. Jesus was praying not only for the people seated around him at table that evening but also for his future followers, which thanks be to God, includes us.  And it is a prayer that focuses on unity, on all being one.

It seems to be an unanswered prayer.

Nearly 15 years ago a journalist, named Bill Bishop coined the term “the big sort.” He in collaboration with sociologist and statistician Robert Cushing co-authored a book of the same title, The Big Sort.[1]  It is the story of how America has become to be a country of cultural division, economic separation, and political polarization.  Bishop and Cushing used demographic data (2004), to show how Americans have been sorting ourselves into homogeneous communities— not only by region or by state, but by city and even neighborhood. Over the past three decades, we have been going far beyond the simplistic red state/blue state divide, we have sorted ourselves geographically, economically, politically and religiously into like-minded communities.

We (Americans) have been choosing the neighborhood, the church and the channel we get our news that are compatible with our lifestyle and our beliefs. Bishop and Cushing concluded that the result of this sorting is a country that has become so polarized, so ideologically inbred that people don’t know and can’t understand those who live a few miles away.   And I add are not interested in learning more about our neighbors with other world views.

Our country — our culture, economy, neighborhoods, and churches— have been influenced by this social sorting that we have knowingly been part of for over the past thirty years. For example:

• People with college degrees were relatively evenly spread across the nation’s cities in 1970. Fifty years later, college graduates had congregated cities, a phenomenon that decimated the economies in some places and caused other regions to flourish.

• The generation of ministers who built sprawling mega-churches in the new suburbs learned to attract their stadium-sized congregations through the “homogenous unit principle,” (“a section of society in which all members have some characteristic in common.” Whether or not members of the group can readily articulate it, the common characteristic makes them feel at home with each other and aware of their identity as “we” in distinction to ‘they’).[2] The new churches were designed for cookie-cutter parishioners, what one church-growth proponent described as “people like us.”

• Businesses learned to target their marketing to like-minded “image tribes,”[3] a technique that has been perfected by social media and used by political parties in their campaigns.

The authors went through dozens of calculations and discovered that following World War II, some communities around the Untied States were busy converging but all that began to change in the early 1970’s.  This cultural shift could have been fueled by the turbulent 1960’s, the Viet-Nam War, Watergate, Race and Gender battles or any number of culture changing movements.  The country began to sort and that caused certain places to boom and others to bust economically, socially and culturally.  The places where educated people moved were getting richer and others poorer.  The places where young people were moving were producing more patents and other areas were dying off.

The authors state that people — especially Americans — abhor disagreement.  That’s why we choose to participate in churches, live in neighborhoods, and join clubs where we can easily find agreement, people like us.  It’s interesting, however, that when pollsters ask about compromise, most Democrats and Republicans believe their side has given enough and now it is time for the other side to see the error of their ways and change.  We all seem to think it’s the other side that’s causing the problems.  So, yes, there’s a lot of talk about the end of partisanship. We just don’t see anybody changing neighborhoods.

Living in politically like-minded groups has had its consequences. People living in homogenous communities grow both more extreme and more certain in their beliefs.  Local governments are becoming more and more extreme.  While, nationally, we see nothing but gridlock because Congress has lost most of its moderate members and compromise has been replaced with conflict.  Division rules the day.  Which begs the question, is there any hope for Jesus prayer in John 17:21 to be fulfilled?

John 17:21, that they may all be one is a familiar verse for us at the Indian Hill Episcopal Presbyterian Church, as we are one of the few dual denominational churches in the country.  We have been together for over 70 years now; we have demonstrated that there can be unity even in the midst of our denominational differences.  We can demonstrate a diversity of the strength of vision points beyond mere differences.

It was the hope of the founders of our church to create a place of worship in this affluent community where people would be challenged not to become conformists, but instead to be exposed to multiple perspectives. We honor our Episcopal and Presbyterian heritages in our different worship services, but we all come together to celebrate as children of God.  We also strive to contribute our time and our talents to reach out to the community at large.  We are challenged to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.”  We hope that we have an environment to explore social issues and provide opportunities to respond by encouraging each other participate in making the world a better place.

We affirm that there is more than one way to worship God and to love our neighbors.  It is a prayer for community.  Jesus prays that, “all may be one.”  To be a follower of Jesus is to be a part of a greater whole.  According to Jesus there are to be no solitary Christians or spiritual “Lone Rangers.”

Within that community the prayer is for unity: “that all may be one.” Does that mean we all have to get along all the time?  Does that mean we all have to agree all the time?  We are one in Christ whether we agree with each other or not.  We are one in Christ whether we like one another or not.  To become a part of Christ is to become a part of the community; a part of the one.

Jesus’ prayer reminds us that our unity, our “oneness” is to be a sign to the world of God’s love for us in Jesus Christ.  Oneness and unity are about love not homogeny.  And if you have been a part of a family, a member of a church, or a community, you know that within that love there can be disagreements and squabbling.  We are human.  But the mystery of faith is that God wanted to be in relationship with us so much that God became one of us.  And in that moment, we were drawn into oneness with God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  It is with God’s help that we can live into that oneness and show it to our fractured and sorted world. May it be so, in your life and in mine.

Let us pray:

[1] (Houghton Mifflin, May 7, 2008)

[2] https://www.lausanne.org/content/lop/lop-1

[3] http://www.upenn.edu/gazette/0597/turow.html

May 12, 2019 (The Fourth Sunday of Easter & Confirmation)

Indian Hill Church

Cincinnati, OH

Acts 9:36-43

Psalm 23

John 10:22-30

Reverend Dr. Stephen Caine

10:²² At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, ²³ and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon. ²⁴ So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.” ²⁵ Jesus answered, “I have told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me; ²⁶ but you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep. ²⁷ My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. ²⁸ I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. ²⁹ What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. ³⁰ The Father and I are one.” (John 10:22-30, NRSV)

Let us pray: God of comfort and compassion, through Jesus, your Son, you lead us to the water of life and to the table of your bounty.  May we who have received the care and love of our Good Shepherd be strengthened by your grace to care for your flock. Amen.

If ever there was a perfect text for Confirmation Sunday, this just may be it. One of the great gifts of working with the Confirmation Class each year are their questions.  We get all kinds of questions, serious, irreverent, sad, humorous, some I will be happy to share with you and some that are not safe for public consumption.  What is so much fun is the fact that they are not afraid to ask.  Anything, everything.  How did the Holy Spirit have relations with Mary?  Explain the Trinity?  Why does God let bad things happen to his people?   If Jesus is the only way to heaven then what about my friends who are Jewish, Muslim, Atheist, Agnostic?  See they ask great questions. Deep probing questions.

The crowd asked Jesus a question as he was walking outside of the Temple in the portico of Solomon.  It’s a late December day in Jerusalem.  As usual, he’s drawing a crowd. This time, the people gathered around him have come to celebrate the Feast of the Dedication (better known to us as Hanukkah), a festival honoring the rededication of the Temple. This is a Hanukah story that celebrates the successful Maccabean revolt against the Syrian ruler Antiochus Epiphanes, who contaminated the temple in Jerusalem by setting up a pagan idol. About 200 years before Jesus’ time, Judas Maccabeus had driven out the foreign oppressor and rededicated the temple; thus, the festival was both a commemoration of national independence, like our Fourth of July, and a religious holiday recalling the temple’s purification.

Some people in the crowd have come with a question.  Maybe they heard Jesus teaching or preaching. Maybe they witnessed one of his miracles.  Or maybe they want to trap him into saying something blasphemous.  Whatever their motive, they ask, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.”

Most parents are used to the questions from your children. You know the typical kid questions. “Why?” “What does that mean?” “How do you know?” Children are asserting their need to question the world and better understand the reality around them. For some that need to question authority and to test the limits of perceived reality never stops, many of us continue to question everything in life and especially in faith.  This is a wonderful gift.  Maybe, that is the point of theology/ church/ confirmation not to resolve the tensions that come in the life of faith, but rather to help us to ask better questions.[1]

Jesus, like most every parent has learned avoids giving a direct answer and instead states, “The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me.” 

This is what is happening in this story.  Jesus has shown the people around him three years of examples of who he is.  He has taught, preached, healed, cast out demons, calmed storms and… He has had others question his identity repeatedly. Questioning who he is and what he is about is quite normal.  Prophets were often asked to give proof of their powers.  But the question that Jesus is asked goes much deeper than simply giving proof.  This goes to the heart of his identity.  The crowd doubts that he is the messiah.

I am reminded that doubt is a constant companion to faith.  It warmed my heart on Wednesday night to hear some of the Confirmation Class in their faith statements acknowledge that they had doubts, they had questions, they want to know more about God, faith and the Bible.  Doubt and questioning are normal parts of our lives as people and as followers of Jesus. To live in the tension of faith and doubt, of questions and answers, gives us room to hear the words of promise that Jesus offers: “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand.”

If you learn nothing else this year from confirmation, please learn this: that God will not abandon you, that Jesus will hold on to you through all things, that God will never, ever let you go.  There are so many times in life where we feel, inadequate, afraid, unsure, unworthy or unsafe, God will never ever let you go! No matter how crazy or difficulty or stressful or scary your life may seem, God chooses you, God loves you, God is with you, and God will hold onto you through all of life.  Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. No one will snatch them out of my hand.”[2]

So, keep asking questions.  Keep searching. And know that God is big enough to take it, and God will be with you every step of the way.

Let us pray:

[1] David Lose

[2] David Lose

April 21, 2019 (Easter)

The Resurrection of the Lord

Indian Hill Church

Cincinnati, OH

Acts 10:34-43

Isaiah 65:17-25

Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24

John 20:1-18

Rev. Dr. Stephen Caine

20: ¹ “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. ² So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” ³ Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. ⁴ The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. ⁵ He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. ⁶ Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, ⁷ and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. ⁸ Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; ⁹ for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. ¹⁰ Then the disciples returned to their homes. ¹¹ But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; ¹² and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. ¹³ They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” ¹⁴ When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. ¹⁵ Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” ¹⁶ Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). ¹⁷ Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ “¹⁸Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.” (John 20:1-18, NRSV)

Let us pray: Almighty God, who through your Son Jesus Christ overcame death and opened to us the way of everlasting life: Grant that we, who celebrate with joy the day of the Lord’s resurrection, may be raised from the death of sin by your life-giving Spirit; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

It’s Easter, and Mary goes to the tomb.  I think we can all agree on that but maybe not much else.  But I wonder why Mary went to the tomb.[1] 

If I went around the sanctuary and asked some of you to tell the story of Easter, we all might tell it a little differently.  Some of us would tell of Mary Magdalene and others of us would tell of the disciples running back and forth.  Some of us might remark of how the stone had been rolled away and others still would tell how the gardener appeared and called Mary’s name.  We would all have our way of telling the Easter story. Apparently, eyewitness accounts are often not the most trustworthy.

The Gospel writers all had their own eyewitness accounts.  There are basically four different accounts of the resurrection, all with their own nuances and details and focus.  Matthew says there was an earthquake.  Mark ends so abruptly that we must fill in the details and provide our own ending.  Luke has a group of women that see the angels in dazzling clothes.  John has the gardener who ends up being Jesus.  Some accounts have Mary alone, some with other women.  Some have one angel, some two. It gets a bit confusing with all the differences and discrepancies.

But if you think about it, isn’t that confusion all part of the Easter story, all part of the Christian faith, our faith.  There are lots of differences, lots of running back and forth, there is skepticism, there is doubt, there is fear and there is faith.

So, why, Mary?  Why did you go?   What did you hope to find?  What did you think you would see?  Did you go Mary as we do when we go to such places?  To remember?  You go, knowing there’s nothing to do.  Nothing can be done.  You have buried your loved one, along with your fondest hopes.  All you can do is mourn all that has been lost.

Yet, knowing this, you go.  You go to the sealed tomb to weep for your friend. You go to mourn and to remember— to remember when he was still alive and the shining dream of all you wanted from him, all you hoped he would be and do. He and all that still lived in your heart.  You go hoping to experience again the days when Jesus was something special.  You go to remember when it was possible to still believe that he was a gift of God, of grace, of mercy, and the hope of the future.

You go to remember the way he reached out his hand to touch the heads of children and bless them.  You go to remember the great pleasure he took at seeing people as their lives were changed, their hearts lifted, and as they realized they were part of something holy, something wondrous, something that would lift them beyond the burden of their daily drudgeries.  You go to remember the tear in his eyes and the catch in his throat on that day when the man fell at his feet and begged him to come and heal his dying child.   You go, Mary, to remember the fire in his eyes, his anger at the money changers, the Pharisees, the religious leaders and all the senseless suffering.  You go for that precious moment to remember the day he stood outside the tomb of his friend Lazarus and wept.

Mary goes to look at the cold stone tomb and to imagine him lying there, still.  In many ways we are just like Mary on that first Easter morning.  Mary knew all about death, she knew that death was the end.  She knew that Jesus was gone, and life would never be the same.  With his death on the cross, her hope died too.  Mary had to face reality and reality told her:

Death is final

Some situations are hopeless

And now she is all alone

She went for a private time to let her tears flow and to mourn her loss. But, Mary, if that’s why you go, I understand that.  Yet what I don’t understand is what you actually find.  It turns out to be much more than a time to remember a time to cry because you miss him deeply.  You get something beyond my comprehension, you find something that changes everything. You get resurrection, you get life. 

Likewise, with us there is all kind of evidence that we are wrong about our belief in the Resurrection:  There are school shootings and drunk drivers killing innocent people, there is war and more war, there are divorces and depression and hopelessness.  There is all the evidence in the world that death is final, that some situations are hopeless and that we are all alone.

But here, we are gathered here at church on Easter Sunday because we believe otherwise, while we don’t understand it all and sometimes, we find ourselves running back and forth, but in the end, we say “life.” 

We stake our lives on the resurrection and that is enough to send us out into the world to live each day with hope, a hope that we don’t completely understand, but a hope, none the less a hope that we can trust, that we know that God is working, that life even comes out of death. 

William Slone Coffin, chaplain, social activist, preacher and prophet died in 2006.  He wrote a book before his death entitled “Credo” and the last chapter is “The End of Life.” Reflecting on his own impending death he wrote…

“As Job said, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.  That does not mean that God is responsible for every death.  What that means is that before every birth and after every death there is still God.  The abyss of God’s love is deeper that the abyss of death.  Paul insists that neither death nor life can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Even if we don’t know what is beyond the grave, we know who is beyond the grave.”[2]

Henri Nouwen wrote beautifully upon the occasion of his mother’s death:

“The resurrection is God’s way of revealing to us that nothing that belongs to God will ever go to waste.  What belongs to God will never get lost.  The resurrection doesn’t answer any of our common questions about life after death such as “How will it be?  How will it look?  But it does reveal to us that love is stronger than death.  God’s love for us, our love for each other, and our love for those who lived before and will live after us is not just a quickly passing experience, but a reality transcending all time and space.”[3] 

We all know the reality of this world.  Reality of pain and death and grief.  But now with Easter, with the empty tomb there is another reality.  There is reality that says this is not the end, death is not the final word, there is more, there is hope, there is the possibility for something new, there is hope for life and healing and wholeness.  With Easter eyes we know a reality that says you just never know what may happen, what the future may hold.

When we see these resurrections moments, when we see hope and life emerge from death, we may not completely understand it at the moment.  We may find ourselves confused just like those early followers.  We may find ourselves running back and forth not knowing whether to shout for joy or weep with grief.  We may find ourselves staring at the gardener and wondering if it might be Jesus.  And then we might find ourselves telling our version of the resurrection story.

We may find ourselves smiling and laughing and feeling hope again.  For Finally, ultimately, we are people of joy.  We are people of life.  We are people of faith.

The power of hope.  The power of life.  The power of resurrection.  It is enough to send us out from here to tell others that He is risen.  He is risen indeed.  On the other side of pain, on the other side of death there is always resurrection.  Across the darkness shadows of life, there shines a light that will never fail.  That is the truth of Easter.  Thanks be to God for it.  Alleluia. Christ is risen. Alleluia. He is risen, Indeed. Alleluia. Amen.

[1] Revered Dr. David Miller, http://day1.org/634-sermon_for_easter

[2] Reverend William Slone Coffin (Credo, p.167-171)

[3] Henri Nouwen, (Our greatest Gift)

March 17, 2019 (Lent 2)

Service for the Lord’s Day

Indian Hill Church

Cincinnati, OH

Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18

Psalm 27

Luke 13:31-35

Reverend Dr. Stephen Caine

15:¹ After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” ² But Abram said, “O Lord GOD, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” ³ And Abram said, “You have given me no offspring, and so a slave born in my house is to be my heir.” ⁴ But the word of the LORD came to him, “This man shall not be your heir; no one but your very own issue shall be your heir.” ⁵ He brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” ⁶ And he believed the LORD; and the LORD reckoned it to him as righteousness. ⁷ Then he said to him, “I am the LORD who brought you from Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess.” ⁸ But he said, “O Lord GOD, how am I to know that I shall possess it?” ⁹ He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” ¹⁰ He brought him all these and cut them in two, laying each half over against the other; but he did not cut the birds in two. ¹¹ And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away. ¹² As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and a deep and terrifying darkness descended upon him.

¹⁷ When the sun had gone down and it was dark, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. ¹⁸ On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates….” (Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18, NRSV)

Let us pray: God of infinite grace, you love us too much to leave us to ourselves, even though we do so much to protect ourselves from you and to find security apart from you. We know our resistance does not scare you off, and we rejoice that you will finish your work with us. Amen. 

Good morning.  The storms of Thursday evening served as a reminder for me and to me.  During the intense wind and rain, destruction, unrelenting non-discriminating power and randomness, the sun came up Friday morning.  Nikki sent out the beautiful picture of the Evening Sky after the storm and it showed the glory of the colors, purple, gray, silver, yellow, and many others.  It is both a cheesy yet beautiful metaphor for life and ministry.  Then I hear the reports of mass violence in of all places, Christchurch, New Zealand.  I have been there before, over 25 years ago.  It is a calm and peaceful city, with good people and not many guns…but today the violence surges and seems to win.  Which calls into question once again God’s promise, God’s Covenant, with Abram, us and all creation.

So, from where I stand the reminders are everywhere and yet unseen.  Fighting to burst forth from the cold, hard, dark, ground like the early buds of spring.  The words of God, “I am here, fear not.  I am with you, fear not.  This is my beloved son, in him I am well pleased, listen to him.”  So, I will try again today to listen…listen to and for the still small voice calling me, us, creation to trust and believe, and follow.

It begins with a promise: “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” Promises, promises.  The Lord brought Abram outside and said, “Look toward heaven. Count the stars if you can.  This is how many descendants you will have.” But Abram was a doubting Thomas, like anyone would be at such an audacious promise. When he replies, “How will I know Lord?”

There are important nuanced differences between covenants and promises, differences that most of us do not catch.  Think about the different promises you have made in your life.   I promise I won’t tell anyone!  I promise I will clean my room.  I promise to pick up the dry cleaning on the way home.  I promise to write, or call, or stay in touch.  I promise to have and to hold from this day forward, till death do us part…”  Promises, Promises.  We all make them, and we make them for all sorts of situations and stations in life.  We also make promises to God when babies are baptized and couples are married, or the more desperate promises…God if you get me out of this, I promise I will… But a Covenant is different than a promise.

This week’s Old Testament lesson from Genesis 15 needs to be set in its context.[1]

We go back a few chapters to the end of Genesis 11, where we meet Abram and Sarai. God has created the world and called it good.  God has attended to Adam and Eve and the garden.  All of creation is teeming with life and God has commanded the people to “be fruitful and multiply.”  Yet, it seems that Sarai is the first person to be “childless.”[2]

According to the Genesis narrative God has a problem.  People are spread out all over, nations here and there, people speaking all kinds of languages, people could not understand each other, so God decides to fix it.  God chooses one people to become his people, a nation through which the Lord might bless all the other nations.[3]

So, in typical God-like fashion, God chooses the most unlikely way to bring about the divine future.  God chooses an aging, childless couple, to become originators of the people of God.

The Lord says to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”[4]

And so, Abram and Sarai go.  They journeyed to the land.  They waited for a child.  Not just any child, but a promised child, who would become the first of their many descendants, who would in turn become a great nation.  A Promise because God said so.

Time passed. They went to Egypt. They came back. No child.

They worked and became wealthy. No child.

Their nephew Lot separated from them. Lot was captured. Lot was rescued.

And still, no child.  Promises, Promises…

And then, finally, the Lord broke the silence.

“Do Not be Afraid:” More Good News from the Lord[5]

Then we hear the first words of Genesis 15, “After these things” and after a great deal of time “the Lord spoke to Abram in a vision, ‘Do not be afraid.’”  And what was the good news the Lord spoke? “I am your shield; your reward will be very great.”  “Good news, Abram! You are going to get something awesome!”

This is a second promise from the Lord!  Promises, Promises…Well, Abram didn’t think so!

God responds by renewing the promise of many descendants.  In fact, God responds by expanding the promise!

Keeping promises is God’s business.

“And Abram trusted.”

Abram believed and trusted God’s promise.

The Lord evaluated Abram both his act of complaining in prayer and the reality that Abram trusted the divine promises and then the LORD reckoned it to him as righteousness!

And then the Lord made a promise to Abram that is breathtaking in its magnitude, an incredible pledge.  A commitment that is so absolute that the Lord commits to die rather than break the promise.  When the sun had gone down and it was dark, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces.[6]   The ritual was literally the “cutting of a covenant.” To make a covenant in the ancient world, animals were cut in half, and then the one(s) making the covenantal commitment walked down the middle between the animals.  So, God cut the animals and passed between them as a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch.  This was an ancient Near Eastern custom and the implication is that the individual making the covenant would be cut in two like the animals if the promise was not kept.  A relationship – a covenant – however — is not one-sided.  We have a role to fulfill.  God says, “I will take care of you. In return, you will worship me.”

So here we are thousands of years later with this covenant— I will be your God and you will be my people, I will take care of you and you will worship me.  God honored his covenant with Abram. God gave him, Isaac which led to descendants as numerous as the stars in the night sky, too many to count.  It did not always seem like God is honoring His end of the covenant.  There were times, years, decades where Abram wondered. But yet, God made a covenant and kept it.

And with us when I see storms and hear of violence, and suffering, and rage, I wonder about this covenant. 

I question! 

I doubt!

But then I look up at the sky, with stars too many to count, I see the dawn of a new day or a rainbow after a storm and…I know. I remember that God always, always, always, keeps His covenant and so we do our part. We worship God and we trust God and we remember…

Let us pray: Faithful God, deliver us from thinking that works will save us and grant us the faith to believe your audacious promises. Amen.

[1] Reverend Dr. Rolf Jacobson, Commentary on Genesis 15: 1-12, 17-19 Professor of Old Testament at Luther Seminary, St Paul. MN

[2] Ibid Genesis 11:30.

[3] Ibid “priestly kingdom and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:6)

[4] Ibid (Genesis 12:1-3)

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid, Genesis 15:9-11, 1-18.

February 17, 2019

The Sixth Sunday after Epiphany

Service for the Lord’s Day

Indian Hill Church

Cincinnati, OH

Jeremiah 17:5-10

Psalm 1

Luke 6:17-26

Reverend Dr. Stephen R. Caine

6:¹⁷ He came down with them and stood on a level place, with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon. ¹⁸ They had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases; and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. ¹⁹ And all in the crowd were trying to touch him, for power came out from him and healed all of them. ²⁰ Then he looked up at his disciples and said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. ²¹ Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. ²² Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. ²³ Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets. ²⁴ “But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. ²⁵ Woe to you who are full now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep. ²⁶ Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets.”. (Luke 6:17-21, NRSV)

Let us pray: O God, you spoke your word and revealed your good news in Jesus, the Christ. So, we pray that you will fill each of us with that word again, so that by proclaiming your joyful promises to all nations and singing of your glorious hope to all peoples, so we may become one living body, the body of Christ on the earth. Amen.

Location, location, location.  You have heard how important it is, in many different facets of life.  Where you live, where you work, where you are seen matters.

A house in one location can sell for quadruple the amount of the exact same house in another location.  If you have the corner office with the window view, your paycheck looks a lot different than if your work in the mailroom in the basement.

We see location come into play in the world of politics all the time. Pretty soon we will be gearing up for another presidential election (God help us all), and the potential candidates will choose very carefully where they are seen, where they make their announcement of running, where they give their stump speeches.  Will it be in a board room with executives, will it be a large fancy dinner with guests paying thousands of dollars to attend, or will be at a local diner in a small midwestern town where the everyday folk hang out.  Wherever they appear it is well calculated to send a message.  Location, location, location.

Even with Jesus, even in the Word of God, location matters.  Always pay attention to where something is happening.  It means something, usually something deep and powerful.  Our location impacts how we hear a scripture passage.

For example, in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus delivers the Sermon on the Mount, up on a mountain, hence Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes.  It was a sermon he gave to his disciples, his trusted followers, away from the crowds.

Blessed are the poor in spirit

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness

A powerful message and set the stage for the disciple’s ministry.

But in Luke’s Gospel, the sermon Jesus delivers cuts to the chase and goes right for the heart.  None of this poor in spirit or hungering for righteousness.  Jesus leaves no gray area, he is cut and dry and brutally clear.   But, did you notice where Jesus delivers this sermon?   Not high on a mountain, or low in a valley, but on the level plain.

Here is some background for his sermon, the story was out about Jesus, people from all over were hearing about his healing power.  They wanted to see him for themselves. Many of them had physical ailments and wanted to be healed. So as Jesus was walking among them, people were clamoring to touch him, to feel his power.  Over here Jesus.  Heal me, please heal me.

And then Jesus began to speak.  You can imagine an immediate quiet fell over the crowd – “Hush, the healer is going to speak.  How will he make our lives better?”  And so, they listened. His first words must have been such a welcome to the crowds. 

“Blessed are the poor, the hungry, the weeping.

Blessed are the hated, the reviled, the defamed, on account of the son of Man.”

The crowd was probably tracking with him, feeling pretty good, agreeing with his message. Then Jesus goes from preaching to meddling.  When he says, the “woes,” and the woes change everything.

“Woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.

Woe to you are full now, for you will be hungry

Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep.

Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets.”

WOE!

You see, location matters, it matters in how we hear this sermon.  Where we are in life impacts how we hear what Jesus is saying. Again, back to Matthew’s version, which is much more palatable to our North American ears.  While how we hear Luke’s, version puts us in a defensive mode.  In Matthew Jesus delivered this sermon high on a mountain, but Luke moves Jesus to a much different location; down in the plains, down with the people, looking them eye to eye, heart to heart, hand to hand.  Location matters.

In Guatemala, as in many third world countries, there is a literal pecking order of where people live.  The poorer you are the lower on the hill or the mountain you live.  The wealthy you are, the higher up you can afford to live on the mountain.  At the bottom of the hill is where all the trash is dumped and the sewage flows.  Location means everything.  You either look up or down at life and the world.  It strikes me that Jesus comes down the mountain to the level plain to engage people on the same level, not looking up or looking down.  A flat place is where everyone is equal.  And that is the vision of the kingdom that Jesus is talking about.

It is a vision of what the Kingdom of God will be. 

Blessed are the poor and the weeping and the hurting, because they know they need God.

Woe to the rich and the powerful and the well fed, because they think they are in control and don’t know how to fully rely on God.

Please hear me and understand, that I am not in any way, shape or form, romanticizing the poor or the hungry.   No one would choose such a life.  Being poor, hungry, filled with grief is a hard life, filled with pain and heart ache. Never knowing where your next meal is coming from, or a warm place to live, a bed to sleep in, joy for your heart.  But being at rock bottom you just might be more aware of God’s grace when the meal does arrive.

When you are weeping uncontrollably and hurting deep down in your soul, then you know that God is the only one who can give any comfort or peace or help.

When you are lonely and scared and at your wits end, you just might find yourself on your knees praying God I need you.

But those of us who live comfortable, lives of abundance, who don’t really want for anything.  Hear this sermon much differently.  Why, because our material prosperity helps us to believe that we are self-sufficient, and it lulls us away from the kingdom of God.  When we are so encumbered by things, we can’t see clearly.   When we have so much stuff and wealth and food and entertainment, we get more caught up in ourselves with no real need of Jesus and his healing power.  

Blessed are those who live in dependence on God rather than self.

Blessed are those who live lives utterly dependent on God for life, for sustenance, for well-being.

Blessed are those who don’t have a grip on life for God will show the way.

Woe to those who don’t know what it is like to need God to trust God alone.

Woe to those who are so encumbered by things that a quest for righteousness is foreign.

Woe to those who are so satisfied with this world that they don’t yearn for the kingdom of God.

So, what does Jesus sermon on the plain have to say to us, well fed, comfortable, rich Episcopalians and Presbyterians?  Could it be that it means that we need to come down from our mountain or our hill?  We need to visit the plains.  See people eye to eye, heart to heart and hand to hand.  Rethink our own needs and wants.  Re-adjust where we place our trust.  Begin seeing the world the way Jesus does, where all are equal, and all are fed, and all are loved.  Location makes all the difference in the world.

Perhaps Psalm 1 says it best: Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners tread, or sit in the seat of scoffers. But their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law, they meditate day and night.

May it be so in your life and in mine.  Amen.

January 27, 2019

Service for the Lord’s Day

Annual Congregational Meeting

Indian Hill Church

Cincinnati, OH

1 Corinthians 12:12-31

Reverend Dr. Stephen Caine

12: ¹² For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. ¹³ For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. ¹⁴ Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. ¹⁵ If the foot would say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? ¹⁸ But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. ¹⁹ If all were a single member, where would the body be? ²⁰ As it is, there are many members, yet one body. ²¹ The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” ²² On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, ²³ and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect; ²⁴ whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, ²⁵ that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. ²⁶ If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it.  ²⁷ Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. ²⁸ And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers; then deeds of power, then gifts of healing, forms of assistance, forms of leadership, various kinds of tongues. ²⁹ Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? ³⁰ Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret? ³¹ But strive for the greater gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way. (1 Corinthians 12:12-31, NRSV)

Let us pray: In you, O Lord, we find our joy, through your law and your prophets you formed a people in mercy and freedom, in justice and righteousness. So, we pray that you will pour out your Spirit on us today, that we who are Christ’s body may bear the good news of your promises to all. Amen.

Every so often a biblical text seems to fit the focus of a Sunday or the work of the church so perfectly, that it makes me wonder if it is truly a gift from God. This Sunday is one of those occasions when the focus of our worship and the work of the congregation coincide with the wisdom of the lectionary. Today is the annual congregational meeting and the epistle reading for today is the well-known admonition from the Apostle Paul using the metaphor of the human body as the body of Christ, the church. Paul deals with what it means to be united when we are so different. How to be one amid diversity. How to remain together with such talented and gifted people who make up the church and how we relate to each other.

My sermon for today is based on Paul’s teaching in Corinth around the year A.D. 54 or 55, two decades or so after Jesus. The new Corinthian church was growing and doing well. They reported that they were filled with knowledge and using the “spiritual gifts” that God blessed them with.   But, with most growth and change not all the news from Corinth was so good. These gifts that should have drawn the Corinthian Christians closer together was instead causing jealousy, division, and schisms in the church. The lines were being drawn between the more conservative Jewish Christians and the more liberal Greek Christians, between the politically enslaved and the politically free, between those who emphasize speaking in tongues and those who emphasized speaking boldly about Christ, between the followers who were loyal to the teachings of Paul or Peter or Apollos.  There were many factions in this church, and each of them was equally passionate and committed to their viewpoints and beliefs.  So, they asked the Apostle Paul for guidance, “What shall we do with all these divisions in the church?” Chapters 12-14 of the book of I Corinthians are Paul’s cohesive response to the issue of diversity and division with the church.

Paul says, “The body is one and has many members.” “The body” in this case means more than one thing.  He (Paul) is mixing his metaphors here in a beautiful way as he uses the physical body to describe the communal body of the church sense.

I can’t read this passage without thinking back to my former church in small town Tennessee and the old curmudgeon Roman Catholic Priest, in our local ministerial association used to say about this text…” some members of the body of Christ are the hemorrhoids! Every church has got them.” Anyway.

So, there we sat gathered around a table, on Wednesday morning. All very committed members of the Indian Hill Church but we were also Republicans and Democrats, Independents and moderates. Young, middle age and elderly. Discussing the recent unpleasantness in Washington DC that was captured on a camera phone and quickly went viral for all to see, to pass judgement and to condemn. If a picture is worth 1000 words, then video tells so much more.  As time passed and the story evolved, we found out that it was much more complicated than it first seemed, a face-off between a Catholic High School Junior and a Native American elder on the steps of the Lincoln memorial over a week ago.

It was clear that as we discussed the recent event that we would never come to a conscious and that is not my point, because we are all entitled to our opinions and our viewpoints, no matter how diverse.  No, what struck me was what kept us together.  When it was clear that we all would not agree on the interpretation of this recent event why did we continue talking? What kept us from throwing salt shakers and silverware at each other?  Trying to stab each other with our forks or worse.  Dividing up into camps of Red and Blue, declaring war and never gathering around a table again?   It is what I believe the Apostle Paul is getting at in this passage.

There is one Spirit, but a variety of gifts as well as opinions.

There is one Lord, but a variety of ways that people serve.

There is one God and Father, but a variety of ways that people work for the kingdom. God gives different gifts to different people.

Some, are hardcore to the right;

Others, just as hardcore to the left.

A Few of us are much too confused to be either.

Some, a passion for a more literal interpretation of the Bible,

Others, a passion for a more open and progressive interpretation of the Bible.

All of us, however, is bound together with love. 

In just the same way, that each and every one of us in this room today is inspired by the one and same Spirit, the Spirit who gives to each person their unique and different perspective, their passions and their gifts. This is what Paul is teaching.  Diversity in oneness is okay, not only is it okay it is a gift from God.  Work together to stay together.

Just as the human body is a unified whole, composed of millions of different parts, so is Christ and his body.

The human body is miraculously complex,

With 60 million cells,

With 36 million heart beats every year,

With 300 billion red cells produced every day,

With 60,000 miles of blood vessels in each body.

Just as the human mind cannot begin to fathom the complexity of its own body, so it is with us, with the body of Christ. Our minds cannot comprehend the complexity of the body of Christ.[1] 

Christ is a living body, composed of billions of parts, miraculously complex, with billions of members, located in millions of different settings, with thousands of different languages, with thousands of unique cultures and billions of expressions of the true faith…throughout all the centuries of recorded time.

The human mind cannot begin to fathom the complexity of the body of Christ, any more than the human mind can imagine the 60,000 miles of blood vessels in one’s own physical body.

As the Apostle Paul says, we have these gifts, these passions in our hearts, these workings, these ways of serving God and God’s kingdom; but if you don’t have love inside of you for our sisters and brothers, who think and feel differently than you, then you are nothing. The greatest gift that God has for you and me, all of us, is love is love.  Love for people who don’t think like you.  Love for people who do not share your point of view of the world, of politics, of life.  Love is a sappy, over used, misunderstood word— but it is what holds us — the body of Christ together. The greatest of these is love.

Amen.

[1] Reverend Edward F. Markquart, Division, Diversity, and Oneness in the Parish: A Conflict Drama