Reflections for Sunday, September 22, 2019
1st Scripture Reading:  Jeremiah 8:18-9:1 & Psalm 79
Reflection:
          Did you ever wonder where the term “don’t be such a Jeremiah” came from?  Well, these readings during this Season of Creation certainly convey a mood of gloom and doom, an accusatory tone that is hard to ignore.  The prophet Jeremiah continues in this vein, as he openly mourns for the people of God, the people of Israel.
          He says, “My joy is gone, grief is upon me, my heart is sick.”  And then, “the harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.”
          Along with many of you, I’m sure, I watched in awe and wonder as millions of children and youth took to the streets of big cities all over the world on Saturday, to demand action on climate change.  They seem to know what we will not acknowledge; that the summer of our life on earth has ended, and we have taken in the harvest far too greedily, and our survival here on the beautiful planet Earth, as a result, is in jeopardy.  God has not, and will not save us from the consequences of our poor choices.
          The psalmist says, “O God, the nations have come into your inheritance; they have defiled your holy temple; they have laid Jerusalem in ruins.”  A friend of mine from long ago called yesterday and said this to me:  “What if we all stopped pretending?”   Pretending we can’t read the signs? Pretending we don’t know that what we are doing is not sustainable? Pretending that dishonest politics is the only way to govern this country?  Pretending that free market capitalism will take care of us all?  Pretending that unlimited, unregulated growth of both our economies and our populations is in any way realistic, given the finite fragility of our planet?
          I saw a picture on the news a few days ago, a quick news item about the sale of a toilet….  A solid gold toilet that was made for Winston Churchill.  It reminded me of some of the comments made recently by our Prime Minister about the privilege of the rich and powerful, and for many, their complete lack of understanding of the needs of others less fortunate.
          “Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of your name deliver us, and forgive our sins, for your name’s sake….let your compassion come speedily to meet us.”
 
Hymn #12 MV “Come touch our hearts”
 
2nd Scripture Reading:  1 Timothy 2:1-7  & Luke 16:1-13
Reflection:
          Paul’s letter to Timothy exhorts him to pray for all those in authority, so that the rest of us might live in peace, in godliness and dignity.
          Acknowledging that those in power have the power to make our lives miserable is a start, I can agree.  Praying for them to be wise and compassionate leaders can’t hurt.  But in these times we need to do more – much more.  We need to hold our leaders to account.  We could demand of them good character and integrity.  We might expect of them a certain model of dignity, godliness, and calm assurance of their responsibility to the people they govern.
          Shrewd.  Our leaders should be – must be shrewd!  It’s a strange word for Jesus to use, but use it he did.  It actually means to act with foresight.  It means those who govern must be called upon to look ahead – to anticipate what is coming down the road towards them and to take appropriate action.
          It means our leaders must expect to govern today for many generations into the future – not to ensure themselves of re-election and a return to power and privilege. In this time of an election campaign, we could ask our leaders about these things – how are they planning to care for the health of the planet, the future home of their own children and grandchildren?  We must ask them how are they modelling for our young people what is good and admirable in the halls of government?
          And even so, we must remember the Christian values that have guided our own lives for many generations: generosity, forgiveness, compassion, and faith in our ability to learn and to make better choices.  We are, after all, children of a loving God, creative beings with a spiritual calling to work with God to realize the kingdom of God in all things and in all places.
          And we all know this one:  the definition of insanity is doing the same things over and over and expecting a different result.
          God expects us to learn to make better choices, and Jesus died to show us how to do that.
 
Hymn #508 VU “Just as I am without one plea”
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Reflections for Sunday, September 15, 2019
1st Scripture Reading:  Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28 & Psalm 14
Reflection:
          Oceans – many of us love to live near or visit often, oceans.  Mystics say that oceans are symbolic of the deep unconscious, present in each and every one of us – the place of our most vulnerable emotions, our hidden fears and buried shame, the place in us where we are most needful of Divine Guidance, support and love.
          Dan’s song invites us to reflect on the way God calls us into uncharted territory, calls us away from the familiar, the safe, the comfortable and into the unknown, the potential, the mystery of being close to God – trusting in God – in spite of our fear being willing to grow, to change to become who God knows we can be.
          In such a time as this, this song is pertinent.  The reading from the prophet Jeremiah (who always seems to be the bearer of bad news, by the way!) points out God’s disappointment with the people of Israel, who, having been given good things by God, are still failing to make moral progress, are still doing evil and missing opportunities to do good.
          As we in Canada enter this federal election cycle, we are acutely aware that we have not been good stewards of this beautiful planet, and we are asking our political candidates to elucidate for us what they would do to help us grapple with our shortcomings in this area should they be elected.  What are we, the present tenants of this finite planet, prepared to do to protect our environment and the habitat of many vulnerable species?  How are we prepared to grow in understanding and responsibility-taking to become better stewards of God’s Creation? Are we even prepared to listen for Divine guidance?
Hymn #87 MV “Water flowing from the mountains”
 
2nd Scripture Reading:  1 Timothy 1:12-17 & Luke 15:1-10
Reflection:
          And we are all complicit.  Every time I take garbage to the dump, every time I use and discard a plastic bag, every time I take my car to the store or the post office, I feel acutely my shame and my complicity.
          Like Timothy says, we are all sinners, in so far as we are not listening for and trusting in the will of God.  In other words, if we are not part of the solution, then we must by definition, be part of the problem!
          Our spiritual growth and development are very important to God.  The future of this wonderful experiment, life on earth, depends on us learning the spiritual lessons laid before us by the prophets and by Jesus the Christ.  It is becoming ever more obvious that if we don’t learn these spiritual lessons, our time in this amazing schoolroom will soon be over.  We are looking at so many ways we could destroy ourselves and our viability as a life form on planet Earth.  Nuclear apocalypse, dead oceans, massive climate change causing increasing desertification with attendant famine, mass migration, wars and widespread disease.  If we don’t learn to live in harmony, we will end up fighting for the scraps.
          As I say all these things, I feel like a modern day Jeremiah.  But I also know that Jesus is there for me – Jesus is part of me and I am part of him.  His love for me is deeply personal, and has resulted for me and countless other lost souls in deep healing that has liberated us from fear and hatred.  We win this battle, friends, when we can rise above the waves of fear, and shame, and unworthiness to know ourselves as children of God, beloved and loving servants of the good, of each other, and of life itself.  Jesus love never fails us.  He will find us, heal us, and love us into wholeness, if only we will say yes to him. His mission, I believe is to find every last one of us and fill us with his love.
          The way of Love, the way of Jesus, that is our only hope, our only path to salvation and survival.  It seems to me the choice is very clear.  We must be willing to work hand in hand with God, to build the kingdom of God here on earth.  Apathy and procrastination lead to certain disaster.  Time is running out.
          “Know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
 
Hymn #157 MV “I am a child of God”
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Reflections for Sunday, September 8, 2019  - 1st in Creation
1st Scripture Reading:  Jeremiah 18:1-11  &  Psalm 139
Reflection:
          The prophet Jeremiah is a mouthpiece for God.  He listens for the Spirit of God to speak within him, and then he feels compelled to share what God has spoken to him with the people of Israel.
          This is a famous piece – a reading we have all heard before – about God as the potter – the shaper or moulder of nations and of human beings.  As a sometime potter I can relate to this process – the building up, and the breaking down to make something better… the lop-sided pot gets pushed down, squished together and re-started to make a perfect one.  God is in the process of making us perfect!  But as an old employer of mine used to say: “If you want to make an omelette, you have to break the eggs!”  Sometimes the process is painful indeed, but the endurance, the patience, the humility we all learn thru it, makes us better people for the next round!
          And this does not mean that we are garbage, no not at all!  For as the psalmist says:  “I praise you (God), for I am fearfully, wonderfully made.  Wondrous are your works, that I know very well.”
          God knows us thru and thru, and will help us grow and develop into wholeness.  Physically, the Creator has already made us incredibly beautiful and complex – a wonder of inter-locking systems and abilities. Our spiritual development, our ability to discern good from evil, and our capacity for empathy and direct caring for the needs of others is embryonic when we are born, and these things will be learned and put into practice as we grow up.  We will make mistakes, we will fall down, and we will get up and try again  - this is how we mature and become the best we can be.  Like the prophet Jeremiah, we too must learn to listen for spiritual guidance from God who knows every hair on our head, every step we take wrong, and loves us anyway.
          People of God, we are clay in the hands of the Potter – rejoice and be glad to be “Soil of God”, for this way surely lies our salvation.
 
Hymn #174 MV “Soil of God”
 
2nd Scripture Reading:  Philemon 1-21  &  Luke 14:25-33
Reflection:
          Soil of God, you and I… and Philemon too, and even Onesimus, and even more dramatically, Paul himself! Paul, on the road to Damascus, had his life changed forever.  Philemon, a slave owner, is being asked to change his whole way of thinking about Onesimus, his runaway slave, who has become a follower of Christ under Paul’s tutelage, and who therefore must be accepted by his owner, as an equally beloved child of God.
          These are huge changes for every one of these three men. The old ways must be discarded, and new lives embraced. This is challenging work folks – this is how we are made perfect in Christ.
          And some of us will be dragged kicking and screaming into our new reality.  Paul had to use all his powers of persuasion to ensure that Onesimus would find a welcome response when he returned to Philemon.  The slave trade was alive and well in the lands of the Bible, and so normal a part of everyday life that it was not questioned in terms of morality. At the end of his entreaty to Philemon, Paul even asks him to prepare a guest room for his eventual return – clearly signalling that he intended to make sure that Onesimus was treated well.
          The Gospel of Jesus the Christ is not always welcome news.  Sometimes our old ways, our entrenched beliefs, our cultural norms are so deeply embedded in us that it is difficult, even painful to give them up.
          In the reading from the book of Luke this morning, we hear Jesus talking about exactly that.  We may be required to deny the power of our parents or teachers to dictate our behaviours and our stated beliefs.  This may cause terrible disruption in our families and our communities.  But we can’t follow Jesus half way.  He makes that very clear.  And so he invites us to be aware that there may be costs, consequences to accepting his teachings that we may not be prepared to pay.
          When Jesus says we must be prepared to give up all our possessions, he is not really talking about material wealth.  He is talking about our most cherished beliefs about who we are and our place in society.  He is talking about letting go of traditional ways of doing things, traditional roles in society, traditional ways of responding to grievances.  He is talking about equality of all God’s children within a society – about justice and about sharing, and about caring for one another – no matter what.  He is asking people to give up revenge, discrimination, sexism, child abuse, slavery, violence – and all these things were sanctioned within these societies – all these things were NORMAL!
          To change any one of these abuses was a huge paradigm shift – a dramatic, disruptive change in the way people lived.  And we are still coping with how hard it is for some of us to give them up.
          We are presently grappling with the discrimination that up until recently was common against the LGBTQ community, and still working on equality for men and women in the workplace and at home.
          In terms of climate change we are facing the ever clearer fact that our reliance on fossil fuels for our energy needs is damaging the planet, and therefore the future for our children.
          We are being asked as followers of Jesus, to open our hearts to the fragility of all God’s creation – to stop hurting each other and the earth.  That is what it means to be a disciple – a willing student of the Master Jesus.  That is what he calls us to do.  With God’s help we can do this – we must do this for the love of God.
 
 
Hymn #12 MV “Come Touch Our Hearts”
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Reflections for Sunday, September 1, 2019
1st Scripture Reading:  Jeremiah 2:4-13  & Psalm 81
Reflection:
          Next Sunday we enter the Season of Creation. “The reading from the prophet Jeremiah this morning is an amazing segue into this new season of the church liturgical year, where we concern ourselves with our relationships with all of God’s handiwork.
               “I brought you into a plentiful land” God says, “but when you entered, you defiled my land, and made my heritage an abomination.”
               I can think of a few instances in my own past where I have been revolted almost to the point of being sick by the sight of what we humans have done to the land.  My partner and I went one morning to walk in a heritage park in Mission – a place we had explored and enjoyed many times before – only to find that without warning a part of the land had been cleared, the trees uprooted and the soil turned to mud.  We walked unprepared, right into it and were so horrified by the destruction and the smell of fresh cut trees that we had to leave, shaken and appalled. The familiar landscape was gone, we couldn’t find the trails, all had been replaced with chaos and bleeding trees.
               My first seeing of the tar sands in Alberta, on television no doubt, similarly left me shaking and angry at what desecration we do.  My first trip through our quarries here on Texada was equally sickening.
               We are not unlike those Israelites Jeremiah was talking to.  We too have lost contact with God – with the Creator and the Giver of all this plentiful land.  We too have made vessels for ourselves that do not hold water – invented practices of resource exploitation that are desecrating the land we live in and are not sustainable.
               And like those ancient people, we too have choice.  We can continue to be part of the problem, people of God, or we can choose to become part of the solution.  We can continue down the path of death and destruction, or we can make different choices – choices that honour the God of Creation, and are life-affirming instead.
               Don’t be afraid.  God is with us in this place, as God has always been with us.  We are not alone.  I invite you to  choose God, align yourself with the Divine, remember that we stand on hallowed ground, and choose Life every time.  This is the challenge of our lifetime, beloved of God.  Are we up to it?
 
Hymn #806 VU  “O God our help in ages past”
 
2nd Scripture Reading:  Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16 & Luke 14:1, 7-14
Reflection:
          Do you ever wonder, where does all this rape and pillage, this brutal exploitation of the natural resources that are our inheritance, where does this all come from?  Who has the right to do this to what is our common legacy? 
          Have you heard the expression:  “To the victor go the spoils.”  In other words the strongest warrior wins and gets to take whatever he wants.  In old Britain, 3 or 4 hundred years AD, that meant the victorious soldiers killed all the men and boys, raped or enslaved all the women and girls, burned down their villages and took control of the land.  Ugly as this scenario is, it is in our DNA.  It is what we do.  Not so graphically perhaps now as then, and many battles are now fought in the boardrooms of the nations rather than on the battlefields.  But the winner still gets the resources, and the simple peasants still lose almost everything – except jobs, that is.  Yes, the ordinary citizens hang on desperately to the idea of jobs, because that is all that is left for them.  Most these days cannot even afford to buy a house – or if they do, the bank owns it for the rest of their working lives.  Any idea of shared ownership and responsibility for the stewardship of the land has long been stripped away.
          We need to find our way back to the garden.  We need to stop applauding the ambitions and acquisitiveness of our smartest minds and start turning their brains and their consciousness to the collective good of humanity and of the planet that sustains us as a species.
          There is plenty of work to do to clean up the messes we have made, to put out the fires set only to profit those who would be winners – those whose arrogance knows no limits. 
          Humbling ourselves to be in service to our fellow humans, and to the earth – that is a hard sell in our capitalist society – where for sure the winners take all.  We are not sharing.  99% of the wealth of this world is held by a very small percentage of people.  The rest of us are living in relative poverty in a world that should be plentiful, where the harvest should be abundant, and where all this is threatened if we don’t change our ways.
          The Living God is speaking to us thru our children!  Let us do what we can to support them, to take their messages seriously, and to willingly take a back seat to this new-to-us but really very old thinking. This earth is our life and our livelihood – our inheritance from God.  We need to learn to take better care of it.  Our young people are hearing God’s clarion call. We must be willing to take them seriously.
Hymn #87 MV  “Water Flowing from the Mountains”
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