Saturday, December 27, 2003
Sermon to be preached on December 28, 2003 at Christ Presbyterian Church in San Francisco, CA.
PUTTING ON THE TENDER MERCIES OF GOD
Colossians 3:12-21: Therefore as the elect children of God put on tender mercies. . ." (New King James Version)
On this last Sunday of the year Paul reminds us that the baby of Bethlehem became a man and that he calls us to live with him. As we begin the New Year we are called to begin it living with Jesus.
I have a young friend who has worked with me over the years. He is very much into his own spiritual journey--through meditation, Buddhism, Hinduism, but when it comes to Christianity he avoids the discussion and loves to make fun of Christians. Last year when he made a wise crack I snapped back "What is your problem with Christianity?" His reponse: "I don't like the fact that to be a Christian you have to follow one man, and besides he is too demanding."
Several years ago I was preaching in a congregation whose pastor I had only talked to briefly. After worship as we were talking he commented: "You kknow it is as if Jesus is your friend, someone you really know, the way you talk about him."
This Jesus, whose birth we have celebrated, is one with whom we can relate, and know, and love, and who is with us--but he calls us to seek to live out our lives as he lives out his.
As I read the Epistle in different translations the phrase from the older translations "put on the tender mercies of God" played over and over in my mind. For the last week that phrase constantly ran through my thoughts. "Tender" designates soft, gentle caressing love, and "mercies" denotes a loving graceful compassion expressed in so many forms by God. and so this phrase has become God's word for me to share this day.
To "put on the tender mercies" is what it means to live with Jesus. Recently a young lady from a local high school doing a class project on homelessness asked: "What do you see as the solution to homelessness?" I responded: "A revolution of the heart"-for only when our hearts are transformed to put the priorities of others over our own greed will we see real change.
This revolution begins when we put on the "tender mercies." What are those tender mercies:
1. AWARENESS OF GOD'S PRESENCE:
A number of years ago I had a minster friend tell me that he would commit suicide if it was not for his family--he had achieved all there was to have. Recently I sat with a young 20 year old who wanted to take his life. He asked me over and over what gave life meaning to me--because to him life had no meaning.
Throughout my life knowing and feeling the awareness of God in my daily life--in its ups and in its down, in my good, and in my dark times has given me a reason to live out my life. People asked me what I try to teach the kids I work with, and for me I try to journey with people in trying to find that within themselves that gives meaning to their lives, whatever it maybe. For me it has been my relationship to Jesus of Nazareth.
Last year Nate came into my life. He is an 18 year old with a long history of drug problems and constantly struggling with life. He was looking for something. He would call me and drop by. He started out very anti-Christian, but then he begin to soften and asked me for a Bible. I told him to read the Gospel of Mark. We talked about Jesus, and about how Jesus can make a difference in our lives. Nate disappeared. I next heard from him when he called me from home in New York to thank me for helping him find Jesus. He said once he separated Christ from the instituition he became a real person who gave him hope.
That awareness of God's love in our lives gives us hope, and meaning, and that awareness leads us to see people as Jesus in our midst. People become sacred to us, there is within them a divine spark--and in so doing we find ourselves wanting to relate to them on their journey as friends, not as the other or the different.
2. BEARING ONE ANOTHER'S BURDEN:
This awareness of God leads us to a second tender mercy--that of bearing one another's burden. In our culture we have created many boundaries from people. We call them clients, homeless, youth, or the aged, we have different ways of relating. People have become objects. But to live with Jesus means that we bear one another's burden, that we see other people as just fellow travelers on this space ship we call earth, all journeying all dying. No matter how who we are in the end we are all equal.
My life for the past ten years has been with young adult sex workers and drug abusers. Through these years there have been interns who have come and gone. Many have difficulty relating to my kids. In the past weeks we have heard much about the homeless in City--newspaper articles, politicians, bill boards all create an image of the homeless that is negative, one that portrays them other than ourselves.
But the reality is that my kids, and those who are homeless are no different than us--they are human beings on the same journey--many who have made choices that have severe consequences,others that have not had any choices in life. But all children of the same God as we.
I tell my interns that the only secret I can offer them, when they have difficulty in relating to the kids, is that of being vulnerable, of being open, of being just a nother human being to the kids. To help them bear their burdens.
To live with Jesus one of the tender mercies we are to put on is to bear one another's burdens--without looking at the artificial boundaries we create--but seeing them as a fellow traveler.
I was once eating at a restautasrant with a clergy friend. One of the guys saw me and asked me for something to eat. I invited him to sit down and have lunch. My friend was scandalized, and to this day she will not have lunch with me on Polk. To me John was just one of my friends, and I treated him as such.
When people ask me the solution to homelessness I often respond: "This is my solution--to meet each person each day as Jesus--it is the sandwich I give, the socks I give, but more importantly it is just for a while the sharing of their burden."
3. ACCEPTING GOD'S GRACE IN OUR LIVES AND BEING A CHANNEL FOR THAT GRACE
Finally there is the tender mercy of accepting God's grace in our lives and being a channel of that grace.
Will Campbell, a Baptist minister, civil rights pioneer, once shared the story of going to visit a black man in prison who had killed a white man. There were many people angry with him and asked him how he could do such a thing. Will responded: "God forgives bastards, and I am the greatest bastard of all--how can I not forgive another."
Often I think of King David, an adulterer and murderer, Peter, the denier, and Paul, accomplish to murder--and am reminded that it is not how far we fall but that we get up and continue to be faithful to God as best we can--for all of us are sinners in need of God's grace.
In these years I have been a witness to the most destructive things a human being can do to another or to him or her self. And what I have learned is that in one way or another I am as guilty as they, because I have thought of doing the same things, just not acted out, and that all of us are in need of God';s grace and we cannot judge another but must be a channel of God's grace to them.
For me this came home last year. I had a son who died from drug related causes nearly two years ago. Some months afterward there was a young man passing through and he asked me to hear his confession, as we do in our tradition. Not knowing my relationship to Zach he shared with me how he was one of several who had tied him up and over dosed him on speed. In those moments i still remember my grief, my anger, my rage, but also that this was God giving me a time of grace as I pronounced the words of absolution.
We are called to be channels of God's grace.
And so on this final Sunday of the year I invite you to put on the tender mercies of God and to live with Jesus. Amen.
*****************------------------------*****************
Friday, December 26, 2003
People often ask me if i miss spending christmas with family--well i do spend it with family--i took six out to eat yesterday at noon, i fed 50 plus others last night--and hung out throughout the day with five or six others, and u know they are just as dysfunctional as my biological family, so i am right at home.
Christmas is always a hard day for people. stores are closed, and we are conditioned to a consumeristic type of approach that creates a mythical reality that does not exist. i spent most of last night hanging out with T.
I let him call his parents, and he shared how since he was 16 he has been on the road. At 22 he cannot just settle down. to him his life is moving from one place to another, he is clean from drugs at the present. and then 26 year old S is just waiting to be picked up, he has violaed his parole. and K is bored all day, waiting to do speed.
And as i listen to them i can understand where they come from. i am the same way if i let myself get pulled into depression and futility. for me the awareness of God's presence is what gives my life meaning, it excites me, it carrys me. without that presence life would be just futile and like moving from one city to another looking for the "city of peace and brotherhood" that T searches for. It is that awareness that brings life to my life. Deo Gratis! Thanks be to God!
*****************------------------------*****************
Wednesday, December 24, 2003
CHRISTMAS MEDITATION
As I sit at my desk I look outside and it is chilly, rainy. Inside the turkey is cooking, and I am taking my time of quiet before the business of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day consume me. Tonight we will have Mass, and the Scripture will be from John 1: "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us."
There are two types of religion that one can preach: the mythic, magical God who solves all of our problems or the God who is with us in the trials and pain of life. For me the latter is the God in Jesus that I know.
I am asked all the time why God does not take away people's suffering, whatever form that suffering may come. And as I reflect upon that question I think of how God must feel.
I can imagine that long ago God came to the understanding within herself that he would not be fulfilled unless she had created beings who fulfilled his love. And so God created the world. He gave his beings everything they wanted, and the freedom to choose her love. But God underestimated himself. These creatures had other plans, they chose to love other things rather than God and consequently that love of things that were not from God lead to consequences--suffering and death. God became angry over and over, even destroying his creation, but finally God thought--"I will come in the form of a human being and if I love them they will love me back." And so in the form of Jesus the Word came into the world, but what happened was the same as in the beginning. People rejected that love, even killing it. But God is a stubborn God--she resurrected Jesus from the grave and affirmed to the world that Jesus would be with us until the end of time and that unltimately her realm of love will win out.
In my years of counseling I have learned that if we do not place limits on ourselves we cannot place limits on others. i believe that God has placed limits on himself and those limits are letting us be accountable for the consequences of our actions. God wants to be a lover not a dictator, and so God comes to us in Jesus calling us to that eternal love.
And in the Word become flesh Jesus is with us in our limitations. He suffers with us. He is with us when we are dying of AIDS. He is with us when we are sleeping in the alley. He is with us when we struggle against drug abuse and fail again and again. Jesus is with us in our living and our dying. And in that presence we know that Jesus calls us to work with him to bring the realm of God to earth.
The promise of Christmas is the promise of God with us, and the calling of God for us to be God with others. May you have a Merry Christmas!
*****************------------------------*****************
Tuesday, December 23, 2003
this is the first day i have felt my old self in over a week. the flu took its toll on me. i still find myself getting weak, but that too will pass. illness always reminds me of mortality and as i age i meditate when i am ill on death, knowing that some day there will be an illness i will not recover from, and i find in doing so that all we have left is Jesus, with the "words of eternal life."
k is out of hospital, and was not home an hour before he was using speed. his illness is one that will shorten his life span as is, and all he is doing is hastening that end--what does one do when despite all support another continues to be self-destructive--accept to tell him that ultimately know matter what he does or happens he is cared for and i will be there.
as we approach xmas people are more and more needy. all around are the trappings of consumerism and one is left with an emptiness. money is hard on the streets now, the police are getting tougher. people are spending nights in jail for sleeping on the streets. i am asked more and more "Where is God" and all i know is that God is here in our illneseess, with us in jail, on the streets, in life, and death, and life beyond death God is with us. I have lived my life on that premise and it is what i believe. Deo Gratis! Thanks be to God!
*****************------------------------*****************
|
HOME
