THE REV. E. WAYNE ROLLINS

​ The lectionary for the Easter season always seems to be a bit confusing. The first three Sundays all have events that take place on the first day, the day of resurrection. The Fourth Sunday is always Good Shepherd Sunday. Then Sundays five, six, and seven feature lessons from what’s known as the Farewell Discourse in John’s Gospel.
 
Today’s lessons begin with the martyrdom of Stephen, a deacon who is known as the first martyr of the church. His example is supposed to give us strength; his faith is about trusting the God who raised Christ from the dead even as Stephen is pummeled with rocks as religious authorities stone him to death. 

You might have noticed the identity of the man watching the coat closet at this event. Luke, the writer of the Acts of the Apostles, tells us that those wielding the stones laid their cloaks at the feet of a young man named Saul. This is the entry of the man who will become known as Paul the Apostle into the story of the first-century church. 

The gospels for today and for the coming weeks help us understand Jesus’ words preparing his closest followers for his imminent departure. Today’s lesson takes place immediately after the scene in the upper room. Jesus has shared supper with his friends. He has washed their feet and given them an all-encompassing new commandment—the mandatum novum, as it is known, from whence we get the name for the day we hear it. Maundy Thursday. 

For us, it seems strange. While there are seven Sundays in the Easter season, there simply aren’t enough gospel lessons telling us of post-resurrection appearances of the risen Christ so that we have different lessons for all the Sundays in the three-year cycle. And so, the lectionary prepares us for a coming event. Forty days after the resurrection, Luke tells us, Jesus met with his disciples on a hilltop. He raises his hands in blessing and is raised into the heavens, a day we call the Feast of the Ascension. 

But there’s something else at work in today’s readings. Today’s Psalm is part of the same one chosen for the Feast of Saint Stephen. You probably aren’t aware of that because the Feast of Saint Stephen falls on December 26, when most of us have other things on our minds. Today’s Psalm is also identical to the Psalm the lectionary chooses for Holy Saturday, also a day when we are usually too busy to stop and take notice. Yet this Psalm contains a sentence that Luke quotes from Jesus as he hangs on the cross. I'll let you look for that on your own. 

All this raises a question in my mind. What do we do when it seems that God has gone silent or has even gone away? 

​For a long time now I've been thinking that we seem to be stuck in this Holy Saturday moment. Jesus is gone, and even though we know what is to come in just another day, we don’t seem to be able to move beyond this moment.

While we wait, while we wonder what’s next, there are many opportunities made available for someone or something to come and enter the void in our hearts, in our minds, in our faith. At least one of the temptation stories heard on the First Sunday in Lent tells us that the tempter went away to wait for a more opportune time.

We are living in that more opportune time.

Luke, Paul, Peter, John—all the writers of the books and letters we now call the New Testament—expected the risen Christ to return to earth in their own lifetime. Even now, some 2,000 years later, there are those still expecting the risen Christ to return in a triumphant, military-style victory in our own lifetime. Some are so eager for this moment that they decided to try to bring it about by creating the chaos, the conflict that they expect to happen at that time. Yet faith stands silently while we wait in this moment between Jesus’ departure and his expected return. What do we do?

We remember. We remember ourselves—join ourselves together with Christ in as many ways as we might find possible. That is what the word "religion" means. We join as ligaments join muscles to bone and to flesh for movement, for signs of life, so that even though we stand on this day and time in between, we find life.

The church, that life that Paul calls the body of Christ, is to live into the uncertainty of the moment, just as the risen Christ moved into the uncertainty of death and transformed it into life in ways no one else could do. We are called to live into Jesus’ admonition to Philip, who asked Jesus to show us the Father. I can just imagine the incredulity in Jesus’ voice as he wonders out loud, "Have I been with you all this time, and you still don't get it?”

Then comes the statement that we all fail to live into. Jesus says if you don’t believe because I tell you who I am, then believe because of what you have witnessed. Indeed, you will do what I have done and even more, even greater things than I have done.

I can’t tell you how many times I've stood beside a hospital bed, a grave, or a crying parishioner with the full understanding that I have yet to live fully into that moment. It doesn’t mean I’ve given up. But it does mean I still have a lifetime of work to do. Most of that work is to open myself to be in the time and place where Jesus can fill me with his promised Spirit.
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It’s good to know that I’m not alone.

THE REV. E. WAYNE ROLLINS

​One winter’s evening, I went to visit a friend. As I walked to the gate to his yard, I heard a sound. It was one of his dogs barking at me as I approached in the darkness. I knew which dog it was, so I called her name. Sophie. The barking turned to whining, and as I got closer I could see her in the light from the street. The back half of the dog was wiggling around enough to make Elvis Presley green with envy. I knew her voice, and she knew mine. 

Today is Good Shepherd Sunday. On the Fourth Sunday of Easter, we hear lessons from John 10 telling us about Jesus being the Good Shepherd. The emphasis is on the word "good." Jesus contrasts himself with others who want to or pretend to shepherd the people around them. They may be community or political leaders. They may be leaders in the synagogue. But with the emphasis on the word "good," what is Jesus really trying to tell us? 

We are bombarded by voices claiming to be acting in our best interests. Turn on the news, especially during an election season, and you will hear promises made that we know are never intended to be kept. Listen to commercials where a manufacturer is promising grand results if we will only purchase their product. They may fit a somewhat loose definition of "shepherd," yet are they good shepherds? 
With all the words, all the noise, the constant chatter, the blathering, if you will, how do we discern what is good? 

Last fall I attended a conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico, sponsored by the Center for Action and Contemplation founded by Fr. Richard Rohr. During that conference several speakers pointed us in the direction of an answer to my question. There were three criteria presented—is it true, is it good, and is it beautiful? 

As I consider these three criteria, I'm led to add a little bit more to them. For the question "Is it good?" I want to ask, "For whom is it good?" Is it good for a majority of those to whom it is presented, whatever “it” is, or is it good only for one or two people or for a corporation’s bottom line? Growing up I heard a lot about so-called snake oil salesmen; they may not be driving a team of horses pulling a carriage with bottles of elixir, nor may they be Lucille Ball selling Vitameatavegamin or even Professor Harold Hill. Is it truly—and there's that word—good? Will it give life in the abundance that the Good Shepherd promises to us? 

It was only a few weeks ago that we heard the story of Jesus’ trial, where he stood before Pilate, the governor who asked, "What is truth?” In our own time we continue to hear those who defend themselves by saying they have alternative facts. Or they may claim that something is not true even though there is recorded sound and video evidence of their having said the very words they now deny. It’s difficult to tell just what is true these days. Yet as those who follow the Good Shepherd, we are often called to not only live in truth but also point out where truth is absent. And in order to determine what is true, we often have to set it alongside those alternative facts and see which one of them holds up. Sometimes, we need to engage the help of others in order to determine just what is true. 

Sometimes we need to set the words against history. That means we have to know and understand history in order for it to assist us in our judgment. We may need to engage others to help us gain a vision of what is to be in order to determine whether the actions we take and the words we say are leading us into truth. And we also must admit that sometimes it’s only in hindsight that we know whether something is really true. 

Some say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Some may claim that beauty is a mathematical formula, a series of equations and algorithms that determine in a purely objective way whether something is beautiful. It’s difficult to define any one of these terms without the assistance of the other, and we must admit the truth that beauty is a matter of opinion in many cases. And what might not be objectively beautiful by some definition may be beautiful in a way that only discerning eyes and hearts can determine. 

So let me return to today’s gospel lesson, because whether something is good or true or beautiful may be determined by answering whether these things give abundant life in the same ways that Jesus of Nazareth taught and promised. He describes himself as the Good Shepherd. He also describes himself as the way, the truth, and the life. All the sheep care about is that there be abundant grass and plenty of water to drink. They're really not concerned whether the shepherd’s family might have mutton for dinner later on that day or tomorrow. Or how their wool might be sheared from them in order to provide warm clothing for their shepherd come next winter. What they know to do is follow. What they instinctively know to do is trust the voice that calls them into the direction they must go in order to have the promised things that the Good Shepherd will provide. 

And so perhaps the lesson isn’t a cute picture of a handsome Jesus holding a newborn lamb. Perhaps the lesson isn't even about our discernment of what is good or true or beautiful. Perhaps the lesson is to learn whose voice we can really trust. 

When we trust the voice calling us to abundant life for all, and not just for ourselves, then it becomes clear just whom we should follow. 

THE REV. E. WAYNE ROLLINS

​ The story of the disciples’ trip home to Emmaus after their terrible weekend in Jerusalem is one of the most beloved stories in Luke’s gospel. They've witnessed their leader being tortured, crucified, and buried. Yet their journey home was long enough that they had to wait until after the Sabbath and the Passover in order to make what was a forbidden journey on those days. 

They’re walking along, possibly in despair, wondering what hope there may be for them, when suddenly they’re joined by a stranger. The stranger begins asking what’s happened. They're incredulous! How can this man, this stranger not know what has happened? How can he be so completely clueless as to what they have witnessed? Has he just been hiding under a rock? 

But it’s late; they’re near home and their own sense of who they are in their faith means asking a stranger to share in their hospitality, to join them in their home, to have a safe place to be overnight. They sit down to supper and continued conversation. Then, the guest becomes the host. He takes bread. He blesses it. He breaks it as is their custom for supper. At the beginning of the meal the host breaks the bread and then offers it to those sitting around the table. 

Suddenly everything changes. It’s not just hospitality norms that get rewritten. Life itself has suddenly transformed, is changed forever. The guest disappears, and the disciples leap up, run back to Jerusalem and tell the other disciples what they have just seen, how the risen Christ appeared to them and was made known to them by breaking bread with them. 

At some point during the Easter season I ask a question. Have you seen the risen Christ lately? 

There are a lot of ways that we expect to see Christ. There are a lot of places where we expect to encounter the risen Christ. Most of those we’ve been taught occur in church, in the liturgy. Perhaps it’s during a reading when we hear something we haven’t heard before. In liturgical churches like our own, we’re taught to look for Christ in the Eucharist. 

I wonder if it’s time to reconsider all those things we’ve been taught. I wonder if we’re looking for Christ in all the wrong places, or only in certain places so that we miss the presence of the risen Christ where Christ most often can be made known. 

Look again at today’s gospel. The disciples on their way to Emmaus are about as low as they have ever been. The sun is setting; the world is literally becoming darker all around them. All they know now is how to make their way home, and for now, that’s enough. They don’t have to do anything miraculous. They don’t have to have a life plan, a life coach or any other accepted method available to them. All they have to do is find their way home. 

I can imagine that with each step the disciples feel their sandals growing heavier. It must feel like the weight of the world, like gravity itself is increasing as their heavy steps move in a familiar direction. Yet even that seems uncertain even after all the trips they must have made before this day. 

Yet, as they look back they sensed things were changing. This sad, familiar journey was somehow becoming different. Looking back, they asked themselves, “were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke to us on the road?” 

For about 2 1/2 years now I’ve been asking questions about ministry. With all the numbered reports, the budgets, the attendance, all of those things that give data to those who live on data, I’ve been asking questions about ministry. Ministry is defined as that action undertaken to help others, not to enrich ourselves, even though that happens in the activity of ministry. 

I ask about ministry because it is in ministry, in the doing of ministry, that we find ourselves sitting at familiar tables, and suddenly joined in the presence of the risen Christ. It is in the activity of ministry that we discover the risen Christ has been with us all along, especially in those dark times where it seemed that we could not go one step further. 

It is in ministry where the light of the world, the light of Christ we proclaim at the beginning of the Easter vigil, shines most brightly. The places, the budgets, the how-to manuals, the coaches, those are all secondary to the activity of ministry. They are a means, not an end. 
Yet, for far too long we’ve gotten that backwards. We have, as they say, put the cart before the horse. We stress over numbers. We look at empty pews and see only the emptiness and not the fullness of those who are actually here. We make a big deal about the high holy days and the greater numbers, then sit in despair until the next one while doing very little in between to help folks know that this is a way of life and not just a dress-up party a couple of times during the year. 

So maybe all these years I've been asking the wrong question. To ask, “Have you seen the risen Christ lately?” is the wrong way of looking at things. I say that because we only look for what is outside ourselves. We are always looking for help, for safety, for hope, in the other. And so let me change my question. Have you been the risen Christ lately? Have you been the evidence of resurrection to those wandering in the valley of so many shadows? Have you carried the light of Christ into our increasingly darkened world so that others might rediscover the hope that's been with us all along? 
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Maybe, when we begin to answer those questions we'll find our own hearts burning within us as we walk this road before us. Because just like it was that day in Emmaus, it is the road home. 

​ We know the story. We’ve heard it for years and years. We claim to believe it is true. But do we really know what it means? 

We’re here to celebrate the story that Jesus is raised from the dead. We love to celebrate good news. It’s a great big “Yay God” moment. 
Yet, embodied in this risen Christ is death. After all, new life means the old life is no more. That is Paul’s point in his letter to the church in Colossae. We heard just the point this morning, with the expectation that we’ll take time to discover what that point means on our own. Or, perhaps someone might decide to explain it further. I wonder who that might be? 

We live in a culture, a world, if I may, where all are judged by their achievements. We bestow ribbons and trophies and have documents printed on fine paper and displayed in ornamented frames for all to see. Those who judge our worthiness use these as proof of their own authority to make judgement. It can be a circular process, much like a cat chasing its own tail. 

We treat salvation that same way. Some have taught the people of Colossae that they have to do certain things, eat the right foods, follow the rules, in order to be judged worthy of being raised with Christ. If you’ve read much at all of the Apostle Paul, you’ll know he has a few words to say about that. 

He speaks of a new way of life now, not just a life to be hoped for later on. And the way that new life comes is through death—moving away from old ways of living based on making ourselves worthy. Those ways keep us in line by a dependence on fear, not living in faith. 
We’ve kept that old tradition in place. We believe the right words, hold to specific creeds, say that sacraments have to be one thing and not the other. It’s difficult to give up the old ways. But new life is kept from its fullness—what Paul calls the full stature of Christ—in our hesitancy to let go. 

And letting go is what God has done. In the presence of the Word made flesh, God has let go of all the ways that keep us separated from the abundant life promised in Jesus of Nazareth. In other words, God has forgiven sin. Letting go is what the word translated as forgive means in the original Greek. And sin is a state of being, a way of life, that separates us from God. 

Today’s celebration is the evidence we need to let go of the greatest power the world has over us—fear. We can be the walking, talking, living Body of Christ in our own time when we let go of fear of death’s having the final word. We can live humbly, unbound by the chains tied to fear of loss of “stuff” like prestige and admiration, and minister to the poor, the friendless, the needy in the name of the One who entered into their suffering in his own persecution and death. We can do this without fear of what might happen to us at the hands of those who worship power and prestige, and who need to keep the poor and oppressed “in their place” in order to maintain the appearance of power.

In the resurrection of Jesus, God pronounced once and for all time that death no longer has the final word, but that death itself, eternal death, has died. This does not mean that we will not someday face our own physical death, but that in dying to things that also must someday die, we share in the same life of the risen Christ, and that life will never end.

And both of those things—death and new life—are ours now in our own time and place. Our lives are founded on that proclamation we made this morning, words which are a continuing affirmation of who we are and the purpose of our new life, even as we wait for its completeness.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!
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So are you.

​ Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ resurrection is perhaps the most dramatic of the four Gospel narratives. The earth shakes. Angels appear and roll away the stone covering the entrance to the tomb. Then they sit down on the stone in all their blazing glory. Guards freeze. Witnesses wonder even as they’re invited to take a look for themselves. 
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They expected to grieve. They’re prepared to finish the task they didn’t have time to complete just a couple of days earlier. Sundown beginning the Sabbath meant they needed to get home. It was Passover on top of that, but they didn’t feel like celebrating that year. 
I imagine that at least one of the two Marys mentioned in this version of the story is the same one who broke open an expensive jar of ointment and poured it on Jesus. We’re told she bathed his feet in tears and wiped them with her hair. This morning, she likely repeated some of that, this time bathing his feet in tears of joy. 

Then the two companions are given a new task. They are to go tell Jesus’ friends to meet him in Galilee—not Jerusalem, mind you—and Jesus will meet them there. These first witnesses to the resurrection are to convince skeptical disciples that despair has been turned into hope, that death has become new life. 

Matthew tells us that just a couple of days ago, the earth shook, the veil of the Temple concealing the Holy of Holies—the dwelling place of God—was torn in two. Tombs shook open, and many of the dead were raised, then seen walking around town. I wonder what the response to that was. After all, it’s not the zombie apocalypse, not a forerunner of The Walking Dead. 

It’s entirely new, something that never happened that way before. All because Jesus died—entered into death itself—and death could not hold him, despite its powerful grip on life. 

Matthew tells us those things happened at Jesus’ death, as his presence in death stirred them into new life, not pointing them to old ways of life, mind you. New life, just waiting for the moment of new birth. 

We, too, are given a new task this day. Well, not entirely new, because it’s been ours to do from that first resurrection morning. Our task is to bear the new life of the risen Christ into the places of death and oppression in our own time, and to witness what the very presence of the life of Christ can do to transform the many ways death continues to hold life in its grasp. 

The risen Christ waits for us in the many Galilees of our own time. We just need to recognize that those Galilees can be within us, and also the place where others find they meet new life for themselves. We carry the new life of Galilee into the tombs of our own time, where we join with others to proclaim new life in those places and ways of life where death no longer has power.

So go to Galilee. Meet the risen Christ. Then be the new Galilee, where the risen Christ is made known.

​ It’s a perennial question we face this day. We hear the same lessons every year, we go through the same rituals, even though it’s tempting to jump ahead a couple of days so we’re not left standing before a sealed tomb. 
Why? 

I used to spend a lot of time trying to answer the question about why Jesus had to die, especially a cruel death that puts him in the same place as one who is an abomination to God. That’s what Torah says about anyone hanged on a tree. Images of not just three crosses on a hill outside Jerusalem, but those in dark fields and front yards in our own country come to mind as they bear this “strange fruit.” 
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I think I may have answered that question, and it’s not one usually taught in seminary theology classes. However, I think that dependence on those often confusing answers are what leads me to ask it again today. 
Why? 

We’ve been led to believe that the cross of Jesus served as a replacement for the sacrificial offerings made from the time of Abraham up until the destruction of the last Temple in the year 70 CE. Another theory is that his death is a ransom paid to Satan in order for God to purchase humanity back from the clutches of sin. I’ve read that there are anywhere from four to ten theories that try to answer my question, “why,” and, there may be some truth in each one. But frankly, they tend to raise more questions than they answer. 

So, rather than keep chasing that proverbial tail, while ignoring the true nature of the beast it’s attached to, I want to pose it another way. Why, after some 2,000 years, have we found it easier to just repeat the act of crucifixion rather than try to understand and live its atoning possibilities? 

Our world is possibly on the brink of a global conflict brought about because we not only find it easier, but we revel in the short-term successes of crucifixion. Closer to home, we turn a deaf ear or even become defensive because one group or another dares to point out that their lives matter, too, when true sadness comes when we understand and admit why they have to say that so loudly. We relish the possibility of employment gains when prisons and detention centers are built nearby to house those who for some reason are easier to isolate or remove from our community than to find ways to reach out before it’s too late and to teach and share in life’s abundance. 

To top it all off, why do we who wear jewelry in the shape of a cross still not understand the long-term effect of creating more martyrs?
​Maybe it’s because we believe that one cross is sufficient, so long as it’s not our pain or suffering but only for personal gain. Maybe it’s because we believe some of those theories rather than wonder why religion itself sometimes conspires with government power in order to keep pointing out just who ought to hang on those many crosses we continue to create and then turn our backs on because we have other things to do.

Maybe it’s because we have too much invested in kingdoms of death to really believe that in his death, Jesus entered that realm and overturned it once and for all.

There could be many answers, and just as many defenses of their opposites. We’ve been hearing all this for two millennia, but it looks like little in our world has changed since it occurred.
Why?
 

THE REV. E. WAYNE ROLLINS

​ This day always confuses me. It dashes from shouts of victory to death and burial. Hopes are lifted, only to be shattered when nailed to a tree. It’s a bit like life is being condensed into an hour or so of collective memory. 

I won’t go into centuries of mistranslations of the word “hosanna,” except to remind you that it meant “save us, we beg you” in Jesus’ native language. Remember that a bit later when you sing “hosanna in the highest” and what you might be praying for when you sing. 

Today seems to make more sense when I step back and remember all the things we’ve celebrated over the past five months. Maybe, instead of victory parades, today’s “triumphal entry” is the culmination of the Incarnation we celebrated a few months ago. When Jesus entered Jerusalem that day, he didn’t just go into the city. He entered fully into our lives. He has something to tell us, which he will do by showing us. 

Jesus has been called a prophet, a title given to those who see the reality around them and tell the truth about what they see. They might express anger, even rage, such as when Jesus overturned the tables of merchants in the Temple and drove them away. “Zeal,” some politely called it. 

It takes a lot of energy to keep overturning tables, especially when there are those ready to reset them as soon as you’re done. Initial anger often turns into empathetic sorrow as tears cleanse the hearts and souls of those who see others caught in webs of oppression and deceit meant to extort their very lives. 

Jesus shows us a different way. He enters a city whose very name means City of Peace, not to change its structure or overthrow its rulers. Well, not literally in the heavenly military sense many expected of the Messiah. Jesus’ ride is not a forerunner of Paul Revere’s, nor is it Dr. Strangelove’s hitching a ride to destruction. 

Jesus’ ride is a journey into our own lives, our joys and sorrows, our health and our suffering, our hopes and our disappointments, to show us that God understands that these things are both sides of the coin of life, and that we are not alone when any one of them dominates the others. He will carry these things when life overturns our own tables, and hold them near as they are transfigured into unity with him, because he knows firsthand these same life-defining moments. 
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What he does with them, and with us, is show us how ministry is done. And he will show us the possibilities of Almighty God when it seems all is lost and we release all we hold dear into God’s loving embrace. But for that, we’ll need to walk with him through this city of life where peace is in such short supply. We can do that by imitating his own faith in the One in whose name he comes to us, and who gives himself to and for us so that our own journey will be complete as his will soon be

THE REV. E. WAYNE ROLLINS

​​ Today we have two familiar, even beloved stories. The first is from that madman prophet Ezekiel, whose words are sometimes so explicit that ancient scholars advised limiting their reading to only those over the age of thirty. You want to get teenagers to read the Bible, tell them that. 

The second is the story of raising Lazarus from the dead, which is only found in John’s Gospel. It’s an event so radical that a conspiracy was launched to murder Lazarus because his presence caused many to believe Jesus is the Messiah. Whether that happened, we don’t know. But we do know that Lazarus would have had to face death a second time. 

As you might guess, I want to take a look at these two stories that doesn’t adhere to traditional interpretation. I’m not really all that interested in what others have said about them, and repeating that to you. You might also guess that's one reason I wouldn’t use AI to write sermons. For better or worse, it’s all on me this morning. 

We are surrounded by death and the multitude of ways leading to it. We might even find that we support a lot of those ways. A few weeks ago, as I drove friends to visit another friend dying of lung cancer, I found myself begging some of them to give up smoking, because I didn’t want to have to do that again. I didn’t make them get out of the car and walk so they would understand how important breathing continues to be. I think they get that, despite the effects of addiction. 

During the covid lockdown six years ago I decided to read some literature I hadn’t bothered to consider before then. At the urging of one friend, I read the whole Harry Potter series in March. Then I downloaded and read all of C. S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia. I commend that series to you, which is enhanced by having either a literal or figurative child on your knee as you do so. 

It’s the last book of Narnia that comes to mind today. Entitled The Last Battle, it begins in a shocking way that the reader imagines, but is only told later is fact. A battle rages, its background being the old story of good versus evil, which is at the heart of the Harry Potter series as well. 

Several warriors find themselves in a cabin, where it seems they face inevitable destruction. The heroes of the story recognize the appearance of a way out, while others cower in fear. Fear prevents them from taking the risk of leaving the cabin, while those who do leave enter into a new field that can best be described as paradise. 

No more spoilers. Consider Ezekiel’s pile of bones, Lazarus’ sealed tomb. The call rings out. Prophesy to the bones! Lazarus, come out! What if the bones replied, “we’ve gotten used to this,” or Lazarus said “I’m just fine in here.” 

​This parish is engaged in a discernment period to try to figure out what the future holds for it. There are and will continue to be efforts to keep repeating past glory days, or even today's familiar days that are maybe not so glorious. What if the only prophetic words worth hearing are a command to just get up and live?

Ezekiel is given no declarative words of assurance of a livable wage. Lazarus isn’t told his 401k will be restored. But there is a command given by Jesus to those standing around in amazement. “Unbind him and let him go.”

How can we do that if we continue to bind ourselves to ways that no longer give life to us or to those around us? Perhaps the best we can do is be honest about the aspects of our lives that keep us in the sun-parched desert or behind sealed doors of the tombs of our own choosing. Maybe then we can begin to respond faithfully to the command “get up and live.”

We like to know what’s going to happen. We want to control the topics, schedule the dates, limit the time span. But we’re talking about eternal things, and discernment means listening more than talking, waiting more than achieving. It’s confusing, sometimes frustrating. It’s uncomfortable. It’s also about God.

God offers us life without calendars, schedules, or precise GPS coordinates. The call to come out of our comfortable and comforting tombs is a call to live in the surprising wonder of the God who told Moses, “I will be what I will be.” There’s no controlling that, although that doesn’t seem to keep us from trying.

The wind hears the voice of God that enables it to become the breath of the Spirit that gives us life. We can say we’re ready to inhale, but the proof comes when we actually do it.
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And then, we become part of the continuing and beloved story of new life that is God’s joy to help us keep telling.

THE REV. E. WAYNE ROLLINS

​ The writer of the Gospel of John uses a method where an event poses a question, followed by a response in the form of an action. This, in turn, leads to a deeper teaching, often leading to a confrontation of some kind. 

In today’s lesson, a blind beggar is seen by the disciples, who wonder why he is the way he is. They want to place blame somewhere, but Jesus will have none of that. His explanation, however, is somewhat less than satisfying. “He was born this way so that the works of God might be made manifest in him.” Anyone who might want to write a theodicy on that statement is welcome to have at it. 

Right at the outset we have a reversal. The work of God is to be seen through a man who has been blind from birth. Juxtapose that with the ending of the story, where those who claim to have 20/20 vision regarding the works of God are told they are blind. 

How about us? Do we truly see or are we in some way blind to the works of God? After all, the answers we give just might make manifest whether we live in the wholeness we seek, or whether we continue to choose brokenness as our way of life, our very identity. 

We don’t have to look very far to find brokenness due to blindness. In our city, we have many who live unsheltered in part because our economy idolizes property as status, and the very real foundation of our wealth. Then we go further to confuse wealth with worth, and therefore those without wealth are in some way unworthy of its provisions and security. 

In our nation, we choose to see differences in language, skin color, age, gender, and a lot of other identifying attributes as ways of determining and maintaining superiority and that word “dominion,” which we use to serve ourselves by interpreting it as dominant rather than the responsibility to care for one another. 

That extends into the wider world, including the planet Earth and its resources. Have you noticed that when a tragedy occurs, and I’ll include chosen forms of violent action as tragedy, for they are just that to at least one party in the conflict, have you seen that some of the first concerns raised are economic? Oil prices. Inflation. Canceled modes of transportation. Vacation plans. All this while so many are faced with grief and loss while burying their children, other loved ones, and neighbors. 

Does anyone really understand what real peace, you know, that peace that passes all understanding, really looks like? Will we recognize it even if it stands right in front of us? Or will we dismiss it, like the Pharisees who dismissed the formerly blind man from the synagogue, because we don’t like what its appearance says to us? Or says about us? Truth often holds up a mirror, showing us our true selves in our own judgmental words.

Jesus asks the man if he believes in the Son of Man, then identifies himself as that being. I’ve struggled to understand what the phrase “Son of Man” means in John’s Gospel. Current sight leads me to believe that it is the identity of the One whom theologians, including Paul, have called the “Second Adam,” the one who, in some way, embodies all humanity, as well as its future hope.

As that foundational belief takes hold, I also believe that for too long we have blinded ourselves by our refusal to see not just Jesus in others, but others in some way present with Christ in the same way we believe ourselves to be. This drives home Matthew’s words, “as much as you do it to the least of these, my children, you do it to me.” And on top of that, as the body of Christ, the church, we also do it—whatever “it” is—to ourselves.
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Maybe when we truly see the many ways our self-inflicted wounds drive us far from the very things we say we seek, our eyes will behold the true peace we claim to long for. It’s probably still standing right in front of us.

THE REV. E. WAYNE ROLLINS

​ A few weeks ago the active clergy in our diocese met for one of our Clergy Day sessions. We talked about lay licensing for various ministries and heard reports about events affecting all of us. At one point, we sat around our tables to discuss some questions presented to us. 

I don’t remember what those specific questions were. I do remember a discussion about hierarchies and proper places for folks exercising some of the ministries we discussed. I said that as heirs of a tradition based in England, we had to admit that a lot of our structures are based in a highly defined hierarchy—royalty, nobility, aristocracy, all the way to those of us who have to work for a living. 

Much of our canonical structure is hierarchical. The alternative to that comes from the congregational polity of the Presbyterians, Baptists, and other Reformed traditions. Opposition to our hierarchical structure played a large part in the Puritans’ sailing to these shores, especially since beheading a king and seizing Parliament for eleven years didn’t work out all that well for them as they might have hoped. It's also a big factor in the decision to not have a state-sanctioned religious denomination in this country. You might discern the wisdom behind that when you consider the effects of state-sanctioned religion in the history of the world. Everything from the crusades to empire-building to September 11, 2001 and pretty much any day in the Middle East finds its roots in religious posturing, even when at heart actions were more about power and wealth. 

During our discussion, a colleague said that every communal tradition has its hierarchy. Whether it be a formal, defined structure, or tribal customs, every community pays deference to its leaders who might be elected, or simply considered wise due to the experience of age or particular spiritual gifts. This is true for families as well. 

One community is set-up differently, if it defines itself in ways that are not the customs of traditional worldly structures. That different community is one that took on a derogatory name in its early years. We’re told that it was in the ancient city of Antioch, Syria, that its name was first pronounced. Christian. 

Years ago it became apparent to me that there is one group of people whom Jesus denounces, even shuns. Those people are the religious leaders who tried to maintain their status by judging Jesus because of those with whom he associates. He hangs out with outcasts and “sinners.” He touches the ill and infirm. Why, one time, he made mud with his own spit and rubbed it on a blind man’s eyes. 

He doesn’t obey every jot and tittle of the law when pastoral concerns supersede it. And to beat it all, he sits down—and stays a few days with—those considered mortal enemies. You know, Samaritans. You have to say and hear that word with the same disdain as the people of Antioch said “Christian.” Or as some of our own leaders might refer to folks from Caribbean, African, and Central American ancestry.

Jesus has a favorite word for those of us who like to use those terms to feed our own desire for superiority. It means, in the translation from the original Greek, actors. Scripture usually uses the English version of the Greek. “Hypocrites.”

But we aren’t here, bearers of that disdained identity Christian, to be actors on a stage as if God posted our Playbill on the heavenly refrigerator door. We are here to be ministers, a word meaning those who use their skills and resources to help others.

It might be as simple as looking beyond accepted practice and sitting with a stranger to share a cold drink and warm conversation. It could be a conversation where truth is spoken in love in such a way that each life is changed for the better. It’s always where a child of God dares to see a sibling—another child of God—and shares life in as much abundance as is possible in that moment.
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Who knows? Perhaps the encounter of God’s children with one another, and the realization that each bears that identity, will cause one to jump up to spread the good news of the presence of the Savior of the world in our own time. It caused an outcast to recognize Truth sitting next to her. It caused a German priest named Martin Luther to turn in a new direction when he came to understand that it’s more about what God has done—and continues to do—than what we do.
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Why, it could even be the witness of a fountain of life-giving sustenance gushing from our own, and hopefully formerly, rocky hearts.