Author: Kyle

Google Pittsburgh sign

I have a hunch: The church and the maker movement

Kyle

I have a hunch.

The maker movement is changing the way we think about education, formation, creativity, job training, and so much more.  I think the church is going to learn a lot from this movement. I think the church is a natural participant and partner.

“The world is a better place as a participatory sport,” says Mark Hatch. I say the church is nothing if not a participatory sport.

I don’t know where any of this is going, but I know I can’t not write, think, and do something about the way I came alive when Lisa Brown and I spent the week with a bunch of makers in Pittsburgh recently. I know it’s not just because I’m engineer. The church is called to creativity.

The church has a lot to learn from the maker movement, and I hope vice versa. Let’s test that hypothesis in as active a way as possible.

More soon.

e-Formation banner

e-Formation FAQ

Kyle

It’s that time of year again—the e-Formation Conference is almost upon us. Here’s my stab at the e-Formation FAQ blog challenge.

Q: What is e-Formation?

A: A learning community for ministry in a digital world, convened by the Center for the Ministry of Teaching at Virginia Theological Seminary.

Q: Why should technology matter to churches?

A: Because digital media are helping churches reach out to their neighborhoods and strengthen the ties among their members. Because technology is helping individual Christians explore and deepen their faith outside of Sunday morning. Because the Spirit of God is with us wherever we go (Psalm 139). Because Christ has no online presence but yours.

Q: What is e-Formation 2015?

A: This year’s big e-Formation gathering—150 or so ministry practitioners sharing hands-on training and big-picture inspiration. You can check out this year’s program here.

Speakers include author Keith Anderson, Augsburg Fortress CEO Beth Lewis, Scott Gunn of Forward Movement, Anthony Guillén and Jake Dell from the Episcopal Church Center staff, and so many more.

Q: Tell me about the cost, location, etc.

A: The event takes place June 1-3 on the campus of Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, just a few miles from Washington DC’s Reagan National Airport. Limited on-campus housing is still available for the evenings of May 31 through June 3. The cost of attending the full conference is $279, and online registration is available here.

Q: Is there somewhere I can get a taste of last year’s event?

A: Absolutely. Our #eform14 Pinterest board contains links to workshop materials and recordings from last year, and there are photos on RebelMouse and Flickr. You can also read our summary here, or check out blog posts from participants Chris Yaw and Nurya Love Parish.

Q: What if I can’t afford the time and expense of attending?

A: For just $79, you can purchase webinar access to the conference for simultaneous participation with a lively online audience and/or later streaming of recorded workshops and plenaries. For $99, you can purchase a single-day pass. And students can take advantage of our discounted registration price of $167. Find more information on the registration and webinar access pages.

Q: Are there opportunities for training in Spanish?

A: Yes, absolutely. Through our partnership with the Episcopal Church Latino/Hispanic Ministries office, we are thrilled to offer an evening program in Spanish corresponding to each day’s conference theme (Monday: congregational growth and development; Tuesday: tools/skills bootcamp; Wednesday: faith formation and learning).

Participants can attend in person or online via Zoom at prices designed to be affordable for everyone. Simultaneous interpretation will also be available at the conference for the plenaries and a small selection of workshops. Learn more about e-Formation en español here.

Q: OK, so why should I come to e-Formation?

A: I’m most excited for the insights from innovators on the cutting edge of faith formation and technology. Last year that meant Sarah Lefton from G-dcast. This year, for me, it’s Beth Lewis. She’s CEO of Augsburg Fortress, whose sparkhouse imprint continually rocks my world. I can’t wait to get a behind-the-scenes peek at the work she does and to pick her brain about curriculum design in the 21st century.

New Fire

We have been this way before: An Easter Vigil homily

Kyle

Great Vigil of Easter

We have been this way before.

Once again, Jesus gathered us together in community. Once again, we left our betrayals and our brokenness at the foot of the cross. Once again, we were there when they laid him in the tomb. Once again, he proved to us that the powers of sin and death are as nothing compared to the power of the grace and mercy of our God.

We have arrived at this place by the telling of the story. And there are only a couple of required chapters. One of them is the story of the Exodus, the crossing of the Red Sea, the liberation of the Ancient Hebrews from their bondage in Egypt.

If you know that story, you know it is more a beginning than an ending. The same is true for us this night. *

We too have been set free, free from the bondage of sin, free to embark on a journey into the unknown with our Redeemer.

Where will we meet the Risen Christ along the road? What will we do with that most precious gift of redemption and new life?

We have been this way before, but what happens next is another holy mystery.

Beloved, we are God’s children now—redeemed, renewed. What we will be has not yet been revealed.

* This is, if memory serves (now), where I drew a total blank, said something halting and lame, and ended the sermon. Preaching with out notes at the Vigil? Much more perilous than doing so on Palm Sunday, apparently.

Photo from St. Paul’s, K Street, website.

Family prayer

Resolving to practice faith at home: A sermon for the Feast of the Holy Name

Kyle

Feast of the Holy Name

(Numbers 6:22-27; Galatians 4:4-7; Luke 2:15-21; Psalm 8)

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Some of you know that my job at Virginia Seminary is as a coach and curator in the area of Christian formation. So I spend my days immersed in the world of best practices for teaching and learning about faith, for claiming and practicing and living faith. It’s my job to distill and share what church leaders, researchers, curriculum writers, seminary faculty, and others have learned about passing on this great gift of God.

One of the chief lessons of this work might surprise you: Studies have shown that the most significant factor among those that help faith “stick” in adolescents and persist into adulthood is what researchers call “family religiosity”: talking about faith, participating in household devotions, serving those in need as a family. In other words, faith is formed, or not, in the home—more so than in church, it turns out. And adults benefit from family religiosity too, both of their family of origin and their faith at home practice as adults—even single adults.

This is both an intimidating and an empowering reality. Even if we sometimes feel unsure about adapting or creating family prayers, rituals, and other practices (and I don’t mind admitting that I do), it’s nice to have this concrete reminder that the way we live our everyday lives matters not just to God but to the corporate lives of even our smallest faith communities.

That, in my opinion, is why it’s worth rising early-ish on New Year’s Day to celebrate this Feast of the Holy Name, or what the 1662 prayer book called the Feast of the Circumcision.

The story of Jesus’s first day on earth is dramatic, what with the full inn and the manger, the shepherds and flocks and heavenly hosts crying Gloria! The story of the baby Jesus’s eighth day of life is briefer and relatively ordinary: “After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child; and he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb” (Luke 2:21).

The circumcision and naming was just the first rite of passage for Jewish boys in Ancient Israel. It almost certainly took place at home, and not in the Temple as some Christian art portrays. But this art may be confusing the Circumcision of Jesus with the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple, which happened next. Luke tells us this later rite took place partly in fulfillment of the Torah’s command to redeem firstborn sons by the sacrifice of a lamb or, in the case of poor couples like Mary and Joseph, two “turtle-doves or young pigeons” (2:24b).

We don’t know much else about the faith practices of the Holy Family, except for a yearly pilgrimage to Jerusalem. And Jesus did not live to reach many later life-stage transitions. But he did famously attend a wedding feast, and use that particular rite of passage as a metaphor in much of his teaching. We also believe that he instituted the Eucharist in another bit of at-home religious observance: the sharing of the Passover meal with his friends.

Even those of us who are terrified of praying or talking about God at home have probably been attending to family faith during the holiday season. We made ready our homes with decorations. Perhaps we lit Advent wreaths. And we almost certainly gave or received gifts or participated in a festive meal. I believe these practices and the holiday season in general can be a source of valuable momentum for this particular aspect of Christ-like living.

So in addition to its primary meanings, I submit that we might think of today more broadly as a feast honoring rites of passage, a feast celebrating everyday faith.

To observe it, let’s spend some time considering how in 2015 we might attend to our faith not just at church but in our households of whatever size.

  • What new or additional ritual might help faith stick a bit more for us?
  • What practice with friends and loved ones could regularly gather us around the light of Christ?
  • What rite of passage or other life transition might provide an occasion to give thanks for God’s many blessings or even to share with God that we’re ready for better?

There are so many resources to recommend, but we might make a start by taking a look at the Daily Devotions for Individuals and Families found on page 136 of the Book of Common Prayer. And if they don’t appeal to you, ask your fellow parishioners or one of the clergy for some ideas. The most important thing is that you find a practice that works for you.

So Happy New Year. Happy Feast of the Holy Name. And happy hunting at home for new ways to engage and deepen your faith in the God who came among us in an extraordinary—and also ordinary—human life.

Image credit: “Thanksgiving 2008” by Matthew Self via Flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0)

March for Justice in Washington DC

Psalm 126 and National Lament: Black Lives Matter

Kyle 2 Comments

Advent 3, Year B

Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11; Psalm 126; 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24; John 1:6-8, 19-28

With profound respect and gratitude to the many people whose writing and witness helped me prepare, including Remington Gregg, Osheta Moore, Mike Kinman, Broderick Greer, the Theology of Ferguson/StayWokeAdvent/DearWhitePastor crew (especially Micky Jones and Jake Dockter), Mike Angell, and Emily Scott.

PDF | Audio (soon, or via Dropbox) | Text:

Our psalm today is the perfect prayer for the season of Advent. It’s a song of in-betweenness, then as now. Of hope, yes, perhaps, but not a cheap hope. Maybe a hope in the midst of lament. Let’s hear the translation from our prayer book:

When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, *

then were we like those who dream.

Then was our mouth filled with laughter, *

and our tongue with shouts of joy.

Then they said among the nations, *

“The LORD has done great things for them.”

The LORD has done great things for us, *

and we are glad indeed.

Restore our fortunes, O LORD, *

like the watercourses of the Negev.

Those who sowed with tears *

will reap with songs of joy.

Those who go out weeping, carrying the seed, *

will come again with joy, shouldering their sheaves. (Psalm 126, BCP)

Of course, the poetry of the original Hebrew and this artful translation is much of the initial appeal here. Both the music and the message of those final verses are simply stunning. When the Lord restores the fortune of Zion, it is a bountiful harvest for those who have been in waiting.

It’s not hard to imagine this psalm being a favorite of the young Jewish man who went on to preach over and over about the upside-down kingdom of God. There is an unmistakable pattern to Jesus’s teaching, to Jesus’s promises, to Jesus’s prophetic actions, to Jesus’s presence with us still by the power of the Spirit. The message is that God cares about the suffering of God’s people, especially the most vulnerable. And God will deliver them. God longs to grant release, recovery, redemption, restoration.

It’s all those “re”s that make this psalm powerful, and hard. In the opening verses, the people remember a time of great promise:

When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, *

then were we like those who dream.

Then was our mouth filled with laughter, *

and our tongue with shouts of joy.

Then they said among the nations, *

“The LORD has done great things for them.”

The LORD has done great things for us, *

and we are glad indeed.

But here’s where it all comes crashing down; here’s where we realize where we are and what’s at stake. Here the Psalmist speaks to God in the imperative voice: the command form, you may have heard it called in language classes. But here it is a plea:

Restore our fortunes, O LORD, *

like the watercourses of the Negev.

That one shift in perspective changes everything. Now we realize we’re in the midst of what one scholar calls a National Lament: O Lord, we remember the bounty, the optimism, the reputation in the sight of our neighbors. They are lost to us. Restore our fortunes. Burst forth in the desert like a river when the rains came.

Those of you who have studied the narrative arch of the Hebrew Scriptures, perhaps in Pilgrims class, perhaps while studying The Story last year, will recognize here one of the “troughs” in the cyclical ups and downs of the life of the people of God.

God reaches out. The people respond in faith. The people get complacent. Complacency turns to disobedience. Disobedience turns to hostility at the bearers of God’s message of repentance. Finally, God chooses a messenger that the people cannot ignore. The people repent. God forgives. And the cycle begins again.

Of course, it wasn’t only so for the Jews of the Ancient Near East. Advent 2014 has coincided with the deepening of our own sort of national lament.

We’re not pleading for a bountiful harvest, or the restoration of our homeland, not literally. Our songs today are punctuated with different refrains: Hands up, don’t shoot. I can’t breathe. Black lives matter.

The killing of African Americans Mike Brown and Eric Garner, and the subsequent grand jury acquittals in recent weeks of the white officers who took their lives, have brought an urgency to the conversations about the racial injustices that still plague our nation, and still grieve the heart of God.

On Thursday, black staffers on Capitol Hill staged a walk-out in solidarity with those who are suffering. Senate Chaplain Dr. Barry Black led the prayer: “Forgive us when we have failed to lift our voices for those who could not speak or breathe themselves.”

Among those who have helped bring these conversations home for me is our parishioner Remington Gregg, who shared these reflections a week or so ago on Facebook and gave me permission to share them here:

This is not a question of pro- versus anti-law enforcement. Nor is it a question of absolving those who died. One of the reasons why so many people are enraged is because there seems to be a complete lack of comprehension by some to admit that there is even a problem. That there is suspicion among some—I stress some—members of society when they see a black man … People cross the street. Security guards follow us whilst shopping in Brooks Brothers. And executives disregard our resume because a name sounds too ‘urban.’ Many just want an honest conversation about how, in 2014, the United States still propagates individuals who see pillaging in Seattle and call it ‘shenanigans,’ but see the same thing in Ferguson and call folks ‘savages.’

Somewhere in the cycle of sin and repentance comes the point where the people have that honest conversation. I don’t think we’re there yet, but we’re making progress. This psalm is an excellent spiritual song to sing on our way together. And this season, with it’s call to keep awake, is the perfect time to continue making steps forward as a nation.

For those of us who don’t have first-person experience of violent discrimination, waking up means tuning in to the voices crying out. Osheta Moore of the Shalom in the City blog recently wrote, “I wonder if the love that is spun in the words, “I’m listening and I’m sorry” can change the very fabric of this world? I think so. I think this is who our God is …” She goes on to name the various ways she is listening, including this one:

I’m listening to Christians who don’t want to acknowledge racism. I’m sorry it’s unsettling to look this darkness in the face, but Jesus looked darkness in the face for you. In his very body he suffered pain and abuse to express your great value to God. In light of this, can you look darkness in the face by listening to me and millions of black women when we cry out unsettled by the devaluation of the bodies of our black boys, men, fathers, and brothers? Will you ask God what you should do with such a precious gift?

No matter what our race or color, let’s make sure we’re not squandering God’s gift of life. Let’s make sure we’re not avoiding uncomfortable conversations or assenting to the status quo with silence.

Of course all lives matter, as some have started shouting in misguided reaction to our growing cultural refrain. That’s not the point for the time being, in the wake of so clear a message that our systems of law and justice continue to be broken for some. At this time, in this season, black Americans feel understandably exhausted and betrayed. It is the responsibility of all Americans and especially all Christians to claim for themselves the message that black lives matter, and to stay awake for opportunities to make that proclamation more than just a slogan or a hashtag online. But slogans and hashtags are a start.

In this nation, in this city, in this neighborhood, it should be impossible to hear “then were we like those who dream” without remembering or at least being reminded about a time when people of goodwill throughout our nation were inspired by one man’s dream, claimed it for themselves, and responded with integrity and courageous action.

It will take no less commitment from all people of goodwill today to tackle a problem that too may still believe has already been dealt with. May we remember that our walk with God and neighbor will always be of a more cyclical character, our progress always hard-won and fragile.

And may Advent 2014 continue to be a time when we keep awake in hopeful expectation for the time when we can all proclaim—not only with our lips but in our lives—that black lives matter. Restore our fortunes, O Lord. Your people need you.

Horcrux: The locket

Horcruxes, podcasts, and singleness of heart: A stewardship sermon

Kyle 2 Comments

Proper 24, Year A

Isaiah 45:1-7; Psalm 96:1-9; 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10; Matthew 22:15-22)

PDF | Audio (or via Dropbox) | Text:

Of all the profoundly adult spiritual insights J. K. Rowling explores in the Harry Potter series, the most fascinating to me is an object the wizards call a horcrux. Over the course of the series, we learn that the seemingly immortal dark lord has maintained his grasp on earthly life by dividing his soul into pieces and hiding them in objects of personal and social resonance.

These objects become both the signs and the anchors of his twisted power and indeed his very existence. Our heroes’ shared journey is a race to find and destroy the horcruxes before doing battle, one last time, with what’s left of the man himself.

If there’s a sense of inevitability as the seven books pile up, it comes not from the vague idea that good is going to triumph over evil but from the specific notion that the Dark Lord Voldemort is a house divided against himself. He has passed beyond any unity between his actions and his humanity. He may be single-minded, but he lacks the virtues named in our Rite II post-communion prayer: “gladness and singleness of heart.”

***

It’s tough to read the entire Harry Potter saga in a self-aware way without reflecting on the horcruxes we create in our own lives, the vessels into which we pour our own divided souls according to an alchemy that will always leave us diminished.

A bank account can become a horcrux, or a smartphone. The perfect home, or body, or professional portfolio. Dare I say a bookshelf? Dare I say a church building? And yet we know that no earthly object was meant to contain our souls, not even our earthly bodies in the end.

Only the very heart of God can contain, uphold, and embrace our fullness. There is no lesser altar onto which we should pour out the sacrifice of our lives. In a sense, the alignment of our intentions with God’s will be our very salvation.

***

The biblical writer known to scholars as Second Isaiah profoundly understands singleness of heart, of purpose, of vision. Twice in these seven verses we hear the following words: “I am the Lord, and there is no other.”

That’s not just an empty refrain. This passage declares that the creator of the universe is also at the center of human affairs. Cyrus the Great, who didn’t know the God of Israel from Adam, has become God’s chosen servant. A foreign conqueror has been selected to show the whole world that there is no other God but the LORD.

We see no division here between the political and the spiritual, between the economic and the religious. It’s a unitive vision of our world. Everything belongs to God and will serve God’s ultimate purposes.

Jesus, too, warns us about dividing our souls into pieces, about parcelling out our loyalties, about sectioning off the difficult parts of our lives. Recall his admonition that “No one 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.” (6:24).

Against that backdrop, it’s peculiar at first to hear today’s gospel saying, about giving to Caesar what what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God. And then we remember that our coins may not bear God’s image, but we do. What does God expect from us? Our very selves, our souls and bodies, our wholeness.

Isaiah, Matthew, and our Lord agree: In the life of faith, the question is never “God or …” or even “God and …” but rather and finally “God in …” If Jesus gives a “God and …” answer to a “God or …” question, it is only to make a “God in …” point: “Give to God the things that are God’s,” and remember that that is everything.

Our God who is in all wants us to be all in.

That doesn’t mean Jesus is raising the biblical tithe to 100%. It does mean that God should be fully present in our budgeting process and our giving decisions. God wants our full awareness, our full commitment, an all-embracing relationship of love and service.

Even if it meant giving zero dollars to the church, I guarantee you that God would rather have that fullness than ten percent of any sum given without a second thought to its impact on the church’s mission or our individual discipleship. But to be all in in spirit, most of us need to give substantially of our time, talent, and treasure.

***

I’m wary of stewardship sermons that seem to let the preacher off the hook, so here’s a personal example that helped make this idea real for me this week. I have long been an admirer and user of WorkingPreacher.org, an online sermon preparation resource from Luther Seminary. It is an effort of incredible scope and quality. Almost 300 scholars from dozens of schools have contributed more than 2,000 commentaries on weekly readings. And the commentaries are just the beginning.

The real inspiration to me is the Sermon Brainwave podcast, a collaboration of four Luther Seminary professors. For those of you who don’t know, a podcast is like a radio show whose episodes can be individually downloaded for on-demand and often on-the-go listening.

I produce a biweekly podcast as part of my work at Virginia Seminary. We’ve been at it for a year or so and just recorded episode 25. I can tell you that it is a ton of work. That these busy faculty members have recorded and distributed 378 episodes is nothing short of astonishing.

When I look at this project, I see a team that is all in for the mission of God. No one would fault these professors for focusing more narrowly on current students, or on their own research and writing. But Rolf Jacobson, David Lose, Karoline Lewis, and Matt Skinner have made a decision about God’s call for them, and they reaffirm it every week when they press record. They give their time and talent to produce a free resource for preachers all over the world, one for which they receive no royalties and, I fear, precious little esteem from their colleagues in the academy.

As I reflected on my own stewardship this week—and made use of Working Preacher to prepare this sermon—I realized I needed to be all in too. I decided not to live with a divided consciousness, benefiting from this remarkable resource but ignoring its need for my support. Maybe some of you have had the same experience during a public radio fund drive.

So I finally made a gift. It’s not going to pay anyone’s salary, but it was a good deal larger than the token donations I routinely make—donations that, if I’m honest, I know are intended principally to get phone volunteers or the tickling of my conscience to leave me the heck alone.

With a click and a monthly credit card deduction, the Spirit’s prompting helped me bring my actions into slightly better alignment with my values. I took a baby step toward singleness of heart. And, not surprisingly, I found the gift of gladness there as well. Working Preacher became, for me, in that moment, a sort of anti-horcrux, an earthly well of grace, and opportunity to nourish my soul on the inspiration of God’s Living Word, and to help share that richness with others.

So there’s a little part of my story. But let’s bring it back to St. Paul’s. In the weeks ahead, I hope that our prayerful discernment, our frank and perhaps uncomfortable conversations, and at last our decisive action will be marked by a profound desire to live united. What delights and inspires us about this community? What challenges us and helps us grow? We all have amazing answers to those questions. So whatever the quantity of time, talent, and treasure we contribute to these efforts, let’s let the quality of our support be whole-hearted.

Let us pray.

Gracious Lord, grant to each of us that precious gift of your Spirit: singleness of heart. Help us find peace, meaning, and gladness in the fullness of our support for your mission among us. And help us offer to you what is yours: the fullness of our lives. Amen.

What I sent to TREC about ‘the contractor thing’

Kyle

Last week I attended a churchwide meeting convened by the Task Force for Reimagining the Episcopal Church (TREC). It wasn’t a “reading a public statement” kind of affair, so I wanted to post the feedback I sent to the committee. I did ask a question that spoke to these concerns, and I’m writing about it today over at Key Resources.

My name is Kyle Oliver. I’m the digital missioner in the Center for the Ministry of Teaching at Virginia Theological Seminary. I serve as well as a part-time parish priest here in Washington and a board member for Forma, the Episcopal Church’s independent network of faith formation ministers. My comment is about the proposed “transition in the mission-related staff of the Church Center to a primarily contractor-only model.”

In our center’s resourcing and training work, we regularly collaborate with the Church Center’s Lifelong Christian Formation Office and also the Diversity and Ethnic Ministries Office. The local church needs these Church Center staff members. They do a ton of the heavy lifting of forming and resourcing the parish, diocesan, and campus ministers who pass on and nurture faith at the local level. And none of our reorganization will matter if we aren’t forming disciples.

As you know, fewer and fewer dioceses have the resources to support local faith formation excellence. Already there is much more demand for low-cost training, consultation, and resource-sharing than is available, and the situation would get much worse under this proposal. Of course it is possible, though probably not just, to outsource and commodify specific faith formation programs and other projects. But you can’t outsource the rest of what these ministers do, which is provide invaluable support for the many effective networks doing good work around the church.

Networks may not have centers, but they do have hubs. They may not need executives, but they do need conveners. The faith formation ministry ecosystem needs well-connected connectors, idea-bouncer-offers, experienced mentors, and wise stewards of pilot money to help new projects get off the ground. I believe no one is better positioned to do such work than highly qualified, full-time church center staff members.

Michelangelo's "Young Slave"

Conforming to Christ: Romans 12 & Michelangelo’s Prisoners

Kyle

Proper 16, Year A

(Isaiah 51:1-6; Psalm 138; Romans 12:1-8; Matthew 16:13-20)

PDF | Audio (or via Dropbox) | Text:

I want to begin by passing on a word of thanks and admiration from a recent visitor. It was sent to our music directors and acolyte coordinators but applies much more broadly. The Rev. Dr. William Bradley Roberts is a professor and the director of chapel music at Virginia Theological Seminary. He writes,

Seldom am I compelled to write after visiting a parish on Sunday morning, but I must share some impressions with you of worship last Sunday, August 17.

At a time of year when most parishes drastically cut back their liturgical offerings, worshippers at St. Paul’s were led in a manner that most parishes might consider a festival service. We belong to another parish but are regular visitors to St. Paul’s, and last Sunday we felt it had been too long and was, therefore, time for us to worship on K Street. Now I see that inclination as the movement of the Holy Spirit.

The liturgy and music were exhilarating … It was a feast. [… there were so many thrilling moments it’s hard to know where to begin. The anthems were done with elegance … Improvisations occurred at various places that many would easily have assumed were carefully constructed compositions … the people responded accordingly, singing with faith and fervor.]

… I know that parishes often hear from people who are distressed about something, so I wanted you to hear from this worshipper when everything was just about perfect … Sunday was an extraordinary experience at an ordinary time of year, and we came away blessed because of it.

Nice, huh? It’s good to take a moment to celebrate when the occasion presents itself, especially in a parish where perhaps we are sometimes too hard on ourselves. I hope this well-deserved kudos can provide for all of us such an occasion today.

If you’re looking for further cause for celebration, I suggest you check in with the work of our search committee. I believe the recently completed parish profile is a real triumph, not just for the search committee and vestry but for all of us who contributed through our feedback and through our participation in this community.

The document is honest about our many and significant challenges, insightful about our immediate and future needs, and appropriately appreciative of our distinctive strengths and gifts. I encourage you to read it carefully, or read it again, and reflect not just on how our next rector can help us respond to our challenges but how you can too.

I believe we are a church living into the vision Paul presents to us in today’s Epistle lesson:

For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. (Romans 12:3-5)

Sober judgment and self-reflection? That’s what our discernment process is all about. One body in the Body of Christ? That’s basically the title of the parish profile. A variety of gifts given by grace and exercised in faith? Just look around you on any given Sunday, and not just the ones we get nice letters about. We are indeed discerning, for us, “what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable” and sometimes, to quote Dr. Roberts, “just about perfect.”

And yet there’s one line in this reading that ought to give us pause, give any church pause:

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds (Romans 12:2a)

This is the most open-ended of Paul’s admonitions today, and I think the most challenging. On the one hand, the Spirit has called God’s people to be a community set apart. Think of all the imagery that Jesus and the prophets use: light of the world, city on a hill, lamp on a lampstand, salt of the earth, a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.

There’s something exemplary and countercultural about our witness and our gifts.

  • It’s why we put on silly clothes and process through the streets on Palm Sunday.
  • It’s why we get up early every weekend to serve homeless neighbors most people would rather avoid.
  • It’s why Dr. Roberts was so surprised and delighted to see a full choir and a full nave in the dog days of a DC summer.

On the other hand, we live and participate in a particular culture, and are trying to reach people who may not be as inclined to critique that culture or offer an alternative vision. God certainly does not want us to create a sanctified enclave. We can’t be a self-satisfied island to ourselves that cannot or will not perceive the remarkable things the Spirit is up to beyond the walls of our churches, among people of other faiths and of no faith at all. Our resistance to conformity must not become a license to judge or to disengage.

So how do we resolve this dilemma between conformity to the world and rejection of it? I believe the answer is right there in our mission statement: Christ-like living. Jesus himself struck the balance perfectly between both participating in his culture and turning it upside-down.

  • He showed up at the social gatherings of common people, and even scandalous people.
  • He taught about the Reign of God using stories and imagery from common life experience.
  • And as we heard last week in the story of the Canaanite woman, he listened and responded on those few occasions where someone accused him of limiting the scope of God’s message of love.

Our transforming journey, the renewing of our minds, will proceed as we continue to conform not to the world but to Christ, who was not against the world but deeply and compassionately for it. Our gifts will sharpen, and our challenges catalyze our growth, as the sometimes gentle and sometimes scouring winds of the Spirit blow upon us. They will blow away, if we let them, the detritus of the self-centeredness and listlessness and fear that are a natural part of any community. God has been with us throughout our life together and is working on us and in us still.

***

There’s a striking if imperfect image I haven’t been able to shake this week, one that came to me upon first reading our remarkable lesson from Isaiah:

Look to the rock from which you were hewn,

and to the quarry from which you were dug.

Look to Abraham your father

and to Sarah who bore you (51:1b-2a)

We Christians might add “Look to Peter, the rock of the church.”

I love this notion of we the faithful being chiseled out of the foundation stone laid by our ancestors, maybe even made of our ancestors. The stone metaphor is limited, to be sure, but it’s perfect for capturing this idea of our slow conforming not to some external ideal but to the image of Christ that is already within us.

This is an idea the artist Michelangelo understood particularly well. In fact, if you’ve been fortunate enough to see his original David at the Accademia in Florence, then you’ve also seen four powerful icons of this spiritual experience. (If you haven’t seen them, I’ve put some photos in the atrium.) Listen to how the museum’s curators describe the four figures who line the hallway leading toward David:

All the unfinished statues at the Accademia reveal Michelangelo’s approach and concept of carving. [He] believed the sculptor was a tool of God, not creating but simply revealing the powerful figures already contained in the marble. Michelangelo’s task was only to chip away the excess, to reveal … Unlike most sculptors, who prepared a plaster cast model and then marked up their block of marble to know where to chip, Michelangelo mostly worked free hand … These figures emerged from the marble “as though surfacing from a pool of water.” (More here, emphasis added.)

These are the non-finito, the unfinished, the prisoners—torsos wriggling free, heads and limbs still trapped in stone. Maybe they capture the way God looks at us some of the time, figures powerful and poised, longing to be fully free. Set free, more and more, from the impediments to our true nature, from the shackles of stone that still bind and paralyze us.

My sisters and brothers, we don’t need to conform to anyone else’s model of success or beauty or even holiness. We are sacred masterpieces in progress, participating, by grace, in the terrifying and liberating process of divine transformation.

Some days, we need the sharpness of God’s chisel and the persistent tapping of a mallet that will do its work better if we can manage not to flinch.

And occasionally, we catch a vision, usually in each other, of the divine perfection that will one day break the surface into radiant, graceful resurrection life. On those days, things are “just about perfect” and we go forth rejoicing in the power of the Spirit.

Image credit: “Michaelangelo’s unfinished pieces Florence Firenze Accademia” by Scott MacLeod Liddle via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

Transfagarasan-north

“Less certain, more convinced”: A sermon on the end of Romans 8

Kyle

Proper 12, Year A

(1 Kings 3:5–12; Romans 8:26–39; Matthew 13:31–33, 44–52)

PDF | Audio (soon, or Dropbox) | Text:

Do you ever get jealous of the disciples? Not for the mighty deeds or the heroic deaths, necessarily, but for the simple fact that they met and knew the Lord as none of us can?

I’m quick to assume that faith came easy for the women and men who knew Jesus of Nazareth during his incarnate lifetime. And yet we have good reason to believe that wasn’t true.

Others saw his signs, his teachings, his authority, and yet they did not believe. The apostles had it straight from his mouth that he would die and rise again, and yet by all accounts they gave in to fear and hopelessness, before even his crucifixion in most cases.

There are a lot of truisms to extrapolate from scripture, and one of them is surely this: If it’s proof or certainty we’re after in matters of faith, we’re barking up the wrong tree. But I wonder if we can’t do better than proof.

* * *

An elderly monk of a friend of mine’s acquaintance was once asked how his faith had changed over the course of his lifetime. I’ll never forget his answer: “I’m less certain. But I’m more convinced.”

That’s the answer of a man who’s seen some things, endured some things, who’s lost love ones, celebrated unexpected blessings, let go of earthly treasure and the illusion of control.

“I’m less certain. But I’m more convinced.”

That answer taught me that to be convinced, to be persuaded, is a dynamic process. It’s a lifelong experience, a full-body knowing, a deep but simple trust in a relationship that has passed the test of time.

The Apostle Paul is a man convinced. And I think it’s important that we understand why.

Don’t put too much stock in his dramatic conversion story. I don’t dispute the claim that he was struck blind on the road to Damascus by an encounter with the Risen Lord. I just think, on it’s own, the experience wasn’t what made the difference for Paul, not in the long run.

Sure, it was a touchstone, a turning point, a close encounter with a grace as raw and powerful and true as any we can imagine. But it couldn’t be enough. It couldn’t be enough to form a faith the likes of which is on display in today’s lesson from Paul’s Letter to the Romans:

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:35, 37–39)

Stunning, isn’t it? Gorgeous. Transcendent even. But the prose itself, even the idea itself, can’t be the point for us. Verbal pyrotechnics can impress and even move us, like Jesus’s fantastic signs and wonders. Stirring testimony can set us on a new path, not unlike the one Paul started walking in temporary blindness, while he was still known by a different name.

But I think the experience that really has the power to convince, to get in deep in our bones and our spiritual muscle memory, is captured in the space between this passage and one I like to think of as its first draft.

There’s a stretch in the Second Letter to the Corinthians where Paul “boasts in the Lord,” testifying to the experiences that he’s been through for the sake of the gospel. The really dramatic part recounts his sufferings:

Five times I have received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I received a stoning. Three times I was shipwrecked; for a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from bandits, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers and sisters; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, hungry and thirsty, often without food, cold and naked. (2 Cor 11:24–27)

Now that is a list of dangers, toils, and snares if ever I’ve heard one.

I like this passage because it’s so real and concrete: “Look at what I’ve been through for God!” he shouts to his detractors. Paul remembers these experiences all too well, and he’s not afraid to get specific.

Our passage from Romans comes in a quieter, reflective moment. Notice that he tells us not what he’s done, but what he’s learned, which is that God was with him through all of it, that hardship, distress, etc., never had a chance against the power of the love of God, that the past, the future, the powers of earth and heaven and death itself are as nothing compared to Christ’s abiding presence.

From one text to the other, “I’m still here with God” turns to “God will always be here with me, with us.” We can almost hear Paul borrowing the words of our latter-day hymn to finish it all off: “’Tis grace that brought me safe thus far and grace will lead me home.”

* * *

The point is this: to be convinced in our faith is to take stock of our life with God and our neighbor, in all its ups and downs. It’s to be slowly persuaded that all the high drama and all the numbing tedium and the joys big and small were indeed working together for the good by God’s power to transform and redeem.

To be convinced is to let it all wash over us and sink in, to move beyond “When will you show me a sign?” to “How can I keep from singing?” Of course we can’t do this in our own time or on our own power.

It’s a lifelong process, a tiny seed of faith becoming a tree wide and strong. It’s a costly process, the faithful pursuit of a pearl of great price. It’s the transmutation of the core of our being, hearts of stone giving way to pure, persistent love.

How could we hope to effect this change without the grace of God? It’s foolish to try to earn this reward, but that doesn’t stop us most of the time. The trick is to learn to shape our efforts as faithful responses to God’s gifts and deliverances. And in that department we have lots of ways to practice.

An idea of such a discipline for today is to pilfer from our patron: why not make your own list of the dangers and the delights of your life, of the arc of your transforming encounters with the mystery of love and hope and peace. It doesn’t have to be all Damascus, shipwrecks, and swords.

If your sounds more like the 2 Corinthians passage than the Romans, then there’s no doubt you’re in touch with the rich contours of your own personal walk with God. If it sounds more like the Romans, then perhaps you’re starting to see how your experience fits into the even bigger story about the people of the way and the God who is with us on the way.

The process will be tender and difficult. Some of you have engaged it in Pilgrims, drawing the ups and down in your life and your experience of the closeness, or the distance, of God in the midst of them.

Yes, the process will be hard. But for most of us, by the end of it, we become a bit more persuaded of Paul’s deep conviction, that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Not layoffs or transfers, not abortions or miscarriages, not defeats in the right battles or victories in the wrong ones, not failed finals or terrifying diagnoses, not panics in the night or failures of nerve, not divorces or bad credit or terrible decisions or disasters beyond our control, not even the suffering or death of a person most dear to us can separate us from the love of God.

We may not know that love, we may doubt it, we may even reject it, but Christ is still there in our hearts, the Spirit is still moving all around us. Sighs too deep for words aren’t the half of what God is praying and doing in us, in our finest hours and in our darkest ones.

I can’t prove it to you. Neither can Paul, for that matter. But the grace of God in Christ, and the experience of a lifetime of love, can convince us. It might be the only thing that can.

Image credit: Transfagarasan-north by Michał Sałaban via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)