Trinity Parish
Sermons
« October 2006 | Main | December 2006 »
November 26, 2006
Frannie Kieschnick - Nov 26, 2006
The Sunday after Thanksgiving Day - Rev Frannie Kieschnick
(Audio recording coming soon)
The early Church believed that the end of time was imminent-that soon very soon the King of Glory would come- but they found themselves as we do living in the meantime- as people of faith-how do we live in the meantime- They tried to make him a king but Jesus said, "For this I was born, to testify to the truth- and what is that truth- God is love-Thanks be to God."
The story is told of two friends who bumped into one another on the street one day. One of them looked especially forlorn, almost on the verge of tears. His friend asked him, “What has happened. What has the world done to you, that you should be so sad?” His forlorn friend replied, “Let me tell you. Three weeks ago, an aunt died and left me $10,000.” “Well, well. That’s a lot of money!” “But two weeks ago, a cousin I never even knew, passed away leaving me $20,000 free and clear.” “Sounds like you have been incredibly blessed!” “Just wait. Last week I learned I had inherited $100,000.” Now his friend was really confused. Then why do you look so glum?” “This week...nothing!”
That is the trouble with receiving something on a regular basis. Even if it is a gift. We eventually come to expect it! There is actually a word for this these days, it is called entitlement--a whole bunch of parents on the peninsula are very concerned about their own children acquiring this mindset not realizing that we can all fall victim to it- it is an attitude that permeates our community, our nation and even our international relations. It is a problem.
What can we do. What is the antidote for this epidemic- the antidote for this attitude of entitlement?
The antidote is a daily dose of gratitude- It is an attitude of gratitude-the attitude not only practiced by people of faith but required of people of faith. Scripture is filled with injunctions to be grateful. In Colossians we hear, "Put on the garments that suit God’s chosen people, compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience. And be filled with gratitude. Let the message of Christ dwell among you in all its richness." In Philippians, "Have no worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.".
Perhaps you are so filled with worry there is no room for gratitude, perhaps you aren’t feeling blessed this day. Perhaps, hard as you try, you cannot see the gifts that God has given you. Maybe the pain in your life has overwhelmed you to the point where you cannot no longer see how blessed you are. Or perhaps you have been so blessed that even those blessings don’t feel as blessed any more.
The truth is, the world has had a hard year. Locally we have had a hard year-many of us have had hard years-lots of loss-close relatives and beloved mentors have died, jobs have been lost, health has deteriorated-
But it is the Sunday after Thanksgiving-we are supposed to give thanks- we are people of faith it is what is required of us.
So what do we do? One thing we do is to gather together to make Eucharist-which means in Greek "give thanks." In a way we could say that Thanksgiving day is Eucharist day when we practice giving thanks- we give thanks consciously, intentionally for all that God has given us in our lives-when we say thank you to God and one another for the gift of every moment of life and love in this world and then next. I don’t ‘know about you all but in my house it is the only meal of the entire year when everyone is willing to take a moment to hold hands and give thanks before diving in.
It is not a new idea, giving thanks; giving thanks even for apparent tragedy and trusting god to be god. Thousands of years ago, the Jewish people formulated blessings (berakah) for every circumstance of their lives. Good news comes, "then blessed be the one who is good and does good." Bad news comes-"then blessed be the judge of truth!" Humankind had a duty to pronounce blessing on the bad as well as the good in life, because all life came from God. The Talmud says, "It is forbidden to taste of this world without a blessing!"
Let me tell you about a man named George- he has had more than his share of life’s hell, especially in recent years What puzzles all his friends is that he is so inexplicably cheerful-and in a way that doesn’t make you uncomfortable. There’s nothing forced about his upbeat spirit, he say there are basically three responses to life, “Damn!”, “Help!”, and “Thank you”. He’s tried them all. The first one he describes as something like pouring all your energy down the drain. The second is appropriated more often than he would like. But it is the third that produce the most mileage. He says, “I faced a lot of bad stuff in my life, including death, and I decided I might as well live, and lives as gratefully as I could. Every day’s a gift, and I don’t want to waste it in either cynicism or self pity.”
Our challenge then this Thanksgiving weekend and every day is to say "thank you" to God for the whole mess-the things we welcome as well as the things we wish we could escape. For all that we experience is an invitation to draw closer to God, and God is constantly drawing closer to us. God goes with us everywhere; there is no corner of our lives where God is not present. Difficult as that often is to believe, let alone remember!
Sometimes we have to work our way through the "damn!" and "help!" before getting to gratitude and it’s often a struggle to get to that grateful place when life is particularly hard and unfair. No one said it would be easy. In fact in the face of tragedy and evil, gratitude is the hardest spiritual practice of all.
- it is all about the radical conversion of a woman, Sara, who visited St. Gregory’s in the city, took communion, found Jesus and heard a call to feed others in Jesus' name by establishing food pantries all across the city. When people come to the pantry they often ask her to pray for them. In one passage, Sara describes a middle aged couple who have found sobriety a little to late for their daughter a broken and bitter girl whose life had been made hell by her parent’s drinking. They are fervent AA members now but they are consumed by guilt about their child, much as Sara was about the years her own daughter, Katie, had been lonely and worried, when Sara had been going through her own troubles. Sara writes, "Katie was thriving now, unafraid and sunny. I had to believe that the hurt places in her and my inadequacies were not defining who she could become. that our lives were not about avoiding pain at all costs but about going through it, together and finding gratitude for the experience.'God', I said after a long time holding hands with the couple, 'thank you for healing; for new life after all, and thank you especially for the dark years. Thank you for everything that works in the dark.'”
It is hard to feel gratitude in a society that encourages us to want more, to be greedy for more, to compare ourselves to others-that fills us with a sense of entitlement that won’t let go- just check the advertisements for post Thanksgiving sales. Greed grabs, gratitude receives. That is why it can seem like a radical, subversive reaction to life.
Gratitude takes nothing for granted.
Gratitude unleashes the imagination. It defies the messages of the world and of others.
Gratitude is irrational, Unnerving, Life changing.
So let us be thankful that we don’t already have everything we want for we have something to look forward to.
Let us be thankful that we don’t know something for it gives us an opportunity to learn.
Let us be thankful for our limitations, because they give us opportunities for improvements and to depend on others.
Let us be thankful for each new challenge for it can build character and strength.
Let us be thankful when we are tired or weary, because it might mean that we were able to make a difference.
Let us be thankful even for our mistakes, for they teach us valuable lessons and God's unconditional love.
To be grateful is to remember and recognize the love of God in everything God has given us and God has given us everything...So let us be on the lookout for God and ready with our chorus, “This week....Everything! “
Thanks be to God. Amen.
November 13, 2006
Anne Jensen November 5, 2006
Anne Jensen All Saints’ Day - 2006
“I sing a song of the saints of God…”
Here it is-- All Saints' Day, and we, who are very much alive, are invited to recall the faithful departed. The hymn we just sang holds up the virtues of those saints, “patient and brave and true.”
In New Testament usage, saints are those who aspire to the holiness of the Holy God whom they serve. Because the Holy Spirit dwells within them, they too are made holy. A saint, therefore, is one who reflects the sanctity of the God he or she serves: to be a saint in this sense is a sign not of perfection, but of faithfulness.
I agree with Peter Gomes, who wrote, “Of all the Christian holidays, I find this one, in all of its senses, to be the most reassuring. I like the idea of the great and heroic ones who have gone on before: their names remind us that great lives were called to do great things for God. I like thinking of the saints beyond, not simply resting, but waiting for us to join them: they assure us of a future. And I like thinking of saints as ordinary people like ourselves, seeking to be faithful and holy here and now.”
So what’s in this holiness? We find the heart of holy living in the summary of the law: Jesus said, “Love God with all your heart, with all your souls, and with all your mind, and love your neighbors as yourselves,” and the two are not to be separated. Thus we cannot simply sit in humble adoration of the divine at the expense of the human. Nor can we be filled, indeed even obsessed with feel-good good works and at the same time neglect the duty and reverence owed to God.
Katherine Jefferts Schori, who was installed as the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church yesterday caught this truth in her homily. She called the Church to her vision of "shalom." She said, “Shalom doesn't just mean that sort of peace that comes when we're no longer at war,"
“Shalom is created,” she said, “when all people are at home with each other and with God. When Augustine says "our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee, O Lord" he means that our natural home is in God.” In another approach to what home is, she refers to Robert Frost’s poem “Death of the Hired Man” in which he wrote, "home is the place where, when you go there, they have to take you in." Building on this, the Bishop said, “We all ache for a community that will take us in, with all our warts and quirks and petty meanness – and still celebrate when they see us coming!"
She continues, "That vision of home going and homecoming that underlies our deepest spiritual yearnings is also the job assignment each one of us gets in baptism – go home, and while you're at it, help to make a home for everyone else on earth," she continued.
"The home we ultimately seek is found in relationship with creator, with redeemer, with spirit." Home is where the faithful departed find shalom and where they await us. And not only that, they surround us and cheer us on even now.
This morning we are baptizing Virginia Sybil Such, Karen and Asa’s daughter, and we welcome her to this communion of saints. She will be sealed and marked as Christ’s own forever. When I met with Karen last week, she told me about her experience last year on All Saints’ Day., and she graciously gave me permission to share it with you. It is a real-life example of experiencing the Communion of Saints. Karen had wanted another child and didn’t think she could have another one. At that time last year she was singing in the choir and had just learned that the baby she carried was going to be just fine—no chromosomal problems at all. In the midst of the hymns and homily, in which Frannie gave us the image of the church balcony with all the saints gathered, looking down on us, smiling at us and loving us, Karen had a profound sense of her deceased mother’s presence. Filled with joy and gratitude she was overcome with tears, and she couldn’t stop the weeping. Our deacon, ever in tune with human need, provided her with Kleenex. The early church mothers and fathers wrote of the gift of tears and that it expresses a deep spiritual state. It is with great joy and thanksgiving that we baptize Virginia Sybil, who is named after her grandmother, a year later on this All Saints Day.
As we renew our baptismal vows, let us hold onto the image of the everyday saints, who in baptism are made holy by the presence of God’s Holy Spirit. We do not go on this journey alone; we together, are the body of Christ, and our faith is not just individual. Faith is demonstrated by how we together as the church work to re-establishing God’s shalom.
Remember the words we sang just a few minutes ago:
“They lived not only in ages past,/ There are hundreds of thousands still;
The world is bright with the joyous saints/ Who love to do Jesus' will.
You can meet them in school, or in lanes, or at sea, /In church, or in trains, or in shops, or at tea,
For the saints of God began just like me, /And I mean to be one too.”
In our prayers we ask for assistance in the daily hard work of holiness, the daily grind of sainthood. It is reassuring to know that those saints who went before us were aided by the very God whom they loved and served, and that this great cloud of witnesses is rooting for us now.
