Mother’s Day Prayer
Rev. Laurie Furr-Vancini
O God,
This morning we sing for joy!
We give thanks for mothers. All mothers.
Mothers who raise us up,
birth mothers,
adoptive mother,
step-mothers,
foster mothers,
mothers-in-law,
grandmothers,
mothers to be, aunts,
mothering neighbors,
friends’ mothers with motherly advice and love,
all those women who have cared for us.
We pause to think of those in our lives who have mothered us in ways big and ways small…..
….And we give thanks that you are a mothering God who loves us before you know us and writes our name on the palm of your hand so you are always with us.
We pray for those who cannot mother as they would like.
Those who yearned for children who did not come.
Those who wait still.
Those who chose to mother nieces and nephews and pets and humanity
and feel as if they have to explain their choice.
We pray for mothers who cannot mother as they would like
because they live in poverty and cannot feed their children every day,
who cannot protect their children from war and violence and disease.
We pray for mothers who are not good mothers.
Who, because of addiction,
disease,
mental illness,
broken hearts,
anger,
feelings of helplessness or loneliness
could not and cannot mother their children as they needed to be mothered.
We pray for them and we pray mightily for their children.
We pray for mothers who mourn the loss of their children
and for children who mourn the loss of their mother.
We give thanks that you cause the mountains to sing and have comforted us, your people.
We pray for hearts of compassion for us and we pray that others have compassion for us.
Amen.
Monday, May 13, 2013
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Lindisfarne - An Old Story for Today
Genesis 17:1-8 Laurie Furr-Vancini
Hebrews 11 (selected verses) October 21, 2012
Stewardship of our Religious Heritage Palms Presbyterian Church
An Old Story for Today
A few weeks ago, I found myself on the shores of a tidal island in Northern England
In the region of Northumbria.
(I like to say that because it sounds so very Chronicles of Narnia)…Northumbria.
So, there I was on an island of Northumbria, called Lindisfarne, otherwise known as The Holy Island.
What makes the Holy Island, Holy? You might ask?
And the answer is…it’s history…and it’s present.
Here is the story…..
A long, long time ago in the 7th century A.D. there was a King of Northumbria, named Oswald.
He was a devout Christian who battled others in the name of Christ.
When he became King, he sent for a contingent of monks from Scotland to come spread Christianity
Throughout his kingdom.
And so it came to pass that a monk named Aidan, austere, gentle, holy and moderate, having a zeal for God came to the Holy Island of LIndisfarne, established a priory and sent monks out from there through what we now know as England and that is how England became a Christian country.
As happens with kings, King Oswald was killed. His body was cut into quarters, but his brother went and retrieved his Head which was brought to the Holy Island to be buried.
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient. You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
I am not much in to history.
I only sort of like museums.
I only sort of like to read about history.
I only sort of like history classes in high school and college.
I appreciate people who are full of historical facts
and can re-tell details from time gone past.
I understand the importance of passing on history
as part of our shared understanding.
Now, stories from history, those capture my interest.
The people, the places, the events, if they are told like stories, those I love.
If I can smell the horses,
if I can see the landscape,
if I can feel the wind blowing, if I can visualize the king’s severed head...
then, I am there
And history becomes the now.
I can stand outside the tent with Abraham and hear God say,
Look up in the sky and look at those stars.
I can see them twinkle. I can see the expanse out there in the open desert. I can feel the sand on my feet and face.
See how many starts there are, those will be your descendents….
I know what it feels like to wonder if I will ever have a baby.
I know what promise sounds like and the excitement that Abraham must have felt.
And to look at the big expanse of sky and wonder, “How will this be?” and
“Glory, Hallelujah” all at the same time……
After King Oswald died, Aiden, the monk, became bishop and lived a long life,
(well a longer life than Oswald).
Then he died and was also buried on the Holy Island.
A few years later another monk,Cuthbert, came along.
Cuthbert was as beloved as Aiden had been.
According to historian priest David Adam,
“Cuthbert recognized the need for rhythm in life. Like tidal Holy Island, we sometimes need to be part of the mainland and all that is going on, and sometimes need to separate out and be an island for a while.”
The people loved Cuthbert and he became a bishop ….
the head of the English Church in Northumbria.
and he lived a long life, then died. Cuthbert, too, was buried on the Holy Island.
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient. You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
In the church, we have a number of sources for our history.
We have the Hebrew Scriptures, where we find our story about our ancestor Abraham.
We have stories of the life of Jesus found in the gospels.
We have the stories of the early church, where our second scripture for today from Hebrews recounts earlier stories and heroes.
We have traditions from the early church.
We have writings and sayings such as the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed.
We have much newer creeds, as well, written at specific points in history when the church needed to proclaim what it believed.
We have the ancient places where modern people live today.
We can walk the road to Jericho and we can drink from the river Jordan (but we wouldn’t because it is terribly polluted). We can walk through the same ancient gate of Jerusalem that Jesus would have walked through.
We can follow Paul’s footsteps throughout Asia Minor
And we can go to places like the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.
After Cuthbert died, monks and bishops came and went.
Time came and went.
The priory on the tiny island fell into disrepair and was rebuilt.
One day, the Vikings came and ransacked and ravaged the Holy Island and much of Northumbria.
The monks of the Holy Island were lost. They did not know where to go or what to do. So, they dug up bones and they set out for the mainland. They took the bones of Cuthbert and the head of Oswald and wandered Northumbria for an unknown amount of time
There are statues in a number of places which depict the bones and the bonus head of Oswald being carried around the countryside.
The story came to be told (and might be true) that before Cuthbert’s death, he carried around the head of King Oswald.
I made a collage of a number of the beautiful stained glass windows that show the now Sainted Cuthbert carrying around the head of the dead king.
We might find that rather “yuck”, but here is the truth.
We in the church, carry around a lot of our history that is yuck.
And beyond yuck, we carry around a lot that was wrong, bad and evil in the name of a loving Christ.
We carry around the bloody crusades.
We carry around the history of a Church that didn’t respond and when it did respond it did so with swords and spears and guns and all things hurtful.
We carry around the history of a Church that built grand cathedrals while folks starved and died.
We carry around a Church that baptized native peoples
all over the world as they ravaged the land and the people in the name of Christ.
We carry around a history of a Church that didn’t respond or under-responded to wars, injustices, lack of human rights and dignity,
We carry around a load of wrong in the church.
We Protestants in this country, of a certain age,
carry around the church of our childhood.
A church filled to the brim with people and programs…
babies baptized every week.
We think of it as the best of times of the church.
That same church in that same time didn’t allow in people
whose skin was a different color….
women were not permitted in leadership roles….
yet we dream wistfully of the “glory days.”
We carry it around and it is wrong if we ignore it or if we pretend we are not carrying it, that it is not part of our story, from which we need to repent. That which we need to remember in order not to repeat.
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient. You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
The bones of Cuthbert and the head of Oswald came to rest in Durham (not North Carolina, but Durham, England)
You can go there, as I did, and visit the place where St. Cuthbert is buried.
From the website of Durham Cathedral: Durham Cathedral has been a place of pilgrimage ever since it was built to house the shrine of St Cuthbert. Today people still come to visit his tomb.”
It is said that Oswald’s head is still enshrined with the bones of Cuthbert.
As for the bones of St. Aidan, the first monk on the Holy Island, his bones seemed to have scattered,
Reportedly, half of his bones are on the Isle of Iona in Scotland and others in Durham.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, bone to bone, head to head, generation to generation.
I am not moved by bones.
I know some are (particularly in Northumbria) and I give thanks that
the bones’ presence moves some closer to the love of Christ.
But, I am moved by the life behind (or rather in front of the bones).
I am touched by those who breathed and lived and died. Who loved with and by a love a Christ. Who, even though misguided made decisions based on the church and a love for the it.
Like the writer of Hebrews, I am captivated by the stories of our heroes of faith….
Of Noah and Isaac and Jacob (guided, yet willful)
Of Sarah who laughed long and hard when she was told that she would have a child at an old age and generations would call her blessed.
Of Jacob and Esau who fought and tricked and forgave and loved
Of Moses who had his own problems, but was the one chosen to lead a people.
Of Joseph and his brothers all with their problems
That the writer of Hebrews chose to include the prostitute Rahab in the list of heroes of faith….
I love that!
And what more should I say?
I should say because we are talking about “Stewardship of the Faith”,
that we are part of a church of the Reformation.
Of brave Martin Luther who said, “enough” and spoke truth to power leading the Reformation
Men and women who would cry:
Sola Scripture – Scripture Alone
Sola Fides – Faith Alone
Sola Gratia – Grace Alone
Sola Christus – Christ Alone
Soli Deo Gloria – God’s Glory Alone
I love that the reformers named five things ALONE that as essential, not one thing alone. And I laugh because five things ALONE sounds very Presbyterian.
Being shaped by the reformation means something.
In our story, it means that things aren’t written and followed.
The bible is alive!
Our faith must be active!
Our heroes aren’t only the heroes of our past, but our heroes of NOW!
Grace is present and moving, swirling around and resting upon us as individuals and as a community.
Christ is present among us – at font, at table, in our gathering, in our going out, love poured out to be shared.
God’s glory is all around – waiting to be named and praised!
If we understand our Reformed Heritage as always being reformed, we understand ourselves to be part of the evolving history of the love of Christ come to God’s earth.
And that…has less to do with us changing than with us being changed
By the power of the Holy Spirit.
New life. New flesh on new bones.
There are bones and severed heads that do not need to be carried around.
We can put them down.
We can say “we are sorry for what damage was done by the church….
Injustices carried out in the name of Christ.
Past wrongdoing.
We can mourn that which is lost and wrong with our church and with our history.
We can repent of the wrongdoing of our ancestors while holding up moments of
Calling and grace and love and goodness. Stories and heroes of our faith.
Real men and women. Bones and muscle and blood and spirit.
So, if you go to the tiny, Holy Island of Lindisfarne,
you will see the ruins of the once great priory.
You will see a BIIIIIGGGGG castle up on a TAAALLLLL hill.
You will see a fishing village.
You will see crosses against the backdrop of the beautiful English countryside.
You will see rocky beaches and a castle high.
You will feel the cool wind blow on your face.
You will watch the tides come in…..
and the tides go out……
You will see roosters and sheep and horses.
You will see vacationers and pilgrims and regular folks who live on the island.
You will walk on a beach full of sea glass and hear the colony of seals that surround the island.
And if you listen, very, very closely you may hear God say:
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient.
You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
Hebrews 11 (selected verses) October 21, 2012
Stewardship of our Religious Heritage Palms Presbyterian Church
An Old Story for Today
A few weeks ago, I found myself on the shores of a tidal island in Northern England
In the region of Northumbria.
(I like to say that because it sounds so very Chronicles of Narnia)…Northumbria.
So, there I was on an island of Northumbria, called Lindisfarne, otherwise known as The Holy Island.
What makes the Holy Island, Holy? You might ask?
And the answer is…it’s history…and it’s present.
Here is the story…..
A long, long time ago in the 7th century A.D. there was a King of Northumbria, named Oswald.
He was a devout Christian who battled others in the name of Christ.
When he became King, he sent for a contingent of monks from Scotland to come spread Christianity
Throughout his kingdom.
And so it came to pass that a monk named Aidan, austere, gentle, holy and moderate, having a zeal for God came to the Holy Island of LIndisfarne, established a priory and sent monks out from there through what we now know as England and that is how England became a Christian country.
As happens with kings, King Oswald was killed. His body was cut into quarters, but his brother went and retrieved his Head which was brought to the Holy Island to be buried.
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient. You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
I am not much in to history.
I only sort of like museums.
I only sort of like to read about history.
I only sort of like history classes in high school and college.
I appreciate people who are full of historical facts
and can re-tell details from time gone past.
I understand the importance of passing on history
as part of our shared understanding.
Now, stories from history, those capture my interest.
The people, the places, the events, if they are told like stories, those I love.
If I can smell the horses,
if I can see the landscape,
if I can feel the wind blowing, if I can visualize the king’s severed head...
then, I am there
And history becomes the now.
I can stand outside the tent with Abraham and hear God say,
Look up in the sky and look at those stars.
I can see them twinkle. I can see the expanse out there in the open desert. I can feel the sand on my feet and face.
See how many starts there are, those will be your descendents….
I know what it feels like to wonder if I will ever have a baby.
I know what promise sounds like and the excitement that Abraham must have felt.
And to look at the big expanse of sky and wonder, “How will this be?” and
“Glory, Hallelujah” all at the same time……
After King Oswald died, Aiden, the monk, became bishop and lived a long life,
(well a longer life than Oswald).
Then he died and was also buried on the Holy Island.
A few years later another monk,Cuthbert, came along.
Cuthbert was as beloved as Aiden had been.
According to historian priest David Adam,
“Cuthbert recognized the need for rhythm in life. Like tidal Holy Island, we sometimes need to be part of the mainland and all that is going on, and sometimes need to separate out and be an island for a while.”
The people loved Cuthbert and he became a bishop ….
the head of the English Church in Northumbria.
and he lived a long life, then died. Cuthbert, too, was buried on the Holy Island.
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient. You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
In the church, we have a number of sources for our history.
We have the Hebrew Scriptures, where we find our story about our ancestor Abraham.
We have stories of the life of Jesus found in the gospels.
We have the stories of the early church, where our second scripture for today from Hebrews recounts earlier stories and heroes.
We have traditions from the early church.
We have writings and sayings such as the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed.
We have much newer creeds, as well, written at specific points in history when the church needed to proclaim what it believed.
We have the ancient places where modern people live today.
We can walk the road to Jericho and we can drink from the river Jordan (but we wouldn’t because it is terribly polluted). We can walk through the same ancient gate of Jerusalem that Jesus would have walked through.
We can follow Paul’s footsteps throughout Asia Minor
And we can go to places like the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.
After Cuthbert died, monks and bishops came and went.
Time came and went.
The priory on the tiny island fell into disrepair and was rebuilt.
One day, the Vikings came and ransacked and ravaged the Holy Island and much of Northumbria.
The monks of the Holy Island were lost. They did not know where to go or what to do. So, they dug up bones and they set out for the mainland. They took the bones of Cuthbert and the head of Oswald and wandered Northumbria for an unknown amount of time
There are statues in a number of places which depict the bones and the bonus head of Oswald being carried around the countryside.
The story came to be told (and might be true) that before Cuthbert’s death, he carried around the head of King Oswald.
I made a collage of a number of the beautiful stained glass windows that show the now Sainted Cuthbert carrying around the head of the dead king.
We might find that rather “yuck”, but here is the truth.
We in the church, carry around a lot of our history that is yuck.
And beyond yuck, we carry around a lot that was wrong, bad and evil in the name of a loving Christ.
We carry around the bloody crusades.
We carry around the history of a Church that didn’t respond and when it did respond it did so with swords and spears and guns and all things hurtful.
We carry around the history of a Church that built grand cathedrals while folks starved and died.
We carry around a Church that baptized native peoples
all over the world as they ravaged the land and the people in the name of Christ.
We carry around a history of a Church that didn’t respond or under-responded to wars, injustices, lack of human rights and dignity,
We carry around a load of wrong in the church.
We Protestants in this country, of a certain age,
carry around the church of our childhood.
A church filled to the brim with people and programs…
babies baptized every week.
We think of it as the best of times of the church.
That same church in that same time didn’t allow in people
whose skin was a different color….
women were not permitted in leadership roles….
yet we dream wistfully of the “glory days.”
We carry it around and it is wrong if we ignore it or if we pretend we are not carrying it, that it is not part of our story, from which we need to repent. That which we need to remember in order not to repeat.
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient. You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
The bones of Cuthbert and the head of Oswald came to rest in Durham (not North Carolina, but Durham, England)
You can go there, as I did, and visit the place where St. Cuthbert is buried.
From the website of Durham Cathedral: Durham Cathedral has been a place of pilgrimage ever since it was built to house the shrine of St Cuthbert. Today people still come to visit his tomb.”
It is said that Oswald’s head is still enshrined with the bones of Cuthbert.
As for the bones of St. Aidan, the first monk on the Holy Island, his bones seemed to have scattered,
Reportedly, half of his bones are on the Isle of Iona in Scotland and others in Durham.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, bone to bone, head to head, generation to generation.
I am not moved by bones.
I know some are (particularly in Northumbria) and I give thanks that
the bones’ presence moves some closer to the love of Christ.
But, I am moved by the life behind (or rather in front of the bones).
I am touched by those who breathed and lived and died. Who loved with and by a love a Christ. Who, even though misguided made decisions based on the church and a love for the it.
Like the writer of Hebrews, I am captivated by the stories of our heroes of faith….
Of Noah and Isaac and Jacob (guided, yet willful)
Of Sarah who laughed long and hard when she was told that she would have a child at an old age and generations would call her blessed.
Of Jacob and Esau who fought and tricked and forgave and loved
Of Moses who had his own problems, but was the one chosen to lead a people.
Of Joseph and his brothers all with their problems
That the writer of Hebrews chose to include the prostitute Rahab in the list of heroes of faith….
I love that!
And what more should I say?
I should say because we are talking about “Stewardship of the Faith”,
that we are part of a church of the Reformation.
Of brave Martin Luther who said, “enough” and spoke truth to power leading the Reformation
Men and women who would cry:
Sola Scripture – Scripture Alone
Sola Fides – Faith Alone
Sola Gratia – Grace Alone
Sola Christus – Christ Alone
Soli Deo Gloria – God’s Glory Alone
I love that the reformers named five things ALONE that as essential, not one thing alone. And I laugh because five things ALONE sounds very Presbyterian.
Being shaped by the reformation means something.
In our story, it means that things aren’t written and followed.
The bible is alive!
Our faith must be active!
Our heroes aren’t only the heroes of our past, but our heroes of NOW!
Grace is present and moving, swirling around and resting upon us as individuals and as a community.
Christ is present among us – at font, at table, in our gathering, in our going out, love poured out to be shared.
God’s glory is all around – waiting to be named and praised!
If we understand our Reformed Heritage as always being reformed, we understand ourselves to be part of the evolving history of the love of Christ come to God’s earth.
And that…has less to do with us changing than with us being changed
By the power of the Holy Spirit.
New life. New flesh on new bones.
There are bones and severed heads that do not need to be carried around.
We can put them down.
We can say “we are sorry for what damage was done by the church….
Injustices carried out in the name of Christ.
Past wrongdoing.
We can mourn that which is lost and wrong with our church and with our history.
We can repent of the wrongdoing of our ancestors while holding up moments of
Calling and grace and love and goodness. Stories and heroes of our faith.
Real men and women. Bones and muscle and blood and spirit.
So, if you go to the tiny, Holy Island of Lindisfarne,
you will see the ruins of the once great priory.
You will see a BIIIIIGGGGG castle up on a TAAALLLLL hill.
You will see a fishing village.
You will see crosses against the backdrop of the beautiful English countryside.
You will see rocky beaches and a castle high.
You will feel the cool wind blow on your face.
You will watch the tides come in…..
and the tides go out……
You will see roosters and sheep and horses.
You will see vacationers and pilgrims and regular folks who live on the island.
You will walk on a beach full of sea glass and hear the colony of seals that surround the island.
And if you listen, very, very closely you may hear God say:
It is a lovely story, isn’t it. And there is more, but you must be patient.
You must wait, and the end isn’t even yet written.
Monday, September 24, 2012
Hexham, Northumbria, England - Monday, September 24, 2012
I m closer to figuring out why i am here. It is rainy and cold and blustery and it is supposed to remain this way for 3-4 days. Had Sharyn and I walked the length of the wall, tolday would have been the first day of at best long, hard trudge, at worst, misery.
I wasa still determined to walk today, so I put on layers and loaded up my lunch (leftover salami and brie on a crusty roll with 2 plums). I decided not to use the gps (the call gps "the tom tom" here) because the lovely young woman at the Corbridge Roman Town gave me a simple map that I reasoned surely I could follow. Wrong. The mistake came somewhere and I ended up in Hexham, not on Military Road (where Hadrian's Wall lies). Because I had a ticket for an a capella concert tonight in Hexham (part of the Hexham Abbey Arts Festival), I decided as long as I wasa here, I might as well figure out where the Abbey was and where I could park tonight.
I headed into the city center in the Audi. Mind you, I am still fearful each time I make a turn in the car. Behold, right beside me.....a sports store! I am searching for a Newcastle soccer jersey for Sam. I figure out how to park, going back and forth about 18 times in a parallel spot. I make my way to the store.
Sadness. No jersey. Not only are there no jeseys, but I am told by the very kind owner, that I am not going to find a Newcastle jersey except for at the stadium. "Why?" I ask. It turns out the guy who owns the team, owns the t-shirt manufacurer and the sports store in newastle, which is in a very busy part of town. The store owner advises me not to drive there (maybe he saw me park?) He suggests ordering it off the internet. Too bad, Sammy. On a better note, the store owner shows me I am very close to the Abbey and where I can park this evening.
It is raining harder now. I decide to walk to the Abbey to see for myself where it is. And...because I am there now, I go in. I take a "Welcome to Hexham Abbey" brochure and go in.
It is an old, warm, dry, lovely place. Immediately to the right is "St. Etheldreda's Chapel". Note to self: look him/her up. Then St. Acca's cross-shaft. Need to look up both St. Acca and cross-shaft, as well.
There are a effegies of knights and ladies.
I come to St. Wilifrid's Chapel (again, look this up) where a sign says, "St. Wilifrid's chapel is set aside for quiet prayer." I go in. To the right is an icon of St. Wilifrid. He holds his right hand out and has his thumb and ring finger together, his hand outstretched. In front, there is a stained glass window of a bishop (probably Wilifrid, I presume?) with three young angels under his feet. The angels in the middle and on the right are in color. The one on the left is grey. Interesting. Why? Damaged? Never colored? Strange and out of place, it seems. What does it mean? To my immediate left is a niche with some sort of strange little statue on the left, a large candle on the right and a bunch of rocks that look very intentionally placed. Not the kind of stone the Abbey is made of, but smooth, egg sized stones of various shades of grey and differing textures. These stones make me know I am meant to be here. So I quiet myself and settle in.
Why am I here? In the quiet, stillness of this small space of this chapel within the huge space of this Abbey in Northumbria in England. (I like to say Northumbria because it sounds so Narnia). Wait for it......"I brought you hhere for freedom. Do not be restrained." This comes into my head. I am skeptical enought to think that I made that up in the quiet of prayer. I also know myself enough to know that I wouldn't have chosen the word "restrained" to describe myself. I don't think of myself as a particularly restrained person. Generally, I feel I can do and say what I please in a fairly unrestrained way. I came to Northumbria, by myself, I might remind God. Restrained? OK, I think it through. "What restrains me," I ask myself. Strangely enough, a list begins to form: obligation, guilt, moods, t-do-lists, money, the rain, my body, this sports bra, my need for productivity.
There is a piano being tuned in the Abbey and I hear a ping, ping, ping, like Nora the Cat on the YouTube videos. "Slow down with the drizzly rain. I brought you here for freedome. Do not be restrained. Listen to the piano being tuned." Ping, ping, ping.
At some point I leave the chapel. The piano continues to be tuned and I can see the tuner now.
I come upon the crypts of two women. There is a carving below the crypt that reads: From the 1514 Book of Hours, often used at funerals.
God be in my head, and in my understanding;
God be in my eyes, and in my looking;
God be in my mouth, and in my speaking;
God be in my heart, and in my thinking;
God be at my end, and at my departing.
Hmmmmm.......
I move on and look at the huge stone baptimal font with a pointy wooden steeple above it. There are stairs in the floor and a sign that reads, "Entrance to St. Wilifrid's famous 7th century crypt. Please see website for tour times." Odd and creepy to my Protestant bones how important all these old bones are to people even today. Same as yesterday at Durham where the old kings head and the bones of St. Cuthbert can be found in the cathedral. Can these bones live. Maybe, but only if they bring new life to people today.
Near the bones, I see something new. Modern. Art. I pick up a pamphlet because I so love pamphlets: "New Beginnings" Art Exhibition in Hexham Abbey featuring 19 local artists: masks, watercolor, fiber, canvas. Some are hung between windows by wire, some are propped up on wood on top of radiators. All are interpretations of creation or new life. We could do this at Palms Presbyterian. This is doable. One of the pieces catches my eye. It is a rectangular labyrinth with spectacular, interesting starts at the center. I notice there is writing in the bottom left corner of the labyrinth. The words weave themselves through the labyrinth: The end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started. The last inlaid on labyrinth of earth yet to discover is that which was the beginning." - Carolyn Hawkes. (I need to look her up, also. I pick up her card: www.carolynhawkes.co.uk)
Other artists to explore: www.ildikoncz.co.uk
www.jennymathersworks.co.uk
Karen Vickers - no web address.
I notice the piano tuner has finished his work. I pull on my raincoast and head outdoors.
____________
____________
Epilogue to the Abbey Visit: I stayed the entire day in Hexham, poking in lots of Thrift Stores and other shops, sipping tea and writing.
When I showed up for the concert, I remembered that my seat assignment was on the front row. I was a few minutes early and noone was on my row. I went back to St. Wilifrid's Chapel and I made a cairn out of some of the stones and moved the others around. I went to the front row and sat down as some others were now seated there. Before the concert and during the beginning of intermission, I visited with the woman next to me. She explained who St. Wilifrid was (indeed, the bishop). I told her I was going to Lindisfarne and she took me to show me a picture of St. Cuthbert (of Lindisfarne) carrying the head of King Oswald. (another stange story, for another time) At the end of intermission, she told me that she was an artist and her work was displayed over in the art show. "Which ones are yours?" I asked? "The labyrinths." she answered. She is Carolyn Hawkes, whom I had written about earlier in the day. Hmmmm.....
I wasa still determined to walk today, so I put on layers and loaded up my lunch (leftover salami and brie on a crusty roll with 2 plums). I decided not to use the gps (the call gps "the tom tom" here) because the lovely young woman at the Corbridge Roman Town gave me a simple map that I reasoned surely I could follow. Wrong. The mistake came somewhere and I ended up in Hexham, not on Military Road (where Hadrian's Wall lies). Because I had a ticket for an a capella concert tonight in Hexham (part of the Hexham Abbey Arts Festival), I decided as long as I wasa here, I might as well figure out where the Abbey was and where I could park tonight.
I headed into the city center in the Audi. Mind you, I am still fearful each time I make a turn in the car. Behold, right beside me.....a sports store! I am searching for a Newcastle soccer jersey for Sam. I figure out how to park, going back and forth about 18 times in a parallel spot. I make my way to the store.
Sadness. No jersey. Not only are there no jeseys, but I am told by the very kind owner, that I am not going to find a Newcastle jersey except for at the stadium. "Why?" I ask. It turns out the guy who owns the team, owns the t-shirt manufacurer and the sports store in newastle, which is in a very busy part of town. The store owner advises me not to drive there (maybe he saw me park?) He suggests ordering it off the internet. Too bad, Sammy. On a better note, the store owner shows me I am very close to the Abbey and where I can park this evening.
It is raining harder now. I decide to walk to the Abbey to see for myself where it is. And...because I am there now, I go in. I take a "Welcome to Hexham Abbey" brochure and go in.
It is an old, warm, dry, lovely place. Immediately to the right is "St. Etheldreda's Chapel". Note to self: look him/her up. Then St. Acca's cross-shaft. Need to look up both St. Acca and cross-shaft, as well.
There are a effegies of knights and ladies.
I come to St. Wilifrid's Chapel (again, look this up) where a sign says, "St. Wilifrid's chapel is set aside for quiet prayer." I go in. To the right is an icon of St. Wilifrid. He holds his right hand out and has his thumb and ring finger together, his hand outstretched. In front, there is a stained glass window of a bishop (probably Wilifrid, I presume?) with three young angels under his feet. The angels in the middle and on the right are in color. The one on the left is grey. Interesting. Why? Damaged? Never colored? Strange and out of place, it seems. What does it mean? To my immediate left is a niche with some sort of strange little statue on the left, a large candle on the right and a bunch of rocks that look very intentionally placed. Not the kind of stone the Abbey is made of, but smooth, egg sized stones of various shades of grey and differing textures. These stones make me know I am meant to be here. So I quiet myself and settle in.
Why am I here? In the quiet, stillness of this small space of this chapel within the huge space of this Abbey in Northumbria in England. (I like to say Northumbria because it sounds so Narnia). Wait for it......"I brought you hhere for freedom. Do not be restrained." This comes into my head. I am skeptical enought to think that I made that up in the quiet of prayer. I also know myself enough to know that I wouldn't have chosen the word "restrained" to describe myself. I don't think of myself as a particularly restrained person. Generally, I feel I can do and say what I please in a fairly unrestrained way. I came to Northumbria, by myself, I might remind God. Restrained? OK, I think it through. "What restrains me," I ask myself. Strangely enough, a list begins to form: obligation, guilt, moods, t-do-lists, money, the rain, my body, this sports bra, my need for productivity.
There is a piano being tuned in the Abbey and I hear a ping, ping, ping, like Nora the Cat on the YouTube videos. "Slow down with the drizzly rain. I brought you here for freedome. Do not be restrained. Listen to the piano being tuned." Ping, ping, ping.
At some point I leave the chapel. The piano continues to be tuned and I can see the tuner now.
I come upon the crypts of two women. There is a carving below the crypt that reads: From the 1514 Book of Hours, often used at funerals.
God be in my head, and in my understanding;
God be in my eyes, and in my looking;
God be in my mouth, and in my speaking;
God be in my heart, and in my thinking;
God be at my end, and at my departing.
Hmmmmm.......
I move on and look at the huge stone baptimal font with a pointy wooden steeple above it. There are stairs in the floor and a sign that reads, "Entrance to St. Wilifrid's famous 7th century crypt. Please see website for tour times." Odd and creepy to my Protestant bones how important all these old bones are to people even today. Same as yesterday at Durham where the old kings head and the bones of St. Cuthbert can be found in the cathedral. Can these bones live. Maybe, but only if they bring new life to people today.
Near the bones, I see something new. Modern. Art. I pick up a pamphlet because I so love pamphlets: "New Beginnings" Art Exhibition in Hexham Abbey featuring 19 local artists: masks, watercolor, fiber, canvas. Some are hung between windows by wire, some are propped up on wood on top of radiators. All are interpretations of creation or new life. We could do this at Palms Presbyterian. This is doable. One of the pieces catches my eye. It is a rectangular labyrinth with spectacular, interesting starts at the center. I notice there is writing in the bottom left corner of the labyrinth. The words weave themselves through the labyrinth: The end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started. The last inlaid on labyrinth of earth yet to discover is that which was the beginning." - Carolyn Hawkes. (I need to look her up, also. I pick up her card: www.carolynhawkes.co.uk)
Other artists to explore: www.ildikoncz.co.uk
www.jennymathersworks.co.uk
Karen Vickers - no web address.
I notice the piano tuner has finished his work. I pull on my raincoast and head outdoors.
____________
____________
Epilogue to the Abbey Visit: I stayed the entire day in Hexham, poking in lots of Thrift Stores and other shops, sipping tea and writing.
When I showed up for the concert, I remembered that my seat assignment was on the front row. I was a few minutes early and noone was on my row. I went back to St. Wilifrid's Chapel and I made a cairn out of some of the stones and moved the others around. I went to the front row and sat down as some others were now seated there. Before the concert and during the beginning of intermission, I visited with the woman next to me. She explained who St. Wilifrid was (indeed, the bishop). I told her I was going to Lindisfarne and she took me to show me a picture of St. Cuthbert (of Lindisfarne) carrying the head of King Oswald. (another stange story, for another time) At the end of intermission, she told me that she was an artist and her work was displayed over in the art show. "Which ones are yours?" I asked? "The labyrinths." she answered. She is Carolyn Hawkes, whom I had written about earlier in the day. Hmmmm.....
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Hadrian's Wall
Corbridge England---Just off of Hadrian's Wall Responsibility traveled with me. Because of what I leave behind, I am required to come back a better person...better mom, wife, pastor, friend. Because of the opportunity, I am responsible to bring part of the world back with me in my reality and in story.
The question remains, "why am I here?'
I woke up from sleeping for 12 HOURS!! What?? 12 Hours? Yes.
I made my way to Chollerford Roman Ruins, particularly good bath ruins, I am told. This is NOT what is here from me. More interesting, I find, are the drawings of what things would have looked like. I would love to hang out in a real Roman bath --except or the part where you are naked with everyone. The idea of all the different rooms is intriguing: hot bath, cool bath, plunge rooms---why doesn't this exist now? Why hasn't Ponte Vedra Inn and Club recreated one of these? I think it could make it as a business.
I made my way to Housesteads Roman Fort, purchased a national trust 10 day international pass, glanced at the Roman Fort ruins, and was on my way up to Hadrian's Wall.
This is where I was Spirited to come....but why? Months ago, "there is something for you there" was the message. "OK, I am here, what now?" I started walking.
I don't know what is here for me, but I don't want to miss it if it is obvious (I don't think it will be obvious). But, I will pay attention while I walk the wall. After day 1, I do have "lessons I learned on the wall." Actually lessons I learned on the first 3 miles of my walk because the last 7 miles I was tired and seaty and I ran out of water and my level of perception went way down.
Lessons from the Wall
1. Sometimes you take the long way around rather than put yourslf at physical risk.
2. There is lots of poop.
3. On pretty days, there are lots of people, but they leave when it starts to get cold.
4. There are many ups and downs.
5. You should walk next to people, not in a straight line (to help preserve the land).
6. If the walk gets really steep, look down and chount each step. When you get to 100 you are either at the top or you deserve a break.
7. Dogs are good companions.
8. Sometimes, going down is more difficulut than going up.
9. Sports bras are a good invention.
10. Older couples wearing matching sweaters make me smils.
11. When you sweat, little flies follow you.
12. Some days are a great day to live and would be a fine day to die (again, this was written when I had energy and all was beautiful).
13. Sometimes, it is good not to have anyone to complain to (I was beginning to get tired here).
14. You give way to people coming up (not those going down).
15. Cows make a lot of noise eating.
16. Guidebooks are good, but don't use them as rule books.
17. If you go off the path, you might end up in deep poop (see lesson #2)
I'm not sure if any of those lessons are Spirit lessons that I was to learn. Maybe the 12 hours of sleep was what was here for me.
Now, I have had half of my pint at the Golden Lion (built in the 1700's) I ate a big fish and chip meal with some kind of mashed up peas which didn't taste like any peas I know. But, the peas were green, so I ate them because I didn't have any other green thing today.
Off to the Priorfield Bed and Breakfast. Tomorrow, Sunday, I am going to the cathedral in Durham, walking more and then Vespers at the St. Andrews Church in Corbridge.
The question remains, "why am I here?'
I woke up from sleeping for 12 HOURS!! What?? 12 Hours? Yes.
I made my way to Chollerford Roman Ruins, particularly good bath ruins, I am told. This is NOT what is here from me. More interesting, I find, are the drawings of what things would have looked like. I would love to hang out in a real Roman bath --except or the part where you are naked with everyone. The idea of all the different rooms is intriguing: hot bath, cool bath, plunge rooms---why doesn't this exist now? Why hasn't Ponte Vedra Inn and Club recreated one of these? I think it could make it as a business.
I made my way to Housesteads Roman Fort, purchased a national trust 10 day international pass, glanced at the Roman Fort ruins, and was on my way up to Hadrian's Wall.
This is where I was Spirited to come....but why? Months ago, "there is something for you there" was the message. "OK, I am here, what now?" I started walking.
I don't know what is here for me, but I don't want to miss it if it is obvious (I don't think it will be obvious). But, I will pay attention while I walk the wall. After day 1, I do have "lessons I learned on the wall." Actually lessons I learned on the first 3 miles of my walk because the last 7 miles I was tired and seaty and I ran out of water and my level of perception went way down.
Lessons from the Wall
1. Sometimes you take the long way around rather than put yourslf at physical risk.
2. There is lots of poop.
3. On pretty days, there are lots of people, but they leave when it starts to get cold.
4. There are many ups and downs.
5. You should walk next to people, not in a straight line (to help preserve the land).
6. If the walk gets really steep, look down and chount each step. When you get to 100 you are either at the top or you deserve a break.
7. Dogs are good companions.
8. Sometimes, going down is more difficulut than going up.
9. Sports bras are a good invention.
10. Older couples wearing matching sweaters make me smils.
11. When you sweat, little flies follow you.
12. Some days are a great day to live and would be a fine day to die (again, this was written when I had energy and all was beautiful).
13. Sometimes, it is good not to have anyone to complain to (I was beginning to get tired here).
14. You give way to people coming up (not those going down).
15. Cows make a lot of noise eating.
16. Guidebooks are good, but don't use them as rule books.
17. If you go off the path, you might end up in deep poop (see lesson #2)
I'm not sure if any of those lessons are Spirit lessons that I was to learn. Maybe the 12 hours of sleep was what was here for me.
Now, I have had half of my pint at the Golden Lion (built in the 1700's) I ate a big fish and chip meal with some kind of mashed up peas which didn't taste like any peas I know. But, the peas were green, so I ate them because I didn't have any other green thing today.
Off to the Priorfield Bed and Breakfast. Tomorrow, Sunday, I am going to the cathedral in Durham, walking more and then Vespers at the St. Andrews Church in Corbridge.
Sunday, September 9, 2012
The Breath of Life
The Breath of Life
My friend, Sallie sent me a text right as I went in to evening worship. I knew that dad had gotten ill last week and had gone into the hospital last week and things had gotten very bad. The family had gathered at his bed. Her text read: “Please pray right now. They are removing the vent. He will hopefully pass quickly. Thank you. Sallie.”
I had heard the scripture in the two morning services, but this evening Genesis 2 took new meaning. God breaths into the creature just formed from the ground. The holy breath of life. A ventilator can keep oxygen going, but the holy breath is what brings life.
I knew as the service went on my friend’s father was breathing his last breath of this earth. I listened to my own breath as the musicians sang during the offering I prayed their words for Sallie and her family, inhaling and exhaling:
Light in my darkness, peace for my soul.
You are my rescue. You’ve never let go.
Light in my weakness, always the same.
Your love is my shelter. Your life is my way.
All my hope is in You. All my strength is in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
All my hope is in You. All my strength is in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
Constant Savior. Friend forever. Lord, You have my heart.
Sure foundation. Never failing. Lord You have my heart.
All my hope is in You. All my strength is in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
All the earth beneath You. All my life before You.
With every breath, my soul with rest in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
When I came out of worship an hour later I had another text. It read, “He is gone. And no longer in pain. Love you too. Sallie”
My friend, Sallie sent me a text right as I went in to evening worship. I knew that dad had gotten ill last week and had gone into the hospital last week and things had gotten very bad. The family had gathered at his bed. Her text read: “Please pray right now. They are removing the vent. He will hopefully pass quickly. Thank you. Sallie.”
I had heard the scripture in the two morning services, but this evening Genesis 2 took new meaning. God breaths into the creature just formed from the ground. The holy breath of life. A ventilator can keep oxygen going, but the holy breath is what brings life.
I knew as the service went on my friend’s father was breathing his last breath of this earth. I listened to my own breath as the musicians sang during the offering I prayed their words for Sallie and her family, inhaling and exhaling:
Light in my darkness, peace for my soul.
You are my rescue. You’ve never let go.
Light in my weakness, always the same.
Your love is my shelter. Your life is my way.
All my hope is in You. All my strength is in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
All my hope is in You. All my strength is in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
Constant Savior. Friend forever. Lord, You have my heart.
Sure foundation. Never failing. Lord You have my heart.
All my hope is in You. All my strength is in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
All the earth beneath You. All my life before You.
With every breath, my soul with rest in You.
With every breath, my soul will rest in You.
When I came out of worship an hour later I had another text. It read, “He is gone. And no longer in pain. Love you too. Sallie”
Sunday, January 1, 2012
New Years Day Sermon 2012
New Years Day 2012 Rev. Laurie Furr-Vancini
Revelation 21:12-6
Luke 13:6-9 Palms Presbyterian Church
A New Day
Once every seven years – give or take a year because of Leap Year—
New Years Day falls on a Sunday.
Welcome to that day.
Let’s put some things on our New Years Table (not be confused with our communion table)…
Most of you are the ones who don’t make a big party of New Year’s Eve.
Some of you do, but not most of you.
Most of you really want to be here today or you would not have made the effort.
(After all, this is a sort of “free pass Sunday”)
One service, no Sunday School,
I don’t even know if we have snacks in Patten Hall…
Look, no choir….no special music….
Pinch Hitter Preacher….
(I traded Christmas Day off for preaching on New Years Day…)
Aside from all that, we are here….
And we will make the best of it.
Please pray with me: God of this New Year, God of our every year. Thank you for dwelling among mortals, among us. Make our time together a holy time.Fill each person here with your Holy Spirit. Make us a holy people. Amen.
From earlier this week:
I’m in Atlanta, or rather, Decatur, with my family.
We are staying with college friends who live at the edge of Columbia Seminary.
The New Years sermon must be written.
We will leave for Nashville for the Wake Forest Bowl Game in three hours.
More college friends, the kids, hotel, tailgate,
Sermon writing needs to take place now or in a car of chaos.
The seminary library is my destination. I
love the quiet, the closed off-ness.
I love the smell of old books and the feeling of retreat for the purposes of serious study.
It is freezing.
And I have no coat. It will be warm in the library.
I break away from the warm house, get in my van and make my pilgrimage to my alma mater.
I walk up the steps to the brick building on the quad.
The library is locked tight.
And so are all the other buildings.
Doesn’t anyone work here the week between Christmas and New Year?
Isn’t this a holy week, too?
Don’t they know traveling preachers have sermons to write?
I stand on the campus alone in the cold and I am resentful and sad.
It isn’t about the library anymore.
It’s about me not getting what I want.
It is about locked, cold doors and cold wind blowing.
And suddenly, it also about what ifs and jealousy of others for whom doors always seem open.
As I simmer in the middle of the quad, I wonder why I have these feelings because the good folks of Columbia have a day off to spend with their families.
Resentment, sadness, jealousy, what ifs….
Isn’t this the way we could spend much of our lives if we are not careful?
I’ll make the best of it.
I go back to my car, pondering those feelings in my heart.
Surprised that I had such a strong, visceral reaction.
I begin driving.
I get on Missionary Drive and head towards downtown Decatur.
A squirrel sitting in the middle of the road darts away from the car.
It has been standing over the body of a second squirrel. A dead squirrel.
Mate? Brother? Sister? Mother? Friend?
I didn’t know squirrels mourn,
But there is no doubt that this squirrel is mourning.
Our scripture from Revelation is already in my mind—
“God will be with them; God will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more”
It is a promise, but does it already exist, as well?
At least in some form?
And could it be true for mourning squirrels, for all of creation, as well?”
I wait for a train to go by and then cross the tracks.
I see several bundled up homeless people and I think about how cold it was last night.
I find an open parking meter and park.
Two hour limit.
Do I have change?
Yes, lots of nickels.
A nickel gets two minutes.
I scrounge around in the bottom of my purse.
2 mintues, 2 minutes, 10 minutes, 20 minutes….
I get up to an hour and 17 minutes.
That is how much time I have in the coffee shop to write a sermon for
New Years Day 2012.
I’ll make the best of it. God expects no less.
I order a cup of coffee.
I have already had breakfast, but I also get a banana and a piece of
Pumpkin bread to give to the next person I see who looks homeless and hungry.
I scan the coffee shop.
No one here looks physically hungry, so I sit down.
An acoustic version of “Honey Let Me Be Your Salty Dog” comes on.
A memory from Macclenny flits by. But I don’t grab it and think about it.
I let it pass. Time is ticking.
I reread the Revelation verse and parable of the fig tree.
O God, please don’t cut me down, give me one more year.
I take out a clear piece of paper and colored markers.
I write in different colors:
New Year
Baptism
Communion
New Heaven and New Earth
“Water as a gift from the spring of life!”
Fig tree, fruit, Manure, Digging Around
Alpha, Omega
My task? To link these up.
And time is ticking.
The title of the sermon at my ordination was called
Connecting the Dots.
The pastor, who was a good family friend said, “Follow where the Lord leads you, but don’t erase the dots behind you…connect them, not just on paper, but in reality…. Connect them for yourself and your family and connect the dots for others…..”
Baptism, Communion, New Year, Fig Tree, New Heaven….
Come on. Make the Best of It.
And it occurs to me, as if a revelation, that for God “make the best of it” is actually a cop out.
Because God expects more than the best of it.
God expect the best of us.
God came and dwelled among us and within us not so we could slog by in this world and in our life, making the best of it,
But so that we can be God filled creatures ourselves. Created in the image of God.
Lived out in the life of Jesus, as our pioneer and role model for God-like living.
From our first cry, God claimed us.
At our last breath, God will claim us.
At baptism, God’s grace showered over us.
Not with the promise of a walk in the park, lovely, perfect life where all the doors are open.
There is no promise that we will not stand over the body of one we love and mourn,
There is no promise of no hungry and homeless people,
There is no promise that we won’t be filled with sorrow, regret and jealousy for the what ifs in our lives.
The promise IS that God is with us and in us.
And that God will be with us.
And that the day of those promises will come.
A time of a new heaven and new earth to hope for and pray for
And we see just enough glimpses of that time to come,
We are participants in enough holy moments,
We dig around enough and feel the dirt in our hands enough to know that the promises of baptism,
of scripture,
the promises made when we gather at the table….
That they are true.
We gather at the font to baptize,
Because we believe in the promises of God’s grace.
Because we believe in the power of God in Christ Jesus over the evil in the world.
Because as a body of believers, we claim God’s promises not only for ourselves but for brothers and sisters of all ages, stages, races, backgrounds. And we are in this together.
We love, because God first loved us.
And we gather at the table together renewing our bonds with God and with community…
Strengthening who we are and who we are called to be.
Empowered to “go forth” as disciples and as a community of disciples.
This what we do here….
Reading the bible,
thinking on the word,
telling stories,
baptizing, gathering at the table,
connecting the dots,
rooting around in the dirt and manure of life…..and proclaiming “Jesus is Lord”….
Isn’t this more than just “making the best of it?”
And we are linked with those who come before us
And those who come after us.
But still, it is a New Day for us.
A New Year to decide who we will be.
As individuals, As a community, as a country, as a world.
I leave the coffee shop.
The sun is shining now and I don’t miss not having a coat.
I see a young mother kiss her child as she puts him in a stroller.
Two Muslim women in head scarves walk by.
Teenagers are laughing in the adjacent park.
I look around for someone to whom I can give the banana and the pumpkin bread. It is later and the homeless have crept into the shadows.
I know that just because I do not see them, they are not there.
And I will not forget them, I vow.
I think WHAT A BLESSING IT HAS BEEN THAT THE LIBRARY DOORS WERE LOCKED.
I arrive at my car and I have two minutes left on the meter.
The bells on the courthouse chime.
Today is a new day.
Revelation 21:12-6
Luke 13:6-9 Palms Presbyterian Church
A New Day
Once every seven years – give or take a year because of Leap Year—
New Years Day falls on a Sunday.
Welcome to that day.
Let’s put some things on our New Years Table (not be confused with our communion table)…
Most of you are the ones who don’t make a big party of New Year’s Eve.
Some of you do, but not most of you.
Most of you really want to be here today or you would not have made the effort.
(After all, this is a sort of “free pass Sunday”)
One service, no Sunday School,
I don’t even know if we have snacks in Patten Hall…
Look, no choir….no special music….
Pinch Hitter Preacher….
(I traded Christmas Day off for preaching on New Years Day…)
Aside from all that, we are here….
And we will make the best of it.
Please pray with me: God of this New Year, God of our every year. Thank you for dwelling among mortals, among us. Make our time together a holy time.Fill each person here with your Holy Spirit. Make us a holy people. Amen.
From earlier this week:
I’m in Atlanta, or rather, Decatur, with my family.
We are staying with college friends who live at the edge of Columbia Seminary.
The New Years sermon must be written.
We will leave for Nashville for the Wake Forest Bowl Game in three hours.
More college friends, the kids, hotel, tailgate,
Sermon writing needs to take place now or in a car of chaos.
The seminary library is my destination. I
love the quiet, the closed off-ness.
I love the smell of old books and the feeling of retreat for the purposes of serious study.
It is freezing.
And I have no coat. It will be warm in the library.
I break away from the warm house, get in my van and make my pilgrimage to my alma mater.
I walk up the steps to the brick building on the quad.
The library is locked tight.
And so are all the other buildings.
Doesn’t anyone work here the week between Christmas and New Year?
Isn’t this a holy week, too?
Don’t they know traveling preachers have sermons to write?
I stand on the campus alone in the cold and I am resentful and sad.
It isn’t about the library anymore.
It’s about me not getting what I want.
It is about locked, cold doors and cold wind blowing.
And suddenly, it also about what ifs and jealousy of others for whom doors always seem open.
As I simmer in the middle of the quad, I wonder why I have these feelings because the good folks of Columbia have a day off to spend with their families.
Resentment, sadness, jealousy, what ifs….
Isn’t this the way we could spend much of our lives if we are not careful?
I’ll make the best of it.
I go back to my car, pondering those feelings in my heart.
Surprised that I had such a strong, visceral reaction.
I begin driving.
I get on Missionary Drive and head towards downtown Decatur.
A squirrel sitting in the middle of the road darts away from the car.
It has been standing over the body of a second squirrel. A dead squirrel.
Mate? Brother? Sister? Mother? Friend?
I didn’t know squirrels mourn,
But there is no doubt that this squirrel is mourning.
Our scripture from Revelation is already in my mind—
“God will be with them; God will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more”
It is a promise, but does it already exist, as well?
At least in some form?
And could it be true for mourning squirrels, for all of creation, as well?”
I wait for a train to go by and then cross the tracks.
I see several bundled up homeless people and I think about how cold it was last night.
I find an open parking meter and park.
Two hour limit.
Do I have change?
Yes, lots of nickels.
A nickel gets two minutes.
I scrounge around in the bottom of my purse.
2 mintues, 2 minutes, 10 minutes, 20 minutes….
I get up to an hour and 17 minutes.
That is how much time I have in the coffee shop to write a sermon for
New Years Day 2012.
I’ll make the best of it. God expects no less.
I order a cup of coffee.
I have already had breakfast, but I also get a banana and a piece of
Pumpkin bread to give to the next person I see who looks homeless and hungry.
I scan the coffee shop.
No one here looks physically hungry, so I sit down.
An acoustic version of “Honey Let Me Be Your Salty Dog” comes on.
A memory from Macclenny flits by. But I don’t grab it and think about it.
I let it pass. Time is ticking.
I reread the Revelation verse and parable of the fig tree.
O God, please don’t cut me down, give me one more year.
I take out a clear piece of paper and colored markers.
I write in different colors:
New Year
Baptism
Communion
New Heaven and New Earth
“Water as a gift from the spring of life!”
Fig tree, fruit, Manure, Digging Around
Alpha, Omega
My task? To link these up.
And time is ticking.
The title of the sermon at my ordination was called
Connecting the Dots.
The pastor, who was a good family friend said, “Follow where the Lord leads you, but don’t erase the dots behind you…connect them, not just on paper, but in reality…. Connect them for yourself and your family and connect the dots for others…..”
Baptism, Communion, New Year, Fig Tree, New Heaven….
Come on. Make the Best of It.
And it occurs to me, as if a revelation, that for God “make the best of it” is actually a cop out.
Because God expects more than the best of it.
God expect the best of us.
God came and dwelled among us and within us not so we could slog by in this world and in our life, making the best of it,
But so that we can be God filled creatures ourselves. Created in the image of God.
Lived out in the life of Jesus, as our pioneer and role model for God-like living.
From our first cry, God claimed us.
At our last breath, God will claim us.
At baptism, God’s grace showered over us.
Not with the promise of a walk in the park, lovely, perfect life where all the doors are open.
There is no promise that we will not stand over the body of one we love and mourn,
There is no promise of no hungry and homeless people,
There is no promise that we won’t be filled with sorrow, regret and jealousy for the what ifs in our lives.
The promise IS that God is with us and in us.
And that God will be with us.
And that the day of those promises will come.
A time of a new heaven and new earth to hope for and pray for
And we see just enough glimpses of that time to come,
We are participants in enough holy moments,
We dig around enough and feel the dirt in our hands enough to know that the promises of baptism,
of scripture,
the promises made when we gather at the table….
That they are true.
We gather at the font to baptize,
Because we believe in the promises of God’s grace.
Because we believe in the power of God in Christ Jesus over the evil in the world.
Because as a body of believers, we claim God’s promises not only for ourselves but for brothers and sisters of all ages, stages, races, backgrounds. And we are in this together.
We love, because God first loved us.
And we gather at the table together renewing our bonds with God and with community…
Strengthening who we are and who we are called to be.
Empowered to “go forth” as disciples and as a community of disciples.
This what we do here….
Reading the bible,
thinking on the word,
telling stories,
baptizing, gathering at the table,
connecting the dots,
rooting around in the dirt and manure of life…..and proclaiming “Jesus is Lord”….
Isn’t this more than just “making the best of it?”
And we are linked with those who come before us
And those who come after us.
But still, it is a New Day for us.
A New Year to decide who we will be.
As individuals, As a community, as a country, as a world.
I leave the coffee shop.
The sun is shining now and I don’t miss not having a coat.
I see a young mother kiss her child as she puts him in a stroller.
Two Muslim women in head scarves walk by.
Teenagers are laughing in the adjacent park.
I look around for someone to whom I can give the banana and the pumpkin bread. It is later and the homeless have crept into the shadows.
I know that just because I do not see them, they are not there.
And I will not forget them, I vow.
I think WHAT A BLESSING IT HAS BEEN THAT THE LIBRARY DOORS WERE LOCKED.
I arrive at my car and I have two minutes left on the meter.
The bells on the courthouse chime.
Today is a new day.
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Prayer for Harmony
So...there is a family at our church...the Toma family. A number of months ago, they talked to me about transracial adoption. They were already in the process of adopting in the foster care system of Florida and were being considered for an african-American girl. As my only experience in transracial adoption involved having adopted a daughter from China, I do not declare myself an expert. I suggested they trust their instinct and their ability to open their hearts. At first, it seemed that child would not be the child for them, as the foster mother decided to adopt her. Then, the foster mother changed her heart and the little girl, Harmony, began visiting with the Tomas. Everyone fell in love.
As Harmony moved in with the Tomas, the question arose whether to change her name. Harmony is a perfectly lovely name, but the Toma wife/mother is Melody. Too kitschy? Would people think the Tomas named her so as to have Melody and Harmony together? How would this naming affect big sister, Karla, who would be out of the musical naming group? It was decided that the little one had had quite enough change in a brief lifetime and Harmony would remain.
Today, I traveled to the downtown Duval County courthouse with this family along with some of their neighborhood friends. We pulled up in a limo and scrambled out of it into the 95 degree heat of Jacksonville. We took pictures at the riverside....a bunch of dressed up white folk with a black as pitch toddler in a fancy dress and a bow in her hair. Harmony smiled from ear to ear. She gave out hugs willingly, but would return to cling to her Mama and Papa.
Following the brief service, I was invited to offer a prayer. The judge (Judge Gooding) suspended the proceedings of the court and invited me to join him and the Tomas at the front of the courtroom. What an honor and a blessing it was for me to be part of the day. Thank you Toma family. There will be the hardships all families experience yet to come. Today, a celebration!
Prayer at the Adoption of
Harmony Kiehl Toma
August 11, 2011
Creator God,
You made us in love and for love. By your imagination, you form families in different ways, through birth, through adoption, through fostering, through marriage…..
By your sense of humor, you gift us with smiles for each other and with the ability to laugh at the smallest expressions and movements.
By your providence, you place in our arms exactly the child and parents and siblings that will complete us.
By your steadfast love, you equip us with what is needed to live in that family: patience, wisdom, care, gentleness, understanding and more patience.
Where there is woundedness, sow healing.
Where there is abandonment, sow fulfillment.
Where there is emptiness, sow an everlasting bond.
We pray this morning for families all over. May their hearts break open and receive your children through adoption.
We pray for perseverance and courage for families who are in the often lengthy and often frustrating adoption process.
We pray for our government and agencies and the governments of other countries that the adoption process may be made ever and ever easier: that the adoption process not be a yoke to bear, but a glorious time of re-union for your children.
We pray for the day that there is no need for adoption, when hunger and thirst cease for your children and when no one raises a hand or weapon against brother or sister. Restore your creation.
As the Toma family expands, may their joy expand and be a witness to others. Bless Karla in her role as big sister. Bless Jeff in his role as father of two and lone male in the house and bless Melody in her role as mother extraordinaire.
Let Harmony not only dwell in their household, but sing and dance and love with abandon throughout their house and beyond, all the days of their lives.
Amen.
Rev. Laurie Furr-Vancini
As Harmony moved in with the Tomas, the question arose whether to change her name. Harmony is a perfectly lovely name, but the Toma wife/mother is Melody. Too kitschy? Would people think the Tomas named her so as to have Melody and Harmony together? How would this naming affect big sister, Karla, who would be out of the musical naming group? It was decided that the little one had had quite enough change in a brief lifetime and Harmony would remain.
Today, I traveled to the downtown Duval County courthouse with this family along with some of their neighborhood friends. We pulled up in a limo and scrambled out of it into the 95 degree heat of Jacksonville. We took pictures at the riverside....a bunch of dressed up white folk with a black as pitch toddler in a fancy dress and a bow in her hair. Harmony smiled from ear to ear. She gave out hugs willingly, but would return to cling to her Mama and Papa.
Following the brief service, I was invited to offer a prayer. The judge (Judge Gooding) suspended the proceedings of the court and invited me to join him and the Tomas at the front of the courtroom. What an honor and a blessing it was for me to be part of the day. Thank you Toma family. There will be the hardships all families experience yet to come. Today, a celebration!
Prayer at the Adoption of
Harmony Kiehl Toma
August 11, 2011
Creator God,
You made us in love and for love. By your imagination, you form families in different ways, through birth, through adoption, through fostering, through marriage…..
By your sense of humor, you gift us with smiles for each other and with the ability to laugh at the smallest expressions and movements.
By your providence, you place in our arms exactly the child and parents and siblings that will complete us.
By your steadfast love, you equip us with what is needed to live in that family: patience, wisdom, care, gentleness, understanding and more patience.
Where there is woundedness, sow healing.
Where there is abandonment, sow fulfillment.
Where there is emptiness, sow an everlasting bond.
We pray this morning for families all over. May their hearts break open and receive your children through adoption.
We pray for perseverance and courage for families who are in the often lengthy and often frustrating adoption process.
We pray for our government and agencies and the governments of other countries that the adoption process may be made ever and ever easier: that the adoption process not be a yoke to bear, but a glorious time of re-union for your children.
We pray for the day that there is no need for adoption, when hunger and thirst cease for your children and when no one raises a hand or weapon against brother or sister. Restore your creation.
As the Toma family expands, may their joy expand and be a witness to others. Bless Karla in her role as big sister. Bless Jeff in his role as father of two and lone male in the house and bless Melody in her role as mother extraordinaire.
Let Harmony not only dwell in their household, but sing and dance and love with abandon throughout their house and beyond, all the days of their lives.
Amen.
Rev. Laurie Furr-Vancini
Monday, May 16, 2011
Charlie's Confirmation Blessing
Charlie's Confirmation Class (that's him in the Scooby Doo shirt)
CHARLIE'S CONFIRMATION BLESSING
Charlie,
We ask God’s blessings upon you this day.
More than just for happiness, we ask for joy.
More than just for strength, we ask for courage.
More than just for concern, we ask for empathy.
More than just for wealth, we ask for a rich life.
More than just for care, we ask for love to fill his life and his heart.
In times when you are alone, may you be content rather than lonely.
In times when you are in a crowd, may you make decisions as an individual.
May you see God’s light and walk in it.
May you seek goodness.
God’s blessings upon blessings we ask for you
so that you might continue being a blessing for others
all the days of your life.
May 15, 2011
Sunday, February 20, 2011
At the Feet/A Groupie of John Philip Newell
At the Feet/A Groupie of John Philip Newell
This weekend Palms Presbyterian church hosted John Philip Newell as our visiting theologian for 2011. I have now shared 3 meals, listened at his feet, practiced chanting and body prayer, shared local Jacksonville beer and been his “book signing bouncer”.
If you are not familiar with John Philip Newell, I direct you to his web page www.jphilipnewell.com . Beyond what you can learn on the web page I can tell you that he is a gentle soul with a smile and words that can light up a large sanctuary of people. I can tell you his drink of choice is a cold beer in a bottle (though he will take it in a frosted glass) and that in the February sun of Florida he gets sunburned.
I take away much from his visit on which to think and pray. He is written much, so I do not need to repeat that which he says better and in first person.
Here are some take away phrases:
Made of God
Yearnings for Oneness
Love Longings
Relationships
New Ancient Wisdom
Radically New Ways
Heart of Present
Deeply Challenged
Deeply Loved
The Deepest Truth
Oneness
Profoundly False Ways of Seeing
Mystery of Creation
Mystery of Christ
Two Loves: Love of Christ and Creation
Journey of Listening
The Heartbeat of Christ
Deep Within
In the Midst of Pain, We Listen
Mystery Swirlings of Energy that Seek New Life and New Beginnings
Reconnected to the Sand of the Very Beginning
The Time in Which We Live
The Earth is Literally Throwing Up Ancient Books of Scripture and
Testimony of Jesus
Heart of the Light of Tradition
Shadow Side of Tradition
Infinitely Deep Well of Truth
What has Happened to Our Instinct for Unity
We have a Response-Ability
Give Ourselves to the Healing Again
Holy Instinct for Unity
Without Peace in the House of Abraham
There will be No Peace in our nations.
This weekend Palms Presbyterian church hosted John Philip Newell as our visiting theologian for 2011. I have now shared 3 meals, listened at his feet, practiced chanting and body prayer, shared local Jacksonville beer and been his “book signing bouncer”.
If you are not familiar with John Philip Newell, I direct you to his web page www.jphilipnewell.com . Beyond what you can learn on the web page I can tell you that he is a gentle soul with a smile and words that can light up a large sanctuary of people. I can tell you his drink of choice is a cold beer in a bottle (though he will take it in a frosted glass) and that in the February sun of Florida he gets sunburned.
I take away much from his visit on which to think and pray. He is written much, so I do not need to repeat that which he says better and in first person.
Here are some take away phrases:
Made of God
Yearnings for Oneness
Love Longings
Relationships
New Ancient Wisdom
Radically New Ways
Heart of Present
Deeply Challenged
Deeply Loved
The Deepest Truth
Oneness
Profoundly False Ways of Seeing
Mystery of Creation
Mystery of Christ
Two Loves: Love of Christ and Creation
Journey of Listening
The Heartbeat of Christ
Deep Within
In the Midst of Pain, We Listen
Mystery Swirlings of Energy that Seek New Life and New Beginnings
Reconnected to the Sand of the Very Beginning
The Time in Which We Live
The Earth is Literally Throwing Up Ancient Books of Scripture and
Testimony of Jesus
Heart of the Light of Tradition
Shadow Side of Tradition
Infinitely Deep Well of Truth
What has Happened to Our Instinct for Unity
We have a Response-Ability
Give Ourselves to the Healing Again
Holy Instinct for Unity
Without Peace in the House of Abraham
There will be No Peace in our nations.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Semon from January 30, 2011
Laurie Furr-Vancini
Genesis 2 and 3 (selected verses) January 30, 2011
Luke 24 (selected verses) Palms Presbyterian Church
Story of My Life
We will get to the Luke text later, I promise.
I would like to open with a prayer by J. Philip Newell
Who will be with us in a few weeks as our visiting theologian:
We watch this morning
For the light that the darkness has not overcome.
We watch for the fire that was in the beginning
And that burns still in the brilliance of the rising sun.
We watch for the glow of life that gleams in the growing earth
And glistens in sea and sky,
We watch for your light, O God,
In the eyes of every living creature
And in the ever-living flame of my own soul.
If the grace of seeing were ours this day
We would glimpse you in all that lives.
Grant us the grace of seeing this day.
Grant us the grace of seeing. Amen.
Etiologies are stories that explain why things are like they are.
We are not about etiology this morning.
We could be, but we are not.
Genesis is full of them and we could get caught up and lost in them today if we are not careful.
We won’t be talking about why snakes don’t have legs and why they bite and why we are so scared of the slithering serpents.
We won’t be talking about why we wear clothing
We won’t be talking about why there is pain in childbirth or why it is difficult to grow crops.
We won’t be talking about why we die.
All of those stories explaining why things are like they are in Genesis 3.
Beyond those stories, we will put aside any notion or preconceived idea of “the Fall” – central to Milton’s Paradise Lost.
A term which does not occur in the bible.
And…we will not even venture to talk about a notion of marriage not
As partnership, but as male dominated and patriarchical.
That feels good to get that out of the way…..
But if we aren’t talking about any of that, what will we talk about?
If we are tasked to think about “What it means to be human”
This morning we are here to talk about the truth.
We shall know the truth and the truth shall set us free.
Is that a promise or a threat?
We turn to Genesis.
Before time there was nothing.
Once upon a time, God created and it was good.
It was perfect and lovely and static and non-changing.
The green was always green, the river flowed, the tree stood tall and proud with fruit on it.
No storms, no challenges, no unmet needs.
The woman and the man walked blissfully unaware, partners in creation.
Free from understanding,
Responsibility, cravings…..unashamed.
Things were good. (hmmmm………..)
There was but one thing that could not be had:
The woman and the man had been told by the Creator not to eat of the
fruit of the tree.
One day, along came a trickster.
Because a trickster always comes along.
And the trickster, interestingly enough, spoke the truth.
Lest we make the trickster into the bad guy:
The trickster said, “If you eat of the fruit your eyes will be opened and you will be like your Creator, knowing good and evil.”
Hmmmm….the woman said, I would like to know more and see more
And be more and do more…
No easy prey bitten and subdued by the trickster,
this conscious actor on the stage of life chooses:
“seeing the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise….she took and ate.”
In her desire for the wisdom of God, she took and ate.
Given the choice, she chose knowledge.
She gives it to the man and he without dialogue takes and eats, as well.
God gets angry and does a lot of cursing….literal cursing.
The woman and man do a lot of blaming which makes them look silly to us, because we know they did it.
We saw and heard what happened.
Not only that, I think they would do it again.
We like to see ourselves in the audience, but in reality, we are the actors.
And we would do it again.
God throws God’s hands up (my vision)
and repeats the truth the Trickster had earlier proclaimed,
saying, “Behold, they have become like one of us,
knowing good and evil….”
It happened just like the snake said it would.
I don’t know about you,
but it is difficult for me to see what is so wrong here.
It’s all very human.
They disobeyed.
We disobey all the time.
They did that which the Creator God did not want them to do.
We do that all the time.
The woman, at least seemed genuinely interested in bettering their situation. She wanted to be more like her Creator.
She wanted understanding.
She wanted to know between good and evil, she rationalized.
We rationalize.
We are not being willful or mean spirited.
Is it wrong to want to be more than I am?
Is it wrong to want to taste the sweetness that lies within our reach?
What if God is the Trickster, keeping us from being all we can be?
Holding us back from our potential with a capital P!
Now we are talking about What it Means to Be Human.
All good questions.
It’s a good story.
It’s our story.
Since it is our story,
rather than try to answer all the questions the story raises,
rather than try to take it and make it
that which it isn’t,
Claim what it is.
Your story. Our story.
They disobeyed.
We disobey.
They craved more.
We craved more.
They misunderstood.
We misunderstand.
They blamed.
We blame.
They wanted wisdom.
We want wisdom.
They sought truth by their own hand.
We seek truth by our own hand.
Oh yes, that we all understand.
The truth in the story we understand.
They took the fruit and ate…
And their eyes were opened and they recognized.
They recognized they were naked.
And they were ashamed.
And they hid from God.
God comes and the cursing begins….
“And then the Lord God makes for them garments of skins,
and clothes them”
And sends them out of the garden.
That is our story.
Our story of humanness.
Take that story and hold it in your hand and in your mind for a moment,
While we go to another story--that is also our story.
From the book of Luke, the 24th chapter,
selected verses from the translation of Laurie:
Many, many years later.
Two people were walking, going from the big city to a village,
and they were talking.
While they were talking and discussing together,
Jesus, came and walked beside them.
“BUT, their eyes were kept from recognizing him.”
Jesus said, “what are ya’ll talking about while you are walking?”
And they stopped walking.
They stood still.
They looked sad.
“Are you the only guy around
who doesn’t know the things that have happened in Jerusalem?”
And Jesus, baiting them, said,
“What things?”
And they said, “How Jesus, the prophet, mighty in deed and word
before God was handed to the priests and rulers and was crucified.
We thought he was the one who was going to save Israel.
But now, it has been three days.
And not only that,
but some of our women in our group amazed us early today.
The women went to the tomb and could not find his body,
They came back saying they had seen a vision of angels
Who said Jesus was still alive???
Some men in our group went to check out their story.
They found the empty tomb as they said, but did not see Jesus.
The three walked on and Jesus, whom they still did not recognize,
Interpreted scripture to them, beginning with Moses and all of the prophets.
So…..they get to the village where they were going.
And the two asked unrecognizable Jesus
to stay with them because it was pretty much nighttime.
So Jesus went in to stay with them.
“When he as at table with them, he took the bread and blessed,
and broke it, and gave it to them.
AND THEIR EYES WERE OPENED
AND THEY RECOGNIZED HIM….”
Jesus vanishes and the two are dumfounded into action,
running all the way back to the big city of Jerusalem,
finding the 11 disciples (Judas is no longer with us) and
“Then they told what had happened on the road,
and how Jesus was known to them in the breaking of the bread.”
Hold on…it gets even better.
Jesus apparates again.
And again tells interprets all the scripture and charges them saying:
“You are witnesses, the seers who then tell, of all these things.
And behold I send the promise of my Father upon you;
But stay in the city, until you are clothed with power from on high”.
This is the Word of our Lord.
Thanks be to God.
Now, we have a story in either hand.
And we are holding them.
They are both our stories.
In both stories there are two people together with closed eyes.
There are two people who cannot see and understand the Truth.
In both stories there is a third player:
In one…the Trickster
In one…Jesus
In both stories the eyes are opened upon the eating and sharing of food.
In both stories, the need for clothing is noted
and GOD will be the one who will clothe.
One literal clothing to cover our shame as we move out of the garden.
One spiritual clothing to bless us as we move out into the world.
In both stories the players are being sent out.
There is much alike in these stories…but, there is also, much difference.
One story is a story of Good News.
One story is one of Bad News.
One causes great joy.
One causes great shame.
One story involves blessing.
One story involves cursing.
One story involves the food being blessed:
“When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it and gave it to them”
One story involves going out into the world to tell the promise and joy and life that the risen Christ offers.
One story involves going out into the world of endless work and toil and pain.
That first story, from Genesis.
We recognize ourselves in it.
Our eyes are open to that:
We disobey.
We craved more.
We misunderstand.
We blame.
We want wisdom.
We seek truth by our own hand.
This is our story.
But friends, we have to believe that there is more to that story.
There is the Declaration of Forgiveness at the end of the Prayer of Confession.
The light shines in the darkness and the darkness will not overcome it.
Because the other story is just as much our story.
And the second story redeems the first.
It doesn’t do away with that story.
It doesn’t trump it or replace it, it redeems it.
This is our redemption story.
We walk with Jesus, sometimes not even recognizing him.
He teaches us and interprets scripture for us
both when we know and can name our teacher as Jesus
and when we think it is just a stranger walking alongside us.
We crave the Truth.
We want to believe in the empty grave…..in the story of the women….
We tell others.
We sit down at table together.
We hear the familiar words:
“When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it and gave it to them”
And, ahhhh,... we pause at those words, because they are so familiar.
We pause at this part of the story because it is, indeed, sounding
And feeling more and more like our story.
And our eyes are opened….
And we recognize Jesus in our midst….
Maybe only for a second…
Because he vanishes….
And returns and vanishes again…
Jesus, playing now you see me, now you hear me,
now you recognize me,
now you follow me,
now you speak of me…..
And because of the other story….”now you don’t”
But, at least now our eyes are opened.
We can read both stories.
We are in both stories.
Both stories are us.
We are to go forth, created,
clothed, fed,
blessed, broken and redeemed,
eyes wide open to be witnesses…..
tellers and livers of the story, in the story.
The stories of our life!
Genesis 2 and 3 (selected verses) January 30, 2011
Luke 24 (selected verses) Palms Presbyterian Church
Story of My Life
We will get to the Luke text later, I promise.
I would like to open with a prayer by J. Philip Newell
Who will be with us in a few weeks as our visiting theologian:
We watch this morning
For the light that the darkness has not overcome.
We watch for the fire that was in the beginning
And that burns still in the brilliance of the rising sun.
We watch for the glow of life that gleams in the growing earth
And glistens in sea and sky,
We watch for your light, O God,
In the eyes of every living creature
And in the ever-living flame of my own soul.
If the grace of seeing were ours this day
We would glimpse you in all that lives.
Grant us the grace of seeing this day.
Grant us the grace of seeing. Amen.
Etiologies are stories that explain why things are like they are.
We are not about etiology this morning.
We could be, but we are not.
Genesis is full of them and we could get caught up and lost in them today if we are not careful.
We won’t be talking about why snakes don’t have legs and why they bite and why we are so scared of the slithering serpents.
We won’t be talking about why we wear clothing
We won’t be talking about why there is pain in childbirth or why it is difficult to grow crops.
We won’t be talking about why we die.
All of those stories explaining why things are like they are in Genesis 3.
Beyond those stories, we will put aside any notion or preconceived idea of “the Fall” – central to Milton’s Paradise Lost.
A term which does not occur in the bible.
And…we will not even venture to talk about a notion of marriage not
As partnership, but as male dominated and patriarchical.
That feels good to get that out of the way…..
But if we aren’t talking about any of that, what will we talk about?
If we are tasked to think about “What it means to be human”
This morning we are here to talk about the truth.
We shall know the truth and the truth shall set us free.
Is that a promise or a threat?
We turn to Genesis.
Before time there was nothing.
Once upon a time, God created and it was good.
It was perfect and lovely and static and non-changing.
The green was always green, the river flowed, the tree stood tall and proud with fruit on it.
No storms, no challenges, no unmet needs.
The woman and the man walked blissfully unaware, partners in creation.
Free from understanding,
Responsibility, cravings…..unashamed.
Things were good. (hmmmm………..)
There was but one thing that could not be had:
The woman and the man had been told by the Creator not to eat of the
fruit of the tree.
One day, along came a trickster.
Because a trickster always comes along.
And the trickster, interestingly enough, spoke the truth.
Lest we make the trickster into the bad guy:
The trickster said, “If you eat of the fruit your eyes will be opened and you will be like your Creator, knowing good and evil.”
Hmmmm….the woman said, I would like to know more and see more
And be more and do more…
No easy prey bitten and subdued by the trickster,
this conscious actor on the stage of life chooses:
“seeing the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise….she took and ate.”
In her desire for the wisdom of God, she took and ate.
Given the choice, she chose knowledge.
She gives it to the man and he without dialogue takes and eats, as well.
God gets angry and does a lot of cursing….literal cursing.
The woman and man do a lot of blaming which makes them look silly to us, because we know they did it.
We saw and heard what happened.
Not only that, I think they would do it again.
We like to see ourselves in the audience, but in reality, we are the actors.
And we would do it again.
God throws God’s hands up (my vision)
and repeats the truth the Trickster had earlier proclaimed,
saying, “Behold, they have become like one of us,
knowing good and evil….”
It happened just like the snake said it would.
I don’t know about you,
but it is difficult for me to see what is so wrong here.
It’s all very human.
They disobeyed.
We disobey all the time.
They did that which the Creator God did not want them to do.
We do that all the time.
The woman, at least seemed genuinely interested in bettering their situation. She wanted to be more like her Creator.
She wanted understanding.
She wanted to know between good and evil, she rationalized.
We rationalize.
We are not being willful or mean spirited.
Is it wrong to want to be more than I am?
Is it wrong to want to taste the sweetness that lies within our reach?
What if God is the Trickster, keeping us from being all we can be?
Holding us back from our potential with a capital P!
Now we are talking about What it Means to Be Human.
All good questions.
It’s a good story.
It’s our story.
Since it is our story,
rather than try to answer all the questions the story raises,
rather than try to take it and make it
that which it isn’t,
Claim what it is.
Your story. Our story.
They disobeyed.
We disobey.
They craved more.
We craved more.
They misunderstood.
We misunderstand.
They blamed.
We blame.
They wanted wisdom.
We want wisdom.
They sought truth by their own hand.
We seek truth by our own hand.
Oh yes, that we all understand.
The truth in the story we understand.
They took the fruit and ate…
And their eyes were opened and they recognized.
They recognized they were naked.
And they were ashamed.
And they hid from God.
God comes and the cursing begins….
“And then the Lord God makes for them garments of skins,
and clothes them”
And sends them out of the garden.
That is our story.
Our story of humanness.
Take that story and hold it in your hand and in your mind for a moment,
While we go to another story--that is also our story.
From the book of Luke, the 24th chapter,
selected verses from the translation of Laurie:
Many, many years later.
Two people were walking, going from the big city to a village,
and they were talking.
While they were talking and discussing together,
Jesus, came and walked beside them.
“BUT, their eyes were kept from recognizing him.”
Jesus said, “what are ya’ll talking about while you are walking?”
And they stopped walking.
They stood still.
They looked sad.
“Are you the only guy around
who doesn’t know the things that have happened in Jerusalem?”
And Jesus, baiting them, said,
“What things?”
And they said, “How Jesus, the prophet, mighty in deed and word
before God was handed to the priests and rulers and was crucified.
We thought he was the one who was going to save Israel.
But now, it has been three days.
And not only that,
but some of our women in our group amazed us early today.
The women went to the tomb and could not find his body,
They came back saying they had seen a vision of angels
Who said Jesus was still alive???
Some men in our group went to check out their story.
They found the empty tomb as they said, but did not see Jesus.
The three walked on and Jesus, whom they still did not recognize,
Interpreted scripture to them, beginning with Moses and all of the prophets.
So…..they get to the village where they were going.
And the two asked unrecognizable Jesus
to stay with them because it was pretty much nighttime.
So Jesus went in to stay with them.
“When he as at table with them, he took the bread and blessed,
and broke it, and gave it to them.
AND THEIR EYES WERE OPENED
AND THEY RECOGNIZED HIM….”
Jesus vanishes and the two are dumfounded into action,
running all the way back to the big city of Jerusalem,
finding the 11 disciples (Judas is no longer with us) and
“Then they told what had happened on the road,
and how Jesus was known to them in the breaking of the bread.”
Hold on…it gets even better.
Jesus apparates again.
And again tells interprets all the scripture and charges them saying:
“You are witnesses, the seers who then tell, of all these things.
And behold I send the promise of my Father upon you;
But stay in the city, until you are clothed with power from on high”.
This is the Word of our Lord.
Thanks be to God.
Now, we have a story in either hand.
And we are holding them.
They are both our stories.
In both stories there are two people together with closed eyes.
There are two people who cannot see and understand the Truth.
In both stories there is a third player:
In one…the Trickster
In one…Jesus
In both stories the eyes are opened upon the eating and sharing of food.
In both stories, the need for clothing is noted
and GOD will be the one who will clothe.
One literal clothing to cover our shame as we move out of the garden.
One spiritual clothing to bless us as we move out into the world.
In both stories the players are being sent out.
There is much alike in these stories…but, there is also, much difference.
One story is a story of Good News.
One story is one of Bad News.
One causes great joy.
One causes great shame.
One story involves blessing.
One story involves cursing.
One story involves the food being blessed:
“When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it and gave it to them”
One story involves going out into the world to tell the promise and joy and life that the risen Christ offers.
One story involves going out into the world of endless work and toil and pain.
That first story, from Genesis.
We recognize ourselves in it.
Our eyes are open to that:
We disobey.
We craved more.
We misunderstand.
We blame.
We want wisdom.
We seek truth by our own hand.
This is our story.
But friends, we have to believe that there is more to that story.
There is the Declaration of Forgiveness at the end of the Prayer of Confession.
The light shines in the darkness and the darkness will not overcome it.
Because the other story is just as much our story.
And the second story redeems the first.
It doesn’t do away with that story.
It doesn’t trump it or replace it, it redeems it.
This is our redemption story.
We walk with Jesus, sometimes not even recognizing him.
He teaches us and interprets scripture for us
both when we know and can name our teacher as Jesus
and when we think it is just a stranger walking alongside us.
We crave the Truth.
We want to believe in the empty grave…..in the story of the women….
We tell others.
We sit down at table together.
We hear the familiar words:
“When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it and gave it to them”
And, ahhhh,... we pause at those words, because they are so familiar.
We pause at this part of the story because it is, indeed, sounding
And feeling more and more like our story.
And our eyes are opened….
And we recognize Jesus in our midst….
Maybe only for a second…
Because he vanishes….
And returns and vanishes again…
Jesus, playing now you see me, now you hear me,
now you recognize me,
now you follow me,
now you speak of me…..
And because of the other story….”now you don’t”
But, at least now our eyes are opened.
We can read both stories.
We are in both stories.
Both stories are us.
We are to go forth, created,
clothed, fed,
blessed, broken and redeemed,
eyes wide open to be witnesses…..
tellers and livers of the story, in the story.
The stories of our life!
Sunday, January 9, 2011
Haves and Have Nots
Haves and Have Nots
I have a child who is almost 9.
I have doctors.
I have congressional representatives.
I have judges.
I have directors of community outreach.
I have neighbors.
I like the idea of “Congress at My Corner”.
I have compassion.
I have a soul.
I have confusion.
I have sorrow.
I have conflict.
I have bitterness.
I even have something close to hate.
I do not have a gun.
I do not know the term “extended clip”.
I do not have a desire to hurt others.
I do not have a clear understanding of what brings folks to this point.
I do not have clarity.
I want to have hope:
that we are smarter than this,
that we can come together on the need to be civil in a civil land,
That we want more than this,
That human nature is better than this,
That, as a community, we can be more sane than this with
kindness, gentleness and self-control and holding each other accountable, rather than rhetoric of violence and hatred.
God, give me hope.
God, give us hope.
I have a child who is almost 9.
I have doctors.
I have congressional representatives.
I have judges.
I have directors of community outreach.
I have neighbors.
I like the idea of “Congress at My Corner”.
I have compassion.
I have a soul.
I have confusion.
I have sorrow.
I have conflict.
I have bitterness.
I even have something close to hate.
I do not have a gun.
I do not know the term “extended clip”.
I do not have a desire to hurt others.
I do not have a clear understanding of what brings folks to this point.
I do not have clarity.
I want to have hope:
that we are smarter than this,
that we can come together on the need to be civil in a civil land,
That we want more than this,
That human nature is better than this,
That, as a community, we can be more sane than this with
kindness, gentleness and self-control and holding each other accountable, rather than rhetoric of violence and hatred.
God, give me hope.
God, give us hope.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Third Sunday in Advent
African beasts crafted of raffia.
Glimpses of children, younger, encased in felt starts, sloppily painted frames, metal hearts.
The world clear, then frosted with the lone strand of blinking lights.
Glass, plastic, cardboard coated:
Hickory Dickory Dock
Woodstock
Cindy Lou Hoo
Wake Forest Deacon
R2D2.
Reminders of locales:
Carved tree of redwood
Delicate Eifel Tower
Brightly festooned ox cart
Dark-faced shell angel
Rodeo Santa
Olive wood crèche,
Next to local
Palm Trees,
Alligators,
Hula snowman “Be Merry” and Santa “Put a Little Jingle in Your Step”.
Lights through glistening tears now:
First Christmas Together
First House
Pets long gone
Babies first Christmas, then another. Ceramic booties:
“be careful—they are heavy and breakable!”
Wooden carved Chinese baby, bundled, the long-red tassel broken off and lost.
A paper crafted Jack-In-The-Box from little hands long ago. Mine.
Put it in the back of the tree. It is ugly, but holds a place.
Arks, Angels, Stars, Crosses,
Little fingers crafted popsicle stick Mary, Joseph and Baby:
Sprigs of hay gone long ago.
But I know it was there.
One Christmas long ago.
Glimpses of children, younger, encased in felt starts, sloppily painted frames, metal hearts.
The world clear, then frosted with the lone strand of blinking lights.
Glass, plastic, cardboard coated:
Hickory Dickory Dock
Woodstock
Cindy Lou Hoo
Wake Forest Deacon
R2D2.
Reminders of locales:
Carved tree of redwood
Delicate Eifel Tower
Brightly festooned ox cart
Dark-faced shell angel
Rodeo Santa
Olive wood crèche,
Next to local
Palm Trees,
Alligators,
Hula snowman “Be Merry” and Santa “Put a Little Jingle in Your Step”.
Lights through glistening tears now:
First Christmas Together
First House
Pets long gone
Babies first Christmas, then another. Ceramic booties:
“be careful—they are heavy and breakable!”
Wooden carved Chinese baby, bundled, the long-red tassel broken off and lost.
A paper crafted Jack-In-The-Box from little hands long ago. Mine.
Put it in the back of the tree. It is ugly, but holds a place.
Arks, Angels, Stars, Crosses,
Little fingers crafted popsicle stick Mary, Joseph and Baby:
Sprigs of hay gone long ago.
But I know it was there.
One Christmas long ago.
Friday, September 10, 2010
A Better Life
A Better Life
“I pray that I can envision something that is better than the life
I am living” he said.
He said he was a Purple Heart veteran.
He said he pulled people out of burning rubble in Kuwait.
He said he was on Coumadin and an anti-seizure medicine.
He said he had post traumatic stress disorder, but refused to take Prozac….
So they dropped his benefits.
He said his wife committed suicide.
He said he had three kids.
He said his wife’s cousin was taking care of them.
He said the middle daughter needed glasses.
He said the cousin was having a hard time
And the kids might have to go into foster care.
He said his mother and father were dead.
He pointed to the scar on his face.
He indicated where he had a rod in his leg.
He showed me all kinds of medical papers.
He said his purple heart was in a pawn shop because since we turned his back on him,
It wasn’t worth anything more than the money to him anymore.
He said he wanted work.
$100 would do it.
He said he needed to make it to October 16th when he has a hearing to
restore his VA benefits and pay him retroactively.
I held his hands and we prayed……
“I pray that I can envision something that is better than the life I am living” he said.
Now….
He might be lying.
He didn’t have and ID to show me.
What kind of veteran doesn’t have an ID?
He didn’t want to me to call and verify his hearing date.
He might be lying. He might not.
If he is lying, I suspect that the life he is living is worse than what he told me.
And what he told me was plenty bad enough.
I gave him $20 from my wallet.
I was going to use it to get a pedicure.
“I pray that I can envision something that is better than the life
I am living” he said.
He said he was a Purple Heart veteran.
He said he pulled people out of burning rubble in Kuwait.
He said he was on Coumadin and an anti-seizure medicine.
He said he had post traumatic stress disorder, but refused to take Prozac….
So they dropped his benefits.
He said his wife committed suicide.
He said he had three kids.
He said his wife’s cousin was taking care of them.
He said the middle daughter needed glasses.
He said the cousin was having a hard time
And the kids might have to go into foster care.
He said his mother and father were dead.
He pointed to the scar on his face.
He indicated where he had a rod in his leg.
He showed me all kinds of medical papers.
He said his purple heart was in a pawn shop because since we turned his back on him,
It wasn’t worth anything more than the money to him anymore.
He said he wanted work.
$100 would do it.
He said he needed to make it to October 16th when he has a hearing to
restore his VA benefits and pay him retroactively.
I held his hands and we prayed……
“I pray that I can envision something that is better than the life I am living” he said.
Now….
He might be lying.
He didn’t have and ID to show me.
What kind of veteran doesn’t have an ID?
He didn’t want to me to call and verify his hearing date.
He might be lying. He might not.
If he is lying, I suspect that the life he is living is worse than what he told me.
And what he told me was plenty bad enough.
I gave him $20 from my wallet.
I was going to use it to get a pedicure.
Monday, September 6, 2010
2010-11 BOOK GROUP LIST
2010-11 BOOK GROUP LIST
October 18 The Help Kathryn Stockett Grace’s House
(it’s her birthday)
November 15 The Good Daughter Joyce Maynard Tracey’s House
December 13 A Guide to the Birds Nicholas Drayson Nancy’s House
of East Africa
January 17 The Reliable Wife Robert Goolrick Sallie’s House
February 21 The Space Between Us Trity Umrigar Katie R.’s House
March 21 An Altar in the World Barbara Brown Taylor Torri’s House
April 18 Imperfect Birds Ann Lamott Laurie’s House
May 16 Loving Frank Nancy Horan Katie D’s House
October 18 The Help Kathryn Stockett Grace’s House
(it’s her birthday)
November 15 The Good Daughter Joyce Maynard Tracey’s House
December 13 A Guide to the Birds Nicholas Drayson Nancy’s House
of East Africa
January 17 The Reliable Wife Robert Goolrick Sallie’s House
February 21 The Space Between Us Trity Umrigar Katie R.’s House
March 21 An Altar in the World Barbara Brown Taylor Torri’s House
April 18 Imperfect Birds Ann Lamott Laurie’s House
May 16 Loving Frank Nancy Horan Katie D’s House
Monday, May 24, 2010
Pentecost - Evening Service
Pentecost – Evening Service
Outside - the summer evening light
Hits the font
now with algae on the side of the rough stone.
Running water slips over green.
Inside - flies on the bread tell us this in not poetry, but life.
The love of Jesus Christ until he comes again.
Sacrament.
Hover over us.
Commission us.
Send us into surprise -
Outside - the summer evening light
Hits the font
now with algae on the side of the rough stone.
Running water slips over green.
Inside - flies on the bread tell us this in not poetry, but life.
The love of Jesus Christ until he comes again.
Sacrament.
Hover over us.
Commission us.
Send us into surprise -
Friday, December 4, 2009
Advent Devotional - December 4th
December 4th – Rev. Laurie Furr-Vancini
Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing so, some have entertained angels without knowing it. (Hebrews 13:2)
The use of the above verse is not a typographical error. I could not leave this verse quite yet. What Tom did not share with you yesterday is that earlier in the week, he also used this verse in staff meeting. He quoted a poem by Presbyterian poet Ann Weems that plays on this verse. Weems writes:
Wouldn’t it be wonderful
If Advent came filled with angels and alleluias?....
Wouldn’t it be ecstatic if we could take those angels shopping,
or trim the tree or have them hold our ands
and dance through our houses decorating….”
When Tom read this poem I had just finished scrolling through online pictures from my sister who lives outside of Washington D.C. Her church had hosted the United African Children’s Choir and she and her family had housed 3 Ugandan children for 5 days. They hosted 3 girls, the youngest was 6. My sister explained the choir children are chosen from refugee camps throughout eastern Africa. They travel together for about 8 months and during that time they are given health and dental care they have not received in their entire life. When they return home the program sends them to boarding school and pays until they complete the equivalent of high school. These kids are given a chance. My sister explained the plight of the children in the refugee camps are dismal. Little food, scarce clean water, lots of illness and many of the girls are sold in to prostitution. There is little to no education.
The pictures were beautiful in so many ways. The Ugandan children had skin as black as night and their smiles were ear to ear in every picture. They were dancing and singing and learning to ride a bike and playing a video game and making jump ropes. They were with my lily skinned nieces and nephew arms slung around each other in their kitchen, in their dining room, in their family room. And, in fact, they did help trim the tree. And then, they posed under the tree in the princess nightgowns they had picked out.
Maybe this is what angels look like!?!
For Journaling:
Ann Weems poem ends, “An angel-filled Advent has so many possibilities! But in lieu of that, perhaps we can give thanks for the good earthly joys we have been given and for the earthly “angels” that we know who do such a good job of filling our Advent with alleluias!” Who are your Advent earthly angels? Would someone say you have been an earthly angel for them?
Sunday, October 4, 2009
World Communion Sunday
The bread
purchased for the day
breads of the world
all kinds and colors and textures.
Children will bring it forward and set the table.
A favorite day---the world united.
Eating bread.
This bread
left in a car overnight on warm, Florida, harvest moon night.
Early, I open the car door to drive to worship.
The smell of bread.
Yeasty, warm,
bread upon bread
in the closed in space.
This is what Jesus smells like.
Breads of the world.
Bread for the world.
purchased for the day
breads of the world
all kinds and colors and textures.
Children will bring it forward and set the table.
A favorite day---the world united.
Eating bread.
This bread
left in a car overnight on warm, Florida, harvest moon night.
Early, I open the car door to drive to worship.
The smell of bread.
Yeasty, warm,
bread upon bread
in the closed in space.
This is what Jesus smells like.
Breads of the world.
Bread for the world.
Monday, September 14, 2009
In Breaking
by Laurie Furr-Vancini
A Moment of Magic
A Time of Wonder
A Glimpse of Possibility
An Unexpected Shalom
A Bit of Awe
A Crack of Curiosity
A Flash of Genius
An Occasion of Miracle
A Point of Portent
A Twinkle of Light
A Surprise of Marvel
A Taste of Manna
We Lean Into Revelation
And Either Back Away
or Grasp
and Hold On.
A Moment of Magic
A Time of Wonder
A Glimpse of Possibility
An Unexpected Shalom
A Bit of Awe
A Crack of Curiosity
A Flash of Genius
An Occasion of Miracle
A Point of Portent
A Twinkle of Light
A Surprise of Marvel
A Taste of Manna
We Lean Into Revelation
And Either Back Away
or Grasp
and Hold On.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Sophia Evangeline - sermon for B-Ordinary 20
B – Ordinary 20 Rev. Laurie Furr-Vancini
Proverbs 9:1-6 Palms Presbyterian Church
Ephesians 5:11-17 August 16, 2009
“Sophia Evangeline”
The title of the sermon this morning is my name suggestion
for Pastor Andrew and Caroline’s new baby
who will be greeting us sometime in December.
This name suggestion is an early baby present to you.
This morning we are called by Wisdom.
Wisdom searches for us and hopefully we search for Wisdom.
We speak of Wisdom as Wisdom woman
because Wisdom is feminine in the Bible.
Lest we females get pumped up about that,
her evil twin, Folly, is also feminine.
Wisdom personifies all the positive characteristics
of womanhood in early Hebrew times.
Folly personifies all the negatives.
Wisdom calls to us.
But, Folly is out there calling to us, also.
So our question for this morning is which twin do we embrace?
Theologian Paul Tillich has this to say about Wisdom:
“One speaks of experience, insight, knowledge;
and indeed those area related to wisdom and often part of it.
But none of them is wisdom itself.
Wisdom is greater than these.
It is one of the great things that profoundly concern
every human being in every period of conscious life.
Widsom is not bound to old age.
It is found equally in the young.
And there are fools at all ages of life.”
If, as Tillich proposes, we are to search for wisdom at all points in our life.
I propose we turn today to wisdom.
-1-
There is never a better or worse day to start than today.
And there is never a better undertaking than to start being wise.
I know many of you are wise everyday…..
so for you….sit back and think about how lovely it will be
when the rest of us are as wise as you.
Because the rest of us are beginning today. Right now.
We are going to be wise.
You may think that today may be the worst day to start being wise.
Some may be starting back work after the summer off
or a summer slow down.
Maybe you are thinking about summer ending and the fall heating up.
Hurricanes are coming…I just know they are.
You may have any number of reasons for not starting to be wise
beginning today.
But, whatever reason you have is Folly.
It is best to be wise beginning today.
It is best to move into a new school year with intentionality.
It is best to confront chaos with scripture and care.
It is best to have structure in your daily walk.
Beginning today.
Today is always the best day to begin.
The other day, I heard these words…..”mama, you gotta watch!”
My seven year old was bouncing in a bouncy house at Pump It Up.
Pump it Up is a warehouse of chaos with high ceilinged rooms filled with
huge inflatables and lots of squealing and screaming kids.
She is bouncing up and down and then on her bottom and back up.
And my job is to pay attention.
Interestingly enough, I am trying to journal at the edges of Pump It Up….
But she reminds me, I am to live where I am.
And I am at Pump It Up.
“Mama, you gotta watch!”
Beginning right now….beginning today, you have to pay attention.
-2-
You have a life to live.
And there is the life you have been living
and the life you have been meaning to live.
Beginning today, you are done with the life you have been living.
Beginning today, you are going to turn to Wisdom, the one
who has been calling you to a new life…..
the life you’ve been meaning to live.
Beginning today, you are going to make steps to live that life.
The life you’ve been meaning to live becomes the life you live.
Are you with me?
Wisdom is calling to you.
She is standing out on the street corner.
A street corner preacher…that makes us nervous doesn’t it.
But she finds the place where everyone will see her.
You can’t miss her….
And she calls to everyone…..
Everyone….
I told you she was calling you.
She is pursuing you.
You don’t have to go off into a quiet place to meditate for days.
You don’t have to search her out on a mountaintop.
She might be at Pump it Up, “for God’s sake”.
She doesn’t send others to do her work.
Did you catch that, she sent away her helpers, her maids…..
She herself will make personal invitations to you and to you and to you.
Everyone is invited.
She may be the first evangelist in the bible.
And now it is time to tell you her name.
Theologians and biblical scholars call wisdom Sophia.
Wisdom’s name is Sophia which is the Greek translation for Wisdom.
The name makes some people nervous because we think there was and
maybe a goddess cult that took her name.
-3-
I happen to agree with some theologians that Wisdom is the feminine embodiment of God – God herself…..and this also makes some people nervous and anxious (thinking of God with feminine qualities).
But…please stay at ease…I am not here to push that down anyone’s throat, because Sophia would not approve.
Sophia Wisdom is not at all combative stating her case, setting her table.
Calling us to her table, calling us to partake of her hospitality.
Which has no place for either gorging or force feeding.
Calling, telling the good news, inviting, evangelizing
Evangalizing means telling the good news
So I give her a middle name….Evangaline.
Wisdom, the Evangalist.
Sophia Evangaline.
Sophia Evangeline is inviting you.
We’ve been eating a lot lately.
Jesus invited us to the dinner on the ground with the 5,000.
Jesus told us he is the bread of life.
And this week there is a table set by wisdom.
She has pulled out her best food, best table settings.
She is the “hostess with the mostest” on a mission from God.
“Here is the way of life- the way of wisdom”
Come to my table, everyone. Today.
Get your head out of the refrigerator,
your hand off the bottle,
your bottom from your work chair,
your eyes off the computer screen,
your fingers off the controller,
your mind off the mindless,
your self talk out of selfishness,
selflessness
self-centeredness
self serving
self deprecating….
None of that is at Sophia’s table.
Come here.
Sit down next to me.
And look into my eyes.
You will see the eyes of God looking back at you.
-4-
This is Good News.
This is the way of life.
Sophia was there in the beginning, we are told in the previous chapter of proverbs 8: Sophia was there: in the chaos, the void, the nothingness.
She knows what that is like.
Her evil twin Folly lives there now.
Do you remember the Sirens in Greek mythology?
This is how I picture Folly calling.
The Sirens sit on the rocks and call to sailors as they pass in their boats.
They are beautiful and alluring and they sing the sailors in.
Then CRASH - the boats shatter as they hit the rocks.
In Homer’s The Odyssey, the Sirens sing to Odysseus:
"Draw near ... illustrious Odysseus, flower of the Achaean chivalry, and bring your ship to rest that you may hear our voices. No seaman ever sailed his black ship past this place without listening to the sweet voice that flow from our lips…...”
And there is the problem.
Sophia Evangeline isn’t the only one calling.
Folly is calling also. But her middle name is not good news.
It is bad new. It is death.
Sophia has set a beautiful table in a beautiful home.
Folly has also set a table and in Proverbs 9:17, she says:
“stolen water is sweet and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.”
Listen what Steven Baugh, a seminary professor in California has to say of Wisdom’s evil twin:
“Folly’s fun house is a one-way elevator to the house of Death – non-stop to the Sheol Suite. And her guests are the dead. If Wisdom is life, Folly is death.”
-5-
Again, we stop to question.
If I am to begin today living a life of wisdom, what does that mean?
How do I find wisdom?
We generally know wisdom when we hear it.
We recognize Sophia when we see her.
And according to our scripture today when we see Folly,
we need to not ignore her, but expose her for what she is….
From Ephesians:
Don’t waste your time on useless work, mere busywork,
the barren pursuits of darkness.
Expose these things for the sham they are.
It’s a scandal when people waste their lives on things
they must do in the darkness where no one will see.
Rip the cover off those frauds
and see how attractive they look in the light of Christ.
Wake up from your sleep,
Climb out of your coffins;
Christ will show you the light!
A public declaration of what is good.
An invitation to a life giving, life sustaining, life altering banquet.
An open call to everyone, not just some.
Jesus or Sophia?
Yes, both.
If Christ is showing the light of God,
the way of God certainly includes Wisdom.
And in proverbs 9 and proverbs 1, as well as psalm 111,
we are told the beginning of Wisdom, is the fear,
the paying attention, of God.
“Mama, you gotta watch!”
-6-
Sara Koenig, a bible professor at Seattle Pacific University,
says Wisdom, Sophia, requires the
“obligation to deal with life head on,
head up,
with open eyes
an honest heart
and courageous conviction.”
She continues:
Clearly, wisdom is not a gift: wisdom is a task.
Wisdom costs.
Wisdom calls each of us to be everything we have the capacity to be.
It is wisdom that is the internal force that drives us to become the fullness of ourselves.”
In other words, “the life we have been meaning to live.”
Folly is easy, Sophia Wisdom is difficult.
Folly is docile.
Wisdom is active.
Folly is secretive and often hidden.
Wisdom is truth and sincerity and openness.
Folly is complacency.
Wisdom is a commitment to lifelong learning and changing
and growing. Lifelong.
Folly is status quo.
Wisdom is standing for justice and righteousness and mercy.
Folly is thinking you know it all.
Wisdom is knowing your limitations, your finitude.
Folly is not recognizing our foolishness.
Wisdom is knowing when and where we have turned to Folly
and returning to Wisdom.
-7-
So, Wisdom, the evangelist, the caller and teller of Good News
is Sophia Evangeline.
It’s a pretty good name, don’t you think?
You can call her Sophie Eva for short.
No pressure from the name or much to live up to. Ha. Ha. Ha.
I can hear the parents now:
“Sophia Evangeline, don’t you go getting all
uppity with me---like you know what’s best for everyone.”
Oh, but she does know.
She is Wisdom.
And beginning today.
we are going to live the life we’ve been meaning to live.
Folly, be gone!
Proverbs 9:1-6 Palms Presbyterian Church
Ephesians 5:11-17 August 16, 2009
“Sophia Evangeline”
The title of the sermon this morning is my name suggestion
for Pastor Andrew and Caroline’s new baby
who will be greeting us sometime in December.
This name suggestion is an early baby present to you.
This morning we are called by Wisdom.
Wisdom searches for us and hopefully we search for Wisdom.
We speak of Wisdom as Wisdom woman
because Wisdom is feminine in the Bible.
Lest we females get pumped up about that,
her evil twin, Folly, is also feminine.
Wisdom personifies all the positive characteristics
of womanhood in early Hebrew times.
Folly personifies all the negatives.
Wisdom calls to us.
But, Folly is out there calling to us, also.
So our question for this morning is which twin do we embrace?
Theologian Paul Tillich has this to say about Wisdom:
“One speaks of experience, insight, knowledge;
and indeed those area related to wisdom and often part of it.
But none of them is wisdom itself.
Wisdom is greater than these.
It is one of the great things that profoundly concern
every human being in every period of conscious life.
Widsom is not bound to old age.
It is found equally in the young.
And there are fools at all ages of life.”
If, as Tillich proposes, we are to search for wisdom at all points in our life.
I propose we turn today to wisdom.
-1-
There is never a better or worse day to start than today.
And there is never a better undertaking than to start being wise.
I know many of you are wise everyday…..
so for you….sit back and think about how lovely it will be
when the rest of us are as wise as you.
Because the rest of us are beginning today. Right now.
We are going to be wise.
You may think that today may be the worst day to start being wise.
Some may be starting back work after the summer off
or a summer slow down.
Maybe you are thinking about summer ending and the fall heating up.
Hurricanes are coming…I just know they are.
You may have any number of reasons for not starting to be wise
beginning today.
But, whatever reason you have is Folly.
It is best to be wise beginning today.
It is best to move into a new school year with intentionality.
It is best to confront chaos with scripture and care.
It is best to have structure in your daily walk.
Beginning today.
Today is always the best day to begin.
The other day, I heard these words…..”mama, you gotta watch!”
My seven year old was bouncing in a bouncy house at Pump It Up.
Pump it Up is a warehouse of chaos with high ceilinged rooms filled with
huge inflatables and lots of squealing and screaming kids.
She is bouncing up and down and then on her bottom and back up.
And my job is to pay attention.
Interestingly enough, I am trying to journal at the edges of Pump It Up….
But she reminds me, I am to live where I am.
And I am at Pump It Up.
“Mama, you gotta watch!”
Beginning right now….beginning today, you have to pay attention.
-2-
You have a life to live.
And there is the life you have been living
and the life you have been meaning to live.
Beginning today, you are done with the life you have been living.
Beginning today, you are going to turn to Wisdom, the one
who has been calling you to a new life…..
the life you’ve been meaning to live.
Beginning today, you are going to make steps to live that life.
The life you’ve been meaning to live becomes the life you live.
Are you with me?
Wisdom is calling to you.
She is standing out on the street corner.
A street corner preacher…that makes us nervous doesn’t it.
But she finds the place where everyone will see her.
You can’t miss her….
And she calls to everyone…..
Everyone….
I told you she was calling you.
She is pursuing you.
You don’t have to go off into a quiet place to meditate for days.
You don’t have to search her out on a mountaintop.
She might be at Pump it Up, “for God’s sake”.
She doesn’t send others to do her work.
Did you catch that, she sent away her helpers, her maids…..
She herself will make personal invitations to you and to you and to you.
Everyone is invited.
She may be the first evangelist in the bible.
And now it is time to tell you her name.
Theologians and biblical scholars call wisdom Sophia.
Wisdom’s name is Sophia which is the Greek translation for Wisdom.
The name makes some people nervous because we think there was and
maybe a goddess cult that took her name.
-3-
I happen to agree with some theologians that Wisdom is the feminine embodiment of God – God herself…..and this also makes some people nervous and anxious (thinking of God with feminine qualities).
But…please stay at ease…I am not here to push that down anyone’s throat, because Sophia would not approve.
Sophia Wisdom is not at all combative stating her case, setting her table.
Calling us to her table, calling us to partake of her hospitality.
Which has no place for either gorging or force feeding.
Calling, telling the good news, inviting, evangelizing
Evangalizing means telling the good news
So I give her a middle name….Evangaline.
Wisdom, the Evangalist.
Sophia Evangaline.
Sophia Evangeline is inviting you.
We’ve been eating a lot lately.
Jesus invited us to the dinner on the ground with the 5,000.
Jesus told us he is the bread of life.
And this week there is a table set by wisdom.
She has pulled out her best food, best table settings.
She is the “hostess with the mostest” on a mission from God.
“Here is the way of life- the way of wisdom”
Come to my table, everyone. Today.
Get your head out of the refrigerator,
your hand off the bottle,
your bottom from your work chair,
your eyes off the computer screen,
your fingers off the controller,
your mind off the mindless,
your self talk out of selfishness,
selflessness
self-centeredness
self serving
self deprecating….
None of that is at Sophia’s table.
Come here.
Sit down next to me.
And look into my eyes.
You will see the eyes of God looking back at you.
-4-
This is Good News.
This is the way of life.
Sophia was there in the beginning, we are told in the previous chapter of proverbs 8: Sophia was there: in the chaos, the void, the nothingness.
She knows what that is like.
Her evil twin Folly lives there now.
Do you remember the Sirens in Greek mythology?
This is how I picture Folly calling.
The Sirens sit on the rocks and call to sailors as they pass in their boats.
They are beautiful and alluring and they sing the sailors in.
Then CRASH - the boats shatter as they hit the rocks.
In Homer’s The Odyssey, the Sirens sing to Odysseus:
"Draw near ... illustrious Odysseus, flower of the Achaean chivalry, and bring your ship to rest that you may hear our voices. No seaman ever sailed his black ship past this place without listening to the sweet voice that flow from our lips…...”
And there is the problem.
Sophia Evangeline isn’t the only one calling.
Folly is calling also. But her middle name is not good news.
It is bad new. It is death.
Sophia has set a beautiful table in a beautiful home.
Folly has also set a table and in Proverbs 9:17, she says:
“stolen water is sweet and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.”
Listen what Steven Baugh, a seminary professor in California has to say of Wisdom’s evil twin:
“Folly’s fun house is a one-way elevator to the house of Death – non-stop to the Sheol Suite. And her guests are the dead. If Wisdom is life, Folly is death.”
-5-
Again, we stop to question.
If I am to begin today living a life of wisdom, what does that mean?
How do I find wisdom?
We generally know wisdom when we hear it.
We recognize Sophia when we see her.
And according to our scripture today when we see Folly,
we need to not ignore her, but expose her for what she is….
From Ephesians:
Don’t waste your time on useless work, mere busywork,
the barren pursuits of darkness.
Expose these things for the sham they are.
It’s a scandal when people waste their lives on things
they must do in the darkness where no one will see.
Rip the cover off those frauds
and see how attractive they look in the light of Christ.
Wake up from your sleep,
Climb out of your coffins;
Christ will show you the light!
A public declaration of what is good.
An invitation to a life giving, life sustaining, life altering banquet.
An open call to everyone, not just some.
Jesus or Sophia?
Yes, both.
If Christ is showing the light of God,
the way of God certainly includes Wisdom.
And in proverbs 9 and proverbs 1, as well as psalm 111,
we are told the beginning of Wisdom, is the fear,
the paying attention, of God.
“Mama, you gotta watch!”
-6-
Sara Koenig, a bible professor at Seattle Pacific University,
says Wisdom, Sophia, requires the
“obligation to deal with life head on,
head up,
with open eyes
an honest heart
and courageous conviction.”
She continues:
Clearly, wisdom is not a gift: wisdom is a task.
Wisdom costs.
Wisdom calls each of us to be everything we have the capacity to be.
It is wisdom that is the internal force that drives us to become the fullness of ourselves.”
In other words, “the life we have been meaning to live.”
Folly is easy, Sophia Wisdom is difficult.
Folly is docile.
Wisdom is active.
Folly is secretive and often hidden.
Wisdom is truth and sincerity and openness.
Folly is complacency.
Wisdom is a commitment to lifelong learning and changing
and growing. Lifelong.
Folly is status quo.
Wisdom is standing for justice and righteousness and mercy.
Folly is thinking you know it all.
Wisdom is knowing your limitations, your finitude.
Folly is not recognizing our foolishness.
Wisdom is knowing when and where we have turned to Folly
and returning to Wisdom.
-7-
So, Wisdom, the evangelist, the caller and teller of Good News
is Sophia Evangeline.
It’s a pretty good name, don’t you think?
You can call her Sophie Eva for short.
No pressure from the name or much to live up to. Ha. Ha. Ha.
I can hear the parents now:
“Sophia Evangeline, don’t you go getting all
uppity with me---like you know what’s best for everyone.”
Oh, but she does know.
She is Wisdom.
And beginning today.
we are going to live the life we’ve been meaning to live.
Folly, be gone!
Monday, June 29, 2009
Jessi's Ordination Charge
My friend Jessi Higginbothom was ordained last night as a Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) I was asked to charge her following her ordination. Here is the charge:
Jessi’s Charge
June 28, 2009
Jessi,
You will learn that things happen so quickly it is like the blink of an eye.
That is how long ago it seems that you introduced yourself to me right back there after my first Sunday at St. Giles.
You said, “My name is Jessi. I just graduated from FSU and I am here to do whatever you want me to do!!”
I thought, “I love this place and I love this young woman.”
And I do love this place and I do love you.
That was almost five years ago.
And now, here you are…
in your new robe and in your new stole with your new degree
at a new church!
My task is to charge you this evening.
My charge does not include things I have mastered, but what I hope for you and for myself.
For now, be very gentle with yourself.
Do a lot more listening than talking.
Understand that your congregation has a story that you do not yet understand.
Understand that that story will unfold slowly to you as you open yourself to it.
Understand that you will have an important place in that story,
but you will not be the story.
Try never to be the story.
As a pastor, be a story teller and story proclaimer, but not the story maker.
Be comfortable behind the scenes as well as in the pulpit.
Identify and celebrate and lift up the gifts in others.
Be the imaginer.
Let your congregation shine the light of Christ
in ways they had never imagined for themselves.
Learn to walk the balance beam of pastor and friendship and do not confuse the two.
Sometimes you cannot be both.
During times of discouragement,
(there will be times of discouragement)
Find someone or a group of someones to talk to outside your congregation.
In church business, be transparent.
Make no church decisions behind closed doors.
Include as many as possible in everything you do in ministry
all the days of your ministry.
Be present for your colleagues.
As an associate, make the entire staff look good.
Be humble.
Be gracious.
Be loving.
Learn when to hold your tongue and when to speak boldly.
Find your voice and use it wisely and sparingly.
Insist on being paid fairly and insist on being treated fairly.
Be a role model for women in ministry and find women role models.
Support young women and look toward the older women.
And as you age into one of the older women…..
Pick up some younger women and bring them with you on your journey.
When and if you have a family,
be at peace with spending less time at the church.
Be at peace with schlepping children around with you.
Be at peace with their always being more you can do.
Be at peace with a messy office and a messier house.
Be at peace with plans that change,
Know when it is time to remain with a congregation
and when it is time to leave.
Know that sometimes your needs and vision and the
congregations needs and vision will not be the same.
Rejoice when they are the same.
And again, I say, rejoice.
I probably could go on, but I will close with a prayer from Teresa of Avila.
“May today there be peace within.
May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts that you have received,
and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing that you are a child of God.
Let His presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and everyone of us.” Blessings Jessi!
Jessi’s Charge
June 28, 2009
Jessi,
You will learn that things happen so quickly it is like the blink of an eye.
That is how long ago it seems that you introduced yourself to me right back there after my first Sunday at St. Giles.
You said, “My name is Jessi. I just graduated from FSU and I am here to do whatever you want me to do!!”
I thought, “I love this place and I love this young woman.”
And I do love this place and I do love you.
That was almost five years ago.
And now, here you are…
in your new robe and in your new stole with your new degree
at a new church!
My task is to charge you this evening.
My charge does not include things I have mastered, but what I hope for you and for myself.
For now, be very gentle with yourself.
Do a lot more listening than talking.
Understand that your congregation has a story that you do not yet understand.
Understand that that story will unfold slowly to you as you open yourself to it.
Understand that you will have an important place in that story,
but you will not be the story.
Try never to be the story.
As a pastor, be a story teller and story proclaimer, but not the story maker.
Be comfortable behind the scenes as well as in the pulpit.
Identify and celebrate and lift up the gifts in others.
Be the imaginer.
Let your congregation shine the light of Christ
in ways they had never imagined for themselves.
Learn to walk the balance beam of pastor and friendship and do not confuse the two.
Sometimes you cannot be both.
During times of discouragement,
(there will be times of discouragement)
Find someone or a group of someones to talk to outside your congregation.
In church business, be transparent.
Make no church decisions behind closed doors.
Include as many as possible in everything you do in ministry
all the days of your ministry.
Be present for your colleagues.
As an associate, make the entire staff look good.
Be humble.
Be gracious.
Be loving.
Learn when to hold your tongue and when to speak boldly.
Find your voice and use it wisely and sparingly.
Insist on being paid fairly and insist on being treated fairly.
Be a role model for women in ministry and find women role models.
Support young women and look toward the older women.
And as you age into one of the older women…..
Pick up some younger women and bring them with you on your journey.
When and if you have a family,
be at peace with spending less time at the church.
Be at peace with schlepping children around with you.
Be at peace with their always being more you can do.
Be at peace with a messy office and a messier house.
Be at peace with plans that change,
Know when it is time to remain with a congregation
and when it is time to leave.
Know that sometimes your needs and vision and the
congregations needs and vision will not be the same.
Rejoice when they are the same.
And again, I say, rejoice.
I probably could go on, but I will close with a prayer from Teresa of Avila.
“May today there be peace within.
May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts that you have received,
and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing that you are a child of God.
Let His presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and everyone of us.” Blessings Jessi!
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