Lent Day 26: The Women Who Anointed Jesus Part 1

Sermon Prep

There are some gospel stories that are one-of-a-kind--the parable of the Prodigal Son comes to mind, a beloved tale that is reported only in the Gospel According to Luke. There are other gospel stories that are told over and over; there is something so essential about them, it seems the gospel wouldn't be the gospel if they were missing.  The feeding of the multitudes is one such story, told six times across the four gospels. Jesus predicts his death three times in the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), and talks about it extensively in the second half of the Gospel According to John. And, of course, the crucifixion and the empty tomb are recounted in all four gospels, with varying details. 

The anointing of Jesus is another such story.  It is told four times, once in each gospel, providing us essentially, three versions of the story. As I prepare to preach on the version found in John's gospel, I thought I'd clarify my thoughts. Today I'll talk about the version found (with only slight differences) in the gospels of Matthew and Mark; tomorrow I will address the version found in the Gospel According to Luke, and on Saturday, I will talk about the version I'll be preaching on this Sunday, as found in the gospel as John.

Again, the versions told in Matthew and Mark are nearly identical, with only a few details changed. The setting is the same--the home of Simon the leper, in Bethany. Both passages take place during Holy Week, most likely on Wednesday. Both passages take place immediately following the news of the religious leaders plotting to kill Jesus, and immediately prior to Judas acting on his decision to betray Jesus--what textual critics call an inclusio, a kind of thematic sandwich. Betrayal is all around this story, but the story itself is about an action that is the opposite of betrayal.

Jesus is dining at Simon's home, and at some point during the evening, an unnamed woman enters. She brings with her a jar of costly ointment, and proceeds to pour it on Jesus' head. 

Matthew and Mark both have the woman anointing Jesus' head (as opposed to his feet, as portrayed in Luke and John). This evokes the anointing of a king, a priest, or a prophet-- all roles associated with the ministry of Jesus and subsequent theological understanding of his role as Messiah. 

Matthew includes the detail that it is Nard, a product of the spikenard plant; he also includes the detail that the woman breaks the jar open.

Immediately anger ensues. In Mark's gospel, it is attributed to "some who were there," but in Matthew, it is the disciples. Why such a waste? This ointment could have been sold for a large amount of money (Matthew: 300 denarii, about a year's wages for a day laborer). The money could have been given to the poor. Matthew has the disciples scolding the woman directly, while in Mark, the comments are all directed at Jesus.

Jesus' response is strong: Leave her alone (Matthew). Why do you trouble her? She has done a good service for me (as so strongly contrasted with the evil service cooked up by the religious leaders and Judas). Jesus identifies this anointing as preparation for his burial. As I mentioned earlier, all four gospels show Jesus predicting his passion and death. The disciples push back on his predictions (especially Peter), Only this unnamed woman acknowledges what he has predicted, and, by his interpretation of her action, ritually prepares for that moment.

A breathtaking statement ends both accounts. The goodness of the woman's action is so profound, Jesus states that it will live on in the memory of the church.

"Truly I tell you, wherever the good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her." (Mark 14:9; Matthew 26:13)

The memory of the unnamed woman lives on. 

Lent Day 23: Rituals

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the people of Israel, saying: On the fifteenth day of this seventh month, and lasting seven days, there shall be the festival of booths to the Lord.  
~Leviticus 26:33-34

We all have our rituals. Whether they involve the order in which we put out the lights before climbing the stairs to go to bed, or the procedure for creating a beloved dish "just like mom made it," our rituals offer us comfort, predictability, maybe even a sense of safety. 

We have rituals around our work (what time we arrive, what we prioritize as we begin the day, whether we approach tasks in order of difficulty-- hardest first? or get the easy ones out of the way so you can attack the hard ones with a clean plate?). We have rituals around our play (The snacks! Setting up the table for mahjong!)! And, of course, many of us engage in sacred rituals.

In my branch of Christianity most of our rituals are communal: Sunday worship and the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper are the cornerstones of life together in community as a people who serve the God of Jesus Christ. But they also offer us the comfort of predictability woven together with the novelty of the prayers and texts and sermonizing of the day. But there are rituals for home, as well--morning prayers, grace before a meal, "Now I lay me down to sleep..." 

The best rituals--by which I mean, the rituals that feel most essential, weighty in a good way--are those that appeal to our different senses. My morning prayer ritual includes the right location (where I am comfortable but also upright, with good natural light or at least a good lamp), music (some I listen to, and some I make), and a candle. Not just any candle, mind you, but a candle specially created for clergywomen by the Rev. Ruth Hetland (the genius behind the @consecratebox). The candle is called "God, Evil, and Suffering." Here's the thing, though: it doesn't smell like God, evil, and suffering, but, rather, like the gentlest whiff of the pipe tobacco of a beloved seminary professor who happened to teach a class by that name. I received one by subscription to Ruth's monthly treasure trove of items clergywomen need, and promptly ordered a dozen more. I don't know what I'll do when I run out. 

My point is: this ritual is especially meaningful to me. The involvement of my senses, my location, my prayerbook... all these things combine to give my prayer time the weight I think such a time deserves. It is the time I open my heart to God, and it is important.

There are other kinds of rituals, of course, beside the ones that root us to our daily lives, or even our weekly communal worship. The United States has highly ritualized the anniversary of September 11, 2001, for example. 

I have been wondering today whether we will ever create rituals to mark this season of pandemic, of which we have entered year 3. This morning's passage from Leviticus set me thinking about this. The Festival of Booths described in chapter 26 is a ritual commemorating the forty years God's covenant people spend on their wilderness sojourn between enslavement in Egypt and their entry into the Land of Promise. The festival lives on in the contemporary Jewish practice of Sukkoth (Hebrew for "booths") in which individuals and families create an outdoor dwelling place for a week that might resemble a tent or a booth, extravagantly decorated with specific kinds of fruits, flowers and greenery. 

An important facet of the booth is that it must be at least partially open to the elements--the reality of the vulnerability of the people to the elements of nature cannot be forgotten. But the festive nature of the observance--it is particularly beloved by children, it includes beautiful adornments--is part of its celebratory nature. "We got through it," Sukkoth reminds those who celebrate. "Look at our strength. Look at our resilience."

What rituals do you observe? The ritual of the morning coffee? (Oh, I do that one.) Saturday date night? I'm curious to know what you do, and how you do it. Rituals help to make life richer, to remind us of what we treasure. I hope yours give you joy.

Ready for Morning Prayer.

Lent Day 21: Lady Day

When I find myself in times of trouble...

I'm going to tell you these things in the order in which I learned them. 

Growing up Catholic, of course I knew that March 25 was the Feast of the Annunciation of Gabriel to Mary. It was the first Joyful Mystery of the rosary, and I inherited my love of the rosary and of Mary from my mother. (She stopped going to church, but she never stopped saying the rosary.)

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.”
~Luke 1:26-28

At some point it occurred to me that, of course, someone did the math and counted nine months backwards from Christmas.

Nope.

Rather, I learned that March 25 was celebrated as the day of the conception of Jesus Christ very early in church history. The reason for this was that the church, from its very earliest days, marked March 25 as the date of the crucifixion. 

I did not understand. Why should these be the same day? Wasn't that some kind of crazy coincidence?

No. It was, rather, trust in the consistency of God's designs for humankind. If the crucifixion took place on March 25, it stood to reason that it was also the date of Christ's conception, because it was the day chosen by God to be the day of salvation. God's purposes were being worked out in creation on this very day, whether that was by Christ's crucifixion or his conception... or even the creation of all things. Yes, there is also an ancient tradition that March 25 was the first day of creation.

Finally, I was today years old when I learned that, for nearly 600 years, March 25 was New Year's Day for the British Empire, also known as Lady Day. (Thanks so much Cody!).

So, a blessed day of Annunciation to you all, and a blessed remembrance of the first Good Friday. However it was done, by whatever method or design, today is a day to recall God's overflowing love for us.

Enjoy this, my favorite rendition of Mary's magnificent song, the Magnificat.

Lent Day 19: Cleaning

 

Guess who's using these bad boys again?

I've been cleaning. It's a pretty normal thing to do after a viral illness, I guess, but it's also something a lot of us learned to ratchet up at the beginning of the pandemic. 

Remember all the disinfectant wipes, and how they disappeared from stores and reappeared online at ten times the price?

Remember disinfecting your grocery bags before bringing them in the house, and then disinfecting the wrappings the food was in, too?

That was all so weird.

I'll be clear. I hate, loathe, despise, and abominate cleaning... except when I really, really want to do it. (Don't worry, my house is fine.)

This morning I was captivated by an urge to really clean following my weekend bug (not Covid, some have been asking). So I donned rubber gloves and got out the cleaners that you're not supposed to inhale for too long or they'll, I don't know, scorch your lungs? And I set to work.

It took about an hour, after which I felt like I'd done, not only a necessary thing, but a good thing.  Cleaning made my house feel like home again after the dislocating, disorienting experience of feeling distanced from it, even though I've been here, without interruption, since Saturday.

Some language around Lent evokes the notions of cleaning. "Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean," the psalm reads. "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and steadfast spirit within me." I will admit that some of the language of this psalm troubles me, though not because I don't believe in sin. (I do.) It bothers me because "clean" and "unclean" have been used throughout history to isolate and punish groups of people, usually on the basis of ethnicity, social class, or sexual orientation. "Dirty ______" has been an epithet hurled too often, and too many, resulting in real damage, including death.

At the same time, Lent is a time for... can we say, decluttering? Prioritizing? Setting the house of the soul in order--not because some part of it is polluted, but because clarity can be good. It helps us to see and appreciate what is there. It helps us to let go of what we no longer need. It helps us to restore order after a time of distress. 

I admit it. Cleaning can be good.

Lent Day 18: Rest

I knew on Friday something was off.

I was in one of my favorite spaces for working-- beautiful, serene, full of light-- and I was having a terrible time. I was trying to finish my meditation for Sunday, and I had all the attention span of an excited puppy, but with none of the energy. 

Writing sentences was like pulling my own teeth (without the pain but with all the effort). I knew I was excited about the passage--I'd had the most wonderful conversation about it with the Bible Study group earlier in the week. But I couldn't summon that excitement in the moment, and it felt like the task of Sisyphus to summon the willpower to keep going,

I am not very good at understanding when I am getting sick. Usually, if there's going to be a fever, I cry at some point, but I didn't cry. I just felt off, and found concentration very, very hard. I even attempted a nap, though anxiety about what I still had to do for Sunday wouldn't let it happen.

I was getting sick, but I was experiencing it as a moral failing. My body was sending me signals that all was not well physically, but I experienced it as failing at being productive. 

It took another 24 hours, and undeniable evidence of a virus, before I understood what was happening, and that I would not be capable of going to church on Sunday morning. 

It took another 6 hours after that to understand that I also wouldn't be capable of video-calling in to the service. 

And another 10 hours to finalize the last bit of coverage with a church member, which involved somehow breaking into my office to get a book for the Sunday School kids in Child Care.

This takes us up to 7 AM Sunday.

It was not lost on me, during all this, that our devotional cards seemed to be speaking directly to me. Here are the weekend's reminders for the day.

Friday:

Humans need seven
types of rest - creative,
emotional, mental, 
physical, spiritual,
social, and sensory.
Which of these areas
have you protected?
Which needs 
protecting?

Saturday:

Allow
yourself
space and
time to rest.

Sunday:

You are worthy
of Sabbath
time.

Monday:

Your worth is not
rooted in your
productivity.

(I include Monday in the "weekend" because I was still pretty weak, even though the symptoms had resolved on Sunday.)

I know I'm not unique in struggling with maintaining Sabbath time. Clergy are notoriously bad at this, though I have generally thought of myself as having a pretty reasonable work-life balance, and I also believe in it. It's not a suggestion to us; our sacred writings command it, not because God is a kill-joy, but quite the opposite. Human beings are deserving of rest.

Yet, it took me being confronted with incontrovertible evidence (fatigue and inability to focus, actual symptoms, worsening symptoms, new symptoms) to let go of plans, to share responsibilities, and, finally, to rest, which I began to do about 40 hours after the whole thing got rolling.

I couldn't let go of the idea that I was being self-indulgent.

I am incredibly fortunate in that I was able to share the resources to allow other people to step into my Sunday roles. I have fantastic colleagues in ministry and leadership who were happy to do whatever they could. I was able to message someone on Sunday morning to take care of that last bit of business, and they were happy to help. My direct deposit salary will be the same, despite the fact that I did not go to church on Sunday morning.

Not everyone has the kind of job where it works out this way. For most people missing work means  missed wages, and increased financial pressure, and the possibility of not making rent or the mortgage payment. The kind of work I do protects me from those kinds of outcomes due to a brief illness, but I know plenty of people for whom missing the main thing they are supposed to do that week means true financial hardship.

Not everyone does the kind of work that allows them the kind of rest Sabbath was meant to provide. I'm guessing, most people struggle to take Sabbath at all, and it has nothing to do with self-criticism and everything to do with a child's medical bills, or the heating bill, or being able to replace failing tires on the car.

Eventually, despite the way my brain was working against me, I was able to take the rest I needed, and I'm deeply grateful for it.

But our culture has made getting a three-day bug unaffordable for the vast majority of its workers, and that is a societal failing on the deepest level. 

We can do better. We must find a way for all people to find the space and time to rest. 

We must do better.

Full to the Brim devotional card,
from @sanctifiedart.

(PS, FYI, not Covid. Just your bog-standard bug.)

Lent Day 14: God Has Heard

"The High Priest and Hannah," James Tissot (1836-1902, French)

I shared a meditation on the boy-turned-prophet Samuel at last evening's Lenten service (you can read it here, if you like). It was the first in a series of Wednesday evening services around the theme of "Bedtime Stories." There are a lot of things that happen in the Bible when, under normal circumstances, people are supposed to be sleeping. 

I owe all credit for the idea of the series to my seminary buddy Chris Shelton (the link will take you to Broadway Presbyterian Church, where he is pastor, and you will see a fantastic picture there of him in the center of the congregation, with his son and husband). Chris is the one who came up with the idea of this passage as a bedtime story, famously donning a bathrobe and holding a Teddy bear in his arms to preach it. This is a sermon I didn't hear in person, but the idea of which has delighted me for years. 

The story of Samuel begins, not with him, but with his mother Hannah, heartbroken because she cannot conceive a baby, while her sister-wife is quite fertile (1 Samuel 1). She cries and prays at the Temple at Shiloh. The priest, Eli, doesn't recognize her tears and prayers for what they are; he thinks she's drunk. She clarifies for him that she is distressed and praying, without offering any details. Eli offers a prayer: 

“Go in peace; the God of Israel grant the petition you have made to him.” And the God of Israel does. 

A child is conceived. A child is born, and Hannah names him Samuel, which is Hebrew for "God has heard."

God has heard.

This is the central thing I think we want to know, when we are praying. That God has heard our prayers--even if the answer is "no," or "not yet," or sheer silence. We want to know that our prayers have risen up like incense before God, that God has taken note. Hannah's naming of her son celebrates the birth, certainly, but her actions after the child is born show what her heart is truly celebrating. 

Even while Samuel is a babe in arms, Hannah determines that she will dedicate him to God, and that he will serve in the Temple. When he is weaned, she presents him, along with offerings of flour, wine, and a three-year-old bull (an echo of the three-year-old Samuel?), to the priest. "For this child I prayed," Hannah tells the priest, "and the Lord has granted me the petition that I made to him. Therefore  I have lent him to the Lord; as long as he lives, he is given to the Lord."

Hannah is best known for the song she sings immediately following this moment of offering. Her canticle is believed to be the model for the Magnificat, the song Mary sings when her cousin Elizabeth confirms in her that she is carrying Jesus, the Messiah. Both canticles are songs of a world turned upside down, with the mighty tumbling from their thrones and the humble gaining ascendancy.

And it is a song that celebrates, at the very soul of it: God has heard.

Lent Day 12: White Privilege On Display

I'm having an interesting time over on Twitter, where my white privilege is fully on display and being appropriately called out.

I hate it.

I hate my white privilege.

I hate that I can blithely (and with about two minutes of thought) post something that can so expose my limitations and the sea I've been swimming in my whole life, which is to say, the sea of white supremacy, and the fact that, on some level, I still don't get it. 

And I hate being called out, because it is so profoundly uncomfortable.

Context: A guy who posts stuff about music (and who has 807,000 followers) posted a list released by Rolling Stone titled, "Rolling Stone Readers Pick the Best Lead Singers of All Time." 

They were all white men, but that's not what I noticed. I noticed that they were all men.

So, I posted a response, which was a list of almost all white women (the one who is a POC is not widely viewed as a POC--Linda Ronstadt, Mexican dad).

And very quickly, many people responded to it along the lines of "not one Black or brown woman?"

AND THEY ARE RIGHT. 

Left to my own devices, and not thinking terribly deeply about a topic, my response shows how very limited my scope is. Sure, I have tons of Aretha (and Beyonce and Solange Knowles and Nina Simone and Ella Fitzgerald and Tracy Chapman and Rhiannon Giddens) on my Apple Music account. (<--- VIRTUE SIGNALING)

But I have shown who I am, which is a person whose life experience (including the music I have listened to most) has been shaped by whiteness. 

Here's what matters: Despite my own taste, and what I know I love and value, despite my conviction that we are all steeped in white supremacy and white people are responsible for keeping that knowledge at the forefront of our consciousness... despite all the boxes I like to think I have checked on this topic, I can easily default, when describing excellence, to people who look like me.

I'm not asking for anything in response to this. I think it's important that I be uncomfortable right now. Black and brown people go through life in a world that works pretty hard to make them uncomfortable, not to mention killing and imprisoning them at rates disproportional to their numbers in the population.

I am uncomfortable, and I think it's a good idea for me to be uncomfortable on this topic, until I get it.

I have work to do.

Lent Day 11: Mother Hens and T. Rex

This week's Sunday text from the gospel of Luke was Jesus' lament over Jerusalem, in which he gives us a startling image of himself.

Jerusalem, Jerusalem... How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! 
~Luke 13:34 

A chicken is not exactly an august, stately, lordly image for Jesus Christ, whom the Church confesses to be truly human and truly God. Chickens are rather... silly. They make silly noises. They are ungainly, inelegant, and graceless. 

Still. A friend's daughter sits in the henhouse with their chickens and holds them on her lap, and finds great comfort in them. There is something soft and vulnerable about them. They are lovable.

And maybe an inelegant, ungainly, homely image of Jesus is good for us. A large percentage of those who claim the Christian label have bought into an image of a buff, muscular Jesus, looking very much as if he's gone overboard with steroids, and who vaporizes nonbelievers with X-ray vision... or something like that. (I confess: I couldn't get through three chapters of the first book, the writing is so bad... but I digress.)

But news flash: The incarnation is not about God coming as The Rock, or Arnold Schwarzenegger, circa 1988. The incarnation is about God taking on human flesh, becoming, not like us, but one of us. Maybe the image of Jesus as a slightly silly bird, who nevertheless has strong protective instincts towards her young, and who gives of herself prolifically... maybe that's not the worst image of Jesus we could have. Maybe it's an improvement on Royal Jesus, and Buff Jesus, and X-ray Vision Jesus.

But, also, there's this: 68 million year-old Tyrannosaurus Rex DNA was compared with the DNA of 21 modern species, and guess which modern species was the closest match? Read about it here.

Most of us non-DNA experts might have assumed rhinoceroses and alligators would be stronger candidates for a direct lineage to the T Rex.  (I'm imagining at least some DNA experts would have expected something similar?) But no. The most direct lineage comes to the humble, not very impressive chicken. The large and, apparently, terrifying (if Steven Spielberg is to be believed) carnivore to whom scientists assigned a name that included Tyrannosaur (Latin for "Tyrant lizard) and "Rex" (Latin for "king") was displaced by the little, feathery, and, apparently, cuddly bird. Nature rejected the tyrant, and went with the protective mom.

(I know. I might not exactly have the clearest picture of natural selection here... but work with me...)

But back to Jesus... and his selection of the mother hen for an image of his loving protectiveness. The more I meditate on it, the more it delights me. The more I ponder it, the more I welcome it as an image for God's love. 

Jeffrey Vallance, Divine Mother Hen (2018), Stained glass

Lent Day 10: 40 days

Off the top of my head, I can come up with about three examples of the number 40 in scripture:

The forty days and nights of rain, the great flood of Genesis and Noah and pairs of animals.

The forty years God's covenant people were in the wilderness.

The forty days Jesus was in the wilderness.

And... those are, to me, the Big Three.

But our Presbyterian Book of Common Worship highlights these and more in a litany for Lent. We are reminded that...

Moses spent forty days on the mountain, learning the commandments of God.

Elijah traveled forty days in the wilderness to hear the voice of God in the silence,

Jonah cried out to the people of Nineveh, Repent, or in forty days you will perish.

In scripture, forty is a number that makes you sit up and take notice. When something lasts forty days (or years) the story you are reading involves a sea change in the people affected. From the re-fashioning of the human race after God's deadly flooding, to the prophet Elijah running for his life, waiting for the still, quiet voice of God to suddenly become audible to him, to Jesus undergoing grueling testing of his physical strength and moral character, things change. People are changed. In the story of God's people in the wilderness after their escape from enslavement, it is made clear that a new people will enter the land of promise--literally. Nearly all the original escapees will have died, including Moses and his siblings, Miriam and Aaron. The spies Joshua and Caleb are the only two of the original 600,000 who cross over. God wants them to be a new people, and so they are.

We observe Lent for forty days because of similar reasoning. At the end, we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, new life emerging from a tomb, new life that seems impossible, yet, there it is. And the idea of Lent-- the traditional idea--is that we will be new, too. In the ancient church, following a lengthy process of study and prayer, converts were baptized at the Easter Vigil. We are made new.

This year we are approaching Lent from a different perspective. It is still a time of transformation, but the desired transformation is not that we have given up something or taken on a strict discipline of some kind. The transformation that we all need most deeply is to finally believe that God loves us, and there is nothing we can do about it. 

We can run away from it, we can doubt it, we can try to block it out, but we can't make it stop. 

We can mess up, we break down, we can refuse to budge, but God is still love.

I have often wondered whether the forty days of Lent were based on a basic hunch about how long it takes to establish a pattern, or form a habit. The conventional wisdom is that it takes 21 days to form a habit, but I've always believed that wasn't long enough. They've done a study (of course), and it turns out, most people will take between 18 and (gulp) 254 days to form and solidify a habit. Lent can, at the very least, give you a good start.

For Lent this year, I encourage all of us to take up the habit of trusting in God's love for us. That's it, that's the message.

God loves us, and there's not a thing we can do about it.

Color against the white of snow.
Artist: Joanne Thorne Arnold

Lent Day 9: Uncertainty

I just had some blood drawn for my triennial (ahem) physical. Everything's gonna be fine, fine, fine.

Probably.

There's a forecast today for snow tomorrow. Six to ten inches, and 40 mph wind gusts! 

Of course, I remember when a "6" to 10" inches" forecast turned into 26"--or was it 42"? No one's really got it figured out just yet.

The past two years (almost to the day, now) have been a lesson in living with uncertainty, and it turns out it is hard. I remember when our congregation went into lockdown the week of March 15, 2020, assuming we would be back in church by Easter. While we worshiped together last Easter (2021) in our congregation's cemetery, Easter 2022 will be our first celebration of the resurrection in our sanctuary since Sunday April 21, 2019. 

The early months of lockdown were probably easier for me than they were for many others. I was fully engaged in learning how to create worship for a new medium (for me), for the online viewer. I was also engaged in figuring out how to Zoom and use MS Teams, not to mention learning how to successfully record at home and then send those recordings to our Media Manager. (Pro tip: what Apple calls a "vintage" laptop is probably not going to do the job.)

I did well during a period of uncertainty because I had specific, engrossing tasks geared towards an important outcome: keeping a congregation connected and spiritually fed during a time when it was not safe to gather in groups. 

Not everyone had that experience. I have witnessed the struggles of families in which a parent suddenly became their child/ children's teacher, with or without a teacher on Zoom, and I have heard stories about how excruciatingly hard that was, or how dispiriting, or even how impossible. I have seen young adults thrown into an unstructured, anxiety-filled time that was detrimental to their mental and physical health, and other young adults trying to do essential jobs, for inadequate pay, at great personal risk. I have witnessed some retirement-aged adults become withdrawn and isolated as the pandemic dragged on, and ebbed and flowed with seasons of severely heightened danger alternating with moments--but only moments-- of, "Oh hey, it's over! Back to normal."

Everything's gonna be fine, fine, fine.

At times of uncertainty, people of faith have some resources at our disposal. For one thing, we have a great prayerbook right in the middle of the Bible: the Book of Psalms. I will repeat here my very favorite quote of John Calvin:  

I have been accustomed to call this book, I think not inappropriately, “An Anatomy of all the Parts of the Soul;” for there is not an emotion of which any one can be conscious that is not here represented as in a mirror. Or rather, the Holy Spirit has here drawn to the life all the griefs, sorrows, fears, doubts, hopes, cares, perplexities, in short, all the distracting emotions with which the minds of [human beings] are wont to be agitated. 

Having an emotion? There's a psalm for that. The psalm appointed for this Sunday is particularly wonderful.

The Lord is my light and my salvation;
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life;
of whom shall I be afraid?  ~Psalm 27:1

Uncertainty is so often about fear or anxiety. The chief difference between these two for me: Fear is about something specific. Anxiety is undifferentiated and global, because the "danger" feels so unknowable. Pandemic time has seen an enormous increase in anxiety-- in late 2020 people reported anxiety to their health care providers at a rate 62% higher than the previous year. 

The psalms can meet us in our state of anxiety, and, without giving us empty assurances about the specifics ("everything's gonna be fine, fine fine"), can nevertheless give us a sense of a firmer ground beneath us. "I believe," the psalmist sings, "I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living." The "goodness of the Lord" is on plain view for us if we take care to look for it. I think of the people volunteering at food pantries. I think of the health care providers who never signed up for such a time of testing, but who nevertheless persist. I think of the people of God who are brokenhearted over a war nearly five thousand miles away. I think of the people who shovel for their older neighbors, and I think of the people who offer the shovelers hot cocoa or coffee.

I don't think everything is "fine, fine, fine." But I believe we can see the goodness of God, and that gives us a counterbalance for otherwise uncertain times. 

Today, for me, that is enough.

Lent Day 8: Yes, but....

Augustine of Hippo, philosopher, theologian, and famously honest pray-er allegedly prayed, 

"O Lord, make me chaste--but not yet."

Sometimes we want to say "yes," but something holds us back. 

I've written about my experience of being called to ministry in a little essay in this terrific book, as well as in this recent sermon. What I haven't written about, is the fourteen year gap between my call and my ordination.

I describe the beginning of that fourteen year journey in the sermon:

And then it hit me, like a bolt of lightning to the chest. That was what I wanted, or that was what God wanted of me, or something like that: ordination. To be a minister, to be a pastor. And I was so elated that I threw my arms up into the air...

...[But] as quickly as the elation came, it was replaced with a kind of resignation bordering on despair, because I did not see a path.

I was born and raised in the Roman Catholic Church. I attended Catholic schools for sixteen successive years (first grade through college), and then obtained my first Master's degree from one. I was deeply immersed in the life of my church. It gave me joy, it fed my soul, it offered a place where I could share my gifts... to an extent.

But now I felt God was calling me to do something that my church would not permit, would not even entertain. (Still true--five years after my lightning bolt to the chest, the beloved Pope John Paul II declared the issue of women's ordination closed, and seemed to indicate that theologians should neither write nor speak of it. Recently Pope Francis issued a book of Canon Law that outlines the penalties of excommunication for those who ordain women, as well as for the women who are ordained.) 

I did not want to leave the church of my childhood. But the God to whom that church had introduced me seemed to be making her intentions clear. As another Catholic woman who experienced that same call has stated, "If you were born to do something, you resist it at your own peril.”

In fact, I couldn't even contemplate leaving the church I loved. At the time lived in the greater Boston area, and attended the university parish at Boston College. I sang in the choir. Once, during my grad school tenure, I had been invited to preach at a campus mass in another chapel. But there seemed to be no direction to take my sense of call, until I moved away from Boston and landed in the Southern Tier of New York.

For a year I visited Catholic churches. Displaced from a church home where women's gifts had been lifted up, I saw no such thing in the places I visited. In Boston I had, perhaps, lived in a bubble that suggested change was just around the corner. Now, the realities of life outside the big, liberal (in some ways) city had opened my eyes to the reality that change was not, in fact, coming any time soon.

I was in the wilderness. But I was also a young mother, who was finishing a degree long-distance, and who longed for some kind of church home.

I started attending an Episcopal Church. After a couple of years I joined it, and had my daughter baptized there. 

And I grieved, even as I began to have a glimmer of hope that I might finally be able to answer my call. I worked for the church for two years as a Christian Educator, and then took another position at a Presbyterian Church (USA) congregation, where, finally, I experienced a call as powerful as the one I'd felt in 1989. During church one day I watched as Deacons and Elders were ordained and installed. For the first time, I listened to the ordination vows, and one lodged firmly in my heart: 

Do you trust in Jesus Christ your Savior, acknowledge him Lord and all and Head of the Church, and through him believe on one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit?

"Lord of all and Head of the Church." I had been excluded from answering my call by a church that seemed to believe a living human male was head of the church, and could, thus, determine single-handedly who could answer that call. Now I was in a church where Christ, as Head, could continue to guide us, because, as our UCC siblings constantly remind us, "God is still speaking." 

That day, that moment of being called again, set me on the path to saying "Yes" to God's urgent earlier call. I embarked on a path of discernment, accompanied by my congregation and the wider church. I went to seminary. And fourteen years following that first call, almost to the day, I was able to say the ordination vows myself. 

Today's Reminder of the Day from A Sanctified Art is:

Saying "yes" can
be holy, when
that yes moves
you closer to
God and closer
to your true self.

Sometimes we're called by God to something, and our answer is, like Augustine, "yes, but..." I don't regret my long and meandering path to ministry. I believe it brought me to exactly the place I was meant to be. I know it brought me closer to God and to my true self. There was pain along the way, to be sure.  I struggled and, at times, I truly grieved what was not to be. But God is infinitely wise and infinitely patient, and I am so grateful for who I am and where I am, by her grace. 

I'm so grateful for being able, at last, to say a resounding, joyful "yes."

May such a "yes" be possible for all of us, when it's God calling.

Stoles. Lots of 'em.

Lent Day 7: No

Saying "no" can be holy.

Last night I said to someone, "No is a complete sentence."

They were sharing about the experience of being recruited for something they weren't sure they could do at this point in their life. They counted the ways it might not be the best thing for them.

My response (see above) was snarky, to be sure. But if there's one thing I can't abide, it's people not accepting "no" from people other who need to say it. 

OK, so the above is hyperbole. There's plenty I can't abide. But I can count on one hand the times I have tried to persuade people to stay on a committee or board. Two. I can remember two occasions in the past seventeen-plus years as a pastor, twenty-three years serving in ministries of the church, when I tried to persuade someone not to step down.

The first was a board member who wasn't sure they were in step with the rest of the board. They often had a different take from the majority. They felt they were usually the lone voice speaking out against something everyone else was eager to do, and wondered aloud to me whether we should find someone more like-minded. I told them I valued that in them. I told them they were highly respected on the board, and that their words carried weight. In told them, even if the board voted differently than they would have liked, their views made a lasting impact. I told them, I didn't want a rubber stamp board, that diversity of opinions was critical. They stayed.

The second was someone who was feeling frustrated with the committee work. I tried to persuade them to stay for the sake of another member, whom I thought they could help. But in the end they chose to leave, and I supported it.

I support people stepping down from church leadership positions, because leadership is hard, and draining, and takes time away from other things, and I don't think any volunteer service should be a life sentence. 

I'll say that a little louder. 

No volunteer service should be a life sentence.

Today's devotional card from @sanctifiedart* reads, 

REMINDER 
FOR THE DAY

Saying 
"no"
can be
holy.

The prayer goes on to pray for the ability to say "no" to things that "steal my joy, steal my energy, and steal my sense of self." Oh, Amen, and Amen.

May we all find within us the capacity to say a holy "no" for the sake of our well-being, our joy, our very selves.

*Throughout Lent I will be trying to write here--no promises of every day! Some of the thoughts I will be sharing reflect the themes of A Sanctified Art's Full to the Brim resources for Lent. I will indicate these by use of *. Today I mention the devotional, which is fantastic.

Lent Day 6: Peaceful/ Hopeful

Peaceful. Hopeful.

I am terrible at waiting. Terrrrrrrible. 

This trait shows up most noticeably in relationships... if I should happen to think (imagine) someone is angry with me. A bunch of years ago, I received an email that indicated that someone thought I was angry with them (I wasn't! I had no idea what was going on!). So, I called their home phone, and left a message. Then I called their cell phone, ditto. Then I sent them an email. Finally, when the rest of the day--hours and hours-- had passed and I hadn't heard from them, I drove to their house to see them. They weren't there, so I left a message in their mailbox.

To be clear, I wanted to make sure they knew I wasn't mad, but of course, the worst part was, it was pretty clear they were upset. Mad. Angry, and I had to wait. And wait. And wait. In the end, I had to wait a whole 24 hours before we were able to connect by phone, and I had a chance to clear things up. 

A whole 24 hours, I tell you.

That is my idea of hell. Waiting for someone I think (imagine) (know) is angry with me, to clear it up.

In case this has escaped your understanding, I really, really, really hate it when I think (imagine) (know) people are mad at me. It is soul-crushing.

So. I guess "waiting" might seem ancillary to the story, but waiting is the hardest part, as the great Tom Petty sang. 

My poor waiting skills show up in other places, too. Waiting for decisions that other people are making. Waiting for test results. Waiting for the test itself. Waiting for the surgery to be over. 

This morning my yoga teacher offered a meditative framing to the class that was designed to help with my issues around waiting. (I'm not sure she knew that directly, but what she did was perfect for me.) Among other things, at different times during the class, when we were holding different poses, she offered the suggestion that we find a mantra that might be helpful if tension or fear (or waiting) was causing stress. I came up with:

Peaceful/ Hopeful.

One challenge I have in my yoga class is something teachers of meditation call "monkey mind." It originates in Buddhism, and refers to a mind that is unsettled, or restless, or confused. The person with monkey mind (this person, me) experiences it as the mind latching onto whatever thoughts float by. So, during yoga, I might think ahead to what I will be writing about in my blog post, followed by where are my devotional cards this morning anyway? ... followed by thoughts of needing to clean off the dining room table from the papers that have accumulated there, followed by--

You get the drift. The mental dominoes that are the above may have taken a total of ten seconds to tip over, but the problem is, that's ten seconds I wasn't actually present to what I was doing at the moment. Yoga is about presence, because life is about presence.

And being present while waiting is excruciating (for me). 

But today, while I'm waiting, I have a mantra. Peaceful. Hopeful. 

Breathing in, Peaceful. Breathing out, Hopeful.

Waiting is definitely the hardest part. 

But today, I can breathe in, Peaceful. I can breathe out, Hopeful.

Lent Day 4: No Mistakes

Megan Follows as "Anne of Green Gables,"
a photo for which I hold no copyright,
but I hope no one gets bent out of shape about it.

I didn't read the "Anne of Green Gables" books as a girl. I simply never heard of them. I read "The Bobbsey Twins," "Cherry Ames [Does Every Possible Thing a Nurse Can Do, in 87 volumes or so], "Little Women." But no Anne for me, not until I was a 31-year-old mother of two.

That's when I propped my daughter up in front of the videos of the Megan Follows version at a time when she was still learning to sit up (my daughter, not Megan). It was Thanksgiving, and it was just us two that year (ear infections had grounded her; her dad and brother had flown to California to be with family). 

The series was delightful and distracting, and I became a fan of the smart, stubborn red-headed orphan who found two people to love her after a harsh start in life. I also became a fan of her tenacity--in everything she tried, started, wanted. And I found in her a soul sister when she uttered the famous words,

“Isn't it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?”

I woke up this morning wanting to fix what I wrote yesterday. It left me with that uncomfortable feeling that I really screwed up. I have this thing I do, when I'm dwelling on something I said that I regret, or that makes me cringe, or for which I had a Hermione-Granger-type time-turner, so that I could go back and do it better: I let out a big, audible sigh, and it ends with UGH.

UGH. I hate this feeling. 

I'm going to resist the urge to try to fix what I said yesterday, though, because I am resisting the idea that I have to do something perfectly or. at least fix it and make it perfect when I realize it's not. 

I worry for Anne of Green Gables (for, of course, she is alive and trying somewhere--that's how I experience fiction). I worry about her feeling about the fresh new day because I imagine what it's like for her when she realizes, Well, there goes that. To be clear: I worry for her because I know exactly what that feels like! 

I think mistakes are not the same thing as, say, sins. And even sin isn't what we think it is. The word "sin" in the Bible comes from Hebrew and Greek words that are associated with archery or target practice. In scripture, "sin" is "a miss," as in, I tried, but I missed the mark. Scripture tells us that God assumes we tried.

The reminder for the day in my devotional cards* is this:

Faith is a 
constant
returning to
God. Each day
we get to
practice again.

I did not express myself perfectly yesterday. I will try to do better today (and try to avoid beating myself up with "perfect"). I love and serve a God who does not demand my perfection. Today, I get to return again, to practice again.

I hope I get it right. But if I don't, I will probably be able to try again tomorrow.

~~~

Throughout Lent I will be trying to write here. No promises of every day, but a sincere effort, that I do promise. Some of the thoughts I will be sharing will reflect the themes suggested by @sanctifiedart's Lenten series "Full to the Brim," I will indicate these by use of *. Today I made reference to their Lenten Devotional. I am loving it.

Lent Day 3: Refuge

Because you have made the Lord your refuge, 

    the Most High your dwelling place,

No evil shall befall you,

    no scourge come near your tent.

~Psalm 91:1-2

Oh, that it were so.

Our eyes offer us evidence that this is not the case, day after day, year after year. We watch as refugees stream out of Ukraine... or Guatemala, or Syria, or Darfur, or Bosnia... and we know that, just statistically speaking, there are people of faith among them, deep faith in a God of their understanding. There are people who have spent their lives trusting in God's providence and protection, and teaching their children to do the same. 

And yet their homes have become the battlefields of the powerful, and their only safety lies in running, far and fast.

(Just to be clear: I have no wisdom, zip, zilch, about the situation in Ukraine. For that, go read Tom Nichols in the Atlantic, and Heather Cox Richardson on Facebook or by subscription. Also, pray.)

Even so, I delight in this psalm. I sing heartily every time "On Eagles' Wings" is our hymn in worship, and I believe every word of it to be true.

Yes, I have just said two contradictory things. That's because:

There is more to refuge than physical safety. On Friday, my Daily Prayers remind me to be thankful for "the presence of [God] in my weakness and suffering," and that is my refuge.

There is more to God's protection than a magic shield from falling bombs. God's protection looks different for different people, in different places: for me, it is a hedge against despair in desperate times. (I know this is a privilege, and probably reflects my privileged status as a white woman with financial stability and a good network of support. I acknowledge this.) I do not know why some suffer and others are able to avoid suffering, but I know it has nothing whatsoever to do with worthiness or holiness.

There is more to faith than God not letting anything bad to happen to me. Sometimes the deepest faith is forged in the crucible of the deepest suffering. (And sometimes, it is not. This, too, I acknowledge.)

There's an old story (I've probably told it here, on this very blog) about Saint Teresa of Avila. Wikipedia's thumbnail bio tells us that she was "a Spanish noblewoman who was called to convent life in the Catholic Church. A Carmelite nun, prominent Spanish mystic, religious reformer, author, theologian of the contemplative life and of mental prayer, she earned the rare distinction of being declared a Doctor of the Church" (meaning, she made a significant contribution to the church's theology... to this date, only four women have been given this distinction).

Anyway, the story. Teresa was traveling by donkey between convents, and was somehow knocked off her donkey. She landed in a puddle of mud and injured her leg. She prayed the equivalent of, "God, how could you? And what lousy timing." (Remember this. This is a prayer. You get to pray like this.)

God replied: "That is how I treat my friends."

To which Teresa replied, "No wonder you have so few of them."

There's another hymn we sing in church (though, admittedly, less frequently than "On Eagles' Wings"), courtesy of the Taizé Community. "Nada de turbe." Its lyrics are a prayer of this same St. Teresa:

“Let nothing perturb you, nothing frighten you.
All things pass. God does not change. Patience achieves everything.”

There is more to refuge than physical safety. 

There is more to God's protection than a magic shield from falling bombs.

There is more to faith than God not letting anything bad happen to me.

Lent Day 2: Anger

Then Moses turned again to the Lord and said, “O Lord, why have you mistreated this people? Why did you ever send me? Since I first came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has mistreated this people, and you have done nothing at all to deliver your people.” ~Exodus 5:22-23

I left our Ash Wednesday service last night filled with love. 

O so I thought, until a I saw a car ahead of me that was stopped where it shouldn't be--on a busy street that has no parking--not because it was an emergency, but.............

Actually, I have no idea why they were stopped. All I know is that it was an inconvenience that tapped right into my own personal simmering cauldron of rage. I was angry.

And immediately the cognitive dissonance of that moment was very, very clear to me, and I breathed, and breathed some more, and thought, 

Way to go pastor.

I have a short fuse. Very short. In most areas of my life, I can manage it, control it, and I'm betting this is at least a little surprising to most of my congregants, for example. 

Although, to be fair, a lot of them have seen Monster Pastor on social media. So, maybe it's not as well-kept a secret as I think?

Here's the thing: I do not feel entitled to my anger at all. My anger has no rightful place in my life, at least, the anger that rises up in the quotidian interactions we all have with ourselves and the world (and cars that are parked where they shouldn't be.) I am ashamed of it, because I know it is usually way out of proportion to the harm (or perceived possibility) of harm done.

That's not entirely true when it comes to, let's say, dreadful politicians who put personal wealth and power above the common good. I feel COMPLETELY entitled to my anger at them. But even in that arena, I sense that my anger isn't necessarily a force for good. It certainly doesn't change a single unjust thing.

This morning, during my prayer, I decided I wanted to try to deal with my anger, to understand it better. This morning's passage from Exodus contains a LOT of anger: Pharaoh angry at the Hebrews; the Hebrews furious with Moses, and, finally, Moses royally pissed at God. I guess all that anger pinged something in my brain that led to me wanting to understand myself better, and maybe diffuse this, or at least re-direct it. 

Then, at the end of my prayer time, I pulled out today's card from my devotional*, and it said:

REMINDER FOR THE DAY

We are safe 
to bring our
anger and fear
to God.

And there it was. I had that hairs-standing-up-on-the-back-of-my-neck feeling, that feeling you get when things converge, and who you are and what you are experiencing and scripture and resources you have made available to yourself are all whispering (or speaking, or yelling) the same thing at you.

And let me not skate past the ever helpful reminder that anger is nearly always about fear. They are twins, close as the two sides of a coin, and to understand one, we have to understand the other.

So, my work is cut out for me. And the universe seems ready to help.

~~~

Throughout Lent I will be trying to write here. No promises of every day, but a sincere effort, that I do promise. Some of the thoughts I will be sharing will reflect the themes suggested by @sanctifiedart's Lenten series "Full to the Brim," I will indicate these by use of *. Today I made reference to their Lenten Devotional. It is really lovely.

Lent Day 1: Ashes

I've thought about death a lot in the past two years. 

I bet you have, too.

I wouldn't say I've become obsessed with it, exactly. But beginning in early 2020 with the pandemic, and continuing into 2021 when I turned a new, big, round number on my birthday, and even when the little things--aches and pains--reminded me of my age, and the limitations of human bodies... well.  I've thought about death. 

I've imagined my own death, sure, but more than that, I've run the scenarios that might lead to the deaths of the people I love. My partner, for whom every day after thirty was a glorious gift. My children, who moved home for a while to remind me of how much I love them, but then had the audacity to move back into the world with all its threats and indifference to my love. My family, my friends, close and far. My congregants, the people I love because my work introduced me to them, and then, of course I fell in love with them. And if I love you, I have thought about your death.

It is Ash Wednesday today, and like countless other pastors, I've checked to make sure I had the ashes ready. (I do. Thanks Scott!) 

The ashes we put on one another's heads on Ash Wednesday are meant to remind us of death--there's really no getting away from that. But they remind us of other things, too. Because they are the burnt up remnants of the dried palms we carried on a Palm Sunday, they remind us of how quickly things can change--how Jesus went from being adored and admired to being strung up on a tree, lickety split. Ashes also remind us of the earth, the dust of the earth, from which, it is said, God created humanity. (Evolutionarily, add a gazillion years or so, and I think this is more or less right, but scientists, feel free to correct me.) 

But that creation part... if we stay with that, and maybe even stay with the image of God playing in the mud, which God seems to have done, we find something else at play. God is creating something (us), not because God must, but because God can. God is creating humanity--fractious, cranky, often not-getting-it-right us--because God needs us. Not in the sense that God can't get along without us, but in the sense that God is so purely and essentially love, that God's love must have a direct object, and that would seem to be us. 

God creates us to love us. That's the truth behind the ashes. Remembering that we are "beloved dust"* opens our eyes and hearts to a season that, sure, has its ups and downs, but that always returns home to that love. 

God creates us, beloved dust that we are, to love us. Let's start there.

~~~

Throughout Lent I will be trying to write here. No promises of every day, but a sincere effort, that I do promise. Some of the thoughts I will be sharing will reflect the themes suggested by @sanctifiedart's Lenten series "Full to the Brim," I will indicate these by use of *.