The Power of Love: Who Would Jesus Refuse to Serve? - an Easter article for the local newspaper

This article was written and submitted well before Indiana recently made it legal for people to refuse service to anyone they don't like, or hate, or fear, or wish could be legislated out of the country, etc. But it was published today, a few days after Indiana has opened an incredible can of worms on the pretense of "freedom" and "ending religious discrimination" (which is actually "ending the law that keeps religious folk from discriminating against others", but folks in that camp seem to like to redefine words and phrases, and so they also give us "peacekeeper missiles" and "right to work" laws that actually hinder the right to work and benefit the employers).

So I retitled the article to be a bit more timely, though I have not edited any of the words. If I were writing it now, I would include mention of Indiana's new "Nobody has legal protection from being abused from businesses and ideological zealots any more" law. Because let's be honest - though the law was passed under the rubric that it would allow Christians to not have to serve those terrible LGBT people, it will also allow Muslims to not serve Christians, or allow LGBT-owned business to refuse to serve the governor who passed the law, or allow anyone to refuse to serve anyone else for any reason (too fat, too thin, too black, too white, too brown, too liberal, too conservative, wrong color hair, left-handed, female, single mother, unmarried-but-not-a-virgins, ACLU members, NRA members, and so on and so on and so on).

This law is particularly heinous simply because it was triumphed by self-proclaimed Christians; as a Christian, as a follower of Jesus, this really bothers me because if there was one thing Jesus was about, it was about not discriminating. And it is also heinous because if a business refuses service to gay people, those same gay people - if they are police or firemen/women or doctors, for example - have to serve and protect that business owner. On a much larger scale, that business owner that is allowed to tell gay people to go elsewhere lives under the protection of how many LGBT soldiers, marines, sailors, etc.? Can the gay person working at the municipal water supply shut off the main to that business when they're on duty? Can the transgender person at the power plant? The transvestite emergency room intake person?

Jesus said to love your neighbor, not to keep finding new ways to ensure that they live as second- or third-class citizens, whether of the country or of the Kindom/Realm/Commonwealth of God. Sheesh. Grow up, folks.

I think that in the rush to be "pure" and "holy", too many confused Christians can't look far enough beyond their own piety to realize how dirty they've just made themselves and their community. And to do so under the pretense that this is what Jesus wants is just infuriating and heart-breaking.

Here is the article, and then below it I include a photo of it as it was published in today's Leader-Telegram newspaper in Eau Claire, WI. It is not available online, unfortunately.

The Article

Easter is the premiere Holy Day in the Christian calendar. It celebrates Jesus’ triumph over death and violence by rising from the dead the Sunday after his crucifixion. It is so important that Sunday became the normative day for the Church’s worship gatherings, and other Sundays are considered little Easters.

Easter is special to me for a more geeky reason. It’s our only astronomy-based holy day. Each year the earth makes another circuit around the sun, but Easters are not exactly a year apart. Last Easter wasn’t a year ago, it was 50 weeks ago. What’s up with that? Easter is not a fixed calendar day like Christmas. Nor does it float within the calendar, like Thanksgiving (the fourth Thursday of November). Easter is instead fixed to the celestial roaming of the moon around the earth and the earth around the sun, a holdover from the Jewish lunar calendar. In Western Christianity, Easter’s date is the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. Orthodox Christians use a slightly different system, which is why you may have noticed your wall calendar often having one Sunday labeled Easter and another labeled Orthodox Easter.

End of digression. Easter is important because of that rising from the dead thing Jesus did. It is the day of salvation. I like to say “Jesus rose from the dead for us” instead of “Jesus died for me”. It speaks to the universal effect of his resurrection, and reminds us that Easter is about life, not death. Jesus did willingly die, yes; but he rose from the dead a few days later to show us the power of love. To show us that, whatever eagerness we have to fire up the engines of death to kill and hurt and cause fear and divide, this is false power, a weakness completely impotent against the power of love.

That’s the scandalous nature of Jesus! He doesn’t play by our rules. Whoever we dislike, might wish to be barred from heaven or earthly life, or are positive has lost favor with God, Jesus rose from the dead for that person, too. That’s worth remembering. He rose for murderers and for life-bringers. For people of every political persuasion. For illegal immigrants and natives. For Americans and Iranians. For miners deep underground and astronauts in the International Space Station. For ISIS and for nuns. Gamblers, adulterers, addicts, smokers, vegans, hipsters, and goth. Communists and capitalists. Muslims, Jews, Christians, Buddhists, atheists, and every other expression. Children on our borders and our border’s patrollers Whatever one’s gender identity, sexuality, hobbies, or hair color, Jesus rose for you and them. Everyone.

So imagine if we lived according to Easter’s scandalous love. What if we took a moment to remember “Jesus’ resurrection was for this person” the next time we’re tempted to dehumanize someone online, or a waitress, the neighbor who votes differently, the man with a different religion or the woman from another country? Imagine Jesus holding them in arms of love as you hurl viciousness at them. Seems pretty childish and wrong, doesn’t it? Easter’s power is quenching death’s tempting voice and easy ways in favor of life and the power of love to transform people, and thus transform the world we share with one another. And it comes around once an orbit with a full moon every springtime to remind us of who we are supposed to be. Let us be that.

"For God So Loved the World" - sermon on John 3:16 and belief as obedience, not "belief"

I was quite sick on the Sunday I offered this sermon, and that's what the first sentence is about. So a short sermon, distilled down as best I could in a Nyquil haze.

The more I read scripture, the more I strive to follow Jesus, the more I meditate on Jesus' words, the less and less concerned I becomes with "right belief", and the more concerned I become with living in the way that Jesus showed us. Even the beloved verse John 3:16 which is often portrayed as meaning that Jesus just wants us to believe the right things, is really about action: belief for John's writer is about obedience, not an intellectual assent to a set of abstract theological statements. My tradition, the United Church of Christ, has long been non-creedal and non-doctrinal, so I'm not saying anything new with my confession at the beginning of this paragraph. 

Christianity has spent, I think, too much time trying to figure out abstract theological propositions we're supposed to say "yes" to in order to not be eternally punished in hell (and causing schisms, wars, and an awful lot of hurt along the way) instead of focusing on what Jesus' modeled for us as a good way to live: showing compassion, loving our neighbor, taking risks of faith and trusting in God's love (not God's anger). To live the way Jesus wants us to live is to live in eternal life.

What are your thoughts?

“For God So Loved the World”

Sermon, Year B, Lent 4, March 15, 2015

Plymouth United Church of Christ, Eau Claire, WI

© Rev. David J. Huber

Focus Scripture: John 3:14-21 

Listen to the sermon

I kept my sermon short today because of my sickness: I’m not sure how much I’m going to cough, and not sure how coherent it is when written while drinking a lot of Nyquil.

This passage from John, this is a very famous one. Especially the John 3:16 verse. You may remember back in the 80s and 90s it seemed like every sports game there was at least one person in the crowd holding a giant sign that said “John 3:16”. It’s a famous passage. But I think it’s also often misunderstood. It says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only son so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.”

I think a point of misunderstanding is to take this verse all by itself, which is always problematic when reading the Bible to just take a verse out of context and not talk about how it interacts with the verses around it. I see this one sometimes taken out of context and rewritten, in a sense, so it comes across as saying, “So that those who don’t believe in him will be eternally punished.” That seems to be the flip-side of how this verse is read. I don’t think that it is talking about eternal punishment so much here.

It’s not a heaven and a hell thing that the verse is talking about. For the writer of John’s Gospel, the things that Jesus says are very much in the here and now. They are not future words, about some future rewards or punishment, but something that is right now. And for the writer of John, the way he uses the word “believe” is not simply as an intellectual act, an agreement to a set of propositions. For John, to believe is to obey. Belief is an action. And so for him, the opposite of belief is not unbelief, but inaction or disobeying. To not live the way that Jesus wants us to live. To believe is to live how Jesus would have us live. It is not about agreement to a set of propositions, but a way of life. So for John, the reward and the punishment are in the present moment. Not future, but something that happens right now. So if one believes, that is if one obeys, living the way that Jesus asks us to live, then the reward is right now. The reward is to be living in relationship with God, the way that God would have us live. To disobey is to be condemned already, not to await some future hellish punishment, but to be condemned in the moment simply because it is a life detached and separated from God, which is its own punishment. It is to not live fully into the life that God would like us to enjoy.

To obey Jesus is to live the way of eternal life. Which in John’s Gospel is his way of saying the Kingdom of God, the Realm of God, the Kin-dom of God, some of these words we’ve talked about the past few years. To obey Jesus is to live into eternal life, the way of God’s vision.

When I think of “believing” as a set of propositions, we see it get reduced down to a set of abstract beliefs that must be believed: virgin birth, crucifixion, being raised from the dead, the Trinity. The faith becomes a self-focused way of living in the world. It becomes about whether or not I believe the right things so that I can have my salvation and so that I can go to heaven without any regard to neighbor, other than maybe to get them to believe the same way. But belief has action: to obey Jesus. It is not a self-centered way of living, caring about whether one believes the right doctrine in order to earn salvation, but an outward way of living. About hospitality, love, compassion. To live the way that Jesus lived, on behalf of the other. Belief as action. To obey Jesus is to do what Jesus would have us do.

And to do so in the confidence that, as scripture says, God does not want to condemn the world. God wants to save the world. “God so loved the world.” And therefore loves us. So we can follow in Jesus’ way without worrying about having to be perfect at it, or losing our eternal future if we make a mistake (and especially not if we ‘believe’ the wrong thing, or the right thing the wrong way). We always have God’s grace. God loves us, God picks us up when we fail. Especially if we are failing on the side of love and generosity, on the side of grace.

I had a meeting with some UCC clergy on Friday, part of our Communities of Practice for UCC ministers. We got to talking about this idea of making mistakes and building theological fences to “protect” ourselves, and we thought, if God is going to be upset with us for making mistakes, let it be because we showed too much hospitality, were too generous, erred too much on the side of love, and not the other way. Not that God would condemn for being too loving, but I think you see the point.

To live the way that Jesus would have us live, and trust in God’s grace. Don’t worry about our future salvation, but to offer salvation in the here and now to ourselves and to those who are around us. To live Jesus’ way of love. To go into the brokenness of the world and not be afraid of it. To go into the dark places. Jesus is the light of the world. So go into the dark, and bring Jesus with us. Not to condemn it, but to lift it up, to bring grace and mercy, love and hope. And do so understanding that we are all broken in one way or another. We have broken pottery on our altar table to remind us that we are all broken in some way, all have cracks and dark places, but are all loved, all part of the community of God. We come here to join with one another in that brokenness and help relive some of the suffering from it. Not to judge it or condemn it, but simply to embrace it and bring healing.

God’s love, God’s grace is about life. Jesus is the Lord of Life. God’s love, God’s grace is about life in the here and now. We are loved despite our brokenness, despite our mistakes. No, reverse that: because of them. God knows that is who we are, and God sent Jesus to show us and to say “I love you! I know this is who you are, and I love you. Don’t worry about it. Don’t be afraid.”

We are asked only to be obedient, not to be perfect. To live the way that Jesus would have us live. So the rest of this Lenten season, I ask that you trust in that grace. Trust in God’s grace as we all strive to be obedient and to live in accordance with the way that Jesus would have us live.

Amen.

Human trafficking in Thailand - a personal story

On Sunday, March 8, Plymouth church had two guest speakers, Madison Lovelien and Gretchen Bye. They were in Thailand in January of this year on a mission trip to work with women and children who are victims (or were victims) of human trafficking (slavery), specifically caught up in sex trafficking.

Madison and Gretchen shared some of their story with the congregation about how the trip changed them.

We do not have a text for this, just the audio. The audio begins with a reading of the ten commandments and the story of Jesus overthrowing the money changers in the temple from the second chapter of John's gospel. Fitting scriptures for testimony about the evils of slavery. Their stories can be difficult to listen to, but they also end with much hope for the future.

Listen

I have known Madison for many years. Her family owns the Living Room Coffee House (on Cameron, and at the Luther Hospital, and a few other places) in Eau Claire, which is where I first met her. She is in her first year of college, studying online. Gretchen is a junior at UW-EC studying a form of psychology (sadly I just can't remember).

Communion in More than Bread - sermon for Lent 2.

What if we saw our acts of charity, kindness, and even basic human interaction not just as acts of charity, kindness, and so on, but as sacred acts of communion with the people around us? Communion is not just the bread and wine of the worship celebration we call communion or eucharest, but also our way of being with others, and with all of creation.

What do you think? Have you had a moment in which you felt that you are in the midst of a celebration of holy communion, that was outside of worship and didn't involve bread and wine? Please post and comment below. I'm curious to hear your story! (and let the sharing of that story - a sharing of yourself with others - be an act of communion). 

“Communion in More than Bread”

Sermon, Year B, Lent 2, March 1, 2015

Plymouth United Church of Christ, Eau Claire, WI

© Rev. David J. Huber

Focus Scripture: Gen 17:1-7,15-16 andMark 8:31-38 

[you may also listen to the sermon]

When we were having our soup and discussion time this last Wednesday, the thought came up that transformation often has a cost involved with it. To become something else usually means giving up another thing. Whatever that might be, there is some kind of cost that comes in transformation. And there is some kind of cost in following Jesus as we decide to forsake other ways and focus our attention on following Jesus. One thing Jesus says in this passage is “Take up your cross and follow me.” Which implies some level of discomfort. Even if there is great joy in it, some level of discomfort just simply in that to grow often involves some pain. To grow spiritually is to experience some discomfort. To let go of former thoughts and ideas. Especially if you really liked hem or cherished them. Letting go can have some discomfort, even when you are going to something really good.

There is a cost in that change. To let go of things that are harmful, that are not godly, or that are not, in some way, appropriate for the journey you are on. There is also the cost of entering a new kind of world, as you are transformed. To follow Jesus is to see the world as a bigger world. To see our connection to our neighbors. To see our connection with all of humanity. To see the communion of all of God’s creation together.

That, sometimes, can be uncomfortable. To see the world in such a radically new way, as a much larger place, and to see our responsibility to one another. One thing that came up Wednesday was how even something as simple as going to college can involve this, or joining the military and serving overseas. How having one’s world enlarged and have an experience of that. There is a cost in a change in relationships with family or friends who have not had that experience. I felt that when I went off to college and my friends stayed in the hometown. And then I moved to NYC, and then to Hawaii, back to NYC... and they stayed there.

There is a cost in following Jesus in giving up ways that are not his ways. Following Jesus takes time and money and more, and involves a changing relationship with time and money. Changing relationship with the idea of “Who is my neighbor, who am I in communion with?” You may have friends who say “Let’s go do something on Sunday morning” and you have to respond, “I go to worship on Sunday morning, so I can’t join you.”

Perhaps you’ve had the experience of saying that you go to church on Sunday and receive a weird look. But if you do get a weird look, that’s a good opportunity for extending an invitation to them. “Come with me, and experience what I experience about fellowship, love, being included. Experience it with me!”

I was listening to an interview with Alton Brown, the FoodNetwork star who does Iron Chef, and Good Eats, and other shows. In the interview he said that he travels a lot, but that even with all the travel, sometimes by himself, sometimes with his family, wherever he is he goes to worship on Sunday morning. It’s a non-negotiable for him. He talked about how he sometimes gets weird looks or surprised responses from his crew or other people he’s working with when they invite him to go party on Saturday night and he says, “No, I need to go to bed, so I can get up for worship.” Or if they invite him to something on a Sunday and he says, “Thank you, but no, I’ll be in church.”

To follow Jesus can be to give things up. There can be a cost in that. Jesus says, “Take up your cross and follow me.” Dietrich Bonnhoeffer expanded that to “Jesus bids us to take up our crosses and die.”

Now, it seems that we often think that means we are supposed to suffer or be in misery. But I don’t think that Jesus calls you to intentional suffering on his behalf. As though if you are enjoying your life you are somehow failing a a follower of Jesus. He’s not saying that. But this cross, taking up the cross, is for us to give up our self-centered desires on behalf of the other. To take us away from focusing on ourselves to focus on others. And I think that’s what the cross for Jesus. Yes, it was an instrument of execution and shame. But it also a sign of Jesus’ willingness to take up a literal cross. But it also is a sign of Jesus’ love. A sign that Jesus was thinking of others, not of himself. Thinking of us. “How far will I go to show you my love? I will do this for you.” We can think of Jesus as saying also, “I will let you do this to me” to the people who were doing it to him. “I will let you do this to me. This is a sign of my love for you, that death on a cross is better than self-preservation.” Especially self-preservation through violence. That’s a sign of love.

Take up the cross, take up the way of love. Take up that sacrificial way of love.

We see that symbolized here at this table that is set for Communion. Jesus offering bread and wine, body and blood, for us.

But there is also the Communion that doesn’t happen just at this table. There is communion that comes in taking up the cross for others. Of being Communion for others. Other ways to think of this sacred moment of communion. To see our acts of charity, all the good things we do, rethinking why we do them or what is happening in that process of doing them. Not just acts of charity as being a nice or a kind thing to do, but what if we saw them as sacred acts of communion with the people for whom we are doing with them or for? Sacred acts of communion. If we saw visiting the sick not just as something we do to brighten their day, but as something that we do as a sacred moment of communion with them. Or offering a prayer for someone. Or listening to stories from people outside the mainstream. Listening to the stories of the poor, the homeless, the ill, the goth, the stories of women and children... not just listening as an act of kindness, but as an act of communion with that person. A sharing of one another, body and spirit, with the other person.

Maybe even more simple things. Perhaps you shovel your neighbor’s sidewalk. What if you saw that act not just as a way to help your neighbor, but as a sacred communion moment with your neighbor? You do that because you are connected to them through God, through Jesus, a spiritual connection with your neighbor. To transform a good deed into an act of sacred communion with your neighbor. So the act doesn’t change, but a change – a transformation – of our internal sense of the act. Of the meaning.

Jesus said to take up your cross and follow him. Part of the trick of doing that is that it doesn’t have to be distasteful. It doesn’t mean to do only things that you don’t want to do, or that you don’t like to do. That if you are doing something that you enjoy, then God doesn’t want you to do it. It doesn’t mean that at all. Though part of our spiritual growth is do some things that are uncomfortable or make us feel weird. That’s part of growth. But it doesn’t mean we can’t like what we are doing, or can’t enjoy what we’re doing, and have it be a holy act or have it be an act of communion with another.

I remember when I was a kid, we had a snowblower. For some reason, I’m coming up with a lot of snow imagery today. I’m going to end with a poem that involves snow as well. I don’t know why this is. It’s winter. Snow on my mind.

We had a snowblower when I was a kid, a big one. And it was fussy, so it didn’t work all the time, but every now and again we could get it to work. It was wide, and it had a tall chute that blow snow 10-15 feet in the air. I don’t know why, but I found it hilarious and fun as a kid to run that thing and see the snow flying out of that chute, and see where I could make it blow the snow. So I’d run that up and down the sidewalk. Not so much to help my neighbors, though that was part of it. It was good to help them, and I liked that. But mostly I just loved running the snowblower and seeing what I could do. “I’m going to do this until I run out of gas!” And then my dad pokes his head out and sees me halfway down the block, “Stop it, you’re going to use up all the gas!”

But dad, I’m enjoying it and I’m helping my neighbors.

You can enjoy what you are doing and still be doing ministry. Take up your cross doesn’t mean you have to not like the moment. You can be freely sharing with others because you enjoy it, and still be sharing a moment of sacred communion with someone else. It does not have to involve literal bread and wine, but a moment of sharing of yourself, of your body, your spirit. Who you are being shared with someone else. A moment of communion.

I want to read a poem, by Maren Tirabassi. It talks about communion, starting with communion of bread and wine (though a gluten-free and alcohol-free one) and then turns into a communion of a relationship with someone else.

Maren Tirabassi, Communion [Please be sure to go to this link and read the poem before you finish this sermon]

My morning crumb of gospel hope, not just in the communion at church, but in the communion of the paw-friendly ice-melt used by the neighbor. The writer’s neighbor used paw-friendly ice-melt because she (the neighbor) knew that she (the writer) had a beagle and that she’d be walking on the sidewalk and she wanted to make sure the beagle would have a safe place to walk. She (the writer) thought of that moment also as communion. For the neighbor to have put out the ice-melt, that’s a cross-taking-up sacred moment of holy Communion that we can all do in the cost and in the joy of following Jesus.

Amen.

Noah and God's Repentance - sermon for the first Sunday of Lent

The story of Noah and his ark includes in it a story of God's repentance and transformation. One kind of transformation comes when we have our eyes opened to see ourselves in a way that allows us to ask, "What have I done?" about the pain we have caused to others or to ourselves. God has that moment after flooding the earth, and offers a covenant of the rainbow. Waters of flooding and death become later waters of baptism and new life. We are no longer punished for our mistakes (not by God, anyway), but instead God reminds us of love and mercy and holds us in tender hands.

Have you had a "What have I done?" moment of transformation? How did it happen, how did it work out? 

“Noah and God’s Repentance”

Sermon, Year B, Lent 1, February 22, 2015

Plymouth United Church of Christ, Eau Claire, WI

© Rev. David J. Huber

Focus Scripture: Genesis 9:8-17 andMark 1:9-15 

(you may also listen to this sermon)

We started by reading the end of the Noah and the flood story. I’ll be honest, I find Noah’s story to be a terrible story. It’s a story of destruction and death. I don’t understand why it’s become such a cherished children’s story. People write children’s books about, and make artwork and paintings for children’s room, and toys. Now, it is at one level the story of God saving some lives: Noah’s family, some animals. But at the time that God is saving those few lives God is also sending floods to destroy everything else. All the surface of the earth is being destroyed. Destroying everything. God is so angry at humanity’s sin that it all has to be wiped out, except Noah’s family. And when we read that story it’s so easy to get to the part about the flood waters coming and to say the words about the flood covering the earth, without taking a moment to pause and think about what that means. That God sent the waters to flood the earth and destroy everything. We read those words with no more thought than we might recite a grocery list. Where’s the contemplative pause after reading such terrible words?

I will say, that I do not believe that this literally happened. I do not think the Noah is true in a factual, historical sense. It’s out of character for God, for one thing. It also reflects the point of view and the issues of people thousands of years ago when the story was first being told, retold, and passed down. There is also no archaeological evidence for a worldwide catastrophic flood five or six thousand years ago. But there is some evidence of flooding in the Mideast about that time. So this could very well be a story that began with flooding, perhaps numerous floods over a number of years, and the stories get passed down. If you’ve ever played the telephone game, you know that as stories get passed on, they get changed, embellished, mistakes creep in. These stories also come at a time when people were worshiping a god or gods that were believed to be in control of things. So when a flood happens, then they have to think, “Why is this?” Often, then, the logical conclusion that they make is that the gods must be causing it, and they are causing it because they are angry at us for something. We must have done something wrong, and we’re being punished. Unfortunately, that thinking continues into today. When we have natural disasters now, seems like there are always some Christian leaders who come out and say that the hurricane came because of New Orleans’ sin, or that the school shootings happened because punishing us for our sins, and so on.

That’s a kind of thinking that is stuck in a Noah’s ark ancient understanding of God sending disaters to punish us.

But even without belief in the literal truth of Noah’s ark story, we still have it. It is in our text. It is in our scripture that we call holy. And we have to deal with it.

One thing that I see in it, in the verse from today and also the verses before this one, is a point of redemption in this saga. As we talk of transformation this Lent season, transformation of self, church, community, etc., one part is repentance. To repent is simply to turn around, to change direction to a more godly way. It is not to flog ourselves our feel terrible. Just to turn around from sin, and sin just means to miss the mark, to make a mistake. There is in this story a transformation of repentance: on God’s part. God has a moment here. Whether literally true or not, the text has a transformation that God goes through.

At the beginning of the story, God is getting angry at humanity. We are sinful, wicked, evil. God is angry at humanity for all of its sin and wicked ways. God’s anger seethes and seethes, and rage builds up like water behind the Three Gorges Dam until it bursts and floods the world in watery death.

And I bet that felt good! God may have had a moment that it felt really, really good to let all of that anger out. It can feel good to us, yes? Let that anger out! Throw the plate at a spouse, punch the guy who is offending you, flipping of the guy in traffic, insulting a loved one who, because you love them, you know them well and you know that one place to insult them that’s going to hurt them the most. You tear them down and it feels sooooo good in that moment! Let that anger out!

But as good as succumbing to the anger feels in that moment, it is often followed by remorse. Perhaps you have felt that. Been through that process. A moment of remorse. After all the destruction of the flood, God sees the destruction once the punishment is rendered, once it’s too late to not do it... once God really sees the death and destruction that has been wrought, there is a moment at which God has a change. The text does not say that God was ashamed, but I wonder if that was part of it. I can imagine God looking on the world and saying, “What have I done?”

Perhaps you have asked that of yourself at some point. Or multiple points. I’ve asked it.

I had one big moment, and I don’t want to turn this into a personal confession time, but last September I had a moment. During the week of September 11, I had a very tough week. Most of you know that I was in NYC during the attacks, and so the week around the anniversary is always kind of weird. Usually not too bad, but for some reason last year it was not a good week for me at all. Plus, my car broke down that week, and some other things happened not related to the anniversary just piled on the bad feelings.

So I’m feeling bad that week, and I send messages to Yuki, my partner in Japan to let her know how I’m feeling and what is up. And I didn’t hear back from her for days. For days! And finally, late in the evening on September 11 I was at a total low. One should never write letters when one is really angry. Lesson probably not learned. I was in a rage from not hearing from her, and wrote from my suffering a note to her. It wasn’t long, but it was sufficient, and it was mean-spirited, nasty. She called me soon after receiving it, and we talked a bit. But mostly it was just me yelling at her, and then hanging up. And then I turned off my phone and computer so she couldn’t call me back. And it felt so good! I was in that moment of anger, and I was totally justified in what I said, and totally right! Because she was the sinful, miserable, wicked people and I was the perfect God who was being insulted and having indignities heaped upon me. I totally won! I was so triumphant and so proud of myself. I had won!

But of course, if you’ve been there you know, that you don’t win. It’s not a win. When I woke up the next day, I turned my electronics on and I had some emails from her. And by rights of my rage, her emails should have been full of apology and contrition. By rights of my rage, that’s what I deserved! But they weren’t full of that. They were, instead, a sharing of her story – of what had gone on in her week. They were actually quite compassionate. Way more compassionate than I deserved. And I saw that she was not being the unsupportive intentionally hurtful wicked enemy of all that is good. That was me. I was the one being that.

I’ve done things in my past, been a person that I am not proud of. I don’t know that any of us escape those moments of failure. That’s just part of being human. But we have grace. The gift and beauty of grace and love is that they don’t come to us because we are perfect, and they don’t wait until we are perfect, we have them – God gives them to us – because we are faulty human beings who make mistakes. Who do things that we know we shouldn’t, but we do them anyway. That’s the gift of grace and God’s love, that they come to us despite who we are.

And so that night, I don’t know if I’ve ever been a more horrible person than I was that night. That was perhaps my lowest point at being a decent person. And the irony is that it felt so right at the time! I was so convinced, I felt so justified at the time. I don’t know that I have ever been that mean or unreasonable. That morning, after reading the emails from Yuki, I looked upon the destruction I had wrought and I thought, “My God, what have I done?”

I was transformed there, in that moment of repentance, realizing just how much of a jerk I had been.

I think there is also in this Noah’s story, a moment when God repents. When God looks upon the world that had been created out of love, and then destroyed in anger, and God says, “Never again. I will never do this again.” God creates the covenant with Noah, and with the rest of humanity and with ALL living things, not to do that again. That’s a life changing moment. And I wonder if God had a moment in all this, after all this destruction, that God might have thought, “If Noah and his family want nothing to do with me after this, I will understand. They would be totally justified to want nothing to do with me again.”

There is another transformation that we can see between the Genesis passage we read, and the Gospel lesson we read about Jesus’ baptism. Another transformation that takes place in the biblical epic, and it’s about how water is used. Water, essential for life on earth. Water, out of which our ancestors a billion years or so again crawled onto the land for the first time. The way God uses water changes. God uses water to kill all but a few of humanity and billions of animals in collateral damage, to cleanse to the earth of evil. But of course, it didn’t cleanse the earth of evil, because Noah and his family are still human. They still sin. The destructive power had no power to bring the ends that God had hoped. There is no power in violence. Then God makes a new kind of cleansing via water. Not to destroy life, but to grant life, through the waters of baptism. We are flooded not by suffocating power of water, but flooded with grace and love. Cleaned by the water. God says “I’m not going to wipe you out, I am going to clean you of your guilt, your shame.” God, who stood at a distance and send flooding waters to destroy us, now comes to us as Jesus into our brokenness, into our pain. God came as Jesus, was tempted and understands temptation, knows our human lot, came to live our story and hear our story with a tender heart, and with a tender hand, reaching out with cleansing waters on them to touch us and say, “You are my beloved.”

You are my beloved just as you are. No more floods, no more destruction, just this covenant of the rainbow and baptism. A covenant of hope, of life, and the transforming power of love.

Amen.

Staying Transformable - sermon for Transfiguration Sunday

Sermon from Transfiguration Of Jesus Sunday. It makes reference to clay toward the end - we handed out blocks of clay as people came into worship, and told them to just play with it during worship. No directions about what to make, simply to enjoy playing with it and seeing how many ways they could reshape it and transform it. 

I ask a lot of questions in this sermon, so won't ask them in this introduction. They make more sense in the context of the sermon, anyway. So please feel free to answer them in the comments section!

You can also listen to the sermon.

“Staying Transformable”

Sermon, Year B, Transfiguration, February 15, 2015

Plymouth United Church of Christ, Eau Claire, WI

© Rev. David J. Huber

Focus Scripture: Mark 9:2-9 

So I had this crazy thought this week. Thinking about the Transfiguration. Here we have Jesus up on the mountain. It takes a couple of disciples with them. Doesn't tell them why. Basically just says, hey come with me. We don’t know if this was typical for Jesus to go off with just a couple disciples at a time, or if this was a new thing. And why these? Why not one or more of the others? So they go up the mountain and there's this incredible transformation. Event. Happening. Almost a kind of performance art. A kind of flash mob event that only Jesus could pull off – one made up of Moses and Elijah.

Very much out of the realm of experience. I doubt any of the disciples had seen anything like this before. The text says that they were terrified. Outside of the realm of experience. The disciples see Jesus and he is glowing bright white. Brighter white than anyone could bleach. He’s glowing. There’s a bright light. And there also are Moses and Elijah. I don’t know how the disciples knew that was Moses and Elijah. They never would've seen pictures of them, they had been dead for hundreds of years. Well, Elijah wasn’t. He had been taken up into heaven while he was still alive hundreds of years before.

Incredible moment up on the mountain. Jesus appearing with these two important prophets from Jewish history. Moses the one who led the Hebrews out of Egypt. Elijah one of the great prophets during Israel’s existence. So important that he was taken up into heaven while he was still alive.

And so my crazy thought was this: what if that happened to us? What if one of us had that experience of being transfigured, or bring with someone to whom this happened? I’m assuming that none of you have that had happen. I haven’t. I would hope that as your pastor, if something like this happened to you, you would tell me.

What if that happened to you? What if one of us got transformed, transfigured, whatever word we want to use.

It would certainly be pretty crazy. Probably uncomfortable. It’s weird. This is not the kind of thing that happens in a sensible universe. But then, God is not always sensible. Gods does not always do the sensible thing. The Holy Spirit is not always sensible. Rarely, in fact, does God do the sensible. Very little of importance that happens in scripture happens in a sensible, orderly and proper way. God is most often doing what is not sensible, what is not orderly, what is not proper. The God of Surprises!

And so what if this happened to you? I’m thinking that Jesus knew this was going to happen. Maybe he didn’t. But he knew enough to go up the mountain, anyway. So imagine if you knew this kind of thing was going to happen to you, if you knew that you were going to go to the mountain and have this happen to you, getting transfigured transformed whatever, who would you take with you? Jesus brought a couple of his friends. Who would you take with you? Who would you want with you to witness this event with you?

A friend, spouse, a family member, your pastor? Someone from your past? A teacher, a mentor? Do you take the bully from work or school, that makes your life miserable, as a kind of “Hey, look at this – stop being a jerk.” Take someone that hurt you? Or do you take the people that you are closest to? A mix? Who would you take with you, if you had two, three, four choices?

And when you’re up on the mountain and you are going to be transfigured and have two people, supposedly dead, show up next to you, who would you want that to be?

For Jesus it was Moses and Elijah. Which I think we can take that to mean as a sign that Jesus is in that historical succession of prophets. That Jesus is in line with these two great and famous prophets from Israel’s history. We can see it as a kind of legitimizing event that put the stamp on Jesus, saying yes he is trustworthy. The voice also says, “This is my beloved son: listen to him.” Who would you have show up next to you while you’re radiating this bright light?

I think it would be awfully cool to have Jesus as one of those people. And then have one of the prophets that I really resonate with, like Jonah or Amos or Micah. But we don't have to stick with biblical figures. Would also be pretty cool to have my dad and my mom, or a grandparent and a parent. Or some others from the family who have died that I really connected with. Or maybe some of the people that taught me a lot about life, faith, how to be a generous and kind person. One person I think about, I’ve mentioned her before, is a neighbor lady, Evelyn Kettle. She had an in-ground pool, and when I was a kid she would invite all the kids in the neighborhood to come over every Monday in the summer to swim in the pool. She’d have a hundred kids. She was generous, created bowling leagues for kids because she felt it was important for children to have a place to go. She did a lot for her church. She was a big inspiration to me. Having her next to me would be quite a stamp of approval, to say that I am living, however poorly I do it, at least living into her model.

Maybe you opt for Right Shark and Left Shark...

Who would you have appear in place of Moses and Elijah? Maybe you are thinking of someone in your family who was a big influence on you. Someone who would be proud of the way you are living. Maybe a teacher or a mentor on one side, and on the other side, one of their teachers or mentors. That line of succession there. Or a great, great, grandparent.

Who would you have stand with you to witness, and who would you want to appear?

Maybe not such a crazy idea. But I’d never thought of this story in this way before. What if it were us who were being transformed?

We're going to talk during Lent about transformation, transfiguration, how God is working in our lives, how is God working in Plymouth, how God is working in the world, in the church. And how can we can work along with God, what God might be calling us to be as individuals, as community as a church. How can we be changed? How would we like to be changed? What can we do to bring change, to make the world a more loving world, bringing Jesus’ message to the world?

So maybe within these questions, the bigger question is simply, Who do I want to be? Who does God want me to be? Who do I wish I were? Or who am I growing into being? If we allowed it, what would God shape us into? Like the clay that you have had in your hands this hour.

And in all of this is the question, How am I going to invite God to be part of who I am? Do we bring God with us, or do we forget about God?

Because God can do miraculous things. It is good to have God with us, and that we do what we do, at least as followers of Jesus’, as a response to God’s love and presence in our lives.

And what is God saying inside of this process? Certainly God is saying “You are my beloved.” That is always there. But the rest of the call will be different for each of us. What is God saying to you? What is God saying to you on that mountain with whoever you brought with you and whoever has appeared next to you? What would you like God to say to you?

We are being formed and transformed. God wants to work in us. The Holy Spirit working in us to be God’s people. Like those pieces of clay that you've had in your hands, that you can mold and shape and turn into many things. But which still always remains clay.

But also, just like clay that becomes more and more difficult to shape as it dries out, so also with us. If we lose our moisture, God can't mold us if we dry out. If our spiritual disciplines dry out, it becomes harder and harder for God to mold us. We stay pliable by keeping our spiritual disciplines up, the disciplines of giving, of being in fellowship, or praying, of worshiping, of learning, of being invitational... part of our discipleship is to invite others to join us on this journey. To invite others into God’s realm. So if we don't do those, then we dry out and even God can do little with us. But if we keep up those disciplines, and Lent is a good time to remind us of those disciplines, and opportunities abound during Lent: our street ministry will still be going, our quilters will still be meeting doing service for others, we have the Wednesday noon and evening meals and fellowship time. Those are spiritual discipleship times. We will have opportunities to give, and lots of opportunities to invite. Keep up those spiritual disciplines and we stay hydrated and malleable, and God can do beautiful things with us. God can transform us more and more into God’s people and Jesus’ followers. And by doing all of that, we might just find ourselves being transformed. No, not might – we will! We will find ourselves being transformed. Amen.

Climate Change, Faith, Science - essay for Leader-Telegram for Evolution Weekend

Article for Leader Telegram, February 7, 2015

Evolution Weekend

© Rev. David J. Huber

[read at the version at the newspaper]

Evolution shows that we are not separate from other life, but are related to it. Climate change shows we are not above the created order, but live within it. Our actions affect God's creation; or at a minimum, this pale blue dot called Earth. We are not outsiders looking in, but are part of this grand experiment of God's called "life."

This is Evolution Weekend. Hundreds of religious communities around the world are celebrating how science and faith ought not be confrontational, but cooperative. They will talk about evolution and other scientific truths, like climate change, genetics, the Big Bang, a 4.5 billion year old earth.

Evolution Weekend was started by the Clergy Letter Project by Michael Zimmerman, a Professor of Biology at Evergreen State College. As the CLP's website says, "Evolution Weekend is an opportunity for serious discussion and reflection on the relationship between religion and science. An ongoing goal has been to elevate the quality of the discussion on this critical topic, and to show that religion and science are not adversaries."

As good as that news is, there are still religious communities who deny some science. This is why I and other faith communities continue to speak that there is no controversy, and that reasonableness is better than dogma when it comes to things scientific.

America has an incredible scientific history, but we also have one of world's largest anti-science populations. People who deny evolution and climate change because of what they claim is their literal reading of scripture, though even the literalists cannot agree on what "literally" reading Genesis means, and so date the age of the earth variously from 6,000-10,000 years, or allow for a billions year old earth, but life only existing for 6-10,000 years. As I've written before, the Bible was never intended to be scientific revelation, nor to be taken literally (however one wants to define that word). Don’t take it literally, take it seriously.

I saw a facebook photo meme on Groundhog Day that said "Only in America do we accept weather predictions from a rodent but deny climate change evidence from scientists."

Climate change, like evolution, gravity, and the impossibility of lifting oneself by one's bootstraps, is established science accepted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA. The Department of Defense says climate change is a significant threat to our national security. It is a critical theological and ethical issue because it affects people and our entire planet.

We are to love our neighbor. If we believe Jesus' words, anyway. But our consumption habits and policies made by politicians who deny science are hurting our neighbors.

Forcing neighbors to choke on dirty air or lose their shorelines because we refuse to live sustainably is not an act of love. South Pacific islands like Tuvalu and Maldives are losing shoreline to, and their fertile ground is being poisoned by the salt in, rising oceans. Belize and Bolivia have had armed conflict because of water shortages. Climate refugees leave their homelands because of water and food shortages.

We have a responsibility to consider our neighbors. Our policies and lifestyles ought to be such that the earth remains healthy for all life. This is our only livable spot in the universe, and it is a precious gift from God. Our neighbors are also precious gifts. Let us trust the people who have the training and expertise to give us facts, however difficult it is to hear.

My congregation is celebrating Evolution Weekend with a talk by a climate change scientist, Dr. Jim Boulter, Prof. of Chemistry and Director of the Watershed Institute at UW-EC, who will speak about how his faith informs his scientific and civil work during our 10:30 am worship service at Plymouth United Church of Christ, with question and answer session afterward. For more information, please see the church's webpage or facebook.