That Which We Have Heard & Known

Occasional thoughts of an Anglican Episcopal priest

Category: Psalms (Page 38 of 41)

God At My Right Hand – From the Daily Office – October 19, 2012

October 19, 2012 / / 0 Comments

From the Psalms:

I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand I shall not fall.
My heart, therefore, is glad, and my spirit rejoices; my body also shall rest in hope.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 16:8-9 (BCP Version) – October 19, 2012)

Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da VinciHeart, spirit, body. These two verses speak to me of the necessary investment of one’s whole self, the whole person, into the spiritual and religious life. One of the most influential lay theologians of the middle 20th Century, William Stringfellow wrote: “Spiritual maturity or spiritual fulfillment necessarily involves the whole person – body, mind and soul, place, relationships – in connection with the whole of creation throughout the era of time . . . . Spirituality encompasses the whole person in the totality of existence in the world, not some fragment or scrap or incident of a person.” (The Politics of Spirituality, Westminster John Knox: 1984, p. 22) If Stringfellow is right, and I think he is, then a plan for spiritual growth should follow the Psalmist example and “set the Lord always before” the person seeking to grow. Always . . . not just an hour or so on Sunday morning.

Consider all the areas of life in which a modern person lives, all the activities that fill our days, all the commitments to self and others that we juggle: marriage (or other significant relationship), family (nuclear and extended), friends and coworkers, employment, finances, health, entertainment, volunteer service . . . everyone who makes such a list creates different or additional categories, but the point is that life is (always has been) a bundle of stuff. However one subsections one’s life, there are going to be one or two areas that are just wonderful, and one or two areas that aren’t so good; there are parts of our lives that fill us spiritually and other parts that drain us. Good spiritual practice attends to both sorts of life activities.

Some questions I ask myself on a regular basis are: What has been going well? What hasn’t? What can I do to pour-over the strengthening aspects of the fulfilling areas of life into those that are draining? What are some achieveable goals for filling up those less-than-rewarding aspects? Who is speaking in these areas of my life? Is God? Who else needs to join the conversation?

That last one for me is a big one. The Psalmist said, “Because God is at my right hand I shall not fall.” I often wonder how he knew that. The only way I know that God is present with me is through the presence of other people. For me the presence of God is mediated through the community of faith. In his first catholic epistle, St. John wrote: “No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.” (1 Jn 4:12-13) I only know that God is at my side when God is there in the presence of a brother or sister in Christ. So the question of who else should be engaged in my spiritual conversation is very important.

The gospel lesson for today is St. Luke’s story of the Transfiguration. Having seen Jesus transformed, Peter, James, and John are overshadowed by a cloud from which they hear a voice say, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him.” (Lk 9:35) That doesn’t happen to most of us very often, if at all. But Christ does come to each of us through those around us; we should engage him in conversation and listen to him. Only in that way will we be assured, like the Psalmist, that God is at our right hand.

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A request to my readers: I’m trying to build the readership of this blog and I’d very much appreciate your help in doing so. If you find something here that is of value, please share it with others. If you are on Facebook, “like” the posts on your page so others can see them. If you are following me on Twitter, please “retweet” the notices of these meditations. If you have a blog of your own, please include mine in your links (a favor I will gladly reciprocate). Many thanks!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

In God We Trust – From the Daily Office – October 15, 2012

October 15, 2012 / / 0 Comments

From the Prophet Micah:

Put no trust in a friend,
have no confidence in a loved one;
guard the doors of your mouth
from her who lies in your embrace;
for the son treats the father with contempt,
the daughter rises up against her mother,
the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
your enemies are members of your own household.
But as for me, I will look to the Lord,
I will wait for the God of my salvation;
my God will hear me.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Micah 7:5-7 – October 15, 2012)

In God We Trust on Dollar BillSound familiar? Jesus sounded a lot like Micah at times:

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household. (Matt. 10:34-36; cf. Luke 12:51-53)

Micah is the same prophet who authored what may be my favorite verse in all of the Old Testament: “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” (6:8) And Jesus is the same preacher who said “Love your neighbor as yourself” was one of the greatest commandments. (Mark 12:31) How does one reconcile these admonitions with advice to put no trust in friend or loved one and promises to bring enmity between family members?

The answer lies in the last part of the above quotation from Micah: Trust in God. In the 1950s the U.S. Congress decided to emblazon “In God We Trust” across American currency as a response to the rise of “Godless communism” in the Soviet Union and its sphere of influence. One may debate whether it was appropriate under the U.S. Constitution, or whether it has since had any salutary effect, but it is what Micah models here, and it is the message of Scripture and of Jesus. “Don’t trust human beings! Trust God!”

In the last weeks of the U.S. presidential campaign, as political debates lead to family arguments and people begin to see the members of their own households as political enemies, it is well to remember this. Human beings, even the best of us, are fallible and untrustworthy, especially the ones we put on pedestals and look to to solve the problems of our nation or our world. As the Psalmist (echoing Micah’s sentiment) reminded us, “Put not your trust in rulers, nor in any child of earth, for there is no help in them.” (Ps. 146:2, BCP version)

It may sound trite. It may be misplaced on our currency. But it is the only solution: “In God We Trust.” If we remember that, maybe we can all just get along . . . .

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A request to my readers: I’m trying to build the readership of this blog and I’d very much appreciate your help in doing so. If you find something here that is of value, please share it with others. If you are on Facebook, “like” the posts on your page so others can see them. If you are following me on Twitter, please “retweet” the notices of these meditations. If you have a blog of your own, please include mine in your links (a favor I will gladly reciprocate). Many thanks!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

The Patients of Job: Part Two – “I Don’t Know Where to Find God!” – Sermon for Pentecost 20, Proper 23B – October 14, 2012

October 14, 2012 / / 0 Comments

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This sermon was preached on Sunday, October 14, 2012, at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio, where Fr. Funston is rector.

(Revised Common Lectionary, Proper 23B: Job 23:1-9,16-17; Psalm 22:1-15; Hebrews 4:12-16; and Mark 10:17-31. These lessons can be read at The Lectionary Page.)

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Lost and Confused SignpostIn last week’s reading from the Old Testament, you will remember, God gave Satan permission to test the righteousness of a man of integrity named Job. First all of Job’s possessions and his family are taken from him: his oxen and donkeys are carried off by Sabeans; his sheep are burned up in a fire; his camels are stolen by the invading Chaldeans; and the collapse of a house kills all of Job’s ten children. But Job, being a righteous man, does not curse God; instead, he shaves his head, tears his clothes, and says, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job does not sin or curse God. (1:21-22)

Therefore, Satan returns to God and seeks permission to cause Job bodily, suffering as well. God agrees saying, “He is in your power; only spare his life.” (2:6) Satan, therefore, afflicts him with a loathsome skin disease. Job’s response is to scratch his skin with broken pottery and sit down in a pile of ashes. Job’s wife prompts him to “curse God, and die” but Job answers that she is speaking foolishly, and she departs the scene and will not be heard from again. As Chapter Two closes, Job’s three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, having heard of his calamity, come to comfort him. When they arrive, they join him in mourning, tearing their own clothes, weeping loudly, throwing dust on their heads, and sitting with him in silence for a week.

After that week of silence, a dialog ensues between the friends and Job. Each speaks in turn in three cycles of addresses, and Job answers them. In the first cycle – and I admit that this is a very simplistic summary – Job curses the day he was born, but essentially holds that he is blameless and does not deserve what has befallen him; this indeed, will be his position throughout the rest of the book.

Eliphaz is the first of his friends to speak; basically, he asserts his agreement with Job that Job is blameless. “Is not your fear of God your confidence,” says Eliphaz, “and the integrity of your ways your hope?” (4:6) So Eliphaz advises him to “seek God, and to God . . . commit [your] cause.” (5:8) Eliphaz is sure that if he does so, Job will live to a ripe old age. But Job, in his misery is not able to hear what his friend says; he continues to complain of “the anguish of [his] spirit” and “the bitterness of [his] soul.” (7:11) “I loathe my life,” says Job, “I would choose death.” (7:15-16)

The next to speak is his friend Bildad. Bildad also speaks of Job’s innocence and integrity, but in a somewhat more conditional way. He’s not quite as sure as Eliphaz: “If you are pure and upright,” he says, “surely then [God] will rouse himself for you and restore to you your rightful place.” (8:6) Job is more responsive to Bildad. He acknowledges that what his friend says is true, but then rejects his advice asking, “How can a mortal be just before God? If one wished to contend with [God], one could not answer him once in a thousand.” (9:2-3) Although he rejects Bildad’s advice, this is an important turning point in the story, I think, because it is here that the seed of the idea of contending with God in a lawsuit is planted in Job’s mind. Nonetheless, he still complains of the bitterness in his soul and says he’d rather die.

The last of his friends to speak is Zophar. Zophar isn’t buying the blamelessness argument. He believes that punishments and rewards in life follow directly from our actions; if Job has suffered these calamities, Job must have committed some great sin. He simply assumes that Job is guilty: he condemns Job for babbling and for mocking the Almighty. “Shall no one shame you?” he asks Job. “Know this, Job! God exacts of you less than your guilt deserves.” (11:3,6) But Job will have none of Zophar’s condemnation: “I am a just and blameless man,” he asserts. (12:4) “I may be a laughingstock, but I am a just and blameless man.”

Now the idea of taking God to court has rooted firmly in Job’s imagination: “I would speak to the Almighty,” he declares, “and I desire to argue my case with God.” (13:3) As the first cycle ends, in fact, Job is starting to formulate his arguments.

In the second cycle of speeches, the characters leave behind the specific issue of whether Job is blameless or guilty, righteous or sinful. In fact, the second cycle of speeches seems to have little or nothing to do with Job himself. Instead, the characters debate the issue of whether, in fact, the retribution that sometimes falls upon the wicked is a result of their own blameworthiness, and all of the friends seem to be in agreement that it is. Whether this debate has anything to do with Job’s situation is somewhat ambiguous; none of the friends identifies Job as the wicked person they describe in their speeches. In answer to each of them, Job complains that their words are not a comfort to him. At the end of the second cycle, he tells them, “You comfort me with empty nothings” and “there is nothing left of your answers but falsehood.” (21:34) Apparently in reply to Job – it’s not really all that clear that it is a response, however – Eliphaz tells him that he should follow the advice of the righteous who say, “Agree with God, and be at peace; in this way good will come to you.” (22:21)

This is where the lectionary has brought us today, to Chapter 23, most of which is today’s Old Testament lesson. We are more than halfway through the Book of Job; the first two cycles of speeches have been made; and Job’s mind seems to have been made up. He is determined to take God to court and argue his case. “I would lay my case before him, and fill my mouth with arguments.” (23:4) In the verses the lectionary has left out, Job continues to argue his innocence, asserting that

[God] knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I shall come out like gold. My foot has held fast to his steps; I have kept his way and have not turned aside. I have not departed from the commandment of his lips; I have treasured in my bosom the words of his mouth. (23:10-12)

Job’s problem now, he believes, is that he doesn’t know where to find God! “If I go forward, he is not there; or backward, I cannot perceive him; on the left he hides, and I cannot behold him; I turn to the right, but I cannot see him.” (23:8-9) This uncertainty seems to shake Job’s confidence in his case: “God has made my heart faint,” he says, “the Almighty has terrified me.” But faint and terrified though he may be, Job does present his case. None of the friends speak again, except Bildad who interrupts to ask Job’s own question, “How can a mortal be can righteous before God?” (25:1-6) Job pleads his case with eloquence and at the conclusion of the third cycle, his three friends have “ceased to answer Job, because he was righteous in his own eyes.” (32:1)

So what are we to make of today’s lesson from Job, this brief chapter in which we find Job wondering where to find God? What balm for our souls, what spiritual medicine for the “Patients of Job” does it offer?

Job’s confusion and anxiety at the elusiveness of God are echoed in today’s Psalm whose first verse is familiar to us from the story of Christ’s Crucifixion:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
and are so far from my cry
and from the words of my distress? (Ps. 22:1)

God seems to be so far away that God cannot be found: “He is not there . . . I cannot perceive him . . . I cannot behold him . . . I cannot see him.” Job feels that he has been abandoned by God. But wait! Job knows that God has tested him; Job has known God’s terrifying presence. Job finds this reassuring; although Job cannot see God, God can perceive Job! God’s knowledge of Job is his comfort; it will assure his vindication. Although Job does not know where to find God, God knows where to find Job and this convinces Job that he can, in the words of today’s reading from the Letter to the Hebrews, “approach the throne of grace with boldness.” In fact, he shall do so, and so can we!

Not knowing where or how to find God is the existential problem of modern life. Baptist theologian Brooks Ramsey sums up the problem nicely in this question: “It is easy to sense God’s presence when things are going right. But where is God when things fall apart?” While the Book of Job offers no easy answers to this question, it does assure us that God is there even though we, like the character Job, may be unable to perceive God’s presence. The French Reformed theologian Jacques Ellul wrote in his book Hope in Time of Abandonment that it is in those times when we share Job’s frustration that hope is truly born:

Hope comes alive only in the dreary silence of God, in our loneliness before a closed heaven, in our abandonment . . . Hope is a protest before this God, who is leaving us without miracles and without conversions, that he is not keeping his Word.

Now, I don’t believe that God is ever truly silent, nor that God does not keep God’s promises; but I do know that there are times in our lives when we are all like Job – we cannot seem to find God; we do not sense God’s presence; and we do not know where to look for God.

Hope, as Ellul said, is humanity’s answer to God’s apparent silence, to God’s elusiveness, and it is through hopeful prayer that we demand the fulfillment of God’s promises; it is through prayer that we, like Job, approach the throne of grace and plead our case. We do not need to know where to find God in order to pray; we do not need to know where to find God in order to have hope.

Our Christian faith that assures us that in our times of pain and suffering God comes to us. God finds us and comes to us in the loving acts of others. In illness, God finds us and comes to us in the ministrations of the medical professionals who treat us. In emotional distress, God finds us and comes to us through friends, family members, and others who offer us encouragement. In moments of deep need, God finds us and comes to us in a mysterious way through those who care. This gives us hope and courage. We need not cry out like the character Job, “Oh, that I knew where I might find [God];” (23:3) God knows where to find us.

This is the balm for our souls, the spiritual medicine that we, the “Patients of Job,” find in today’s lesson from the Book of Job, that in our times of need, God knows where to find us and that God does, indeed, come to us. Amen.

God Has Done Great Things – From the Daily Office – October 9, 2012

October 9, 2012 / / 1 Comment

From the Psalms:

When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream.
Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.
Then they said among the nations, “The Lord has done great things for them.”
The Lord has done great things for us, and we are glad indeed.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 126:1-4 (BCP Version) – October 9, 2012)

Jesus Clapping and Shouting for Joy (artist unknown)Have you ever visited a church which as part of its normative worship service gives congregants an opportunity to voice aloud their own prayers to God? It may surprise some that the Episcopal Church is one such religious group. In the typical service of the Holy Eucharist in the Episcopal Church, following readings from Scripture, the sermon and a recitation of the Nicene Creed, the congregation is led in a responsive cycle of prayer called The Prayers of the People.

A rubric (a direction for the conduct of worship services) in The Book of Common Prayer outlines what is to be included in these prayers. It states that

Prayer is offered with intercession for
The Universal Church, its members, and its mission
The Nation and all in authority
The welfare of the world
The concerns of the local community
Those who suffer and those in any trouble
The departed (with commemoration of a saint when appropriate)
(BCP, Page 359 or 383)

Six forms of suggested prayers are provided in the BCP, but other forms conforming to the rubrical requirements may be used. Each of those forms provides opportunities for silence during which the People are encouraged to speak their own petitions, intercessions, or thanksgivings. The sixth form even includes this specific invitation, “The People may add their own thanksgivings.” (Page 393)

I have visited a lot of Episcopal Churches. I have heard many prayer leaders invite the People’s prayers during those silences. I have seldom heard anyone laugh, shout with joy, or express gladness because the Lord has done great things for them. Why do you suppose that is? Garrison Keillor (who is an Episcopalian, by the way) has suggested that “Episcopalians believe in prayer, but would practically die if asked to pray out loud.” That may be doubly true of giving thanks out loud.

I have no answer to the question. Keillor suggests that Episcopalians are known for our blandness, our excessive calm, and our fear of giving offense, and maybe that’s part of it. I don’t know. But I do wish in prayers and worship that we would laugh a little more, shout with joy from time to time, and let our gladness show when God has done great things for us, because God has done great things for us!

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A request to my readers: I’m trying to build the readership of this blog and I’d very much appreciate your help in doing so. If you find something here that is of value, please share it with others. If you are on Facebook, “like” the posts on your page so others can see them. If you are following me on Twitter, please “retweet” the notices of these meditations. If you have a blog of your own, please include mine in your links (a favor I will gladly reciprocate). Many thanks!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Be Righteous, Not Stupid! – From the Daily Office – September 21, 2012

September 21, 2012 / / 0 Comments

From Psalms:

When my mind became embittered,
I was sorely wounded in my heart.
I was stupid and had no understanding;
I was like a brute beast in your presence.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 7:21-22 (BCP Version) – September 21, 2012)
 
Raging Bull CartoonToday’s evening Psalm is ascribed to Asaph who, according to the genealogies in the Books of Chronicles, seems to have been one of King David’s chief musicians. His sons, we are told, were assigned by David to “prophesy with lyres, harps, and cymbals” (1 Chr 25:1). Asaph seems to have been something of a psychologist, for in these two verses he draws the connection between anger and stupidity – being embittered and “wounded in heart” leads to lack of understanding and brutish behavior. Was there ever a truer observation?

There is nothing wrong with anger per se. In fact, St. Paul commends anger that is controlled: “Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not make room for the devil” (Eph. 4:26). It’s the loss of control that is the problem. As we read in the Book of Proverbs: “One given to anger stirs up strife, and the hothead causes much transgression.” (Prov. 29:22) In fact, we find Asaph’s point repeated in Proverbs: “One who is quick-tempered acts foolishly, and the schemer is hated” (Prov. 14:17) and “Whoever is slow to anger has great understanding, but one who has a hasty temper exalts folly” (14:29). Someone who flies off the handle and cannot or does not control their anger will say things they wouldn’t normally say and do things they wouldn’t normally do – stupid things!

A Japanese Buddhist sage, Nicherin Daishonin, once wrote, “The extremity of greed, anger, and stupidity in people’s minds . . . is beyond the power of any sage or worthy man to control.” Albert Einstein is reported to have said, “Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the universe.” Does the extreme, possibly infinite, amount of uncontrollable stupidity in the world suggest that there is a similar infinite amount of anger and rage?

The Hebrew word for anger in the verses from the Book of Proverbs quoted above is anaph, which seems to be derived from a root word referring to the flaring of one’s nostrils. It calls to mind those cartoons of raging bulls with smoke puffing from their nostrils, which reminds me of the Psalmist’s image of the angry individual behaving like a “brute beast.”

Two words are used in the original Greek of the New Testament to name anger. One is thumos which the lexicon defines as “passion, anger, heat, anger forthwith boiling up and soon subsiding again.” Its origin or root is a word that describes the immolation or burning of animal sacrifices. It refers to an uncontrolled outburst of blazing anger. It is a sudden outburst of anger, a flying off the handle that rages like a fire out of control. The other is orge with the lexicon defines as a “movement or agitation of the soul,” wrath or indignation; it comes from a root meaning to stretch. The word implies a slowly building, controlled, and slow-burning anger, what we might call “righteous indignation”. It is the first type of anger that leads to stupidity; the second can lead to positive change.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in his book Strive for Freedom laid out six principles of nonviolence, the first of which acknowledges the positive potential of controlled anger:

Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people. It is a positive force confronting the forces of injustice, and utilizes the righteous indignation and the spiritual, emotional and intellectual capabilities of people as the vital force for change and reconciliation.

The lesson I take from this bit of the Psalm is “Don’t be stupid!” Don’t let uncontrolled anger cloud your judgment. There’s more than enough stupidity in the world already (possibly an infinite amount, as Einstein suggested); don’t add to it. If your nostrils flare . . . use them to take a deep breath and get control! Controlled anger, righteous indignation, can be a force for good. Stupidity never can. Be righteous, not stupid!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

God My Crag, God My Commonwealth – From the Daily Office – September 20, 2012

September 20, 2012 / / 0 Comments

From Psalms:

In you, O Lord, have I taken refuge;
let me never be ashamed.
In your righteousness, deliver me and set me free;
incline your ear to me and save me.
Be my strong rock, a castle to keep me safe;
you are my crag and my stronghold.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 71:1-3 (BCP Version) – September 20, 2012)
 
Castle Kennedy, ScotlandThis is one of my favorite images from Scripture, God as strong rock, castle, crag, and stronghold. In fact, during my sabbatical last year this verse kept coming to mind as I explored the ruins of castles and monastic foundations in Scotland, England, and Ireland. My fondness for this metaphor today dovetails with my thoughts the past couple of days about the nature of sovereignty (see yesterday’s meditation on praying Psalm 72 in modern America) and God’s reign (the day before, considering the modern political implications of Christ’s triumphal entry in John 9).

Like any metaphor and every metaphor, God as rocky fortress is limited. All metaphors, similes, and analogies breakdown at some point. Nonetheless, this is where the metaphor in today’s Psalm takes me . . . .

Life in a stone castle was anything but relaxed and luxurious. Even the “lairds and ladies of the manor” would have had their work to do, although it wouldn’t have been as onerous as that of, say, the scullery maids, the chamberlains, or the stable boys. Monastic foundations weren’t much different: a division of labor shared by everyone from the newest novice or lay brother to the abbot or prior. The same would have held true in a Celtic or early medieval convent. Everyone would have had some share in keeping the community within the stone walls running smoothly to everyone’s good. In a very real sense, the castle, monastery, or convent would have been a “commonwealth”.

Although mostly used today in the context of international trade (as in “the commonwealth of nations”) or as a synonym for nation, state, or territory (as in “the Commonwealth of Massachusetts” or “the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico”), the word dates from the 15th Century with a different significance. Meaning “common well-being,” it connoted a community of interest promoting the public welfare or general good of every member.

In the 17th Century the philosopher Thomas Hobbes wrote his book Leviathan on the origin, nature, and forms of a commonwealth, explaining that the function of a commonwealth is to protect human liberty and provide security for the people living in it. Hobbes argued that the citizens or subjects of a commonwealth have the right to food, clothing, and shelter, the right to protection from harm or injury, the right to engage in lawful commerce, the right to an education, the right to health and safety, and the right to legal protection of one’s possessions; these rights are matched by the commonwealth’s mutual responsibility to protect them. Interestingly, Hobbes’s treatise suggests the notion that the kingdom or reign of God is an eternally perfect and spiritual commonwealth.

Which brings me back to the metaphor in the Psalm. God conceived of by the Psalmist as a castle, crag, or rocky fortress is not simply an image of God’s protection of individual safety; it is a metaphor of the community which in God lives and moves and has its being (Acts 17:28). The Psalmist’s strong rock, castle, crag, and stronghold is Jesus’ kingdom of God (or kingdom of heaven). It is the commonwealth of God, “the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign forever and ever.” (Rev. 11:15) It is the community of eternal life in which we, believing participants, have mutual accountability for our rights and responsibilities.

When we pray this Psalm and claim God as our stronghold, we also claim our rights and take up our responsibilities as “citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God.” (Eph. 2:19)

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

It’s A Puzzlement! – From the Daily Office – September 19, 2012

September 19, 2012 / / 0 Comments

From Psalms:

Give the king your justice, O God,
and your righteousness to a king’s son.
May he judge your people with righteousness,
and your poor with justice.
May the mountains yield prosperity for the people,
and the hills, in righteousness.
May he defend the cause of the poor of the people,
give deliverance to the needy,
and crush the oppressor.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 72:1-4 (NRSV) – September 19, 2012)
 
Yul Brynner as the King of Siam in The King and IIt’s a puzzlement!

In a recent online discussion of economic issues, a participant commented: “Government should not be charged with solving societal issues such as poverty, and this should be a society’s efforts to solve these problems through programs, charities, etc. sought by a willing group of individuals.” (I quote the comment as written; no editing.)

I don’t understand this compartmentalization of reality, this distinction of “government” as somehow separate from and different from “society”. I especially don’t understand it in a country whose founding document begins,

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

What is “society” if it is not “We the People”? And in our system of governance, the government, the sovereign, is also “We the People”. So how is it that “government” is distinct and different from “society” in the context of the United States of America? We the People decide by our votes who serves in “the government”. If we like the job they do, we vote them in again; if not, we vote them out. (There are a lot of people employed by “the government” who are not elected to it; but they are not “the government” — they are “government employees”. We can get rid of them, too, by voting out their elected bosses who are answerable to us.)

OK . . . so there’s that political framework puzzlement, but there’s also a religious puzzlement. Christian folk, especially conservative evangelical American Christian folk, love to pray the Psalms. Some of our most conservative brothers and sisters will allow no music in their worship other than the Psalms. So here we have a Psalm praying to God to give “the king” the power to “judge [God’s] poor with justice,” to “defend the cause of the poor,” to “give deliverance to the needy.” Later in the Psalm, “the king” is praised because he “delivers the needy when they call” (v. 12), he “has pity on the weak and the needy” and saves their lives (v. 13), he redeems their lives from oppression and violence (v. 14). In other words, he does all the things the participant in that conversation said the government shouldn’t do.

But the king was the government at the time the Psalms were written! We might be tempted to change king to president in an attempt to contextualize and modernize this Psalm to fit our American circumstance, but president would be the wrong word to substitute. The right word would be government. And an even more correct substitution would be We the People . . . for the king named in this Psalm was the sovereign and in our country We the People are the sovereign.

If we wish to pray this Psalm in our context, that would be the way to do it:

Give We the People your justice, O God,
and your righteousness to our children.
May We the People judge your people with righteousness,
and your poor with justice.
May the mountains yield prosperity for the people,
and the hills, in righteousness.
May We the People defend the cause of the poor of the people,
give deliverance to the needy,
and crush the oppressor.

Why the compartmentalization of life? Why the separation of government from society? Why the failure to see that what we revere in Holy Scripture, the righteousness prayed for the government in ancient Israel, ought to be our prayer for the government in modern America? Why the failure to see that it should be a prayer for ourselves? Why the refusal, as a society, as a nation, as the sovereigns of our nation’s government, to deliver the needy when they call, to have pity on the weak and the needy and save their lives, to redeem the lives of the poor from oppression and violence?

We the People are the society. We the People are the sovereign. We the People are the government. We the People are the ones called by this Psalm and charged by Holy Scripture with “solving societal issues such as poverty.” Why is this so difficult to comprehend?

As another king (a fictional one) was wont to say, “It’s a puzzlement!”

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Wonderfully and Marvelously Made – From the Daily Office – September 15, 2012

September 15, 2012 / / 0 Comments

From the Psalms:

For you yourself created my inmost parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I will thank you because I am marvelously made;
your works are wonderful, and I know it well.
My body was not hidden from you,
while I was being made in secret
and woven in the depths of the earth.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 139:12-14 (BCP Versification) – September 15, 2012)
 
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to tackle what this portion of the evening Psalm for today brings to mind. After all, I love the Old Testament reading for today which is (as many have recently been) from the Book of Job; it is that wonderful chapter where God, having had enough of Job’s whining, finally answers him saying:

Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?
Gird up your loins like a man,
I will question you, and you shall declare to me.
Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.

I just love God’s reply which basically says, “Who the Hell are you?” But as I was reading this lesson, I came upon this question that God asks, “Who shut the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb?” and that mention of a womb took me back to the evening Psalm and that took me back to a conversation I was part of earlier in the week. The conversation had to do with abortion, opposition to abortion, and what it means to be pro-life.

The conversation was sparked by this picture:

“Jesus,” said one party to the conversation, “commands us to care about both?”

“Where,” asked another party, “does Jesus command us to care about fetuses.”

Of course, Jesus does not; Jesus never made much mention of pregnancy or childbirth or care for the unborn. However, today’s Psalm might be read to lay the foundation for an understanding of God’s care for the unborn. The other party to the conversation didn’t go there, however. Instead, that person referred to Jesus’ citation of the second great commandmant: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matt. 22:39) He continued with this assertion: “Since a baby in utero is a person and a child of God, the baby is your neighbor.” This statement is a logical as well as a theological stretch, I’m afraid, and here is where I started giving the issue some thought.

The reference to “a baby in utero” is fraught with issues. There is considerable debate today as to when a fertilized egg achieves the status of “baby”. It is not, however, at the moment of conception. Technically, from a medical point of view, a baby isn’t a baby until it’s born; “baby”, medically, refers to an infant, a newborn. From two months after conception until birth the child in utero is considered a fetus. During the first two months after conception, it is an embryo. (And then there are the theological issue of “ensoulment”, which is said to happen at “quickening”, and the legal issue of “viability”, which is the ability of the fetus to live outside the womb. Neither time nor space allow exploration of those issues.)

The second issue with the statement is in referring to whatever it is that is in utero as a “person”. Personhood is a legal concept and, in law, personhood is achieved at birth. (I’m not going to get into the currently hot political issue of whether corporations are people; that’s a whole other legal question.) Legally, a person is an autonomous being, a natural born man, woman, or child. The fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus in utero may be a person-in-potential, but is not yet a person-in-actuality. There are, of course, a number of proposed bills or constitutional amendments in several states that would change this legal definition, but as of now this is where American law stands.

Now, having said that, there are good reasons for being opposed to abortion, but basing that opposition on the supposed personhood of the in utero embryo or fetus, and stretching that personhood to neighbor status, and attaching Jesus’ “second great commandment” to that supposed neighbor just is not one of them. I’m opposed to abortion because I truly do believe, as this Psalm says, that God is involved in the procreative and developmental processes, that the development of the embryo into a fetus and the growth of the fetus are not simply mindless biological operations, that there is a mystical, spiritual “knitting” taking place, that we human beings are wonderfully and marvelously made by God. Abortion interferes with God’s work whereby we are “made in secret and woven in the depths of the earth.”

But I am also opposed to the outlawing of abortion because I hold what I believe is a fully consistent “pro-life” philosophy. I believe that one who is opposed to abortion must also be in favor of safeguarding the health and welfare of mothers before, during, and after giving birth. I believe that one must be in favor of improving the lives of children after they are born. A truly pro-life position would promote child and maternal welfare and health programs, feeding programs, education programs, and (I believe) access to safe and legal abortion in those circumstances where the life, health and safety of the mother are at risk, where the pregnancy results from rape or incest, or where there is medical reason to believe that the person-in-potential will be born with severe physical or mental developmental handicaps which would make life an intolerable burden. To be truly pro-life is to be pro-choice, because the choice is not between abortion or a baby; the choice is between a safe, legal abortion and an unsafe, deadly one. No woman should ever have to choose the latter!

To oppose abortion without supporting infant and maternal health programs, child welfare programs, good education, and access to safe and legal abortion when needed, is not a pro-life stance. It is simply to be pro-birth, but there is so much more to life after birth!

We are wonderfully and marvelously made, knit and woven together by God in our mother’s wombs, not just to be born but to have a life, a good life. That’s why, as opposed to abortion as I may be, I hold to a pro-life pro-choice position in favor of the availability of legally regulated, medically safe, accessible abortion for women who need to choose that path.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Shout! Good Liturgy! – From the Daily Office – September 11, 2012

September 11, 2012 / / 0 Comments

From the Psalms:

Clap your hands, all you peoples;
shout to God with a cry of joy.
* * *
God has gone up with a shout,
the Lord with the sound of the ram’s-horn.
Sing praises to God, sing praises;
sing praises to our King, sing praises.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 47:1,5-6 – September 11, 2012)
 
ShoutI love this Psalm – it’s about liturgy and worship, something dear to my heart!

There’s a children’s song based on this song that we used to sing in the Cursillo movement (maybe they still do – I haven’t been to a Cursillo event in years). Our church school children learned to sing it at Vacation Bible School this year and had a great time doing so. I went surfing through YouTube and found this recording of Pat Boone teaching it to some kids:

The song, like the Psalm, has great energy. I have no idea how the Psalm was performed in the Temple, but how could a Psalm that calls for clapping, shouting, playing trumpets, and singing praises not be vibrant and energetic. That’s how liturgy should be.

It doesn’t have to be all kids’ songs, however. This same Psalm was sat as a choral anthem by Ralph Vaughn Williams. Here’s a YouTube of Williams’ O, Clap Your Hands performed by the Louisville Collegiate Choir.

It, too, is vibrant and energetic, but totally unlike Pat Boone’s children’s tune. Vibrancy and energy is not a matter of “style”; it is an issue of authenticity, of life, in the liturgy.

I love good liturgy! Good liturgy involves clapping, singing, praising, and even shouting done with authenticity and feeling! I love good liturgy!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

An Instant of Transforming Grace – Sermon for Pentecost 15, Proper 18B – September 9, 2012

September 9, 2012 / / 0 Comments

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This sermon was preached on Sunday, September 9, 2012, at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio, where Fr. Funston is rector.

(Revised Common Lectionary, Proper 18B: Isaiah 35:4-7a; Psalm 146; James 2:1-17; and Mark 7:24-37.)

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Yellow and Purple WildflowersIf you are a political junkie like me, you’ve been following the campaigns, watching the conventions, reading the editorials, and generally getting angry with one side or the other or both and the whole process. You may have noticed, as I have, that candidates are never alone. They are surrounded by a whole corps, an entire gaggle of handlers, some of whom have the responsibility to make sure the candidate stays “on message”, that he or she makes no “gaffs”. Jesus was surrounded by a gaggle, as well, but these were not handlers and there was no one to keep him “on message” except himself. In fact, the gospel witness is pretty clear that even right up to the end the gaggle that followed him around really didn’t understand the message!

To be honest, it’s not clear in today’s lesson whether the gaggle is even around. Mark doesn’t say anything about them and the way he writes this story it sounds like Jesus may have gone without them to the city of Tyre, a gentile town north of the sea of Galilee and on the Mediterranean coast in what is now Lebanon. But whether they were with him or not, he doesn’t have anyone there who can stop him making a really awful racist gaff, from calling this foreign woman “a dog”! O.M.G.! Can you imagine what Fox News or MSNBC would have done with this?

Gentle Jesus, meek-and-mild Jesus, love-everyone Jesus, welcome-the-sinner Jesus has just said about the worst, most insulting, most awful thing he could say to a woman who wanted nothing more than to get medical help for her daughter! And make no mistake about it, that is what he has done. He has uttered a racial slur!
Immediately we want to say, “That can’t be! Jesus couldn’t possibly have been racist!” But Mark’s story of Jesus’ encounter with this Syrophoenician woman says otherwise. Jesus has called this woman, who simply wants a cure for her child, a dog, a dehumanizing ethnic slur common at the time. We can do some theological dancing, some interpretive two-step to avoid this uncomfortable reality, but eventually we have to face the truth. Jesus, with no handlers nearby to stop him making a “gaff”, has uttered a racial insult.

The difficulty of this passage is that we, as 21st Century Christians, want Jesus to be the simple, easy answer to all of our problems and to all of society’s problems. When faced with the problem of racism, whether personal or institutional, we would prefer to think of Jesus as always loving all people regardless of skin color or ethnicity. But Jesus the First Century Palestinian Jew doesn’t give us those easy 21st Century answers. He had a real life and real feelings. He was born and reared in a real culture with all of its trappings.

As a good Jewish man, Jesus would have given thanks daily that he was born a Jew not a Gentile, a man not a woman. He would have said the siddur prayer every day, one version of which praises God “. . . who has created me a human and not beast, a man and not a woman, an Israelite and not a gentile, circumcised and not uncircumcised, free and not slave.” (From the Cairo Genizah.) Even the best of humanity, the Incarnation himself, could get entangled in the sexist and racist snare of this tradition, could get caught up in its inherent system of oppression, its culture of supremacy.

The great lesson of his encounter with the Syrophoenician woman is that it teaches us how the cultural dynamics of racism, of prejudice of any kind, can be overcome in a real moment of conversion. Jesus’ understanding of what he was called to do was changed and expanded because of this gentile woman’s challenge. From that moment, he moved forward, and went about his work with an expanded awareness of who the Good News was for, healing the woman’s daughter and then going deeper into gentile territory.
Mark masterfully combines this story with the tale of healing the man with the speech impediment which seems also to have taken place in gentile territory. Mark writes that Jesus returned to the Sea of Galilee by way of Sidon; if you look at a map, that makes no sense. The Galilean Lake is south of Tyre and inland; Sidon is a considerable distance north of Tyre and on the coast. Like Tyre, it was and is a gentile settlement. The way Mark tells the story it may have been here that Jesus restored the hearing of the man with impeded speech. Mark combines the stories because because the second story explains the first. Jesus metaphorical ears, his ethnic or socio-political ears (if you will) were opened by the woman in the same manner that the deaf man’s physical ears were opened by Jesus. That Jesus went deeper into gentile territory and there healed the deaf man, probably himself a gentile, shows the impact of the woman’s words on Jesus. The man’s ears were opened by Jesus, his tongue was loosened, and he no longer spoke his slurred speech; Jesus’ “ears” were opened by the woman, his traditional upbringing was loosened, and he no longer uttered ethnic slurs.

What is noticeable about both “healings” is their surprising quickness. The Syrophoenician woman challenges Jesus and in a single instant of profound grace his heart is changed; Jesus speaks a single word and in an instant of profound grace the man’s ears are unstopped and his speech restored. These gospel stories of sudden and immediate transformation are combined for us today with a short lesson from the prophet Isaiah who likens the coming of God’s power, the time when the ears of the deaf will be opened and the eyes of the blind will be given sight, to one of the briefest moments in the desert, that time when the spring rains come and the desert quickly blooms.

There’s nothing quite like springtime in the desert! One is never sure when it will happen but one spring day a storm moves in and for a few hours the dry burning sands are covered with pools, the thirsty ground runs with streams that rush through the desert often to the point of dangerous flooding. In just a few more hours, the wilderness blooms with an intensity that truly has to be seen to be appreciated. Around my hometown of Las Vegas, the spring rains produce an incredible variety of blossoms. There are all sorts of different yellows: bear poppy, bristly fiddleneck, buttercups, and desert dandelion, to name a few. There are vivid pinks: beardtongue and arrowweed and the mojave thistle. There’s a red-spotted purple flower called “desert five spot”. There’s a flower called “desert bell” that is the most vivid blue you’ve ever seen and, of course, there are the red-orange California poppies all over the place. It’s just incredible! And it happens almost instantaneously and then, in just a few hours, the desert goes dry again . . . and the brilliant rainbow of desert color is gone, but for that brief moment the desert has been transformed and, truly, it will never be the same again.

Isaiah tells us that that is precisely the way the power of God comes, with that same sort of startling swiftness, in a moment of magnificent immediacy. That’s the way new hearing and new understanding came to the deaf man and, surprisingly, to Jesus, as well. And that’s the way it comes to us. We may study Scripture for years; that’s a good thing to do and we gain knowledge and understanding that way. But it is not through that study that we are transformed. We may attend worship services weekly or even daily; that’s a good thing to do and we show our love of God in that way. But it is not through liturgy that we are transformed. We may regularly give of our time and talent in ministry to the poor; that’s a good thing to do and we serve Christ in others in that way. But it is not through that service that we are transformed. It is, rather, through the swift and surprising in-breaking of God’s power and Spirit that we are transformed! And it is through that transformation that we are empowered to serve with new vigor, to worship with new thanksgiving, to read Scripture with new understanding.

Isaiah assures us that when the waters of God’s power break forth in the wilderness of our lives, when the streams of God’s Spirit flow through the deserts of our existence, then the burning sands of our souls become pools, the thirsty ground of our hearts become springs of living water. Through the words of the Syrophoenician woman it happened to Jesus; through the ministry of Jesus it happened to the man with the speech impediment; and through the power of the Holy Spirit it happens to us. The writer of the letter to the Hebrews declares that God in Jesus became like us “his brothers and sisters in every respect” that he might be “the pioneer and perfecter of our faith” (Heb. 2:17, 12:2) so that, as John says, “we will be like him!” (1 John 3:2) It happens in an instant, like the transformation of the desert in the spring rains or, as Paul said, “in the twinkling of an eye.” (1 Cor. 15:42)

Let us pray:

Almighty and merciful God, how wonderfully you created us and still more wonderfully transform us. In moments of surprising grace, you send your Holy Spirit into our hearts to reform our lives; you constantly renew us through your redeeming love, refreshing us as rain refreshes the wilderness. We thank you for the wondrous streams of your mercy, for the pools of your love, for the water of life which restores our parched spirits and transforms us ever more closely into the likeness of your Son, through whom in the power of the Holy Spirit, we join with the whole Church to give you praise, now and for ever. Amen.

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