Author: Rebecca

Easter Sunday 2020; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson

Human life moves between two darknesses.  We begin life out of the darkness that surrounds us before we are born, and we end life with the darkness of death.  Life is what happens in between these two dark times.  All along the way, though, there are other dark times.  Given all the darkness that surrounds our lives, we might have a hard time living in the light, if it were not for the promises of God.  Brilliantly bright promises like those we celebrate today– hope, forgiveness, and new life.

But, even Easter is not all brightness and joy.  In fact Mary came to the tomb while it was still dark, the gloomy memories of the last few days shrouding her mind.  Her grief would have weighed down on her like a blanket of dark.  She was not going there to do a happy or pleasant thing.  She was going to put sweet smelling spices and oils on the corpse of her well-loved and well-known friend.  It was one final caring action she could do for his crucified body.

During the terrible days she had just experienced the one they had placed all their hopes on had been betrayed and denied by close friends, he had been falsely accused, tortured, mocked, and killed in a slow and painful way.  All but a few women had deserted him.  She must have felt alone and completely drained.  She might have thought that nothing else could possibly happen to disappoint her.  Then arriving, in the dark, she found the tomb empty.  Even his dead body was taken away from her.  She told Simon Peter and another disciple.  After they looked for him without success they left her alone again, without any answers, alone with her grief and doubts and loss. 

It was there, alone and without hope, as the light of day broke that Jesus, appeared to Mary and called her by name.  There in the place of death, life and hope shattered the darkness and gave Mary a reason to believe again, a reason to celebrate and share her news.  As a people living between life and death we too are called to believe and celebrate even when suffering or death are just a moment behind or ahead.  It is the dark story of Jesus suffering and death followed by the surprising bright dawn of Easter that makes it possible for us to celebrate life even in the face of death. 

A pastor I know of told a story about how she learned through ministering to one of her parishoners that it is the very darkness of Jesus’ suffering and death that gives the resurrection such bright power.  This pastor enjoyed a wonderful friendship with a family in her parish.  The parents in this family was about 50 and the wife and mother in the family had become a close friend of the pastor.  Their house was always full of good music and laughter.  Then their only child was killed in a car accident.  The pastor came to visit and found the parents avoiding each other and not talking.  After a few minutes the woman asked her pastor to leave saying she wanted to be alone.  People from a local grief group came to offer their support.  The woman kept saying she wanted to be alone.  The music fell silent in that house and the woman retreated to the dark quiet of the basement and paced the floor. 

Again the pastor came to visit.  She went into the basement with her and paced with her.  She sensed the anguish the woman felt, the sadness and anger and emptiness.  She silently paced with her and the woman began to share her pain.  She spoke of her despair and loneliness.  She tried to explain that she just had to be alone.  The pastor decided not to pray with her at that time.  She went out and prayed in her car as she left that grieving household. 

Some time later it came to her what to do.  She found a rough cross.  She typed selected words from Psalm 22, including the words Jesus quoted as he hung on the cross.  “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?  Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?  O my God I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night but find no rest.  I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast; my mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to my jaws; you lay me in the dust of death.”  Then she added the words:  You are not alone.  Jesus is in union with all believers.

The pastor took the paper and the cross to the grieving woman with a request that she read it over and over again.  Then she left her alone as she had been asked to. 

Time went by.  The pastor continued to pray for her but left her alone.  Eventually the woman called and asked the pastor to come over.  They sat in the bright light at the kitchen table this time, not in the basement.  The woman looked different.  She quietly but steadily described her pacing and reading.  She set up the cross in the basement and let it be with her.  Then one day, as she paced and read the words typed on the paper she sensed that someone else was groaning within her, at first groaning the words of the psalm and then crying the words, “I’m gonna live.” 

As they shared Holy Communion at that kitchen table the woman told her pastor that it was through living with the dark pain of the cross that could see the hope of new life in Christ and could believe again.  Darkness and sadness and loss all by themselves are life-taking forces.  But illumined by the presence of the crucified and risen Lord they become bearable, even more than that those dark times can be opportunities to see the depth of God’s love and the promise of new life.

The resurrection with all its brilliance follows the agonizing hell of Great and Holy Saturday and turns a terrible Friday into Good Friday.  It is almost too bright to consider; it is like looking straight into the sun at high noon.  It shines with a light that breaks into all the dark spaces of our lives because it originates out of the darkness of death and sorrow and anguish. 

We live our lives between two darknesses and with dark times scattered all through our lives.  Easter does not remove the dark times.  Easter shines into them and speaks a word of light and hope.  “The light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.” 

Maundy Thursday, April 9, 2020;

ICCM in Diaspora; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson

Washing and feeding, washing and feeding, it is a rhythm we are familiar with.  My mom used to instruct us to, “Wash up for dinner” and I did the same things when my kids were little.  Now during the Coronavirus we are especially familiar with washing and feeding.  How many times a day do we wash our hands?  I bet we are all eating so many more homecooked meals than we have in years.  Our awareness is heightened right now.

The chaplain of a Baptist Children’s home in Texas tells a story about one little boy who never wanted to wash up.  The housemother had to ask him four times one day to get washed up for dinner.  He stomped past her, muttering, “All I hear around this place day after day is ‘germs and Jesus, germs and Jesus.’  So far, I ain’t seen neither one!”

Washing and feeding… I remember when my children were newborns—it seemed like all I did was wash and feed, wash and feed those hungry little ones.  We begin our lives dependent on others, washed by other’s hands and fed the food that will sustain us.  Gradually we learn to do things for ourselves and then even to care for others.  Being washed and fed evolves into washing and feeding oneself.  Dependence develops into self-reliance.  And we come to live with the illusion of independence and self-sufficiency.  Right now we are tested by the isolation.  I know I am more aware of how much I need other people and how much I miss them when I am unable to gather with friends and family.

On Maundy Thursday, when we read the story of the last supper, complete with the story of Jesus washing his disciple’s feet I think of my great aunt named Rubye.  She and her husband Chuck lived in Moorhead, my hometown.  They didn’t have any children and lavished lots of love on me and my sister Betsy.  I was sick a lot as a little girl and when I had to miss school my mom would bring me either to my grandma’s house or to Rubye’s house when she went to work.  Rubye and Chuck were fun to be with—they played cards with me and fed me lots of treats.  Rubye was a big woman, very big.  She had arthritis and diabetes.

As she got older it got harder and harder for her to move about and care for herself.  Our roles changed some over time.  After I got my driver’s license I would visit them on my own.  I got allergy shots every week at a clinic near their house.  I stopped to see them nearly every week and we would play cards and visit.  I know how much they looked forward to those days.

Rubye and Chuck had a neighbor named Faith who also came to visit them every week.  She brought them groceries and she also provided some personal care for Rubye.  Faith would tend Rubye’s big, arthritic, and diabetic feet.  She washed her feet and trimmed her toenails and massaged her sore bones.  She took care of Rubye’s bunions and corns.  I expect that Rubye looked forward to Faith’s visits even more than my visits.  I expect it was hard for her to accept such intimate service, to be washed by someone else.   

Footwashing—it’s a personal thing, uncommon in our lives, handwashing we can relate to.  But for the disciples, washing up for dinner meant not hands but feet.  Footwashing was an absolute necessity in Palestine.  The road and pathways were packed-down soil.  During the dry seasons they were covered with dust.  In rainy weather they turned to mud.  Footwear consisted of cured leather sandals.  Before entering a home, feet had to be cleaned.  Large water jugs were put beside the door for that purpose.  Richer homes had foot-washing servants. 

Jesus and his disciples, like many people of his time, may not even have worn sandals.  If that was the case, then they really would have needed a foot washing that day.  Since they wouldn’t have had a servant to wash feet, the disciples probably took turns doing it for one another. 

On this one night, the night of the Passover, Jesus was the one who took up the task.  Maybe they had been bickering about whose turn it was.  It wouldn’t have been the first time they fought over status and who was the most important.  Over and over again the disciples showed a silly stubbornness, not unlike the kind of quibbling between siblings over whose turn it is to take out the garbage or wash the dishes. 

I imagine that Jesus ended the bickering by teaching a lesson with his actions.  He humbled himself and evidently embarrassed the disciples in the process, exposing their pettiness with his loving service.  He demonstrated powerfully that greatness is shown most of all in service.  His actions spoke louder than any words could.  Those actions said, ‘I love you.  I will serve you.  I send you to serve one another.”  Then, in case they didn’t get it through his example he told them. 

John 13: 12-17, 34-35: After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, ‘Do you know what I have done to you? ¹³You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. ¹⁴So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. ¹⁵For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. ¹⁶Very truly, I tell you, servants^* are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. ¹⁷If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them… ³⁴I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. ³⁵By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’

Maundy Thursday brings us up to the threshold of this Most Holy Time.  It brings us right up to the betrayal of Jesus, to the cross, and to the tomb, reminding us that what matters most is not our independence and self-reliance, but those things that Christ does for us.  Today shows us that we need to be washed and fed by Christ. 

We cannot gather right now, so our entry into the dark agony of Jesus’ passion must be a solitary one, were in the quiet of our own homes we can consider how he was denied, mocked, whipped, killed and buried.  The one who came into the world with love and justice was pushed aside and hung on a cross to die. 

Part of me, and maybe part of you too, would rather turn away from this part of the story and from the nasty grisly parts of life.  If we can’t have Easter dinner, with all the trimmings, chairs crowed around a family table, if there will be no egg hunts this year, couldn’t we just move right through to resurrection? 

If we consider the cost of life and freedom in Christ we can glimpse the depth of God’s commitment to us, to justice, to love.  Even as Jesus was being plotted against and set up to die, he offered love and gentle personal service and a meal to his followers.  He offered himself as hope and truth and ultimate victory over the worst this world has to offer.

Washing and feeding.  I am hungry for the table of the Lord, hungry for the words, given and shed for you, in remembrance of Christ. I am hungry for community, for nourishment and strength, for forgiveness and peace and purpose.  Especially now, when danger is invisible, carried on human droplets, when our patterns are disrupted, when we worry for our loved ones who work in essential services or for those with underlying health risks.  We live covered in the dust and germs of this world’s struggle.  In the rituals of the church we are washed and fed. 

Jesus gave a command:  To love as he loved, to forgive as he forgave, to give as he gave, to pray as he prayed, to help as he helped, to do as he did.  And he provided the food we need for the tasks.  This year as we sit at our isolated tables, remind us that we are united in one Body, the Body of Christ.  As we eat whatever food we have and drink whatever drink we pour, remind us that Christ is our bread and blood. Christ supplies our needs, fills us with himself, gives us new life, new hope, and new strength we need to fulfill his command.  Amen.

Hosanna!  April 5, 2020; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson

This is not how I expected to be spending Holy Week.  I thought Steve and I would be watching the crowds thronging to the beaches.  Today, Palm Sunday, I expected the ladies in the Spanish Speaking Congregation of Iglesia Cristiana Congregacional de Mazatlan to have beautifully decorated the sanctuary with Palm Branches.  Daniel, Steve and Rich would be playing the opening strains of All Glory Laud and Honor, the trumpet’s clear sound rising over the voices of the English Speaking congregation.  I was looking forward to the first (hopefully annual) Palm Sunday brunch potluck at Linda Hannawalt’s lovely home on Libertad Street.  As the season wound down, we would try to fit in as many farewell -for this- year dinners at our favorite restaurants with friends.  The warmer weather would mean morning coffee on the patio watching the hummingbirds flit between my neighbor Sylvia’s azalea tree, the hibiscus plants and her feeders.  We had plans.  We thought we knew what to expect. 

Jesus’ followers had expectations too.  He was headed to Jerusalem, the seat of religious and political power, for Passover.  Special meals and rituals would recall the ancient plagues and God’s liberating power to save the people.  Their hopes were pinned on this unlikely man, Jesus.  Centuries of longing were going to be fulfilled in this Messiah.  They waved their cloaks and whatever they could find along the dusty roads, palm branches held high in acclamation with cheers of Hosanna!

Hoshiya-na, Hosanna in Hebrew, means Save, Please!  Like a failing swimmer’s cry for help as they struggled to make it to shore, Ayudame!– the word changed over the years.  It came to mean, Salvation! in the sense that even before a call for help was uttered, help arrived.  No longer a victim’s plea, it became an exclamation of praise bubbling from the heart of the endangered as the lifeguard could be seen racing through the turbulent waves to save the drowning. 

The story of the faithful follows a repeating pattern: threats come and then salvation, disaster and restoration, death and rebirth. We know this from studying the scriptures, from reading history.  This too shall pass.  God is good, all the time.  We know this from our own lives too—when we have felt the strength of the community, the support of prayer, the presence of God carrying us through difficult times.  But this global pandemic—this is not what any of us (except maybe the doomsday preppers) know or expected.

We are asked or commanded, as the case may be, to stay safe at home.  Shopping and restaurant parking lots are empty.  Even the beaches in Mazatlan during Semana Santa, normally the busiest time of the year, are vacant for the very first time.  Social isolation means even the faithful are sleeping in on Sunday mornings, or watching hastily prepared video broadcasts of preachers proclaiming to empty sanctuaries.  On this first Sunday in April pastors everywhere are consecrating the elements for the Eucharist via YouTube.  Communicants are individually partaking of their own bread and cup, simultaneously in dispersion.  Not in anyone’s wildest dreams would this be so!

It is a drab morning here in the Northwoods of Wisconsin.  I write this from my desk in the loft of our home, looking out our floor to ceiling window.  A dozen deer are silently making their way through the grey and dormant landscape, avoiding the icy patches in the shade they nibble on our brush pile and the tender shoots of my rhubarb plants.  If I close my eyes I can seen the congregation now scattered: a few still in Mazatlan.  Are Rich and Wendy, Keith and Sylvia sipping coffee or tea, watching the waves crash on the empty beaches on either side of the Casa del Marino? Are Chuck and Katy, Bob and Cheryl, Kirk and Carol hunkered down in the Pacific Northwest, one of the hotspots of this silent, invisible threat—the coronavirus?  Are our friends from Alberta wearing wool socks and fuzzy robes warming their feet by a blazing woodstove?  Surely in all these places and more, masks and gloves and sanitizer are ready by the doorways for any essential excursions. 

Like Jesus’ first followers our expectations have not been met.  We face mortality in a new way, the future uncertain. But unlike those palm waving crowds we know the ending of the story.  We know that the betrayal, denial, suffering and injustice of Holy Week was followed by God’s ultimate salvation—resurrection.  We know through the witness of Mary and Peter and others that God has more in store for the world than we can even imagine.  The nationalistic dream of a restored Israel with Jesus on the throne of David was too small a hope.  God’s holy plan is bigger and bolder.  The prophets tried to tell them.  “Behold I am doing a new thing!” (Isaiah 43.19)

Paul proclaimed it for the early church, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation h as come!  The old is gone and the new is here!”  (2Corinthians 5:17)  Each year the cycle repeats, the message is proclaimed.  Each year our hopes and dreams are too small.  This year, 2020, the whole earth finds itself at a standstill during Holy Week.  We wait for what we cannot know, crying Hosanna!  Save us!  Ayudame! 

Surely our dreams and hopes are too small.  We may long for a return to the old normal: palm branches waving, a potluck brunch complete with baked ham and green bean casserole in Grandma’s china dishes, friends and family around the laden table, every chair in the house crowded to fit, the freedom to shake hands, hug, and kiss cheeks.  But this grand pause can direct our attention to the One who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine! (Ephesians 3: 20)  And so, we are called to open our hearts to trust God’s repeating pattern of salvation. 

Lord God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us the faith to go out (or stay home!) with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.  (Martin Luther’s evening prayer.)

Steve has a section of this blog called Cop Out and About. Take a minute to read his latest writing .

March 15, 2020, One Body—Living Water; ICCM; John 4: 5-42; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson

There is a hymn for holy communion called One Bread, One Body that goes like this.  One bread, one body, one Lord of all; one cup of blessing which we bless, and we though many throughout the earth we are one body in this one Lord.  Gentile or Jew, servant or free, woman or man, no more.  Many the gifts, many the works, one in the Lord of all. 

We are One Body, the Body of Christ, with various gifts and talents, interdependently entwined.  Our gathering for worship today feels poignant to me.  We come here as the Psalmist said, to sing, to make a joyful noise, to give thanks and praise, to bow down and bend the knee.  It is so good to be together.  This is our lifeblood—our community, a place to give, to serve, to support, to grow, to be held in prayer and Christian love. 

The decision to suspend our services for this season is hard.  We will miss this sharing of physical presence with each other. Some may think this is a premature overreaction. I hope they are right and this whole mess does not materialize as the scientists and mathematicians are predicting, and as has happened in Europe, China, Korea, and as is happening in the United States and Canada already.  But I think that is wishful thinking. 

I believe the decision will contribute to a greater good.  Those of us who are here may be healthy.  If we contract the virus it may be no more than something like the common cold.  But we are acting as the Body, linked together with all of God’s creation, with those who are very old, with those who are frail, with those whose underlying health conditions put them at greater risk.  We are acting to protect the medical workers who will be overtaxed as the outbreak happens and community transmission begins. We are acting on behalf of those we may never meet.  We all need this pandemic to move slowly enough for our collective medical systems to hold the very ill so that all of the very ill can be taken care of. Hospitals, doctors, nurses, and orderlies are a precious and limited resource.  We are protecting them in our action.

Perhaps you’ve seen this story online.  I read it again this week and thought it most appropriate for today.   

A man was asked to paint a boat. He brought his paint and brushes and began to paint the boat a bright red, as the owner asked him.  While painting, he noticed a small hole in the hull, and quietly repaired it. When he finished painting, he received his money and left.

The next day, the owner of the boat came to the painter and presented him with a nice check, much higher than the payment for painting.  The painter was surprised and said “You’ve already paid me for painting the boat Sir!”

“But this is not for the paint job. It’s for repairing the hole in the boat.”

“Ah! But it was such a small service… certainly it’s not worth paying me such a high amount for something so insignificant.”

“My dear friend, you do not understand. Let me tell you what happened:

“When I asked you to paint the boat, I forgot to mention the hole.

“When the boat dried, my kids took the boat and went on a fishing trip.

“They did not know that there was a hole. I was not at home at that time.

“When I returned and noticed they had taken the boat, I was desperate because I remembered that the boat had a hole.

“Imagine my relief and joy when I saw them returning from fishing.

“Then, I examined the boat and found that you had repaired the hole!

“You see, now, what you did? You saved the life of my children! I do not have enough money to pay your ‘small’ good deed.”

The careful decisions we and others make for the sake of those in need may be like repairing all the ‘leaks’ we find. We may never know who we are protecting.

Most of the time when we think about how we are the Body of Christ, we think of it in terms of our own congregations or families.  This pandemic offers us an opportunity to see how truly connected all of God’s world is.  China, to Italy, to Mexico, or Canada or the US. We are all one body, interdependent and in relationship, even when we can’t see that connection or feel it. 

In our gospel today Jesus is alone in the desert. He encounters a woman and has his longest recorded conversation in all of the gospels. The woman, whose name is never revealed, is out in the heat of noonday because she has been ostracized and shunned, and is on her own to provide for her most basic needs. No father, husband, brother or son is around to look after her. And there is no group of women to share her story, wipe her tears or help her to laugh.

Jesus needs to drink fresh water to live. The woman also needs a drink: she needs the fresh, living water of grace and truth only Jesus can provide to drink deep of healing and wholeness and a new life. And in their various needs, these two affirm their mutual humanity. They share in the holy Source of Life that transcends all boundary, custom, hatred, fear and scarcity.

In the desert at noon, with all distraction stripped away, all shadows erased, the light shines bright enough for these two strangers to discover that they need each other. As they are transfigured in the light of the noonday sun, each enemy sees the face of a friend. Distance dissolves into relationship. Enmity melts into mutuality. They glimpse a spiritual wholeness, a new healing reality.

Jesus models a barrier-breaking relationship of mutuality and compassion. The woman is bold enough to both remind Jesus of what separates them—he a Jew and she a Samaritan—and of what connects them—their ancestor Jacob. She is audacious and spars verbally with this strange man. In their truth-telling, she experiences him as prophet and in turn she is acclaimed for speaking the word.

To this day, the Samaritan woman is honored in many cultures. In southern Mexico, La Samaritana is remembered on the fourth Friday in Lent, this week in fact.  Aguas flavored with chilacoyota, tamarindo, jamaica and horchata are given to commemorate her gift of water to Jesus. The Orthodox know her as St. Photini, or Svetlana in Russian. Her name means “equal to the apostles,” and she is honored as apostle and martyr on the Feast of the Samaritan Woman.

The gospel witnesses to the gift of God for all God’s children. In the vulnerability of an interdependent community, in the insistence upon relationship, in the breaking down of barriers. Jesus shows us a new way to learn about one another, learn the truth of one another, and learn that we need one another. True worship takes place not at a sacred mountain or even a shared ancestral well, but in a relationship with the person of Christ, who is the wellspring and mountaintop of hope and peace.

On another day, also about noon, Jesus will face death and again confess his thirst. On that day, only vinegar will be offered—in mockery. The gift of his living water will not be apparent to the one holding that sour sponge. But today, when Jesus and the Samaritan woman meet, they conspire to bring life out of death. The water they offer each other, water that quenches the thirst of body and soul, holds the gift of life for all.

ICCM; March 8, 2020; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson Steve and I have been taking tango lessons for two years now.  This weekend we went to a workshop with a guest instructor.  We worked on giros for over an hour on Friday.  To do this particular move one must keep the weight on the ball of the foot in order to pivot forward and then backward.  It is important to focus visually in the distance to avoid dizziness.  If you look at the floor or right in front of you, you lose your balance.  How we live our lives can be something like the whirl of a turn. As we twist and turn through our calendars, we can lose our focus by looking away from what orients our life: our faith. With the psalmist, we lift our eyes to the hills—or to the streets, churches, workplaces, malls, or smartphones—but we lose our balance and our steps fail, because the hills are not a reliable source of strength. The psalmist knows where to focus and it’s not the hills, not other people, and not even one’s self. Our help comes from the Lord. God can ground us, clear our vision, and help us move without reeling. The Lord will not let our foot be moved. The Lord will keep us; the Lord will watch over our going out and coming in. Like the psalmist, we can choose to focus on the Lord. No one wants to be dizzy or nauseous (except young children who like to spin around and around and then attempt to walk without falling). We don’t want to feel helpless, at the mercy of the whirling world around us, so we locate our focus where it belongs. We look to the Lord. We keep our gaze steady and hold our sight. God doesn’t stop the spinning, but instead offers a spot to give our turning focus. In John 3, Jesus offers Nicodemus a new spot. Nicodemus comes to Jesus in the night, awhirl with questions about the deeds of power that he and his fellow Pharisees have witnessed Jesus performing. He wonders, “How can these things be?” Jesus uses conversation to facilitate a new focal point in Nicodemus’s life. John’s Gospel features many such conversations, in which Jesus takes time to talk face to face with seekers. He is not afraid to make eye contact and to offer the nearness of the kingdom of God as a counterpoint to the demands of the world. Jesus welcomes these talks that often create genuine relationship and open up a space for conversion. Behavioral economist Jonathan Haidt writes in The Righteous Mind that one of the most potent and effective ways to enact personal change is through relationship. Transformation is made possible when affection forces us to entertain thoughts that differ from our own opinions. For most humans, the only way we change our mind about an issue or a person is to lean toward someone we love who thinks differently. In looking to them, we suspend our own opinions and see the world through their eyes. We change our focus. Nicodemus leans toward the Lord and entertains a new vision of faith. The psalmist leans toward the Lord and shifts the gaze from the hills to the creator and sustainer of life. In love, we too are invited to lean toward Christ.

It’s repeatedly surprising to me that even those of us who have spent our whole lives knowing God’s love for us still live many of our days somewhere between verse one and verse two of Psalm 121. “I lift up my eyes to the hills—from where will my help come?” “My help comes from the Lord.” Whenever we read or recited this psalm, I think there should be a big pause between those two sentences.  I lift my eyes to the hills—from where will my help come?  Pause.  Pause long enough to consider where we are looking for help, then and only them move on to My Help comes from the Lord.” The pause is important.  It’s like the word Selah that we looked at last week.  We pause to consider our own needs, our limitedness and our failings.  Then we look to God and discover the help we need.

It is so easy to get distracted by the worries and the activities of our days or by the irritations or inconveniences.  We forget our focus and we lose our balance.

The Jewish people have a practice that helps them remember who they are and to whom they belong.  They post on their doorposts a Mezuzah- it is a touchstone marked with the Hebrew letter Shin- which is the first letter of the word Shaddai— a word that means the Most High or God. Inside the Mezuzah are the words of the Shema, from Deuteronomy 6: 4-9

Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates”

The idea is that whenever they enter or leave their home, they remember that God will keep them, no matter what. They touch it to remind themselves to love the Lord God with all their heart, soul and mind.  Sometimes the Mezuzah is also decorated with the words from our Psalm, The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.  It’s something like wearing a cross necklace, or carrying a token in a pocket to remind oneself what is important, or making the sign of the cross over one’s self.  It’s not a good luck charm or a superstition, but a way of keeping our focus.

After that first section, the rest of Psalm 121 seems very assured, like a great hymn of trust in God. But, it can also be seen as a suspense-filled drama in which the story of God’s faithfulness is at great risk. This is a daring love song that is sung in the face of all the other choices we could make. It is not so much philosophical certitude but passionate love for God.

² My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

³ The Lord will not let your foot be moved;   your keeper will not slumber.
⁴ Israel’s keeper will neither slumber nor sleep.
⁵ The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
⁶ The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
⁷ The Lord will keep you from all evil; The Lord will keep your life.
⁸ The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in  from this time on and for evermore.

The key word is this psalm is keep/keeper, from the Hebrew word shamar. Who is God? God is a keeper. God’s identity is to protect, shield, watch over, guard, keep. God does this like a watchman keeping guard over a city (130:8) or a bird shielding its young in the shelter of his wings (91:4). What does God promise to do? God promises to keep you. God will guard you as you go on your journey of life, and as you return home. As you go out and come in. As you face the dangers of the day and of the night.

The list of promises here is not meant to suggest that those who walk in the shelter of God will face no harm or that nothing ill will befall them. They are characteristic promises — these are the sort of things that the Lord does for those who turn to the Lord. The words of blessing and promise evoke God’s protection and our awareness of it. 

I recommend memorizing this psalm, recite it when you rise in the morning and at night before you sleep. You could even post it by your doorway to remind you where to look for help.  It can be a touchstone to ward off the doubt and disbelief that pulls us from God like an unseen magnetic force.

The psalms were the songbook for the Jewish people, let the words of this great hymn ring in your mind like the words of your favorite hymn—like Amazing Grace, or the one we’re going to sing right now.  

Let us pray.  O Lord, you are our Keeper, in the morning when we rise, at dark midnight when we cry, just about the break of day, and when we come to die, and when we want to sing.  Focus our sight on Jesus, help us keep our balance and be our help.  Amen.

Selah; 3.1.20; ICCM; Psalm 32; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson

Noel Coward, the famous playwright, once pulled an interesting prank. He sent an identical note to twenty of the most famous men in London. The anonymous note read: “Everybody has found out what you are doing. If I were you I would get out of town.” Supposedly, all twenty men actually left town.

What if you opened your mail one day and found such a note? What would race through your mind? The income you failed to report on your tax return? The time you spent on the internet watching questionable sites? The lies you told about an honest, hardworking individual?

Guilt is the dread of the past; a pain that wells up within our heart because we committed an offense or failed to do something right. It is a phantom pain. You know, like amputees experience after a limb has been removed. A part of the body that does not exist screams for attention.  The memory of some sin committed years ago can cripple the enjoyment of life, any devotional life, and relationships with others. People live in fear that someone will discover their past. They work overtime trying to prove to God they’re truly repentant. They erect barriers against the enveloping, loving grace of God.

Guilt performs an important function. It is like an electric fence that gives us a jolt when we begin to stray beyond our boundaries. It sends an alarm to wake us up that something needs our attention. Like pain, guilt tells us when something is wrong. When you feel it, you don’t just sit there, you do something about it.

The problem comes when we keep our failings secret, holding them inside.  12 Step program participants know the value of confession.  They have a saying—We’re only as sick as our secrets. The steps include making a searching and fearless moral inventory and admitting those things to the self, to another and to God. 

Lent is a time for confessing our shortcomings.  It’s a time to pause, to rest, to reflect.  Today we read about the sin of Adam and Eve in the garden and Jesus’ testing in the wilderness.  Those seem to fit the theme of Lent—but our Psalm for today is full of happy words.  Psalm 32 begins with happiness and ends with being glad, rejoicing, and shouting for Joy.  According to the psalm, it isn’t revelry and parties that brings happiness, but forgiveness. 

Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.  Happy are those to whom the Lord imputes no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. While I kept silence by body wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength dried up as by the heat of summer.  We all know the truth of that.  Consider an argument with a loved one, a really sticky one, the kind that has you pursing your lips and crossing your arms in defiant self-righteousness and silence. When we hold on to the anger, rehearse our woundedness, and savor the injustice we do waste away.  The groaning drowns out all joy.  Harboring anger, hurt and sadness can take up all the space there is, drying up our strength and leaving us feeling the weight of it all like a heavy hand pressing us down.

In our psalm there’s a mysterious little word, Selah, whose meaning has been debated for centuries. Most scholars think that it means stop, dwell, think, or consider. This Hebrew word occurs 71 times in 39 of the Psalms and three times in Habakkuk. Most of the psalms that include the word selah are titled, “to the choirmaster.” The prophetic book of Habakkuk, like the Psalms, is a book of poetry. In the third chapter is a prayer in the form of a song where we find the word selah. It is probably something like a stage direction in a play that was known and understood by musicians and even those who were just singing along. 

We have Bibles written in English because the overwhelming majority of the original Hebrew and Greek words can be translated into English. However, there are a handful of words in the Bible that are not, or cannot, be translated. When this happens, what we read is not a translation, but a transliteration.

A translation is when a Hebrew word is translated into an English word that means the same thing. For example, the Hebrew word erets is translated to earth, because they have the same meaning, so we English speakers just read ‘earth’. 

A transliteration is when a Hebrew word is simply sounded out to English so we can read and pronounce it. An example is Hallelujah. Hallelujah is a transliteration of a Hebrew word that literally means, Praise God (Hallel=praise, Jah =God). Instead of being translated as “Praise God,” this word has been left for us to sound out as it would be in the original Hebrew and continues to be a powerful expression of praise.

Like hallelujah, the fact that selah is transliterated and not translated signifies that when we read selah, we are pronouncing the word generally the same way it would have been pronounced thousands of years ago by those who originally wrote and read it. This little word invites us to pause and consider what God may be saying even when we don’t fully understand. It gives us an opportunity to take a moment away from this crazy, busy, life we all tend to live and consider the immense mysteries and wonders of God. It’s a good reminder of what Lent is supposed to be all about.

It’s after a pause, a reflection on our sin, that we can move to the next stage—Then I acknowledge my sin and did not hide my iniquity.  I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord and you forgave the guilt of my sin.  Selah. And the pause is offered again, moving the psalmist and the reader to reflect on how all can pray to God in distress. In that turning to God the floods will not overwhelm.  God will be a hiding place, preserving us and surrounding us with glad shouts of deliverance.  Selah.  Then the psalm continues by telling us not to be like a mule in need of bridling. Be open to instruction and counsel. Be glad in God and rejoice, shout for joy. 

What is it that makes us Happy? How can Lent be a time for rejoicing?  Well, this Psalm about confession and the little word Selah give us a clue.  We acknowledge our sin, confess, and we are forgiven.  We pause, we rest, we trust in God.  We take time to breathe into the grace of God that surrounds, preserves and hides us. 

The late Dr. F.E. Marsh was preaching about the importance of confession of sin and, wherever possible, restitution for wrong done to others. After the service a young man, came up to him with a troubled look on his face. “Pastor,” he explained, “you have put me in a sad fix. I have wronged another and I am ashamed to confess it or to try to put it right. You see, I am a boat builder and the man I work for is an unbeliever. I have talked to him often about Christ and urged him to come and hear you preach, but he scoffs and ridicules it all. Now, I have been guilty of something that, if I should acknowledge it to him, will ruin my testimony forever.”

He explained that he was building a boat for himself in his own yard. In this work expensive copper nails are used because they do not rust. The young man had been pocketing the nails  to use on his own boat. He knew it was stealing, but he tried to ease his conscience be telling himself that the master had so many he would never miss them and besides he was not being paid all that he thought he deserved. But this sermon had brought him to face the fact that he was just a common thief, for whose dishonest actions there was no excuse.

“But,” said he, “I cannot go to my boss and tell him what I have done or offer to pay for those I have used and return the rest. If I do, he will think I am just a hypocrite. And yet those copper mails are digging into my conscience and I know I shall never have peace until I put this matter right.”

For weeks the struggle went on. Then one night he came to Dr. Marsh and said, “I’ve settled for the copper nails and my conscience is clear at last.”

“What happened?” asked the pastor.

“Oh,” he answered, “My boss looked at me a bit odd, then said, ‘George, I always did think you were just a hypocrite, but now I begin to feel there’s something in this Christianity after all. Any religion that would make a dishonest workman come back and confess that he had been stealing copper nails and offer to settle for them, must be worth having.’”

Dr. Marsh asked if he might use the story and was granted permission. Sometime afterwards, he told it in another city. The next day a lady came up and said, “Doctor, I have had ‘copper nails’ on my conscience too.” “Surely, you are not a boat builder!” “No, but I am a book-lover and I have stolen a number of books from a friend of mine who gets far more that I could ever afford. I decided last night I must get rid of the ‘copper nails,’ so I took them all back to her today and confessed my sin. I can’t tell you how relieved I am. She forgave me, and God has forgiven me. I am so thankful the ‘copper mails’ are not digging into my conscience anymore.”

Happy are those whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sin is covered.  Amen.

Strict Discipline; 2.16.20; ICCM; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson

Once a long time ago, there was a devout man who thought he wanted to be a monk.  He asked to be accepted as a postulant in a Cistercian Order known for their severe asceticism. He followed the pattern of monastic life, including the manual labor, the seven hours of daily prayer, and even the discipline of strict silence.  After the first year he was invited to meet with the Abbot who reviewed his progress and asked him if he wanted to speak the two words he was allowed to say each year.  The man said, “Food Bad”.  With that the monk shuffled down the unheated stone hallways. The next year, when the Abbot asked him for his two-word comment the would-be monk said with a scowl, “Bed Hard!” The Abbot sent him back to his duties.  When the Abbot summoned him after another year and asked for his two words, he responded, “I Quit.”  “You might as well,” the Abbot replied, “Since you got here, all you’ve done is complain.” 

Christian monasticism originated in the third and fourth centuries, when a group of Christians now known as the desert fathers withdrew from the cities of the Roman Empire to the deserts of Syria and Egypt. They renounced their possessions, their social status, the prospect of marriage and family. They believed that money and their comfortable houses and their lives of general ease were interfering with their friendship with God. So they renounced all those things and went to the desert to fast and live quietly.

When they got there, they were distressed to find that although they had left all those things back in the city, they were now afflicted by thoughts about them–thoughts about loneliness, thoughts about love, thoughts about safety. They were haunted by memories of the fine meals and beautiful homes they had left in Alexandria and plagued by thoughts about how their fellow monk in the hut down the road had a better view and a more comfortable mat. The desert monks had escaped the things themselves, but they had not escaped their own imaginations. And so, they began to retrain their thoughts.

The pattern these desert monks developed for that retraining boils down to three steps – notice, quarantine, and replace. That is: before you can stop thinking a thought, first you must notice it. You must notice that you are indeed stuck in thoughts of anger or lust or envy or gloom. Then, the next step is to intentionally set the thought aside.

Let us say hypothetically that you are totally occupied by thinking about an adult child back home, or a grandchild who’s gone off the rails. It keeps you up at night, your stomach is churning, you roll the thoughts around in your head like marbles, “if only she would listen to me, what he needs to do is…, how can I get in touch with her?”

In this example – you might notice that you are imagining the worst case scenario, then having noticed, you might set the thought aside, maybe just for 10 minutes; you might say–“I’m just not going to think that thought right now, I can come back to it in a half hour if I want to, but for right now, I’m walking away from it.” Notice. Quarantine. And then – step 3 – replace the thought with a prayer. Disciplining of our imaginations is not undertaken simply for the sake of discipline. It is for the sake of truer self-knowledge, and of living more in reality instead of living in distraction, and all of that is in turn for the sake of creating space to attend to God

(This account of desert practice draws on, inter alia, Mary Margaret Funk, Thoughts Matter: The Practice of the Spiritual Life (Continuum, 1988), especially chapter one.)

“You have heard it said, ‘You shall not murder’…But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment.” “You have heard it said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery … in his heart”

Jesus sounds somewhat extreme here. What might it mean to take seriously the idea that your thoughts and emotions matter? What if your thoughts and emotions can themselves be sin?

Historical precedent suggests that when you take that notion seriously, you get ridiculed. It was 1976 when then-candidate Jimmy Carter agreed to an ill-fated interview with Playboy magazine.  After the umpteenth question about whether his firmly held Baptist religious convictions would unduly influence his policy decisions in the White House, Carter began opining about grace, and about sin, and he quoted this morning’s Gospel reading:

I try not to commit a deliberate sin. I recognize that I’m going to do it anyhow, because I’m human and I’m tempted. And Christ set some almost impossible standards for us. Christ said, ‘I tell you that anyone who looks on a woman with lust has in his heart already committed adultery.’ I’ve looked on a lot of women with lust. I’ve committed adultery in my heart many times. This is something that God recognizes I will do–and I have done it–and God forgives me for it.

Carter had a big lead before this interview, but when choice quotations leaked to the press, even before the interview was published, he dropped 15 points in the polls. Evangelicals and feminists were, for different reasons, horrified that Carter had spoken to Playboy in the first place, and everyone else, especially Northerners mocked him for his piety and his lame attempt to sound like he was connecting with the common man by admitting the lust in his heart.

Political cartoonists had a field day. Instead of making him seem like an average Joe, the governor’s comments about lust and adultery actually reinforced people’s opinion that Carter was way too pious and way too priggish and took Jesus way too seriously – I mean, really, confessing that you have lustful thoughts as though it were a sin – a serious sin, on par with actually having an affair? Please.

Surely, we are not supposed to take these hyperbolic and demanding things Jesus is saying about murder and lust and false witness at face value. Surely it cannot be that thinking a mean thought about someone is the equivalent of murdering her. Surely our thoughts–the thoughts we keep to ourselves and never even speak of, much less act on—surely those thoughts are less important than our actions. And in addition to being less important than actions, surely also thoughts are less controllable than actions: I can prevent myself from sleeping with someone besides my spouse, but I can’t reasonably be held responsible for daydreaming about doing so.

Jesus, and Jimmy Carter – and I pair the two together in the least partisan way possible – Jesus and Jimmy Carter seem to suggest something different.

Underneath the specifics of murder and adultery and bearing false witness, Jesus seems to be suggesting that we are capable of disciplining our thoughts, at least as capable as we are of disciplining our bodies; and Jesus seems to be suggesting that what happens in our thoughts and imaginations matters.

Perhaps today’s Gospel passage is inviting each of us to give up a thought. Consider renouncing the anxiety about family members back home. Consider renouncing the jealous thoughts about the person with more health or wealth or whatever. Renounce those thoughts, because Jesus told us that they are the equivalent of murder and theft. Renounce them to make a different kind of space in your brain for God, for charity, for love, for whatever wonderful thing you might uncover when you set aside the anger and the anxiety and the envy.

I don’t know how this renouncing will work out for you, but I want you to try it before you toss it aside on the pile we all keep, that pile called “things Jesus says to do but we know no one possibly could.”

Our thoughts about our fears or anger are really just expressions of another underlying belief: that we are alone, that our lives are not enough, that we know best. Those thoughts – those alone thoughts, those isolate-from-my-neighbors thoughts – those thoughts are the opposite of Christianity because in the Christian faith we love one another and we have brothers and sisters and we don’t isolate ourselves. For Christians, the kind of isolation that follows from our fearful, self-pitying, self-justifying, or judgmental thinking is frankly just not allowed.

The hardest thing about Jesus’ words in today’s passage is not that they set a high standard, or that they feel moralistic. The hardest thing about these words is that they are simple – so simple as to feel threatening and strange. Jesus is simply telling us that it is not just our good deeds but even our thoughts that somehow contribute to the Kingdom of God. To think a loving thought is to bring about the Kingdom of God, and to think an angry thought is not.

This seems mysterious to me – It seems as mysterious as God sending Jesus to show us the way. It seems as mysterious as God reaching out and making a community from outsiders, as mysterious as the sending of the Spirit to teach us and lead us in holiness. It seems as mysterious as God feeding us the bread and cup, and making us his body, and giving us his peace. Amen.

Matthew 5: 13-20; “We are Salt and Light” ICCM; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson

Let us pray.  Most loving God, you show us yourself in the body—the body of Christ.  You show us yourself in Jesus, our brother, our friend, our servant, our savior.  We want to see you more clearly.  Most loving God, you show yourself to us in the body of Christ, it the flesh, in each other, and in ourselves.  You identify us as your body in the world.  We want to see ourselves more clearly, as Salt and Light.  Amen.

Who are we?  We answer that question in many ways.  When asked who I am I usually answer with my name or one of my roles. I am Rebecca, or I am a pastor, or Steve’s wife, or Cora and Kelsey and Peter’s mom. 

Today we look at one of the ways Jesus described his followers.  The bible uses a variety of images to describe us.  We are the Body of Christ. 

In today’s gospel Jesus was seated by the Sea of Galilee, teaching the crowds.  He was a body, flesh and blood, a man who knew and felt all that we are.  Jesus was certainly more than just the one who died on the cross though.  He was also the living, serving, teaching, laughing, loving, growing body—the friend of Mary and Martha, of James and John. 

And even that is not all.  He is also the risen body, the one who rose from death victorious and promises us that resurrection life too. The one who sent the Spirit to lead us into all knowledge.  When we say we are the Body of Christ we proclaim that we are connected to all of that.  We are joined to Christ in life and death and resurrection.  There is nothing that we experience that is far away from God. 

We’ve been reading from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians.  In chapter12, verses13-27 is the main place where he describes who we are using the image of Christ’s body.  It answers the question, who are we? with a collective answer.  We are part of the whole, we are part of the living changing organism that is the church.  Each part is important.  Not only are we connected to Christ, we are connected to each other and serve as little Christ’s to each other and together we, the church, serve as Christ to the world.  God is counting on us to be his body. 

Images are helpful.  They help us to understand things that mere words cannot.  In the sermon on the mount Jesus calls us the salt of the earth and the light of the world.  He says, This is what we are, not what we will be or what we are supposed to be.   It is what we are. 

Today these are common, ordinary, inexpensive items.  In Jesus’ day they were not common or ordinary or cheap. 

Salt is essential for life.  Without it our bodies stop functioning.  We are literally salt, blood and bodily fluids are salty.  So, this image tells us we are absolutely necessary.  The church is needed for the life and the health of the world, just as salt is needed for life.  Even in our modern sophisticated world, what is perhaps the most common treatment in a hospital—Intravenous saline?  

Salt was especially valuable in biblical times.  Today we buy it for a few cents, or get it for free in fast food stores.  We have so much that some of us limit our salt intake for health reasons.  But in Jesus’ day it was mined.  It was not as pure as it is today.  Salt was mined or derived from natural sources, like sea water.  Purified salt was so valuable, in fact, that it was used in many religious ceremonies.  It was used as currency.  People were often paid in salt—hence the word salary.

Last year Steve and I went to the city of Comala in the Mexican State of Colima for a few days.  There we bought sea salt, naturally harvested and prized for its excellent quality.  I thought salt was salt—I grew up on the Morton Salt, the one in the round box with the girl with an umbrella on it.  But I discovered that there’s salt, and then there’s SALT!  I gained a new appreciation for this image of who we are in Christ.

Salt is useful, as a preservative, a purifier, an antiseptic.  Jesus says we are salt, that which heals, cleanses, saves, preserves. 

Salt also, obviously, adds flavor.  If I pour salt in water, the two mingle together and the salt permeates the liquid.  Once it is added to food the food is changed and the salt cannot be removed or separated.   Salt adds flavor to the whole dish.  On the shelf in the kitchen it cannot affect a dish’s flavor.  It has to be added.  As salt, we can permeate the world and improve its character.

Light is everywhere these days.  At the flip of a switch or the striking of a match we can illumine our lives.  Not so in Jesus’ day.  Little lamps filled with costly oils gave the only produced light.  The sun and the moon and the stars were the only other source of light.  It’s hard to even imagine such a dark world.  Maybe we can experience that in some remote places, like the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, or the far reaches of the Quetico, or in the middle of the ocean, but today we have nearly the opposite experience.  Like salt, even a tiny bit of light can completely change its environment. 

Light gives hope; everything seems scarier in the dark.  Light can expose what we fear and make it manageable.  As the church we bring the light of hope to others.  Light makes things understandable.  As the people of God our presence can do the same for another.  Light can be beautiful, it can give sparkle, even to a rock.  We can bring out the sparkle in the world, exposing for others the beauty in them and around them.  Light gives safety.  When life is dangerous the church can offer a refuge and a safe place. 

Who are we?  We are the body of Christ.  We may feel fear or loneliness or a lack of purpose.  We may not feel worthy.  But Jesus says we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.  He does not say we can be these things or that we should be.  We are.  We are valuable, useful, essential.  We add health, flavor, hope, beauty, and safety to the world.  We do not do this all by ourselves.  We do it as the community of God.  The Body whose members are all important parts of the whole. 

Let us pray.  You have named us and claimed us as Salt and Light.  Send us out like rays of light or grains of salt to bring you into all the world.  Amen.