John 9.1-41
The Rev. Hal Chorpenning, Plymouth Congregational UCC Fort Collins, Colorado Most of the world right now is finding itself in a strange and unexpected place. There are lots of unknowns, lots of fears, lots of needs for healing of our spirits, our minds … and for some of us, our bodies. Healing is a main thrust of this story of Jesus healing blind man at the pool of Siloam. But the story begins with a question: “Who sinned? This man or his parents? For he was born blind.” The disciples try to blame the victim with that question, and Jesus turns the blame-game around. In the past, I have heard people say of others suffering from cancer or heart disease, “Well, did they smoke?” or “They didn’t have a very good diet,” and regardless of what a person may have done or neglected, that’s an unhelpful kind of remark. I even had a former parishioner in Maine who held the belief that we all do something to manifest the illnesses we have; try telling that to the parents of a three-year-old with leukemia. So, as we hear of more people who have contracted the virus, please don’t play the blame-game and guess whether they washed their hands thoroughly enough or whether they didn’t keep six feet away. Instead, let’s do what Jesus did and respond with compassion and with healing. I know that we wonder about the literalness of miracles, like Jesus curing the blind man, and see if this helps: Anthony de Mello, a Jesuit from India, told this story about a seeker and a spiritual master’s disciple: “A man traversed land and sea to check for himself the Master’s extraordinary fame. ‘What miracles has your Master worked?’ he said to a disciple. ‘Well, said the disciple, there are miracles … and then there are miracles. In your land it is regarded as a miracle if God does someone’s will. In our country it is regarded as a miracle if someone does the will of God.’” [Anthony de Mello, One Minute Wisdom, p. 4.] Are you expecting the kind of miracle that happens if God does your will…or would it be miraculous if we did God’s will? Where are the miracles in our midst? Where do we see ourselves and others doing God’s will? Would it be a miracle if you saw someone in Safeway offering the last package of toilet paper on the shelf to another shopper, even though it meant going without themselves? Would it be a miracle if we witnessed an outpouring of generosity to keep essential nonprofit organizations funded fully? Would it be a miracle if you heard that Plymouth is continuing to pay its childcare staff, even though we have no in-person work for them to do? So, there is a literal sense in which this story is about Jesus restoring the sight of the man born blind. And I’ll bet that the newly sighted man never again saw things in quite the same way. I wonder if he saw everything in a new light. Imagine yourself as that man, trying to live without the aid of vision and then having your eyes opened because of your faith in Jesus. The blue sky and the orange sunset stand out in their beauty, but then again, you also see the suffering of those around you. In the Buddhist tradition, the story of Siddhartha Gautama’s enlightenment goes like this: the young man who would become the Buddha was a wealthy aristocrat, whose father did not want him to see the suffering of humankind, so he kept him within the palace walls, sheltered from witnessing the ravages of human existence: disease, poverty, death. One day, the young man escaped the confines of the palace and saw the suffering of human existence, which spurred him on to seek enlightenment. Siddhartha’s eyes were opened to the world around him. He saw the world in a new light. Have you ever had that kind of experience? I remember traveling in West Africa before Cameron and Chris were born, being approached by legless beggars who rolled up to us on plywood platforms with casters on the bottom. It was a real eye-opener. But, the other thing that opened my eyes on that trip were the experiences of seeing tight extended families as the center of life and also seeing dozens of children share with their friends the pieces of candy that we shared with them. Would American kids do that? It was an aha! moment that I had not expected to see. Sometimes, we’re unwilling or unable to see things because they are unpleasant and we’d rather not see them. At other times, we don’t see things because we haven’t had the opportunity to look at them carefully and closely. And sometimes we are not given a choice. Have you ever had that happen? Has there been something that you’ve had to re-examine in your life, based on a new vision? Something that’s caused you to respond by saying, “Oh…now I see!” You probably know the story of John Newton, the Anglican curate who wrote “Amazing Grace.” Newton had been a naval deserter, slave trader, a self-described “wretch,” and who had a phenomenal transformation in his life, becoming one of the great voices in Britain for the abolition of the slave trade. You know his words: “I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see.” So, while I don’t doubt that Jesus had the ability to perform healings that we typify as miraculous, I think there is an amazing metaphorical dimension, a depth to this story, that we are apt to miss, unless we look more closely. The trust of the blind man in Jesus — the trust that we have in Jesus — can give us is a new vision: the ability to see the divine, ourselves, and God’s world in a new light. “Taste and see that God is good,” sings the Psalmist, “Taste and SEE…” Do you see that God is good? If not, look around you! Look at the miracle of life within yourself! The fact that you are sitting here and that the presence of the holy is within you – within each of us – is nothing short of miraculous. In the midst of this pandemic, look around and see those who are acting with compassion and courage and commitment to serve others. SEE that God is good! How have your eyes been opened, and how do you respond? How is Christ’s compassion envisioned through you? Is it because you know that many people in Ft. Collins live on the economic margin, so you volunteer with our Homelessness Prevention Initiative? Is it because you know that exclusion of LGBTQ folks is a real injustice, so you joined an Open and Affirming Church? Is it because you helped an elderly neighbor with errands or getting their computer hooked up last week, because you know they need to stay connected during this strange time? I wonder if you have encountered any of your own blind spots in these past few weeks. I’m not necessarily talking about finding fault with yourself, but perhaps finding delight in something that you hadn’t allowed yourself to experience for a while. Maybe you haven’t baked homemade bread for years, and you have seen the joy of bread-baking in a new light. Others of you might be finding solace in meditation or another spiritual practice that you haven’t found the time for until this week, and you’re seeing your own sense of spirituality and God’s presence in a new light. For me, one of the flashes of new light has been the visceral realization that we are all one people, whether we are princes or homeless, whether we are Italian or Mozambican, whether we are gay or straight or bi or trans, male or female or nonbinary…we are all inextricably bound together by the strange bond of being susceptible to Covid-19. Wouldn’t it be a miracle if this virus helped us see that we are all in this together with one another? My prayer for God’s world is that we learn to see each other as fellow pilgrims on this amazing planet, that we catch a glimpse of our unity in the midst of tragedy, and that we act with compassion with one another. Many of you know the wonderful book, The Little Prince, by Antoine de St.-Exupéry, written while he was pilot during World War II. The little prince shares with us this secret: that “it is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” What might you see this coming week, when you open your heart to others, to your community, to your family, to yourself, and to God? It could result in a miracle! May it be so! Amen. © 2020 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact Hal for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses. AuthorThe Rev. Hal Chorpenning has been Plymouth's senior minister since 2002. Before that, he was associate conference minister with the Connecticut Conference of the UCC. A grant from the Lilly Endowment enabled him to study Celtic Christianity in the UK and Ireland. Prior to ordained ministry, Hal had a business in corporate communications. Read more about Hal.
0 Comments
John 4.5-15
The Rev. Hal Chorpenning, Plymouth Congregational UCC Fort Collins, Colorado One of the best cartoons I saw online this week was a picture of Jesus and the Samaritan woman standing at the well…but the pump bottle on the edge of the well was a dead giveaway, and the sign above the well indicated that this wasn’t just the story you heard from John’s gospel this morning, it said “Jesus and the woman at the Purell well.” I know that a lot of us are really feeling a sense of anxiety about the spread of the coronavirus. Many of us are nervous because it seems so ominous – and like flu viruses, it’s invisible, transmissible, and potentially fatal. We have something in common with the woman at the well. We are seeking the healing waters that will enable us never to experience spiritual thirst. And we need to have some kind of assurance that it’s going to be okay, whether we get the coronavirus or not. William Sloane Coffin, the late senior minister of the Riverside Church in New York, offered some profound words in a sermon ten days after his 24-year-old son died in a car crash: This is “what God gives all of us — minimum protection, maximum support.” What does that mean? I take it to indicate that God does not keep bad things from happening to anyone. But if we have a relationship with God, we are held up by a companion who walks with us through the wilderness. “Minimum protection, maximum support.” Perhaps that is a way that we can approach what God’s world is experiencing right now: as a time to broaden our perspectives and become stronger. Our faith is like muscle that needs to be stretched and tested in order for it to grow, and Lent can be a time for a good spiritual workout, not that anyone EVER asked for the coronavirus to help us. Ernest Hemingway wrote this in A Farewell to Arms: “The world breaks everyone, then some become strong at the broken places.” The experience of living in these days will break some of us, and within that group there will be those who are made stronger. Some of us will learn to rely more fully on God’s presence within us and among us. Some will finally see that God’s abundance means that there is enough for all of us if we share. Some will take away the idea that radical individualism is morally bankrupt. Others will learn the lesson that it is a beautiful thing to rely on one another….that working together, we can make it over this hurdle. And there will be those among us who aren’t able to open their eyes to learn those things: Some people will hoard toilet paper (for unknown reasons!), others will make certain that THEIR family has the supplies they need without caring for anyone else, and others will not take precautions because THEY are not worried about getting ill, even though people around them may be at greater risk than they are. Whether we like it or not, the whole world is in this together. And nothing like a virus can show us that we are truly interconnected as the human family. The God who walks with us through the wilderness isn’t going to magically keep you from getting sick, but that same God is going to stay by your side no matter what. That’s what “minimum protection, maximum support” means. Not only is that what God offers US, it is what WE can offer to one another: supporting each other, perhaps from a distance, but supporting one another nonetheless. Last week, Carla got an email from a Plymouth couple in their 30s saying that since they were not in a high-risk group, that if there was something that elder members of our congregation needed, they could help out. That’s maximum support. Mandy Hall sent me an email concerned about the plight of our childcare staff, who are paid hourly, if there wasn’t going to be a need for their work if we don’t have in-person worship, and we’ve come up with a plan to continue to pay them, which we are doing. That’s maximum support. In the midst of this pandemic, we all are finding ourselves in unknown territory, in a wilderness. We can see this wilderness as a parched and barren land that is filled with threats, fears, and real danger. But that isn’t the only way to look at it. We can hold fast and see the landscape as one that is saturated with living water: with the love and the radical generosity and abundance of God. We can see the abundance of scientists, physicians, nurses, and other caregivers in the midst of a crisis and say, “Thanks be to God. This is living water.” We can see the indomitable spirit and the cooperation of people working together and say, “Thanks be to God. This is living water.” We can hear online the people of Italy applauding for medical workers and singing from their balconies and say, “Thanks be to God. This is living water.” We can feel the sense the compassion of people caring deeply for those most in need and say, “Thanks be to God. This is living water.” There are desert wilderness times for us all – moments or seasons in our lives when things seem to have dried up and blown away. And that is part of the reminder of Lent: that Jesus had those moments of walking through a parched landscape. Jesus confronted his demons and walked past them. It was a time that stretched him to the limits of physical, mental, and spiritual exertion…and he made it beyond that breaking point and lived into his ministry. Jesus opted to live a life that was saturated, not parched: a life of extravagant welcome, risk-taking, and active engagement, of envisioning and proclaiming a new way of being in the world. And that is the spirit-saturated life that we are being invited into. Jesus says to the Samaritan woman, “If you know the generosity [the gifts] of God and who it is asking you to give him a drink of water, you’d be the one asking me for a drink, and I would have given you living water.” In Hebrew and Aramaic this is a play on words, “living water” means water that is upwelling from a spring, like an artesian well. And it also has the significance of something more than just H20. “Everyone who drinks of this water will never be thirsty again,” Jesus says. Do you want to live a parched life or a saturated life? I had planned to talk more extensively today about the Celtic tradition, since St. Patrick’s Day is only two days away, but just to give you a snippet: In the pre-Christian Celtic tradition, wells (what you and I think of as springs and the ancient Jews thought of as “living water”) were considered sacred, not only because they sprung up pure from the earth, which was the source of their divinity, but because of all the metaphorical meaning that water has as being essential to sustenance, to growth, to the greening of life itself. As Christianity moved into Celtic Britain, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, the druidic wells were “rebaptized” in the name of Christian saints. So, in London you find a section called Bridewell (the well of St. Bride or St. Brigid), and all over Ireland there are wells dedicated to Brigid and Mary. The Gaelic word for well is “tober,” and on the Isle of Mull in Scotland, the largest town in called Tobermory, the Well of Mary. Throughout the middle ages and even today, people come to these sacred springs, many seeking healing and others on pilgrimage seeking living water. At St. Winifred’s Well in Wales, etched into the gothic stone walls surrounding the spring, you will see etched graffiti with the names and dates of physical healings accomplished there going back centuries, and people still come to the well seeking physical healing and spiritual wholeness. As we walk together through Lent and as we walk together through this pandemic, may we remember that God’s presence is with us, strengthens us, upholds us and offer us the living water we need. Amen. (If you’d like to see a three-minute video meditation on Holy Wells and this story from John’s Gospel, you can go to tinyurl.com/Celticwell) © 2020 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact hal@plymouthucc.org for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses. AuthorThe Rev. Hal Chorpenning has been Plymouth's senior minister since 2002. Before that, he was associate conference minister with the Connecticut Conference of the UCC. A grant from the Lilly Endowment enabled him to study Celtic Christianity in the UK and Ireland. Prior to ordained ministry, Hal had a business in corporate communications. Read more about Hal. AuthorRev. Carla Cain began her ministry at Plymouth as a Designated Term Associate Minister (two years) in December 2019. Learn more about Carla here.
Matthew 4.1-11
Lent 1 Plymouth Congregational Church, UCC The Rev. Jane Anne Ferguson
1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness
to be tempted by the devil. 2 He fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was famished. 3 The tempter came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread." 4 But he answered, "It is written, 'One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" 5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6 saying to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, 'He will command his angels concerning you,' and 'On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.'" 7 Jesus said to him, "Again it is written, 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'" 8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; 9 and he said to him, "All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me." 10 Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan! for it is written, 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.'" 11 Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.
About a month ago your three pastors made the preaching schedule through May and chose scriptures for each Sunday. I came up with this Sunday and with this text. At first I resisted....it seemed too hard and too harsh to deal with...you know, vanquishing the devil and temptation, blah, blah, blah! And the world is hard and harsh enough right now. Then I remembered that I really like the wilderness....the physical one that is...I have hiked the deserts of New Mexico and Arizona, the bogs and meadows and hills of Scotland and Ireland where standing stone circles and the ruins of ancient worshiping communities can be found. I love to walk on a beach, particularly when I can find a stretch not inhabited by vacation homes. I have hiked in our Rocky Mountain foothills and occasionally in our mountains. I like being alone in the wilderness with time to contemplate and even pray.
I remembered my journal from a retreat center in Tucson that paraphrases Hosea 2:14 on its cover, “The desert will lead you to your heart...where I will speak.” Hosea was an 8th century BCE prophet whom Yahweh called to bring the straying Hebrew people back to their covenant with Yahweh. His name actually means “Yahweh helps.” In the book of Hosea, the prophet uses his own failing marriage to a woman named Gomer who has been unfaithful to him as the metaphor for the covenant relationship of Yahweh with the chosen people. The Holy One speaks through the prophet saying, “I will bring the unfaithful one to the wilderness and speak tenderly to her.” Or as paraphrased for a 21st century retreat participant, “The desert will lead you to your heart....where I, the Holy One, will speak - tenderly.” Jesus had been schooled in the law and the prophets when he came to John for baptism and was then led by the Spirit into deeper wilderness for solitude and prayer. Perhaps as the joy and responsibility of his baptism filled him while following the Spirit, he remembered Hosea and his words. Perhaps he went to the wilderness so the Holy One could speak to his heart, so that he can discover in prayer his identity as God’s beloved child. This is infinitely more interesting than going to the wilderness to be bludgeoned with provocative words so he can vanquish Satan. In the Judaism of Jesus’ time, the devil was an accuser or adversary, a questioner. The Hebrew word satan, could be used for any accuser. Ha-satan was the name of the accuser that comes to question Job and tempt Jesus. The devil is not the personification of evil or the great horned beast of the frozen ninth level of Dante’s Inferno who governs hell, punishes the wicked and chews on those who betray others. The satan or the devil tests and tempts with questions. Notice when tempter comes. Not during the 40 days and night of prayer, but after. Forty days and nights is a length of time that is not a literal time, but it’s meant to remind us of Noah in the wilderness of the flood, of Moses on the far mountain receiving the 10 commandments from Yahweh and of the Hebrew people wandering 40 years in the wilderness. 40 days and nights means “a substantially long time.” The tempter comes when Jesus is famished, physically weak, perhaps a little hangry, to test Jesus’ identity, the naming by the Spirit at his baptism as the beloved Son of God. The Hebrew translated in passage as “If” might be better translated “since to emphasize Jesus’ identity. The tempter says, since you are the Son of God” Son of God, the Divine and Human Son of the Holy One, what do you think of these three things? Number one, will you choose scarcity thinking over abundance... exploit your God-given gifts to make your own bread instead of waiting on the Spirit to provide sustenance at the right time? Number 2, will you pridefully exploit your divinity over your humanity by jumping from the temple and commanding angels to save you? Will you make a spectacle of yourself as the Son of God to gain notoriety? Number 3, will you exploit your God-given power to have power OVER others, to rule the world, to play by the rules of empire rather than authentic relationship and compassion? And Jesus answers with scripture each time, quoting the ways of God set forth for all the Hebrew people in the laws and the prophets. “Human beings live by the Spirit of God within them, not just by bread alone. Human beings do not test the Holy One who sustains us. And finally in a burst of passion, “Away with you, Satan. Leave me, you accuser. It is written that the people of God worship the Holy One alone.” And then we are told that angels – messengers of God – come and minister to Jesus, serve and take care of him. Are they tall, stately beings with large white wings? I think they are more likely, friends coming to find Jesus at the end of his retreat with bread and wine. Or maybe the voices of a people in a caravan that lead him to an oasis with water and fruit. And maybe the message is a sense of deep peace coming from within his heart. However the messengers and messages from God show up they tell him with help for his mind, body and soul, “You are beloved!” So what about us? For we too are God’s beloveds. We are made in God’s image and we are invited into the spiritual wilderness of the Lenten season. What will our wildernesses contain? That is the risk...the danger... isn’t it? The physical wildernesses I have been in are full of beauty, often full of prayer and a sense of the Spirit’s presence. Yet you have to watch your step when you are hiking in a wilderness. They have also been for me places of loneliness and sadness. As for Jesus, they are often full of tough questions. Besides physical wildernesses, I have experienced the wildernesses of deep grief, divorce, unemployment. I have to say I felt rather rudely thrust into those....not gently led by the Spirit. Yet I can tell you that the Spirit never left me, even in the darkness of despair and doubt, the Holy One was/is still with me. Our God is not an accusing God....our God is a companioning God. So, my friends, go forth into the wilderness of Lent today for there the Holy One, the Spirit of God will speak to your heart. Tenderly and with compassion. In tough love and with questions. You will be tempted at times to give up the spiritual practice you have chosen or to cheat on whatever life habit you are including to challenge you. You will be tempted to do things an easier way. You may be called by the Spirit to an action of love and justice that you never expected. You may go deeper into prayer in ways that surprise you. As Jesus was tempted, you may have to wrestle with an attitude of scarcity instead of claiming God’s abundance. You may come up against false pride and be confronted with God’s ways of humility in relationships. You may be given a vision of power – will you use your personal power over someone, some group, some situation? Or will you choose Jesus’ empowering, life-giving way of power with people? The power of compassion and cooperation in God’s love. The gospel writers do not elaborate on Jesus’ inner struggle during the 40 days of prayer, his wrestling in the wilderness. We do not see the times he might have felt failure and despair, only to be visited by the loving Spirit of God speaking to his heart. A presence that turned him around, brought him hope. Perhaps those angels are named Hope. In the wilderness of Lent we will stumble and fall. Because God is a companioning God, we will also begin again. “Begin again,” life whispered in my ear; For some days are beginning days. Some days are designed to be the day we try again, And on those days—the sun rises for you. On those days, the birds sing for you. On those days, God is cheering for you. That’s just the way God and beginnings work. For when your heart is broken and your life is in pieces, Or when the addiction or the depression have found their way back into your bones, Or when you lose sight of the person that you were called to be, The wilderness will sing to you, “Begin again.” “Begin again” with the person you want to be. “Begin again” with the person you want to love. “Begin again” with the knowledge of your faith. “Begin again.” The sun is rising for you. May it be so. Amen. © The Reverend Jane Anne Ferguson, 2020 and beyond. May be reprinted with permission only. AuthorAssociate Minister Jane Anne Ferguson is a writer, storyteller, and contributor to Feasting on the Word, a popular biblical commentary. Learn more about Jane Anne here.
Click to view or download the PDF of this sermon.
AuthorBobbi Wells Hargleroad is a member of Plymouth UCC. Poem Response to Sermon
by Anne Thompson
Wiped feet with her hair -- Should not this be used to feed the poor among us? Extravagant life? Learn the art of true living -- extravagant grace We are called to share, broken open for giving in this house of love. Washing dirty feet -- blessings in humility -- extravagant love. What do these words mean? "The poor are always with us." Time for Jubilee! What's the sound of love? Take clay tablets out and drop them into the dust. Structured injustice, founding visions fall apart. What is Jubilee? Equal pay for work for women, especially black, Latina, poor. Time for equity, for cleansing dirt from our hands. Time for Jubilee.
The Rev. Jake Miles Joseph
Joshua 5: 9-12 Plymouth Congregational UCC, Fort Collins, Colorado Will you share with me a moment of prayer? May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be good and pleasing to you, O God of the refugee, the migrant, and the immigrant. Amen. The members of Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ, Fort Collins, Colorado hear God’s Call to care for and welcome with compassion and justice the widowed, the orphaned and the alienated who are living in our community. We follow Jesus, the Christ, who lives among the “least of these” in our communities. We affirm that each and every person is a Child of God welcome in the Realm of God’s Love. Our refugee-immigrant ancestors fled persecution; upon arriving in Colorado they established the German Evangelical Congregational Church that laid the foundation for Plymouth Congregational UCC. Therefore, Plymouth Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, Fort Collins, CO declares itself an “Immigrant Welcoming Congregation” to encourage the development of policies and activities within Plymouth UCC dedicated to facilitating respectful, compassionate welcome and inclusion of immigrants in our midst. (Enacted by Unanimous Vote of the Congregation, January 2018) Since 2005, long before I was a minister here, I have been a member of Plymouth. Since that time, the telling and retelling of this congregation’s storied history is to me a Poetic Epic of heroism and hope for refugees. It is a story that has become for me a “scripture” (lower case “s”) of a sort—a sacred tale that can help us remember where our values and call to assist the migrant and refugee come from in this context. If you know about the history of the City of Fort Collins and immigration to our city, you know that it is a pretty sweet story! Sweet, that is, in terms of sugar beets as the “produce of the land” in this region in the early 20th century. The sugar beet industry, a common alternative for sugar cane in the wake of the Spanish-American War, came to Fort Collins at the same time as a large wave of ethnic Germans from Russia. That wave of refugees escaping persecution were resettled in Nebraska, the Dakotas, Wyoming and Northern Colorado by the US Government and church groups like the Congregational and Lutheran Church. Now, sugar beet farming and processing, which happened at the time in the Andersonville area, isn’t for the faint of heart. It is hard, unglamorous work! But the sugar beets were a source of empowerment and a status change from refugees to fabric of our community. The sugar beets were a source of hope in a new land. The founders of this congregation were of a large group of poor, ethnic Germans whose ancestors had moved to the Volga River Valley region of Russia under Catherine the Great in the 18th Century. They did this with a promise that they could keep their language, culture, religion, and not be conscripted into the military. By the late 19th Century, Russia was undoing those promises and persecuting the German minority. This forced a mass refugee migration to the United States, Canada, and Argentina. Those who chose to remain behind in the Volga Region, were mostly murdered by the Russian military during World War II—accused of being German spies. While this is a story that many of us know by heart, I try and repeat it in a sermon at least once a year to remind us, as a congregation, where this place, these walls, our story comes from. To me it is a great saga, a tale of courage and faith, and it bears repeating, especially today as our Scripture points us to the plight of refugees once again. If you go to the website for city history at the Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, there is a title called, “Factory worker churches.” In this section it describes our congregation: “Earliest church services for immigrant workers were conducted in private homes in Andersonville or Buckingham. The German Evangelical Congregational Church held services in the G. A. R. hall. In 1904 there were enough German Russians to employ Montezuma Fuller in the design of the German Congregational church at the southwest corner of Whedbee and Oak. The church was designed in a Gothic style with a fifty-foot tower and pointed arch windows and was composed of a red stone foundation with Fort Collins pressed brick walls and red stone trim.” [https://history.fcgov.com/contexts/sugar] The fruit, the produce of the land was now, again, sustaining them in this new place—a third place of refuge in only a couple generations. (Trinity ELCA, Shephard of the Hills ELCA, and Immanuel Reformed are also Russian-German Congregations in Fort Collins.) It wasn’t always easy here in “Fort Fun.” This church would later have to change its name to Plymouth Congregational Church during World War II. While they were Russian-Germans, the locals began attacking them again, here in their place of refuge, for being German of all things. Both in our immigrant story and our adopted Pilgrim story, as a congregation and a denomination, we have a rootedness in refugee stories. By becoming members of this church—these stories of refugee past, bravery, political uncertainty, urgent changing of a name for salvation sake, and hope become our story as well. That is the magic of joining a church community—we are now part of that legacy. Likewise, the responsibility to support new refugees with the “produce of the land” and resources here in Colorado comes with assuming that membership. These walls demand justice for refugees. This brings me to our Scripture today. Our reading comes to us from an early part of the Book of Joshua. Joshua is part of what many scholars call the Hebrew Bible’s Deuteronomistic History—meaning second or history or law. Moses leads the people out of Egypt, out of slavery and death, and into the desert of wandering. That is the “first history,” categorized and told through Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers. The “first history” ends when Moses dies without reaching the promised land. When Moses dies, a new leader is appointed named Joshua. The Book of Joshua picks-up where the Moses story ends in the desert. While Moses’ story is a tale of being refugees, we can see the Joshua story (the second history) as the story of being resettled. The fact that in the Hebrew Bible/ Old Testament it takes two leaders and two whole histories to get us from the state of refugee status to a state of finding home evidences that throughout history immemorial becoming a refugee happens quickly, instantaneously based on external factors, but the process to resettle again, to claim stability is long and hard. Resettlement can take generations, it can require changes in law (as we see in the Bible with two laws), and it requires people of faith and vision like Moses and Joshua to lead. We also find ancient language for a green card, for safety, resettlement, for hope, and for fulfillment of blessing in the repeated phrase, produce or crops of the land. Let us hear the Scripture again: 10 While the Israelites were camped in Gilgal, they kept the Passover in the evening on the fourteenth day of the month in the plains of Jericho. 11 On the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. 12 The manna ceased on the day they ate the produce of the land, and the Israelites no longer had manna; they ate the crops of the land of Canaan that year. Whenever something is repeated three times, it means we should pay attention. This reference to produce of the land, tevua in Hebrew, is found 40 times in the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible. Importantly, almost every place where this word for “produce of the land” is found (and I looked at them all) in the Bible signs of peace and a sense of hope and community exists as well. Psalm 107 “They sowed fields, and planted vineyards that yielded a fruitful produce.” Proverbs 3:9 “Honor the Lord with your wealth with the first produce.” Our story this morning is the story of a change in resident status in the land. This is an ancient green card story in Joshua, Chapter 5. This is the moment when they no longer have to reply on the manna—the symbol of being refugees without a home. This is the moment when the people, after a generation of living in the unknown, are able to claim a sense of hope again. The ability to grow food, we forget in our modern supermarket and click-list lives, is the difference in the ancient world between having a place to call home and hope and being afraid of starvation, consumed by despair. The produce of the land is a synonym for stability, for shelter, and the moment when refugees become residents. There are other ways to read the Joshua story and what the arrival of the Israelites means, but today I think we should focus on this moment. Joshua, Chapter 5, Verse 12 is perhaps the most important verse in the whole story of the Exodus when “The manna ceased on the day they ate the produce of the land.” I was able to bear witness to a produce of the land moment myself two years ago when my husband, Gerhard, was selected to be part of the once annual naturalization citizenship ceremony to take place in Rocky Mountain National Park. There, at the foot of Long’s Peak in Moraine Park Amphitheater, the Superintendent of RMNP, a jolly man dressed like Yogi Bear in a green ranger panama hat, spoke. He told the new immigrants, many refugees, that the great mountain before us, and it was a blue bird Colorado day, now belonged to them. It was theirs to take care of and a symbol of hope. This was a generous offer of the produce of the land that will always stick with us. In our church story, the same moment comes when the produce of the land, in their case sugar beets, allowed our ancestors in 1904 to finally build a new place of worship in Fort Collins and to claim their place in our city. It is also notable that they didn’t just hire any architect, but they hired the best architect in our city’s history—a sign of pride! That sugar beet foundation, the cornerstone of which we brought with us to this site, is allowing refugees the opportunity to become settled, home, and connected to community roots again. I received an urgent email from the UCC and the Church World Service this week. It read like this, “We have a moral responsibility to hold the administration accountable, for slashing the refugee program by 75 percent. This is the worst refugee crisis in history. With global need at its highest, the [administration] has dismantled the refugee resettlement program and reversed our nation’s history as a world leader in refugee protection… The administration set a new record-low refugee admissions goal for fiscal year 2019 at 30,000, and what’s worse, we are only on track to resettle 21,000 refugees this year -- not even meeting this abysmally low goal.” [“Where R The Refugees Worship Toolkit”] God isn’t subtle. I want you all to know that. That same day, I received the email from the Church World Service, a copy of The Seventh-Day Adventist Magazine, Liberty, arrived in my mailbox with the cover article, “A Refugee Crisis.” It reads, “The world today is in the midst of mass migrations, reminiscent of the period encompassing the run-up to World War II, the war itself, and its aftermath…Today we have the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fleeing government action in Myanmar. In Ukraine there is again flight from the Russians…In Syria there is massive dislocation of communities…And, less in the headlines, climate change and consequent loss of crops is driving desperate people north from Africa…Aside from Germany and Scandinavian countries, developed countries have not felt the weight of the crisis. Canada is doing moderately, and the United States is doing very little. The question of just how to balance security and charity remains,” and the article ends with the question, “Just how can the lamp at the golden door be relit?” [Amdur, Reuel S. “A Refugee Crisis: A Canadian Perspective,” Liberty: A Magazine of Religious Freedom. March-April 2019.] Later, that same day, a Facebook friend from PCUSA posted this article from the Christian Century: “Over the past two years, the nation’s refugee resettlement system has been slowly dismantled. The process started after…the president temporarily suspended the entire refugee program in the United States and issued the first version of a ban on travel from predominantly Muslim countries. That dismantling has led to layoffs and office closings for resettlement groups. The nine agencies authorized by the federal government to resettle refugees in the United States—six of which are faith-based—also saw reduced funding for fiscal year 2018. Cuts to the refugee resettlement program will have lasting consequences, said Jen Smyers, director of policy and advocacy for the immigration and refugee program with Church World Service. 'You’re not just changing policy for a couple of years; you’re dismantling decades of work and relationships that will be nearly impossible to rebuild.'” Did I mention that God hasn’t been subtle this week about what needed to be preached? “The manna ceased on the day they ate the produce of the land.” The produce of the land is a symbol throughout the Bible of what all humans hope to have and deserve to obtain by the laws of the Bible and by principles of basic Human Rights—to live without fear of starvation, to be able to grow and put down roots of community, and to connect to earth and to Creator. Our passage from Joshua reminds us of our own refugee, not just immigrant, saga as a congregation. Guided by our story and by the call of the Holy Bible, we must hear the signs of God calling us to work harder for advocacy, pay attention to funding bills in FY2020 that cut the produce of the land even greater and the possibility of safety and welcome. The moment when the refugees go from eating manna to eating from the land is the moment when they have a change in residency status and are offered new hope in a new home. It isn’t fast, it isn’t easy (as the next chapters in Joshua would reveal), and the politics aren’t always clear… but it is right. Let us work harder to live into our call claimed and affirmed in 2018 to be an immigrant and refugee welcoming congregation and to help plant the seeds of the produce of the land for those most in need. Amen. AuthorThe Rev. Jake Miles Joseph ("just Jake"), Associate Minister, came to Plymouth in 2014 having served in the national setting of the UCC on the board of Justice & Witness Ministries, the Coalition for LGBT Concerns, and the Chairperson of the Council for Youth and Young Adult Ministries (CYYAM). Jake has a passion for ecumenical work and has worked in a wide variety of churches and traditions. Read more about him on our staff page. Poem Response to Sermon
Anne Thompson writes a weekly poem based on her hearing of the sermon. Here is her poem this week in response to Jake's "Produce of the Land" Sermon. 3/31/19
Produce of the land
can become a source of hope to those who migrate. There is a story of immigrants in these walls - tales of sugar beets. This is our story. We assume the legacy of those refugees. Refugee status can happen very quickly and can be painful – leaving behind home, family and heritage, risking death and worse. But resettlement and status of belonging can take a long time. “Produce of the land” is a symbol for safety from hunger and fear. Refugee crises - our responsibility? Where is charity? How can the lamplight be relit, and the closed door be open again? For those who made it over seas and over walls, the manna will cease. It is up to us to offer food and shelter with our open hands. Those of us who now are nourished by fertile land – how to be worthy? We can help plant seeds, connect Earth with Creator, open minds and doors. Plant the seeds of hope, for the produce of the land – our future and theirs. A wilderness cry – tired, feeble voices as one – “Will you let me in?”
The Rev. Jake Miles Joseph Plymouth Congregational UCC, Fort Collins, Colorado A couple of days ago, a new friend told me why she loves Lent, and it was her insight which inspired the sermon I’m about to preach. “I love the Season of Lent,” she said, “because it is the time of the year when I reset, and I learn to pay attention again.” Lent is the Art of Paying Attention. Lent is reclaiming the power of the detail. Today, I would like to share a word on reclaiming Poetry in our busy modern lives as a way (one way) to, again, learn to pay attention to meaning, to detail, to ourselves, to others, and to God. It is time for us to reclaim poetry as Christians both for ourselves and for our world which is desperate for new language and new vocabularies for love. Let us pray together. May the words of my mouth, O God of All Creation, and the intimate thoughts of our hearts, help us to renew our ability to truly pay attention to our world. You are our reminder of the details we treasure—our rock and our redeemer. Amen. “O God, you are my God, I seek you, my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.” The Psalms have a way of speaking to us in ways that no other Scripture can. This is because, unlike the narrative or legalistic parts of the Bible, the Psalms have a way of being chameleons, changing color, metamorphosing, and somehow meeting us wherever we are in life. As we grow older, I’ve noticed now at 30, the Psalms grow with us, new details emerge, new hearing develops. “So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; I will lift up my hands and call on your name.” Can you imagine how beautiful this poem is in the original Hebrew where it actually retains the stanzas and repetitions of the original poetry? Last week, Hal also preached on a Psalm, and he encouraged us to go deeper with them to pray the Psalms for lent. I love that! For that reason, I have chosen to also preach on a Psalm this week to help us with that going deeper together. I, like Hal, believe that the Psalms become part of us—they are able to become our own prayers in unexpected ways. When we don’t know how to pray or don’t know how to go deeper, a Psalm is usually in order. “My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.”
Two pictures of the mad-libs “Time with Children”
and the Psalms they helped us write in worship at 9:00 AM and 11:00 AM.
Today, I want to go deeper with a focus on the poetry of the Psalms and how they can help us rediscover the need for details in our lives. The Psalms reawaken in us an attention to detail. To claim the Psalms as our own is to reclaim the power of language from the powers now choosing to wield words as weapons. We shall not accept this abuse of the power of language. By looking for poetry in the Psalms and in our world, we may reclaim poetry and the power of words for good in our lives and culture. If ever there were a time for poetry, it is now.
Friends, a world that doesn’t appreciate poetry is a world at risk of losing its very sense of the meaning of existence. A world without the Poets and the Psalmists is a world without love, or dreams, or visions, or hope. Humans need poetry as the food for our souls. Extending this metaphor, I would say the Psalms are like a tapas bar with something for everyone and every time. Academics tell us that, “Psalms or The Psalter, as it is often called, is a collection of prayers and songs composed throughout Israel’s history. Its title, Psalms, is derived from a Greek term meaning ‘song.’ The Hebrew title of the book, Tehillim, means more specifically ‘hymns’ or ‘songs of praise.’ The poetic character of the Psalms is manifest in the balance or symmetry of each line.” [Patrick D. Miller, “Psalms,” The Harper Collins Study Bible (San Francisco, CA: Harper One, 1989), 732.] The Psalms are the part of the Bible where the details, and how they make us see our own existence, matters most of all. In Seminary, I was your classic fish out of water. I came right from an undergraduate degree in French Literature analyzing Rimbaud and Baudelaire into Divinity School where I found myself surrounded by Religious Studies majors…analyzing Paul. They knew all the facts, could recite the books of the Bible backwards and forwards without error. They enjoyed, as a leisure sport, reciting quotes from long dead theologians with funny names to one another. It was when I discovered the Psalms that I found my place in Seminary and subsequently in ministry. Here is a part of the Bible where literary analysis, poetry, a love for language and words matters as much or more than facts about dead theologians and historic hypothesis theories. A “Psalmist Christian,” as I identify, is a Christian who is most interested in the details of how religion makes us feel connected with God and community. It isn’t about the facts of faith, but Psalms are about the feeling and connections of faith. With the Psalms, we are free to dream, wonder, and feel—even as Mainline Protestants. The Psalms help us to pay attention to the Spirit at work and at play. It is time to be Psalmist Christians…poets all. Friends, we are drowning in facts—both accurate and deceptive. We are floundering in a sea of useless language. Wikipedia, news alerts on our smartphones, press secretary pronouncements, publicity, advertisements, from dawn to dusk drunk on factoids. The over-abundance of trivia has made finding meaningful words difficult. It has made the Lenten art of really paying attention to detail all but impossible. There are more words in our lives than ever, yet there is less and less meaning that gets in here to our hearts! “O God, you are my God, I seek you, my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water, [meaning, purpose, substance].” Like our Psalmist today, we are all thirsty for meaning beyond what we can memorize or google search. We are thirsty for lives grounded in meaning and purpose. Our purpose as humans must be greater than that of the news we aggregate or the revenue we generate. That is what the Psalms offer us for such a time as this. The Psalms offer us poetry and a chance to reclaim purpose and to see the beauty in the small details of life. Rose Marie Berger is a poet, a writer and staffer for Sojourners Magazine and a Christian who writes in what she calls “holy poetry.” She was recently asked in an interview, “As a Catholic, do you see poetry as a spiritual practice?” She replied by saying, “Because of my Catholic-ness, I see the world liturgically and sacramentally. The world is a holy place. Time moves in liturgical seasons. Poetry is an ancient form of speech for speaking about God and beauty, for witnessing and praising, for calling to account, for reanimating mystery. So yes, while not all poets write from a spiritual lens and not all poetry, even my own, needs to reflect spirituality, I do see poetry as part of my spiritual practice… Prose writing can convey lots of things–emotions, information, historical continuity. It can prompt intellectual insights and shifts. But long before prose was invented, birds sang poetry to small human communities and those communities learned to sing it back [Palms]. Poetry is what makes us human animals in the creation. It’s the language God uses to speak worlds into existence — and out of existence. Poetry is elemental, like earth, fire, water, and air.” ["Bending the Arch"] “I love Lent,” she said, “because it is the time every year when I learn to pay attention again.” Poetry and the Psalms, then, are essential to Lent—they help us reclaim the mystery and the detail of the basic elements of life: earth, fire, water, and air…poetry. Which Psalms or Poetry are speaking to you this season? I would invite you to pick a favorite poem (secular or Sacred), read it daily through the rest of this season and see how it reawakens deep meaning of language beyond the artificial divide between fact or fiction. What new details emerge and make meaning every day? This Lent, I invite you to pay attention with me again to the words and their meaning as a method to saving our souls from the cold and unforgiving facts of life we are dying to every day. Only Poetry can save us now. We need the Psalms in Christianity in 2019 (and certainly in 2020 with the certain vitriol of an election year coming) more than we need any other part of the Bible. We need to get back to the basics of reanimating mystery and discovering purpose in the details. Words matter and have power to destroy or heal. Tweets are not William Carlos Williams poems any more than every speech made from a little wooden box three feet in the air is a sermon. Poetry like preaching requires sacred intention. Those of you who have been at Plymouth for at least four and a half years had the joy of hearing my predecessor preach. The Rev. Sharon Benton, if you ever looked at her sermons, didn’t write sermons as speeches. No, she wrote them in the form of poems. Every single one of Sharon’s sermons over her ten years at Plymouth was a poem written for you in love and care. While some of my colleagues find it odd that I am serving my home church, I find a great beauty in the fact that I too was ministered to and formed by the one who held my job before me. Many days, I too really miss Sharon, her poetry, and her poetic attention to detail. This Lent, the poem I am reading every day is one of Sharon’s published Psalms. I am going to close by reading that poem, and I hope that in Lent and in the seasons beyond Lent, we all may rediscover the details in our lives—especially our great meaning and purpose that comes through Poetry. Thanksgiving by The Rev. Sharon Benton Some gratitude comes hard, O Spirit: hard as a brick thrown through a strained-glass Jesus feeding his flock; hard as teeth grinding their own enamel night after anxious night; hard as fighting through Black Friday shopping crowds. Sometimes gratitude comes hard, O Spirit: when there is loss of relationship, loss of abilities, loss of life, loss of hope. But when a wet nose nuzzles us awake in the morning, or a stranger captures our wind-stolen scarf, or a single star stretched out in so much space reminds us-- we are not alone in this life: we are one with each creature, and with each other, and with each part of your creation. Spirit, our individual griefs are not small, nor are the world’s pains. But grant us gratitude amidst them so we may also overcome addiction, depression, disease, or accident; poverty and war and all that depletes life rather than sustains it. Even when gratitude is hard, O Spirit, soften us to see your love poured out upon all the universe, and help us give thanks. Amen. AuthorThe Rev. Jake Miles Joseph ("just Jake"), Associate Minister, came to Plymouth in 2014 having served in the national setting of the UCC on the board of Justice & Witness Ministries, the Coalition for LGBT Concerns, and the Chairperson of the Council for Youth and Young Adult Ministries (CYYAM). Jake has a passion for ecumenical work and has worked in a wide variety of churches and traditions. Read more about him on our staff page.
Psalm 27
The Rev. Hal Chorpenning Plymouth Congregational UCC, Fort Collins, Colorado The Feast of St. Patrick My name is Patrick. I am a sinner, a simple country person, and the least of all believers. I am looked down upon by many. My father was Calpurnius. He was a deacon; his father was Potitus, a priest, who lived at Bannavem Taburniae. His home was near there, and that is where I was taken prisoner. I was about sixteen at the time. At that time, I did not know the true God. I was taken into captivity in Ireland, along with thousands of others. So begins The Confession of St. Patrick, which is thought to be authentic, unlike just about everything else we have been told about this fifth-century British saint. No shamrocks, no snakes, no green beer. Wait…British?! Though it comes as a grave disappointment to some, one of the three patron saints of Ireland came from Scotland or the north of England – easily accessible to Irish raiding parties. Britain had been a Roman province, and at the time of Patrick’s youth, Roman political influence had waned and their occupation of Britain had ended, so it was a time of political instability. And we have an early manuscript of The Confession in the 8th-century Book of Armagh, which lives at Trinity College in Dublin. In this document, Patrick details how as a slave he came to embrace the faith of his father, a deacon, and his grandfather, a priest. He speaks of how after being enslaved he had a vision of how to escape, of his reuniting with his family, and his temptation by Satan. Even without shamrocks, it’s a gripping story! Patrick writes of his difficulties and mission: “It was not by my own grace, but God who overcame [adversities] in me, and resisted them all so that I could come to the peoples of Ireland to preach the gospel. I bore insults from unbelievers, so that I would hear the hatred directed at me for traveling here. I bore many persecutions, even chains, so that I could give up my freeborn state for the sake of others.” The Confession is one of the great spiritual testimonies of late antiquity, and we learn from it that Patrick, like so many prophets, sensed the divine call to speak on God’s behalf, and like so many apostles, was sent by God into an alien land as an exponent of the Gospel. Patrick’s mission to the Irish was not only surprisingly successful in introducing the Christian faith, but there was something distinctive from the mission to virtually every other country: it was bloodless. Patrick’s mission was nonviolent, which is especially striking given the circumstances under which he was taken to Ireland as a youth. But it isn’t just The Confession that I want to introduce you to, but another writing attributed to Patrick, a prayer called "The Breastplate." It takes the form of a plea for protection in troubled times. Here is an extract of the prayer…I won’t read the whole thing, because it does go on a bit: I arise today Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity, Through belief in the Threeness, Through confession of the Oneness of the Creator of creation. … I arise today, through The strength of heaven, The light of the sun, The radiance of the moon, The splendor of fire, The speed of lightning, The swiftness of wind, The depth of the sea, The stability of the earth, The firmness of rock. I arise today, through God’s strength to pilot me, God’s might to uphold me, God’s wisdom to guide me, God’s eye to look before me, God’s ear to hear me, God’s word to speak for me, God’s hand to guard me, God’s shield to protect me. … I arise today Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity, Through belief in the Threeness, Through confession of the Oneness of the Creator of creation. Patrick, whether he wrote this prayer or not, certainly needed the protection of God as he re-entered the land of his captivity. He demonstrated his faith in, his deep trust in, the triune God, whom he sensed was within him, around him, and infinitely far beyond him. That sense of panentheism – God as close to us as our breathing and at the same time beyond the reaches of the universe – is central to the experience of Celtic Christianity then and now. God is not simply “in a heaven, lightyears away,” but near to us, and can be a help in times of trouble. And that, too, is the expression of faith and trust in Psalm 27. God “is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?” The confident faith of the psalmist is something that we can use today. I actually use the prayer in your bulletin every morning in my own devotional time, and it has echoes of Psalm 27: “The Lord is my light and salvation,” and “Christ as a light illumine and guide me.” The horrific attack on the mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, on Friday was the latest chapter in the tragic history of terrorism by white men who feel threatened by the prospect of not being in control of a world of diverse peoples. And yet, as Christians, we have the example of Patrick, who not only didn’t attack those whom he could justifiably see as a threat…he loved and embraced them. That courageous ability to not be threatened, but to love one’s enemies is at the core of the real St. Patrick, and that is far more valuable to God and to us, than chasing a few snakes away. I know that many of us are overwhelmed because we are living in fraught and dangerous times and that zero-sum politics are tearing our nation – even God’s planet – apart. I am concerned about you, the members of this congregation, because I see you working for justice and feeling a sense of oppression. I know that some of you are disheartened by the state of our republic and its politics…and with good reason. And I want you to be able to use the tools of your faith to keep on keeping on. I want you to be able to use the oaken staff of your faith to lean on as you go into the world. The Psalms, especially the 27th Psalm, can be a part of your toolkit for protection. The 27th Psalm can be your breastplate that you put on like armor to protect yourself from the dishonesty, avarice, and ill will that seem to dominate the news. Prayers for protection are an essential part of the literature of the Celtic saints, including Patrick. Here is the beginning of a prayer attributed to St. Brendan the Navigator: “Help me to journey beyond the familiar and into the unknown. Give me faith to leave old ways and break fresh ground with you.” And one of St. Columba of Iona: “Be thou a bright flame before me: be thou a guiding star above me; be though a smooth path below me; be thou a kindly shepherd behind me…today, tonight, and forever.” And a prayer from St. Columbanus, an Irish monk who founded monasteries in today’s France, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy: “Lord, kindle our lamps, Savior most dear to us, that we may always shine in your presence and always receive light from you, the Light Perpetual, so that our own personal darkness may be overcome, and the world’s darkness driven from us.” “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?” The words of saints and the psalmist are the words of courage, of confidence, of reliance on the intimate presence of God. The psalm ends with a theological claim, which the Celtic saints would affirm, but it is more than that: it is a statement of what is in the heart of the psalmist, and I pray that it is in your heart as well: “I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!” As a newer paraphrase of this psalm says, “Stay with God!” Many of you want to know more about how to pray, so here is one way to go deeper: Pray with the psalms. When you go home, pull out your Bible and find Psalm 27, make a space of five minutes, and open your heart and mind to God, and read this psalm with an attitude of prayer. Do it five times this week, and see what changes happen within you. (And you can have your pint of green beer first!) The saints of old have stood up against fear of the other, against oppression, against tyrants, against injustice, and against violence. You can, too, because the Lord is your light and your salvation…you have nothing to fear. Amen. © 2019 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact hal@plymouthucc.org for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses. AuthorThe Rev. Hal Chorpenning has been Plymouth's senior minister since 2002. Before that, he was associate conference minister with the Connecticut Conference of the UCC. A grant from the Lilly Endowment enabled him to study Celtic Christianity in the UK and Ireland. Prior to ordained ministry, Hal had a business in corporate communications. Read more about Hal. AuthorThe Rev. Hal Chorpenning has been Plymouth's senior minister since 2002. Before that, he was associate conference minister with the Connecticut Conference of the UCC. A grant from the Lilly Endowment enabled him to study Celtic Christianity in the UK and Ireland. Prior to ordained ministry, Hal had a business in corporate communications. Read more about Hal. |
Details
|