When It’s Okay to Vacay

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year BLeave a comment

Mark 4:26-32 NRSV

Jesus said: The way the Kingdom of God happens, the way love wins and justice prevails in our world, is like someone scattering seeds on the ground, and then, lies down and goes to sleep. Then, while they are not paying any attention to it, and are unable to explain it, the seed sprouts and grows. The earth produces “of itself.” The seed produces “of itself.”

I think it is hopeful to consider the Greek word translated “of itself.” The word is automatos. Sound familiar? It is where we get our English word “automatically.”

And for emphasis, the Greek places the word in the beginning of the sentence. When we scatter good seeds: “Automatically, the seed grows. Automatically, the earth produces. Automatically, the Kingdom of God happens.”

In miraculous ways that we cannot begin to understand, when we plant the right seeds, the Kingdom of God automatically happens.

I love Martin Luther’s interpretation of this parable. He said:

After I preach my sermon on Sunday, when I return home, I drink my little glass of Wittenberg beer, and I just let the gospel run its course.

In other words, after working with God scattering some good seeds, proclaiming the gospel that Jesus taught, enacted, and embodied, Luther knew he could take some time off, enjoy a Sabbath, or possibly, take a little vacation.

Because Luther knew that the power of his sermons to create a more just and peaceful world was not based on the power of his theological acuity, the eloquence of his words, or in his gifts as a community organizer. No amount of charisma or art of his persuasion could plant the gospel in such a way that it would grow, expand, and transform into something that looked like the Kingdom of God. That was only something that only God could do, organically, mysteriously, and miraculously. All he could do was scatter some good seeds.

This explains how I could go to the beach with my family last week and do absolutely nothing for seven days and still call myself a faithful disciple. And it explains how you can take a vacation too without the guilt of thinking you need to be doing more to make a difference in this world!

Now, I know telling you to “take a vacation” flies in the face of what you usually hear me say from this pulpit on Sunday mornings. And for that, perhaps I should apologize.

Since I have been your pastor, you could argue that you’ve only heard me preach one sermon. And that is: “We’ve got some work to do!”

If you were here a couple of weeks ago, you heard me say that God does not work alone in this world. Since the very beginning, God has called human beings to accomplish God’s divine purposes for the world. And I said that when God calls, God calls us to do some pretty big things! My sermon even inspired Johnny Louthridge to challenge Ken Burger end all wars and to bring peace on earth.

On Trinity Sunday, I called being a disciple of the Triune God a “dance”—a beautiful dance of selfless, self-expending love. God calls us to enter that dance, to get busy answering the call to love this world! On Easter Sunday, I said: “For Easter to happen, for love to win, for justice to prevail, we need to pick up and carry a cross!”

Attempting to make a difference in this world as a preacher, I am afraid I may have given the impression that it is up to us to do good in this world, or good will not be done. Through my sermons, you may have heard the blasphemous belief that we are the saviors of the world, that it is up to us, and only us, to set the world right, or the world will be lost.

This “only-I-can-fix-it” mentality can be very dangerous, not only to ourselves, but ultimately, to the world.

It is what causes preachers to burn out and followers of Jesus to check out. We look at the overwhelming gravity of the world’s problems, at all the violence and greed, the injustice and inequity, and we say: “There’s just no way we can make any real difference.” So, we throw our hands in the air and give up. Some take even a permanent vacation from church.

So, please forgive me if you heard me say that God created the world and then left it all entirely up to us. Pardon me if I have ever sounded like our country’s Deist founders who believed that God created the universe and then went on some cosmic vacation.

There’s a famous account of the great prophet, Sojourner Truth, while she was listening to a speech one day in 1852 by a despairing and nearly burned-out Frederick Douglass, who was questioning if slavery could end without slaves resorting to violence. From the audience, Sojourner Truth interrupted Douglass by shouting out a rhetorical question: “Is God dead?” Douglass said her interruption was like someone throwing a brick through a window!

Truth had faith that God had a central role in the quest towards the abolition of slavery. Truth believed that God not only created the world, but God is still creating. God not only sent and resurrected Jesus, but our God is still resurrecting, and is still sending God’s self through God’s Holy Spirit. Our God is not dead, inactive, or ineffective, but very much alive, active, and ever victorious!

And because of that, the good news is that we can go on vacation. Because God is continually acting, we can relish times of inactivity, reflection, and the good grace of doing absolutely nothing.

We can spend a lazy day, or seven, at the beach, because God’s reign in the world is growing and will continue to grow, day in and day out, year after year.

But there’s an important caveat for the faithful disciple who wants to take a break. There are a few terms and conditions we must consider. There’s an acknowledgement box that needs to be checked. And I know how most of us like to skip over all those words, scroll quickly down to the bottom so we can check the box and move on. But it’s important for us to take some time and actually read the terms and conditions that apply.

The problem with too many Christians today is that they’ll put their hand on the Bible to be sworn into public office and never open the Bible and read it!

It’s only okay to take a vacay, if we’ve been working with God scattering good seeds. We don’t get to take a vacation if all we’ve been doing is working against God sowing bad or mean seeds: seeds of division, seeds of fear, and seeds of hate.

And the good news is that if we are working with God sowing good seeds, they can be the smallest of seeds, like the mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet it grows and becomes the greatest of all shrubs which puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.

Did you hear that?

Disciples are those who do something, even a little something, to cultivate structures and systems that provide shade, shelter, protection, and healthy living environments.

This is what working with God looks like in this world. And notice that this is not the first time we read about birds in this fourth chapter of Mark’s gospel. We read in verses three and four that the seeds that fall on the path are eaten up by birds that were hungry. Is it possible then, that those same hungry birds are the ones who will be able to make their nests in the shade and protection of the large shrub produced by the mustard seed?

The Psalmists certainly understood that the provision of protection, especially for the hungry and the poor, is paramount to the purposes of God. Listen to this prayer for those in power recorded in the seventy-second Psalm:

May [they] judge your people with righteousness and your poor with justice. May the mountains yield prosperity for the people, and the hills, in righteousness. May [they] defend the cause of the poor of the people, give deliverance to the needy, and crush the oppressor… May [they] be like rain that falls on the mown grass, like showers that water the earth… For [they] deliver the needy when they call, the poor and those who have no helper. [They have] pity on the weak and the needy and save the lives of the needy. From oppression and violence, [they] redeem their lives; and precious is their blood in their sight”(Psalm 72:1-6, 12-13).

The psalmist’s prayer underscores that “working with God” means working for a justice that emphasizes the well-being of the entire community, with special attention on behalf of the poor, the vulnerable, and the marginalized. “Working with God” means working to protect the least of these from being overpowered, exploited, or rendered landless, homeless, and destitute.

The psalmist prays that those with political, social, and economic power will be especially attentive to bring justice to the poor, to defend the cause of the poor, to protect the poor, and to crush those who would oppress them.

This is why we are working to charter a bus to Washington on June 29 to stand with the Poor People’s Campaign. Bishop William Barber compares this event to the march on Washington on January 6, 2021, saying:

We’re marching on Washington with a spirit of resurrection, not of insurrection—a non-violent resurrection of unity, not a violent insurrection of division.

In other words, we’re marching to combat hate, division, and an extremist political agenda by scattering seeds of new life, seeds that will sprout opportunity for people, especially poor people, to live lives that are protected and enabled to thrive.

We are scattering seeds to sprout: living wages for low-income workers; healthcare for all people; environmental justice; a ceasefire and humanitarian relief in Gaza and an end to genocide worldwide; just immigration laws; the restoration of the rights of women; adequate and affordable housing; a fully-funded public education; and full and expanded voting rights.

And when we do this work, when we get in lockstep with God, when we join that dance between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, when we pick up and carry a cross, when we pray with the Psalmist, doing what we can individually, democratically and ecclesiastically to scatter seeds of justice, seeds of equity, seeds of mercy, and seeds of peace—because they are good seeds, because they are holy seeds—the fruits that God will produce from those seeds, the fruits of “love winning” and “God’s kingdom coming,” will be automatic!

The hungry will be filled with good things.

The lowly will be lifted up.

The mighty will be cast down from their thrones.

And then, we can rest from our labors.

We can take a vacation.

We can enjoy a sabbath.

And if we want, even this very afternoon, we can sit back with Martin Luther and sip a cold beer.  Amen.

Answering the Call to Love – Honoring the Rev. Ken Burger

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year BLeave a comment

1 Samuel 3:1-10 NRSV

Oh, how the Church needs more days like today! Days when we turn our attention to the peculiar way that the Kingdom of God comes to this world—to be reminded how Jesus began his ministry on this earth ushering in the reign of God creating a new world where the poor are blessed, those who hunger and thirst for justice are filled, the lowly are lifted up, and the mighty are cast down from their thrones.

As the Lord and Savior of the world, the Son of the Most High, the Alpha and the Omega, the eternal Word who became flesh, the One through all things came into being, did Jesus do it all by himself?

I suppose an argument could be made that he certainly could have. But instead, Jesus gets the kingdom started by going out, finding, and calling people like me and you, people who were just minding their business one day, mending their nets or sitting in a tax booth, or on a camping trip with friends (I’ll talk more about that a little later), calling people who had very little idea of who Jesus was and where Jesus was taking them. Yet, this is how God works in our world. It is the way God has always worked. God works in the world by calling others to do the work.

In Genesis, we read that God creates the world: the mountains and the seas; the valleys and streams; every animal, every living thing in the water, in the air and on the land; the sun, moon, stars and all that lies beyond. Then, God creates human beings, gives them a garden that has enough to feed the world, and calls them, all of them, male and female, to look after it, protect it, tend to it, and share it.

It is as if God says: “You know, I have really enjoyed creating all the beauty and order in this world. Of course, I could take care of it all myself. I could work to make sure all are able not to just survive but to thrive from the bounty of this creation, but I want to see you do it.”

Likewise, Jesus comes into the world making all things new, creating, recreating, reordering, ushering in the Kingdom of God. He touches and heals, welcomes, includes, advocates, and forgives. He turns water into a whole lot of wine and a small basket of food into a great feast that feeds everyone with leftovers, all as a sign of that Kingdom of God is here and there is grace enough and mercy enough and nourishment enough for all. He redeems and restores the lives of the lost, the poor and the marginalized. He chastises judgmental religion, challenges systems of oppression, and exorcises demonic forces that exclude, devalue, and dehumanize.

And then it is as if he says: “You know, I’ve enjoyed doing the holy work of God, demonstrating the reality of God’s reign in this world, but now, it’s your turn. I am calling you to do my work in the world.”

Just as God called people like Abraham and Sarah, Moses and Miriam, Ruth and Jeremiah, Samuel and Deborah, Mary Magdalene and John the Baptizer, Paul and Pricilla, God called a young man living in Huntsville, Alabama who liked to blaze trails as a Boy Scout and as a member of the youth group of First Christian Church. On a camping trip with his friends, it was his friends who first told Ken Burger he should go into the ministry. Like Samuel who soon learned it was not Eli calling, but it was actually God calling him, Ken learned that it wasn’t just his friends calling that day, as he later announced to a surprised family that he was called by God to vocational ministry.

After graduating from the University of Alabama, Ken attended the Lexington Theological Seminary and was ordained into the ministry, 50 years ago this August.

After seminary, Ken says he was surprised when he was called to serve as a pastor of a church in Girard, Illinois. But that is how the call of God usually comes– as a surprise. We are awakened from sleep in the middle of the night like Samuel, or we’re busy at work like the Twelve, or we’re camping in the woods, sitting on the porch, or driving in our car, and out of nowhere, the call come. It’s inexplicable, yet real; incredulous, yet convincing. And no matter how hard we might try, there is no shaking it, and certainly no ignoring it.

After serving that church for 3 years, Ken accepted a call to serve as Associate Minister, 40 miles away in Jacksonville. Then 2 years later he resigned and returned to Girard to start a new ministry, one that lasted 8 years.

Ken says that he remained on the “mission field” of the Midwest for 12 years before moving to Virginia in 1986 where he accepted a call to serve with Bedford Christian Church, a ministry which lasted 8 ½ years.

During those years, he, Marilyn Taylor, and David Herrick sensed a call minister to Senior Adults. One day, they met on the campus of Lynchburg College to explore possibilities together. This is when Ken learned that when God calls, God often calls us to do some pretty big things.

I think we sometimes overlook Jesus’ call of the disciples. For what did he call them to do? Sit on a pew every Sunday? Sing, pray, listen to a sermon, try to be a good person? Maybe attend a ministry team meeting every now and again or join a book study?

No, they were called to do what Jesus did. Nothing too big mind you. Just your ordinary raising of the dead. Just your routine healing of a disease. Just your typical demon exorcism sort-of-thing. They were called by Jesus to do big things that change the world.

Ken understood this, that God calls us to dream and to dream big. And bringing big dreams to life takes time and a lot of patience, for that one meeting at the University of Lynchburg led to a task force that met for 7 years.

Then, in 1995, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Virginia called Ken to serve on the Regional staff as Project Director for the new ministry.  Ken says: “Our own Herb Moore and my second-best friend Johnny Loughridge, were a big part of that call, but that’s a story for another time.”

In November 1996, Ken married his first-best friend, Linda. Her children April and Adam became what  Ken calls his “bonus” daughter and son, along with 3 grandchildren and a great-grandchild. Ken is also a proud Dad to two daughters, Melinda and Stephanie, with whom he enjoys regular Father-Daughter retreats. I believe Ken would say that his role as husband, father and grandfather is his highest calling.

His first Sunday in his new position was when he and Linda were called to joined the First Christian Church of Lynchburg. That was the day he told David Edwards, the senior minister at the time: “I’ve watched this congregation for over 8 years. I want to be part of this.”

Ken’s visionary work with the region led to establishing a joint venture project with Centra and the development of The Summit, where Ken served as Executive Director for 13 years, retiring 8 years ago.

But here’s the thing. Ken never retired from ministry, because Ken understands that the call of God upon people is never silenced. As member of this congregation, Ken continues to say “yes” to the call of God as he faithfully uses his gifts to serve this church, his family and community.

Ken writes: “I love what we are doing here at FCC, for which I am both humbled and proud to be a part.”

Ken Burger, we are grateful that God has called you here. And that you answered that call. And we trust, that wherever you are, even if it is not with us here, that you are there because you are still answering a divine call to love.

Last week, I quoted CS Lewis who described God: “not as a static thing, not even as a person, but as a dynamic, pulsating activity, a life, almost a kind of drama.”

Perhaps one way to describe God is as “a call.”  God is a prodding, pulling, provoking, universal force—a beckoning, compelling energy that transcends denominations, religions, and any human construct that tries to define or limit it– calling people to love.

God is a continual call to love in small and big ways that change the world!

The Call to Love is a call to affirm that every person is created in Love’s image to care for, tend to, and share in the diversity and extravagant bounty of creation.

Thus, the Call to Love is a call to favor democracy over dictatorship, a generosity over greed, truth over talking points, and love over fear.

The Call to Love bends the moral arc of the universe towards justice and brings wholeness and peace to a fragmented world.

The Call to Love leads churches to be Open and Affirming of all people, regarding and embracing the wondrous diversity of the human family as a portrait of divinity.

Ken says he “loves being a part of what we are doing here.” I believe Ken is saying that he loves the way he is witnessing people here answering The Call to Love.

Several of you answer The Call to Love every day in your jobs and through volunteerism in your community.

Many of you are answering The Call to Love as you care for members of your family who need you.

Ann Boynton is answering the call to vocational ministry. Several of you are answering the call to serve as elders, deacons, officers and on various ministry teams.

The One Home – One Future Team is answering the call to transform our grounds to model ecological justice.

The Outreach Team is answering a call to serve children, feed the hungry, fight for democracy, and provide equitable access to housing.

The Education Team led by Maria is answering the call to teach and train our children how to answer The Call to Love.

These are serious times. We are living in dangerous days. But the good news is that Love is calling. Love is calling people like you and me and Love is still calling Ken Burger, for the Call to Love can never be silenced. Love is calling us every day to do what we can to make this world more just, equitable and peaceful.

How is Love calling you today?

There is perhaps no more important question. For it is simply the way our God works in this world. Amen.

Triune Identity Politics

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year BLeave a comment

Romans 8:12-17 NRSV

How ironic that we are recognizing graduates and celebrating the gift of learning on Trinity Sunday, the day the church celebrates its most difficult teaching of all to learn, some would say its most impossible teaching to learn, the doctrine of the Holy Trinity.

It’s fascinating to read the letters regarding the Trinity between those radical Presbyterians, Barton Stone and Alexander Campbell, who started this movement for wholeness that we call the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). It is obvious that Stone had a more difficult time accepting the Trinity than Campbell. Stone writes to Campbell:

On this doctrine many things are said, which are dark, unintelligible, unscriptural, and too mysterious for comprehension. Many of these expressions we have rejected…

I wonder if Stone’s problem was that he was trying to comprehend the Trinity in the first place. For maybe the Holy Trinity is something to be lived, more than learned, something to be experienced more than explained, something or someone with whom to relate more than to understand.

Modern Trinitarian thought uses a word spoken by Gregory of Nazianzus and Maximus the Confessor to describe how three can be one. These ancient thinkers of the fourth and fifth centuries referred to the inner life and the outer working of the Trinity as peri-co-reses, which means literally in the Greek, “to dance.” They were suggesting a dynamic, intimate, self-giving relationship shared by the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

So perhaps, the Holy Trinity is not a doctrine to learn at all, but more of a connection to be enjoyed. It is to be encountered more in relationship than in religion. It is something that is unseen, yet true; inexplicable, yet real. It is more surreal than literal; more actual than factual.

The late author and lecturer Phyllis Tickle tells the following story that I believe speaks to the mystery of the Trinity. She was addressing a Cathedral gathering on the historicity of the Virgin Birth. She recounts:

The Cathedral young people had served the evening’s dinner and were busily scraping plates and doing general clean-up when I began the opening sections of the lecture I had come to give.

The longer I talked, the more I noticed one youngster—no more than seventeen at the most—scraping more and more slowly until, at last, he gave up and took a back seat as part of the audience.

When all the talking was done, he hung back until the last of the adults had left. He looked at me tentatively and, gaining courage, finally came up front and said, ‘May I ask you something?’

‘Certainly,’ I said. ‘What about?’

‘It’s about that Virgin Birth thing,’ he said. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘What don’t you understand,’ I asked, being myself rather curious by now because of his intensity and earnestness.

‘I don’t understand,’ he said, ‘what their problem is,’ and he gestured toward the empty chairs the adults had just vacated.

‘What do you mean?’ I asked him.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘it’s just so beautiful that it has to be true whether it happened or not.’

So, I believe it is with the Trinity. This dynamic, intimate relationship, this holy, self-giving dance, shared by the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is so beautiful, that it has be to true, whether it is the most accurate description of the image of God or not.

C. S. Lewis once wrote:

All sorts of people are fond of repeating the Christian statement that ‘God is love.’  But they seem not to notice that the words ‘God is love’ has no real meaning unless God contains at least two Persons. Love is something that one person has for another person. If God was a single person, then before the world was made, [God] was not love…

And that, wrote Lewis:

is perhaps the most important difference between Christianity and all other religions: that in Christianity, God is not a static thing—not even a person—but a dynamic, pulsating activity, a life, almost a kind of drama. Almost, a kind of dance…

There it is again: a dance. The Trinity is an activity. It’s something moving, something to be experienced, something to be lived, something to be shared. Lewis continues:

And now, what does it all matter?  It matters more than anything else in the world. The whole dance, or drama, or pattern of this Three-Personal life is to be played out in each one of us: (or putting it the other way around) each one of us has got to enter that pattern, take [their] place in that dance. There is no other way to the happiness for which we were made.

Trappist Monk Thomas Merton once said:

To say that I am made in the image of God is to say that love is the reason for my existence, for God is love. Love is my true identity. Selflessness is my true self. Love is my true character. Love is my name.

I believe it is in the sacred dance of selfless, self-giving love shared by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit that we find our holy purpose. It is where we can get in touch with our true identity that Paul describes in his letter to the Romans as “children of God,” “joint heirs with Christ” who “live by” and are “led by the Spirit.”

And when we embrace our true, authentic selves, when we accept our identity that we are created in love to share love, when we accept that we are love, and we begin to fulfill our holy purpose by sharing ourselves with others and the world, something wonderful happens. Not only are we happier and more fulfilled, but the world around us becomes just, more equitable, more gracious, more merciful, and more peaceful.

Think of how much evil exists in our world because people do the exact opposite. We define God on our own terms, instead of allowing the image of the Triune God define us. Instead of understanding God and our true identity as selfless, self-givers, we understand God and our identity as selfish takers. Such an understanding emboldens oppression. It fuels White Christian Nationalism, justifies war, and is behind much, if not all, of the violence in our world today.

How often have you attended a funeral and heard the phrase: “God came and took them home?”  We might hear it as a harmless misinterpretation of God by a preacher who didn’t go to seminary, but it is very bad theology that has very evil consequences.

The Trinity teaches us that God does never “takes” anyone. For givers are the opposite of not takers. I believe a more accurate way of describing what happens to us when breathe our last breath on this earth is that God comes and completely, eternally, and finally gives all of God’ self to us.

I believe with all my heart that by living our identity as self-givers, by joining the holy, self-giving dance of the Trinity, we can reclaim a gospel that has been hijacked by people who would rather live in this world on their terms instead of on God’s terms. We can reclaim a gospel that has been co-opted by takers, by people who have exploited the name of God for their own selfish gain.

For if we embraced our identity as self-givers, as persons living, moving and having our being with God, in God, think of how everything that is upside down in our world today is transformed. Think of how our relationships with ourselves and others would change.

Think of how our faith would change. Our faith would not be about what we can take from God—healthier marriages, stronger families, deeper friendships, peace, security, comfort, a mechanism to overcome trials or to achieve a more prosperous life, or even gain an eternal life.

Our faith would be what we can give back to the Holy Giver—namely all that we have and all that we are, even if it is costly, even if it involves risk, danger and suffering, even if it involves the loss of relationships, some stress on our marriages, sleepless nights, a tighter budget, even if it involves laying down our very lives.

Think of how church would change.  Church would not be about what we can take from it. It would not be about feeding our souls, experiencing some personal peace, receiving a blessing or some inspiration to help us through the week.

Church would be about opportunities to participate in self-giving acts of love. Church would be about feeding those who hunger for justice, working for world peace, being a blessing to our communities, and inspiring our nation and the world.

Church would not be a way to for us to get some Jesus. Church would be way we allow Jesus to get us, to love our neighbors as we were created to love, dynamically, graciously, generously.

And we would never see our neighbors for what we can take from them, or how we can use them, profit by them, but always see what we may be able to offer them, especially those things that others are constantly robbing them of to support their dominance and superiority over them—their dignity, their equality, their sacred value as human beings created in the holy image of God.

The earth would not be something for us to take from, plunder and exploit for our own selfish wants, but something for which we sacrificially care for, respect, nurture, and protect.

I believe when we embrace our sacred identity as givers, instead of takers, and enter into the holy, self-giving dance of the Trinity, God’s kingdom comes on earth as it is in heaven.

Embracing the holy self-giving dance of the Trinity rebuilds a broken world, corrects an upside-down moral narrative, and heals sick religion.

Embracing the holy, self-giving dance of the Trinity brings down walls and breaks the chains of injustice.

When we embrace our identity and enter into the holy, self-giving dance of the Trinity, hate, bigotry, and violence passes away, liberty and justice and peace come, and it comes for all, as all of creation is born again.

And this, my fellow Americans, is how we can best honor those who have died in war on this Memorial Day weekend. For when we all embrace our sacred identity, and enter into the holy, self-giving dance of the Trinity, the words of the prophet Isaiah are fulfilled:

They shall beat their swords into ploughshares,

   and their spears into pruning-hooks.

Nation shall not lift up sword against nation,

   neither shall they learn war anymore (Isaiah 2:3-4).

Yes, Barton Stone, this Holy Trinitarian dance is a mystery. But it is a Mystery that has happened and is happening to us, and in us. It is our sacred identity. We can’t comprehend it. But we can accept it. We can join it. We can live it. We can move and have our being in it. And we can share it, today and forevermore.

Pentecostal Hope

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Short Articles3 Comments

Sermon preached at the Arkansas State Capitol, May 21, 2018, the day after Pentecost Sunday, following a march of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Moral Call for Revival

For God so loved the world, that God came into the world to show us how to love our neighbors as ourselves—All of our neighbors, but especially our neighbors who have been pushed to the margins: the sick in need of healthcare; the immigrant in need of a home; the poor in need of a living wage; school children who just want to be safe; people of other faiths who hunger for respect; and people of color who thirst for their lives to matter.

Offended by the unsettling force of this inclusive love that proclaimed good news to the poor and liberation to the oppressed, that affirmed the rights of women and welcomed the children; afraid of this radical love that had the audacity to stand for liberty and justice for all, the privileged powers-that-be plotted against it, arrested it, and crucified it.

Three days later there were stories of a resurrection, a resurgence of this love. Because that’s the thing about this love. This love will not be defeated. No amount of obstruction or collusion can conquer this love. No amount of hush money can silence this love. There’s not enough nails in Jerusalem or bullets in Memphis or lies in Washington that can assassinate this love.

But the light of this love is such a threat to the systems that feed the darkness, the darkness will still try to find a way to overcome it.

Discrimination will be legalized under the guise of religious freedom. Voter suppression will be carried out under the guise of preventing voter fraud. Racist voter ID laws, gerrymandering, and sick religion will be used to disengage and disenfranchise minorities. People with different faiths and different ethnicities will be demonized and dehumanized by Caesar himself. More prisons will be built. New walls will be erected. Families will be separated.

However, yesterday, I went to church. I went to church, and I heard some good news from the second chapter of the book of Acts.

“When the day of Pentecost had come, they all came together in one place.”

“They all came together”—black, white and brown; Gay, Transgendered, and Straight; Democrat, Republican and Independent; Muslim, Jew and Christian.

“And there came a sound, like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house” where they had gathered. I believe the sound sounded something like: “FORWARD TOGETHER—NOT ONE STEP BACK!”

“Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them… All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit” of a love that was so inclusive, so radical, so audacious, that despite their different languages, when they spoke out together, they were heard with a miraculous clarity by all.

“But others sneered and said, ‘They are filled with new wine.’”

They’re a bunch of sore losers, entitled whiners.

“But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them: ‘Men of Judea and all who live [and work] in Jerusalem [and Little Rock and Washington], let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose,

“No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:
‘In the last days it will be, God declares,
that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
and your sons and your daughters shall proclaim prophetic justice,
and your young men shall see visions,
and your old men shall dream dreams.
Even upon [the poorest of the poor] both men and women,
in those days I will pour out my Spirit;
and they shall [proclaim good news to the poor and liberation to the oppressed]
And I will show portents in the heaven above
and signs on the earth…

[In other words, God is saying: “Through these people, through a new unsettling force of inclusive love, I am going to change the world!’]

“Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs that were being done…”

The moral narrative changed. Walls came down. Chains were loosed. A blessed community was formed. Racism, sexism, Islamophobia, homophobia, and xenophobia were relinquished. Voting rights were restored. Fair living wages were paid. Unfair incarcerations ceased. Affordable housing, healthcare and education were available. All of creation was respected and protected. Clean water was consumed. Clean air was breathed.

And liberty and justice came. And it came for all. Not just to one race, one faith, and one nation. It came for every nation under heaven.

Truth came for all. Peace came for all. Mercy came for all. Love came for all.

Into the world’s darkness, light came for all, and darkness could not, cannot, and will not, ever overcome it!

A Pentecostal Outpouring

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year BLeave a comment

Acts 2 NRSV

I have heard more than one person say: “the Spirit of God is in this place.”

I have also heard people make the counter observation about other churches, saying something like: “I no longer felt the Spirit in that place.” And I am sure that there are some who have made, and who still make, that observation about our church.

So, a good question for us to ask on this Pentecost Sunday is: “How do we know whether or not the Holy Spirit is here?” How do we know if any church ever experiences something like Luke described as a violent wind and tongues of fire? How do we recognize a Pentecostal outpouring of the Holy Spirit?”

As a child, I remember our congregation often opening a worship service by singing:

There’s a sweet, sweet Spirit in this place. And, I know that it’s the Spirit of the Lord; There are sweet expressions on each face, And I know that it’s the presence of the Lord (Doris Akers, 1962).

“Sweet facial expressions?” Is that how we know? I suppose I see a few of those today. But are you happy because the Spirit is here or because you know there’s some good food waiting for you at the end of the service?

I have heard some people talk about an outpouring of the Spirit as they describe a worship service where people are standing singing praise songs to Jesus with their hands raised and tears rolling down their cheeks.

I once served on a town’s recreation committee with the responsibility of organizing the summer church softball league. After leading worship on Sunday, I drove over to a neighboring church to deliver the schedule for the upcoming season. As I pulled into the parking lot, I noticed that cars were pulling out, so I assumed their service had just ended. As I opened and walked through the front door of the sanctuary, I was alarmed to see several people lying motionless in the aisle! The pastor, who was gathering his notes at the pulpit, saw me come in, and without even a hint of concern in his voice, greeted me with a smile saying: “Brother Banks, welcome! Come back with me to my office, and don’t mind those folks lying there in the aisle.”

More than a little distressed, as I walked around the bodies lying in the aisle, I asked: “Are these people ok?”

The pastor said: “Oh, don’t you worry about them. They’ll get up soon enough. We just had a tremendous outpouring of the Holy Spirit today where several people were slain in the Spirit. It happens from time to time.”

I anxiously followed the pastor into his office, where he asked me to sit down across from his desk. As I handed him the softball schedules, I must have had a not-too-sweet expression on my face, because he asked, “Brother Banks, you don’t ever have people fall out during your services, do you?”

I answered: “Oh, it’s happened a time or two, and each time, somebody called 911.”

He smiled and said, “Well, that’s how we know that the Holy Spirit is in this place.”

So, should be concerned that no body passes out in the floor during our worship here? That no one stands and raises their hands as they sing overwhelmed with emotion?

So, what do we mean when we say we feel the spirit in this place?

Some Sundays, I am amazed how the anthem that Jeremy selects or the hymns that Judy plays fit perfectly with the sermon. I sit back here and say to myself: “That’s the Spirit working!”

However, as amazing as that is at times, I am not sure that exactly what is being described by Luke on the Jewish festival called Pentecost.

Luke writes: “When the day of Pentecost had come…all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.”

I suppose we could ask someone who knows a few languages, like Brian Cox, to come up here and speak to us this morning. But there’s a problem with that. The miracle of Pentecost was not so much in the speaking as it was in the hearing.

Amazed and astonished, they asked, ‘How is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language?

If Brian comes up here and speaks to us in German, I am pretty sure we are not going to hear him in English.

Perhaps Luke, in describing the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, is trying to paint a portrait to help us see something larger, more wonderful, and more astonishing.

Perhaps Luke is describing what our country needs today, what our world needs today— a divine grace to listen, to hear, to understand, to empathize with others who may be so different from us that they speak a different language. Perhaps Luke is describing an outpouring of the Holy Spirit that produces a divine compassion for more people than the people we see as “our own,” a holy call for people to possess an empathy that transcends countries, ethnicities, sexual orientation, gender, and race. In this great Pentecostal outpouring-of-the-Spirit event, Luke just well may be describing the first Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Conference!

Luke is describing a Pentecostal outpouring that transforms the hearts and minds of people to have the heart and mind of Jesus who listened to, heard, and learned from a Syrophoenician woman, saw the Samaritan as his neighbor, and accepted Eunuchs, who Matthew records Jesus saying were “born that way” (Matthew 19).

Luke is describing a people who would never say “God bless America” without a sincere desire for God to bless the entire world. He is describing a group of people who would never condemn the genocide of one nation without condemning the genocide of another. He is describing white people who do not hesitate when they see a black man mercilessly executed by police in the street to stand up and say “Black Lives Matter” or to speak out at the school board when the history lessons taught to children in our schools are being whitewashed.

Luke is describing people who do not merely worship Jesus, but they follow Jesus, and teach the way of love that Jesus taught, a generous love that is expressed as goodwill for all people.

Luke is describing hearts that are so generous “they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.” These are people who never complain about food stamps, free healthcare, and increasing the minimum wage, because they truly believe in supporting the welfare of all people, so no one, regardless of their citizenship is in need.

Luke is describing people who feel a deep sense of connectedness to all people.

The COVID-19 pandemic taught us many things. Like all communicable diseases, that a virus can originate on the other side of the world and quickly spread to every nation on earth taught us how connected we all are to one another.

But it also taught us something about our refusal to acknowledge such connectedness. It taught us something sinister about our selfishness and self-centeredness as some refused to wear a mask in public or get a vaccine to protect their neighbor. Even some churches refused to abide by the stay-at-home orders at the beginning of the pandemic, revealing that we have many churches in America devoid of the Holy Spirit of the One who said the greatest commandment is to love our neighbors as ourselves.

It revealed that what this world needs today is some Pentecost, a serious outpouring of the Holy Spirit!

And by “serious,” I mean the world doesn’t need more people tearfully worshipping Jesus with their hands raised in the air. It needs more people following Jesus by extending their hands to help their neighbors in need.

The world doesn’t need more anthems or postludes that pair well with the sermon. It needs more people who are offering their spiritual gifts to pair with the needs of the world.

The world doesn’t need more people slain in the spirit on Sunday morning. It needs more people to be awakened by the spirit to a live a life of generosity for the goodwill of all people every day of the week.

And the world doesn’t need any more congregations with sweet expressions on each face. It needs more of the fire that was experienced on that day the Holy Spirit showed up enabling people of all nationalities, ethnicities, and races to see, to listen, to hear, and to care for one another.

The world needs more empathy and equity, more justice and generosity, more sharing and more goodwill, and not just for people who speak our language, are born in our country, share our pigmentation, or go to our church, but for all people.

The good news is that I believe this is indeed a spirit-filled church. Now, we are still calling 911 if you fall out in the aisle this morning, but there’s plenty of other evidence that the Spirit of the Lord is in this place.

The building and the blessing of the little food pantries, our donations to the Rivermont food pantry, our volunteers each month who serve at the Park View Mission, our folks who have signed up to deliver Meals on Wheels—these are all evidence of a Pentecostal outpouring of the Holy Spirit, or as my childhood preacher liked to say, “an unction of the Holy Ghost!”

And just this past week, our Outreach Team met with the Interfaith Virginia Center for Public Policy to discuss a partnership that will enable us to not only feed our neighbors in need, but to be advocates for justice, so our neighbors will not be hungry in the first place. This may be the strongest evidence of all that there’s Pentecostal outpouring in this place.

So, as we celebrate 150 years as a church, on this day which has been called “the birthday of the Church” (that’s Church with a big ‘C’), there is indeed a sweet, sweet spirit in this place. There are sweet expressions on some faces, but there are also some holy scowls, some furrowed brows, some eyes filled with divine determination, souls ignited by a fiery Call of Love to make this a more generous, equitable, and just world, not just for some of the people, but for all people. And I know that it’s the Spirit of the Lord. Amen.

Lynchburg Loves You, Unless…

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Short Articles5 Comments
     Before moving to Lynchburg last summer to begin my duties as the senior minister of First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), like most people who move here, I went online to learn as much as I could about the city. The city’s website entitled “Lynchburg Loves You” made me smile as I had been planting a new church in the greater New Orleans area called “Just Love Your Neighbor.”
     While I was visiting the city prior to moving to meet with the church’s search team and a real estate agent, I went for a run on the beautiful Blackwater Creek Trail, and took a selfie by the big “LOVE” sign down by the river and another selfie by the mural at the trailhead which reads: “You Matter.”
     As a Christian pastor I could not wait to move to a city which really seemed to be all about what Jesus said was the greatest commandment: to love God and to love our neighbors.
     I cannot begin to tell you how incredibly disappointed I have been since moving here, not by my church, not by the wonderful organizations that we have here whose mission is to love our neighbors, like Park View Mission, Lynchburg Daily Bread, Miriam’s House, Bright Beginnings, the Free Clinic, HumanKind and Interfaith Mission, and many others, and not by the many citizens I have met here, but by some of the members of our city council.
     Last week, I talked with more than one pastor here in Lynchburg who expressed the same sentiment.
     One minister suggested that to avoid disappointing other newcomers to this beautiful city, perhaps the city council should think about changing the city’s website to: “Lynchburg Might Love You,” or “Lynchburg Loves You, If…” or “Lynchburg loves you, unless…unless you are queer, unless you have children who are queer, or unless you are the parent of any child who needs public education which this city council is going to continue to underfund.” “Lynchburg loves you, unless you do not have the same political beliefs that some of us do. Because not only will we not love you and welcome you ‘with open arms and invite you to be part of our story,’ we are going to threaten you, hurt you, and even scapegoat you.”
     However,  I am praying that instead of changing the website, we might change our hearts. And if our hearts do not change, then hopefully we we will change this city council come November.

A Cloudy Ascension Sunday on Mother’s Day

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Easter, Sermons Year B2 Comments
Photo taken by Carrie Knutsen

Acts 1:6-11 NRSV

In today’s epistle lesson, on what the church traditionally calls Ascension Sunday, we have one of the first hints of how we are capable of mucking up the purposes of God in this world.

 It’s the first inkling of how we got to this place today where the Christianity not only doesn’t look anything like the way of love that Jesus taught and embodied, but in many ways, looks like the exact opposite.

The risen Christ has been telling his followers for months that he would one day leave them and how he expected them to continue his mission in the world loving one another as he loved, by being his hands and feet in the world, and in today’s lesson, we read where time had come. But before he departed, they asked him: “When will you come again and restore the kingdom to Israel?”

 Jesus replied: “It is not for you to know the time or the period…But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

With those words, he ascended into heaven and left the followers of standing there, looking up into the clouds.

And while they had their heads in the clouds, suddenly, angles show up saying: “Why do you stand there looking up toward heaven?”

Jesus’ followers were instructed to get their heads out of the clouds. They didn’t need to be alarmed about the departure of Jesus, because one day, God’s kingdom would fully come, the day is certainly coming when love will finally win. The disciples are not told when, but they didn’t need to know.

“All you need to know,” said the angels, is that the Kingdom is coming. Justice will prevail. Love will eventually win, and here’s the thing, you are going help to make that happen! That is, if you get your head out of the clouds and keep loving this world as you witnessed Jesus loving this world, if you keep being his “witnesses to the ends of the earth.”

I believe this wonderful Ascension story has much to teach today’s church that seems that still seems to have its head somewhere in the distant clouds.

Angels say: “Church, God needs you to get your heads out of the clouds, get your minds off going to heaven, and come back down to earth and to do something for this world. Do the things that you witnessed Jesus do in the gospels. Feed the hungry. Make a place at the table for the left out and the left behind. Stand up and speak out advocating for those who are marginalized by sick religion and greedy politics. Love your neighbor as yourself. Give something, create something, be something that will make a positive difference in the world, especially in the worlds of those considered to be the least of these.

Get your heads out of the clouds, come back down to earth and go to Jerusalem. Go all the way to Richmond and Washington DC to be public moral witnesses of the Jesus who preached good news to the poor and freedom for the oppressed. Why are all of you hunkered up in one place? Don’t close yourself up in a sanctuary of comfort and security. Get out of here. Go into all of Judea. Go all over Central Virginia. Go to places like Samaria and Palestine, those place that you may not want to go. Be witnesses to the ends of the earth to the good news of the inclusive, unconditional, generous love of God that Jesus revealed, embodied, and commanded.

And what’s the church’s response:

But these clouds are so pretty. They are so soft. So comforting. Let’s just stay right here. Let’s keep our heads in the clouds.

Giving ourselves to transform the world seems too risky, too hard, just too exhausting. Everyone knows that standing up for the marginalized won’t get you very far in this world, and fighting for the rights of the oppressed will only get you in trouble. It’s all too costly. After all, look what it cost Jesus.

So, instead of all of that, let’s make the faith about these pretty clouds. We can even get some smoke machines to create some real clouds in our worship centers. Instead of inspiring people to give, live and love like Jesus, let’s just encourage people to worship Jesus. Instead asking people to feed the hungry and fight for the least of these, let’s just study Jesus with a cup of coffee, sing praise hymns to Jesus and listen to sermons about Jesus.

We are going to take this clear, but very uncomfortable, call to go into all the world to fight for the least of these, and we are going to cloud it up by turning it into a religion, better yet, we are going to make it a blissful, personal, relationship that we must have as a ticket to heaven.

Then, we can use this ticket-to-experience-the-clouds-of-heaven- while-avoiding-the fires-of-hell to frighten people to do things that serve us. We can cloud it up a bit more and get people to love the Bible more than they love Jesus. Then we can use the Bible as a tool, really as weapon, to protect our power and privilege, to keep us comfortable and to even make us some money.

And if we must compromise a little, even cloud it up more with some dark, mean, sinister clouds to get it, that will be ok. If we have to lie a little,  hurt the planet a little, stir up a little racism and bigotry, scapegoat a group of people, pay workers a low wage, even embrace a little Nazism along the way, it will be worth it. Because at least we will be more comfortable, our taxes will be lower, and our wealth, you know, it will eventually trickle down to the least, right?

To say that we have clouded up what it means to be a public witness doing the things that Jesus did in this world is an understatement.

Which makes it all the more ironic, that this year, Ascension Sunday falls on Mother’s Day. Because we have done the exact same thing to the original Mother’s Day proclamation written by a prophet named Julia Ward Howe in 1870. We have taken a clear call to action, a summons to work and sacrifice to make this world more loving, more peaceful and more just and clouded it up creating something that serves our own interests.

Howe writes:

Arise, then, women of this day!

Arise, all women who have hearts, whether our baptism be of water or of tears!

Say firmly:

“We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies.

Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause.

Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.

We, the women of one country, will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.”

From the bosom of the devastated Earth a voice goes up with our own.

It says: “Disarm! Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.”

Blood does not wipe out dishonor, nor violence indicate possession. As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel.

Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead. Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means whereby the great human family can live in peace, each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar, but of God.

In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask that a general congress of women without limit of nationality may be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient and at the earliest period consistent with its objects, to promote the alliance of the different nationalities, the amicable settlement of international questions, the great and general interests of peace.

And what was the response?

We’ve all become more committed to the general interests of peace? To the relearning of charity, mercy, and patience? To disarmament? To the recognition of the one great human family? To living for God and not for Caesar?

No, that’s too risky, too costly, too woke. I tell ya what. Let’s make it about clouds, soft, fluffy, white clouds.

And in 1914, a white supremacist named Woodrow Wilson proclaimed Mother’s Day a national holiday– as a moral call for world peace and justice? As a call for mercy and patience? A call for a world summit of women to negotiate how nations can finally live in harmony?

 Nope. He clouded it up, making it a “public expression of our love and reverence for all mothers.” Instead of making it a call for a ceasefire, a call to disarm, and to work for peace; instead of making it a plea to create sensible gun laws, we will make it about flowers, candy and greeting cards.

And what was the church’s response to the original Mother’s Day proclamation?

Do we finally answer our call to be prophetic witnesses for world peace and justice? Do we finally stand up for God’s children everywhere who are bullied, mistreated, and harmed for being different, for being poor, for belonging to another ethnicity or nationality or religion?

In the words of Hosea, do we finally rise up and “fall upon those who do harm” to any of God’s children, even if they are from Samaria or Palestine, “like a bear robbed of her cubs” (Hosea 13:8)? Whenever we see injustice in our world, whether it comes out of Washington DC, Richmond or Lynchburg, do we finally echo the words of the prophet Isaiah: “For a long time I have held my peace, I have kept still and restrained myself; now I will cry out like a woman in labor, I will gasp and pant” (Isaiah 42:14)?

No. That’s too risky. It’s much too costly. So, what do we do? We cloud it up. We sentimentalize it. We make this day in the church about recognizing the oldest mother and the youngest mother with flowers. We make it about giving a special gift to all mothers who attend worship.

And on Mother’s Day in 2024, the church looks nothing like the clarion call of Julia Howe to be prophetic voices of peace and justice, as on this Ascension Sunday, it looks nothing like the summon of angels to go into all the world to live, serve and love like Jesus.

Now, I love my mother. I called her first thing this morning. Most of us love our mothers. We wouldn’t be here without them. And I love church. I love worship. I love our faith. But the truth is: we’ve clouded it all up.

Today, on this cloudy Ascension Sunday on Mother’s Day, I believe God wants those who claim to be friends of Jesus to get our heads out of the clouds to heed the clear call of angels and a prophet named Julia. Let’s be moral witnesses continuing the work of Jesus in this world. And today, let’s rise up with women everywhere to be public prophetic voices for peace and for justice, a holy movement for wholeness in this fragmented world.

Being a Friend of Jesus

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Easter, Sermons Year B2 Comments
The actual note that was left by the truck driver in the story.

John 15:9-17 NRSV

This may sound strange, even a bit offensive, but I suspect some of you can relate. I struggle these days referring to myself as a “Christian.” As senior minister of the First Christian Church, part of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), it grieves me that the word “Christian” has been co-opted by folks who espouse the exact opposite views of Jesus, views that are best described as “anti-Christ.”

Sadly, if the word “Christian” is used to describe anything these days, whether it is “a Christian University,” or just “Christian values,” I automatically assume that the school or the values being described are diametrically opposed to the values of Jesus.

Allow me to share a story which illustrates this sad reality.

While I was a serving with the First Christian Church in Fort Smith, Arkansas, there was a teen in the church who was struggling with her gender identity. So much so, that it prompted me to attempt to create a support group for her and other teens who were struggling with the same issues. I contacted a school teacher who was a member of the LGBTQ community who had been attending to our worship services and asked her if she would meet with me to discuss the possibility of her leading a support group. She agreed to meet me at a restaurant after worship that Sunday to discuss it further.

I walked into the restaurant, looked around, and saw her sitting at the bar. I sat down on a stool beside her to her left. She immediately started talking about how she enjoyed the service. After a few minutes of talking about church, she saw a few friends on the other side of the restaurant and excused herself to go over and say “hello.”

It was then that this gentlemen, who was seated a couple of stools over from me, moved over to sit next to me.

He said, “Forgive my eavesdropping, but did I hear you were a Christian pastor?”

When I told him that I was, he began telling me how God must have led him into the restaurant that day. He went on to tell me that he was a truck driver who was just passing through that day. With religious language, he told me how he grew up in church, but had since “fallen away from the church and the from Lord.” But lately, the Lord had led him to listen to these “Christian” radio programs while driving truck, and it was making him consider coming back to church. And how he couldn’t believe he was now sitting beside a pastor at a bar of all places!”

I smiled politely, but I have to admit he lost me as soon as he said, “Christian radio.”

As soon as the truck driver’s meal arrived, the school teacher returned, and we immediately began discussing our vision for a support group to help LGBTQ youth in the city. After we talked for some time, she got up again to say goodbye to her friends who were leaving.

It was then that the truck driver leaned over to me and asked, “You do know what the law says about her don’t you?”

I replied, “What? Arkansas law?”

“No,” he said. “I am talking about the law, you know, the Bible.”

I responded, “Not sure if I know what laws you are referring to, but when they asked Jesus what the greatest law was, he replied, ‘Love God and love your neighbor as yourself.’ And he said, ‘that on these two laws hang all of the laws in the Bible.’”

The school teacher returned to the bar, and the truck driver got up, picked up his plate and drink, and moved back to his original seat.

As we finished our conversation about the support group, we never saw that the truck driver had left the restaurant without saying goodbye. How Christian was that? Before we got our checks, the bartender walked over to us, and asked me if I was a pastor. After the school teacher introduced me as her pastor, the bartender asked I knew the man who was sitting beside me. When I said “no” explaining that we had just met, she said, “Well, he left this note to warn me about you on the back of his receipt: ‘Beware of this guy on your left, my right. He is a demon in disguise.'”

This is just one example of how upside-down Christianity is today. It’s so backwards that when you quote Jesus saying that the greatest commandment is to love our neighbors, Christians will call you “a demon in disguise.”

So, these days, it’s very difficult for me to identify as a “Christian.” When asked if I am a Christian, I sometimes respond, “You know, Jesus was not a Christian. I am just trying to be whatever he was.”

Our gospel lesson this morning may offer people like me, and perhaps like you, some help as the risen Christ says to his disciples: “I do not call you servants any longer. . . I call you friends.”

“A friend of Jesus.” I like that.  These days, I’m liking it better than being a “Christian.” Especially when I read that being a friend of Jesus comes with a stipulation.

“You are my friends,” says Jesus, “if you do what I command you.” And this is my commandment, “that you love one another as I have loved you.”

Author Garrett Bucks, who visited Lynchburg this week, points out that religion is either “about being right” or “it is about love.” I believe what this world needs today are fewer “Christians” who are concerned about who’s right and who’s wrong and more friends of Jesus who follow his commandment to love one another.

Perhaps this is what the world has always needed, for throughout history, there has always been a large number of Christians who, although they claimed to be on the side of Jesus, were actually standing on the opposite side of Jesus and probably believed those who are trying to love like Jesus are “demons in disguise.”

During the Medieval period, Christians, in the name of Jesus, fought in the Crusades against the Muslims. In the name of Jesus, Christians supported the genocide of Native Americans and the slavery of Africans, which literally led to a Civil War. In the name of Jesus, Christians supported the Jewish Holocaust, Jim Crow laws, and still today support racist policies, laws that subjugate the rights of women, and legislation hurt the poor and LGBTQ people.

However, the good news is that there have always been friends of Jesus who have stood with Jesus by faithfully following his command to love one another, proving that the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice.

So, how do we know if we are standing with Jesus? How do we know we are friends of Jesus?

Well, whenever we are taking a stand against something or for something, we simply need to ask ourselves, am I standing on this side because of love? Do I have these beliefs because I am trying to love like Jesus, selflessly and sacrificially?  Am I in this fight because I love my neighbors as myself?

Or am fighting for something else? Is it pride? Is it power and privilege? If it is not about love for another, is about being superior to another, more holy, more right? If it is not about love, is it about fear? If it is not selfless and sacrificial, is it selfish? Is it greed?

You really want to know if you are a friend of Jesus?

Well, what do we say when we meet a friend of a friend? “Any friend of his or hers is a friend of mine!”

And who were Jesus’ friends? The gospel writers call him a friend of tax collectors and sinners. Because Jesus was a friend to anyone left out or left behind. That means that as friends of Jesus, we are committed to being a friend to the least of these. We cannot claim to be a friend of Jesus and not be a friend to the poor, to the sick, to the imprisoned, to the underprivileged, and to all those oppressed by the sick religion of the privileged.

And the good news is: Being a friend of Jesus means something else. It means knowing something of what the Risen Christ knows, as the Risen Christ says to his new friends, “I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father.”

This is especially good news for those of us living in these upside-down days when Christians call pastors who quote Jesus “demons in disguise.” No matter how dark things seem in our world today, as we were reminded by a prophet named Martin Luther King, Jr., “that is when we can see the stars.”

This Jesus who taught love, revealed love, embodied love, and was crucified and buried for love, is still standing, still teaching, still revealing, and miraculously, still embodying love in the flesh before his friends. This one who was arrested, tried and executed by a deadly mix of sick religion and greedy politics for being a friend to the least, is still living, still free, still loving, still speaking, still inspiring love, because love never ends. In the words of the Apostle Paul, “love [truly] bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.”

No matter how dark the world may seem, no matter how loud the voices of antisemitism, Islamophobia, Christian Nationalism and hate are, no matter how widespread the religious hypocrisy, no matter how upside down this world gets, the forces of fear and darkness, even the violent forces of death will never have the final word. Friends of Jesus can keep loving, keep befriending the least, keep standing for justice, keep speaking truth to power, keep the light of God’s love for this world burning, confident that this light will never be extinguished and will one day fully and finally change the world. Amen.

Healing Religious Trauma

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Easter, Sermons Year BLeave a comment

Acts 8:26-38 NRSV

This year’s Turner-Warren lecture still inspires me, and I hope you too, to think about the opportunities we have as a church to heal religious trauma caused by the oppressive beliefs of many who call themselves “Christian.” How do we support people who have been taught by preachers and by teachers and professors at their private conservative schools that who they are, that their very being, is outside of the boundaries of God’s love and grace?

How do we help people deconstruct the exclusion and fear of the other they have been taught in Sunday School and through sermons?  How do we help them to reach a point where they truly believe in the words of the Apostle Paul— the one who believed if anyone is outside the boundaries of God’s love, as a former persecutor of Christians, it was him— but became “convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:28-29)?

How do we heal religious trauma here in city that is known for creating it?

Well, this may come as a surprise to people who have been injured by those who have weaponized the Bible, but I believe the Bible, particularly this morning’s epistle lesson, can help a church like ours serving in a city like ours. I often think of what a better world this would be if the people who claim to love the Bible or sell the Bible would actually read the Bible.

Verse 26 of chapter 8 of the book of Acts reads:

Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, ‘Get up and go…:

The first thing we must learn is that we will never be able to fulfill our call to be healers of religious trauma unless we first fulfill our call to “get up and go” to meet people where they are. We must go to them, because, sadly, those who have been wounded by the church have some very good reasons for not coming to us.

People who have been hurt by the church understand that most churches not only expect people to come to them, but they expect them to come in a manner that meets their own religious and cultural expectations. That is, they know that many churches expect people to come to them who want to believe like them, look like them, love like them, and even hate like them.

And as our political environment teaches us, it’s not just the church that has trouble accepting those who are different. Excluding others seems to be something that seems to come very naturally for us. I think if we are honest, we would all admit that we would much rather be around people who are a lot like us.

Some have said that it may be part of our evolutionary DNA. It’s some inborn, natural instinct of survival. Fear the different. Beware of the other. Trust no foreigner. Avoid the outsider.

This, of course, is what fuels racism and homophobia. It supports white Christian nationalism and isolationism. It builds walls, discriminates, excludes, and demeans the other.

I believe this is what the Apostle Paul is talking about when he talks about the dangers of being led by the flesh and not by the Spirit. Because we human beings can easily be led by the flesh. A false prophet or Anti-Christ-like leader can easily stoke the fear of the outsider that is inside all of us. Unfortunately, it doesn’t take a stable genius to lead us to hate the other.

However, the Spirit leads us to take a higher road.

Notice that Luke tells us that the Spirit had to urge Philip, the Spirit had to push Philip, pull Philip, to get up and go to this chariot to meet this queer black man from Ethiopia.

Philip, I know this may be hard for you. I know this may be against your natural inclination. But go to this chariot and meet this stranger, this gender-variant foreigner, this victim of bad faith and sick religion who had been ostracized from their community of faith, this one demeaned and exploited for their sexuality, this one who has been clobbered by the Bible by those who arbitrarily pick and choose scripture passages like Deuteronomy 23:1 that says Eunuchs are forbidden to enter the temple, this one who has been taught their entire life that they are despised by God. Go to their chariot and meet them where they are. Don’t expect them to come to you. And when you encounter them, do not stand above them or over them. Do not judge them or condemn them. Join them. Get into the chariot and sit beside them. Ride alongside them. Engage them. Listen to them. Seek to understand them, empathize with them. Learn from this other, this stranger, this foreigner, this beloved child of God, this beautiful sibling of yours.

Philip meets the Eunuch who is reading from the book of Isaiah. This should not surprise us. For this is one of the most hopeful books in the Hebrew Bible for those who have been marginalized by sick religion, for those who have been taught that they are despised by God. Imagine the hope that burned in this Eunuch’s heart when he read the following words we find in Isaiah 56:

Thus says the Lord:

Maintain justice, and do what is right,

for soon my salvation will come,

and my deliverance be revealed.

Do not let the foreigner joined to the Lord say,

‘The Lord will surely separate me from his people’;

and do not let the eunuch say,

‘I am just a dry tree.’

For thus says the Lord:

To the eunuchs…

…I will give, in my house and within my walls,

a monument and a name

better than sons and daughters;

I will give them an everlasting name

that shall not be cut off.

And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord,

…these I will bring to my holy mountain,

and make them joyful in my house of prayer;

their burnt-offerings and their sacrifices

will be accepted on my altar;

for my house shall be called a house of prayer

for all peoples.

Thus says the Lord God,

who gathers the outcasts of Israel,

I will gather others to them

beside those already gathered.

Philip hears him reading from Isaiah and asked: “Do you understand what you are reading?”

The Eunuch responds: “How can I understand it unless someone interprets it for me?

What a great question! What a better world this would be if more people understood that the Bible needs to be interpreted.

God never intended for people, on their own, to pick up the Bible, and arbitrarily lift scripture passages out of their contexts, and try to understand it or follow it. For this is one of the main causes of religious trauma today. Too many Christians are using the Bible out of context to support all kinds of hate, bigotry, and injustice.

And because of that, there are countless people in this world, countless people in this community, who are the victims of sick religion. They feel marginalized and disenfranchised by the church. They have been taught their entire lives that God despises them. They have no idea that God loves them and has a future for them— All because no one has interpreted the Bible pointing to the Jesus who came into the world, not to condemn the world by to save the world, to love the world.

The eunuch then begins to read from chapter 53:

Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter,

and like a lamb silent before its shearer,

so he does not open his mouth.

In his humiliation justice was denied him.

Who can describe his generation?

For his life is taken away from the earth.

Then the Eunuch asks Philip, ‘About whom, may I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?’

The Eunuch is asking: Who is this one was also ostracized and marginalized by others, as I have been? Who is this who was led like a sheep to be slaughtered? Who is this one who has been humiliated and denied justice? Who is this who had his life taken from him? Who is this one who is just like me? Who is this one who relates to me so well, who understands my pain, who knows my heartache, who empathizes with my sufferings? Is it Isaiah? Or is it someone else?

Then, Philip tells the eunuch the good news about Jesus, perhaps saying something like: the one who understands your pain, knows your heartache, and empathizes with your sufferings is none other than Jesus, the enfleshed presence of God, and the powers-that-be crucified him for it. The one who relates to you, identifies with you, and because of that, loves you, welcomes you, accepts you, affirms you and forgives you like none other, is the very One who others said despised you.

When the Eunuch hears this good news about Jesus, the words of the prophet become not only hopeful news for the future, but good, glad, certain news for the present:

For thus says the Lord:

To the eunuchs…

…I will give, in my house and within my walls,

a monument and a name

better than sons and daughters;

I will give them an everlasting name

that shall not be cut off.

Suddenly, barriers fall. Walls crumble. Obstacles disappear. And the very doors of the Kingdom of Heaven swing wide open.

It is then the Eunuch, this one who had no name and no future, but now has an everlasting name exclaims:s “Look here is water! What is to prevent me then from being baptized?” In other words, “What is separating me from the love of God?”

Knowing that nothing in heaven nor on earth, nor angels, nor preachers, nor church boards, nor church bylaws, nor books of discipline, nor elders, nor deacons, nor Sunday School teachers, nor college presidents nor or professors, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God, Philip commanded the chariot to stop, and both of them, Philip and the eunuch, went down into the water, and Philip baptizes him, washing away the trauma.

Witnesses of Humanity

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Easter, Sermons Year BLeave a comment

Luke 24:36b-48 NRSV

The Risen Christ stands among the disciples saying, “Peace be with you.”

And what’s the disciple’s response?

“And also with you.”

Nope, not even close.

They are startled, skeptical, and terrified. They think they are seeing a ghost.

Now, think about that for a minute.

Because of fear, the Risen Christ finds himself in a position that many find themselves in today: trying to convince others of their humanity.

“Look at my hands and my feet… Touch me and see that I have flesh and bones.” Look at me, and see I am a human.”

Jesus has joined all those who have yearned and who yearn today for their humanity to be recognized.

I will never forget visiting Berlin, Germany in the 1986 before the Berlin Wall was torn down. We toured a small museum dedicated to the holocaust at “Checkpoint Charlie,” before going into East Berlin. As a stark reminder that the Germans are not the only ones guilty of racism, one of the last exhibits displayed pictures taken during the 1968 strike of sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee. I will never forget standing in the city where Adolph Hitler once ruled looking at pictures of black men in my own country, in my neighboring state, in my lifetime, holding signs which read: “I am a man.” I am a human. I am somebody. I have flesh and bones.

And this was Jesus. “Look at my hands and my feet.”

But “in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering.”

I suspect that is where many of us are today. Justice and mercy prevailing and love winning brings us some joy when we first think about it, but it seems too good to be true. As much as we want it, we have difficulty believing it, seeing it, recognizing the possibility of any true peace in our world. Because for love to win, the first thing we must do is to recognize the humanity in others. And that is something we human beings have always had a difficult time doing.

The good news is that Jesus is not finished with his disciples. For it is then Jesus asks a rather embarrassing question: “Do you have anything here to eat?” Now think about that for a moment.

Jesus is put into the awkward position to invite himself to dinner, to ask the disciples for the most basic form of hospitality. Because of the disciple’s fear, Jesus has to remind them that when someone pays a visit, the polite thing to do is to offer that someone something to eat or drink.

Amy and David, you will be glad to know that one of the first things we discussed after you agreed to be here this weekend is how and what we were going to feed you!

Perhaps we also need to be reminded that offering another food and drink is simple, yet profoundly powerful. For when we offer someone something to eat, we are recognizing and affirming their humanity. Thus, not only is it the polite thing to do; it is the humane thing to do. It is also a faithful thing to do.

Father Abraham taught us this truth that hot day by the oaks of Mamre.

In Genesis 18, we read where three strangers appear on the street and get Abraham’s attention. Which raises a good question: “Whose humanity gets our attention? Are there some lives that get our attention over other lives?

Next, Abraham simply does what people of faith do for others, he welcomes them with a generous, gracious hospitality.

Notice that when he sees them, he doesn’t ignore them and allow them to pass on by. He doesn’t politely nod or wave in their direction. Nor does he safely call out to them from a distance asking them to come to him, and he certainly does not tell them to go back to where they came from. Abraham goes out to them. And he doesn’t cautiously walk over to them. When he sees them, the scripture says that he “runs” to meet them where they are.

And when he encounters these strangers, notice that he does not stand arrogantly over them or above them, but he humbly bows himself to the ground before them and speaks to them like a servant:

“Please do not pass me by. Let me get some water and wash the dust off your feet. Let me make a place for you to rest in the shade. Oh, and my wife, Sarah, bakes the best bread. Come and allow us to serve you. Then, you can continue your journey refueled and refreshed.”

When the strangers agree to stay a while, Abraham can hardly contain himself. He runs back inside, “Hurry, Sarah, prepare three cups of choice flour, knead it, and bake a delicious cake. He then runs out back to the field and takes the best-looking calf of the flock and has his servant prepare a delicious dinner. He brought it to them under the shade tree and waited on them while they ate.

And as verse one of chapter 18 suggests, we later discover that these three strangers were actually angels, messengers from God. This story teaches us that when we graciously and generously welcome the stranger, we welcome God. When we invite others to the table, the Lord appears.

In chapter 10 of Mark’s Gospel, we read the following words of Jesus:

Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me (Mark 10:40-42).

In the previous chapter we read where Jesus took a little child in his arms, and said:

Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me (Mark 9:36-37).

And in Matthew 25 we read Jesus’ words:

I was hungry, and you gave me food; I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink; I was a stranger, and you welcomed me.

Do you see the pattern here? Jesus said that when we welcome others, we are welcoming him. And when we welcome him, we welcome God.

There was once a monastery that had fallen on hard times. The order was dying out. There were only five monks left, the abbot and four others.

The four monks feared that the monastery would have to be closed. In their desperation, they went out and sought counsel from a wise man they knew who lived in a hut in the woods that surrounded their monastery.

The wise man agreed to a meeting to talk with the abbot regarding the fate of their monastery. The meeting was very brief. For the only thing the abbot had to say was that he knew that “the Messiah was among them.”

The wise man returned to the monastery where the monks were eagerly waiting. “Please tell us! What do we have to do to save the monastery?” “Well,” the abbot replied, “the abbot was rather cryptic. He simply said that the Messiah is among us.”

“The Messiah is among us?” The four monks scratched their heads. How could the Messiah be among them? As they pondered the meaning of those words, the monks soon began to think of each member of the order as a possible Messiah. They started to treat one another with tremendous respect and kindness. And when people came to visit, they treated each of them as if they could be the Messiah, too.

When people from the surrounding area often came to picnic on the monastery’s beautiful grounds, to walk along the paths, and to pray in the chapel, the visitors were amazed by the generous welcome they received from the monks. There was an aura of respect and love that filled the place, making it strangely attractive, even compelling. Hardly knowing why, they began to come back to the monastery more frequently, to picnic, to play, and to pray. They began to bring their friends to show them this special place. And their friends brought their friends. Some of the younger men who came to visit talked more and more with the old monks, and they began to join the order. So before long, the monastery had once again become a thriving order, and a vibrant center of light and love for all people.

When we recognize the humanity of another, the dignity of another, when we graciously set a place at the table for another, when we do something as simple but as powerful as offering them something to eat or drink, we can begin to see the Imago Dei, the image of God in that person. And that is when something shifts and something we call “resurrection” happens, something that once seemed too good to be true becomes reality. Justice and mercy prevail. Love wins and peace comes.

As Jesus eats, enough of their fear subsides that their minds are opened, and they begin “to understand.” With each bite of fish that Jesus takes, the disciples are transformed from fearful skeptics to “witnesses of these things,” emboldened to be public witnesses for justice, mercy, and love in the world—which is exactly what our world needs today!

The world needs witnesses who do not merely talk about “these things” here, among ourselves, inside these four walls, but who do “these things” out in the public for all those who yearn for their humanity to be recognized:

For those whose basic human rights, even their bodily autonomy, are being stripped away;

For those who would love to have a seat at the table but are not invited or feel unwelcomed;

For those who have been traumatized by sick religion;

For those who are living in poverty, for workers denied a living wage;

For those whose lives are terrorized by war and violence.

We need to witness in public spaces speaking truth to power, asking questions of our presidential candidates, our governor, our representatives, and our mayor and city council, all who claim to be Christians:

“What are you doing to be a witness for the least of these?”

“What are you doing to be a witness of mercy for sick people and elderly people?”

“What are you doing to be a witness of justice for poor people and for incarcerated people?”

“What are you doing to be a witness of love for all those who are crying out for their humanity to be recognized?”

Jesus, the brown-skinned Jewish Palestinian, has risen from the dead and is standing before us today, pleading: “Friends, I’m hungry. Will somebody please give me something to eat? Will somebody please recognize my humanity by being a witness to the humanity of others?”

As disciples, may we push past our fear—fear of the stranger, fear of losing some friends, fear of upsetting some family, fear of some failure, fear of not having enough left over for ourselves—and understand that to be Easter people, to practice resurrection, is to first practice hospitality. And may we understand that we feed Jesus every time we feed the least, every time we offer a seat at the table for someone hungering and thirsting for justice.And the good news is that when the disciples fed Jesus, he fed them in return. When they chose generosity over suspicion, love over fear, their eyes were opened, their doubt vanished, and the resurrected Jesus came alive in them. Peace didn’t come first. Sharing a meal did. A recognition of another’s humanity did.

May we be witnesses of these things. And may the peace of Christ be with us all.