Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Luke 14-16

 

These chapters begin to increase tension within Luke’s gospel.  The tension of a meal and the cost of discipleship.  Luke than offers a meditation on lostness in chapter 15, where we are invited to ponder prayerfully what we have lost or where we feel lost or relationship that are strained or no longer in existence.  The tension is amplified as Jesus teaches about a dishonest manager who is forgiven but unable to forgive (which can be like a mirror to our lives) and then a rich man who is unable to see the human person of Lazarus along his path (which can be like a window to the world).  Hold both those metaphors of a mirror and window in your life this day.  What are you seeing in yourself – good or not so great?  What are you seeing in others – both good and not so great.

 

Three questions to ponder prayerfully: When have you recently had a meal that filled you, where perhaps it wasn’t even about the food, but about the people there?  Did you notice anything new in the parable of the Lost Sons – because in my mind both brothers are lost – it is just that the older brother never changed his mailing address.  You can be lost and never leave home.  Finally, how might you look out the window of your life with new eyes to see the Lazarus you might be missing?  Remember this is easier when we slow down (throwback reference to yesterday!)

 

A few comments on the chapters:  I find the parable of the prodigal family to be so powerful ~ it really is a great summary of ALL the gospels.  “Great,” you think, “Now you tell me!  You mean I didn’t have to read all those other chapters during Lent!”  Sure, Luke 15, may be the CliffsNotes version of the good news, but you would miss some of the other deeper truths if you only read this one chapter.  The word, “prodigal” means lavish sharing that could even be reckless or wasteful.  We heard this in the parable of the Sower of chapter 8 too.  If prodigal means over the top, the younger son shows this by going off and spending all the inheritance in the blink of an eye with extravagant parties and expensive cars.  The father also is prodigal in showing over-the-top love in receiving the younger son home.  Finally, the older brother is prodigal in his anger – I can still feel his frustration radiating off the page when I read this parable.  Pause to reflect if you believe any of the actions and words of this family were justifiable, this can be a mirror to your life.  I encourage you to think about moments you have wandered off or walked away from relationships, even when you had a good reason to do so.  Think about moments you were overjoyed to embrace someone, even if that person hurt you.  Think about moments you have fueled and fed hurt and anger in your life toward someone else.  May the prodigal (over-the-top) love of God find you today in ways that surround and sustain you.  Amen. 

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Luke 11-13

 

An overview of these three chapters: This grouping of chapters starts with prayer but takes a turn toward brokenness and pain and suffering.  Placing the stories side-by-side in these chapters reminds us that prayer is not just some salve that will solve everything that ails us.  Prayer isn’t a money-back guarantee for the good life.  Prayer will be honest about the evils that surround us, even assail us.  Jesus reminds us that we are called to persist in shining our light, even when there are gale force winds that threaten to extinguish the light.  Luke continues to place truths that contradict one another next to each other.  We have parables about building up more and more in storehouses, but then told not to worry.  This is a contradiction to the cultural gospel which says you need to save, build up your nest egg, because who is going to take care of you later?  We live in a culture of individualization and isolation, but the call of discipleship is into community ~ connections that are not always perfect or even easy.  I do believe that when Jesus talks about the lilies of the fields, he is pointing to being present and aware ~ open to the fullness of this moment ~ even when there is some evil or brokenness.  In chapter 13, we read a few more parables about that which is seemingly small or insignificant bringing about great change.  I think here of moments when someone’s words made all the difference in my life or one kind gesture really causing my heart to feel strangely warmed.  

 

Three questions to ponder prayerfully: Do you remember or recall how you learned the Lord’s Prayer and who taught it to you?  You are invited to slowly pray these words, letting each settle in ~ evoke and provoke new insights.  How can you today slow down?  Dallas Willard said that, “Hurry is the great enemy of the spiritual life in our day.  You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life…There is nothing else.”  This takes time, but that journey to a slower pace can begin today.  As you slow down, try to notice one small mustard-seed or yeast moment rising in your life today, how does this make an impression and impact for you?

 

Rather than more words from me, today let these chapters and words simmer and stew in your soul to see where the good news in these verses might take you.  Amen.

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Luke 8-10

 

An overview of these three chapters, we begin with parables ~ stories Jesus is telling about the ways of God.  Parables are not neat and tidy; they are messy and can make us uncomfortable.  An example is the Good Samaritan ~ Samaritans were the “others,” those people who had been pushed to the fringe and fray, the ones you avoided, the ones who pushed your buttons.  What in the name of all that is holy is Jesus doing calling a Samaritan, “Good”??  If you hold the Bible close to your ear you might still hear the audible gasp from people when it is the Samaritan ~ not the good religious pious people ~ who stops to offer care.  This is offensive.  This is subversive.  This trinity of chapters begins with women following Jesus, note this!  And ends in chapter 10 with Mary taking the posture of a disciple to learn from Jesus.  This isn’t the only subversive part of these chapters.  Jesus upends the economic system by driving a herd of swine into the water ~ think of all that bacon that is lost!  Right after that, Jesus upends death itself by restoring life to a young girl.  Hold these stories for the profound power in these words.  Jesus also upends the idea of what it means to save the world is not just success after success but means suffering and death (Luke 9:21-27) ~ this message is amplified in his transfiguration as well as saying to the disciples, “Become childlike.”  More on this in just a moment.

 

Three questions to ponder prayerfully: What seeds are being sowed in your life right now?  The beautiful subversiveness of Luke 8:4-8 is that God, the Sower of seeds in life, is so generous placing seeds even where the practicality and possibility of that seed growing is next to nothing.  God, the Sower of seeds, is willing to scatter love and grace in places where they won’t get past the surface ~ I think of our own busyness and focus on being productive that causes us to miss the traces of God’s grace as we quickly skim the surface of life like a speedboat.  The transfiguration is a reminder that God is in the transformation business.  Faith is not a transaction or something we consume, but a fierce force of Holy love that changes us.  Where have you felt most fully alive so you glowed with God’s presence?  Where are you, like Mary, learning?  What are you reading or listening to or watching?  Where are you curious and want to know more?

 

A few comments on the chapters: I recently heard someone reflect on the difference between being childlike and childish.  Childlike is full of wonder and whimsy, willing to even look foolish and not completely in control.  Childish is throwing tantrums and insisting on your own way ~ that you’ve got it all figured out.  The author went on to say that there is also a difference between being adult-like and adult-ish.  Adult-like people can embrace the prayerfulness and playfulness of life.  Adult-ish people might present themselves as having it all together, but live life with joyless urgency ~ constantly pointing out the less-than-perfectness of life.  In what ways this Lent can you hold the good news of Jesus inviting us into a child-like way of being?  In some ways, Mary reminds us of that prayer posture of being a learner ~ an openness and curiosity about what God is up to in our lives.  Reading the gospels over Lent is one way to embrace and embody this; reading a good book; going for a walk in God’s creation without headphones; listening to someone from a different point of view (for we all have views from one single point), and so many other ways.  How might you and I let loose our inner-Mary for the sake of the world in these days?  Let that question guide you this day.  Amen. 

Prayer for the School Shooting in Nashville

 

Prayer when there are no words ~ in response to the school shooting in Nashville

O God, there are no words this morning for the heartbreak and soul ache of another school shooting. There are tons of questions about our human propensity to turn to violence. There is the honest fear and anxiety of parents whose kids are being dropped off or driving or walking to school today. There is the eroding of our collective mental health because living in a constant state of fear has left us all weary and worn out.

But even these words don't begin to capture what is within us. I wonder, how long? There are communal tears for families grieving and a school in shock and a community that knows that there is no way to comfort or take away the ache ~ because that would mean going back in time and stop the tragedy.

Today there is silence of hurt. Today there is the speechlessness because no words can make sense of this or take away the pain. Today I pray for Your presence O God to comfort and love those whose hearts will never be the same. More than just today, because the lives of the families in Nashville will never be the same, so be with them for countless days to come.

Meet us, O God, in this moment also with a challenge to see how we harm each other. Meet us, O God, in the feelings of hopelessness when we shake our heads in despair. Self-empty God of the cross on this day that feels like Good Friday has arrived early, may we stand here with an openness and vulnerability and willingness to be transformed by Your way. And into the emptiness give us new words and new ways of speaking into these all too frequent shootings that might compel us to live differently.

God meet us, hold us, and let Your love be the first and last word in our lives today. Amen.    

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Luke 5-7

 

An overview of these three chapters: Jesus is walking along with a crowd of people wanting to hear him preach and teach, he gets into a boat ~ which becomes a make-shift pulpit ~ and out of this moment he calls Simon Peter.  After healing two people and calling Levi, Jesus talks about the new ways of life ~ that you don’t put new wine into an old wine skin.  Chapter 6 continues these themes of healing, calling, sending, preaching, and teaching.  In Luke, Jesus is on the move ~ which many can relate to amid the hustle and bustle of life today.  In verse 20, we get the Sermon on the Plain ~ which is an echo of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7.  You may want to compare the two sermons.  Luke sometimes subtracts a word ~ as in the very first Beatitude in Luke, Jesus says, “Blessed are you who are poor” (6:20), whereas Matthew says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit” (Matthew 5:3).  These subtle shifts help us notice the perspective from which the Gospel writer comes from, as well as a glimpse into the audience to whom the Gospel writer is penning the words.  Perhaps for Luke, his community to which he was writing didn’t have a large balance in the bank or a 401K plan; and for Matthew maybe he is ministering to people who are feeling spiritually depleted and drained.  Is there room in our faith for people who find themselves in both camps?  Maybe there are people who feel both financially and spiritually worn out and hanging by a thread. Chapter 7 takes the form of healing ~ exploring and expanding that word in many different directions.  Literal healing of a centurion’s (that is a Roman guard ~ the enemy) slave!  Then, from interacting with a person of power, Jesus goes to the other economic extreme of a widow’s son ~ just as Elijah ministered to the widow of Zarephath (1 Kings 17). Finally, I love how chapter 7 ends with John the Baptist’s disciples questioning Jesus.  Notice Jesus’ response in verse 22.  I wonder if John’s disciples got it.  Because immediately, we meet an unnamed woman who washes Jesus’ feet and dries with her hair ~ she senses God’s presence in Jesus.  Hold this tension between these two stories.

 

Three questions to ponder prayerfully: Is there a new patch you are trying to sew onto the garment of your life right now?  Perhaps it is reading the gospels or volunteering or trying to be more mindful/prayerful/present.  What is that new patch of clothe in your life right now?  What stood out for you most in Jesus’ sermon of chapter 6?  At the end of chapter 7, John’s disciples come with the question, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait/expect someone else?”  I love this question because it is our question.  Does Jesus conform to the categories of our expectations?  Do we have a mold Jesus needs to fit into?  On Ash Wednesday we heard Jesus ask the question to the disciples, “Who do you say I am?”  Hold that question, who is this Jesus you’ve encountered over the last month of reading the gospels?  What words would you use to describe Christ?

 

A few comments on the chapters: I love in Luke 6, how the Pharisees are just waiting ~ I guess hiding behind a stock of grain/wheat ~ for the disciples to make a mistake.  How they jump out and say, “Gotcha!”  How do we do this to others in our life, on the look out for a person to step out of line?  I encourage you to read prayerfully chapter 6, Jesus’ sermon on a level/plain place.  I think these words are at the heart of who Luke knows Jesus to be.  Finally, the intimate scene of washing Jesus’ feet, reminds us that we pour out our lives (our energy, finances, care, and love) on others.  Who is a person you are ministering to today?  And who is ministering to you?  May our journey deeper into the gospel of Luke reveal God’s love in the most peculiar and less-than-perfect moments of life.  Amen.

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Luke 2-4

 

Hold the story of Jesus’ birth. What stirs within you reading the Christmas Eve story at Lent? 

 

Hold the story of Christmas and Easter together today.  Both are about mystery and marvel and that God is at work in the world today in ways that won’t conform or be confined by us.  God’s work at both Christmas and Easter may not be seen by the masses or trend on social media.

 

Hold the story of Christmas and Easter together of God’s presence amid the less-than-perfectness ~ whether that is a cobweb filled barn or a stone-cold empty tomb.  What does it mean that God shows up in these places?  Where are the messy barns of your life and the places where there seems to be no life right now for you?  What would it mean to be curious and open and present to God there??

 

Hold Luke’s opening with two fiercely faithful women ~ Elizabeth and Mary ~ who echo and amplify strong women in Scripture like Deborah, Ruth, Hagar, and Esther.  Sing out Mary’s Magnificat (Luke 1:46-55) and let these words inspire you to conspire with God among the least and lost and lowly in your corner of the world, right here and now.

 

Hold Jesus’ birth that even as the powers that be (I am looking at you, Caesar), think they are pulling all the strings, God is subversively doing a new thing that others will never perceive because their power and position and privilege won’t allow them to receive the equality of God’s love for all.

 

Hold Jesus staying behind in the temple in chapter 2:41-51.  The anxiety of parents ~ I mean I am with Mary and Joseph, losing God’s son would certainly make me frantic too!  Hold the phrase that Jesus grew in wisdom (2:52). What wisdom have you gleaned during Lent?  In what ways have your grown having now read three…yes three…gospels?

 

Hold all of this and be held by God’s love that will never let us go.  I look forward to next week and journeying through Luke as we continue this prayer practice of dwelling in the Word and the World dwelling in us this Lent.  Amen. 

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Mark 15-16, Luke 1

 

Mark ends rather abruptly.  In fact, the original ending of Mark was the women went away saying nothing to no one.  Not exactly a happy, neat, and tidy ending.  We think, “Thanks for that uplifting note, Mr. Eeyore.  I’m going to so see if the jellybeans are on sale at the store now.” 

 

Yet, sometimes I wish that we didn’t have the extended ending. Wait, you think, why? Thank you for asking. 

 

Because life is messy.  Or, at least my life is.  I don’t have neat and tidy ending where I see resurrection every day.  To be sure, I get glimpses of God’s grace often.  I experience and encounter God’s love in ways that feed and fuel my faith.  And there are desert-like/wilderness wandering moments in my life too.  There are days that I am like the women at the empty tomb having just encountered the angels of God, but I have lost my voice.  I have misplaced my courage.  Where I say nothing to no one, because it is better to be quiet and have people think you are foolishness, then open your mouth and remove all doubt (thank you to Mark Twain for that gem of an insight).

 

Where is life messy for you?  Where don’t you have “it” all figured out?  Where do you recognize that life is often like the invisible algorithms online, we don’t see/understand/know as much as we’d like?

 

There is hope in the empty tomb when we realize that we don’t have life all figured out.  There is love in the empty tomb that invites us to pause before racing off.  There is peace echoing in the empty tomb when we are open to a mystery that we will never fully understand, but God isn’t going to quiz you!  The point is not that we “get it”, but that we are willing to admit that in our beautiful brokenness, in our less-than-perfectness, maybe I stop relying on myself and start letting grace lead the way.  Grace, by the way, that I don’t control!  This is the promise of resurrection, new life, and God’s emphatic, “Yes” to another way that we are preparing to celebrate in April.  For now, be in that tomb of uncertainty and mystery and God’s work in this world, with openness and curiosity and even some confusion that keeps us faithfully caught up in our Creating God today.  Amen

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Mark 12-14

 

Jesus enters Jerusalem and Mark slows his narrative down.  Jesus is no longer rushing and racing.  Jesus talks about the reality of violence in chapter 12, knowing that the cross has fallen upon his path.  Jesus confronts the systems of power in taxes.  The subversiveness here is the tension/contradiction every person of faith lived with ~ you had to pay taxes to Caesar or else face punishment.  You had to pay taxes to the guy who thought he was the son of god then put his image on a coin that you had to work hard to earn just to give it back to that same guy ~ talk about a vicious cycle. 

 

Jesus wants to break us free. 

 

I am not sure if Jesus paid taxes.  I am not sure if Jesus carried around coins with Caesar’s face emblazoned upon it, which contradicted the commandment against graven images.  I am not sure that I will ever be able to know fully the rules of what belongs to the powers of this world and what belongs to God ~ because I know deep in my heart that my life ~ every minute and breath ~ belongs to God.  If all I am and will be is already in God’s hands, how do I live my life?

 

Jesus then answers this convoluted question about resurrection.  Remember, the Sadducees don’t believe in resurrection, so they are already outside their lane.  It would be like me asking a religious question about predestination or about being a professional auto racer.  I also love how this caricature of religion still holds ~ as people of faith we can complicate almost anything.  Too often we can philosophize or endless question thinking that at some point we will “figure” things out. 

 

Jesus wants us to break us free from thinking we are just brains with legs or that we are souls caged in bodies.

 

As you keep reading, Jesus is once again anointed.  Notice how often this has happened in our holiest week.  In the gospels, a woman, sometimes named other times not, comes and blesses Jesus with a fragrant love.  We have heard this story before and prayerfully pondered who are the women and people who have blessed us with a fragrant love?  During March, which is women’s history month, celebrate the women whose fingerprints have made you who you are.

 

In Mark’s telling of the Last Supper I picture Judas is at the table.  As he eats, he looks for that time to slip out the side door to betray Jesus.  Hold the truth of people who are close to us who have wounded us.  Hold the truth that people we loved, rejected our love for their own gain.  Not only Judas, but Peter also hides in the shadows ~ curious but not wanting to get caught up in the trial Jesus will face.  How often do I stay in the shadows of the sidelines, saying, “I am here,” ~ even as I have one foot ready to run in the opposite direction should anything bad happen.  Jesus prays in the garden ~ we will return to this part of Scripture during Holy Week but hold the words Jesus says with tears in his eyes and anguish in his soul.  A prayer position and posture so many of us have known in our lives.  Finally, Jesus is brought before people who did not understand his ministry, couldn’t pick him out of the crowd, but wanted to blame and shame someone so they pick him.  We continue this story in our lives ~ we all put others on trial as the “problem” then serve as judge and jury.  We blame and shame others who are different than us based on flimsy evidence that we cling to in the conviction of our own minds. 

I say this not out of guilt, but for our own growth.  Not to be ashamed, but aware of how we keep repeating and replaying out this heartbreaking and soul aching scene in our lives.  I wish that family tables where love is offered didn’t have betrayal and desertion returned in response.  I wish that we didn’t convict one another.  I wish that we didn’t shame and blame one another so quickly.  Whether what the Gospels say really happened on the last night of Jesus life I don’t know.  But I know it is true because it is in the paper and social media and woven in our individual stories every day. 

 

That is why we need Good Friday, to lay our ways at the foot of cross and stand before God’s sacrificial, self-giving love as the gospel, good news that can set us free.  For me, the cross is not a transaction.  God didn’t have a debt problem or some accounting imbalance, God has sought us with holy love time and time and time again in Scripture and we keep thinking, “Just not sure this whole “love wins” thing will really work, God.  So let me try it my way!”  I pray that Mark’s powerful and profound words about God’s love in Christ, the pain of the cross, will meet you in the pain of life today in ways that can help heal and guide and ground you to a new life, good news and resurrection life that makes a difference.  Amen.

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Mark 9-11

 

In chapter 9:33 the disciples are arguing about rating and ranking, they want to know who is the GOAT (greatest of all time)?  Who is the MVP of the disciples?  Who is going to win the award, get promoted, be seen as a success.

 

I am so glad we don’t do this anymore…now excuse me while I go check attendance at the church, how the budget is doing, and if this post is trending on Facebook yet.  Insert irony here.

 

We are constantly competing and comparing, we are still the disciples wanting to know where we rate and rank, jockeying for position. 

 

This is echoed in chapter 10 when Jesus says that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than someone who is rich (possessed by their possession, clinging to control, stuffing their life with stuff) to enter God’s realm.  We enter God’s realm open-handed. We are like the disciples staring at the crowd of 5000 and 4000 holding only a few loaves of bread and fish while everyone is eyeing our dinner and licking their lips.  Faith begins when our competency and control ends.  Faith, God’s address, is at the end of our rope. 

 

This is true not only for us, but for God’s love in the flesh of Jesus the Christ.  In chapter 11, Jesus enters Jerusalem to the shouts and songs of “Hosanna” on Palm Sunday.  But you and I know the story will take a turn toward pain and blame and shame as less than a week later when Judas, Jesus’ friend, betrays him, Peter denies him, and all the rest run away deserting him.  Eek, and I thought my friends disappointed me sometimes.

 

This story is our story.  We strive to succeed and spend our lives trying to get ahead.  Along the way we encounter others who hurt us, leaving scars that sometimes don’t heal.  We limp, just as Jacob limps after wrestling with God.  At the heart of Lent is both a mirror and window.  A mirror for us to see ourselves in these words, our own story in this story.  And a window to see others too.  To connect to yesterday, we don’t know why the other person did that, said that, thinks that, votes that way.  We are a mystery to ourselves and others.  Why do we think we have it all figured out? 

 

Lent invites us to cease from striving.  Grace is free.

Lent invites us to stop clinging.  Love is unconditional.

Lent invites us to be who God calls us to be.  Beloved is your first, middle, and last name (as well as everyone else too).

 

May these truths this day open to you to the One whose love we don’t compete for because God’s love will never be exhausted or fully explored in our lives.  Be in God’s love this day. Amen.

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Mark 6-8

 

There is much in these three chapters to comment on, but I want to focus on one passage, 8:14-21.  Jesus says to beware of the yeast of the Pharisees (religious people) and the yeast of Herod (political powers that be).  Enter the metaphor with me, yeast is what causes bread to rise, it creates a chemical reaction and response when mixed and mingled into the flour and salt.  So too, religion and politics can create a chemical reaction and response within us.  This can be good.  There is nothing I love more than a warm slice of bread with butter on it.  Yet, sometimes the chemical reactions and responses are not so great or grand.  One of my favorite quotes from Richard Rohr, “It’s possible to trace the movement of Christianity from its earliest days until now. In Israel, Jesus and the early “church” offered people an experience; it moved to Greece, and it became a philosophy. When it moved to Rome and Constantinople, it became organized religion. Then it spread to Europe, and it became a culture. Finally, it moved to North America and became a business.” 

 

There is a tension in being the church.  Balancing the experience of God that is unique to each of us as created in God’s image and or with call to be in community.  There is a yeast in community that can cause us to rise, but not always in healthy ways.  We can be stirred by outrage that we are always looking for something else to be upset about, and there are so many options to be angry about in the paper this morning.  We can be stirred by fear, again no shortage of options here that can cause our amygdala to race and run with all kinds of “what if,” worst case scenarios for tomorrow.  We can be stirred by malaise, wondering difference can one person make?  We can be stirred by cynicism.  Connecting this to yesterday, there is a legion of emotions that dwell within us as yeast to our lives.  Not all yeast is healthy or helpful. 

 

I love that right after this warming to pay attention to the yeast in our lives, Jesus encounters a blind man…that is us.  You and me.  We are not aware of what is stirring and churning and swirling within us.  We don’t always know why we do what we do.  And then, just for funzies, we like to think we know what motivates the other person!  Pause with me.  We are confusing to ourselves, but we think we have the other person figured out! 

 

Mark is a master storyteller here inviting us to pay attention to what is moving and motivating us, the motion of emotions that are causing chemical reactions and responses within us.  And to realize that we need healing from our inability to see clearly.  It is my prayer as we inch closer to our Holiest Week that you will be caught up in God’s yeasty movement, which by the way we don’t always grasp, but we are grasped by a grace that will never let us go.  Be open to that this day.  Amen.  

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read ~ Mark 3-5  

 

Mark’s narrative moves a rapid pace.  Just in chapter three alone ~ Jesus heals a man whose hand was withered; he no more than turns around and a crowd has congregated needing healing; after seeing the last patient of the day, he and his disciples hike up a mountain for a ritual of blessing and sending; only to come down from the mountain top to have mob outside his house calling him Satan (always nice to be appreciated for your hard, loving work).  And that was just his schedule in the morning!  (Totally kidding, we have no idea how many hours or days chapter 3 covers, but we seem to cover a lot of ground and activity).

 

Whew.  Give me just a minute to catch my breath.

 

Okay, I’m better.  Chapter 4 is Mark’s take on the parables of the seeds and sower ~ reminding us of that great question, what kind of soil is in your soul?  Where is the soil of your soul rocky or rough or rigid or ready to receive God’s presence, realizing that we are all four kinds of soil all at once.  I love how Mark then has the calming of the storm, because right now we all can feel like we are living storms emotionally, relationally, politically, socially, economically, and globally. 

 

And then, we land in chapter 5, which is one of Mark’s longest stories of Jesus confronting a man with an unclean spirit.  This beloved son of God has been forced to live amid the tomb ~ essentially, he is left for dead among the dead.  How often do we still do this today?  How often do we force to the fringe and fray those people who are not like us?  Those people who are like porcupines to our souls?  This man cries out, tears his clothes, but people in the nearby village act as if there is nothing to see here, move along.  This beloved son of God sees Jesus, cries out, Jesus sees him and asks him his name.

 

I love this.  The power of asking someone’s name.  The power for someone to name him or herself.  The man says his name is Legion.  Fun Bible Nerd fact here, legion is a term for a Roman military unit.  The man adopts and adapts a name of the foreign military machine.  We miss this.  What does it mean that Jesus looks into the eyes of the one who is at war with himself?  How often is this story our story?

 

What/who are you battling today?  My hunch is that there is a legion inside you.  Maybe you are battling despair or disease or depression or discouragement.  Maybe you are battling people who won’t listen to you or feeling like you are not enough.  Maybe you are battling voices in your head that want to point out, in a not so helpful way, all your bumbles and stumbles.  Where does legion ~ a foreign army ~ seem to have taken up residence in your soul and living rent free in your mind?

 

How might Jesus be calling that out of you?  How might Jesus be offering healing, asking you to set down the names you call yourself for your true name?  How might Jesus be saying, set that aside and here enjoy some delicious bacon?  I need to hear this every day, maybe every hour.  Amid the hustle and bustle, the tyranny of urgency and joyless racing we live our lives, I want to sit with Jesus.  Finally, notice that once the man is healed, he and Jesus sit down for a chat among the tombs.  I love that Jesus meets us where we are and will stay with us in that place.  How might Jesus meet you in your life today with a love and grace that heals and frees us?  May you and I both experience and encounter tactile/tangible/lived responses to that question. Amen.

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read Matthew 28, Mark 1-2

 

Woo hoo!  Two Gospels complete!  Pause for a moment of celebration.  Pause for a moment to hold what you have found meaningful.  Pause for a moment to also name and claim your questions about Jesus’ birth, life, death, and resurrection.  We continue to dwell in the Word of God and let the Word of God dwell in us because every time we re-read the words of the Gospels we see something different ~ usually because we are different.  You could go back to John 1 today and spy a word, phrase or have a thought that didn’t occur to you back on February 27^th when we began this adventure.  Hold this truth.   Speaking of birth of Jesus, Mark doesn’t have one.  In fact, I love that Mark just jumps into the middle of the story.  Like a teacher who dives into the material without any kind of introduction.  Mark catches us off guard.  In fact, the very first verse in Mark isn’t even a complete sentence in Greek.  Mark 1:1 could read: “Good news!  Jesus Christ!”  Mark wants to share a story of God’s liberating love that is gospel.  Recall that Rome had a gospel, one of violence and fear and worshiping Caesar.  Rome had a gospel of conformity and staying in your place.  Jesus brings a different gospel. 

How would you describe the gospel, good news, as you have encountered it so far?  Note that we have four gospels so that we can be expansive and elastic.  With each reading of the gospels there can be an evolution toward revolution and freedom.  John longs for us to make room on the shelves of our souls for Christ, God in the flesh, to dwell in us and us in Christ.  John wants us to be a vine that is rooted in a live-changing relationship with the Creator and Redeemer. Matthew wants to encourage us to have urgency and immediacy about how we live our lives.  We need to steward our lives; to be awake and aware of the shepherd in our lives.  Mark longs to share a vision of God’s sacrificial love.  Mark is the shortest of all four gospels.  In fact, many believe that Mark wants to get the reader to the crucifixion as quickly as possible.  This is perhaps why Mark doesn’t have a birth narrative.  What is important for Mark is to meet Jesus as an adult, who embodies God’s love, that will be misunderstood by the powers that be.  Even though Mark is the shortest, there is an economy of words, each verse matters.  So, I encourage you to read slowly, savoring every word.  What do you notice that is unique to Mark?  What do you pick up in his abbreviated narratives that you might have missed in the wordier Matthew and John versions?  Finally, how do the vignettes of chapters 1 and 2 stir and speak to your life in these Lenten days?  May you continue to encounter God’s grace and love in the good news of these words this day. Amen.  

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read Matthew 25-27

 

As Jesus continues to preach and teach, he tells two parables about being good stewards of time, talent, and treasure.  In the first, it is about managing your oil; and in the second, it is about managing what is entrusted to you by someone else.  Recall that parables are not supposed to be easily understood.  They should provoke questions and cause us to scratch/shake our heads.  What questions do you have after reading the two parables?  I wonder about what metaphorical oil in my life am I not managing well?  This could be my energy or relationships or even how I care for my body.  What about talents that I hide ~ perhaps because of fear or frustration or feeling misunderstood?  These parables are the climax of Jesus’ teaching right before the last night of his life.  How is the timing, that he is talking about these right before he will face the cross color how you read these stories? 

Then Jesus is anointed by a woman with a costly jar of perfume.  We have heard this story before about how Jesus smells like the cosmetic department of Macy’s as he approaches the last night of his life.  The heartbreaking irony is that even as Jesus says what the beloved daughter of God did for him will be remembered and proclaimed (26:13), we don’t get her name!!  But what if, this is intentional?  What if the beloved daughter are the fiercely faithful women in our lives?  Who is that beloved daughter of God who anointed (e.g. blessed) you?  Could be your mother, sister, cousin, teacher, preacher, friend, or neighbor.  Name the women in your life who have showered you with the sacred.

In 26:26, we get the invitation to communion.  I invite you to go get some bread and juice/wine.  Or go get an animal cracker and grape.  Or go get any ordinary, everyday, in your cupboard right now element and take communion.  What does it mean to you that Jesus would offer gifts of God’s love to the very “friends” who will desert, deny, and even betray him?  When we talk about unconditional love, Jesus embraces and embodies this at the Last Supper and we are called to the same ethic/way of life every time we come to the table of Christ.

Finally, compare Matthew’s Good Friday story to John’s.  In John, Jesus seems to be in charge and control to the very end.  Directing the beloved disciple to take care of Mary and even saying, “It is finished” as he breathes his last breath (John 19:30).  But in Matthew, there is pain, Jesus quotes Psalm 22, “My God, why have you forsaken me!!”  There is anguish and even anger in those words.  Hold the tension here.  Sometimes amid pain, we find strength and other times we struggle to just put one foot in front of the other.  Moments of pain are often because someone or something is dying.  We come to the cross open to God who suffers out of a love that will never let us go.  Let the good news of this story be woven into your story today. Amen.

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read Matthew 22-24

 

A few weeks ago, we read John 2, where Jesus changed water into wine.  Today, we read of another wedding feast that sounds like a scene from Game of Thrones.  Good lord, the King goes nuclear sending troops out to destroy everyone just because they didn’t come to his party.  Eek!!  You are now wondering, why am I reading this during Lent?!?  Not only that, then some poor chap didn’t get the memo on what to wear to the wedding feast and he gets tossed out on his ear.  Is this really the Word of God?!?  Is this really good news??  Take me back to Jesus doing the electric slide on the dance floor and changing water into wine of week one, please!!

Yet, part of the power in this passage, is that in Matthew there is something at stake in life.  We can’t just live our life on cruise control.  We cannot just sleepwalk our way through our days oblivious to the hurt and harm.  Your life matters.  Your actions and words matter.  How you treat others matters.  And, in your humanness, you won’t always get it right.  I will, like the poor chap who wore white after Labor Day to this wedding feast, won’t get it right always.  I am human size.  We live in the tension between being saved from brokenness and sent forth in blessedness.  We live the tension that we saved continually, day-after-day, through God’s love and grace and sent forth by God’s love to be beloved in the world.  This is where Jesus lands with the greatest commandment in 22:34-40: love God because you are loved by God.  Be love because Beloved is your first, last, and middle name.  I invite you today to not just read the words of the call/invitation to be intentionally/prayerfully embody love in the world.  Let these words have flesh, breath, and bone in your life today.  How will you love God with your full self?  Maybe this is through prayer or walking in creation listening to birds or sitting quietly.  Note, this is less about production or performance and more about being in God’s presence.  Prayer is the truth that we are beings (without constant movement).  Next, how might you love your neighbor?  This is where your prayers can have feet and hands and words.  You may take your neighbor some soup or cookies or just show up to listen and hold a hand.  This could be for your literal neighbor or the person whose name is before and after you in the church directory.  You can also expand the embrace of neighbor to people in our community, country, and around the world.  Finally, how do you love yourself?  How do you stop listening to that inner critic who loves to do color commentary on all your bumbles and stumbles?  How do you resist the tyranny of urgency (you must do something right now!!) as well as resist the tyranny of perfectionism (you must get it right the first time).  This will lead us back to the love of God that never lets us go.

In chapter 23, we sense the heat of intensity around Jesus preaching and teaching turned up.  If Jesus began his Sermon on the Mount in chapter 5 with blessings, he now flips the script to shine a light on the possible pitfalls of life.  Please don’t read these words as if Jesus is wagging his finger at you, read these words in a whisper, like a beloved friend trying to offer you compassion and love.  Remember for Matthew something is at stake here ~ that something is your life which Jesus wants to bear fruit of love and live the greatest commandment.  Amen.

Reading the Gospels for Lent

 

Read Matthew 19-21

 

In Jesus’ day there were two great rabbinic traditions created by two famous rabbis.  There was Hillel and Shammai.  The rabbi’s job in Jesus’ day was to interpret the laws for the people of faith and help the people stay in relationship with God…I dare say some of that still holds for pastors today.  How do I help you connect to scripture, let scripture author your life, and create a safe place for you to open your soul to God?  That is the question that drives my ministry.  Hillel was a bit more liberal in his interpretation of Scripture.  Hillel said, “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow.  That is the entire Torah (or law of God), and the rest is commentary.  Now go and study”.  In that quote you may hear the seeds of the Golden Rule, do unto others as you would have them do unto you from Matthew 7.  Shammai was a bit more by the book.  He was concerned about humanities ability to really know and do good.  This remains true today.  Do you think humanity can really save ourselves when left to our own whims?  There are those who tend to have a higher view of our human abilities, those who tend to focus on human flaws.  Where are you on that spectrum?  Do you think that traditions should be conserved, maintained, respected?  Do humans have the capacity to craft new ways of thinking and living? 

 

Of course, all this is a false choice in some ways.  We are both.  We may vote for expanding human rights, only to insist that our grandmother’s tablecloth be used at Easter because we have always done it that way.  Or we may think that humanity needs to be reigned in, but want liberty for us to do what we want, when we want, how we want.  We are all a messy mixture.  All this is a set up for Jesus’ teaching on divorce.  Jesus usually sided with Hillel on many issues of the law.  Don’t want to wash your hands, fuhgeddaboudit, it’s what comes out of your mouth that defiles you.  Concerned about healing on the Sabbath, be more concerned about the hurting in your midst.  But, in Matthew 19, Jesus takes Shammai’s more traditional teaching.  This could be because Hillel said you could divorce your wife if she burnt your breakfast.  Or maybe Jesus was concerned that we might all begin to think, “Laws, we don’t need no stinking laws.”  That is until we all try to drive down the highway!  To be sure, I don’t think this makes these words easier emotionally.  I know many people who are divorced who are deeply wounded and hurt by how Matthew 19 has been used to blame and shame them.  I know many faithful people who were in emotionally and physically abusive relationships that needed a divorce.  I know many people who married one person and woke up eighteen years later next to another person ~ who said it was okay for your spouse to change?  We hold the tension with Jesus that marriage is a covenant, a vow, between two people before God.  This vow is elastic and can expand.  The vow is woven with love, but it is a love that needs to be tended.  In our humanness, we can hurt those closest to us.  In our humanness, we can drift away from someone we deeply loved, perhaps not even intentionally.  Or our spouse can drift away from us for reasons unknown to him/her.  In our humanness, we don’t always tend our relationships ~ but can take them for granted as we race and run off chasing the gospel of success.  Yet, when we make a vow to another, to break that vow will be painful.  To be sure, the church needs to be careful and prayerful not to cause more woundedness and in no way encourage people to stay in relationships that are harmful or abusive.  How do we tend the vows that bind us and sometimes confine us?  This is not only a question of marriage, but of the church.  In our traditions, to be a member is to covenant with each other.  We say to people who are new, “We love you and we long to grow with you.”  While love is easy, people are hard.  We have porcupine like quills that can make it difficult to get close.  For my brothers and sisters who have sought a divorce, please know you are God’s beloved.  There is nothing you can do that can separate you from God’s love.  Nothing means nothing.  I believe that the divorce was painful and hurtful and you don’t need me adding to that emotional baggage.  In the end, I wonder who do I think I am trying to explain Jesus to you?  In the end, if you want to talk more, I would long to hear your questions and thoughts and hurts.  In the end, I long for you to experience God’s love regardless of who you love.  May this gospel truth work in your life even when we read parts of the good news that don’t sound so good to everyone.  Amen.