What the Saints Said, Part ii (Eucharist Edition!)

 The Church and Communion (The Gift of the Eucharist)

1Co 10:16 The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?

1Co 10:17 For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread.

St. Ignatius of Antioch – Bishop, martyred in 107 AD

Meet together in common – every single one of you – in grace, in one faith and one Jesus Christ (who was of David’s line in his human nature, son of man and son of God) that you may obey the bishop and priest with undistracted mind; breaking one bread, which is the medicine for immortality, our antidote to ensure that we shall not die but live in Jesus Christ for ever.

St. John Chrysostom – Bishop of Constantinople – 350 AD

For what is the bread? The body of Christ. And what do they become who partake of it? The body of Christ: not many bodies, but one body. For as the bread, consisting of many grains, is made one, so that the grains nowhere appear; they exist indeed…so are we, joined with each other and with Christ: there not being one body for you, and another for your neighbor to be nourished by, but the very same for all.

St. Augustine of Hippo – 350 AD

Recognize in the bread what hangs on the Cross; recognize in the chalice the water and blood trickling from his side.

St. John Vianney – 1850 AD

Do not say that you are sinners, that you are too wretched, and that is why you dare not approach the Eucharist. You might just a well say that you are too ill, and that is why you will not try any remedy nor send for the doctor.

He is not content with showing himself to us. He puts himself into our hands, into our mouth, mingling his substance with our substance, that we may become one spirit with him. We ought to visit him often.

St. Therese the Little Flower – 1880 AD

It is not to remain in a golden ciborium that He comes down to us each day from heaven; it’s to find another heaven, infinitely more dear to Him than the first: the heaven of our soul, made to his image, the living temple of the adorable Trinity.

Oh, my darling, think, then, that Jesus is there in the Tabernacle expressly for you, for you alone; He is burning with the desire to enter your heart.

Justin Martyr, c. A.D. 150

There is then brought to the president of the brethren bread and a cup of wine mixed with water. He takes them, gives praise and glory to the Father of the universe through the name of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and offers thanks at considerable length for our being counted worthy to receive these things at his hands. And when he has concluded the prayers and thanksgivings, all the people present express their assent by saying Amen. … 

And when the president has given thanks, and all the people have expressed their assent, those who are called by us deacons give to each of those present to partake of the bread and wine mixed with water over which the thanksgiving was pronounced, and to those who are absent they carry away a portion. (First Apology 65)

What does the poor man do at the rich man's door, the sick man in the presence of his physician, the thirsty man at a limpid stream? What they do, I do before the Eucharistic God. I pray. I adore. I love.

Francis of Assisi

Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament … There you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves upon earth.

J. R. R. Tolkien

"In each of our lives Jesus comes as the Bread of Life - to be eaten, to be consumed by us. This is how He loves us. Then Jesus comes in our human life as the hungry one, the other, hoping to be fed with the Bread of our life, our hearts by loving, and our hands by serving. In loving and serving, we prove that we have been created in the likeness of God, for God is Love and when we love we are like God. This is what Jesus meant when He said, "Be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect." - St. Teresa of Calcutta

1 Cor 11:27-34

Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord. Examine yourselves, and only then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For all who eat and drink[g] without discerning the body eat and drink judgment against themselves. For this reason many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined[j] so that we may not be condemned along with the world.

So then, my brothers and sisters, when you come together to eat, wait for one another. If you are hungry, eat at home, so that when you come together, it will not be for your condemnation. About the other things I will give instructions when I come.

Be present, be present, O Jesus, our great High Priest, as you were present with your disciples, and be known to us in the breaking of bread; who live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever.  Amen. (The Book of Common Prayer)

BAPTISM: ABIDING IN GOD’S LOVE

 BAPTISM: ABIDING IN GOD’S LOVE

“Happy is our sacrament of water, in that, by washing away the sins of our early blindness, we are set free and admitted into eternal life. . . . But we, little fishes after the example of our [Great] Fish,  Jesus Christ, are born in water, nor have we safety in any other way than by permanently abiding in water. So that most monstrous creature, who had no right to teach even sound doctrine, knew full well how to kill the little fishes—by taking them away from the water!” —Tertullian, Baptism 1 Date: 203 A.D.

St. Vincent Ferrer ~ Every baptized person should consider that it is in the womb of the Church where he is transformed from a child of Adam to a child of God. 

“The greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of his love.”― Julian of Norwich

Aphrahat/Aphraates Demonstration VI (Of Monks) par 14.1 [280-367 AD]

"From baptism we receive the Spirit of Christ. At that same moment in which the priests invoke the Spirit, heaven opens, and he descends and rests upon the waters, and those who are baptized are clothed in him.

Cyprian of Carthage epistle 58.6 (200-270 ad)

And therefore, dearest brother, this was our opinion in council, that by us no one ought to he hindered from baptism and from the grace of God, who is merciful and kind and loving to all. 

Barnabas Epistle of Barnabas ch 11:1–10 [10-70 AD]

"'Blessed are those who go down into the water with their hopes set on the cross.' Here he is saying that after we have stepped down into the water, burdened with sin and defilement, we come up out of it bearing fruit, with reverence in our hearts and the hope of Jesus in our souls" (Letter of Barnabas [A.D. 74]).

BAPTISM: HOW TO DO IT

St. Hippolytus of Rome (“The Apostolic Tradition,” 215 A.D.) “Baptize first the children; and if they can speak for themselves, let them do so. Otherwise, let their parents or other relatives speak for them.”

“After his resurrection he promises in a pledge to his disciples that he will send them the promise of his Father; and lastly, he commands them to baptize into the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, not into a unipersonal God. And indeed it is not once only, but three times, that we are immersed into the three persons, at each several mention of their names” —Tertullian, Against Praxeas 26 Date: 216 A.D.

Someone sent to know whether it was permissible to use warm water in baptism.  The Doctor replied, “Tell the blockhead that water, warm or cold, is water.” (Luther’s Table Talk – related in Dictionary of Illustrations for Pulpit and Platform, by Walter Baxendale, Moody Press)

BAPTISM: A CALL TO CARRY FORWARD

Cyril of Jerusalem Catechetical Lecture 16 par30 (315-386 ad)

And other texts thou heardest before, in what was said about Baptism; Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and the rest; a new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and then immediately, And I will put My Spirit within you. And again. The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the Spirit of the Lord.

“So baptism means being with Jesus ‘in the depths’: the depths of human need, including the depths of our own selves in their need – but also in the depths of God’s love; in the depths where the Spirit is re-creating and refreshing human life as God meant it to be.”

― Rowan Williams, Being Christian: Baptism, Bible, Eucharist, Prayer

BAPTISM: A CALL TO COMMUNION AND COMMUNITY 

For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. 1 Cor 12:13

I, therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace: there is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all. Ephesians 4:1-6

New Creation * Commitment * Community in Christ

 

Innovation, Invitation, & the (Very) Recent History of the Great Commission

The Diocese of Dallas met for a leadership day last week, and it was fabulous. Full disclosure: I'm biased. I have great colleagues in this diocese, and we don't see each other enough. I enjoy the opportunities we have to share time together. Even before we get to whatever's on the docket for a given gathering, our time holds the gift of spiritual kinship and community.

That said, last Friday's agenda was especially great. In the first presentation, Dr. Lauren Whitnah of Nashotah House brought insights from key figures of the Middle Ages to bear on the church's charge, today, to remember God's love for us and grow in love for those around us. In the second presentation, Dr. Kristen Deede Johnson of Wycliffe College drew from scripture and Augustine to help us find a way forward in an age of anxiety, anger, and fear. What Dr. Johnson shared toward the end of her lecture was both new and a blessing to me. I share it here in the event it may be one or both for you, as well.

Dr. Johnson shared with us that the term "Great Commission" only appears in Christian thought and conversation in and after 1840. That's right, 1840! Prior to that time, Matthew 28:16-20 was used to think about the presence of Christ (lo, I am with you always), baptism, and the Trinity, but the verse wasn't understood as marching orders for the Church until around 1840. Wilder yet, the phrase "Great Commission" doesn't appear in Bible headings until the Schofield Bible in 1908. That's right, those bolded headings in your Bible didn't come with the original, so they're always a kind of editorial nudge. 

So, the connection of the Great Commission to Matthew 28:16-20 wasn't made official until 17 years before my Granny was born. Who knew? Interestingly, and significantly, the advent of the Great Commission roughly parallels what my former theology professor called the "invention" of rapture theology between 1840-1850. To repeat, the first 1800 years of the church did not have either a Great Commission or a rapture. 

The latter was not news to me, but the former was. Moreover, that both came into being about the same time turns out to be not accidental. Rapture theology, as characterized by Dr. Johnson, holds that things will get worse and worse until Jesus comes to save a remnant at the end, and then the end happens. Very often, this way of thinking about the earth and salvation results in a kind of resignation to the demise of the material world. Perversely, this kind of thinking sometimes leads Christians to devalue things like creation care and justice work on the basis of their faith. If you can't do anything to avoid the sad truth that it'll all go to hell in the end, cut your losses and make sure you can at least get as many folks to heaven as you can. (In fact, a small minority of Christians believe in making things worse in order to bring about the end more quickly.) 

All of this is an important background for the Great Commission. In the light of a rapture-style worldview (it only gets worse and things here are not of lasting importance), the Great Commission becomes a well-intentioned attempt to get as many people off the sinking ship as possible, before it all goes down. An extension of this logic develops in the 1940s via the Navigators, when the language of multiplication relative to discipleship is introduced, again for the sake of getting as many as possible off of the sinking boat of the world.

A brief timeout. 

Dr. Johnson wasn't saying that evangelism or discipleship are bad things (she's a big fan of both - as am I!). What she was saying is that this largely disembodied, gnostic framework for understanding evangelism and discipleship is a pretty recent innovation. Prior to the formalization of these developments, salvation to heaven and work to improve material conditions on earth - for people and all of creation - were understood to be of one cloth. Indeed, the founding president of my alma mater, Wheaton College (nicknamed "the Harvard of Evangelicalism"), was a dedicated abolitionist. Under Jonathan Blanchard's leadership, Wheaton College was a part of the Underground Railroad, because talking about freedom in Christ was of one piece with working for the freedom of slaves on the earth. But the late 1800s saw a kind of separation of salvation from the soil, and the conceptualization of the Great Commission was one of the ways this separation was affected.

As a kid, Matthew 28:20, a portion of the Great Commission in question, was the closest thing to a favorite, or "life", verse I ever had. It remains so today, "Lo, I am with you always." This verse seems to me to be the promise on which our faith depends. On which it all depends. The God of all things has chosen not to be except to be God with us. And we discover this determination most fully in the person of Jesus. 

But the logic of multiplication that I later discovered within some strands of the Christian faith seemed to suggest a kind of growth for the sake of growth that was both circular and primed for scarcity. The job of disciples was to make disciples and there could never be enough. But what was the content of discipleship? In other words, if the world were to be all joined to Jesus, what would be the quality and character of the life God's People would share? These questions haunted me. And not less when I came upon the work of the Rt. Rev. Dr. David Zac Niringiye, Assistant Bishop of Kampala in the Church of Uganda. In an interview with Christianity Today's Andy Crouch, he said, 

We need to begin to read the Bible differently. Americans have been preoccupied with the end of the Gospel of Matthew, the Great Commission: "Go and make." I call them go-and-make missionaries. These are the go-and-fix-it people. The go-and-make people are those who act like it's all in our power, and all we have to do is "finish the task." They love that passage! But when read from the center of power, that passage simply reinforces the illusion that it's about us, that we are in charge.

I would like to suggest a new favorite passage, the Great Invitation. It's what we find if we read from the beginning of the Gospels rather than the end. Jesus says, "Come, follow me. I will make you fishers of men." Not "Go and make," but "I will make you." It's all about Jesus. And do you know the last words of Jesus to Peter, in John 21? "Follow me." The last words of Simon Peter's encounter are the same as the first words.

Can we begin to read those passages that trouble us, that don't reinforce our cultural centeredness? Let's go back to Matthew 25 and read it in the church in America, over and over. Who are Jesus' brothers? The weak, the hungry, the immigrant workers, the economic outcasts. Let's read the passage of this woman who pours ointment over Jesus. Let's ask, who is mostly in the company of Jesus? Not bishops and pastors! The bishops and pastors are the ones who suggest he's a lunatic! Who enjoys his company? The ordinary folk, so ordinary that their characterization is simply this: "sinners." Can we begin to point to those passages?

Yet this ability to read different passages, to read the Bible differently, won't happen until people are displaced from their comfort zones. I thank the Lord for deep friendships he has given to me beyond my comfort zone, beyond my culture, beyond my language. Until that happens, we will all be tribal, all of us.

Come, follow me, and I will make you. This is the promise of Jesus for the People of God. Not that we would be saviors to others, but that God would make all things new, brought together and healed, strangers into friends, of one Body and belonging, in and through Jesus our Lord. 

I'm trying now to land this wandering reflection, and the potential landing strips are many. I'll settle, then, on 3 and ask your help to grow the list from here: 

• History helps us recognize innovations. For example, Christian care for the earth is not a hippie innovation, as I have been sometimes told, but a return and repair of an innovation (separating salvation from soil) that occurred in the faith before any of us came along. 
• Reading with others, especially different others, helps us identify invisible cultural assumptions that may be blocking our full participation in the invitation of Jesus.
• We should always seek to read the Bible as one. So that Go, make is read alongside, Come, follow, and, maybe most importantly, Love one another, just as I have loved you.

 

Trip Wires & Tragedy

The challenge begins with the first word we speak. What word do we speak? Gun violence? Freedom?  The absence of the capacity for discourse? Empathy? Hate? Human dignity? Hypocrisy? (Whose?) 

Lament? 

What words are we to speak? 

To speak a first word is to trip, inevitably, an invisible wire we did not set. To risk identification with and placement in a camp of opposition. Whose foundations were laid long ago, in anticipation of our violation. Whose rebuttals to whatever response one might offer are already written. Because nuance makes a lousy meme. Because to speak is to reveal the necessary selectivity of both society's outrage and compassion.

Perhaps not obviously, silence is an option, but silence has costs and associated trip wires, too, especially if we have spoken or not spoken before. Just whose side are you on? Reminder that society decries our echo chambers while militantly enforcing them. Reminder that we are still grappling with the implications of Pythagoras, reluctant inhabitants of a world that does not, in fact, have sides. Not that we don't take them. Or devour each other with them. The proof of their existence is not their visibility but their capacity to destroy what is real and visible and true.  

Who will rescue us from this body of death?

The seemingly safest thing to say right now is that political violence is never justified. This is unquestionably true. Both Democrats and Republicans have said as much out loud! Given this rarest of agreements, does it risk my exile to an un-nuanced camp to wonder when violence is ever not political? 

To ask if violence is ever not political is to wonder if violence is ever not a definitionally destructive - if arguably justified and necessary - enforcement of a people's, or individual's, ideals for who belongs to the belonging we share and how. The stuff of politics. 

To ask if violence is ever not political is to pray that bipartisan agreement for the protection and flourishing of certain lives against political violence would not be limited to those in closest proximity to power and wealth. To wonder in this way is to seek to be faithful to my faith tradition, whose recurring concern when it comes to political power, in obedience to our Savior, is notice of, and care for, "the least of these, my sisters and brothers" (Mt 25:40).

If the world is a sphere, without sides, our commitment to the least of these would have us hold a posture open to discovering those at risk of being trampled underfoot, no matter the "side" that brings the marginalization to our attention. The cause of the migrant and the military veteran, if one takes them to be "sided," belonging to one love. And our response to this discovery, from whomever we received it, would be not resentment, but thanksgiving. For we would given the gift of seeing in new ways how, as St. Anthony put it, "our life and death is with our neighbor."

I think the result of lives committed to such a posture would be lives at odds with the logic of silos. Beware of predictable lives! So, a friend tells me about his colleague who is a Christian pacifist and military chaplain. "But," the colleague is frequently asked, "how can you hold those two positions with integrity?" To which he replies, "Friend, to be a chaplain is the only I know how to hold both positions with integrity." In a way that is instructive for our current moment, the chaplain refuses to let his position become the justification for forsaking his belonging to his neighbor. Whether he knows it or not, the chaplain has become a witness to the new logic of the kingdom of God.

In days ahead, if you don't like the question the world invites you to answer, refuse it. Be a parable whose life, like an unquenchable light, insists that more is possible.

We belong to each other. We commit to listen to and learn from each other. We look around for the "others" who aren't at the table where the listening and learning is happening, and we wait for them, too.  We imagine a future that makes room for all. And the fruit of that future is a love that more clearly reflects the love of our Savior, which is love whose joy is that we would know it, by our extending it to one another, not only across the aisle, but under, over, and around it, too. 

A Scribble Thought for Today

I am writing very early this morning, with hope: 

For the day and also as discipline,

Or resistance, or a proclamation, maybe

Of faith, in things that are lasting, real, and true.

I am writing before I am certain

I have clear things to say, and, most

To the point, to be sure, before I have 

Picked up my phone.

A Community Prayer for Hill Country Flood Victims and Their Families

Community Prayer Service July 9, 2025

Gathering Song Abide With Me

Welcome

Bless you, and thank you, for your presence at this community prayer. My name is Father Jonathan, priest of St. James, and on behalf of the St. James family, our friends at Highland Oaks Church of Christ, St. Christopher's Episcopal Church, Lake Highlands Presbyterian, and others, thank you for being here to join in prayer tonight.

One of you asked me what our purpose for tonight would be. My first thought was that the purpose of this community prayer is to grieve. But that’s not quite true. If you’re like me, you are grieving already. The images and headlines recounting the flooding, unimaginable devastation, and loss of life in the Texas Hill Country have challenged and broken our hearts. We have lost loved ones and neighbors. We are grieving already.

No, today, we gather to do something different. We come together to bring our grief to God. To claim our broken hearts and the opportunity to say to God with all that we have that we wish it had been otherwise. So, we come together to pick up an ancient practice of the faithful, which is lament. For people of faith, lament allows our prayer to be honest, gives voice to our pain, and reminds us, through each other, that we are not alone. And lament gives us space to return to the deep promises of God. Lament is prayer that does not rush but leads to trust in the God who hears the cries of God’s People and sees them when they call.

In a moment, a bell will begin and end the silence, and our youth will then call us to prayer in a paraphrase of psalm number 5, which is a psalm of Lament. For even in our grief we are not left alone but joined in word and prayer and breath to every generation of God’s People, all those who have grieved, hoped, and trusted in the God who raised Jesus from the dead.

Psalm 5

O God, find me!
I am lost
In the valley of grief,
and I cannot see my way out.

My friends leave baskets of balm at my feet,
but I cannot bend to touch
the healing
to my heart.

They call me to leave
this valley,
but I cannot follow
the faint sound
of their voices.

They sing their songs
of love,
but the words fade
and vanish in the wind.

They knock,
but I cannot find the door.

They shout to me,
but I cannot find the voice
to answer.

O God, find me!
Come into this valley
and find me!

Bring me out of this land
of weeping.
O you to whom I belong,
find me!

I will wait here,
for you have never failed
to come to me.

I will wait here,
for you have always been faithful.

I will wait here,
for you are my God,
and you have promised
that you counted the hairs on my head.

This is Lament Psalm 5 from “Psalms of Lament,” Copyright 1995 Ann Weems. Used by permission of John Knox Press.

When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep. 

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. 

Come Down, O Love Divine Hymnal #516 

A reading from John’s Gospel. 

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. 

O Gracious Light Hymnal #25 

The Lord be with you. 

And also with you. 

Let us pray. 

Almighty God, your Holy Spirit moved over the waters in the beginning of creation, and your Son Jesus walked on the Sea of Galilee: Be mightily present with all those impacted by catastrophic flooding in the Hill Country. Be close to the lost that they may be found; Guide and protect those who search; Strengthen those who await news of loved ones; Comfort those who mourn; Provide for those who have lost homes and livelihoods. And in the midst of things we cannot understand, empower us to entrust all to your never-failing love, and give us the will to persevere in our response to their needs. All this we ask through your Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. 

God of all compassion, you make nothing in vain and love all you have created. Comfort your servants whose hearts are weighed down by grief and sorrow. Lift them up, and grant that they may so love and serve you in this life, that together with your children, they may obtain the fulness of your promises in the age to come; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

A candle is lit and placed in the sand.

O God, whose beloved Son took children into his arms and blessed them: Give us grace to entrust the more than 100 victims of the Hill Country flooding, including so many children, to your never-failing care and love, and bring us all to your heavenly kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. 

A candle is lit and placed in the sand.

Most merciful God, whose wisdom is beyond our understanding: Deal graciously with the survivors of the departed and all of us in our grief. Surround them and us with your love, that we may not be overwhelmed by the loss, but have confidence in your goodness, and strength to meet the days to come; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

A candle is lit and placed in the sand.

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear, though the earth be moved, and though the mountains be toppled into the depths of the sea; Though its waters rage and foam, and though the mountains tremble at its tumult. The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our stronghold. Amen. 

A candle is lit and placed in the sand.

O God, our times are in your hand. In the midst of uncertainty lead us by your never-failing grace as we seek to be agents of healing and hope. Walk with us through difficult times; watch over us in danger; and give to us a spirit of love and compassion for those who suffer and mourn. And finally remind us that you have promised never to leave us so that even in the valley of the shadow of death your love may be felt, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

A candle is lit and placed in the sand.

Father of all, we pray to you for all those whom we love but see no longer. Grant to them eternal rest. Let light perpetual shine upon them. May his soul and the souls of all the departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen. 

A candle is lit and placed in the sand.

All, together 

Grant us, Lord, the lamp of charity which never fails, that it may burn in us and shed its light on those around us, and that by its brightness we may have a vision of that holy City, where dwells the true and never-failing Light, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

In the space of the music that follows, you are invited to write your own prayers on a prayer card and place it in the basket on the altar, and also to light a candle of intention, as a symbol of your prayer. 

Let us pray God’s care and keeping for the dead. Let us pray God’s mercy on the living. 

Let us pray our thanks for first-responders and helpers. 

Let us pray for solidarity, companionship, and generosity for the affected peoples’ recovery in the weeks and months ahead. 

Let us pray for hearts big enough to break and to follow the Savior’s commandment to love. 

Let us pray in the words our Savior Christ taught us, 

Our Father, who art in heaven, 

hallowed be thy name, 

thy kingdom come, 

thy will be done, 

on earth as it is in heaven. 

Give us this day our daily bread. 

And forgive us our trespasses, 

as we forgive those who trespass against us. 

And lead us not into temptation, 

but deliver us from evil. 

For thine is the kingdom, 

and the power, and the glory, 

for ever and ever. 

Amen. 

Jesus said, “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” 

Amazing Grace Hymnal #671 

Closing Prayer 

God of love, 

God of peace, 

Come and comfort all who are grieving. 

Weep with those in sorrow. 

Gather round the circles of remembrance. 

Hear the choirs of gratitude, 

and make Holy all that pours from broken hearts. 

May your eternal embrace, your forever love, 

your Divine Presence that is before death, 

companions through death, 

and rises after death, 

be the resting place - the place of return - 

where we can always find each other. 

- Rev. M Jade Kaiser, enfleshed 

May Christ the Good Shepherd 

enfold you with love, 

fill you with peace, 

and lead you in hope, 

this day and all your days. Amen. 

Let us bless the Lord. 

Thanks be to God. 

Thank you for your prayers and presence. This concludes our service. You are welcome to go home, and equally welcome to remain in prayer. The doors will remain open for the next little while. The Lord bless and keep you. 

Those who wish to give may donate to local Hill Country relief efforts here. 

Beholding, Becoming, & Ron Burgundy

 When Paul says “imitate me” in Philippians today, I wonder how you hear it. I wonder how he means it. “Imitate me.” And not just imitate me, “Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me.” Do you like what he did there? If you imitate me, you’ll be joining the others who already have. That’s right, there’s a line. A bandwagon, if you will. Don’t worry, there’s probably room for you. Paul, channeling his best Ron Burgundy, “I don’t know how to put this. I’m kind of a big deal.” But even before we get to Paul’s reputation in some circles as a sometimes long-winded and/or arrogant grump, it just feels like a smug thing to say. You want the answer? Look no further. Right here. 

But then. This one time, years ago, I found myself in the Badlands of South Dakota and had me rethinking what I thought I knew about St. Paul. I was in the Badlands of South Dakota on a hike that had become unexpectedly treacherous. I was in way over my head. And a more experienced hiker in front of me, who was no less uneasy about our unfolding situation than I was, calmly and humbly comforted me: Jonathan, it’s gonna be okay. It’s not gonna be easy. But watch where I put my hands and look where I put my feet. Put your hands and feet in those places. I’ll do the figuring. You do the following. We’re gonna make it. Together. I promise I won’t leave without you. So, I did. And we did - we made it out of the wilds together. What I’m suggesting is that it’s at least a possibility, for Paul’s haters this morning, that maybe he isn’t only or always smug. Maybe his invitation to imitation is born of shared belonging and compassion.

 

Even so. Even if Paul didn’t come with some baggage (and he does). Even if he could be read more charitably by us (and he can), some people won’t imitate another person, any person, on principle. They want to be original. They want to write their own story. From scratch. But did you know - and they have studies on this - that even our ideas of independence are things we copy from other people? Because you’re trying to be independent like John Wayne, or your grandpa, or whomever. You’re working off a template. While you and I are probably working off different templates, there doesn’t seem to be any real way around the fact that you’re always copying something; that your pure originality is a myth.

In fact, it turns out, the act, the art, of imitation, of consideration and emulation, is a part of our biological hardwiring. It’s automatic. Because we’re made for connection and social belonging. Babies start imitating parents well within their first year of life. At the same time they start copying you, they start to recognize when you’re copying them, too. And they love it! Which explains the addictive properties of peek a boo.

As adults, we continue to mimic one another, sometimes on purpose and sometimes not. And the not on purpose parts are important. They’re important, not so you and I will learn to stop imitating but so that we’ll become aware that we always are imitating. There’s no turning it off. Constantly, unknowingly, borrowing micro-expressions from other people. Constantly, unknowingly, carrying ideas about the world we got from other people: ideas about love and its limits, scarcity and abundance, ideas about what is and isn’t possible, about what is and is not desirable, ideas we will sometimes only later see were not the only way to see, even when we choose to keep them. The expressions are like threads that show us the ways love has shaped us. Attention and imitation are important because we human beings are shaped by our loves.

A theologian friend of mine was taking his oldest kid and a friend to the mall. As he dropped them off at the circle, he called out, “Have a good time at the temple!” The temple was an inside joke between them. It was the dad’s way of reminding his son that formation doesn’t always start with our heads. It happens in the silent spaces of life, in countless invisible decisions of attention and presence. Where you put your treasure, there will your heart be. That kind of stuff. The dad wanted to remind his son that mall shapes a life in a particular direction. Without asking your permission. Just by your being there. Hopefully, the community of faith offers an alternative formation, life that is life, in a different direction. Because, when it comes to imitation, the question is not if but who and to what end? Because the possibility that you can write or control your own story from scratch is, frankly, not on the table.

One of the gifts Lent can maybe be is space to examine the imitations at work in our lives. The patterns, both life-giving and life-diminishing, running in the background, in us. To get honest about the gazes that grab us. What do I notice? What do I fail to notice? What would I like to notice more? Where would I like my heart to be? Maybe Lent can mean an audit of our longings and our loves. Of our screen-time, so to speak. Of the voices we prioritize and direct the fact of imitation toward the One whose love first moved the sun and the stars.

Along these lines, one possible very good use of Lent is to reflect on the examples you first remember observing and admiring, as a child, especially those example of faith. Who in your life first made some part of you come alive: “That!” you felt. I want to be kind like that? Or unexpectedly gentle like that? Or put together like that? Or totally comfortable being not put together. Or not reducible to a partisan box to fit in, like that? Holy like that? Looking back, what was it about that that that captivated your imagination? How would you describe the thing you saw that compelled your heart?

A young Roger Schutz, years away from founding the ecumenical community of brothers called Taize was, he says, only imitating his grandmother when, at the outset of World War II, he moved to a small town, on the edge of the fighting, to make room for and protect Jewish refugees. She had done the same during the first World War. After the war, Roger opened his home again, this time to German prisoners of war. Looking back, he eventually recognized the force of faith in what he had done. But at the beginning, he was only doing what he knew his grandmother would have done. What she had done. Following her in the way opened up his later understanding.

The fact that you and I can live the life of faith, like Brother Roger, before we understand everything there is to know about either God or ourselves is a great relief to me. If fully understanding a thing was a prerequisite to doing a thing, who would ever, for example, get married? Right? So, good news, says St. Paul. Don’t overthink it. If you want to (eventually) understand generosity, give. If you want to become a person of justice, do just acts. If you want to be a person of prayer, pray. Fake it til you make it. Preferably with others who know you well. But, don’t be fooled, it isn’t faking at all. It’s forming it all. It’s learning with our bodies in the community of faith whose eyes, whose lives, hearts, and attention are all set on Jesus. Because we were made for imitation. Where with hearts fixed on Christ we might become like the One we behold.

Because, bad news/good news. Bad news: you and I can’t think our way to holiness. Good News. You were never meant to. “Imitate me.” Paul says. “Follow me,” Jesus says elsewhere. See, even Paul wasn’t being original. Hear in those words an invitation of belonging and love. Consider the possibility that the invitation to imitation is not the end but the beginning of your freedom and mine, true freedom for the People of God. With the Good News that faith names a journey we travel together. Where together, with Paul, with and in one another, we might also hear our Savior say to us: watch where I put my hands and look where I put my feet. Put your hands and feet in those places. I’ll do the figuring. You do the following. We’re gonna make it. Together. I promise I won’t leave you alone.

Amen.