February 14, 2010
The Last Sunday after Epiphany
Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia
The Reverend Woody Bartlett


You Are Not of the Mall

I’m the Rev. Woody Bartlett, a retired priest in the Diocese of Atlanta and a very enthusiastic member of Holy Trinity. My wife, Carol, and I have been attending since the late spring of last year and find ourselves getting more and more caught up in the life-giving energy of this congregation.

There’s something else you need to know about us. We are deeply involved in working out the many ways that we humans are involved, both spiritually and practically, in the Creation. In fact, just about seven years ago we co-founded Georgia Interfaith Power & Light, an organization that seeks to engage faith communities across the state in the stewardship of creation, particularly in the ways we generate and use power. It has been a compelling journey.

I want to start by telling you about a friend of ours – Francie. She is a single mom with four grown and almost grown children. Everyone in the family is quite dramatic and quite artistic. It’s a pretty remarkable group. One day in the fall several years ago, her two youngest daughters, both high school aged, came to her and said, “Mom. We don’t have any winter clothes to wear to school. Can you take us to Gwinnett Mall so we can shop?” Francie said sure and they set a date. On the appointed day, Francie drove them out there and dropped them off at the entrance. She told them that she just couldn’t bear to be in the Mall on such a beautiful day and that she would come back and pick them up at an appointed time.

That time arrived and Francie picked them up and told them that she wanted to take them to a special place she had discovered while they were in the Mall. They drove to a nearby wooded area, parked the car and walked into the woods. Presently, they came to an open glade and Francie asked them to lie down on their backs and look up. It was a beautiful day, with a warm sun above and cool breezes flowing, leaves starting to turn,. After a while, Francie said to them, “Remember, my children, finally, you are not of the Mall. You are of the Earth.” By that she meant that their primary and deepest relationship was to the community of all of life – the community of wild flowers and honey bees, of deer and chickadees, of earthworms and grubs, of oak trees and green vegetables. It is all one big interactive and interdependent community. And we humans of it and from it and part of it.

As you must realize, we have a crisis on the Earth, largely because way too many of us humans are ‘Of the Mall.’ Human activity is straining way too many of the Earth’s natural systems. Pollution, heedless development, sprawling urban centers, polluting transportation systems and energy systems and our individual life styles are all putting incredible stress on the creation.

There are a number of web sites where you can describe your living patterns and generate your carbon footprint to see how heavy you tromp on the earth. It will tell you how many earths there would have to be if everyone on the planet today lived with your life style. It turns out that even the most eco-friendly of us, living in this country, still need about four earths to support us. Can you imagine the strain if even half the earth’s population gets to our standard of living?

Surely we will need some broad technological changes – more efficiency, new energy sources, new transportation and power systems. But we will also need a far deeper change that puts the issue right into the lap of the church, among other places. We need to answer the following question in thought and action, “Does the earth belong to us? Or do we belong to the earth? Are we of the Mall, or are we of the earth? Can we do whatever we want to do with the earth? Or do the limits of the earth place some real limits on us and our activities? And what might those limits be?

In the Gospel this morning, we heard the story of the Transfiguration where Peter, James and john were up on a mountain with Jesus and they saw him glowing as he prayed. And they saw Moses and Elijah with him. They were pretty stunned. It would be like you were with your favorite politician and they glowed and George Washington and Abraham Lincoln were with them. Pretty stunning. But then a voice came from heaven and said, “This is my Son, my Chosen. Listen to him.”

Listen to him. Follow his actions and his teachings. Listen to him, for he is the example of how humans should get along with one another. Listen to him, for he is the answer to how human communities should work. Listen to him, for he is also the key to how we humans should fit into this great earth community, of which we are such an important part. We started on that exploration during the Rector’s Forum this morning. We need to find other ways to explore that relationship. It is becoming the central issue of our day.

Let me tell you what happened to me that started to open my eyes to my part in this great earth community. A friend of mine, Ed, and I decided to take a hike to the Jacks River Falls up in the northern end of the Cohutta Wilderness in north Georgia. We had seen a picture of it in a brochure. Anyone here been there?

Well we had to hike for a couple of hours just to get to the Jacks River. Getting there and checking our map, we saw that we had to cross the river and then go a short way up stream to get to the falls. We did that and arrived on a large rock outcropping at the top of the falls. We were alone. We sat down on the rock and drank in the scene. A large gush of water was surging down through a cleft in the rocks, sending spray up all around us, watering the incredibly green vegetation and filtering the warm sun that beat down. It was transfiguring. In fact, the rock beneath us seemed to be shaking from the pounding of the water. Or maybe that was just our shaky legs from hiking.

Anyway, after a moment, Ed said, “Look up.” And I did and there were about a dozen large birds, circling, dancing above us, round and round, in and out. Ed said, “Those are eagles.” Now Ed was a nature sort of guy. And he worked with, even danced with Native American Indians. So he knew something about the subject. I’d never even seen an eagle before but I sure could tell that they weren’t hawks or buzzards.

Then Ed said, “Let me get a better look.” And he reached into his knapsack and pulled out a small set of binoculars and looked up at the dancing eagles. Immediately, they turned tail and headed out behind the nearest mountain and disappeared. Pretty soon, we also left.

A couple of weeks later, I was telling the story to another nature guy friend of mine. He said, “Sure, they were there to see you. You know, they can see a field mouse at a mile, so when you looked at them with the binoculars, they left because they just didn’t trust your intentions.” Unwittingly, we had broken the bit of a relationship that we had with those eagles. Ever since, that event has been for me a symbol of the fractured earth community in which we live. And I have looked to what Jesus taught and did as possible guides for our actions. I am convinced that he is the way, the truth and the life for us in this ecological crisis.

Tomorrow, some installers will start putting a solar photovoltaic array on the south roof of Tisdale Hall here at Holy Trinity. That one small system will not do much to heal the crisis in creation in which we find ourselves. But it can be a powerful symbol that we know that we belong to the earth and that we must generate our power from sources that do not destroy the earth as they serve us. It can also be an early step in our determination to spread our concern to other parts of the church, to our homes, to our communities and to our businesses. Can we step out in that direction?

But it is far from just a local problem. There are, as we all know, some huge problems with the larger systems in which we live. Leadership at that systems level must involve governments and those larger institutions. But we are not powerless. So on this Valentine’s Day, let me suggest that we all send a love letter to our senators and representative, urging them to express our love for the Earth, our island home, in some significant legislation.

Finally, we find ourselves with the disciples, standing before the transfigured Christ, coming to terms with the fact that in the end it is painfully clear that we are not of the Mall. We are of the earth.

January 31, 2010
The Fourth Sunday After the Epiphany
Luke 4:21-30
Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia
The Very Reverend William Thomas Deneke, rector


We may have heard the reading from the first letter to the Corinthians at a wedding or as a pleasant devotional statement. Paul’s ode to love has now days taken on a sentimental, romantic flavor, far from the original context of the words. Paul was actually addressing a situation that was tearing the young church apart. Christians in Corinth were doing real and potentially destructive battle with one another over a number of issues revealed in the letter. Everything he said love was, they were not. And everything he said love was not, they were. Rather than hear sweetness in Paul’s letter, the Christians may have found it offensive in pointing out their shortcomings. But it was what needed to be said.

The verse that follows what we heard this morning should not be left out. Paul says, Pursue love and strive for the spiritual gifts. The Corinthians had sought to exercise their ministries and gifts without love. And it was not working. All of their judgments, prophesies, and exercises of gifts were like noisy gongs or a clanging symbols that graded on people’s nerves. Paul said to first learn to love and then prophesy.

Learning to love is always the first task we have. In fact the church is primarily a laboratory for learning to love.

One of my early memories of church was entering a children’s beginner’s Sunday School Class. I was nervous, shy and not at all sure I wanted to be there. The teacher, Mrs. Stinson, came over to me, welcomed me warmly, and assured me that I belonged in that class. After all these years, I remember her smile and her greeting. On that very first day at church I was already learning to love because of Mrs. Stinson.

As we grow in spiritual formation, we discover that love has many dimensions. In today’s gospel reading, the Nazareth congregation had not fully considered love’s implications. Jesus challenged them to a deeper understanding. Love was not only feeling good with your friends, but something much more powerful. When Jesus said, Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing,” here is the scripture of which he was speaking.

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

These words were familiar to Jesus’ audience. They liked to hear them, but they were not prepared to take them seriously. They heard them like we might hear today’s epistle at a wedding. Sweet words, but not life changing. Jesus forced the issue with them and they threw him out.
Maybe what Jesus was saying in part is that his hometown synagogue was not much of a laboratory for learning to love if it did not bring good news to the poor or proclaim release to the captives or offer recovery of sight to the blind or promise freedom for the oppressed or proclaim in word and deed the compassion of God. These were measures of love that kept congregations from being only hearers of the word and not doers.

As we are called to be a laboratory for learning and practicing love, there are gospel standards to guide us. And, if these standards are neglected, God will choose others to do the work of salvation. The God we worship calls us out of complacency, bids us to move beyond childish ways, and reveals to us a realm of justice and love that blesses all humanity.

On this day of our Annual Parish Meeting, it is appropriate for us to consider how Holy Trinity is striving to be a faithful parish. How are we doing as a laboratory for learning how to love?

Our parish mission is to open hearts to God. A mission that begins with the love of God. If we are to be true to the call of Jesus, we begin by opening our hearts to God. We begin with what Paul called the pursuit of love. We look to God because God is love.

I want to commend the commitment of so many to spiritual growth. Learning to love God, living to love God, loving to love God are practices seen in this congregation. I urge that this be a central mission, a top priority more and more. As we grow in love, the fruits of our mission will continue to be revealed in amazing ways. People will indeed know we are Christians by our love – authentic love such as Paul described and such as we behold in Jesus.

But that is only half of our parish mission. We are also committed to open doors to community. Another way of stating this is to say we are not only called to love God, but also to love our neighbor.

It is loving our neighbor that got Jesus into trouble in Nazareth and later elsewhere. Yet when we open our hearts to God, the Spirit that comes upon us moves us deeper and deeper into love just as the prophet Isaiah declared and Jesus proclaimed.

I see the mission of building community and loving our neighbor being carried out everyday at Holy Trinity. I see a passion for social justice, a burning desire to reach out to those in need, a welcome smile for all with whom we minister, a genuine concern and love for one another, and hospitality for the stranger.

We would not have dug clean water wells all along the northern coast of Haiti were we not committed to open doors to community. We would not welcome guests to this parish if we did not seek to open doors to community. We would not have provided emergency funds to Honduras Outreach in its financial crisis or built facilities for DEAM or sustained mission trips to New Orleans or be ready to put a solar array on the roof of Tisdale Hall if we were not interested in what it means to live in community, in what it means to love our neighbor.
Yesterday there was a meeting of over fifty representatives from around the diocese here at Holy Trinity to discuss how we in the Diocese of Atlanta can best minister in Haiti. I was so impressed with what congregations are doing and with what they have been doing for some time. There is support for schools, churches, medical facilities, clean water wells, and resources for feeding people. These ministries are aimed toward bringing good news to the poor, releasing people captive to everyday horrors including those of Haitian prisons, recovery of sight to the blind, – One parish is collecting glasses to be sent to Port au Prince. - and letting oppressed people of all ages go free. This is gospel work.

In Holy Trinity’s laboratory for learning how to love, we need always to connect love for God with love for neighbor. Our mission statement joins these two and that is what makes it vibrant. Our mission, like the Great Commandment, gives shape to who we are and what we are about.

Everyday we are called anew to open our hearts to God. That is quite a calling. We need to support one another in this call and we need support from one another. Our worship, our small groups, our parish life are vehicles to nurture and challenge us to grow in Christ. Acts such as listening to one another, greeting friends and guests, maintaining time for discernment and energy for prayer will help us to grow in love. And as we continue to grow, we may be amazed to see where the Spirit leads us. The Spirit’s track record at Holy Trinity is pretty good. As we open our hearts to God more and more, we may find ourselves anointed to open doors to community in new and continued wonderful ways.

We give thanks today. We are blessed by the love of God revealed in Jesus Christ. We are blessed by the love made known at Holy Trinity. And we pray, that as God’s people gathered in this community, our hearts will be opened more and more to the wonders of God, and our doors will swing wide to welcome all who come, and to encourage all who go forth to love and serve the Lord. Indeed, ours is the mission, ours is the wonder of learning to love!

Sermon: Third Sunday after Epiphany

January 24, 2010

The Third Sunday after Epiphany

Luke 4:14-21

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Rev. Dr. Deborah Silver, assisting priest

My joy is gone; grief is upon me, my heart is sick.

Hark, the cry of my poor people from far and wide in the land:

“Is the Lord not in Zion? Is her King not in her?” …

For the hurt of my poor people I am hurt, I mourn,

and dismay has taken hold of me. Is there no balm in Gilead?

Is there no physician there?

Why then has the health of my poor people not been restored?

O that my head were a spring of water,

and my eyes a fountain of tears,

so that I might weep day and night for the slain of my poor people!

These words of the Prophet Jeremiah could well be a prayer of lament coming directly out of earthquake-ravaged Haiti. In fact, when I consider the question “Is there no healing balm in Gilead?” My mind makes the connection to the wounded and hurting people of Port au Prince and other places who lie in wait for medicine to treat infections or soothe the pain.

And yet, there are signs of hope emerging in Port au Prince – a 23 year old man is pulled out of the rubble, alive and in good shape, after 11 days to the cheers of rescuers and dozens of onlookers. The port has been repaired enough that ships are finally able to unload the aid that is so desperately needed. At Food for the Poor headquarters in the heart of Port au Prince, thousands are being fed a hot meal of rice, beans and chicken at the very feeding station where Ed Buckley and Bill Deneke helped serve the hungry just last month. Differences of politics, religion, ethnicity and nationality are put aside as people all over the world work together to bring aid and comfort to the poorest of the poor, the weakest of the weak.

However, there is still cause for continued lament. There are, what Anderson Cooper from CNN calls “preventable deaths” still occurring – deaths from infections that could have been treated if only antibiotics had arrived in time. Countless numbers of newly orphaned children now occupy the city and those who are injured lie in hospital tents with no parent to comfort them and nowhere to go.

And so the words of Jeremiah continue to ring in our ears and hope is threatened by encroaching cynicism and despair. We begin to feel “compassion fatigue” and perhaps we tune in to the news far less frequently or not at all. We may even hear some say that Haitians are different than us. The people have always lived in poverty, their government has always been ineffective and corrupt and will continue to be so regardless of what we do. Cynicism threatens to diminish our hope.

But just when hope is running low and turning a blind eye tempts us, we are graced with today’s lectionary readings. Jesus announces his mission to the poor and the oppressed and the Apostle Paul reminds us of our calling as members of Christ’s body. Their words are challenging but also promise renewed hope.

Paul presents us with one of his most well-known and effective metaphors of Christian community, the image of the body. The word that is translated as “member” in the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible can also be translated as “part” or “limb.” Paul reminds us that in the human body, the organs don’t have turf wars. The heart does not say to the kidneys, “You guys aren’t as important as I,” or “That’s not my job.” No part of the body gets offended by the behavior of another part. Every organ has its job, but no organ is above doing another’s job if the primary organ becomes infected or damaged. Parts of the brain can learn to do the jobs of other parts after an injury has occurred. If the body is attacked by an infection or injury, the entire body sends all of its resources to the site of the wound or infection. The objective is well defined. The well being of the whole body is at stake.

After I graduated from seminary, I worked for a year as a chaplain-resident at a large hospital in Dayton, Ohio. I was assigned to the cardio-thoracic unit where by-pass surgeries were performed on a daily basis. To my surprise I was invited to observe an open-heart surgery. The profound lesson that I learned from this was that there are no turf wars in the Operating Room. No one says, “That’s not my job.” No one passes the buck to someone else. Each person is dependent on the others. They are truly members of one body, working together for one goal: the health, healing and well being of the patient.

As individuals we are not called to be Christ or little Christs, let alone saviors of the world. Those who suffer from this misconception end up burned out and bitter. Rather, we are called to see ourselves as the embodiment of Christ in the world, not primarily as individuals but as local communities of faith, which belong to a larger whole. We are called to be members of a body, the Body of Christ, and to play our part – not more, not less. With this in mind, we need not be overwhelmed by the needs of Haiti or any other part of our hurting world. We may also discover that when called upon, we are given the courage to act as members of Christ’s body.

During World War II a small village in France made an extraordinary statement about solidarity of the faith community. The village of Le Chambon consisted primarily of Huguenots. As the Nazi presence in France increased and deportation of French Jews began, this village took a great risk for its faith. Jewish children were allowed to come there and live with the villagers in their homes.

The children became part of almost every family in town. Since people in small towns know everyone else and their children, there was no way for the rescue to proceed without the support of everyone. One small admission to the Gestapo or Vichy authorities would have betrayed the cause. No one wavered. The only person arrested was the pastor, Andre Trocme, who continued to preach against fascism despite the risks. The children attended school, played in the park, and were visible in every way.

It may be that even the German soldiers occupying the town later in the war chose to look the other way. Everyone in town did their part, and more than one thousand children were saved.

The good news is that we can respond to the tragedies in the world because our sense of identity lies not just in the role we play, nor the status, nor the reward our role brings, but in the sense of oneness with the life of Christ which is the life of God – and ultimately the life of all that is.

The part of the Body of Christ that is Haiti is severely wounded. And so, we are wounded too. The tears of our Haitian brothers and sisters are our tears. Their pain is our pain. Their prayers are our prayers. And their recovery will be our recovery. Now is the time when the whole body comes together and sends all of its available resources to the site of the wound – to fight infection, to promote healing and to make the body whole again.

Holy Trinity is responding to the needs of our brothers and sisters in Haiti. We are offering intercessory prayers. We are putting our money and our resources together and giving to relief organizations like Food for the Poor or Episcopal Relief and Development. The people of Port au Prince are being given hot meals and clean water. Infections are being treated. Surgeries are being performed with less pain. And eventually new houses, new schools and new clinics and hospitals will be built and a new and better city will emerge.

“Is there no balm in Gilead for the hurt of my people”? Yes. There is a balm that heals the body and soothes the soul. The balm is Jesus Christ who was anointed by the Holy Spirit to preach good news to the poor, the oppressed and the wounded of the world. That spirit is no less upon all of us who proclaim Jesus as Lord. We leave here today renewed and empowered to serve as the Body of Christ in the world. Praise be to God!

Sermon: Second Sunday after Epiphany

January 17, 2010

Second Sunday after the Epiphany

John 2:1-11

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Reverend Allan Sandlin, associate rector

Let us dream God’s dream, glimpsed on the mountain,

first by the one King, then King again;

a dream deferred now, waiting the fountain

where justice rolls down and praise ascends.

It’s a funny thing. I’ve been dreaming a lot this week. Maybe I was already thinking about the last verse of the hymn we’ve just sung or maybe Dr. King’s most famous speech took up residence in my dreams.

And I dreamed of Haiti—but they weren’t earthquake dreams. It was the Haiti I knew from a visit there 15 years ago and the dream was full of friends and colors, full of homes, schools and churches we visited that today lie in ruins.

Martin Luther King dreamed of the beloved community, a community made up of people of every race, class and nation. He believed with all his heart that "We are tied together in the single garment of destiny, caught in an inescapable network of mutuality."

An inescapable network of mutuality. I wonder about that this morning as we mourn with our sisters and brothers in Haiti. We watch and wait and listen with them, as the search for missing family and friends continues; as others try to find places to bury the dead while living in cars and on the streets because the buildings that still stand are simply not safe to enter.

If we are paying attention, we can feel, palpably, that “inescapable network of mutuality” pulling us all together.

Here are a few images, memories and impressions of the Haiti I knew in 1995.

Before the earthquake, in the capital city of the poorest country in the Western hemisphere, Port-au-Prince was painted with big, bright splotches of color. Artists and would-be-artists painted big, brave, bold pictures on sidewalks and walls, on buildings and inside churches and schools, anywhere they could find an empty, flat surface. Pictures of birds and flowers, pictures of people with hats and huge, wide smiles, full of life, full of joy.

It was Sunday morning and we jumped on a tap-tap, one of the colorful, rickety Haitian buses, and rode up into the hills outside of Leogane. Five priests, one a native Haitian and four of us, Americans, stood at the altar of St. Etienne’s Episcopal Church in Buteau to celebrate the Holy Eucharist.

The place was packed to overflowing and it was very hot. But the church was built on a hillside and the turquoise painted cinder blocks had space between them to allow an occasional breeze to float through. The faces and the voices of the people were full of joy, full of hope somehow and oh how they sang. We used the French translation of the Book of Common Prayer and they dutifully said the responses in Haiti’s official language, even as we listened to a sermon in Creole and said a few prayers in English.

Outside, children drew letters and pictures in the dust that covered our car and were more than cooperative posing for photographs. I look at those slides today and wonder how they could smile so generously when they had so little. So little food, so little education, so little shelter, so little of everything. And that was before the earthquake.

The images from Haiti this week have been heart-rending and deeply disturbing, beyond belief.

If ever there was a moment when we needed to remember that we belong to a beloved community, that moment is now.

We are part of a beloved community, mindful of the myriad ways we are connected with the people of Haiti, where there are 83,000 Episcopalians worshipping in over 100 congregations. In addition, Haiti has around 200 Episcopal schools for 6,000 students. As you may have heard, the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti is the largest diocese in the Episcopal Church and it is growing.

If names help connect us, we are part of a beloved community because the Episcopal Cathedral in Port-au-Prince is called St. Trinité, Holy Trinity, and the school that lies in ruins this morning is called Holy Trinity School.

We are part of a beloved community because our rector, Bill Deneke, and friends like Ed Buckley and Damian Reeder, who have travelled to Haiti, representing us, keeping watch over the wells your dollars have helped build, wells that provide clean water for people dying of thirst.

On their trip last month, they were part of a team that secured the release from prison of a man held for months for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his children.

We are part of that beloved community, that “inescapable network of mutuality.”

In the 62nd chapter of the book of Isaiah, we have heard this shout:

For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not rest,

Until her vindication shines out like the dawn, and her salvation like a burning torch.

Isaiah, the prophet, promises to keep talking, keep preaching; he promises that nothing will make him sit down and shut up until God does what God has promised to do: restore Jerusalem and give Jerusalem a new name. No longer will Jerusalem be called desolate and forsaken. God will change her name and everyone in the whole world will know that she is the apple of God’s eye, delightful and pleasing.

Isaiah thus stands at the gate, banging on the door, insisting that God pay attention, that God remember the beloved city and restore the health and welfare of all the people. That’s Isaiah’s vision for the restoration of God’s people, Israel.

What vision, what hope can we have for Haiti today?

We can trust that God is paying attention, that God will remember the people, the beloved, in the city of Port au Prince and the surrounding towns and countryside.

Did you hear that President Obama invited two of his predecessors to the White House yesterday for a meeting about the crisis in Haiti? President Clinton and President Bush subsequently wrote an excellent piece for the NY Times. They are pointing toward the future, God’s future for Haiti.

They wrote: We should never forget the damage done and the lives lost, but we have a chance to do things better than we once did; be a better neighbor than we once were; and help the Haitian people realize their dream for a stronger, more secure nation.

And in order for there to be hope tomorrow, we can send money today, along with our prayers.

At the end of the service this morning (During the announcements this morning), Fr. Deneke will come and share his plan for what we can do at Holy Trinity.

But the question of the future hangs in the air this morning. How can Haiti recover from this cataclysmic disaster?

Bob Herbert, writing in his column yesterday, had this to say:

“Enslavement, murderous colonial oppression, invasions by powerful foreign armies, grotesque homegrown tyrants, natural disasters — all you have to do is wait a while in Haiti for the next catastrophe to strike. On Tuesday, it was an earthquake that crushed the capital city of Port-au-Prince and much of its surroundings and raised the level of suffering and death to heights that defied comprehension…

Just when you think the ultimate has happened, the absolute worst, something even more dire, comes along.

And yet.

No matter how overwhelming the tragedy, how bleak the outlook, no matter what malevolent forces the fates see fit to hurl at this tiny, beleaguered, mountainous, sun-splashed portion of the planet, there is no quit in the Haitian people.

They rose up against the French and defeated the forces of Napoleon to become the only nation to grow out of a slave revolt. They rose up against the despotic Jean-Claude (Baby Doc) Duvalier and sent him packing. Despite ruthless exploitation by more powerful nations, including the United States, and many long years of crippling civil strife, corruption, terror and chronic poverty, the Haitian people have endured.

They will not be defeated by this earthquake.” he concludes.

On Friday afternoon, I had an email from Tracy Bruce, a priest friend of mine who has been working in Haiti for 20 years. She writes about the hope and the courage of the Haitian people…

I have been particularly touched by the singing in procession in Champs de Mars, the large plaza in Port au Prince. They were characterized by CNN reporters as a spiritual people maintaining their faith and hope in the midst of despair. It reminded me of my first visit to Haiti 20 years ago, working with people living in the absolute middle of paradox and celebrating.

These beautiful people know something of celebration in the midst of great suffering!

Today, we open our arms and our hearts to enlarge our beloved community, to remember with thanks the life of the Rev. Martin Luther King, to mourn with our sisters and brothers in Haiti.

In the future, we can redouble our efforts to help build more wells, to rebuild schools and churches, to rebuild roads, to help with reforestation projects. We can send teachers and doctors and engineers to work as partners with the Haitian people.

We can work together, sing, teach, plant trees and learn from the people of Haiti the lessons they have to teach us about hope, about courage, about faith.

Let us pray.

God of the living and the dead, we wail in grief at the pain and loss and horror and distress of our brothers and sisters in Haiti.

We do not understand your ways –that those who already suffer the most,

now suffer so much more.

Where people are still breathing under collapsed buildings, give them air and hope and courageous searchers.

Where children are injured or orphaned, find them trusted friends and generous caregivers.

Where despair is infectious and disease or looting spreads, bring patience and forbearance and healing and strength to conquer temptation.

And when others look with compassion from afar, release resources, empower expertise, shape political will, and bring deliverance for your people in their distress.

Through him who was crushed and bruised for us, in the comfort of your Holy Spirit. Amen. (Prayer written by Sam Well, Dean of Duke Chapel)

One of the personal connections that draws me into a beloved community with the people of Haiti is music. I have friends in that country with whom it’s been my privilege to make music both here and there.

So when I discovered a new hymn about Haiti a couple of days ago, I knew we had to sing it this morning. Presbyterian pastor and songwriter, Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, was inspired to write a hymn for Haiti this past week. In an interview on Thursday, she said “I wrote this hymn as a way of providing a prayer that could be sung in worship, so people could express their sadness and grief at this disaster, as well as their faith in God and a commitment to serve God in the midst of tragedy," Gillette says. "The things we believe, that we sing about on Sunday mornings, need to be related to the things we see and experience in the world around us," Gillette says.

In Haiti, There is Anguish

In Haiti, there is anguish that seems too much to bear;

A land so used to sorrow now knows even more despair.

From city streets, the cries of grief rise up to hills above;

In all the sorrow, pain and death, where are you, God of love?

A woman sifts through rubble, a man has lost his home,

A hungry, orphaned toddler sobs, for she is now alone.

Where are you, Lord, when thousands die, the rich, the poorest poor?

Were you the very first to cry for all that is no more?

O God, you love your children; you hear each lifted prayer!

May all who suffer in that land know you are present there.

In moments of compassion shown, in simple acts of grace,

May those in pain find healing balm, and know your love’s embrace.

Where are you in the anguish? Lord, may we hear anew

That anywhere your world cries out, you’re there-- and suffering, too.

And may we see, in others’ pain, the cross we’re called to bear;

Send out your church in Jesus’ name to pray, to serve, to share.

Tune: Frederick Charles Maker, 1881

Text: Copyright 2010 by Carolyn Winfrey Gillette. All rights reserved.

Permission is given for use by those who support Church World Service

Sermon: The Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ

January 10, 2010

The Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ

Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Very Reverend William Thomas Deneke, rector

Baptism is a rite that proclaims transformation. It is more about Christ’s death and resurrection than John the baptizer’s focus on God’s anger and vengeance. Why Jesus wanted to be baptized by John has long been debated. Whatever the reason, Jesus’ baptism by John did not reveal a messiah with a winnowing fork ready to cast the unfaithful away like chaff. Instead, this figure from Nazareth, ready to take up his mission, got God’s attention and approval. Perhaps it was destined; perhaps the time was right. But the vision of John the baptizer was about to be radically changed. And the signal for what would shake the foundations was a dove and a voice from heaven that said, in the words of the Cotton Patch version of the Bible, “You are my dear Son, I’m proud of you.”

Jesus did not stick around long on the banks of the Jordan after that. He did not stay with John’s theology of retribution and wrath. But he did stay with the commitment to holiness.

And that commitment led him on a journey that defines the baptism we will administer today.

The gospel reading gives us more than a hint about how Jesus reshaped John’s baptism. We discover that somehow in the mix of what we call the baptismal life – a mix much messier than John imagined – the Holy Trinity plays the major role. And what John saw as simple right and wrong is only a prologue to a more profound drama of redemption and hope. With the arrival of the Holy Spirit, Jesus the faithful Son, and God the loving Father, things got a lot more complicated.

The gospel uses imagery to describe the presence of the Holy Spirit and God the Father. The Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus in bodily form like a dove… and a voice came from heaven. This is poetic language. The kind of language that can describe what ordinary words fail to convey. Our imaginations are quickened. And we hear God say, “You are my dear Son; I’m proud of you.”

Somewhere in our baptismal life we need to hear words like that. Maybe at our baptism. But perhaps not even in church. But somewhere, some time, some place.

Today’s reading from the Acts of the Apostles attests to a variety of early church beliefs about how and when the Spirit acts in baptism. There has long been a lively discussion in the Church about the distinction between water baptism and spirit baptism.

In our liturgy the marking of the cross on the forehead of the newly baptized is one sign of spirit baptism. Another is the laying on of hands in confirmation. But then it can be a long time between baptism and confirmation, and what if the Spirit can’t wait?

Generally, we have tried to normalize the work of the Spirit. But truthfully that’s hard to do when you’re dealing with poetic forms like doves and voices from heaven. The Spirit resists our efforts to normalize him …or her. So even though there is a well-defined institutional script for God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, we have to be careful not to fall into the trap of John the baptizer. We can never take away the wonder of what is ultimately sacred and amazingly compassionate.

So here we are, about to baptize Charles Randall Booker and Kaelyn Rebecca Carter into a mystery based on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And about the only way they or any of us can ever really link with the baptismal life is through the gift of the Holy Spirit. That puts us pretty at the mercy of grace. At the mercy of the voice that said, You are my son; I’m proud of you.

Of course, we make promises – vows – as we enter into the baptismal covenant. But we know we’re really not up to keeping those promises. We may do our best, but it is only through the love of God that we will be made what we aspire to become. Only through the gift of the Holy Spirit will we become what God calls us to be.

That does not mean we are free to dismiss our vows. It does mean that in dying to ourselves and allowing God to raise us to the life of Christ, we can be transformed into more faithful keepers of the covenant. That is what the baptismal life is about.

And in this process we may hear with some regularity, if we truly listen, a voice from beyond say, “You are my dear one; I’m proud of you.” When we hear that with our hearts, we know that the Holy Spirit is around.

But there is another twist: one important to keep in mind. Before we get too confident in our walk with Jesus, we might remember the seventh chapter of the Gospel of Mark. Here Jesus is approached by a foreign woman who begs him to cast out a demon from her little daughter. Jesus’ response is “Let the children – my people – be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs – the foreigners. Jesus comes around only after the woman confronts his exclusive moral judgment.

Sometimes the Spirit speaks to us thorough voices other than those from heaven. And dying to ourselves and being raised by God means listening and responding even to what we may not want to hear. That’s what Jesus came to do with the foreign woman.

Yesterday, at a baptism workshop, we listened to one another as we told our stories of doubt and faith, of being lost and being found. It is both in telling our stories and in hearing those of others that we discover the wonder of God among us. The stories we share are gifts, gifts that reveal our joys and struggles in responding to the wonder of a heavenly voice that keeps somehow saying, You are my dear one; I’m proud of you.

So we can promise Charles Randall and Kaelyn Rebecca that if they take their baptism seriously, they are in for a lively journey. This is the baptismal life into which we welcome them. It is a journey that can finally only be described poetically. One too wondrously full of possibilities for us to describe in mundane terms. We need our rich liturgies and more. And we need the soulful silence of the universe.

Charles and Kaelyn, your family, friends and all on the journey are here to encourage you, to love you and to forgive you along the way. But most of all, most of all, the wonder of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit is with you on this day and throughout your journey through baptismal waters.

Sermon: The Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ

December 24, 2009

The Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ

Luke 2:1-14

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Very Reverend William Thomas Deneke, rector

This is the time of year when many folks find themselves stranded at airports. Too many people are going places, more than can be accommodated. So people end-up sleeping in nooks and crannies around air terminals.

Mary and Joseph found themselves in this kind of situation. No accommodations. Too many people. No bed available.

All of us have been waylaid on some journey -- a detour, a cancelled reservation, overbooking on a flight. And we find things more out of our control than we wish.

For Mary and Joseph this was just the time when the baby was due. Right there in the airport. Right there in the village with no vacancy signs on the door of the Inn.

I suppose a lot of people would blame Mary and Joseph. Could they not have postponed the trip for a while? Could they not have phoned ahead for reservations? Maybe Joseph could have secured a gold card and they would have enjoyed the relative privacy of a guest lounge.

But we all know, if we’re honest with ourselves, that things don’t always go as planned and there are plenty of things around for us to trip over.

For Mary and Joseph, the whole journey was something to trip over. This was no mid-winter break, no seasonal vacation. A ruler looking for revenue designed their journey. There were duties to be paid to occupying powers and everyone was to be taxed.

Well, maybe not everyone. There were those who lived on the margins of society. Those whose existence meant little to rulers. Such a group showed up in Bethlehem that night. Shepherds. A motley crew that lived in the fields with sheep avoided the impasse at the airport and walked right into the stable. Walked right into the Christmas story. Remarkable.

Everything about the story draws on the unexpected. Even an angel shows up to say, “Do not be afraid!” “Goodness gracious Angel, the journey has been a disaster. The only inn in town is overbooked, Mary is giving birth in a place intended for animals, home is far away, and you say, “Do not be afraid?”

And this is how the Christmas story unfolds. A story that amazingly does not rattle us but lessens our anxiety. A story in which we find comfort and hope. I’ve heard this story countless times, and it still speaks to the deepest places of my life. And we gather this evening once again to hear the familiar passage from the Gospel according to Luke.

In part, it is the very unexpected circumstances of the account that offer reassurance. In the out of control places of our lives, an angel of the Lord says, “Do not be afraid.” When the doors of hospitality are closed to us, there are those who care. When we can only see disaster, the story gives us a grander perspective and fills us with hope.

There is a lot of mystery in the Christmas story. Things do not fall out in an orderly fashion. Consider again the motley shepherds. Undeterred by official decrees and crowded airports and busy schedules, they are encountered by an angel with a heavenly entourage. These workers, relegated to the margins, are the first to hear the glad tidings. Jesus would later say, “the first shall be last, and the last shall be first.” That contradictory message is ironically comforting because it reveals a compassionate justice that we want to associate with a savior.

The Christmas story turns things upside down. And as much as we don’t want our lives in disarray, we are encouraged by tonight’s gospel.

In our heart of hearts we know we need a savior. A savior who is not bound by our desires or fears. A savior who does not depend upon scheduled flights and vacant rooms. A savior who affirms and upholds what sometimes is accorded little value.

Tonight we celebrate such a messiah. One who finds us even when we miss our flights, even when we’re not where we want to be, in any sense. A messiah who surprises us with new life and hope when they are least expected. And one who is more connected to life - to us – than we imagine.

Tonight, we join with the motley shepherds in glorifying and praising God. And with the angels in proclaiming, “Glory to God and peace on earth!”

Sermon: Third Sunday of Advent

December 13, 2009

The Third Sunday of Advent, Year C

Luke 3:7-18

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Very Reverend William Thomas Deneke, rector

Once again he’s back. Just when the radio is belching out chipmunks singing about Santa and Elvis is promising to be home for Christmas, John the Baptizer arrives with a greeting no one wants to hear. Here comes that preacher from the desert throwing water on our Christmas preparations. Phrases such as “brood of vipers,” “wrath to come,” and “thrown into the fire” are not lines we write on our Christmas cards. “Merry Christmas, you bunch of snakes!” This hardly seems like something we need to hear a few days before we celebrate the nativity of Christ.

But on the other hand, maybe the weird guy from the desert has a point. He’s not thinking about holiday preparations. It is doubtful that he has decorations, gifts and turkey on his mind. John has a vision of the future stirring within him, a vision that is shaking the foundations. God is at work and business as usual won’t do. The coming of Christ calls for new behavior, for repentance and for opening ourselves to a new way of being in the world. Anything that gets in the way of this transformation has to be thrown aside, thrown into the fire.

These days we hear a lot of talk about corporate restructuring. Many times the old ways promised doom. John is proclaiming the need for restructuring our lives. And he is pretty clear that without restructuring we are headed toward doom.

Look at the restructuring John is preaching. “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” If our way of operating is to think only of ourselves, our lives are headed toward the dump with its unquenchable fire. If love of our neighbor and sharing our resources is not part of our moral DNA, we are no more than waste, the chaff that is thrown away.

Of course, we don’t like to think of ourselves as throwaways, especially in an age of recycling. Neither did people in the time of John. And he got into big trouble.

But the early church took him seriously and recorded his message for us to hear today. So only a few days before we gather on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, John’s words ring out in churches around the world.

“O.k., we get the message. We’ve been warned; we’ll try to do better,” we might say. But John is talking about more than “trying to do better.” He is asking us to turn our lives around. He is presenting a twelve-step program for salvation.

A couple of weeks ago parishioner Ed Buckley and I traveled to Haiti with a group from Food for the Poor to inspect the water wells that have been provided by Holy Trinity and other donors. The first day we traveled for nine hours across unbelievably rough roads. On several occasions, I thought of John the Baptizer’s admonition to make the crooked roads straight. That message had not gotten through to the Haitian roads’ department.

One of the wonders we witnessed in Haiti was the release of a man from a horrible prison. Food for the Poor had arranged for Edner’s release. He had been imprisoned for nine months for stealing rice. He had never been sentenced or had a trail because he had no money for a lawyer. Edner maintained his innocence.

I had never been in a facility as horrible as the prison we visited. Thirty-nine prisoners were housed in a cell about 10 by 14 feet. It was so crowed that sleeping on the floor could only take place in shifts. There was not room enough for all to lie down.

Jesus talks about visiting those in prisons and he speaks of release for prisoners. When I witnessed the Ft. Liberte prison, those words took on a new and deeper meaning.

When John admonishes us to share with those in need, I don’t think he is just talking about charity. He is asking us to identify with those in those in need: those who are hungry, homeless, in prison, in refugee camps, all those who live lives of hopelessness. Beyond giving to those in need, he calls us to see ourselves in the face of the homeless child begging for food on a street corner or the prisoner who stares out of prison bars with vacant, lifeless eyes.

The pillars of society of John’s day, those most invested in the status quo, reacted strongly to his message of egalitarianism. They perceived that their well-being was tied to the privileged status they enjoyed.

John makes us uncomfortable if we really listen to what he says. And while discomfort is not pleasing, it may embed a path to salvation. Through turning our lives around, we may find ourselves welcoming Christ in ways we never knew.

That is the good news promised by the desert preacher. His message is ultimately not one of condemnation, but of hope. He knows the future belongs to God. He knows that Christ is coming. He knows we need to be ready to receive the Bearer of grace and salvation. And he knows what is in the way.

We would be foolish to write off John the Baptizer as a wacky, colorful character from the desert who seasons Advent. He is a voice from within us. A voice that disturbs yet represents the wisdom of the ages. He may yet save us from ourselves, this lonely figure who baptizes with words of fire.

Sermon: First Sunday of Advent

November 29, 2009

The First Sunday of Advent

Luke 21:25-36

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Very Reverend William T. Deneke, rector

Advent is upon us; we have only four weeks to prepare for Christmas. Four weeks of shopping, decorating and partying. But that is not the preparation called for in the Bible readings for Advent.

The Psalm for today sets a tone that causes us to pause. It is a lament, a plea for God to reveal the ways and paths of the Lord. No “city sidewalk, busy sidewalks dressed in holiday style”. But rather a plea, even a demand, to be taught.

The epistle provides a window into the struggle of the early church to grasp the wonderful and bewildering future inaugurated by the risen Christ. Paul responds to the embryonic faith of the Thessalonians by blessing the young church. He holds up for them the promise of their faith and reveals his love for the community. “And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to all people, as we do to you.” This is heartwarming and encouraging.

Then Paul adds a prayer that the Thessalonians may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.

Writer and teacher Reynolds Price developed a spinal tumor that was not only deadly but also incredibly painful. He tells us that he was not an especially religious person. But very early one morning he had a vision that transported him to the shore of the Sea of Galilee. He saw twelve persons that he knew were the disciples and a sleeping man that he knew was Jesus. Jesus then stood up and walked toward him. Taking his hand, he led into the water. He took handfuls of water and poured them on Price’s head and damaged back. Then Jesus said: “Your sins are forgiven.” Price asked, “Am I also cured?” And Jesus said, “That too.”

It is the grace and forgiveness of God that rends us blameless. Jesus comes to us on clouds of forgiveness. The great poet Tennyson wrote of his faith. “Not one life shall be destroyed or cast as rubbish to the void.”

Paul focuses on and draws out that seed of faith, that kernel of hope and projects it onto the large screen of promise revealed in Christ.

Both the psalm and epistle plea for a future shaped by God and both draw from this promise to embrace hope. They have as a backdrop the words we heard from the prophet Jeremiah. His vision of hope was also set against a background of destruction. As the first, lone candle of Advent burns, Jeremiah recalls his own city burning, yet speaks of God’s future of hope.

The hope revealed in these scriptures is not just holiday cheer. Nor is it a denial of suffering and death. The hope of which we hear this morning is so drawn from the love of God that we, too, can dare to proclaim, even at the grave, “Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia”.

And then comes the gospel for this First Sunday of Advent. And, on the surface, it seems to have no real connection with the lyrics “In the air there’s a feeling of Christmas.” But if we go beneath the surface of the holidays to the place where redemption is at work, there is, indeed, a feeling of new life in the air and in the heart and throughout the world.

Luke presents a vision of a redeemed future that embraces all reality. The coming of the long expected Jesus is not divorced from the turmoil and suffering of the world. Hang onto your hats, keep the faith, do good works, get ready to have your socks blown off. Jesus is coming and a new realm of truth and justice is emerging. We are being redeemed.

The Jewish Talmud proclaims, “Do not be daunted by the Enormity of the world’s grief.

Do justice now.

Love mercy now.

Walk humbly now.

You are not obligated to complete the work,

but neither are you free to abandon it”.

New Testament theologian Gail O’Day points out that the lessons for this Sunday may seem foreign or discomforting. Yet, she says, “Without this eschatological vision, our celebration of Christmas can become solely an occasion of nostalgia and sentimentality rather than a bold enactment of God’s hopes for the world.”

An issue for many of us is that nostalgia and sentimentality are pretty attractive. We may be looking and listening for silver bells. The sentimental side of Christmas is bigger than life and clearly gets our attention. That’s why O’Day’s words ring true. Is the real promise of Christmas more than can be found under a tree?

The scriptures maintain that Advent points not to what is under the tree but to who was killed upon the tree and rose again. And maybe we don’t want to be reminded of this in late November and December. Maybe we had rather focus only on the promise of new birth and joy and happiness.

But the scriptures know the whole story. And when they speak of the hope of the future, they bear witness to the great drama of redemption in which the love of God is transforming sorrow into joy and hurt into forgiveness.

The scriptures bid us to prepare for the fullness of God’s love, the fullness of redemption and forgiveness. Opening our hearts and minds and lives to this hope that embraces both love and suffering, prepares us to receive grace even now.

Lately, I’ve heard story after story of individuals being called into offices and told they are no longer employed. Often they are told to leave by another door and not return to their workplaces. Sometimes they are even escorted from the building by security guards. These are people who have been loyal employees. Many who have sacrificed for their companies.

Such practices dehumanize and try the souls of men and women. They are a reminder of cruelty and suffering and the need for redemption. And they lead us to the Advent cry, Come, Lord Jesus.

Jesus, who is redeeming humanity, is the Expected One known to scriptures. Not just a jolly, benevolent father figure, but a man who loved and suffered and died for others. A man who revealed the presence of God in forgiving and healing and sacrificing. A man who revealed God’s faith in the future despite the suffering of the present, and did so by entering fully into the joys and sorrows of humankind. A savior and lord who rose from the dead and will come again. It is this long expected savior for which this season invites us to prepare.

The Advent vision of hope is salvation for a troubled world. Writer Edward Hays has said that Advent is a winter training ground for those who desire peace. It is not afraid to look at the sins of the world and still dare to hope that the world is being redeemed.

It is a short season, only four weeks. But Advent has much to offer. The good news it conveys means that we can hope, despite all that is falling apart in our lives, our communities, and the world around us. Advent offers us expectation and hope for something new. “Stand up and raise your heads”, says the gospel, “because your redemption is drawing near.”

Sermon: Christ the King Sunday

November 22, 2009

Christ the King Sunday

John 18:33-38a

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Reverend Allan Sandlin, associate rector

Late November has snuck up on us once again. The last leaves are falling from the trees in our back yard. Our suddenly very tall children are looking forward to one more family Thanksgiving before the oldest one heads off to college. (Tell me I’m not the only one thinking about that?) For Gretchen and me, our thoughts always turn to memories of our fathers, both of whom had late November birthdays. The fading memories of Thanksgivings past get added to the mix. And since we were both born in a certain decade, memories of an infamous November 22nd when our childhood innocence and the nation’s Camelot dreams were shattered.

That’s late November in our world. Late November in the church is all about endings and beginnings. T. S. Eliot poignantly reminds us that

What we call the beginning is often the end

And to make an end is to make a beginning.

The end is where we start from.

And so on this last Sunday in the long season of Pentecost, the Church celebrates the Feast of Christ the King as an end where we start from. If you think about it, today’s sort of like New Year’s Eve in the Church, for next Sunday the church year begins again—the First Sunday of Advent is our New Year’s Day.

If you Googled images of Christ the King, you’d find pictures of Jesus with bright, shining crowns on his head, some of them pure gold, others crusted with jewels. And you’d see icons with muted colors, brilliant halo rays surrounding Jesus’ head. Sometimes he’s sitting on a throne, dressed in flowing red velvet robes. Royal Jesus, looking very much like an earthly king might look. Those images are very much in tune with this morning’s first three readings.

From the Hebrew Scriptures, the book of Daniel presents an apocalyptic vision of a throne engulfed in fiery flames, with an Ancient One seated on it and waited on by ten thousand times ten thousand servants. The king in Psalm 93 has put on his most splendid, beautiful clothes and is acclaimed as mightier than the sound of many waters, mightier than the breakers of the sea. And, of course, leave it to the book of Revelation, the last book in the Bible, the Omega of Holy Scripture to describe Jesus Christ, “the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead and the ruler of the kings on earth”, as the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end… It’s all so rich and wonderful, it’s almost too much to bear, isn’t it?

If we stopped right there, we could go on singing our triumphal hymns, crowning Jesus King of Kings and Lord of Lords, with all the glory and grandeur we can muster. It’s a fitting grand finale to the long season of Pentecost, the final hurrah before entering the quiet days of Advent. We’ve selected hymns this morning that sing of Christ’s reign and God’s glory and if we’d thought about it, we could have hired trumpet players for today. It’s entirely appropriate to celebrate the reign of Christ, the coming of God’s kingdom with pomp and circumstance.

But we can’t close our prayer books and go home just yet. We can’t leave without hearing this brief scene from Jesus’ trial as told in the gospel of John. Our glorious Christ the King stands in handcuffs before an earthly king named Pilate and we know where this will end. On this day of endings, the gospel lesson lands us right in the heart of the Passion of Christ. Standing in the courtroom of an earthly king, on trial for his refusal to play by the rules of an earthly kingdom. The end of our Lord’s life is just around the corner and the story doesn’t need to mention the cross for us to sense its shadow hanging over the scene. And it will be an ending that is also a beginning for if the crucifixion is coming soon, then resurrection is also near and once again, beginnings and endings are so close they almost touch each other…

In this scene, Pilate asks most of the questions, poking and prodding at Jesus. On the surface of things, Pilate’s the one in control. Jesus is in his courtroom, under guard of his soldiers and yet who do you think is the one in control?

Are you the King of the Jews?

Jesus answers Do you ask this on your own, or did someone put you up to it?

I am not a Jew, am I? Your own people handed you over to me. What have you done?

Jesus says My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my followers, my soldiers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to you. My kingdom is not from here.

So you are a king after all?

You say that.

And then Jesus gets to the heart of the matter: This is why I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.

In this very brief scene, two worlds, two kings, two kingdoms collide. Pilate’s questions make clear that this is not a religious conflict but a political one and he’s feeling the pressure of the mob just outside the palace doors, perhaps worried about losing his job if he makes the wrong choice.

When Pilate called Jesus king, according to John’s version of the story, it was as a term of derision. A few scenes further on in the story, Pilate will instruct his people to inscribe “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews” on a notice tacked to the cross in 3 languages.

Jesus, even with his hands tied behind his back, is calm and epitomizes what we today might call a “non-anxious presence”. His royalty permeates the air. My kingdom is not of this world he says. And with those words, Jesus separates himself from Pilate’s world of politics, military might and the banalities of life in the royal court. But Jesus is not taking himself or his followers out of this world. God’s kingdom is not some ethereal place up in the heavens, removed from contact with all the messiness, the pain, the corruption and disease and death of this world. The kingdom Jesus points toward is not on the other side of the cosmos. It is here and now.

John’s gospel from beginning to end, is all about the reality of the in-breaking Kingdom, it’s all about incarnation. And we hear it right away, in the first chapter of the book: And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.

The Word became flesh and lives among us still and we catch glimpses of it if we are paying attention. But how and where do we see it?

Those of you who are in DOCC this fall, the Disciples of Christ in Community course here at Holy Trinity, will recognize this poem by R.S. Thomas entitled “The Kingdom”. It’s a long way off but inside it here are quite different things going on: Festivals at which the poor man is king and the consumptive is healed; mirrors in which the blind look at themselves and love looks at them back; and industry is for mending the bent bones and the minds fractured by life.

It’s a long way off, but to get there takes no time and admission is free, if you will purge yourself of desire, and present yourself with your need only and the simple offering of your faith, green as a leaf.

Can you imagine a festival, a Mardi Gras perhaps, where the poor man is king and the sick are healed? Where blind people look at themselves in the mirror and love looks back at them? Can you imagine a time when our resources, our intelligence, our systems are focused not on war or making more money than we need but on mending bent bones and minds fractured by life? The kingdom of God is like that.

Author and theologian, Daniel Clendenin, sees another way of envisioning the Kingdom of God embodied by Jesus. Imagine what life would be like on earth, here and now if God were king and the rulers of this world were not. Imagine if God ruled the nations, and not Obama, Kim Jong-il, Mugabe, or Ahmadinejad. Every aspect of personal and communal life would experience a radical reversal. The political, economic, and social subversions would be almost endless—peacemaking instead of war mongering, liberation not exploitation, sacrifice rather than subjugation, mercy not vengeance, care for the vulnerable instead of privileges for the powerful, generosity instead of greed, humility rather than hubris, embrace rather than exclusion. (from an on-line essay at www.journeywithjesus.net)

You’ve heard the Hebrew word shalom. We usually think it means peace. But a better translation of shalom is human well-being. And the kingdom of God is like that.

I wonder this morning as we end another year in the church and slow down long enough to consider all our endings and beginnings, can we pay close enough attention to recognize encounters with God’s kingdom happening in our lives every day? There’s definitely some kingdom work happening at the Fair Trade Sale in Tisdale Hall today. If you think of this annual Holy Trinity event only as a great chance to do some early Christmas shopping, think again. More significant is the help we are able to give people all over the world. We are supporting artists and craftspeople whose faces we’ll never see, whose voices we’ll never hear. And they are not artists living and working in Buckhead or on the Upper West Side of New York. They are from Haiti and Bangladesh, from South Africa, Honduras, Vietnam and the Philippines …the dollars we spend go directly to help lift them a little ways out of the poverty engulfing them.

This year, we have some new friends with us, friends who live and work in Clarkston, Stone Mountain and Decatur. They are part of a community of refugees, Bhutanese people who fled their homeland because of ethnic cleansing. Many of them lived in a United Nations refugee camp in Nepal for 18 years before coming to the United States. Here in Georgia, they’ve been making stunning baskets, woven from kudzu and bamboo.

Yesterday at our Fair Trade Sale, they had the best day of sales they’ve ever had, selling over $1,300 worth of baskets. That will pay for 3 month’s rent.

Who would have imagined that our ubiquitous Southern vine could be turned into something so useful and so beautiful? Supporting these Bhutanese people, who left their homes in Asia, came to the United States and discovered a use for kudzu we’d never thought of, gives us the opportunity not only to glimpse the kingdom but perhaps to have a small part in opening up a new corner of that kingdom.

The Kingdom of God is like that.

In a few minutes, we’ll pray the prayer Jesus taught us how to pray, the Lord’s Prayer, the Our Father. It’s a prayer that I suspect we find comforting most days. But I wonder about one petition, in particular, that may be less comfortable for us to say. It might even be a little disturbing. When we look at the way the world really is, in light of what Jesus was saying and doing as he ushered in the Kingdom, do we mean it when we pray Thy kingdom come, thy will be done?

Sermon: Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost

November 8, 2009

The Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost

Mark 12:38-44

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

The Very Reverend William Thomas Deneke, rector

In today’s gospel, a poor widow who contributed a couple of coins, which were all she had to live on, is said to have been a more faithful steward than those who gave large sums but with little sacrifice.

The faithfulness of the woman was not guaranteed by her status as a widow or by her poverty. Those attributes simply predisposed her to a hard life. She could have become bitter and cynical. But in her suffering, she had learned where to place her hope. She had discovered what was ultimately trustworthy. So, perhaps out of thanksgiving or love of God or a desire to share her faith, she gave all she had.

The poor widow’s stewardship response is contrasted with that of those who gave out of their wealth without any sacrifice. Although they gave more money, their giving was less faithful than was the poor widow’s.

It is important to remember that we may hear the story quite differently from Jesus’ original audience. We may wonder at the wisdom of the poor widow in giving away every cent she had. In this part of the story there is a sub plot.

According to Jewish law the widow should have been afforded some security. She should not have been in the position of having no more than a penny. In the account Jesus not only points out the hypocrisy of the religious hierarchy, but also indicts them for neglecting to care for widows. The story’s intent is not to say that every penny should be given to the church but to hold up the injustice of a corrupt system and show how such corruption was revealed in the very ones who should have known better. The poor widow, who was easily dismissed, modeled the devotion that should have been found in community leaders.

None of this is surprising to anyone who has heard the good news of Christ. The kingdom he proclaimed always turned things upside down. The reading reminds us that things are not always as they seem. Irony and paradox commonly frame truth.

This weekend, the Presiding Bishop of our Church addressed Diocesan Council and presided and preached at the Council Eucharist. Bishop Katherine said the call of the Church now is mission, mission, mission.

I was struck by her description of the Church as an organization that exists to serve others. The Church belongs to God, not us. It’s important to remember that. We are not so much drawn into this faith community to be served, but through the power of the Holy Spirit to learn how to share and serve in the name of Christ. That is the DNA of ministry. What we have at the heart of our community is mission. The mission given us in our baptismal covenant.

It is wondrous to see how God is leading the Episcopal Church into mission. The various testimonies at Council surely revealed this. Through the grace of God we are being enabled to share our gifts and open our hearts and grow in faith. God continues to raise up our church as a blessing to many, and to lead us into deeper faith and mission.

That was so evident at Diocesan Council as we heard, for example, of two new congregations. One is the parish of Christ the King in Lilburn, an international community representing nationalities from around the world. The other is the Church of the Common Ground, which serves the homeless in downtown Atlanta. There were stories and more stories that told of the difference Episcopalians are making around the world in our ministries of compassion.

At Holy Trinity we know of many of these ministries first hand as we seek to bring clean water to Haitians without it, home improvements and educational opportunities to poor Hondurans, home rebuilding to people in New Orleans and flood relief to people in our own area. We reach out in these ways and others, such as supporting one another in our Christian formation and being with one another in our joys and sorrows, because our DNA is ministry and we are a people in mission.

When we seriously seek to live into our baptism and mission, our stewardship is less likely to reflect that of the pious folks described in the gospel and more likely to resemble that of the poor widow. And we are more likely to place our hope in God rather than in things such as getting ahead or in having what we want or in just surviving. We come to know as we mature in Christ that church is about serving others and blessing God.

In the gospel today all this activity of the Spirit is witnessed in a poor widow who gave all she had to live on. She is a metaphor for faithful sharing. She is both an inspiration and a challenge.

The question the reading raises for us to ponder is how do we give out of the faith with which we are blessed? Or, in other words, how do we give faithfully rather than just offer what is left over?

Two quotes from two of the saints of our time speak to this: The first is from Mother Teresa of Calcutta, and the second is from the English author, C.S. Lewis.

Mother Teresa once said, “If you give what you do not need, it isn’t giving.”

And in a similar vein, C. S. Lewis wrote: “I do not believe one can settle how much we ought to give. I am afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare.”

These two people of faith lived and served with openness to the Holy Spirit. They were not perfect; they struggled with their faith. But in Mother Teresa and C.S. Lewis, can be seen two people who through grace came to the place of the poor widow.

We can go there, too. And we do so whenever we open ourselves to be transformed by the grace of God. Whenever we come to know the joy of serving God and our neighbor. And whenever we understand that life is about ministry and mission.

It is through this baptismal path that we come to place our hope in God. In this way we stand with the poor widow, knowing where our true salvation lies and that God’s grace is abundant enough to share. In fact, it is in sharing that we receive the best gifts. Another thing the kingdom of God turns upside down.

For many of us, living this way involves some struggle. We have to die to something. Maybe even to our desire to find an alternative to God. The baptismal life is about dying to just these sorts of things. Turning away from whatever draws us from the love of God.

But while entering the tomb with Jesus can be hard to undertake, the promise is that we will find new life. We will be transformed and made free to serve in the power of the Spirit. We will be free to love, to give from our faith and not from what is left over.

I doubt that we will see the poor widow on many billboards or in many commercials. But she points the way to abundant life, and she reminds us that within all of us there is a call to live more fully into Christ our Savior who said it is more blessed to give than to receive.

Sermon: Twenty-First Sunday after Pentecost

Justin Yawn, Seminarian

Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia

Today we hear a story about the 12 disciples, specifically James and John, in our Gospel lesson. It is a story unique to the Synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. In the story we first see James and John make a pretty demanding request of Jesus. Secondly, Jesus responds to their question with questions that are affirmed by James and John. Then, the other disciples are taught a lesson about discipleship. Is anyone having a hard time following the chain of events in the story today? Because I know I was the first time I read it. However, despite the chain of events I think something radical is at work in this text that has real meaning for us today. The main question that I wrestled with after reading this text is what does it mean to be a disciple today? In order to answer this question we are going to have to embark on a journey, a journey into the core of this passage, ending in Jesus’ words to his disciples.

James and John are not just any two disciples. Earlier in the Gospel story we find out that Jesus calls them straight out of a fishing boat and tells them that now they are going to be fishers of men. They are considered the most zealous of all the disciples earning them the name “Sons of thunder”. These were not just any two of the twelve and later in the Gospel story we know that they will be with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. So, these two disciples ask Jesus what seems to be a bold question. “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you?” I can only imagine, although it is not in the text, that Jesus had to have raised an eyebrow to that question, after all he is the one who called these guys in the first place and he is their teacher, but he responds by saying “what can I do for you?” And they quickly ask…. (Read verse 37 here). Wow, is the first word that came to mind when I read that question. What gives these two the right to make such a demanding request? If we follow Mark’s portrayal of the disciples as dense and clueless, then we are presented with one way of understanding their question. In their denseness they have missed the point of Jesus’ passion prediction which just preceded this question. However, that is only one interpretation and I am not sure if that really justifies such a bold question. Another way to look at this problematic question is through the lens of uncertainty. I think that James and John are expressing uncertainty about the future which is probably a product of what Jesus has predicted three times. They believe that Jesus is going to Jerusalem to establish his Kingdom and they want to be certain that they have a place in it. They are not as focused on the present ministry that lies ahead.

This question is probably not too far from our minds this morning, especially in a world that is filled with anxiety about the future and a number of issues, the least of which is the economy. I am sure many of us sitting here this morning would like to change the question slightly and ask Jesus, “Can you make sure that I don’t get laid off this week?” Or “Can you make sure that my small business stays open through this economic decline?” or “Can you make sure that my family can keep their house?” Or even outside the walls of our little church home people around the world might be asking “Can you make sure I have something to eat tomorrow?” or “Can you make sure my children our safe walking to school?” Or “Can you make sure that my family has clean water tomorrow?” Not one of these questions is greater than another because they all are products of our anxiety and very real concerns for us. Just like James and John, we are seeking to bring some certainty to our future.

Jesus provides an interesting answer that does not deal directly with the future anxiety. He says that they will drink the cup that he will drink, that they will be baptized in the same way he is, but it is out his authority to grant them their request to sit at his right hand and left hand because it is for those whom it has been prepared for. What a radical response!! Probably not what James and John were hoping to hear. I am sure they were hoping that Jesus would say, sure James and John!! Which one of you wants to sit on my right and which one on my left? However, this is not the case. Instead Jesus gives an answer that is assures them that they have a place with him in the future, but the right and left hands are not just reserved for two people but for many. It is a unique answer. Not to mention Jesus does not come across as angry or agitated by their question, but the other disciples are angry. Possibly the other ten felt like they had been “one upped” by James and John, or that James and John were trying to take advantage of their beloved teacher. Whatever the case Jesus is quick to turn the situation into a lesson and this is, I believe, is the radical message in the Gospel today.

Jesus tells them that “whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.” What a radical new way to view discipleship. Jesus has shifted the whole role of a disciple into that of a servant. Not just one who proclaims the good news but one that is to live out the message they are spreading. Now I think it is important to make the connection between James and John’s original question and Jesus’ response. Essentially, Jesus has told James, John, and the disciples that in Christ we are reborn and called into the fold at baptism, have access to salvation through the cup/ death and resurrection of Christ, and because of this we should follow Christ’s example and be servants in the world. Jesus, in one way, addresses the future aspect of their question but decides to pull their attention back to the present task. The action that the disciples are to undertake then and there as well as the action we should take now in our lives. My brothers and Sisters through James and John’s question we are brought on a journey that unfolds the true meaning of Christian charity enacted in discipleship. Our love of God and recognition of Christ’s action in our lives leads us not to worry about the future glory that exists for us, but to focus on the present as disciples spreading this message of hope and love in the world not only by word but through action.

Jesus has transformed the way the 12 should think of their ministry and how we should think of our ministry as disciples today. Jesus came to save us and give his life a ransom for many: for us here today and for all of humanity. So, as Disciples of Christ, how are we going to be servants today and spread the love Christ has shown us? What does it mean to live into this life of servant hood or as faithful stewards of ourselves and resources? Yes, stewardship has a prominent place in this language of servant hood. It is not something to be frightened of. Discipleship calls us to be good stewards of what we have and through servant ministry we are able to share what God has blessed us with to those around us.

A modern day example of this stewardship and servant hood is found in the life and teachings of Mother Teresa. She believed that she was called to be a servant to the poorest of the poor, but that did not always mean the destitute. She believed that we should just simply share a smile to those around us because that is an example of the love of God residing in us. She challenges us to view the world in a new way focusing on those who have not been shown the love of Christ. She and her Sisters of Charity were truly servants.

Let’s just think back to my earlier questions I proposed and see how our parish family has responded. We as a community of servants have filled the need of clean water for many people living in Haiti. We have provided food through the Heifer Project to villages in Africa. Through our good stewardship we continue to provide food and other resources to those living in our own community through the ministry of DEAM. But, what about those other questions perhaps the more pressing questions for us here today?

Unfortunately, I am not able to stand before you with all the answers to those other questions. What I can stand before you and say is that we as disciples and servants are called to look around and find those in need just as Mother Teresa did. Think how we can transform the world we live in if we just stop and ask those in need around us “How can I help you today?” What if we find our neighbor who was just laid off and ask “How can I help you today? What if we ask that person on the side of the street in need of food, clothing and shelter “How can I help you today?” All of a sudden, through servant hood, charity and love, we begin to address the anxiety surrounding those questions. It is a radical message: Jesus is calling the disciples to act in faith and not just proclaim their faith.

This radical call to discipleship has to begin inside each one of us. The first step of this is, as our mission statement proudly proclaims, “Open our hearts to God”. This is something we have to decide to do on our own. It is the one part of discipleship, servant hood, and stewardship that cannot be done for us. It is an individual commitment to begin to live our life aligned with Christ and in accord with Christ recognizing that Christ is with us, provided us with our blessings, and calls us to a life of servant hood. Christ was the ultimate example of this radical servant hood when he gave his life on the cross as a ransom for us. As disciples, servants and stewards in God’s kingdom think how we can transform the world we live in if we just stop look around and tend, in whatever way we can, to those in need around us. Just think what you have accomplished in this community by being faithful servants and good stewards of your resources. My brothers and sisters what a wonderful world it would be if we all lived a life of charity and love of neighbor!! Amen.

Sermon: Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost

The Very Rev. William Thomas Deneke, rector

Today we are presented with one of the difficult sayings of Jesus. Difficult, that is, if we are rich, and by world standards, we are. So it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for us to enter the kingdom of God.

That may put us in the position of comedian W.C. Fields. In failing health and near the end of his notoriously irreverent and indulgent life, Fields was found by his doctor propped up in his sick bed, reading the Bible. His doctor said, "W.C., what are you doing with a Bible?" Fields replied with his wit, "Well, my boy, I'm lookin' for loopholes."

We may be tempted to look for loopholes around being faithful stewards. Loopholes, though, are like mirages: they promise more than they give. That's because shortcuts in matters of faith and commitment lead us away from the kingdom of God.

But the gospel isn't just warning us about loopholes. It is describing what our evangelical friends might call the struggle between control and surrender.

As long as we have the resources to shape our destinies, we are going to be tempted to avoid surrendering our lives to God. That's because we tell ourselves that we don't really, really need God. We can take care of ourselves and taking care of ourselves is the most important thing we can do.

Most of us have been brought up to believe that. If our parents didn't teach us that, then our culture did. And it seems to work, so in return for our self-dependency, we may be charitable and sometimes even generous with our resources.

So Jesus could not possibly be talking to us.

As a child growing up in the 50's, I remember going with my mother to eat at Luby's Cafeteria in San Antonio. Cafeterias were sort of big things in the 50's. You would go through the line and choose what you wanted. There were lots of choices. As a kid I was always drawn toward fish and tartar sauce.

The cafeteria was quite different from a boarding house where I sometimes ate when I was in college. There you ate what was put on the table and you had to serve yourself quickly before it was gone. The choice was more eating or not eating than what to eat.

The cafeteria model was probably what the rich man in the gospel was used to. Maybe not so much in his eating habits, but in his decision-making. His resources allowed him to live with choices. And Jesus knew that the same resources that gave him choices could get him into trouble with his soul and his neighbor. Paradoxically, the choices that promised freedom and favor, could bind him to their domain.

Here's the good news: Our money will not save us. Money can do a lot for us and for others but it will never open the gates to the kingdom of God. Those gates are opened by grace, mercy and compassion. And we do well to use our money to facilitate our being open to those gifts of God. That's why Jesus told the rich man to give his money to the poor. In so doing the man might have discovered the true source of wealth.

It is unlikely that banks are going to print on our statements, Money is for glorifying God and not for salvation. But if we want to share in the kingdom of God, we might want to think about it.

The kingdom proclaimed by and revealed in Jesus was a way of living that turned ordinary values upside down. It could not be bought; there were no privileged memberships. It was a realm defined by the Beatitudes, a kingdom where the last was first and the first last.

And that's hard for us to contend with. But at the end of the day our place in the kingdom will be secured not so much by what we believe but by God's mercy. Through the love of God, we can make changes in our lives that seem as unlikely as a camel passing through the eye of a needle.

This afternoon we will honor St. Francis of Assisi by blessing animals on the parish lawn. Francis is a good example of how God transformed a person of wealth into a servant of grace. In him we are presented with a vision of God's realm and a story of a rich, young man who did not turn away from Jesus' invitation.

What kind of invitation is Jesus offering us? And how do we respond? In the gospel story the rich man went away grieving. But at least he got it. He experienced the invitation, took it seriously and responded intentionally. He could have blown it off.

I think that is the greater danger we face. Becoming so defended by our resources or status or beliefs or even debt that we are no longer vulnerable enough to really hear Jesus' invitation.

But life conspires against our defenses. And there are many invitations from God. Invitations to put our trust in mercy and compassion. Invitations to be a blessing to God and a neighbor to others. Invitations to be a faithful steward, trusting the abundance of grace that is redeeming us even now.

As God's stewards, all of us are invited to see money through the eyes of God's kingdom. As with the rich man in the gospel, that may sometimes challenge us. But how much richer we are when our eyes and hearts are opened by the One who loves us more than we can even imagine. The One whose love is such that it enables even a camel to go through the eye of a needle.