Take off Your Blinders

Amos 6:1a, 4-7

Alas for those who are at ease in Zion, and for those who feel secure on Mount Samaria, Alas for those who lie on beds of ivory, and lounge on their couches, and eat lambs from the flock, and calves from the stall; who sing idle songs to the sound of the harp, and like David improvise on instruments of music; who drink wine from bowls, and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved over the ruin of Joseph! Therefore they shall now be the first to go into exile, and the revelry of the loungers shall pass away.

Psalm 146

Hallelujah! Praise the LORD, O my soul! I will praise the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being. Put not your trust in rulers, in mortals in whom there is no help. When they breathe their last, they return to earth, and in that day their thoughts perish. Happy are they who have the God of Jacob for their help, whose hope is in the LORD their God; who made heaven and earth, the seas, and all that is in them; who keeps promises forever; who gives justice to those who are oppressed, and food to those who hunger. The LORD sets the captive free. The LORD opens the eyes of the blind; the LORD lifts up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves the righteous. The LORD opens the eyes of the blind; the LORD lifts up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves the righteous. The LORD cares for the stranger; the LORD sustains the orphan and widow, but frustrates the way of the wicked. The LORD shall reign forever, your God, O Zion, throughout all generations. Hallelujah!

1 Timothy 6:6-19

Of course, there is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it; but if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these. But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains.

But as for you, man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love endurance, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life, to which you were called and for which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. In the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and to Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you to keep the commandment without spot or blame until the manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will bring about at the right time - he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords. It is he alone who has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see; to him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.

As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life.

Luke 16:19-31

Jesus said: There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered in sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. He called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.’ But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’ He said, ‘Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father’s house - for I have five brothers - that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.’ Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.’ He said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’

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The first letter to Timothy might have come in handy for the rich man, like a little "Paul's rules for rich folks.” Or a ‘How Not to End Up in Hades for Dummies.” Paul writes at the end of this morning’s reading “take hold of the life that really is life,” and while the rich man, who spends the entire parable without a name, he probably thought he already had all the best things in life, probably thought he’d figured out what life was for, feasting sumptuously on good things. And it looks as though he might have been so consumed by his consumerism that he didn’t even notice Lazarus at the gate, but he recognized Lazarus up there in the bosom of Abraham, he knew the poor man’s name well enough to beg Abraham to push him around even further. It’s as though, even though Lazarus has a name in this story, his life is not entirely his own because the rich man has so much power over him, so much wealth, so much privilege.

Yeah, that word sure sticks out nowadays, doesn’t it? “Privilege.” Whether this rich man was born rich or worked hard for the money, his wealth afforded him a lot of privilege, even if it was mainly access to food and nice clothing, as this story goes. He has access. He had the ability to ignore what he didn’t want to deal with. Nowadays he might have had one of those “All Lives Matter” sort of responses to people struggling around him. Lazarus was laying out there at the gate, covered in sores, maybe nowadays calling out that “homeless lives matter” or “lives lived in poverty matter,” but that rich man could so easily erase Lazarus’ pain with a swift “why is it always about you? What about the lives of the rich? Can’t we just stick with all lives matter?”

And while every life is sacred, we sure have missed the mark on living like it. And because life is complicated, we might very well know this experience from both sides of it, having one part of our identity erased and another lifted up, depending on our context. What in the world do we do with that sort of complication, living only half-visible lives, feasting on the outside and starving on the inside? What happens when we live as both Lazarus and the rich man, with this gaping chasm in ourselves between who we want to be and what we’re struggling with? And once we find that in ourselves, how do we not see it all around us?

It comes out most in our ‘othering,’ in the ways we place value on attributes like class and race and gender and sexuality, and then treat or mistreat one another based on the value we assign those attributes. It’s why a child who is twelve years old can safely play cops and robbers in a public park if he is white, but will be shot on sight by police if he is black. It’s why a group of white college kids can riot in the streets after a football game and it’s just a lot of fun gotten out of control, but a football player silently taking a knee during the national anthem has become somehow threatening enough to the powerful that the public outcry has become louder than it ever was against those players who are engaged in domestic violence and sexual assault. 

We have a long history of turning a selectively blind eye to those who are different than we are. This has to stop if we are ever to truly take hold of life. The rich man tried to order Lazarus around, tried to get Abraham to play into his hand of treating Lazarus as something less-than, to protect his five siblings who still lived, presumably in the same fashion after their brother, but he never treated Lazarus as a brother, never saw him and all his sores and hunger as an equal human partner in this life that really is life. He got too caught up in his privilege, in protecting his comfort, in sealing himself off from undesirables, and while on the outside it appeared he was well-off, underneath his wealth he was isolated from the world around him, basically suffocating to death.

Moses and the prophets have long told us who we are, really, whose we are, what our worth is and how to live in light of who our God is. Love God, love your neighbor, is what it all comes down to. And while we who are Christian don’t have to worry about Leviticus, don’t have to concern ourselves with fulfilling those First Testament laws now that Christ has fulfilled them all, we do know they point to the kind of God who has come to us in love to redeem the world. Moses led Israel out of slavery and into freedom, and a whole generation of them decided they liked slavery better, so they never made it to the promised land. The prophets call out, again and again, for justice, they bear witness to a God who is on the side of the oppressed, they demand care for widows and orphans because the righteousness of God demands it. And when Moses and the prophets were made inaccessible to a people whose religious leaders had gotten it into their heads to impose a hierarchy of human worth, God stepped down in the flesh to make it plain for us.

This chasm is not so great that God cannot cross over. But this chasm is not only to be feared as a threat for the afterlife, it is only a present reality made clear once death has cleared away our distractions. We live day to day with this chasm, and it is a chasm we ourselves have dug, with bridges we have either neglected to build or have burned along the way. But while we yet live we can always live those second chances, those opportunities to reconnect, to see one another, to sit with each other and find this life that surpasses all of our fears and anxieties about worth and place and comfort. Because the life that really is life grows out of the depths of the love which will never let us go. The flesh and blood life of Jesus Christ, God incarnate, does not erase our differences, does not overlook our peculiarities of race, class, gender, or sexuality. The flesh and blood of God is given and shed for black lives and for queer lives and for lives in poverty and for lives of mental illness and for your particular and complicated life, too. God sees us as we are and loves us as we are, that we may know ourselves to be who we were created to be: Beloved.

How much do you owe?

Amos 8:4-7

Listen to this, you who devour the needy, annihilating the poor of the land, saying, “If only the new moon were over, so that we could sell grain; the sabbath, so that we could offer wheat for sale, using an ephor that is too small, and a shekel that is too big, tilling a dishonest scale, and selling grain refuse as brain! We will buy the poor for silver, the needy for a pair of sandals.” The LORD swears by the Pride of Jacob: “I will never forget any of their doings.”

Psalm 113

Refrain: The LORD lifts up the poor from the ashes.

Hallelujah. O servants of the LORD, give praise; 

praise the name of the LORD.

Let the name of the LORD be blessed

now and forever.

From east to west

the name of the LORD is praised.

The LORD is exalted above all nations;

His glory is above the heavens. R

Who is like the LORD our God,

who, enthroned on high,

sees what is below,

in heaven and on earth?

He raises the poor from the dust,

lifts up the needy from the refuse heap

to set them with the great,

with the great men of his people.

He sets the childless woman among her household

as a happy mother of children. Hallelujah! R

1 Timothy 2:1-7

First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings and all who are in high positions, so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity. This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human, who gave himself a ransom for all - this was attested at the right time. For this I was appointed a herald and an apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying), a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.

Luke 16:1-13

Then Jesus said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property. So he summoned him and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.’ Then the manager said to himself, ‘What will I do, now that my master is taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.’ So, summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ He answered, ‘A hundred jugs of olive oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.’ Then he asked another, ‘And how much do you owe?’ He replied, ‘A hundred containers of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bull and make it  eighty.’ And his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of his age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes. Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”

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Now, it’s easy to say this story really is all about money. And this time of year is typically when churches have their stewardship drives, taking account of the summer’s harvest and preparing for winter, looking forward to budgeting for ministry, considering which ministries are vital to the mission and which can faithfully be let go of. But I don’t think that’s what’s happening here. We tend to find ourselves in parables, and I have to say I found myself in that dishonest manager this week. I doubt many of us would want to be compared to such a character, but one way I tend to default to listening to a parable is to make the most powerful character into the stand-in for God. Usually somewhere along the way I end up discovering that, really, it’s the lowest character on the food chain who is the stand-in for Christ, but for starters, let’s look at this as though God is the rich man, the one with the power to fire and hire, the one with the authority to decide who owes how much and collect as such. Yet the manager who works for this rich one is deemed less than desirable, and has a sort of last minute, death-bed conversion, if you will. He uses the last week of his tenure to make fast friends, to lessen their loads, to use his employee benefits for the benefit of others in order that he has somebody to fall back on when he’s let go.

How does this feel like me? Well, I feel it in my office as pastor. It’s a position that carries more authority in some places than I am entirely comfortable with, and some historical abuses of that authority that I carry each time I wear the uniform, so to speak. Granted, that authority comes not from my Ordination, but from my baptism, so it’s not particular to a pastor, but still I see and hear many church leaders struggle with this sort of weight. It’s the weight of the law of the Lord. The righteousness of God. The grace and the judgment which come with assumptions about what it means to be Christian. So many, in particular many public televangelists and corner preachers, consider it our duty to overburden the world with demands of a certain kind of purity, a peculiar pressure to be separate from and somehow better than the world. I know you’ve heard it, those who claim that suffering happens because we deserve it somehow and our lives will be comfortable once we are “good enough” to earn God’s favor. And how often we assume these things about one another based on the labels we give one another: liberal, conservative, evangelical, atheist… 

This is what I mean about connecting with the dishonest manager. If the rich man is God, the dishonest manager seems to have the power to release people from their debts but only chooses to when it serves him. Forgiveness and acceptance of diversity is not something we Christians have a history of being very good with. In fact, in many ways our history is of hoarding that forgiveness until welcoming others who are different suits our needs to grow. It’s hard to consider how many times churches sit content to ignore their neighbors until it’s imperative that they do outreach so the doors can stay open. Our struggles are not with money, my friends. We know how to use money, how to spend and save and invest and plan. The way we budget our money is the way we live our values. But we have a far easier time putting our money where our mouths are than we do with actually sharing the forgiveness and grace that have been given to us.

See, even if we identify with the dishonest manager, even then we may be missing the point. Loving God more than we love money is not difficult because we are so wrapped up in paychecks and bills and the stress of maintaining or achieving a certain class level. Loving God more than we love money is difficult because we cannot see God, we cannot measure the effects of God, we cannot control the love and grace of God.

And that’s the point. Money is earned and given and spent and lost. Love is not. Money is fought over, and so are our ideas of the moment about who God loves, but who God loves is not up to us to decide. Love is not for sale. Grace is not budgeted out based on who has earned and who has borrowed how much. There is no interest rate on repayment for God’s creative and redeeming love for all the world.

Maybe what the dishonest manager failed to see was how rich his master was, how giving, how forgiving, how abundant. Maybe what he missed was the relationship with the rich man, and the relationship with his debtors. If the rich man is a stand-in for God, then it is all of our rules and expectations that get in the way, it is our middle-man work which stunts the growth of relationship between the rich man and the debtors. If we understand enough of how this world works to know that forgiving people their debts builds relationship, then why don’t we do more of it? Why wait until we are at the end of our rope to use forgiveness of others as a way to save ourselves?

Then again… then again, maybe we aren’t the manager. Maybe we are the debtors, who don’t really get much to say in this parable except to name what they owe to the manager. And if it’s that easy for the manager to reduce our debts, why didn’t he do so sooner? It’s enough to make anybody angry, despite the temporary relief of some debt. Even getting rid of half of my student loans would be enough to let me breathe easier, but if my interest rate can be cut to that which the banks pay, why hasn’t it been, and who decided to pay for their luxuries on the back of my education? Relief and grief and anger have to fit into the story if we are going to be honest about forgiveness coming that easily and being granted that stingily.

Money is easier to handle than forgiveness, when it comes down to it. And if we can’t handle a little thing like our money with trust and hope, how can we handle forgiveness and acceptance freely? How can we live in communities of economic injustice if we can not see the ways injustice harms the soul even more than the wallet? Love is costly, but we’re not talking about money. Money is only a small part of the picture. Love is deeper, more complicated, more lasting, more steady than any market investment, and it can’t be stashed away under the mattress for safekeeping. It shows up like pennies on the sidewalk, like nickels out of a jackpot at the slot machine, like those school fundraisers that will be going door to door soon selling candles or cookies or magazines. Money is so very temporary, so transient, so fleeting. Love, however, love that really matters, that kind of love sticks with you like a bad penny, it’s more difficult to run away from than the IRS.

This love is freely given to us. It’s what we are created for. This love will never let us go, it will never claim we aren’t good enough, it will never require us to earn it, and it will never leave us for a better deal somewhere else. The love of God is abundant, it is gigantic, it is eternal, it is priceless. It is love big enough for this world and every other conceivable world, many times over. It will never run out. The love of God does not depend on us, but it can move us. It can move us to speak up for the earth, as is happening with the Native American tribes protesting the North Dakota pipeline. It can move us to speak up for those who are presumed guilty before they have a chance to prove otherwise, as is happening with Black Lives Matter. It can move us to feed the hungry, as we do with the local food banks and weekly winter dinners. It is a love that moves through the world freely and without restrictions. May that love catch us up in freedom as we greet the days ahead.

First Responder

Exodus 32:7-14

The LORD spoke to Moses, “Hurry down, for your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt, have acted basely. They have been quick to turn aside from the way that I enjoined upon them. They have made themselves a molten calf and bowed low to it and sacrificed to it, saying, ‘This is your god, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!’” The LORD further said to Moses, “I see that this is a stiff-necked people. Now, let me be, that my anger may blaze forth against them and that I may destroy them, and make of you a great nation.” But Moses implored the LORD his God, saying, “Let not your anger, O LORD, blaze forth against your people, whom you delivered from the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand. Let not the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he delivered them, only to kill them off in the mountains and annihilate them from the face of the earth.’ Turn from your blazing anger, and renounce the plan to punish your people. Remember your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, how you swore to them by your self and said to them: I will make your offspring as numerous as the stars of heaven, and I will give to your offspring this whole land of which I spoke, to possess forever.” And the LORD renounced the punishment he had planned to bring upon his people.

Psalm 51

Refrain: Have mercy on me, O God, as befits your faithfulness

Have mercy upon me, O God, as befits your faithfulness

in keeping with your abundant compassion, blot out my transgressions.

Wash me thoroughly of my iniquity

and purify me of my sin;

for I recognize my transgressions,

and am ever conscious of my sin.

Against you alone have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight;

so you are just in your sentence, and right in your judgment. R

Indeed I was born with iniquity;

with sin my mother conceived me.

Indeed you desire truth about that which is hidden;

teach me wisdom about secret things.

Purge me with hyssop till I am pure;

wash me till I am whiter than snow.

Let me hear tidings of joy and gladness;

let the bones that you have crushed exult.

Hide your face from my sins;

blot out all my iniquities.

Fashion a pure heart for me, O God;

create in me a steadfast spirit. R

Do not cast me our of your presence

or take your holy spirit away from me.

Let me again rejoice in your help;

let a vigorous spirit sustain me.

I will teach transgressors your ways,

that sinners may return to you. R

Save me from bloodguilt, O God, God, my deliverer,

that I may sing forth your beneficence.

O Lord, open my lips,

and let my mouth declare your praise.

You do not want me to bring sacrifices;

you do not desire burnt offerings;

True sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit;

God, you will not despise a contrite and crushed heart.

May it please you to make Zion prosper;

rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.

Then you will want sacrifices offered in righteousness, burnt and whole offerings;

then bulls will be offered on your altar. R

1 Timothy 1:12-17

I am grateful to Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because he judged me faithful and appointed me to his service, even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners - of whom I am the foremost. But for that very reason I received mercy, so that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display the utmost patience, making me an example to those who would come to believe in him for eternal life. To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

Luke 15:1-10

Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to Jesus. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.” So he told them this parable: “Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine who need no repentance. Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

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Fifteen years. How has it already been fifteen years? How has it only been fifteen years? I was a freshman in college fifteen years ago today, just starting out in my class on basic stagecraft and learning how to use a T-square, when one of my classmates came in late with the news about a plane and a tower, and it didn’t seem real. Then, flash forward seven years to my last summer as a camp counselor, and I had my first group of campers who were born in or after 2001, who never even knew what the world was like before the World Trade Center fell, before we started these color-coded threat levels at airports and saw a sudden rise in violence against Sikhs and Muslims. And it seems every generation has that definitive historical marker, be it knowing where you were when Kennedy was shot, to living through the draft, to the day the Berlin Wall came down. 

But what do we allow these things to do to us? How do we react, respond, rebuild? What kind of world would we make out of the pain if we could?

When Moses and the Israelites were wandering in the wilderness all those years, it was hard to remember what promises God had made to them, hard to remember the miracles it had taken to get them out of slavery in the first place. So they reverted to worship the way their captors and slave drivers had, by creating a golden calf and singing to it, praying to it, calling it their god so they would have something solid to look at, something they could lay their hands on. The story goes that this made their God angry enough to threaten to disown them. They chose another god, one of their own making (although, really, don’t we all make our own gods?), so the God who brought them out of Egypt told Moses to step aside and let him wipe them out. The God who brought them out of Egypt washed his hands of them, called them Moses’ people, told Moses he wanted no more to do with them because of their transgression.

We really like this image of God when other people are the enemy, don’t we? When we want vengeance, we want a God of fire, when we think we know who the enemy is, we want swift and complete justice to be done. But what if the lines aren’t that clear? What if we just perpetuate the cycles of violence and become the enemy for somebody else? Who will God listen to, then? How can we be sure?

Even God has to be reminded of mercy and faithfulness to God’s promises sometimes. Moses turned the question back around. “These are not my people whom I saved, God, they are your people, under your covenant. Don’t forget who you claim to be.” And the bit that gets me squeamish is that Moses has to get God to consider his reputation in order for God to change his mind. Not the pain of the people, not the mercy and compassion, but how, oh how, will Egypt talk about this God if he lets his people die in the desert after working so hard to set them free from slavery?

We’ve had to work the same way in the past fifteen years, though, haven’t we? What does it mean to be an American? To really live in the land of the free and the home of the brave? What do our founding ideals of freedom of religion mean? So many people died on that day, and death did not discriminate, so why should compassion be any different? Why should compassion reach only so far? Did we ever really see Muslims and Sikhs and people of color and people who speak languages other than English as equal, or did this excuse to lash out at them only reveal our fear of others that had always been there? Do we have to be white and Christian to be American?

Even God, in the first reading today, has a hard time with pain and disappointment and feeling betrayed. But over the course of Scripture even God seems to learn more and more what it means to be in this covenant with people like us, people who hurt and fail and learn and grow and change. So long after Moses, after hundreds of years, hundreds of heartaches, God steps into the world as one of us and tells stories, paints pictures, invites us to imagine a world where compassion far outreaches condemnation, where forgiveness runs deeper than fear, where healing and restoration are the purpose and culmination of our lives.

And Jesus tells the disciples this story about the lost being found. On any other day, we could see it metaphorically, consider it from the point of view of the lost sheep simply missing the mark or misunderstanding or even wrestling with unbelief, but fifteen years ago we saw what it looks like, what it really looks like, for the lost to be found. What the pain and panic and intensity of searching become when another survivor is pulled out, what the joy and relief and breaking open of hearts looks like in the middle of terror. … When we had our dinner for first responders this week, I sat down with a few of them to talk a bit. I heard from one chaplain who went to ground zero a week after the attacks, who saw the shock firsthand, who went through the rubble hearing story after story, exhausted, compassionate. First responders do not have time to decide who deserves to get out of a burning building, they just respond, they just serve and save and then later let things sort themselves out.

And this, my friends, is what the kingdom of God is like. Not vengeance against our enemies, for sometimes we ourselves are the enemy, not violence and retribution, because that sort of hate and fear and reactivity only destroys life. The kingdom is compassion for all, mercy for all, undeserved and unearned, even when unreciprocated. What Jesus does in coming among us, in feeding and healing and welcoming, in dying at our hands, in living again and promising us life, is rescuing us from our self-destruction. Rushing into our systems of oppression and fear and pulling us out. Responding first, and responding again and again, to our pain and disappointment and anger and anxieties, with compassion and grace and forgiveness and a love which follows us into every corner of our lives. He does this for all the world, my friends. Without discrimination. Without requirement. Without checking for identification or status or birth certificates. The kingdom of God is not vengeance, it is healing, it is rebuilding, it is sitting in the depths and bringing out life, again, and again and again. This gift is our definitive story, this resurrection is our moment to be known by, this promise is sure.

Give it all up already

Deuteronomy 30:15-20

See, I set before you this day life and prosperity, death and adversity. For I command you this day, to love the LORD you God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments, His laws, and His rules, that you may thrive and increase, and that the LORD your God may bless you in the land that you are about to enter and possess. But if your heart turns away and you give no heed, and are lured into the worship and service of other gods, I declare to you this day that you shall certainly perish, I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day: I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life - if you and your offspring would live - by loving the LORD your God, heeding His commands, and holding fast to Him. For thereby you shall have life and shall long endure upon the soil that the LORD swore to your ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give to them.

Psalm 1

Happy are they who have not walked in the counsel of the wicked, nor lingered in the way of sinners, nor sat in the seats of the scornful! Their delight is in the law of the LORD, and they meditate on God’s teaching day and night. They are like trees planted by streams of water, bearing fruit in due season, with leaves that do not wither; everything they do shall prosper. It is not so with the wicked; they are like chaff which the wind blows away. Therefore the wicked shall not stand upright when judgment comes, nor the sinner in the council of the righteous. For the LORD knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked shall be destroyed.

Philemon 

Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our dear friend and co-worker, to Apphia our sister, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. When I remember you in my prayers, I always thank my God because I hear of your love for all the saints and your faith toward the Lord Jesus. I pray that the sharing of your faith may become effective when you perceive all the good that we may do for Christ. I have indeed received much joy and encouragement from your love, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you, my brother. For this reason, though I am bold enough in Christ to command you to do your duty, yet I would rather appeal to you on the basis of love - and I, Paul, do this as an old man, and now also as a prisoner of Christ Jesus. I am appealing to you for my child, Onesimus, whose father I have become during my imprisonment. Formerly he was useless to you, but now he is indeed useful both to you and to me. I am sending him, that is, my own heart, back to you. I wanted to keep him with me, so that he might be of service to me in your place during my imprisonment for the gospel; but I preferred to do nothing without your consent, in order that your good deed might be voluntary and not something forced. Perhaps this is the reason he was separated from you for a while, so that you might have him back forever, no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother - especially to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord. So if you consider me your partner, welcome him as you would welcome me. If he has wronged you in any way, or owes you anything, charge that to my account. I, Paul, am writing this with my own hand: I will repay it. I say nothing about you owing me even your own self. Yes, brother, let me have this benefit from you in the Lord! Refresh my heart in Christ. Confident of your obedience, I am writing to you, knowing that you will do even more than I say.

Luke 14:25-33

Now large crowds were traveling with Jesus; and he turned and said to them, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciples. Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, saying, ‘This fellow began and was not able to finish.’ Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.”

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For some reason this weekend, when I hear this Gospel reading I am reminded of, among many other things, the famous Kennedy quote: "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.” On Labor Day weekend, it's good to remember that doing for our country means protecting the workers on whose backs our economy is built. And maybe Kennedy was so young and idealistic as a President that we don’t really hear his words as he meant them. Maybe we have gotten so used to expecting 'our' country to give us the power and privilege we 'deserve' that we have forgotten what it means to be a country of diverse people living together. Part of calling our country to be its best self sometimes means disagreeing with its behavior and calling it out, part of calling our country to its better self means protesting, means working to change laws and policies, means holding those with power accountable for their actions. And it is not always comfortable, and it is certainly not always welcome.

But to stand up for the lives of those who are oppressed and suffering is to walk in the ways of Jesus. To allow injustice to continue while we ignore it as though, just because it doesn't affect us directly it does not exist, that is choosing the ways of death. We should all be familiar with the lines about ‘when they came for the Jews I said nothing, for I was not a Jew, when they came for the communists I said nothing, for I was not a communist, when they came for me, there was no one left.’ There has been a lot of protest in the news lately, a lot of conflict and controversy in the news - which isn’t terribly new, though what we argue about does say something about what we value, doesn’t it? From the rapist who only served three months because the judge saw he had a bright future in swimming (and don't pretend he would have gotten just as light a sentence if he had been black), to the football player who is being threatened and reviled for sitting down during the national anthem, to the Native tribes protesting the construction of an oil pipeline across their protected lands and under a major water source, we have been seeing more and more clearly what people are holding onto and what they are willing to let go of for what they believe.

Jesus calls his disciples to give up everything if they are going to follow him, because in the process of following his example they may well lose everything anyway, and they need to be prepared for that eventuality. Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Martin Luther King, Jr. served some jail time because of their values, as have many peaceful protestors. What would you risk your reputation for, your livelihood? We know the apostle Paul lost a lot when he converted, so many of his letters are written from prison once he became a follower of the Way. His power and authority, his position, his access to certain spaces and people, his colleagues… Becoming a disciple of Jesus basically ruined Paul’s life. He even gave up his name, changing it to Paul from Saul.

The letter Paul wrote to Philemon, which we read today, illustrates another way that being a disciple can turn somebody’s world inside out. Philemon had a slave, named Onesimus, who went to Paul, either as a runaway slave or as a servant sent by his master, and Paul treated him not as a slave but as a brother in Christ. This was a big deal. Even if slavery was run a bit differently two thousand years ago than it has been here in this country in the last hundred and fifty, it’s still labor and ownership and status and power on the line here. Paul was asking Philemon to let his slave Onesimus live as a free man, appealing to his love for Paul, invoking the history of his mentorship in the faith, maybe being just a bit passive aggressive about it: "not to mention you owe me your very life." But, as we know from our history, giving up a slave, really, giving up slavery, is more than just giving up free labor, it’s giving up a mindset. Giving up possessing other people, giving up controlling others, giving up symbols of wealth and power. Putting down dominance for the sake of living into everybody’s freedom is not an easy thing. Those with power never give it up without a fight, which is why those with seeming less power protest and petition and struggle day in and day out to be heard and seen and acknowledged.

Being a disciple of Jesus means we do not set our identity on things we own or jobs we have or money we have earned or who we are related to. It does not even mean setting our value on how well we keep the religious laws, because we all know we all miss the mark there, and that power has been abused for as long as it has been in existence. It almost sounds Buddhist, this letting go of everything in order to follow. We let go of expectations, of demands, of pressures, so that we can freely focus on living, on tending to life all around us, on knowing God and knowing ourselves as created in that Divine Image. When Philemon was able to let go of owning Onesimus, he was granted a brother, belonging with a family, a family which had always been there but had been stifled by slavery and misuse of power.

The lure of the gods of power and prestige and superiority is a strong one, make no mistake. It is tempting to think ourselves better than others because of accidents of birth or systems set up in our favor before we were born. False gods of hate and fear worm their way into every crack and crevice they can find. But to choose life means to choose to disregard those false threats to our value and to see the world around us as it is, to break the bonds of oppression even if we do not see them in our own back yard, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to announce the year of the Lord’s favor rather than the fear of damnation. Following Jesus is not easy, putting down these fears and guilts after being surrounded by them at every turn can take some effort, but the Lord of Life has made it known that life is the ultimate goal, that death no longer holds sway over us, that love wins through the struggle, that we are not ever truly alone in our wrestling and searching.

Our God is merciful and compassionate. We need not be afraid. The God who chases after us will forever seek to give us wholeness and hope and new life.