Hope and Trust

What do you hear in today’s Scripture readings? Do any of today’s readings speak to your own experience? Perhaps you empathize with David’s grief over the death of his beloved friend Jonathan, even as you might wonder how David can also grieve the death of his old enemy Saul. Perhaps you too have known the depths of sorrow – over the death of a loved one, over the deaths of nine innocent people sharing study of the Bible or of innocent tourists on a beach, over the betrayal of someone close to you, over the loss of a job, over continued war and poverty. Perhaps you too cry out with the psalmist, “Out of the depths have a I called to you, O Lord; Lord hear my voice!” Perhaps, like Paul, you have begged others to respond to a need or cause about which you feel passionate. Or perhaps, like the people in today’s Gospel stories, you have begged for healing, either for another person, or for yourself. Perhaps you’ve been in all these places, and you know, from your own deep experience, how Scripture continues to speak to our condition, continues to offer us words of hope and lead us to a deeper trust in God’s saving power.

Our reading from 2 Samuel, catches up with David after he has defeated the Philistines. Despite the fact that the way is now open for David to become king over Israel, and despite his bitter conflict with Saul, David pours out his grief over both Saul’s and Jonathan’s death. More important perhaps for us, the account of David’s grief allows us to see David expressing deep emotion. No “stiff upper lip” or “men don’t cry” here. Perhaps we might, like David, understand our emotions as gifts from God. Perhaps we might even trust that God’s shares our emotions and seeks to console and comfort us in our grief.

Certainly, the psalmist trusts that God shares our griefs and sorrows. The psalmist also reminds us that, eager as we are for God’s comfort, we must wait patiently. And we must never let go of our hope that, in God’s good time, God will restore all things.

St. Paul also counsels the Corinthian Christians to wait patiently – and to also act in faith. As he wrote to the Christians in Corinth, the faithful in Jerusalem were suffering from famine. Now Paul was certain that Jesus would quickly return, probably within Paul’s own lifetime. Yet Paul does not hesitate to look after the living. He does not say, “Ignore the poor, and hungry, because all of us will soon be taken up.” Instead, he asks for help from those he himself had brought to faith in Christ. He knows that life is a gift of God, that it is good, and that the bodies of children and adults must be fed. He knows what matters – and he trusts that the Corinthians will respond to his request – because he compares everything to God’s great gift: “For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.”

Our reading from the Gospel according to Mark offers another of Mark’s gospel “sandwiches:” one story nested within another, each speaking to us in different ways. Here, we catch up with Jesus, just as he has arrived from the other side of the Sea of Galilee. Despite Jesus’ best efforts, his fame as a miraculous healer has spread. As the crowds of the hopeful – and the curious – press in on him, a wealthy and important man, a leader in the synagogue, falls on his knees in front of Jesus, and begs Jesus to save his daughter. Jesus attends to the father in need and turns to accompany him.

Just then, the bleeding woman, outcast from all polite society because of her illness, approaches Jesus. She is convinced that she will be healed by just touching Jesus’ outer garment, and that, because of the crowds, no one will notice her. But Jesus notices her, or rather notices that something has happened. Perhaps the energy of the woman’s immense faith was more powerful than all the shoving and pushing of the crowd. Perhaps that energy was enough to call forth God’s healing power.

As we follow Jairus home, we hear that by the time he and Jesus finally arrive, the child has already been declared dead, and the professional mourners have begun to gather. Why is Jairus still bringing Jesus into the house? What can the rabbi do now? Even so, Jesus turns to the sad father and says the words that we all need to hear over and over again, “Do not fear. Only believe.” As Jairus leads Jesus into the child’s room, Jesus shocks him by saying, “The child is not dead but sleeping.” And then another miracle of healing occurs. Perhaps hinting at the end of Mark’s story, Jesus gently says, “Young woman, get up.” The onlookers collectively let out their breaths, and life returns.

Two instances of healing, for two different kinds of people, that came about in two different ways. In the frame story, Jesus offered healing to the daughter of a wealthy, powerful family. In the nested story, an outcast woman, a woman shunned because of her illness, claimed Jesus’ healing power for herself. What is more important, the healing of Jairus’s daughter was a public event: the crowds knew where he was going, and Jairus himself witnessed it. By contrast, the healing of the bleeding woman was a private event. Even Jesus wasn’t sure what had happened, until the woman, trembling and afraid, fell down before him and told him everything.

Does any of this resonate with our own experience? One thing these stories should tell us is that God offers healing to everyone. You do not need to be rich and powerful, you do not need to have a Cadillac health insurance plan, to claim God’s healing power. Indeed, as Mark and Luke suggest over and over, God has a preference for the poor, the outcast, and the marginalized, and God will attend to their needs, just as God attends to our needs.

Moreover, perhaps we too have experienced healing – or offered it – in these two different ways. An aside here: We hear the gospel stories of miraculous healings so that we can learn something about what God is like, not so that we can think that Jesus came to be a 24/7 medical savior. It is not impossible, though it is extremely rare, for miraculous healings, to actually occur. And if they do not, it is never because our faith was insufficient.

However, we all do experience open, public healing: through our medical facilities, through support groups, and even through our ministries as a church. What’s even more important, we can experience – and offer – healing more indirectly and privately, in the “random acts of kindness” through which God operates in the world. Such healing can happen anywhere. A twelve-step meeting was just ending when a young woman suddenly blurted out her name, shouted that she was an alcoholic, and rushed out of the room. An older woman followed her and saw her sitting in a dark corner weeping uncontrollably. The older woman came over to the younger woman and embraced her. She said gently, “My dear, just let us love you until you can come to love yourself.”

We may not even be aware when such healing occurs. Theologians who have studied the science of cosmology speak of “quantum entanglement,” the idea that ultimately all life, indeed all creation, has a common origin in God, and that we are all ultimately connected. Or perhaps you’ve heard of the “butterfly effect.” This is a term used in chaos theory to describe how small changes to a seemingly unrelated thing or condition can affect large, complex systems. The term comes from the suggestion that the flapping of a butterfly's wings in South America could affect the weather in Texas, meaning that the tiniest influence on one part of a system can have a huge effect on another part. If you think about it, perhaps this is the way prayer works. Our lives are connected. Like Jesus, we may receive healing from someone or some circumstance unknown to us, or we may be the agent of healing for someone, simply by virtue of how we live out our lives. Needless to say, as followers of the one who offered himself in love to all comers, we are called to be grateful to God for any healing in our lives that does occur, and we are called to treat lovingly all who approach us for help and healing.

My brothers and sisters, here is the good news. Much of our lives are out of our control. But as followers of Jesus we believe that we are connected to God and to one another, and that God will respond to our needs, directly or indirectly, in God’s good time. We may not be able to predict when or how God will act, but we can continue to live out our lives with hope and trust in God’s deep care.

The Hidden Work of God

Who knows why all the paraments are now green? The altar frontal, the pulpit and lectern drapes, even my chasuble and stole. Two weeks ago they were all white, the week before that they were all red. Why are they now all green? Can anyone tell me?

In the Episcopal Church we are blessed with a liturgical year that has distinct seasons. In Advent, our paraments are all blue, to symbolize our solemn preparation for the coming of Christ. In Christmas tide, in Easter tide, and on other festal days, they are white and gold, to symbolize our joyful response to Jesus’ birth and Christ’s resurrection. During Lent, the paraments are purple, symbolizing our need to confront our weaknesses and amend our lives. During Holy Week and on Pentecost, they are red, symbolizing either the blood of Jesus’ death or the fire of the Holy Spirit. And finally, in Epiphany tide and from now until next Advent, the paraments are all green. And, if you look outside the church, you see the same color: green! Yes, my friends, during the short season of Epiphany and during this longer Pentecost season, we wear green so that we may always remember that God is at work within us helping us to grow. We may not feel as if we are growing, we may not see any growth. Nevertheless, God is at work within us: enabling us to grow personally in our individual spiritual lives, to grow together as a Christian community held together by bonds of love, and to grow in our ability to see where and how we may join God in God’s work in the world.

Growth: it’s a mysterious process. As you gardeners know, we can stunt growth, or, we can encourage it, but we can’t make it happen. Often, we have to wait patiently before we can even see that it has happened. So you might rightly ask, “How can we tell if we are growing? How we can tell whether God is at work in the world?” I look around me, and it looks like the same old, same old. Same old sins, same old weaknesses, same old conflicts, same old war, violence, corruption, injustice, and death. Am I really growing as a Christian? What does God see that I don’t see? Is God really at work in the world? Well, my friends, you may not have always had the ambition to be a plant, but you are a plant! We are all God’s plants, and rest assured, God is at work in God’s field, even if we don’t always see where and how! Indeed, today’s lessons remind us that most often God’s work is invisible, mysterious, and hidden from us.

Were you surprised by the outcome of today’s lesson from 1st Samuel? God had surely been at work in David from the time of David’s birth, but God’s work was hidden. It was a mystery to everyone, perhaps even including David himself. Certainly, God’s choice of David was hidden from Samuel, from David’s family, and from the whole community of Israel, until the moment that God directed Samuel to anoint David. If you had been there, you would surely have thought: Jesse’s youngest son? Perhaps in 2006 General Convention delegates thought the same thing when Katherine Jefferts Schori was elected Presiding Bishop. She was certainly not the most obvious choice among the group of seven nominees. In subsequent readings this summer we will hear why God chose David and how, with the help of God’s Spirit, David became a great king and the ancestor and model for God’s messiah.

Both of the parables in today’s Gospel lesson remind us even more forcefully that God’s work is hidden, mysterious, and mostly beyond our control. God is indeed bringing in God’s Reign, but we as humans mostly can’t fathom how. The coming of God’s Reign, Jesus tells us in Mark’s Gospel, is like someone throwing out seeds and then waiting. The farmer may prepare the soil and plant at the right time, but the farmer can’t make the seeds grow. Without the farmer knowing how, the earth produces grain all by itself. And the signs are unmistakable: first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain. How? We don’t know. But the harvest is nonetheless assured – in great abundance. In the same way, Jesus suggests, the coming of God’s Reign can be compared to a tiny mustard seed. Not only does the tiny seed grow into a large shrub, it also produces oil and more seeds for cooking and flavoring. But how? We don’t know. In the end, despite our best efforts to find out – and despite the discoveries of modern science – the growth, of plants, no less than of ourselves, is still mysterious.

In his second letter to that fractious Christian community at Corinth, Paul also wrestled with the mysterious, hidden work of God. Paul knew that the Corinthian Christians took great pride in what they thought of as their great spiritual gifts. In this letter, as in his first letter to them, he reminded them that, if we grow or mature spiritually, it is because God has taken the initiative, and God has done the work. Paul tells the Corinthian Christians and us that if we are confident about God’s work, our confidence should not come from ourselves but from the death and resurrection of Christ. Because of Christ’s work, we are able to see as God sees, that is, we are able to “regard nothing from a human point of view,” but rather, to remember that “everything has become new,” through the death and resurrection of Christ.

When I think about the mysterious, hidden work of God in myself, in the Church, and in the world, I’m often reminded of the saguaros of the southwest desert. The saguaros are the cacti that most often symbolize the desert for us: tall, green, spiky, with great curving arms. Of all the cacti, the saguaros grow the most slowly. You can grow one from seed, but you will probably not live to see it as an adult. When they are about my height, they are about 75 years old. They’re about 100 when the buds for the arms begin to develop, and they’re close to 200 years old before they’re fully grown. They do produce flowers and fruit when they are mature, but they grow very slowly. If you want saguaros, you have to be very patient, and you have to take a very long view.

Fortunately, God takes the long view. God is at work in us, invisibly, mysteriously, slowly, and, rest assured, God will have God’s harvest. You may feel like one of those saguaros, as if God’s growth is happening so slowly that you cannot perceive it. Rest assured: you are growing! The Word of God somehow penetrates our hearts, and we come back to Christ with renewed devotion. By God’s grace, we find growing within ourselves the desire to deepen our relationship with God, perhaps even to seek spiritual direction. By God’s grace, we begin to read Scripture more intentionally and regularly. By God’s grace, we begin to pray for others. One day, without our knowing where the words come from, we finally have the courage to ask others to pray for us. By God’s grace, through the leading of the Holy Spirit, we are finally able to commit to a twelve-step program, give up our addictions, and become sober or clean. By God’s grace, we can finally forgive all the old wrongs members of our families have done us. By God’s grace, we can put behind us the old conflicts in our families, workplaces, and churches, and begin to reach out to one another in love. By God’s grace we hear God calling us to a new vocation, and, from unknown depths within ourselves, we answer, “Here am I, send me.” By God’s grace, our parishes discover new ministries that enable us to use our gifts and meet the needs of those around us. By God’s grace, we realize that God’s Reign has already begun, and we take our place at God’s side and participate in God’s renewal of creation. By God’s grace, we realize that where God is at work, the harvest is more abundant than we can ever ask or imagine.

And so, as we enter into this season of growth in the spiritual life, this season of growth reflected in the green paraments around us, we can be filled with hope and faith, and we can patiently trust that God is at work, even if God’s work is hidden, invisible, and mysterious. In a few minutes we will affirm our faith in the words given us by the early Church. Now, though, I’d like us to share a different kind of affirmation of faith, faith in God’s mysterious growth, given us by a contemporary spiritual “midwife,” Joyce Rupp. Let’s stand and say it together.

I believe that it takes much patience to sow a seed, to freely give it away to the heart of the earth, to allow it to take root and to grow in its own good time.

I believe that the Word of God has many times been planted in my life, often because of another who received the seed in ready soil, brought forth a harvest, and shared that goodness with me.

I believe that great things can come forth from even the tiniest seed planted in love and cared for tenderly in the heart of another.

I believe that even the most insignificant aspects of life can be the seed of God’s gifting, that deeper faith can root and mature in very ordinary soil.

I believe that some dying of seed has to take place before it can give itself over to life, that every heart has its germination time, its dark moment, before the future holiness of harvest comes.

I believe that my life will always know its season of hope … that I will find green, growing things after every harsh, barren winter.

And most of all … I believe in the Sower of all seeds, in the God of renewing seasons, in the Giver of all good and growing things, my Lord and my God! Amen.

Who Are My Mother and My Brothers?

What is a family? Perhaps you remember the popular TV show “Father Knows Best.” It aired from 1954 to 1960 on CBS. Set somewhere in the suburban Midwest, the show featured the Anderson family: Jim, an insurance agent, played by well-known actor Robert Young, Margaret, a stay-at-home mom, played by veteran actress Jane Wyatt, and their three children, Betty, Bud, and Kathy. The kids got into the usual scrapes that kids get into. Margaret was a loving, supportive mother, who exemplified the voice of reason, while father Jim always had sage advice for whatever situation the family faced. During the six years the show ran, rarely were there shouting, violence, or nasty words, nor did the family face alcoholism, dire poverty, serious health problems, or sudden death. Instead, “Fathers Knows Best” gave viewers "truly an idealized family, the sort that viewers could relate to and emulate.” One can easily imagine that, after the turmoil and losses of World War II and Korea, that idealized family was exactly the balm that 1950s America desperately wanted.

Is the “Father Knows Best” model what you think of when you hear the word “family?” In the ancient world, of course, in Jesus’ time, such a family would have been rare if not virtually unknown. Families were then – and actually still are in many parts of the world – extended families. Women married into a family headed by a senior male, in which three, perhaps even four, generations lived together in the same compound or village. In some Muslim countries, in some traditional African cultures, and in some defiant Mormon communities in this country, men may have had more than one wife. In some African cultures too and in traditional Chinese culture, one’s family also includes one’s ancestors.

Today we are at last beginning to recognize that the nuclear “Father Knows Best” family is not the only – or even the ideal – description of family. We have begun to see that there are many other ways for people to be family. For different reasons, we are beginning to see again families comprised of three generations in the same house. Two elderly women may live together as a family. A gay couple may enlarge their family by adopting children.

As we begin to accept that there are diverse forms of family structure, we may also need to accept that we have many different feelings about our own families, especially our families of origin. Think about it, what are your own feelings about your family? Was your family so loving and supportive that you totally relate to “Fathers Knows Best?” Or was your family less than ideal, perhaps even dysfunctional and abusive?

As we hear a Scripture reading like the passage we just heard from the gospel according to Mark, it’s important to recognize that we bring a host of different associations and feelings to the idea of “family,” associations and feelings that might color how you hear today’s passage. We’re now in the long growing season of Pentecost. In the first half of the Christian year, we anticipated Jesus’ birth, celebrated the coming of the Word into the human family, watched Jesus reveal his true identity to those around him and to us, walked the sorrowful road with him to Jerusalem, mourned his death, and rejoiced in his rising to life again, his ascension, and his awakening within us of the Holy Spirit.

Now, in the second half of the Christian year, we are called to grow in our commitment to Jesus. We do that by reflecting more closely on how Jesus lived and what he taught. This year, we return to the Gospel of Mark in order to deepen our immersion in Jesus’ story. As you remember, Mark was written in the late ‘60s AD. It was the first gospel to be written, and it probably represents the earliest compilation of the traditions and memories of the first generation of Jesus’ followers. No doubt reflecting the experiences of Mark’s audience, the gospel often shows Jesus in conflict with those around him, especially with the religious leaders. Often his own followers too seem to be clueless as to what he is trying to teach them.

In today’s reading, Jesus has just returned to Nazareth after performing a series of miraculous healings. Right away, before he can even finish his meal, he faces two challenges. As is often the case with Mark, one, the conflict with the Scribes who illogically charge Jesus with being in league with demonic forces, is sandwiched within the story of his conflict with his family members. Since conflict with the religious authorities will come up again before we finish with Mark, here I want to focus on Jesus’ interaction with his family members.

There are at least two ways to hear this story, depending on your feelings about your own families. If you came from a loving, supportive family, you might see the concern of Jesus’ mother and brothers as quite genuine, as evidence that they truly worried that he was becoming mentally unstable. After all, he had left his family profession of carpentry to become an itinerant preacher, and he had persuaded several men from fishing families to travel with him. Although he was not a trained physician, he had cured the sick. He had violated deeply held social and religious norms by touching a leper and healing on the Sabbath. Would we not react the same way as his mother and brothers did, if one of ours did such odd things? Did we not try to keep our children from fleeing to Canada during the Vietnam War and from becoming “flower children?” We might even see Jesus’ response to his family members – “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother” – as overly harsh, even cruel. Perhaps Jesus was suggesting that even the most loving families can be inward-looking and limited, generous with each other but unconcerned about the needs of others.

On the other hand, if you came from an abusive and dysfunctional family, and especially if you suffered psychological and physical abuse, you might be overjoyed by Jesus’ invitation to be part of his loving family, to have him for a brother, and to have a loving and gracious God as your Father and Mother. You might be delighted that now, finally, you can be accepted for who are you, forgiven all your failures, and lovingly embraced by a welcoming community.

The point of this story is that, whatever our families of origin, whatever kinds of family we now find ourselves in, we are all called to accept Jesus’ invitation to join a new kind of family, a family committed to loving God as deeply as we can and to caring for our neighbor as ourselves. Jesus calls us into a family in which our roles are not defined by blood, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, economic status, or previous failings and sins. Jesus calls us into a family that includes all: the wise and the righteous, the nobodies, the tax collectors, the prostitutes, and the sinners, a family in which we are all God’s children, and in which all of us are loved and accepted. That is the good news. That is the sign of the nearness of God’s Reign.

Oncologist Rachel Naomi Remen tells the story of a rabbi at a Yom Kippur service. On the Day of Atonement Jews everywhere seek God’s forgiveness. Instead of directly preaching on forgiveness, the rabbi walked up to the lectern with his infant daughter in his arms. She was a year old and absolutely adorable. As she smiled at the congregation, and then at her father, he smiled back and then began to preach about the meaning of Yom Kippur. The baby grabbed his nose. The rabbi gently took her hand away and continued preaching. Then the baby took his tie and began to chew on it. Everyone chuckled. The rabbi rescued his tie, smiled at his child, looked over her head at the congregation and said, “Think about it. Is there anything she can do that you could not forgive her for?”

Just then, she reached up and grabbed his glasses. Everyone laughed. The rabbi himself laughed, as he retrieved his glasses and settled them back on his nose. Still smiling, he waited for silence. When it came, he asked, “And when does that stop? When does it get hard to forgive? At three? At seven? At fourteen? At thirty-five? How old does someone have to be before you forget that everyone is a child of God?” To which I would add, how old does someone have to be before you forget that all of us are members of the same family, that all of us are Christ’s brothers and sisters?

My friends, this is the good news. All of us are God’s children, all of us have been forgiven and accepted, regardless of who we were and are, and all of us are sisters and brothers of Jesus and of one another. In this place, in this island of love and acceptance, we can begin to reflect out to ourselves and to the world, the love and acceptance we have found in God. As retired Methodist Bishop Will Willimon reminds us, “Every time the family of God gathers for Holy Communion … or a covered-dish fellowship supper, or serves up soup to the homeless on the street corner, the world looks at this odd family and says, ‘Jesus is hanging out with the same reprobates that got him crucified.’ And we say, ‘Thank God.’”

I Saw the Lord

“In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty….” Can you imagine it? The year was 736 BC. It was a time of political conflict and turmoil. (Isn’t it always?) A man named Isaiah stood in the middle of a crowd worshipping in the temple. He could feel the heat from the roaring fire on the brazier, smell the burning flesh of the sacrificed animals, hear the sacred chanting of the priests, and see the rising of the clouds of incense. In the midst of the hubbub, Isaiah had an overwhelming vision of God’s presence. He could see God’s immensity, as just the hem of God’s robe filled the space of the temple. He could sense God’s power and holiness. He could hear the praise of the seraphs, those terrifying angels with three pairs of wings. He knew the world as God-filled, and he knew that he was in the presence of sheer and utter mystery.

Awed and terrified by his sense of God’s holiness, Isaiah immediately felt his own unworthiness. He knew that, despite all the sacrifices in which he had participated, that he himself was anything but holy. His people, still mourning the death of an arrogant king, were also unholy. “Woe is me,” he cried. What else could he say in the face of this totally unexpected vision? And then one of the angels, knowing his despair, transformed his mouth and his heart with a live coal from the sacrificial brazier. Still reeling from the angel’s touch, he heard God thunder, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And to his own surprise – but not to God’s – he answered, “Here am I; send me.” Converted, transformed by his encounter with the living God, Isaiah accepted God’s commission, without knowing what “here I am; send me” might entail, without any sense of the difficulties he would almost immediately face in his prophetic ministry. His life was changed forever by his encounter with God.

It’s hard not to gasp in awe ourselves as we share Isaiah’s sense of God’s overwhelming power and utter otherness. Perhaps we wonder what we would do if we had a similar experience. In fact, Scripture is full of similar stories of God’s breaking into the lives of humans. Samuel too had an encounter with God at the beginning of his ministry. As a young boy, serving the old priest Eli, he heard God calling to him at night in the temple. At first, he misunderstood and thought Eli was calling him. But then, instructed by Eli, Samuel finally answered God, saying, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” Ezekiel too had a vision of God’s immensity, as he encountered God in a chariot surrounded by angels. He heard God’s command to go to the rebellious house of Israel, to speak God’s word to them. To reassure him that he would be speaking for God, Ezekiel was offered a scroll to eat. “Then I ate it; and in my mouth it was sweet as honey.” When God came to Jeremiah to commission him, Jeremiah tried to refuse God’s commission. He said, “Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy.” But you know what God said? God said, “Do not say, ‘I am only a boy;’ for you shall go to all to whom I send you….” Then, just as the angel had touched Isaiah’s lips, God put God’s hand on Jeremiah’s mouth and said, “Now I have put my words in your mouth.”

Many saints have had similar unexpected encounters with God, grace-filled encounters that led them to understand in a new way God’s vision for their lives. Paul, the Desert Fathers and Mothers, Francis and Clare, Julian of Norwich, Teresa of Avila, John Wesley, Brother Lawrence, Therése of Lisieux, William Booth, Evelyn Underhill, and countless others experienced God’s presence in a new and profound way. All of them came away from their experiences knowing that God had transformed them and had commissioned them for new work on God’s behalf, even when they were not yet ready to accept God’s commission.

Many ordinary people also have life-changing encounters with God, encounters where they know God’s utter mystery and their own unworthiness, and yet they sense that God has initiated something transformative within them. I don’t often speak about myself in sermons. Worship is not about me, it’s about us and our encounter with God. Even so, today I want to share with you an experience of God from my own life. It was March, 1998. I had organized a Saturday morning Lenten Quiet day at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Athens. Three meditations, two in the morning and one in the afternoon, were offered by Sr. Eleanor from the Community of the Transfiguration. We had started out in the living room-like lounge. I stayed there after the first meditation and wrote in my journal in response. However, in response to the second meditation, I went into the nave and knelt in one of the pews. Some of you know that Good Shepherd is a Georgian colonial that was built in 1952. It has high ceilings and bare windows, and in daylight there is always a feeling of a lot of light in the nave.

I was kneeling in the pew praying about what Sr. Eleanor had said, something about going into the desert to experience God more intensely. As I knelt there, I had a distinct sense of God calling me and asking me to consider ordained ministry. In March 1998 I had been at Ohio University only two years, I was immersed in my academic career, I still had ambitions for another career move, and, to top it off, I had two children in college. Needless to say, I was not thinking about ordained ministry. And yet, this voice was insistent about ordained ministry. The longer I knelt there, the more insistent it became.

Finally, I had to answer. Unlike Isaiah, Samuel, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Paul, Francis, Julian, Teresa, William Booth, and all the others, I said, “Forget about it, Lord. Not me. Priest? Who me? You gotta be kidding!” I remember clearly what I felt: not such deep commitment to my career that I couldn’t leave it, nor concern about two private-college tuitions. I felt what Isaiah had felt: I felt unworthy, totally unfit for the work of ordained ministry. “Leave me alone, Lord,” I cried. And God did. However, unlike other quiet days, in which I had experienced joy and peace, on that day, even after the third meditation, I felt destabilized and unbalanced, as if something in my world had suddenly shifted. Then in January 2004, God came back….

A true sense of God’s presence. Sometimes it is huge and overwhelming, and we are overawed by the immensity, otherness, and mystery of God. Sometimes we can sense the reality of Jesus’ presence in our lives, as many of us do when we share Jesus’ Body and Blood with each other. And sometimes God comes to us in silence, when God the Holy Spirit whispers to us. In our incessant 24/7 world, can we clear away some of the noise that hides the voice of God: the jangling of cell phones, the shouting commentators on talk radio, the deafening drones of leaf blowers and riding mowers, and the ugly shouts of partisan politics? Can we pause, sit, breathe, and listen? Although we can never control when God will show up, when we open our ears for even a bit, God may just take advantage of our openness, just as God did with Isaiah in the temple. God may just initiate in us an ultimately life-changing transformation.

In seminary I spent an entire semester studying the nature of the Trinity. And even though I now wear a collar, God is still, and will always be, ultimately a mystery. There is so much I still don’t know. But I do know this. We may not be able to put into words any coherent articulation of who God is. But we can point to our own experiences. We have sensed God as the ground of all creation, of all that is, seen and unseen, as the source of all. We have known God in the Word made Flesh and in the Body and Blood. And we have heard God in the silences of our own heart, as God’s Spirit nudges us and urges us into action for God’s sake.

And I know this too. God loves us so much that God relentlessly pursues us. God is “the hound of heaven,” as Francis Thompson called God, whom Thompson fled “down the nights and down the days;” “down the arches of the years; “down the labyrinthine ways/ Of my own mind…” I know that God always shows up unexpectedly, unbidden, always at God’s own initiative, to shower us with grace. And I know that God comes to transform us, to bid us partner with God in continuing God’s creation and renewal of the world.

As we stand in awe at the ultimate mystery of God, we can still join the seraphs, the saints who have gone before us, and the saints among us, as we say, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.”