Mark 10:17-31
Contrary to popular interpretations the Gospel is not about condemning the rich or those of us who have a few worldly possessions. The Gospel I think is asking all of us to think about what we treasure? This question is very closely related to another question -- Are these treasures ours or are they God’s? Our answers to these two questions suggest the key to living a different response than the rich young man who went away sad. Hopefully we will not leave from this time together in any way sad!
The focus of the Gospel is not that we go and sell all our possessions, give all our money to the poor and live as beggars. Such a choice overvalues poverty and diminishes the stewardship opportunity of privilege. At the same time we do need to ask some questions about what we treasure. My sense is that we are all men who cherish our spouse, our families and Trinity Church. Loving spouses, healthy families, good friends and vibrant churches are indeed good things for us to cherish too.
The emphasis of the Gospel goes a little bit further through Jesus’ question to the rich young man. My sense is that there is a little humor in Jesus’ response when he says, “don’t call me good teacher”. I sense him saying don’t try to snow me. I had a supervisor at Price Waterhouse who often said to me, “Joe don’t try to snow the snowman.” The rich young man seems to be trying to snow Jesus.
I read the Gospel as Jesus’ way of upping the ante. I think Jesus is poking fun at the young man. Jesus is asking if his treasure is only for himself or is it for others. Jesus contrasts the rich young man’s small circle of people he cherishes with Jesus’ larger circle of friends who are in communion with God. Jesus is asking us to put our treasure in service of this larger circle of God’s friends.
As men I think as a culture we are vulnerable to believe that our smarts, self-discipline and hard work have led to our privileges. So we could say, “we have earned what we have and it is ours”. Yet if we are not careful this way of thinking can lead to a defensive posture that the rich young man exhibits in this story. I can empathize with him. I sold all my possessions twice when I entered Roman Catholic seminaries and I can assure you that I did not have any better insight to this Gospel when I gave up my job, apartment and other worldly privileges and freedom.
There is another way to understand this Gospel though. It is a very different way of thinking to see all that we have received as a gift from God. To see that all we have received coming from God does not diminish our intellectual gifs, our self-discipline or even our masculine ingenuity. If all we treasure originated with God as gift to us than our discernment, indeed the rich young man’s discernment is about stewardship.
Stewardship is far more than deciding how much to pledge each year or how to be philanthropic in the greater community. Stewardship means that we acknowledge that all the gifts we have received including all of our possessions come from God’s grace. Stewardship means no longer living for our small circle of cherished ones but rather for the larger circle. Our challenge is recognizing the faces of people in need in the larger circle as our friends in communion with God.
A year ago working one night at Family Promise, I had a hard time making conversation with our guests. It was much easier for me to serve them than to call them by their name and talk about their circumstances. In future evenings it was a bit easier, but it was still a challenge for me. I have worked with the homeless before giving food through soup kitchens, staying overnight in shelters and giving to organizations that provide for the needs of the homeless. But as I look back on these ministries I see now the way I kept a safe distance.
What’s different for me now is that the homeless I am meeting in my work with Ted and others have names and stories. The homeless have ceased to be for me untouchable. I am in closer proximity. My friend Dan came with us on the street this week and several hours later he was thinking about Francis, an African-American woman who could have been anybody’s grandmother. Dan said he felt less sorry for the men but Francis melted his heart and he saw through her homelessness the way he was related to her through common humanity and communion with God.
As I read this Gospel and reflect on the work we have done, as street priests I think Jesus’ message is that we exercise stewardship over our treasures. This means recognizing God’s friends and using our judgment to make choices about how we care.
Not all of us are called to be Street Priests or even to work with Family Promise, just as Jesus is not asking all to sell all they have and move to the streets.
The Gospel does call all of us out of our small circle of friends and family with whom we share our treasures into relationship with God’s larger circle of friends.
The Gospel calls all of us out of defensive protection of our hard earned treasures to see God’s gracious hand serving our need through bestowing us with intellectual and financial gifts. In the second reading we heard that in Jesus we have one who is sympathetic to our needs.
The rich young man was not sympathetic to the needs of the poor rather he placed his sole treasure in his possessions. The Gospel calls all of us to be sympathetic to the needs of others in our community who may have not had our privileges or often through their one error in judgment have cost them the possibility of changing their plight.
Jesus called the young man’s bluff, but deeply embedded in that bluff is calling this man as well as all of us to be stewards of our treasures for a larger circle of friends.
The young man cherished his possessions above all else. Yet if he placed his treasure in being in communion with God then he would have approached Jesus differently. Indeed he would not have been self-righteously asking Jesus trick questions rather his focus would have been caring for a larger community of need than his own. As we leave this time of community and fellowship let us continue to be attentive to God’s friends in ways that expand the smaller circles we live so that our stewardship is about relationship not just providing service.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
William Tyndale Feast - October 7, 2010 at Trinity Church, Reno
One of the first things I was taught at the Episcopal Divinity School in Church History class is that contrary to popular belief Henry VIII did not provoke the English Reformation and thus establishing the Church of England later becoming Anglicanism. This was a surprise to most students even many cradle Episcopalians. The English Reformation was coming of age for quite some time.
There are two major figures in history that did provoke the English Reformation: Erasmus and William Tyndale, both of whom were contemporaries. Tyndale is listed among Lesser Feasts and Fasts, Erasmus is not, but maybe he should. Tyndale lived 1495 to 1536. Erasmus’ famous line is that we are all theologians. Erasmus democratized the then dominant Roman Catholic emphasis on the sacred order and authority of priests as divine mediators. William Tyndale in a similar way translated the bible into English so that the common man could read, meditate and learn from the scriptures without dependence on the priest.
At the heart of the Reformation is a power analysis lessening the distance between priest and layperson as well as between layperson and God. Fredrica Harris Thompsett, an Episcopalian church historian wrote the book We Are Theologians in honor of Erasmus’ words. Thompsett wrote that the “principle of divine accessibility is the central inheritance of all reformed religions”. Baptism not ordination was central to the primary identity of these reformed Christians.
Central to this divine accessibility is having the bible available in one’s own language. In our age we typically take this privilege for granted. Indeed, many prophetic missionaries in the early 19th and even 20th centuries valued the importance of translating the bible into the language of the people. Some missionaries then thought it was still a radical act. Now it is commonplace around the world to have bibles printed in one’s native language, but that is a direct contribution to Christianity from the English Reformation and specifically William Tydale’s work.
Who was this William Tyndale? He completed a Masters at Oxford and later was ordained a priest. Tyndale was a revolutionary prophet of his time. Indeed Henry VIII and others of the period attempted to kill Tyndale to destroy his work. Tyndale once wrote to a prominent Churchman, “If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plough shall know more scripture than thou doest.”
Before Tyndale was ultimately betrayed and burned to death, he had finished and revised his translation of the New Testament and had made it through many of the books of the Old Testament too. His work has been described as “a well of English undefiled”. Lesser Feasts and Fasts reports that “some eighty percent of his version has survived in the language of later and more familiar versions, such as the Authorized King James Version of 1611”.
In today’s language Tyndale would be described as a political theologian for he linked politics to theology through his assessment of power he liberated people through vernacular scriptures. Indeed his last recorded words were, “Lord, open the King of England’s eyes”.
He might also be described as a prophetic priest who though not a scholar was forward thinking enough to consider how he might integrate his interest in politics, commitment to the people and love of scripture. There is no doubt that he had a special vocation from God communicated to him through a sense of the compulsion of the Holy Spirit to do this most marvelous work that would meet the test of generations after him.
It would be an understatement to say that today’s celebration of Wlliam Tyndale’s life and work is important. Our very identity as Episcopalians in an Anglican tradition can be traced to Tyndale’s contributions and his fierce independence from mediators of God’s grace. The English reformers rejected the need for a mediator of God’s grace. All had access to God and the Holy Spirit through the scriptures.
Why do we celebrate William Tyndale’s life today? At the very least so that we have a better sense of our own history as Episcopalians in an Anglican tradition. How might William Tyndale’s life be a source of encouragement for us today?
His passionate commitment to divine accessibility by all Christians through the scriptures is complemented by our Prayer Book of 1979 with its emphasis on Baptism as the primary sacrament of incorporation into the Body of Christ.
Collectively through today’s prayer book and the scriptures available in our native language we are equipped to do the work that God calls us to do. Indeed the very call to a particular vocation is channeled often through the Prayer Book and scriptures read in our native language. We must never underestimate the way we are called to exercise our faith with the same passionate determination of William Tyndale.
There are two major figures in history that did provoke the English Reformation: Erasmus and William Tyndale, both of whom were contemporaries. Tyndale is listed among Lesser Feasts and Fasts, Erasmus is not, but maybe he should. Tyndale lived 1495 to 1536. Erasmus’ famous line is that we are all theologians. Erasmus democratized the then dominant Roman Catholic emphasis on the sacred order and authority of priests as divine mediators. William Tyndale in a similar way translated the bible into English so that the common man could read, meditate and learn from the scriptures without dependence on the priest.
At the heart of the Reformation is a power analysis lessening the distance between priest and layperson as well as between layperson and God. Fredrica Harris Thompsett, an Episcopalian church historian wrote the book We Are Theologians in honor of Erasmus’ words. Thompsett wrote that the “principle of divine accessibility is the central inheritance of all reformed religions”. Baptism not ordination was central to the primary identity of these reformed Christians.
Central to this divine accessibility is having the bible available in one’s own language. In our age we typically take this privilege for granted. Indeed, many prophetic missionaries in the early 19th and even 20th centuries valued the importance of translating the bible into the language of the people. Some missionaries then thought it was still a radical act. Now it is commonplace around the world to have bibles printed in one’s native language, but that is a direct contribution to Christianity from the English Reformation and specifically William Tydale’s work.
Who was this William Tyndale? He completed a Masters at Oxford and later was ordained a priest. Tyndale was a revolutionary prophet of his time. Indeed Henry VIII and others of the period attempted to kill Tyndale to destroy his work. Tyndale once wrote to a prominent Churchman, “If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plough shall know more scripture than thou doest.”
Before Tyndale was ultimately betrayed and burned to death, he had finished and revised his translation of the New Testament and had made it through many of the books of the Old Testament too. His work has been described as “a well of English undefiled”. Lesser Feasts and Fasts reports that “some eighty percent of his version has survived in the language of later and more familiar versions, such as the Authorized King James Version of 1611”.
In today’s language Tyndale would be described as a political theologian for he linked politics to theology through his assessment of power he liberated people through vernacular scriptures. Indeed his last recorded words were, “Lord, open the King of England’s eyes”.
He might also be described as a prophetic priest who though not a scholar was forward thinking enough to consider how he might integrate his interest in politics, commitment to the people and love of scripture. There is no doubt that he had a special vocation from God communicated to him through a sense of the compulsion of the Holy Spirit to do this most marvelous work that would meet the test of generations after him.
It would be an understatement to say that today’s celebration of Wlliam Tyndale’s life and work is important. Our very identity as Episcopalians in an Anglican tradition can be traced to Tyndale’s contributions and his fierce independence from mediators of God’s grace. The English reformers rejected the need for a mediator of God’s grace. All had access to God and the Holy Spirit through the scriptures.
Why do we celebrate William Tyndale’s life today? At the very least so that we have a better sense of our own history as Episcopalians in an Anglican tradition. How might William Tyndale’s life be a source of encouragement for us today?
His passionate commitment to divine accessibility by all Christians through the scriptures is complemented by our Prayer Book of 1979 with its emphasis on Baptism as the primary sacrament of incorporation into the Body of Christ.
Collectively through today’s prayer book and the scriptures available in our native language we are equipped to do the work that God calls us to do. Indeed the very call to a particular vocation is channeled often through the Prayer Book and scriptures read in our native language. We must never underestimate the way we are called to exercise our faith with the same passionate determination of William Tyndale.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Total MInistry Parish: Spiritual Freedom To Act Without Clinging - October 4, 2009 at St. Stephen's Church, Reno
Total Ministry in the life of the church, Wes Frensdorf once said, “involves all of those activities in which the members offer their gifts for worship, community life, caring and nurture as well as organizing and administration…But the life of the church, as the body of Christ, exists primarily for the sake of God’s mission.” For Wes Frensdorf Total Ministry was more than just the way a parish is organized or does its ministry. Wes’ core value was a spiritual one and he placed the emphasis on acting out of a compulsion of the Holy Spirit and freedom not to cling to each other especially not clinging to the priest.
Compulsion of the Holy Spirit and the spiritual freedom not to cling are deeply related. The church is not about our business, the plans we cling to but rather about the work of God channeled through the Holy Spirit manifested in our lives as one community among many other communities that make up the entirety of the body of Christ. The church is a place where we align our desires with God’s desires. It is neither pious nor straightforward work.
The way we live as a community now including gifts of time, talents and treasures will have much influence on the next generation who will come to St. Stephen’s. In our communion with God we are deeply connected with those who have come before us and to those who will come after us. We interpret God’s mission through a discernment process of deep communal listening. We listen for the often very subtle nudges of the Holy Spirit that ultimately establish a pattern that cannot be easily ignored. It is this steadily built pattern that contributes to the compulsion to act inspired by the Holy Spirit. Compulsion is different than self-determination requiring us to shed that to which we cling.
Fear, joy, ambiguity and even anger all get mixed in together when the Spirit calls us to places that we would rather not go. Giving up our control to follow the beckoning of the Holy Spirit can be downright scary. It is probably why the John 21 text has been my favorite text in all the Gospels for over two decades. I feel totally understood by Jesus’ words to Peter when he lets John stay and sends Peter on his way.
Peter wanted to stay with Jesus, but he was sent on to do ministry elsewhere. Jesus asked Peter three times, “Do you love me?” and Peter, each time said, Yes”. Then Jesus concluded his conversation with Peter by saying when you were a young man you went about as you wished, but now that you are older you will go where you might rather not go. When we are following Jesus we are free to act through the compulsion of the Holy Spirit.
Yet we are typically like Peter faced with our conflicting emotions navigating between the joy of Jesus’ personal call and our resistance to letting go of our self-determination. This navigating can sometimes throw us off center. When it does not feel right then we can anxiously wonder, “Are we truly following the one Spirit?” The gap between that which we seek and what the Spirit seeks for us can be huge.
I would describe this gap as fully living into ambiguity with all its uncomfortable tensions and unanswered questions. I imagine spiritual ambiguity being something like turbulence in an airplane. In my earliest days of flying as a young businessman passenger whenever I felt turbulence I thought my death was imminent. One time I remember being on a flight from Ithaca, New York to New York LaGuardia airport, less than 500 miles in a propeller prop plane. I was so scared as the wind bounced the plane around that my hands were gripping on to the chair in front of me.
My hands were flying all over the place as the plane bound forward like what felt like a roller coaster in the sky. To my surprise and horror I slapped the head of the man in front of me. Oh my God, I was so embarrassed! Of course, he was surprised and to my even greater surprise he graciously accepted my immediate apology. Perhaps he had once walked in my terrified shoes.
The plane of course was safe and I have since learned that planes can withstand much more turbulence than most planes will ever experience in flight. The plane stays the course in turbulence perhaps the pilot adjusting altitude here and there, but rarely is it at risk. Likewise I have been learning that as I listen to the Holy Spirit it will inevitably involve some unexpected turbulence in my life, but I will be safe.
For most of my life I was convinced that the Holy Spirit was calling me to be a priest. I totally missed that I was called to be a priest just not a Roman Catholic priest. I should have known this. It looks so simple as I look back over my life. Now I see the pattern of questions that I asked even as a little boy were questions of a protestant as I always questioned authority over others where agency seemed to be diminished and at its worst lost.
As a Jesuit, I had affirmations by protestant ministers, I was curious of the lives of Episcopalian seminarians, invited by the Dean of an Episcopal seminary in NYC to even come to classes as a Roman Catholic and despite all of these things I stayed the course in seeking to be a Roman Catholic priest.
On his deathbed my staunchly Roman Catholic father said, “Joe I am convinced that you are being called to be an Episcopal priest.” I said, “No dad, I am suppose to be a Roman Catholic priest”. Dad said, “No, Joe, a time will come when you recognize your call and when you do, please know that you have my blessing and do not look back”. It was over ten years between that conversation and when I was received into The Episcopal Church.
In these years in between I was shedding my self-determination and embracing the Holy Spirit’s image of priest ministering in a parish like this one that rejects every form of imposed hierarchy and aspires to act on shared compulsion of the Holy Spirit and clinging only to God’s radical mission. Like you I was searching for a church that was not hierarchical.
Theologically speaking the greatest power we have is to live trusting the Holy Spirit. How do we know that we trust the Holy Spirit? One way we know is that we do not cling or clutch to our desires as I did to the seat in front of me on that plane to NYC or to a particular version of ordained ministry. We trust patterns pointing to the subtle direction of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
Peter clung onto his own vision of ministry impeding his action to freely follow Jesus until Jesus challenged him. Like Jesus’ and Peter’s conversation the deathbed conversation with my dad marked a dramatic turn in my life. The turn has meant that I live less with following my self-determination and that I increasingly trust the still voice of the Holy Spirit dwelling not exclusively in me but in the relational patterns of my life.
As I listened to the Spirit in this place last June I was compelled to present myself to your Search Committee. At each turn in the process I was drawn deeper into a call to this place at this time. The Holy Spirit has led me to a place I never expected or planned to be. I am not alone in this unexpected place as we heard two weeks ago when our Senior Warden, Nancy Petersen said that St. Stephen’s Vestry was surprised by my very presence in the search process and later that they were being drawn to choose me through our conversations. These kinds of Divine interventions suggest to me that the Holy Spirit is hovering over St. Stephen’s with her hand placed gently on this congregation.
On the last night that I met with Eleanor, Nancy and Norm not one of us wanted our conversation to come to an end. One part of the conversation I think that energized all of us is when I suggested that we think about making this part-time paid priest position a two-year term. I made the suggestion that if we worked together truly implementing the entirety of Total Ministry emphasizing our shared Total Responsibility that it is possible that this parish in two years might need less of my time or that of any paid priest’s time.
I am ready to work with you to create more possibilities than you may seem to have as a congregation today. We can discover these possibilities by not clinging to the future but by staying open and available to being moved by the Holy Spirit. In this way we will continue to be led towards unexpected places that draw us deeper into the heart of God’s mission for this very special church.
I want to share with you a story of a way this kind of availability to be moved was recently manifested in my life. The Sunday I preached here in August I did not have time to go home to change out of my collar before picking up Stefani at Trinity. As I arrived at Trinity their coffee hour was just about over. A young couple came up to me on the lawn and asked if I was a priest. I said, yes and they asked me will you pray for us and I said of course.
Like Jesus asking Peter if he loved him this couple asked me three times to pray with them. Finally it dawned on me that they meant right now not later. A praying circle gathered around this couple. A few minutes later another man came and this homeless man wanted to talk with a priest. He said he felt like a bum and was concerned that people were afraid of him. I assured him of his humanity, we prayed and he left.
A parishioner by name of Ted Moore watched these two experiences unfold. Ted immediately connected that morning’s sermon to push the walls of Trinity’s Church into the streets of Reno with these two unexpected visitors. Ted said there is a real hunger in this city for invisible street people to be called by their name and to be touched and blessed. Ted suggested we go out that week to see if his intuition was true. For a few hours every week since that August Sunday morning Ted and I walk for a few hours through the streets of downtown Reno asking homeless when they had their last meal, shower and warm bed and we pray, touching them and calling them by their name. By being attentive to the Spirit a new ministry has emerged at Trinity.
As a street priest I am learning from those on the street how not to cling but remain free. This work is not new to most of you given your outreach ministries. I am not preaching outreach to you, as this is one of the highest priorities of this parish, rather I am pointing to our shared ministerial sensibilities. I commit myself to you to participate with you in relational attentiveness to the Spirit and practicing freedom from that which we cling to that would otherwise impede our radical following of Jesus and living out of God’s mission.
I am convinced that God has called us to work together because God knows at this point as our journeys intersect that we need each other’s gifts. You and I probably don’t know exactly the way the work we have been called to do together will manifest itself, but if we resist our fear of a little turbulence then we will safely land in the loving arms of God. In time our shared purpose will emerge through the direction of the Holy Spirit as we participate in Total Ministry and Total Responsibility through Wes Frendsorf’s inspired spirituality and communal discernment.
Compulsion of the Holy Spirit and the spiritual freedom not to cling are deeply related. The church is not about our business, the plans we cling to but rather about the work of God channeled through the Holy Spirit manifested in our lives as one community among many other communities that make up the entirety of the body of Christ. The church is a place where we align our desires with God’s desires. It is neither pious nor straightforward work.
The way we live as a community now including gifts of time, talents and treasures will have much influence on the next generation who will come to St. Stephen’s. In our communion with God we are deeply connected with those who have come before us and to those who will come after us. We interpret God’s mission through a discernment process of deep communal listening. We listen for the often very subtle nudges of the Holy Spirit that ultimately establish a pattern that cannot be easily ignored. It is this steadily built pattern that contributes to the compulsion to act inspired by the Holy Spirit. Compulsion is different than self-determination requiring us to shed that to which we cling.
Fear, joy, ambiguity and even anger all get mixed in together when the Spirit calls us to places that we would rather not go. Giving up our control to follow the beckoning of the Holy Spirit can be downright scary. It is probably why the John 21 text has been my favorite text in all the Gospels for over two decades. I feel totally understood by Jesus’ words to Peter when he lets John stay and sends Peter on his way.
Peter wanted to stay with Jesus, but he was sent on to do ministry elsewhere. Jesus asked Peter three times, “Do you love me?” and Peter, each time said, Yes”. Then Jesus concluded his conversation with Peter by saying when you were a young man you went about as you wished, but now that you are older you will go where you might rather not go. When we are following Jesus we are free to act through the compulsion of the Holy Spirit.
Yet we are typically like Peter faced with our conflicting emotions navigating between the joy of Jesus’ personal call and our resistance to letting go of our self-determination. This navigating can sometimes throw us off center. When it does not feel right then we can anxiously wonder, “Are we truly following the one Spirit?” The gap between that which we seek and what the Spirit seeks for us can be huge.
I would describe this gap as fully living into ambiguity with all its uncomfortable tensions and unanswered questions. I imagine spiritual ambiguity being something like turbulence in an airplane. In my earliest days of flying as a young businessman passenger whenever I felt turbulence I thought my death was imminent. One time I remember being on a flight from Ithaca, New York to New York LaGuardia airport, less than 500 miles in a propeller prop plane. I was so scared as the wind bounced the plane around that my hands were gripping on to the chair in front of me.
My hands were flying all over the place as the plane bound forward like what felt like a roller coaster in the sky. To my surprise and horror I slapped the head of the man in front of me. Oh my God, I was so embarrassed! Of course, he was surprised and to my even greater surprise he graciously accepted my immediate apology. Perhaps he had once walked in my terrified shoes.
The plane of course was safe and I have since learned that planes can withstand much more turbulence than most planes will ever experience in flight. The plane stays the course in turbulence perhaps the pilot adjusting altitude here and there, but rarely is it at risk. Likewise I have been learning that as I listen to the Holy Spirit it will inevitably involve some unexpected turbulence in my life, but I will be safe.
For most of my life I was convinced that the Holy Spirit was calling me to be a priest. I totally missed that I was called to be a priest just not a Roman Catholic priest. I should have known this. It looks so simple as I look back over my life. Now I see the pattern of questions that I asked even as a little boy were questions of a protestant as I always questioned authority over others where agency seemed to be diminished and at its worst lost.
As a Jesuit, I had affirmations by protestant ministers, I was curious of the lives of Episcopalian seminarians, invited by the Dean of an Episcopal seminary in NYC to even come to classes as a Roman Catholic and despite all of these things I stayed the course in seeking to be a Roman Catholic priest.
On his deathbed my staunchly Roman Catholic father said, “Joe I am convinced that you are being called to be an Episcopal priest.” I said, “No dad, I am suppose to be a Roman Catholic priest”. Dad said, “No, Joe, a time will come when you recognize your call and when you do, please know that you have my blessing and do not look back”. It was over ten years between that conversation and when I was received into The Episcopal Church.
In these years in between I was shedding my self-determination and embracing the Holy Spirit’s image of priest ministering in a parish like this one that rejects every form of imposed hierarchy and aspires to act on shared compulsion of the Holy Spirit and clinging only to God’s radical mission. Like you I was searching for a church that was not hierarchical.
Theologically speaking the greatest power we have is to live trusting the Holy Spirit. How do we know that we trust the Holy Spirit? One way we know is that we do not cling or clutch to our desires as I did to the seat in front of me on that plane to NYC or to a particular version of ordained ministry. We trust patterns pointing to the subtle direction of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
Peter clung onto his own vision of ministry impeding his action to freely follow Jesus until Jesus challenged him. Like Jesus’ and Peter’s conversation the deathbed conversation with my dad marked a dramatic turn in my life. The turn has meant that I live less with following my self-determination and that I increasingly trust the still voice of the Holy Spirit dwelling not exclusively in me but in the relational patterns of my life.
As I listened to the Spirit in this place last June I was compelled to present myself to your Search Committee. At each turn in the process I was drawn deeper into a call to this place at this time. The Holy Spirit has led me to a place I never expected or planned to be. I am not alone in this unexpected place as we heard two weeks ago when our Senior Warden, Nancy Petersen said that St. Stephen’s Vestry was surprised by my very presence in the search process and later that they were being drawn to choose me through our conversations. These kinds of Divine interventions suggest to me that the Holy Spirit is hovering over St. Stephen’s with her hand placed gently on this congregation.
On the last night that I met with Eleanor, Nancy and Norm not one of us wanted our conversation to come to an end. One part of the conversation I think that energized all of us is when I suggested that we think about making this part-time paid priest position a two-year term. I made the suggestion that if we worked together truly implementing the entirety of Total Ministry emphasizing our shared Total Responsibility that it is possible that this parish in two years might need less of my time or that of any paid priest’s time.
I am ready to work with you to create more possibilities than you may seem to have as a congregation today. We can discover these possibilities by not clinging to the future but by staying open and available to being moved by the Holy Spirit. In this way we will continue to be led towards unexpected places that draw us deeper into the heart of God’s mission for this very special church.
I want to share with you a story of a way this kind of availability to be moved was recently manifested in my life. The Sunday I preached here in August I did not have time to go home to change out of my collar before picking up Stefani at Trinity. As I arrived at Trinity their coffee hour was just about over. A young couple came up to me on the lawn and asked if I was a priest. I said, yes and they asked me will you pray for us and I said of course.
Like Jesus asking Peter if he loved him this couple asked me three times to pray with them. Finally it dawned on me that they meant right now not later. A praying circle gathered around this couple. A few minutes later another man came and this homeless man wanted to talk with a priest. He said he felt like a bum and was concerned that people were afraid of him. I assured him of his humanity, we prayed and he left.
A parishioner by name of Ted Moore watched these two experiences unfold. Ted immediately connected that morning’s sermon to push the walls of Trinity’s Church into the streets of Reno with these two unexpected visitors. Ted said there is a real hunger in this city for invisible street people to be called by their name and to be touched and blessed. Ted suggested we go out that week to see if his intuition was true. For a few hours every week since that August Sunday morning Ted and I walk for a few hours through the streets of downtown Reno asking homeless when they had their last meal, shower and warm bed and we pray, touching them and calling them by their name. By being attentive to the Spirit a new ministry has emerged at Trinity.
As a street priest I am learning from those on the street how not to cling but remain free. This work is not new to most of you given your outreach ministries. I am not preaching outreach to you, as this is one of the highest priorities of this parish, rather I am pointing to our shared ministerial sensibilities. I commit myself to you to participate with you in relational attentiveness to the Spirit and practicing freedom from that which we cling to that would otherwise impede our radical following of Jesus and living out of God’s mission.
I am convinced that God has called us to work together because God knows at this point as our journeys intersect that we need each other’s gifts. You and I probably don’t know exactly the way the work we have been called to do together will manifest itself, but if we resist our fear of a little turbulence then we will safely land in the loving arms of God. In time our shared purpose will emerge through the direction of the Holy Spirit as we participate in Total Ministry and Total Responsibility through Wes Frendsorf’s inspired spirituality and communal discernment.
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