Sermons Archive - St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ

Psalm 121 is for sojourners, for travelers, for people setting out on a journey. It was a hymn on the lips of pilgrims headed to the temple in Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. And because it was a well known prayer people would recite it to one another as they set out on other types of journeys. When you or a loved one had to say “goodbye” and couldn’t muster your own words, the liturgy of Psalm 121 would suffice. A friend (and former boss of mine) and her family used to recite this together as a family before they would leave on long car trips. Picture her buckling her two kids in the car seats, “The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.” Picture a traveler in ancient Israel buckling his sandals as he leaves his wife for battle: “I lift up my eyes to the hills, from where will my help come?” and then, almost to reassure himself he says, “My help comes from the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth.” And you can almost hear his wife’s words of encouragement: “He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.” God guides your steps, in other words. You won’t slip. God takes the nightwatch, even when you lay your head down at night and the moon shines its beams, giving enough light for the enemy to attack. I’d like to introduce you to another traveler, another person who trusted God’s keeping in his “going out and coming in.” Blind Willie Johnson was a phenomenal blues and gospel singer who was born near the turn of the century and died as World War II was ending. His influence on blues and its successors is incalculable. A lot of famous artists have covered his songs. One interesting thing about him is that he mastered the technique of the slide guitar. Another is that one of his songs, “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground” was included on the Voyager I spacecraft in a time capsule of sorts so that, in case extraterrestrial life forms found it, they would know something about the human experience of loneliness. Mr. Johnson was born and died in Texas, but traveled all over the south as an evangelist, which was not typical of blues singers. You see, the blues didn’t usually deal with religious stuff; they were the secular “twin” of the African American spirituals. But Mr. Johnson preached all over the place using the blues — he perched himself on street corners, singing the gospel to passersby in Texas towns and as far away as the French Quarter in New Orleans (not a place people were open to being prosthelytized, I imagine) and even farther away in Atlanta. This was the 20s, so for a black man to travel around the South… well, you could probably hear him reciting Psalm 121. I’d like to play one of his songs for you, “God Don’t Never Change.” The lyrics are printed in your bulletin so you can follow along. Yes God, God don't never change He's God, always will be God God in the middle of the ocean God in the middle of the sea The help of the great creator Truly been a God to me Hey God, God don't never change God, always will be God God in creation God when Adam fell God way up in heaven God way down in hell He's God, God don't never change God, always will be God Spoke to the mountain Said how great I am Want you to get up this mornin' Skip around like a lamb Well he's God, God don't never change God, always will be God God in the time of sickness God in the doctor too In the time of the influenza He truly was a God to you Well he's God, God don't never change He's God, always will be God God in the pulpit God way down at the door He's God in the amen corner God all over the floor Well he's God, God don't never change God, always will be God In the spirit of the psalm, Mr. Johnson lifts his eyes to the mountains… and to the oceans. His soul surges as high as heaven and sinks as low as hell. He invokes the Creator of heaven and earth who also works in the small “stuff” of life, like doctors and preachers. The stanza about doctors, that’s what drew me in this week. Did you catch that line about the flu? “God in the time of sickness / God in the doctor too / In the time of the influenza / He truly was a God to you.” He’s referring to the Spanish Flu of 1918. That pandemic wiped out about ten percent of the world’s population. Johnson recorded this song about ten years later. What amazes me about Mr. Johnson and the Psalmist is their utter confidence in God’s constancy. Both drive their messages home: the Psalmist about how God keeps (guides, guards, protects) and Mr. Johnson about God just being God, never changing. What faith! It strikes me that this idea of putting one’s faith in God for protection is deeply true for some and deeply problematic for others, and that many of us have had both experiences. Or we might not even be sure what means. At some times in our lives we’ve felt God’s watchfulness in our bones… and at other times like the Holy One is asleep on the job. In these “wilderness” moments, to draw on our Lenten theme, we’ve known both God’s watchful presence and God’s seemingly derelict absence. Mr. Johnson’s assurance, God’s “Truly been a God to me” and “He truly was a God to you,” is astounding. You see, the thing about the blues is that, as a musical form, it was born in oppression. In the words of James Cone: “The origin and definition of the blues cannot be understood independent of the suffering that black people endured in the context of white racism and hate… The blues tell us about black people’s attempt to carve out a significant existence in a very trying situation.” [1] The blues weren’t sung for artistic expression alone, but to cope with a life that was brutal. Mr. Johnson knew the scourge of racism; his song that made it on the Voyager was inspired by his experience of having to sleep outside so often during his travels because, as a black man, he wasn’t allowed to stay in most hotels. Although he recorded over 30 songs, he died poor. And he knew personal tragedy too: he was blind because, at the age of seven, his stepmother threw a lye mixture in his face. And he died from pneumonia after his house burned down because he slept on the foundation amid the ashes. So it’s all the more astounding the depth of his faith in the changelessness of God. When it comes down to it, this is something we cannot know intellectually. To feel kept is a heart thing. To feel kept is an experience born of really hard times in which we come to the end of ourselves. We find ourselves “lifting our eyes to the hills” when we wander into unfamiliar territory, stumbling along the edge of our limits… which is hard for us who pride ourselves on independence and self-sufficiency. What we can learn from the Psalmist and from Mr. Johnson is how to move forward in faith in wilderness seasons. To feel kept is a matter of trust. That trust is the "secret ingredient" that allows us to take those brave next steps whenever the journeys of life seem perilous. We are able to put one foot in front of the other precisely because “God will not let your foot be moved.” In the words of Dorothee Sölle, “Only life that opens itself to the other, life that risks… contains promise.” [2] However threatening the road that lies ahead appears, our calling is to hold on to the One who “don’t never change,” the One who “neither slumbers nor sleeps.” We do this not because God promises that bad won’t happen to us, or because God promises to fix things for, but because God promises to give us just enough strength and sustenance for the journey. Whatever that journey looks like, whether that’s walking into a global pandemic, or a pivotal election year, or a job search, or a bleak diagnosis, or the vicissitudes of aging, or some other difficult “road” to walk, we claim our “kept-ness.” This is so vital for living in these times. To paraphrase the former First Lady, “when they go low, we go deep.” In the face of rampant injustice, we look to the One who “brings good news to the poor and freedom to the captives.” In the face of darkness and chaos, we put our confidence in the One who “hovered over the formless void and said, ‘Let there be light.’” In the face of corruption and dishonesty, we trust the “Spirit of truth who will guide us into all truth.” In the face of life’s uncertainties and the constant flurry of change that makes us so weary, we lift our eyes to “the Everlasting One... the Creator of the ends of the earth who does not grow tired.” Friends, whatever “blues” you encounter on the various journeys of your life, even if you don’t feel it in the moment, you are kept by the One who never sleeps, by the One who “don’t never change.” Thanks be to God! [1] James Cone, The Spirituals and the Blues: An Interpretation (1972), p. 110. [2] Dorothee Sölle, The Window of Vulnerability (1990), p. 7, quoted by Alejandro F. Botta in Preaching God’s Transforming Justice: A Lectionary Commentary, Year A (2013), p. 132.

This is both a very real exterior adventure beyond the margins of society and an interior passage of cleansing. Yet the journey to/in the "spirit world" is also a sojourn through mythic time, in order to encounter the story and destiny of one's self and one's people. That this sojourn lasted "forty days" (Lk 4:2) is clearly intended to invoke Israel's forty year wanderings in the wilderness after Egypt. But what exactly is the connection? Jesus is somehow interiorizing the experience of his people… he is mystically re-tracing the footsteps of Israel in order to discover where the journey of his nation went wrong.  -Ched Myers, “Led by the Spirit into the wilderness... Reflections on Lent, Jesus’ Temptations and Indigeneity”

This is Jesus' "inaugural sermon" as he establishes a new community reflecting the Rule of God. Love is the law in the Rule of God. The point of the Law, Jesus effectively says, is to help us love greater, deeper, and more fully. This requires more than checking off boxes. It’s a way of living.

The Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany  February 9, 2020 Matthew 5:13-20 “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot. “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid.… The post Stay Salty appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

Sometimes we, consciously or unconsciously, expect God to be a “bulldozer parent,” clearing the obstacles from our path. We run from grief. We anesthetize ourselves to pain. But God doesn't promise us a life free from hardship.

The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany February 2, 2020 Matthew 5:1-12  When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be… The post #Blessed appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

The Rev. Cindy Kohlmann, Co-Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA), encouraged the congregation to continue showing the light of Christ's justice and mercy.

As people of faith we know that, because the light has come, we can step out into the darkness with boldness. The post The Light appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

The Second Sunday after the Epiphany (The Sunday before the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day) Long before I stood behind a pulpit, I worked in a chain of independent drug stores in a small town in Georgia. It was my job while in high school. If it was a weekend I got to fill and compound prescriptions and work the register. During the week I had to sweep the floor, take out the trash, and put merchandise on the shelves. I’ve said before that I learned most of what I needed to about humanity by working in a store that was both a gathering place (kind of like Cheers, “where everybody knows your name”) and a place where people were forced to be be vulnerable (you can tell a lot about someone by what medications they’re purchasing).  One day I was working the register by the pharmacy. The register would automatically print out receipts. The routine went like this: employees would ask the customer if they’d like a copy, they’d say “no,” and we’d then promptly crumple them up and toss the receipts into the trash.  Mr. Saunders was a very kind and talkative old man (we “clicked”). He was as gentle as they’d come, always offering a smile or a word of encouragement. One day I was checking him out and the register printed the receipt. I tore it off and threw it in the trash. We were talking and I didn’t want to interrupt.  “Hey there, son,” he said kind of softly, “I need that ticket.”  “Sorry ‘bout that, Mr. Saunders,” I said, “I guess you need to balance your checkbook.”  “It’s an old habit, son, somethin’ you wouldn’t know much about.” I eventually connected the dots. The African American customers kept their receipts most of the time. The white customers did not. At some point, someone — I’m not sure who it was — explained to me how, in years past, African American customers were so accustomed to being accused of shoplifting that they “religiously” kept copies of receipts from the time of purchase through the moment they left the parking lot.  This is absolutely by no means my worst illustration of racism from growing up as a white person in middle Georgia. It’s a tiny, everyday moment. It’s subtle. It’s easy to miss.  And that’s the point. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”  If we say we have no white privilege, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.  On our best days we recognize it. We reject overt racism and want to do something to eradicate it. When presented with something as glaringly racist as neo-Nazis marching through the streets of Charlottesville, Virginia, we speak out against it: “That’s disgusting,” we’ll say, “I want nothing to do with it!” But on most days, however, we’re blind to how pervasively it “dyes the social fabric” of our nation and of our world. Some bright thinkers among us have helped us to see how racism is not just an internal attitude of hatred or prejudice but also a part the “scaffolding” of American society. Some rightly call racism “America’s original sin.” [1] Scaffolding.  It would help to define terms here. Racism is “a belief that… racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race.” [2] White supremacy is an ideology that claims that “white people and the ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and actions of white people are superior to People of Color and their ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and actions.” [3] White privilege is “the level of societal advantage that comes with being seen as the norm in America.” [4] The concepts are all interrelated of course but the latter is the one that I think we need to reflect on this weekend as a community that is majority white and a denomination that is majority white. I’m convinced that well-intentioned white folks, especially progressive-leaning ones, are prone to blindness about how we participate in white supremacy and how it then benefits us (privilege).  Many people struggle with this concept. I know I have in the past. They’ll point out that their lives have not been easy, that being white hasn’t given them advantages. “There’s not a racist bone in my body,” they’ll say, “life has kicked me around!” I would never ignore the pain and frustration behind statements like that. But I would, however, gently challenge by saying that white privilege doesn’t guarantee that those with lighter skin won’t be poor, won’t experience hardship, or won’t encounter obstacles. What an awareness of white privilege does reveal is how there is, on the whole, demonstrably less hardship and obstacles for people with darker skin.  Take this exercise for example. Do a Google Images search of words, like “pretty” or “leadership” or “smart” or “trustworthy.” A colleague of mine did this a couple of years ago at his church. They had a screen up front so he could project the images up there for the congregation to see. Can you guess the appearance of the people in the pictures that showed up with each search? The majority appeared to be white. My colleague said that:  On the Leadership slide, there were only 3 people of color [out of 16], but none of them appeared to be in a position of leadership; rather, they were part of the team or in the crowd. For Pretty, there were also 3 people, but they were images 12, 13, and 15. As for Smart, every person in those images was white (Albert Einstein dominated this slide as he was on 7 images). Finally, for Trustworthy, Denzel Washington was the only non-white person. All of the other images of people were White Caucasian. It’s of note that [he] did not use any other qualifiers. [He] didn’t add, “old, or young, or rich, or male, or female, or anything else. [5]  You see, in these images, white was considered “normal,” preferred even. Like fish swimming in water, we might not think about it, but it’s all around us.  This privilege entrenched within the structures of society takes on larger forms. All sorts of patterns become “normal.” Mass incarceration rates for people of color become normal. Racially biased ways schoolchildren are disciplined in the classroom becomes normal. Environmental degradation that disproportionately impacts communities of color becomes normal. Cruel separation of families at the border becomes normal. And those of us who get a “fair shake” from law enforcement, sail through school smoothly, drink clean water, and cross the border with nothing but expired drivers’ licenses don’t know what we don’t know. People get hurt and people die because of these inequalities.  What becomes normal then becomes acceptable, tolerable, “just how things are.” You see, white privilege and white supremacy work together in a feedback loop. They reinforce each other.  So what do we do as the church in the face of this darkness? We bring it into the light of day. We who follow Jesus have in our tradition an uncomfortable but life-giving practice: repentance. We admit our own sin and the sin that pervades the “water” of our society in which we swim. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us,” John tells us, but “if we confess our sins, [God] who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” What John points to in his letter to his church is that we human beings are often living contradictions. We claim connection to God yet live in ways that contradict that connection. To walk in the light, to have genuine fellowship with Christ and one another — with all God’s children — requires admitting that our actions don’t always line up with the beliefs we profess.  It’s an uncomfortable process that provokes resistance. It’s a lifelong process (we’re never done). And yet, this practice of confession and repentance doesn’t end with guilt or resignation. Change, healing, and justice come when we have the humility to ask God to remove our blindness and help us see the truth of how these patterns harm some and benefit others. Through confession we notice this within ourselves and commit to working to dismantle that “scaffolding” within society.  Though some try to dull the prophetic edges of Dr. King’s vision by turning it into a generic plea for human harmony, we shouldn’t neglect looking at the totality of what he taught: how white supremacy and white privilege join together with what he called “the triple evils of racism, economic exploitation, and militarism.” [6] They intersect with and uphold other evils that harm the human family. The vision that image of the Beloved Community that Dr. King articulated so marvelously, a dream of equality, abundance, and safety for all God’s children, is still with us, inspiring us to keep “our hands to the plow.” That vision is still with us because, I believe, it is a reflection of the Biblical prophets’ vision of shalom and Jesus’ vision of the reign of God. It’s a vision of the love of neighbor in action.  As John wrote, “God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.” Friends, let us walk in the light!  [1] Jim Wallis’s book America’s Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America. [2] As defined by Merriam-Webster dictionary online [3] Showing Up for Racial Justice, “White Supremacy Culture” [4] Christine Emba’s “What Is White Privilege” in The Washington Post. [5] With gratitude to the Rev. David McDaniel, senior pastor or Holmeswood Baptist Church in Kansas City, MO, for allowing me to borrow this example from his sermon on the same topic.  [6] In a speech to the Hungry Club Forum on May 10, 1967, publicized in The Atlantic.

To paraphrase John: if we say we have no white privilege, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. The post If We Say We Have No… appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

Baptism is our “ID.” Child of God” is the truest thing about us, regardless of all the other identities that we and the world layer on top of that core identity.

Baptism is our “ID.” Child of God” is the truest thing about us… regardless of all the other identities layered on top of that. The post Your ID appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

January 5, 2020 Matthew 2:1-12 For a brief but intense period in middle and high school the thing I liked to read more than anything was retellings of fairy tales. The particular pleasure of these novels was that I knew I would know the story—Cinderella, Rapunzel, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty—but I never knew when the “tell” would come, and I would read, coming inside the strange world of the book, waiting for something that would tip me off as to where I was. There is a great deal of power in how you tell a story, and there are many, many ways to do it. Our four gospels are one clear example; Paul’s repeated explanations to various officials of how he came to be in that region preaching is another. The Confessions that make up part of our church constitution, pieces of our heritage, are retellings of the same things over and over, as situations demanded. The way a story is told gives it power. The way a story is told holds clues for the hearer, to show them what story they’re in. There are tells in the gospel passage today. The frankincense and myrrh brought from foreign lands to Israel are signposts to Isaiah: Here, now, again, on Mary and Joseph’s front stoop, are they to arise and shine; there, in that house, the glory of the Lord is shining; nations and kings of nations were prophesied, and there are the magi crowding into their kitchen with their lavish gifts. The story they are in is the story of joy and radiance, of the return to what should be, of restoration, brought by the little child the magi went all that way to see. There could be other tells, of course. Perhaps the blustering king means we’re in Esther, with the fate of a people on the line. Perhaps the appearance of Bethlehem means we’re out in the fields with David while Samuel, the prophet, goes looking for which of Jesse’s sons he is to anoint as king. Perhaps the conference with the wise and learned councillors of the king means we’re in Egypt, and its doublespeaking ruler is looking for any reason not to let God’s people be free. Of course no story is reducible to its echoes; yet each echo is another way in for the people of every age to the story of what God has done and is still doing. We follow a good and a steadfast God who is always doing the same thing in different ways, bringing the old justice springing up in new shapes, being the same God to new people who, nonetheless, make the old mistakes in new ways of their own. God always comes to God’s people; righteousness is always met with hostility; those who hold power are always warped by it; God’s promises are always kept. Fear and death come again and again, and hope and life always sprout in their ashes. Our world cannot be as good as it was made to be, and yet the love of God continually sustains it, every moment of every day. Every tell, every echo, every reminder of what has been offers a flash of insight into where we are now. I would tell the story this way. I would say: There were astronomers, people who had been studying the sky, and history books, and old manuals, for years and years, trying to understand the world around them. They were very practiced at taking what information they could get and combing through it for meaning. One night, searching the sky, they saw something new. It took them awhile to figure out what it was, but they knew it was important, so the time spent in their libraries seemed worth it to them. And after a while, they found the confirmation they were looking for: It was important. So they packed their bags and they set off. They were relieved to have each other for company on the way. They were on the road for weeks, for one thing; it would have taken weeks to get where they were going under the best of circumstances, and they were not entirely sure where they were going. And they couldn’t really explain to people what their goal was—well, they could, but they got strange looks, or people changed the subject, or started talking to them differently, or sometimes got hostile. But they knew what they were going to find, and it was worth it, so they kept going. After a time they arrived in a city. This seemed to them a good place to find what they were looking for: kings, after all, live in cities. The shopkeepers and laborers and weavers and herders they passed in the streets were willing enough to point them towards the palace, though none of them seemed excited by the thought. And at the palace the guards were, after some conference, happy enough to open the gates, though the astronomers thought they noticed the guards exchanging looks. And the king was pleased enough to welcome them into his throne room, and his many councillors and learned men were gracious enough in speech, though the astronomers thought they noticed tension in the king’s voice and the councillors did not seem to want to meet their eyes. “We’ve come to greet the new king, and pay him homage,” the astronomers said. But there had been no babies born at the palace. “We saw his star,” the astronomers explained, undeterred. “We know he is here. We want to see him.” The king summoned everyone learned in the city and demanded to know where this new king was to be born. “It isn’t proper,” he said, “for a king to be… hidden away.” He drummed his fingers on the arm of his throne. “He’s in Bethlehem,” said one learned person after another. “The City of David.” “Bethlehem of Judah.” “‘By no means least among the rulers of Judah…’” “The new shepherd comes from Bethlehem.” “Ah, Bethlehem, of course, of course,” said the king, himself Jewish, though only for a generation, and anxious about his bonafides. “Of course, Bethlehem. You go,” he said to the astronomers, who were waiting patiently. They were accustomed to waiting. The sky moved slowly. “You go to Bethlehem. Give this new king your gifts. And then, come back here and tell me where to find him. I want to… visit him, too.” There was an edge in the king’s voice, nervous motion in his knees. His councillors looked straight ahead. The astronomers left the palace. They were only a half-day’s walk from Bethlehem, if they hurried. They arrived as the sun was beginning to sink, and the light was turning as gold as the bars in one of their saddlebags, and the first bright stars were winking faintly into view. Including their star. “Has there been a baby born?” they asked shopkeepers, laborers, herders. “In the last year or two? Under… strange circumstances? Rumors?” There had been lots of babies, of course, but just one born under circumstances strange enough for these dusty strangers to be looking. Pointed fingers led them to a tiny house on a narrow street. A young woman was kneading bread, while a man was crouching over a small child, the child’s hands holding tight to two of the man’s fingers while it took wobbling steps, screeching with glee. As the astronomers’ camels blocked the light to the window, the small family looked up. They were taken aback, but not, the astronomers thought, altogether surprised. The astronomers knelt before the little boy and opened their chests, and the little room was filled with the glow of gold and the perfume of incense and balm. That night the astronomers slept as best they could on the floor of the little house. They tossed and turned with ugly, frightening dreams: the king’s face, red and shouting, and the sounds of men and women wailing and children crying. They woke before dawn, sitting up to face each other in the gray light. “We must go another way,” said one. “We must go another way,” said the others, nodding. “We must go another way.”“We have seen the child; now we must go another way.” These are the things I see in this story, today, this reading. I see people following their best lights, in the face of confusion, hostility, indifference. I see a king, anxious, fragile, impulsive, prevaricating, cruel, fingers on his sword, uncertain of his power and determined to keep it. I see hope, burning brightly in the midst of looming death. And I see those who have seen Christ choosing another way, risking the full wrath of the king to choose another way. Have you seen the tells? Do you know what story we are in? May we, who have seen the Christ, have the courage to choose another way. Amen.

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Matthew 2:13-23 December 29, 2019 Good morning! I am so glad to see all of you on this Sunday after Christmas, the strangest day of the whole year. I want to take advantage of the strangeness of the day—a fifth Sunday, the last Sunday of the year, spitting distance from 2020—by keeping my talking short and hearing what you all have to say about it all. Christmas is a snowglobe of a holiday, isn’t it; sometimes it feels like the sparkle and swirl is the product of being picked up and shaken, and we’re not sure what to do while everything settles again. But at least we are in it together. There’s a tension, I think, between the days that are special—Christmas, Easter, a wedding, a birth—and days that are ordinary—that is, most of them. Christmas is a towering holiday because what happened on that day is so important: A child was born who is the Messiah, the Lord. But it can be hard—it’s hard for me, anyway—to integrate that towering holiday into the life we continue to live. Christ’s birthday is a party, and then we go back to real life, of which the Christ-child may or may not really feel like a part. I don’t have a neat trick for that; I am sorry if I led you to expect it. For what it’s worth, I think integrating an understanding of God into the whole of our lives is really the work of a lifetime of formation. What I have this morning, or rather, one thing the scriptures have brought us this morning doesn’t so much address the issue of our integration of God the Son’s entry into the world as step over it, into the reality of what that entry was like, and what it tells us about God. Some denominations celebrate today the Feast of the Holy Innocents, those babies and toddlers in and around Bethlehem that Matthew tells us were slaughtered by Herod in an attempt to kill the infant Christ. They’re considered martyrs not by will but by deed: they died for Christ without choosing to, and precious in the sight of the LORD, says a Psalm, is the death of his holy ones. Scripture does not forget them, and the Church does not, because they mattered. Jesus teaches his followers later that no sparrow falls to the ground apart from his Father, and we are worth more than many sparrows. And how often yet are innocents killed for the sake of power? How many children dead in DHS custody under the header of national security? How many hundreds and thousands dead in bomb blasts for our foreign policy and others’? We should recognize the weeping heard in Bethlehem, which echoed the weeping Jeremiah heard in Ramah after Babylon sacked Jerusalem, which echoed the weeping of Jacob’s wife Rachel, who longed for children. Jesus was born into a dangerous world, as all babies are and have been since the first baby: a world full of ambient danger: germs and famine and accident; and just as full of acute danger: of hatred and the will to power, of the embrace of death as a means to an end. From the moment of his birth to the moment of his death, my friend Ben observed, Jesus was very close to state power and the death it could impose at any moment as a way to maintain itself. It decreed where he was born, sent his family immediately into exile in a land strange to them, killed his agemates, affected where he would grow up—Joseph heard the name of the new king of Judea and moved them to another province—followed him throughout his ministry, and executed him. This is the way God chose to come to us, the world God loved and chose to redeem. The Incarnation, the humanness and Godness of Jesus Christ, tells us about how God chooses to be near to us, the vulnerability and suffering God accepts for our sake. The name Jesus means “The LORD saves,” the title Emmanuel means “God is with us.” The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, not in some place sealed off from threat of harm, but wide open to the harm of the world, as we are. For our sake. “For the one who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters,” says the letter to the Hebrews, and since “the children share flesh and blood, Jesus himself likewise shared the same things.” He came among us as one of us, not in a metaphorical way but in the realest, most literal way there is. Hebrews says God did it this way to bring many children to glory (we’re the children); the Word of God becoming one of us in Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, means that he is our brother and also, and this sounds the same but is different in an important way, that we are his siblings. Jesus was human as we are human; God is our Parent as God was Jesus’ Parent. We are all children of God, again not in a pleasant metaphorical way but in the sense of adoption and shared right to inheritance, and Jesus is our brother not because we feel close to him but because we share a Father, and everything that may happen to us happened to him, too. It’s easy, I think, to see the Incarnation of the Son as the first time God came this close, because the person of Christ is so tangible and means so much for us, but it would be a misunderstanding. Look at Isaiah: “he became their savior in all their distress. It was no messenger or angel but his presence that saved them; in his love and in his pity he redeemed them.” We read this as a prophecy about Jesus, God With Us, and our redemption through him, and that’s true; but this is also in a place where Isaiah is recounting God’s way with Israel throughout that history: “he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.” The love of God for the world that is behind the Incarnation, the helpless baby in a strange place and the teacher and healer and the man on the Cross, is the love for the world God has had since God made it and declared it good; the nearness of God to us in the Incarnation is the choice of a God who has always been near to God’s beloved people. As it happens, the Hebrew in that last verse is strange, and if you read multiple versions, you’ll find them quite different. If you’re curious about the reasoning for them, please ask me about it after the service. But the upshot is this: Our pew Bibles, the NRSV, says “he became their savior in all their distress. It was no messenger or angel that saved them.” Another translation says “he became their savior. In all their affliction was no affliction,” or, “he did not afflict them”; this interpretation says that distress and affliction are not from God, and indeed the nearness of God to us in the next verses about redemption and carrying through mean that even in affliction we are held up by God and cannot be ultimately shaken. And most common translation says “in their affliction he [that is, God] was afflicted”: that in the suffering and distress this dangerous world visits upon us, God has always been suffering with us; that God’s redemption and carrying of his chosen people have never been from a distance, austere and untouched, and the suffering of the Son for our sake and the anguish of the Father at the pain of the Cross and every cross is of a piece with God’s tender heart for God’s people. “The angel of his presence saved them,” this version says, a phrase used nowhere else in the Bible, and understood to mean not a created angel, but the presence of God Godself. This is all to say that as far back as Isaiah, and even further, is the understanding that God has always been very close, has always held God’s people in his hands, and has always hurt for them when they hurt, and continues to do so with us today. Since the earliest church Christ has been a scandal to the world: It did not seem right that the word should be made flesh, that the Son of God should be subject to the indignities and fragility of a body like ours. It did not seem right that God should enter into a world that kills children and stones prophets. Yet this is how God has always been with us, since first Abraham heard God’s call. And Christians have insisted on the rightness of it, the redemption not just of the spirit but of the body, the preciousness of us, warts and all. The deaths of God’s holy ones, chosen and unchosen, are precious in God’s sight as human lives are precious in God’s sight, precious as God’s only Son, our brother, born to us this day. That’s what I think. Amen.

This is the way God chose to come to us, the world God loved and chose to redeem. The Incarnation, the humanness and Godness of Jesus Christ, tells us about how God chooses to be near to us, the vulnerability and suffering God accepts for our sake. The post The First Sunday after Christmas appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

John 1:1-14 December 24, 2019 Christmas Eve – Lessons & Carols with Communion The post God Couldn’t Wait appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

You might not be saving anyone from a burning building, but I guarantee you that you do hard things. As W.H. Auden says of faith in his Christmas Oratio, courage is choosing "what is difficult all one's days / As if it were easy." The post Courage (Love) Can’t Wait appeared first on St. Mark's Presbyterian Church | Tucson, AZ.

Luke 1:46-55 And Marysaid, “My soul magnifies the Lord,    and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.    Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;for the Mighty One has done great things for me,    and holy is his name.His mercy is for those who fear him    from generation to generation.He has shown strength with his arm;    he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,    and lifted up the lowly;he has filled the hungry with good things,    and sent the rich away empty.He has helped his servant Israel,    in remembrance of his mercy,according to the promise he made to our ancestors,    to Abraham and to his descendants forever.” "Delight Can’t Wait (Joy Can’t Wait)" by Sarah Are I have seen Joy face to face. She was dancing. She took my arm in the crook of hers And spun me around until I couldn’t help but laugh. We met in the kitchen with Motown And then again at your wedding. And I ran into Joy in my mother’s recipe box. Her handwriting looked like my grandmother’s. And she smelled like our famous chocolate cake. Once I saw Joy in the street. She was at the parade. There was glitter in the air And a father hugged his son. Joy cried happy tears. And I have seen Joy on the loose, Running to keep up with you as you go. Did you know that Joy is looking for you? I know that your heart hurts, And that you’re not sure if you like yourself. I know that this world is scary And I know that love can feel fleeting. But Joy told me to tell you—she’s at the door. She delights in who you are. She’s inviting you to dance. I pray and pray you’ll let her in. I pray, and pray, and pray.