Interconnected

This week I’ve been thinking about how much I need all of you…how interconnected we are.

It takes all of us to attend to worship matters each week.  From the moment we set up the chairs to the time we put them away, so many hands, hearts and minds are at work.

Even before the chairs are set up, the Advisory team is arranging speakers weeks in advance, planning the service, and practicing music.  We couldn’t do any of this without you…without each other.

Last week, Sanders introduced us to the Passover Seder. This week, we return with Flo Kim to the night of the Seder table that became known as The Last Supper.  The final Passover Seder of Jesus' ministry. 

Imagine yourself in the scene:  Jesus washes your feet, you recline at the table together.  Jesus talks of many things that night. 

The bread…the wine…his betrayer…Peter's denial. 

And then we leave the table in the Upper Room and begin to walk.  As we walk, we pass one of the many vineyards in the area. 

Jesus begins the last of his "I am" statements:  

I am the Real Vine and my Father is the Farmer. He cuts off every branch of me that doesn’t bear grapes. And every branch that is grape-bearing he prunes back so it will bear even more. You are already pruned back by the message I have spoken.

Live in me. Make your home in me just as I do in you. In the same way that a branch can’t bear grapes by itself but only by being joined to the vine, you can’t bear fruit unless you are joined with me.

I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you’re joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. Separated, you can’t produce a thing. Anyone who separates from me is deadwood, gathered up and thrown on the bonfire. But if you make yourselves at home with me and my words are at home in you, you can be sure that whatever you ask will be listened to and acted upon. This is how my Father shows who he is—when you produce grapes, when you mature as my disciples.

When you’re joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant.

I'm reminded of a beatitude, of getting my inside world—my mind and heart—put right.  I hear Jesus say that this can happen by staying connected to him.  Just as I am connected to you.  Like branches on a grapevine, we are all connected together, to the vine that is Jesus.

Praise the Lord!

Image:  צולם על ידי עמוס מרון, Wikimedia Commons

Wonder

I'm living this week in a state of wonder. Researcher and author Brené Brown says that this is where we may go when things are beyond us.  

Easter…spring…the season of wonders. Wonder inspires learning, a great place to be. 

Part of the reason I'm in a state of wonder is because of you, because of your wonderings from worship last week. Walking the Road to Emmaus with you and your wonderings, placed me on the path of wonder. 

One of the things I'm wondering about is what we read in Luke 24: 25-27:  

Then he said to them, “So thick-headed! So slow-hearted! Why can’t you simply believe all that the prophets said? Don’t you see that these things had to happen, that the Messiah had to suffer and only then enter into his glory?” Then he started at the beginning, with the Books of Moses, and went on through all the Prophets, pointing out everything in the Scriptures that referred to him.

What are the Books of Moses, I wonder?

When we left off last week, Jesus disappeared after sharing a meal with a pair of disciples.  The story In Luke 24 continues,

33-34 They didn’t waste a minute. They were up and on their way back to Jerusalem. They found the Eleven and their friends gathered together, talking away: “It’s really happened! The Master has been raised up—Simon saw him!”

35 Then the two went over everything that happened on the road and how they recognized him when he broke the bread.

36-41 While they were saying all this, Jesus appeared to them and said, “Peace be with you.” They thought they were seeing a ghost and were scared half to death. He continued with them, “Don’t be upset, and don’t let all these doubting questions take over. Look at my hands; look at my feet—it’s really me. Touch me. Look me over from head to toe. A ghost doesn’t have muscle and bone like this.” As he said this, he showed them his hands and feet. They still couldn’t believe what they were seeing. It was too much; it seemed too good to be true.

41-43 He asked, “Do you have any food here?” They gave him a piece of leftover fish they had cooked. He took it and ate it right before their eyes.

44 Then he said, “Everything I told you while I was with you comes to this: All the things written about me in the Law of Moses, in the Prophets, and in the Psalms have to be fulfilled.”

Jesus mentions the Books (or Law) of Moses again in verse 44, so they must be important.

Unlike me, many of you probably know that these Books of Moses are what we know as the first five books of the Old Testament: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

I hear Jesus say that I need to know the Bible that He knew in order to follow the story properly. 

This is where we are going this week, back to the Bible that Jesus knew. Jesus and his disciples went to Jerusalem to celebrate the Festival of Passover.  Sanders is going to help us explore the first Passover, and I can't wait. 

"With each other, we ask questions, we worship, we bring our conflicts and doubts forward. Mostly, we allow ourselves to experience the Resurrection and remain open for Jesus to give us the Resurrection, a life of new possibilities, of newness, of promise. Our proper response to this event is to stand back in amazement and speak these words: My Lord and My God." - John Predmore, S.J.

Image Design: Frode Inge Helland, 1978

The Road to Emmaus

During the seven weeks of Easter, we might ponder what it means to encounter the Risen Christ in our own lives.  Could you identify him?  I’m looking forward to this Sunday, when we will explore more of the Easter story together and see what it might tell us about encountering Christ on our own journey.  

"That same day", our scripture for this week begins. The same day as what?  The day was Sunday, the day of the empty tomb. Yes, we return again, to the first Easter Sunday, to see what else happened on "that same day".  

Let’s first refresh our memories of what happened earlier on that day.  Luke reminds us,

24 1-3 At the crack of dawn on Sunday, the women came to the tomb carrying the burial spices they had prepared. They found the entrance stone rolled back from the tomb, so they walked in. But once inside, they couldn’t find the body of the Master Jesus.

4-8 They were puzzled, wondering what to make of this. Then, out of nowhere it seemed, two men, light cascading over them, stood there. The women were awestruck and bowed down in worship. The men said, “Why are you looking for the Living One in a cemetery? He is not here, but raised up. Remember how he told you when you were still back in Galilee that he had to be handed over to sinners, be killed on a cross, and in three days rise up?” Then they remembered Jesus’ words.

9-11 They left the tomb and broke the news of all this to the Eleven and the rest. Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them kept telling these things to the apostles, but the apostles didn’t believe a word of it, thought they were making it all up.

Luke continues the story with a pair of disciples, walking.  Imagine yourself as one of these.

We are disciples, two of us, and we are walking the seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus. We are walking and talking, trying to make sense of all that has happened recently. 

What are we feeling?  What are we wondering?  A stranger joins us, making us three.

That same day. It’s hard to stay focused there, isn’t it?  Two thousand years later.  Now what?  We put one foot in front of the other in the messiness and confusion of our own lives.  As Easter people, we try to look out for the Risen Christ.

Jesus is apt to come, into the very midst of life at its most real and inescapable. - Frederick Beuchner

Painting By Robert Zünd - joyfulheart ; upload Dezember 2008 ; upload by Adrian Michael, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5537171

New Beginnings

Can you put yourself back into that first post-resurrection story?  We can only imagine how the disciples might have felt. Overjoyed that Jesus had indeed risen?  And mystified and fearful at the same time? Maybe even doubtful?

Where was Jesus in this story now? Appearing in rooms, on roads, sometimes unrecognizable.

I wonder how the post-resurrection disciples coped with this new beginning.  What might we learn from them, as we find our way through our own new beginning? 

After the resurrection, John concludes his gospel in Chapter 21.  I love the miracle of the 153 fish in Verses 1-5:

After this, Jesus appeared again to the disciples, this time at the Tiberias Sea (the Sea of Galilee). This is how he did it: Simon Peter, Thomas (nicknamed “Twin”), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the brothers Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. Simon Peter announced, “I’m going fishing.”

The rest of them replied, “We’re going with you.” They went out and got in the boat. They caught nothing that night. When the sun came up, Jesus was standing on the beach, but they didn’t recognize him.

Jesus spoke to them: “Good morning! Did you catch anything for breakfast?”

They answered, “No.”

He said, “Throw the net off the right side of the boat and see what happens.”

They did what he said. All of a sudden there were so many fish in it, they weren’t strong enough to pull it in.

Whatever the disciples were feeling, they were experiencing great change and uncertainty.  Political…Personal.  They returned to fishing, unsure of anything else or what to do next.  

As my church embarks on a new beginning, and all the scary messiness that this involves, we feel comfort and joy as we welcome back Paul Beckingham as our guest speaker this week. He will help us gather at the Lord's Table in Communion together.  Hallelujah!

This is the day that the Lord has made!  We will rejoice and be glad in it!

WHERE IS GOD?

When I'm having one of THOSE days -

the technology isn't working, 

someone from church is WhatsApping me to do something RIGHT NOW, 

everything is taking longer than I thought, and

I missed my snack in the rush.

Where is God?  Where is He then?

He's right there waiting. Waiting for me to take it to Him.

Name that emotion - powerlessness.

And take it to God.  He's right there waiting. 

Put Your Own Mask On Before Helping the Person Beside You

For better or for worse, Donald Trump has just been inaugurated as President of the USA.  I say better, not because I don't believe that by many objective measures the country isn't better off now than when Obama took office, but better because I wish him and our closest neighbours well.

Throughout Trump's speech, I was reminded of the airline's instructions to "Put your own mask on before helping the person beside you."  Donald Trump sincerely believes that America needs to help itself for awhile.  He doesn't think that the USA is the "shining city on the hill" any more.  There are too many people living in poverty, there is too much crime and drugs, too much fear of terrorism.

Once again I am reminded of Brexit.  The people who are struggling voted for change.  I hope with all my heart, that in four years these struggling people are living a better life and that America is feeling that it can once again look outward instead of inward.

I am also thanking God that I live in a country where most of the citizens feel that they have enough to share with their neighbours from outside.  We feel like our mask is securely on and that we can help the person beside us.

Amazing Grace

It's been kind of a heavy week.  There is a sense of mourning in the air - Remembrance Day, Leonard Cohen's death, the US election.

And yet, if we are alert, God's amazing grace is all around us.  In an unexpected flower, a rainbow, a spider's web in the rain.

My prayer for us all this day, is that we are able to see and feel God's grace.  Leonard Cohen did.  He asked for it in every poem he wrote.  He knew, that even in the darkness, God is always beside us.  Cohen knew how to talk to God; he was a great psalmist.