Sermon: The Difficult Concepts

            Is there such a thing as objective beauty?  You know me and my fascination with comparative religion, so let's look at what the Tao te Ching says about beauty:  "Under heaven all can see beauty as beauty only because there is ugliness.  All can know good as good only because there is evil."  The Tao looks at comparative opposites as being necessary for either to exist.  It teaches a balance of things.

            Now, at the same time, St. Augustine teaches that God created all things good – just look at the first chapter of Genesis.  Therefore, as with darkness only being able to exist where there is light, evil does not exist by itself, but is an absence of good. 

            So to extrapolate from the first question – is there such a thing as objective beauty?  Can beauty exist without a comparison? 

            So let's tackle a question that is easier for us to answer, but still doesn't have an easier explanation:  can good exist without a comparison?  As Christians, we go back to the source – God pronounced His creation good, from the Earth to the Heavens to the animals to humans.  So of course good can exist without evil.  But why do we believe that?  More than that, why do we believe that, and others – like the Taoists – don't?

            The simple and complex answer, of course, is faith.  We have faith that the Bible is the Word of God, and that through the action of the Word, we meet Jesus Christ.  Our Gospel readings these last several weeks have had some pretty tough concepts to understand, and today, it culminates in many of Christ's disciples throwing up their hands, and saying, "This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?" 

            People like things to be clear and understandable.  It makes them clear-cut and able to be categorized.  Unfortunately, knowledge is rarely clear-cut and organized. 

            Did you know that there have been over 8.7 million species of creatures categorized by our scientists?  And that they categorize approximately 15,000 more every year?  Given what they know about our land masses, couldn't they extrapolate an approximate number of species in existence?  And yet, none of them are willing to do so.  Why?  Well, approximately 99% of all living space on Earth is under the ocean, but we've only explored about 10% of that.  Those statistics tell us that there's a lot more that we don't know than there is of what we do know.  And sometimes knowing how much we don't know causes us to have that much more faith that what we do know is accurate and true.

            But how many things do we truly not understand, and still accept it enough on faith that we move forward, just as the twelve disciples did in John's Gospel?

            Let's take for example, Paul's letter to the Ephesians.  Last week, the portion of the letter we read gave us specific examples of how to live:  to choose things wisely, and avoid drunkenness and debauchery; to be filled with the Spirit and exemplifying that through song.  This week, Paul refers to putting on the whole armor of God, using the metaphors of the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of Faith, helmet of Salvation, the sword of the Spirit which is also the Word.  And ensuring that you're dressed head to toe, he advises that you wear whatever shoes will help you be ready to proclaim the Gospel of Peace. 

            There's plenty in that one passage to dig into and discuss, working to understand the complexities of each metaphor.  But right now, we're looking at things that are difficult to understand, and yet we accept that we do not understand them at present.  To do that, we're going to look just a few verses earlier in this letter, to a section that is tough for our modern-day minds to understand:  Paul addresses slaves and masters, exhorting slaves to obey their masters as they would obey Christ, and urging masters to treat their slaves well, as we all have the same Master in Heaven and He shows no partiality.  If God shows no partiality, why is slavery even an issue within Christian society?  And yet, Paul does not tell masters to free their slaves.  He doesn't rail against a social norm of the time.  How do we justify our belief and understanding in the protection of the Armor of God, without addressing the spectre of slavery just 5 verses before?  If you're interested, I just listened to a podcast this week that had an interview with Scot McKnight, who wrote a commentary about Paul's Letter to Philemon, which deals almost entirely about the subject of slavery. 

            The disciples this week don't actually understand the concepts of Christ being the bread of life, of eating his flesh and drinking his blood.  Christians had a reputation for being cannibals in the early formation of the Church for a reason.  They repeated the words of Christ, sharing the bread and wine of the last supper, but not truly understanding them.  Simon Peter's response to Christ's question of whether they would be leaving Him as well is pretty straightforward:  “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.” 

            Religious scholars are numerous as they work through the meanings of words, the context in which they're set, the genre of passages, etc.  Some scholars spend their entire lives trying to figure out one concept, writing article after book after commentary, and finding that truly, it comes down to faith.  The unknown is answered by our faith in God.

            We, like the twelve disciples in today's Gospel, are willing to stay and struggle with the difficult concepts.  Through our baptism, our confirmation, and both our request for our daily bread in the Lord's Prayer and our participation in the Eucharist, we choose to act on what we know and believe, and trust that understanding of the rest will come in time.  We reiterate Joshua's statement, "as for our house, we will serve the Lord."  May the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus.

Sermon - Wisdom

Today, in Proverbs, we are introduced to Lady Wisdom.  There's a ton of symbolism to work through in those first few verses of Chapter 9, but I want to start with Verse 10:  "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight."

Fear in the Old Testament doesn't carry the same connotation that it does today.  Fear comes from the Hebrew word yirah, which has a whole range of meaning within the Hebrew scriptures.  It can mean the fear we feel in anticipation of danger or injury, but it can also mean awe or reverence.  The "fear of the Lord" includes an overwhelming sensation of the glory, worth and beauty of God. 

Some Jewish sages link yirah with another word that comes from the same root, ra'ah, which means seeing.  They feel that if we really see life as it is, we will be filled with wonder and awe over the glory of it all.  Think about that for a second.

Abraham Herschel, who write God in Search of Man, wrote "Awe is an intuition for the dignity of all things, a realization that things not only are what they are but also stand … for something supreme.  Awe is a sense for transcendence, for the mystery beyond all things.  It enables us to perceive in the world intimations of the divine, to sense the ultimate in the common and the simple:  to feel in the rush of the passing the stillness of the eternal.  What we cannot comprehend by analysis, we become aware of in awe."  He notes that such awe is not the goal of wisdom – like some state of nirvana – but rather its means.  We start with awe and that leads us to wisdom. 

So let's start there.  Lady Wisdom invites the simple, those without sense, to come and eat the meal she has prepared.  She's asking that they lay aside their simple, empty lives, to "live, and walk in the way of insight."  She's asking that we step beyond the awe we feel, for that is not the goal, and step into wisdom.

Now interestingly, those words, while different, have the same meaning as the words Christ speaks in our Gospel lesson today.  He invites us to a meal:  "I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh."

And in taking that step from simply being in awe of Him and what He chooses to do for all humanity, we start our way into Wisdom, "Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them" – to live and walk in the way of insight. 

Pretty words.  But how do we go from simple to insightful?  We've talked in the last month or so about asking God for our daily bread.  In doing that, we allow ourselves to abide in Christ, and for Christ to abide in us.  We've taken the first step.  So what are other steps to gain wisdom?

Well, wisdom comes from making mistakes – but not just making them – learning from them, and not making the same mistakes again.  There are plenty of mistakes out there for us to make.  If we keep making the same mistakes, then we're not learning, and we're not gaining wisdom. 

How do we find the right mistakes to make?  By trying new things, gaining experiences that we haven't had before.  While one definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result, the definition of wisdom is the ability or result of an ability to think and act utilizing knowledge, experience, understanding, common sense, and insight. 

Someone once said that a wise man learns from the mistakes of others, because no one lives long enough to make them all himself.  So, gaining experiences that are new to us, is one of the first steps to putting the path of wisdom found in the Bread of Life to use.  Learning from both the mistakes of others, and more importantly, the wisdom of others is the next step. 

Talk to someone you've never spoken with, old or young, with the intention of learning something from them.  Everyone has something to teach.  One of the best lessons I ever learned was from a 5 year old, who wanted to know why I took the word of someone else without even asking her what had happened from her perspective.  I learned to never assume you have the whole story when you've only listened to one person.

You can take a class, teach a class with the intention of collecting the most useful and interesting questions, find a mentor, read a book.  Step out of your comfort zone.  Challenge yourself.  And know that even if you fail, you have gained knowledge, and know how to apply that knowledge to gain wisdom. 

Finally, listen to Paul's words to the Ephesians:  "Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil. So do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is."

Think about the people you know, particularly the simple and those "without sense."  Invite them to a meal, where they can receive the Bread of Life, and start their own path to Wisdom and insight.  If they lack the Living Bread, they won't find the path to Wisdom.  And we vowed in our baptismal covenant to proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ – with God's help.  Our Daily Bread lives within us.  The Holy Spirit is here to guide us to way of Wisdom. 

This faith of ours isn't just a belief.  It has to be an action.

Let us pray:  O God, who by thy Holy Spirit does give to some the word of wisdom, to others the word of knowledge, and to others the word of faith: We praise thy Name for the gifts of grace and we pray that thy Church may never be destitute of such gifts; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Sermon - We Are What We Eat

We are what we eat.  We've all heard that phrase, but where did it come from?  Interestingly, despite all of the current hype about food quality and natural versus organic versus processed, etc., the phrase comes from 1826.  A chef by the name of Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin said, "Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are."  He was literally saying that a person’s mental, emotional, and physical health could be determined by what they ate, and indeed, their very character revealed. The idea that good food led to good character and good health and that bad food corrupted, both morally and physically, has hung on ever since, in some way or another.

But I think we can see in today's Gospel that Jesus said it first.  “Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his seal.”

The allegory of the type of bread that we choose to eat is speaking not to a person's physical health, but rather to their spiritual health.  Our problem is not that we eat bread, but that when faced with a choice, we often choose poorly.

For instance, from our Old Testament lesson, the Israelites were provided with "bread from heaven", but they didn't know exactly what it was, so they called it manna.  Manna literally means "what is it?"  It wasn't bread ready to eat – it was a concentrated form of something that could be made into bread or cakes.  As a result, they never changed the name, and always called it manna – what is it?  The Israelites were surely not the only ones to have eaten of the bread of complaint, dissatisfaction and fear.

In our modern day, in the Middle East, both sides eat of the bread of violence and war.

Politicians of every ilk share the bread of negativity, hostility and name calling.

Sometimes, we eat of the bread of hurt feelings and resentment; other times of loneliness, fear and isolation; and still others of sorrow, guilt and shame.

We are what we choose to eat.

Shall we eat of the bread of power and control, or perhaps the bread of revenge?

The bread we choose to eat reveals a great deal about the nature of our appetite.  The world is full of bread, and yet far too many live their lives unfulfilled and searching.

In a little bit, we're going to sing the song, "I AM the bread of life."  But think about the words of Christ:  “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty."  And then think of the refrain of that song:  "And I will raise him up."

Every interaction that we have, every thought in our head, every action that we take – is a reflection of the bread that we choose to eat.  Each of the types of bread that I listed before are temporal and perishable.  And in every situation, each and every day of our lives, just as each day saw new manna, as the old was now inedible, we have the choice of the bread we will eat – perishable or imperishable.  And in each of those choices, we choose the life we want to live.  We are what we eat.

Someone asked me what the Episcopal Branch of the Jesus Movement means.  The Presiding Bishop Curry explains it pretty well.  In choosing to live a life oriented around the teaching of the Gospel, we demonstrate to others that our faith is loving, liberating and life giving.  We commit ourselves to going into the world to help the world become what it will become.  And the power of the Holy Spirit moving through me allows other people to see what Christ's way is all about, and allows me to choose the Bread of Life with every interaction.

So I'd like to challenge you this week to begin each day asking God to give you the Bread of Life – we ask for it every time we say the Lord's Prayer, so think about what exactly that means, every time you say it.  And when you ask for the Bread of Life, you ask Him to allow you to be the witness to Jesus' word and ministry today.

At the end of each day, reflect – without judgment – and ask yourself, where did I have an opportunity to practice witnessing?  And that doesn't have to be words, but can be actions or gestures, simple examples of the loving, liberating and life-giving ways of Christ.  Ask yourselves, did I take advantage of those opportunities I had?  Where might I have chosen differently than I did?  And thank God for His provision of the Bread of Life, for His gift of Jesus Christ to us – in all that that means.

Let us pray:  God, our hope, as we gather now to worship you, fill us with anticipation and prepare us by your Spirit. Be the first thought in our hearts and help us to be conscious of your direction. Strengthen us for your service, nourish us with the bread of life, transform us for your work.  In the name of Jesus Christ, we ask this. Amen.