Abide in Me and I in You

The imagery of the vine and branches, (John 15:1-8),  depict a beautiful intimate relationship between the Father, Jesus, and us as an intimate dwelling place.

The "you" in the passage is always plural, because the connectedness associated in "lovingly abiding," enjoins us all with the Father and Son in one dynamic relationship that challenges a long-standing interpretation that would prefer to keep God at arms length.

Far from being a “thou shalt not God" of rules or a cosmic judge who exercises power as the preserver of conventional morality, an oxymoronic phrase, John reveals a different role for the Father than the way we may have been originally taught to believe. Instead, He offers us the promise of new life in the present as Jesus' words become flesh in us, and continue to dwell  within and among us. “And his commandment is this: believe in the name of Jesus and love one another as He commanded us.” (John 3:18-21)

In the imagery of the vine, God’s presence is underscored as abiding, nourishing, lasting, and permanent. Just as Jesus is intimately related to the Father, we, the branches, can do nothing unless we abide in relationship with Jesus, the means to the Father. When we relate to Jesus in all that we do, we are connected to the Father. As such, Jesus’ two-fold promise, I AM the vine, you are the branches…is not said as a command or in judgment, but rather as an invitation and a promise. This promise is emphasized as he repeatedly reminds us that without him in our lives, we are powerless and can do nothing.

The promise abiding in…living-in…Jesus is not for its own sake, or an end in itself. Jesus is revealing a dynamic and changing life for us. Vines are pruned and cleansed. Branches that wither and die are removed. We, as the branches in the vine, are a constantly changing community that is called to follow his word by actively living his word. And in keeping with the stewardship of good shepherds, we as branches grow and become vines are nourished and nourish…By this is my Father glorified that you will bear much fruit…

 All those who take refuge in Me, whatever their birth, race, gender, or caste, even those whom society scorns will attain the supreme destination…fill your mind with me; love me; serve me, and worship me always. Seeking me in your heart, you will at last be united with me.

 Chapter 9, Verse 32 – Bhagavad Gita, The Song of God – 

My Sheep Hear My Voice and Follow Me

I grew up in Brooklyn, NY in the 40's and ‘50s. We lived in a two–family house in the Bay Ridge area, It was a carefree time of life, a time in which doors merely marked certain boundaries. For the most part, we were not so afraid of others inappropriately crossing them. In the early years it was not always necessary to lock our doors, and when we finally did, my father kept a key in the Borden's milk box on the porch or left one with our upstairs neighbor. Even as children, we could safely come and go within the confines of our defined limitations. Playing in someone else's backyard or "alleyway" was common as there were no fences between houses on my block, just fences separating the houses on the street  around the corner, which didn't matter anyway since we were not permitted to leave our street without permission and letting our parents know. (I'm reminded of the current international crisis in Israel, Palestine, Iran and of course Ukraine...still looming but off the front page for a while. It's too bad the freedom we enjoyed in our neighborhood as children could not apply. I guess it all changed, even in our old neighborhood when people wanted what the other guy had, even if they weren't entitled because they had yet to earn it.)

Perhaps the only time in those formative years that I was aware of heightened concern for safety was during the polio epidemic. While as children, our need to process the true impact of this "plague" was limited and I suppose that was a good thing; the published photos of children in iron lungs were to this day, indelibly printed in my memory. It’s hard to contrast that time with today’s Covid19. For the most part our only news media were the radio and newspapers. In the early days of television, news broadcasts were relatively short and not very comprehensive. All in all, as long as we stayed in our “sheepfold” we, as children, went about our days without concern.

While gates and doors serve as boundaries to permit entry and exit and security, they also demarcate a safe place, home. In our Gospel (John 10: 11-18) Jesus, the Good Shepherd, is portrayed as a “gate” and a caretaker. Our frame of reference for a shepherd does not likely fit with the image of the shepherd in Jesus' time . Is there any more powerful artistic depiction of compassion in our Christian heritage than the image of Jesus the Good Shepherd ? For me it's the famous painting of Jesus with the lamb draped around his neck and over his shoulder that hung on the wall  of my grade school classroom, and depicted in our church’s stained glass window. Yet, when Jesus lived and John wrote his Gospel, shepherds were among the most disreputable and mistrusted outcasts of society. Shepherds were drifters with no fixed address and because of their occupation, they were perpetually unclean and, by definition, in violation of Jewish law. These outcasts are the very people John’s gospel is talking about. So comparing Jesus to a shepherd and then later calling this very shepherd “good” seems at the very least, a paradox.

When Jesus proclaims that “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me” he characterizes his role as a loving protector. There were no actual gate in sheepfolds; rather, the shepherd would stand, sit or lie down at the entrance to the pasture. In this way the shepherd could serve as protector of his sheep. He knew his sheep and they knew him. John purposely contrasted Jesus, the Good Shepherd, with disreputable religious rulers of his time who exploited their congregations.

Jesus clearly spells out his role as the Father’s steward when he says I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one can take them out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.

Word to Word

 

Over the years I’ve come to appreciate that “spiritual development” has less and less to do with religion. And while the Church, the Bible and the liturgy are important to our development, spiritual formation is more about learning to discern the call of God “outside,” in our everyday lives. Spiritual Formation is an ongoing dynamic process in which we develop the tools to be able to see and align ourselves with people, places and things where God is at work. I know this might sound like heresy but in some ways religion or “being locked in the upper room” and not being involved in the world, can become a static process that lulls us to sleep in its repetitive sameness. As such, it can become an obstacle to our call to “bear witness” to God’s Word to those outside the safety of our “upper rooms.”

In a real sense we are preaching to the choir! We in the comfort and security of our Church community, are like the apostles in the upper room after the Crucifixion. When Jesus appeared to the apostles and Thomas, he said “... As the Father has sent me, so I send you." He beckons us as he did his disciples, to leave the upper room and live our lives outside the walls of our Church as we engage in Christian practices that are fundamental to human needs, and may have nothing to do with religion but everything to do with faith. As such, we join with one another, and with Jesus, and with the Communion of Saints across time and space in a way of life that proclaims Christ’s victory over death and our eternal life. (Luke 24:25-38)

Now in bearing witness to the Word, I'm not talking about "life-style evangelism." That term for many of us, may evoke discomfort and have a strange connotation. We bear witness that is, tell someone about, the movies or television programs we've seen and want others to enjoy. We share the accomplishments (or failures) of our sports teams. We share important events in our family or work lives. We share photos of loved ones and acknowledge milestones. We bear witness to the things that matter to us all the time. But do we bear witness to the presence of God, the Love, in all things in the here and now of our lives?

Witnessing is not really all that different when it comes to faith. It does not mean forcing our beliefs on someone or shunning those who do not believe as we do. The ego tries to convince, while love shares. To witness is simply to communicate with others as we know God’s presence…as the Word becomes flesh in us and those we encounter… by Him and with Him and in Him in the unity of the Holy Spirit.

My Lord and My God

 

In many ways we are just like Thomas; aren’t we? We really don’t want to come by our faith second hand (John20:19-31). Our parents taught us that something worth having was something worth working for? So, we ask; is there really such a thing as “blind faith?” Blind faith does not encourage us to probe; it denies us the opportunity to question, to know what we believe intuitively, in our “core.” Blind faith requires minimal spiritual investment and permits those inclined to cruise through their spiritual journey without the opportunity to really live life’s joy and danger. True faith requires knowing what we believe…beyond any doubt. So, Thomas in refusing to say that he understood what he did not understand, or believe what he did not believe, exhibited an honesty that prompted his need to know. 

Thomas wasn’t the faithless doubter. The so-called faithful disciples remained locked up in the upper room hiding in fear. Fear not doubt gets in the way of our letting the Holy Spirit take charge. Where did Thomas go while others were in hiding? What prompted him to return to his community? Was Thomas “working” at trying to know what he was asked to believe? Thomas wanted the experience of a deeper vision or sight. He was unwilling to blindly accept; it had to be real for him.

True faith is based on trust in God. True faith knows we can deepen our faith by asking critical questions of our traditions and our “inherited” belief propositions. We do this by leaving our comfort zones and living in new ways. Thomas’ encounter with the risen Lord challenges us to know what we believe so for us as, with Thomas, we too can personally acclaim “My Lord and my God.”

Why Easter Is a Sacrament

 It's only natural to think of Easter and the Resurrection as a miracle; after all Christ’s rising from the dead is extraordinary and outside the realm of human experience. Yet, calling Easter a miracle diminishes its importance and makes the event exclusively God’s purview and removes us from having anything to do with it. This was not God’s intent because God’s Divine incarnation in Jesus and Jesus’ death and resurrection were for our salvation and not for God's benefit. This point is reaffirmed in John's Gospel from  two weeks ago: "The voice did not come for my sake but for yours...And when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself."  God did not need Jesus' death or resurrection.  

 

God performs miracles but man celebrate sacraments. While God works a miracles interdependent from man, man is essential to the presence of a sacrament. A sacrament requires our participation for its very existence. 

Easter is never more "sacramental" than when one man gives his life for another. Christians seek to make Easter sacramental in their lives by their memory of Jesus through their words and deeds.

John Calvin wrote that becoming Son of man with us, he made us sons of God with him; that by his descent to earth, he has prepared an ascent to heaven for us; that by taking on out mortality, he has conferred his immortality upon us; that accepting our weakness, he has strengthened us by his power; that receiving our poverty unto himself, he has transferred our wealth to us; that taking the weight of our iniquity upon himself (which oppressed us), he has clothed us with his righteousness. (Kruger, The Shack Revisited, p. 197) 

Jesus became incarnate to teach us how to live our lives and abide in Him through Jesus. Each time we celebrate the Eucharist and say “in him through him and with him,”  we are reminded of our participation in his birth, death and resurrection. (John 20:1-9) (Adapted from Dawn without Darkness, Anthony Padovano, p78)

The Power of Love Vs. The Love of Power

 

Every year the Roman army would come marching into Palestine during Passover. It was Pilate, the governor in the time of Jesus, who led the parade riding a white stallion, a symbol of Rome’s dominance. The parade was a reminder to the Jews not to cause trouble during Passover. As if to challenge Roman oppression, Jesus rode a donkey, a lowly beast of burden, in the opposite direction, entering through the gate from which Pilate exited. (Mark 11:1-10)

 Pilate needed a whole legion to demonstrate his importance and control; however, Jesus’ “power” was rooted in the love of God. It was the power of love vs. the love of power on parade. The gospel writers tell us that this event was not accidental. Jesus planned it ahead of time. He knew he was risking the wrath of Rome by provoking Pilate. 

Contrary to some long-held beliefs, Jesus was not ransomed for us, but rather, he took and continues to take our place for the trials of our human existence. So then, why the cross? The cross was used by the Romans to not only destroy the identity of the one who was crucified, but to erase his mission and send a warning to any of his followers to “cease and desist.” Ironically, in the first century AD the cross was reviled as an image to be kept out of sight as it, on the surface, was a grim reminder of the despicable event on Good Friday. In time, however, the cross became the central symbol of our faith…a symbol that reminds us that the journey does not end with Jesus’ death but we, along with Jesus are resurrected to eternal life. The cross reminds us that death has no power over us because we live in the light of the resurrection of a “nobody” who was raised up as we will be. God is in the midst of our human experience. 

 

Now, I understand what you tried to say to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free
They would not listen, they did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen now.

 

 

 

Everything Must Change; Nothing Stays the Same

 Let’s face it change can be unsettling; it requires our leaving our comfort zone and adjusting to a new way of doing things. Change can be as subtle as using a new pen, sitting in a different chair at dinner, or as profound as losing a job or a loved one. Some changes are optional; others are forced on us. In all instances change is associated with anything from temporary discomfort to long-standing emotional pain. 

Our Gospel lesson (John 12:20-33) suggests that the incarnation of God changed everything through Jesus: through his birth, his life, his teachings, and especially through his dying and rising to new life. It’s a message of hope that God is working in this world to make everything new through Jesus. Yet we know the birth of new life is not without pain. Childbirth is more than a metaphor for life; it is life itself, but it’s preceded by dark days of preparation, ultimately yielding to pain and eventually new life.

Meister Eckhart writes that human nature is like a stable inhabited by the ox of passion and the ass of prejudice; our ego gives these animals permission to reside and most of us quietly feed. And between them, painfully pushing them out, as in childbirth, that Christ must be born, and laid in their own manger. (Evelyn Underhill, “The Light of the World,” Watch for the Light, 2008)

Christ is the essence of God’s love, and his birth is the birth of love in our souls. This birth in us is for a purpose beyond ourselves in that the love of God can only be manifest in the world through us.

How will we surrender to our new life? What changes will we make? How are we preparing during these dark, passively aggressive days of Lent. Change does not happen automatically. 

In a very real sense, if we are to experience the new life that God offers us, we must open ourselves to God’s will and allow ourselves to be vulnerable. Sure, we’d much rather avoid any kind of difficulty or discomfort and just stay in the same old rut we’ve been in. But change requires us to resist the ways we typically use to avoid difficult decisions and discomfort. 

Following the will of God requires persistence and in some cases may result in personal upheaval. It’s not easy to resist the tendency to avoid discomfort that ultimately heals and transforms us into a new life.

That sounds out of reach and even harsh. But in a very real sense it can be as simple as aligning ourselves with God’s peace and compassion by reaching out to others in need. When we make changes in our lives, we’re not just engaged in a self-help project! We’re opening ourselves to the change that God has already made through Jesus, and that God continues to make in all our lives. Everything must change; nothing stays the same.

To everything there is a season, turn, turn, turn