Food as Sabbath

Delivered at St. Jude's Episcopal Church in Wantagh, NY
July 22, 2012     (C) C. B. Park, All rights reserved

I have lots of good memories about growing up in rural Indiana: creating playhouses in fallow cornfields, finding Indian arrowheads in the backyard, and being chased by our Shetland Sheepdog.  Probably my favorite memory of all is Sunday dinner at Monie’s house.  Monie is my mom’s mom.  She and Patti (my grandfather) moved from Kentucky to Indiana to secure jobs at the Studebaker plant and White House clothing factory.  It was at Monie’s house that I learned all about good southern cooking.  You know, all the stuff that’s bad for you: bacon-laced green beans, fried chicken, okra, biscuits and gravy, and fruit pies with crusts made with lard.

It’s no wonder I have cholesterol  issues.

It was only when I was composing the sermon for her funeral 8 years ago that I realized the sacramental significance of those dinners.  Sunday dinner wasn’t just about eating.  It was about becoming family. It was about taking time to really be with each other.  It was about Sabbath.

I’m not talking about Sabbath in a do-nothing sort of way.  I’m talking about Sabbath where we set time aside to be thankful for what we had and were borne up on the love of family.

We were loved because we were, not because of what we did or said or accomplished.  We were appreciated for just being.  Oh, there was plenty of work involved in those Sunday dinners, Monie and my mom finished things in the kitchen, my sister and I set the table, and my dad and grandfather made sure there were enough chairs around the table.

We told stories at those Sunday dinners.  There were fun stories about my grandparents and parents growing up.  They were rural people and so there were all sorts of tales about animals and crops and the silly things that kids did back then.  We made our own stories too, kidding each other about a bad dish of creamed peas or how Patti burned his wrist on the turkey candle one year.  My son was lucky.  While he never got to experience his great-grandfather, he did get the chance to experience Monie’s Sunday dinners when he was growing up.  Leaving that table stuffed full of carbs made for a sleepy boy driving back to Columbus!

Monie’s Sunday dinner table wasn’t only for family, though.  So many times we pulled the table apart for one more leaf and a few more chairs so that a friend or visitor could join us.  I learned hospitality at that table.  I learned about taking a little less so that others could have something.  Funny how the resources always seemed to stretch to feed us all.

I think this is why that sentence in today’s gospel makes me so sad. “For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat.”  I can’t imagine a more vivid image for our lives in 21st century America.  There are days when I look at my watch and realize that it’s 2 pm and I haven’t taken time for lunch!  That’s when I end up in a fast-food drive-through, stuffing my face with something unhealthy, and rationalizing it by saying ‘well, that’s just the way it is.”

The sin in this isn’t that I’m eating fast-food.  Well, okay, maybe that’s a part of it.  The real problem is that I haven’t allowed myself any Sabbath time.  In a culture that moves 24/7, we must carve out for ourselves time to rest, reflect, and remember that we are valuable for who we are – beloved children of God.  I’m beginning to understand that the reason there is so much table fellowship described in the Bible is because that is where we share the Sabbath with each other.  It is at table with family and friends where we experience God incarnate.

Have you ever had those “God” moments at a dinner table with your spouse or your children or a good friend.  It’s like having time stand still and you’re overcome with the sheer reality of the love that is surrounding you.

Have you ever dined alone, closed your eyes and had the aroma of the food you’re eating transport you to a familiar kitchen where a beloved relative was making something special just for you?  All those memories, all those stories, they weave themselves in and out of your conscientiousness like wisps of steam transporting the smell of cinnamon and butter.  You and your loved ones, living and dead, are brought together in an instant created by remembered stories and God’s presence with us.  You want to linger there as long as possible.

But, alas, we cannot stay there forever.  Life reminds us that we can’t just sit at the table, we have work to do, meetings to attend, deadlines to meet.  Nor can we can stay forever at the Lord’s Table.  Our mission is in the world, bringing Good News of God’s love to the broken hearted, feeding the hungry, fixing what we can, and committing what we cannot fix to God’s own healing.  However, we can come away from this Table knowing we are always welcome to return, and of course invited to bring a friend because there is always room for one more.

I invite you to take note, this week, of how you spend your time in food consumption.

Will you rush through, or take some time to be still and have a picnic with Jesus?  Will you grab something to go, or will you make time to have lunch with your colleagues and engage them in conversation?  Will you sit down to dinner, or lunch or breakfast, with your family?  Perhaps you have time to share a snack together.  Dining alone?  Turn off the television and give yourself a gift of divine recollections.

Remember, you’re not just eating, you’re making room for memories.

You’re making room for God.

Amen.

We want a King. Really?

[Sermon preached on 2 Pentecost at St. Patrick's, Dublin, Ohio. Text: 1 Samuel 8:4-11, (12-15), 16-20, (11:14-15)]

 

It’s one of the most used and oft remembered Parent-isms.  It’s that phrase that escapes maternal or paternal lips when one’s offspring is trying to convince you that they should be able to do something that one of their friends is doing just because one of their friends is doing it. The action in question is usually fraught with peril from the parental perspective.  The child can’t see past their own wants and desires.   In frustration and impatience, the Parent-ism rolls out off the tongue:  “If your friend decided to jump off a bridge would you do THAT too?”

This is the image that comes to mind when I read about Samuel’s displeasure in hearing the elders of Israel ask for a king to govern them so that they “can be like other nations.”   The elders weren’t asking for a change in governance.  You might think that given the fact that Samuel’s sons were abject failures.  No, the elders said they wanted a LEADER.  That’s when Samuel knew they were in trouble.  That’s when Samuel knew HE was in trouble.  It was all confirmed in his prayers to Yahweh:  “They have rejected me from being king over them.” 

Yes, the elders said they wanted a leader.  But, that’s not what they really wanted. 

That’s never what we really want. 

We want order.

We want protection.

We want direction. 

And, we want someone to blame when it’s not handed to us freely. 

We, like the elders, want someone else to fight our battles. So, we appoint and elect and hire in the sincere hope that we will get what we want.  Then, when that person fails (and they always do because we’ve set the systems up that way) we don’t have to take any responsibility for failed leadership.

The LORD knew that Israel’s desire would not be good for them.  Earthly kings would conscript young men for war and force young women into work below their abilities.  Earthly kings would take the best of the fruits of their lands and labor – the tenth that belonged to Yahweh would become the spoils of the powerful.  Eventually, their earthly king would fail or betray them and they would be lost to neighboring nations. 

Israel’s dilemma, like that child’s request to be like one’s friends, is that the desire to be like others often results in the loss of one’s God-given identity.  The desire to be accepted and loved by the ones we admire combined with our need for protection, order, and direction, is a recipe for disaster. 

Even within a collective, protection, order, and direction are achievable only in the short-term.  Kings and so-called leaders are too often corrupted. The people eventually become slaves to the systems.

The formation of the nation of Israel was to be set apart.  The point was that they were God’s people.  They were not to behave like all the others. The purpose of Israel was to be the city on the hill; the example for all the other nations. The very reason for the existence of their community was the practice of justice for all, without regard to social station or economic advantage.  The request from the elders to appoint a king over them – the request to be like other nations – was a demand for Israel to forsake Yahweh.  Forsaking Yahweh meant forsaking justice.  Forsaking justice meant forsaking the essence of who they were.

Driven by fear and the desire for security, people have given themselves over to charismatic authority figures over and over and over again.  Are we still willing to jump off that bridge because our friends are doing it? Or can we begin to see ourselves as a community committed to a shared purpose – the proclaiming of God’s Kingdom and working toward God’s justice?

Before you answer that question, I have to give you fair warning:  There is no business plan.  We only know where we are.   Together, we have to determine where we want to go.  What makes it even more fun is that we will discover our limitations while we are on the road and will need to work through them as we move together.  

 There also is no room for apathy.  Everyone must participate in this leadership activity – shared purpose and shared leadership requires that all are engaged in activities that support it.  We require enough integrity to hold ourselves accountable to our shared purpose and call ourselves out when we begin to avoid difficulties by distracting ourselves with work or emotionalism.  

The proclaiming of the Kingdom and working toward God’s justice isn’t anything we are likely to accomplish in our own lifetime.  The children of Samuel lurk in the shadows of commerce, in the halls of government, and – yes – even in the sacred chambers of religious institutions. They work to undermine the children of God by insisting that the way we’ve always done things is the only way to do things.  Their desire is for the security they know, the direction they’ve always gone, and the order that continually feeds them the lion’s share of the system’s resources.  When the children of God ask why these are so, the children of Samuel respond with replies bound to pique our emotions and distract us from the adaptive work at hand. 

As God’s chosen community, we must find our security in the knowledge that God has never given up on God’s people.  Even though they desired a king, God blessed Saul.  When Saul fell to his own corruption, God blessed David.  On and on it continues, through the time of the Judges, through the times of the prophets, even to this very day. We must see order as a means to an end and not the end itself.  We must travel in the direction of our purpose, but not be afraid to listen for the Spirit telling us to take a left, right, or U-turn.

You know, there’s an interesting thing about the word purpose.  Its roots come from the Indo-European word that means FIRE.  Our purpose should set us on fire.  Our shared purpose should give us the energy to change the world.

On Pentecost Sunday, Stephen asked us to be a people on fire with the love of God.  Today, I’d like to ask you to be on fire for an even higher purpose – that the world come to know God’s love through our works of justice and that we commit ourselves to become more and more empowered to do those works.   

We do not need to jump off the bridge of conformity. 

We are not expected to be like other people. 

We should not be like other people.

We need to be who we were created to be:  the people of God.

Amen.

(c) 2012 Ciritta B. Park, all rights reserved. With thanks to the Clergy Leadership Project and Hugh O'Doherty. :-)

Vines and Branches

The Son is the vine; the Father is the vine-grower.  I’ve experienced this metaphor for the relationship between God, Jesus and the disciples in several varieties.  First, there’s the coloring book version: green vines and purple grapes winding around a chalice with a little loaf of bread there for good measure.  Then, there’s the artsy-crafty kind: dried grape vines fashioned into decorative wreaths for any season of the year – even the religious ones.  Many of you experienced the kinetic type at our last EVENT: stomping on grapes to make a mash for wine making. Some of you helped with kneading bread dough too.

 When Steve and I visited Sonoma County last month, I got a brand new perspective on this gospel story.  Not only did we get to taste some amazing wines, thanks to my friend Ken - - the same Ken who rescued me from my near cactus garden fall years before - - but we also drove around and visited several wineries.  More than once, Ken said “you are tasting wine that was grown just outside these doors.”  He explained the different varietals and how several wines can be made from the same grapes using different techniques.  Steve was taking all this in.  I just kept staring at the vineyards….acres and acres and acres of vineyards as far as the eye could see.  “Jesus is the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower,” I thought to myself.  Wow. 

If this metaphor gave me any enlightenment, it was that the reach of Christ is beyond comprehension and the vine-growing Father provides loving care.  The Spirit’s help is most definitely required. Grapevines don’t just bear fruit by themselves; they must be tended through a special creative process that makes possible the wine we choose to enjoy with friends and family.  Ken gave me a great way to remember this process – each of the rooms at his office are named for steps in the process: Bud Break Lobby, Harvest Board Room, Crush Conference Rooms, Fermentation Tank (Kitchen), Storage Tank (copy & work room), and Wine Cellar & Tasting Room.

With a little imagination, you can make each of these vineyard processes match up to a step in one’s spiritual journey.  Let’s see:

·         Bud Break: stirring of the spirit – sensing God’s presence with us – knowing that something is ready to burst forth

·         Harvest: engaging in a ministry – gathered together with others of the same stuff ready to fully become the Christian we’ve declared ourselves to be

·         Crush: experiencing difficulty or temptation as we are led into becoming something/someone new, a crushing experience often

·         Fermentation: maturing…sometimes with heat added…but knowing we get better with age

·         Storage: those times when not much is happening, when we need to set idle and await God’s next move

·         Wine Cellar & Tasting: arriving where God wants us to be and enjoying the gifts of the Spirit

But, Ken’s clever room name scheme forgot a step, I’m afraid.  It’s the step that we know is necessary and the one we probably fear the most:  The Pruning Room.

While most of us don’t own vineyards, we do understand the concept of pruning.  It’s when we cut out the plant material that is keeping the tree or bush or vegetable from growing at its fullest potential.  We hear it referred to as ‘cutting out the dead wood’ and that is true some of the time.  However, pruning also means cutting back live growth or removing sucker plants in order that the plant can concentrate on growing straight or producing better tasting produce.  When we talk about it that way, it sounds violent.  It’s especially so when we talk about ‘cutting out the dead wood’ as taking away employment from people we no longer believe to be productive or who we deem too expensive to keep around.  Unfortunately, I’ve heard too many church people interpret this part of the gospel in this violent matter.  “If you don’t accept Jesus, you’ll be cut away and burned in Hades.”  That makes me shudder.

I believe that this message in John’s gospel has more to do with the consequences of not being in community (with God and with each other) than it does with dogma.  Jesus wants us to abide in him as he abides in us. 

This is an intimate relationship into which we are invited.  We are vines emerging from a central root that are to cling to each other, support each other, and eventually that relationship will be visible to the world because of the fruit that is being produced.  Those vines that choose to stray from the community cannot access the community’s resources.  Without support, without love, they wither….some die. 

The community for whom this gospel was written was under persecution.  It was imperative that they stick together – supporting each other in prayer – in order for the faith (and them!) to stay alive.  There would have been no benefit in quarreling about matters tangential to the message of God’s love for them – love that was made manifest in the death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ.  What mattered was how they loved each other and how that love spilled out into the dangerous world they lived in, like grapes heavy on the vines.

It also matters that we remember that the vineyard is not ours, but God’s.  The vine dresser knows best how to coax the best fruits from the vines.  God may ask us to pinch off or cut out some idea or emotion or habit that is keeping us from fully taking our part in the community or preventing us from producing the best fruit.  I don’t think it would take much effort on anyone’s part to come up with a few of those things for ourselves if we just think about it for a minute or two.  Yes, this pruning is uncomfortable, but it is necessary for a fruitful relationship with God and equally fruitful relationships with each other.  This pruning may be uncomfortable but it is not to be feared.  God is not punishing us; God is helping us grow. 

So come to the table, drink and eat, and abide in Christ. The wine we are about to share is our tangible reminder that we are divinely entwined with one other.  Entwined and rooted in the same Lord who is Love.

(c) 2012 C. B. Park/All rights reserved

PT Reflections

I love vacations. Getting away from the routine and visiting new places always gives me a thrill.  But, as much as I love visiting friends and seeing cool stuff, I love availing myself of public transportation.  While we were in San Francisco, Steve and I made our way around the City thanks to MUNI busses and cable cars.  Our $21, 3-day pass got us everywhere we wanted to go for less than the cost of one night’s parking fee. 

Of course, “PT” is not as beloved out here in the Midwest, the home of Ford, Chrysler, and General Motors.  Buses and trains take the place of cars, you know.  For me, that’s the point.  I’ve never been a fan of driving.  It’s something I have to do. It’s something I’d rather someone else did.  I can get a lot of knitting done, or just enjoy the view, when I don’t have to pay attention to the road.

Public transportation holds another advantage for me.  It puts me in touch with a city’s people.  The cable cars are a fun treat for a tourist, but they are everyday transportation to a lot of people in the Bay area.  C. S. Lewis used a bus to transport people between heaven and hell in his book The Great Divorce.  On the busses, I saw people of all ages, all colors, all economic strata.  It’s a lot like what I think heaven will be.  (Honestly, I think hell will be like walking up to Nob Hill…never mind that beautiful Grace Cathedral’s at the end of the road! But, I digress…)

I invite you to drive your car to a suburban Park and Ride someday soon.  Don’t take an express bus – it’s full of people just like you. Instead, take a local and travel along with the people who make up this metropolitan area.  Let it be a reminder to you of the diversity of people with whom God has peppered this planet.  Let it help you remember that not all of us share in the advantages of suburban living and that, for many, the bus is their way to work or to the grocery store or to the doctor’s office. 

I wonder.  Perhaps if we had better public transportation, we might have a little better understanding of each other.  Busses and trains certainly cut across a bunch of barriers.  Then, again, are we willing to let those barriers disappear?

It's Inevitable (Sermon for Lent II, Mark 8:31-38)

At first glance, Peter’s concern for Jesus seems to be as one friend to another.  He took him aside to talk with him privately.  There was no public outcry that what Jesus was saying was ridiculous and out of line.  In Mark’s gospel we don’t really know what Peter said.  The rebuke could have been anything from “stop talking like this, we don’t want you to get hurt” to “quit this cross-talk, Lord, I didn’t sign up for this.”

Jesus’ response is rather shocking.  First of all, he used his outside voice so that all could hear.  Second of all, he equated Peter’s rebuke to the will of Satan.  Finally, he directed his message to the entire crowd.  Friends, it is the last piece of the response that frightens me the most.  By relating that Jesus calls the crowd to hear his message, Mark is making it very clear that Jesus is talking to the hearer of the message today as well as the crowd way back then.

There was only one thing that the crowd in first-century Palestine would have understood the directive of taking up one’s cross to be.  It would not be the image as we use it in the 21^st century.  Today, it just rolls off of our tongue when we are talking about something that inconveniences us.  “Well, I guess that’s my cross to bear.” 

Our understanding cannot compare with the cruel, tortuous, bloody death that awaited those who dared threaten the Roman Empire.  This bloody image was one Jesus would have been oh so familiar with, having been somewhere between the ages of 8 and 10 when the Romans crucified thousands of Galileans condemned for insurrection.  Jesus knew full well what he was risking and if was going to be required of him, he knew it would be required of his followers.

It frightens me that I have signed up for this difficult discipleship.  It frightens me that I signed my son up for this as an infant.  It frightens me that our young people will affirm their commitment of this next week.  But it doesn’t frighten me here as much as it would if I were preaching in Syria or the Sudan or in Columbia.  We are relatively safe in our suburban bubble.  Here, our sufferings will most likely be from our own bad choices and not what may be forced upon us.  We’ll not likely lose our lives in the tradition of Perpetua and her Companions or even the Martyrs of Memphis.  Yet, following Jesus does require us to acknowledge two uncomfortable facts:

1)    Suffering is inevitable.  None of us are going to get through this life without some kind of pain.

Of course, we do everything possible to prevent suffering; the pharmaceutical industry is clear evidence of that.  And, there are specific times and reasons for pharmaceutical intervention.   The problem is that when we mask over all kinds or degrees of pain, we lose the lessons that suffering teaches us.  Suffering gives us a glimpse of God’s own Self. 

Martin Luther said that to know God truly is to know God hidden in suffering.  The Buddha taught that suffering is not only pain, grief or despair, but also being separated from what we love, not getting what we want, and being forced into proximity with what we hate.  Suffering can also come from our own self-loathing or fear of what we do not understand.  We can only learn from suffering if we are willing to get close to it.  That’s certainly more easily said than done.

No one wants to suffer; we don’t even want to be near it.  We avoid the places where it happens.  I’ve heard too many stories of people who have been abandoned by people they thought were friends when disaster strikes.  It’s as if cancer, tornados, or violent crime can be transmitted through talking.  Getting too close to suffering reminds us that we may be only a split second away from suffering ourselves. We hover over our children to protect them from being hurt, often to their detriment.  We refuse to see the hungry and the homeless in our own neighborhoods, insisting that these conditions only exist ‘somewhere else’.   We want to believe that gates and security systems can keep out accidents, natural disasters, disability or disease.  Problem is they can’t.

 Jesus didn’t want to suffer either – we need only look at the Garden of Gethsemane to know that.  Yet, without it, redemption is short-circuited.  But, for our redemption, Jesus gave up his will to the Father’s and bore a real cross.  And, that’s what leads me to fact number two:

2)    Something has to die.  

Resurrection isn’t from the living, it’s from the dead.

Jesus was warning his disciples that God’s way is not a way where everything is a bed of roses.  God’s way is to be among those who suffer and die.  Jesus said that the he MUST undergo great suffering. Suffering and death are required.  There are no exceptions for anyone wishing to be his disciple.  Putting our minds on divine things means finding God in those places where we can’t imagine God being: in uncertainty, danger, and suffering. 

For us to find God there, we have to go there. We must toss away our suburban security blankets and wander into worlds that are different from ours.  If we are not suffering ourselves, we need to put our egos aside in order to stand with those who are suffering.  “Not what I want, but what God wants” is the mantra of the Christian disciple.

Experiencing our own suffering allows us to be present for others who are going through similar circumstances.  Therefore, if we mask our suffering, we have denied God’s gift of future ministry for us.  Our egos are all wrapped up in this.  There is a difference between the single parent struggling to make a life for his/her family who accepts the hardship as ministry and the self-absorbed person who says ‘it’s okay, don’t change the light bulb, I’ll suffer in the dark.’  This ministry is not one where we compare our experience to the one in our presence but one where we are silent companions in our knowledge of their pain.  Resurrection in the reign of God hinges on our willingness to let self-centeredness die away in order that we can be open to standing with those who are suffering and, yes, dying.  We know this because Christ’s resurrection means that we can be confident that God is with us when we are uncertain, in danger, or inconsolable.

Karen Armstrong, a British theologian and historian, writes: “If we push suffering away and pretend that the ubiquitous grief of the world has nothing to do with us, we will remain confined in an inferior version of ourselves.”  There is a great gift in standing alongside those who suffer.  Suffering strips away everything that is not authentic.  When we are in partnership with God in these ministries, we see not only God’s true Self but also our own. The question is – will you like what you see?

Take these thoughts away with you this week: Will your Lenten discipline move you closer to Jesus’ requirement of his disciples?  Will your taking on or giving up help you bear the real cross that you are currently experiencing or that may be waiting for you?  If not, it’s not too late to reassess.   And please keep our confirmands in your prayers. Amen.

 

Karen Armstrong in Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life (Fourth Step: Empathy).

(c) 2012 C. B. Park, all rights reserved