John 8:31-36  
Gospel for Sunday,
October 31, 2011 

31 Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” 33 They answered him, "We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free?’"
34 Jesus answered them, “Very truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.  35 The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there forever.  36  So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.”

   “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”  So intoned Martin Luther King Jr. during that memorable “I have a dream” speech.  The old spiritual from which those words came referenced our ultimate freedom in Christ, regardless of the extent of our freedoms on earth. And this week’s Gospel is the text both for Reformation Sunday and the commemoration of Martin Luther King, Jr. in January each year.
    Jesus’ words were addressed to Jews “who had believed in him.” They were taken aback at the thought that Jesus considered them to have been slaves.  As a citizen in “the land of the free,” many of us might have a similar response.  And yet, we know that Israel had been enslaved in Egypt and we also know there are many, even in our “land of plenty” who are enslaved by addictions, dysfunctional relationships, the grinding demands of poverty… in short, the world as we know it. But Jesus is referring to the root of all bondages; i.e., sin.  Sin is what we all too easily forget causes all our “un-freedoms.”  Any person, place or thing that distracts and draws us away from God is by definition drawing us toward bondage and away from freedom.  Lots of temporal things (money, good health, living in America…) can give us the illusion that we are free, but Jesus makes us “free indeed.”  We are slaves to sin (John 8:34) until Jesus sets us free (transforms us, in fact) by the renewing of our minds (Romans 12:2).
    In college, I had a poster on my wall for a time that said, “The truth will set you free…but first it will make you miserable.” Young adulthood is usually the time for testing the boundaries and sometimes that can be painful. But freedom is not the ability to “do whatever I want to do,” which is often our culture’s definition of freedom and remarkably similar to the attitude that held sway in the Garden of Eden.  Luther understood sin to be self-centeredness rather than God-centeredness. True freedom is the attitude of our whole being toward God and God’s will in our lives.  We may need to ask for the grace to will God’s will, but we will be set free to serve if we are faithful. The question then becomes, “What will we do with our freedom in Christ?”
   Jesus gives us the freedom to follow him; no one is free who follows because they are required to do so or because they are somehow in thrall to something or someone that is seemingly overpowering.  Our freedom in Christ is transformative; we want to follow him and, through him, we are able freely to do so.
    On Reformation Sunday we commemorate the single event that transformed the face and landscape of Christendom. Luther set out to bring the institutional church back to the fundamentals of the faith: Scripture, Christ, Grace, Faith, and Love.  Any who want to believe that “all roads lead to Rome” (i.e., truth is relative and all religions lead to the same place) would do well to consider that, if this were so, the Reformation was one big waste of energy and lives. Jesus proclaimed himself objective Truth: the Way the Truth and the Life and no one comes to the Father except through him (John 14:6).  This is perhaps THE most counter-cultural message we can proclaim.  We had better be spiritually fit to proclaim it because the world will denounce the message and increasingly, suppress the messenger.
    Writer and missionary Elisabeth Elliot wrote, “Plato, 300 years before Christ, predicted that if ever the truly good man were to appear, the man who would tell the truth, he would have his eyes gouged out and in the end be crucified.” Plato was correct.
    Even so, may we welcome every day as Reformation Day both in the churches and in our lives!

e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsainstphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Matthew 25:1-13
Gospel for Sunday, November 13, 2011

14 "For it is as if a man, going on a journey, summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them;  15 "to one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away.
16 "The one who had received the five talents went off at once and traded with them, and made five more talents. 17 "In the same way, the one who had the two talents made two more talents. 18 "But the one who had received the one talent went off and dug a hole in the ground and hid his master's money.
19 "After a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them.
20 "Then the one who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five more talents, saying, 'Master, you handed over to me five talents; see, I have made five more talents.' 21 "His master said to him, 'Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.'  22 "And the one with the two talents also came forward, saying, 'Master, you handed over to me two talents; see, I have made two more talents.' 
23 "His master said to him, 'Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.'
24 "Then the one who had received the one talent also came forward, saying, 'Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed; 25 "'so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.'  26 "But his master replied, 'You wicked and lazy slave! You knew, did you, that I reap where I did not sow, and gather where I did not scatter? 27 "'Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have received what was my own with interest. 28 "'So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents. 29 "'For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. 30 "As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."

    Talents.  I have heard this word defined as “the gifts we are given.” A church several years ago gave some of its members $100 each, totaling $10,000 and told them to invest it in the work of the kingdom.  That exercise evidently reaped enough rewards in both ministry and money that it made a segment of Dateline NBC!
    I used to think of talents as my gifts and skills…all the things that I have always prized about myself.  In the spirit of “don’t hide your light under a bushel” (Matthew 5:15), I assumed that to bury those talents was a direct slap at God who had created me to share the best of who I am with others for his sake.
    The first two servants in this tale saw a gracious God, served that God and were rewarded in line with their expectations and actions.  The third servant saw a fearsome God and acted accordingly.  This servant was judged by his own standards (in Luke the master says, “Out of your own mouth will I judge you”).  I recently read a humorous book entitled Imaginary Jesus in which the protagonist is besieged by all the “Jesuses” he has invented while finally conducting a quest to find the true Jesus.  It appears as though the third servant had invented a God that was harsh and vengeful and thereby he designed his own ruin!
    Verse 29 is a puzzler until we understand it not as God exacting the last penny from the penniless, but as a matter of those with little faith losing what faith they have when it is tested.  Faith is feeble unless it is nurtured with Bible study, worship and service.
    It is interesting to note that (1) the “talents” referred to were an outrageously huge sum of money in the biblical era; lifetimes worth of money, in fact (and also probably weighed about 70 pounds each!).  And, (2) it was considered normal and prudent to (literally) bury your wealth in the ground “back in the day.”  In these economic times, it has occurred to more than one of us that our money might be safer in a shoebox in the backyard garden than in some of our banking institutions, but that’s for another parable!
    It seems to me that we can actually look at the enormous size of a talent (Greek word: talanta) and compare that to the kingdom!  The kingdom of heaven is an absolutely priceless and bottomless gift; a gift we are called to serve and to steward.  But we often don’t have the first clue how to go about this task.  How do we follow our Lord into the kingdom?  How do we serve him?  How do we make sure the kingdom doesn’t suffer because of our actions (or inactions)?
    For starters, we don’t do it alone.  It isn’t about my talents, gifts or money alone.  It is about the Church; the community of believers that Christ calls together in order to send us out to do the work he has given us to do; i.e., to bring in God’s kingdom. (To reflect further, see Paul’s metaphor of the body in I Corinthians 12:12-27.) God gave the Church all the grace and gifts it needs to accomplish his goal of bringing all his children home to the heavenly banquet. Pooling our talents for the work of the Church is an investment that never depreciates and one that God honors each step of the way. I look forward to hearing, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant” addressed to all of us together who “went about doing good" (Acts 10:38).

e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

1 Corinthians 1:3-9 
 2nd Epistle Lesson for
 Sunday November 27, 2011

 3 Grace to you and peace
 from God our Father and
 the Lord Jesus Christ. 4 I
 give thanks to my God
 always for you because of
 the grace of God that has
 been given you in Christ
 Jesus, 5 for in every way
 you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind – 6 just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you – 7 so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ.  8 He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

    As Advent begins, we encounter scriptures that are pointing back to Christ’s arrival in Bethlehem and forward to his return in glory.  In Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, the emphasis is on balance and focus as they (we) persevere toward “the day of the Lord.”
    For decades now Americans have been offered self-help, motivational, affirmational books, tapes and retreats.  Who can forget (if you were around at the time) the book titled, I’m Okay, You’re Okay where we were introduced to Transactional Analysis and a “new” way to view our own behavior and that of others.
    However, Paul is operating from an entirely different approach to self-esteem and interaction with others! One would think, considering the issues Paul was confronting with this group of early Christians, his praise and thanksgiving for them would have been tempered a bit.  In fact, when you begin to list out the issues he addresses in this epistle, it could as easily and accurately be addressed to the contemporary church: divisive loyalties to competing leaders within the community, notorious sexual misconduct, Christians suing Christians, contention over the use of spiritual gifts, unequal treatment of people depending on social status, and heterodox practices in worship.
    But Paul understood (as we also need to understand) that the worth and meaning of those called by God comes from God alone, not from anything we are or do in and of ourselves.  As Paul tells the Philippians (2:13), “It is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” He is emphasizing that even these notorious Corinthians will be “blameless” at the end, but only because of what Christ has done for all whose faith is in God.
    Paul reminds and encourages the Corinthian Christians (and us) to recognize that God has given us every gift and skill we need to do God’s will and to persevere until we meet God face to face.  That is our legacy and promise from God.
    One of the errors Paul set out to correct in this letter is the complacency that is all too easily acquired when it feels as though everything we need has been provided—and in abundance. The question becomes, “Why should we even think about the end of the age or anything beyond the present?”  Without a definite sense of the ultimate end and purpose of our earthly lives as God’s children, we will see the same mistakes in our lives as Paul was pointing out to the Corinthians: A focus on self rather than community, no sense of urgency toward deepening discipleship, no rootedness in justice or peace in the here and now.
    Paul is challenging the Corinthians (and us as their successors in the faith) to live lives faithfully in a culture that makes that exceedingly difficult. God is faithful (v. 9) even when his children are not. God has called us out from the culture into a community of the faithful, and it seems we need that very community to reinforce our faithfulness.  As Prof. Dwight Peterson (Eastern Univ.) put it, “Faithfulness is a team sport that requires the unity of the church.”
    Paul, who established the Corinthian church, is admonishing them, as his words still admonish us today, to come together in unity, recognizing and using God’s manifold gifts, and together work and wait for the coming of the kingdom of God… that kingdom which is both with us now and yet to come.

 e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-24  
 2nd Reading for 
 Sunday December 11, 
 2011

 16Rejoice always, 
 17 pray without ceasing,
 18 give thanks in all
 circumstances; for  this is the will of God in  Christ Jesus for you. 19Do not quench the Spirit. 20Do not despise the words of prophets, 21but test everything; hold fast to what is good; 22abstain from every form of evil. 23May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this.

    This passage reminds me of my mother calling out to us kids as we were on our way to school: “Don’t forget your homework; be nice to your classmates; look both ways before you cross the street.…”  “Yes, Mom.  Okay, Mom.  Oh sure, Mom.”
    But here, the Apostle Paul is giving us a scatter-gun list of exhortations on the faithful life:

• Rejoice always!  (Even when things are awful?)
• Pray without ceasing! (How is that even possible?)
• Give thanks in all circumstances! (Does he really mean ALL?)
• Do not quench the Spirit.  (I won’t, if you tell me what that means.)
• Do not despise the words of prophets.  (How do we recognize a prophet from a crank?)
• Test everything and hold fast to what is good.  (What’s the test?)
• Abstain from every form of evil.  (Should I just stay in bed from now on?)

    Okay, that’s a bit flip…but not really.  Don’t we all have that kind of response when we are faced with what radically submitting to God actually entails?  And yet, v. 24 gives us courage to go forward because in actuality, it is God who is faithful.  It is God who accomplishes this in us as we seek to do God’s will in all things.
    There is a book entitled The Practice of the Presence of God, which is a compilation of writings and sayings of Brother Lawrence, a seventeenth-century French monk.  In this short book, we are given great insight into precisely how it is that we can fulfill the exhortations delivered above by Paul. Brother Lawrence shows us how to align our attitudes with God’s heart and our hearts with God’s.  In this way, we mature in faith and God’s will becomes ever more fully our will.  Suddenly, we find that we have been transformed, by the renewing of our minds. We will know what is right and want to do it! (Romans 12:1-2) Our lives will embody an “attitude of gratitude.”
    Brother Lawrence saw God’s glory while he was washing dishes in the monastery kitchen.  Here is vintage Bro. Lawrence:
     “The most excellent method of going to God is that of doing our common business without any view of pleasing people but purely for the love of God.”  And again, “We ought not to grow tired of doing little things for the love of God, who regards not the greatness of the work, but the love with which it is performed.”
    The Benedictines made this their motto: “Laborare est Orare:” to work is to pray.  This focus begins a process whereby the dividing walls that compartmentalize our lives begin to crumble.  Eventually, we won’t have a spiritual life, a personal life, a work life…we will have a life and it will be an abundant life, as Christ has promised (John 10:10).
    Through these means, we will come to desire to rejoice always, to pray without ceasing, to give thanks in all circumstances and all the rest of those precious admonitions.  Our love for our Lord not only demands it, but makes it possible! We will know deep in our spirits that whatever we see of this world’s triumphs or tragedies, they are not the last word God is writing.  We are helping God write the next pages of the salvation saga.

      e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Titus 2:11-14  
 2nd Lesson for Christmas
 Eve, 12/24/11

 11For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all, 12training us to renounce impiety and worldly passions, and in the present age to live lives that are self-controlled, upright, and godly, 13while we wait for the blessed hope and the manifestation of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.  14 He it is who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds

    Grace has come and we are in training! Our earthly boot camp in righteous living has begun and continues until Christ returns, ready to pronounce his “Well done” on each of us who persevere. We are called to become those who are “zealous for good deeds.” (see also Micah 6:8)   
    During the holiday season, we are inundated by appeals for donations of money, food, clothing, vehicles…anything we, in our abundance, could possibly release into this world of profound need.  And during this season, our hearts are a bit more tender toward those “others” among us.  But it is perhaps during seasons not so pitched toward charity where we discover the true tenor of our hearts.
    We are approaching that mercifully short season where we ponder making New Year’s resolutions even as we recall so many heartfelt resolutions of the past that faded from our consciousness sometime in mid-January.  But with discipleship, there is no season but rather a path along which we tread, following in the feet of a great “cloud of witnesses.” (Hebrews 12:1) The most important resolution we can make is a re-commitment to follow our Lord’s lead into “self-controlled, upright and righteous lives.” (Titus 2:12)
    This short passage in the letter to Titus is one that jars the modern ear… unfortunately, even the modern Christian ear.  “Zealous,” “upright,” and “righteous” (not to mention “impiety”) are words long gone from mainstream vocabulary. We can find nothing in Scripture to indicate that being baptized is sufficient to bring us to these states of being; God continually calls out our best selves, our best efforts, our sacrificial offerings to bring humanity and all creation back to himself.  But how?
    Pastor and teacher Bill Shiell says of this passage, “Titus sees the flash of the glorious, unexpected appearance—or epiphany—of Christ beginning a transformation that continues throughout our lives.  We are to become students following a new curriculum of grace, reflecting the difference Christ’s presence makes in the world.” The word curriculum means ‘a course of study;’ many Christians refer to this as their ‘rule of life.’ 
    We cannot make of our life a giant self-help project; we can only hand our lives over to God who will gracefully re-mold us into the fullness of his image, as a potter works his clay (Isaiah 64:8). As Paul told the Roman Christians, “Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your minds, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2) As we practice this ‘God’s eye-view’ of our lives and behavior, we will begin to see how it is we are to live faithfully. When we set our hearts and minds on this path within the Christian community, our spiritual and personal growth intensifies and proceeds to strengthen and renew those around us as well.
    We are about to enter a season of epiphanies; perhaps the first one is being called from our idols toward the Christ child…to receive the child, to become like a child and to grow in grace and knowledge as did the Christ child “while we wait for the blessed hope and the manifestation of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.” (Titus 2:13)  And with Isaiah (11:6) we proclaim, “A little child shall lead us.”

 Merry Merry Christmas!

 e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

 Genesis 1:1-5  First reading for 01/08/12

 1In the beginning when God created the heavens and 2the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.  3Then God said, “Let there be light;” and there was light.  4And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness.  5God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

    Genesis 1:1-5 has the feel of sitting in a dark theatre waiting for the curtain to be raised, the orchestra to swell and a great story to begin!  Vast, formless darkness, a great encompassing wind (ruach in Hebrew) swooping and sailing over the waters of the earth like a majestic bird…all in an attempt to display for an early generation of Hebrews the magnificence of our very existence and the God who called it into being! Some biblical scholars describe the entire creation narrative as a confession rather than a recitation of facts, a poem instead of a documentary. And that is where trouble can begin!
    In modern days, one of an assortment of litmus tests for one group of Christians to evaluate another group is how we believe God created the world.  Created the world… not allowed it to evolve, or sat back and lit a fuse on the “big bang.” And, by the way, how many hours were in each of those creation days?  If, in fact, a day is as a thousand years to the Lord (2 Peter 3:8), those were mighty long days indeed to accomplish the birthing of the world.
    There is a big difference between truth writ large and “just the facts, ma’am.” If the word “myth” were not so fraught with the connotation of fiction, it would be a good word to use for this creation story as it also connotes the sense of uber-truth: the truth behind and beyond any mere facts that can be collected by our finite efforts.
    Those who are unyielding in their requirement that the Bible be a literal history; a spreadsheet of spirituality, so to speak, are often those who unintentionally divert others from the faith.  Pope John Paul II is quoted as saying, “The Bible itself speaks to us of the origin of the universe and its make-up, not in order to provide us with a scientific treatise but in order to state the correct relationships of man with God and with the Universe…the Bible does not wish to teach how the heavens were made but how one goes to heaven.” (www.Brittanica.com)
    Any who cling to literalism in all things biblical, run the risk of inserting human understandings into God’s revelation rather than allowing God’s story to be the story of infinite meaning and grace that it actually is.  The sin of pride (hubris in the Greek) can infect even our reading of Scripture!
    This creation passage is linked with this Sunday’s Gospel lesson in Mark relating the story of Jesus’ baptism.  Again, we have water and the Spirit of God bringing order out of chaos, life out of primal elements, redemption back into God’s kingdom, the Light of the World dispelling the darkness of sin.  The creation story comes full circle as God (who never abandoned his creation) has done everything to bring us back to himself and make us a new creation. Read the Thanksgiving at the Font (ELW, p. 230) for a beautiful prayer recounting these connections for us.
    That same water, the wind of the Spirit and the Light present at the beginning of the world are given again to each of us who give ourselves back to God through his Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. As at the beginning, God brings order out of chaos for each of his children. These elemental realities (and vehicles of Baptism and Epiphany) are both fact and, more than fact, the very essence of new and eternal life with God.

e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Jonah 3:1-5,10
Lesson for Sunday, January 22, 2012 

1 The word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time, saying,
2 "Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you."
3 So Jonah set out and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly large city, a three days' walk across.
4 Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's walk. And he cried out, "Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!"
5 And the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast, and everyone, great and small, put on sackcloth.
10 When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it.

    Everybody likes a good story; especially if it is laced with wisdom and a dose of humor.  The Book of Jonah delivers on both counts. 
    Here’s the story in a nutshell:  Our protagonist, the reluctant prophet Jonah, was given the unenviable task of proclaiming doom to Israel’s most fearsome oppressor and enemy, Assyria, and to do so in the midst of its biggest, most forbidding capital city, Nineveh. Upon hearing of his assignment from the Lord, Jonah promptly took off—in the opposite direction!  He freely told his shipmates that he was not only fleeing Nineveh but the Lord himself!  (At least Jonah was self-aware!)  But as the ship begins to pitch, Jonah—in a moment of selflessness—told his mates to throw him overboard as he was no doubt the cause of their distress.   
    Since God wasn’t quite through with Jonah, he arranged for a whale-taxi to swallow up our prophet and courier him right straight back to where God wanted him to be in the first place to confront again his dreaded prophetic assignment.  Accepting his second chance, Jonah took off for Nineveh, stepped nervously into town and delivered the most feeble (almost “under his breath”) proclamation of doom ever recorded as a prophetic utterance.  Amazingly, he got results Billy Graham in his heyday could only dream about: when all was said and done even the animals in that town were decked out in sackcloth and ashes.
    Okay, that should have made Jonah very satisfied.  Nope.  He was furious. Jonah threw a whale of a tantrum (sorry; couldn’t help it) and said, “I just knew you would be merciful to these guys.  That’s why I didn’t want to warn them in the first place.  They repented, you forgave them, and I’m mad.”  He stalked off.  God sighed and grew a tree for Jonah for rest and shade. When it wilted and died the next day, Jonah got ticked off again and decided, in true high dudgeon, that he’d be better off dead.  God just had to be smiling at this high-maintenance prophet of his. So God gently explained to Jonah (as a mother might explain to her mulish child) all about his mercy to this city “in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also many animals.” If you aren’t chuckling by the end of the Book of Jonah, you need a humor transplant!
    Stories, if they are good stories, draw us in and before we know it, we’re identifying with at least one of the characters. It is way too easy to identify with Jonah! How like him we can be when confronted with even an inkling of what God expects of us! And when we then discover we are to minister to a person or situation that frightens us or that we feel should, by rights, remain in its distress, how like Jonah do we run away or stamp our feet or pretend we didn’t hear a thing.  We pray for God’s will to be done every Sunday, but what if that meant we had to do something that scared us nearly to death or offended our very sense of how we believe the world should work?
    I can identify with Jonah…his reluctance to give God his all, his disappointment that God doesn’t see the world the same way he does, the aggravation that mercy trumps justice, my annoyance that things can’t just go my way for a change…all of it.  And yet, I find our great, compassionate patient Lord working with me and around me to accomplish his purposes.  God knows I will get it eventually.  I’d better. The alternative is probably pretty messy, smelly and dark!

 e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

1 Corinthians 9:16-23

 2nd Reading for
 Sunday, February 5, 
 2012

16If I proclaim the
 gospel, this gives me no ground for boasting, for an obligation is laid on me, and woe to me if I do not proclaim the gospel!  17For if I do this of my own will, I have a reward; but if not of my own will, I am entrusted with a commission.  18What then is my reward?  Just this: that in my proclamation I may make the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my rights in the gospel.  19For though I am free with respect to all, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I might win more of them.  20To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews.  To those under the law I became as one under the law (though I myself am not under the law) so that I might win those under the law.  21To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law) so that I might win those outside the law.  22To the weak I became weak, so that I might win the weak.  I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some.  23I do it all for the sake of the gospel, so that I may share in its blessings. 

   The old adage, “Never judge a person until you have walked a mile in their moccasins” came to mind as I read this week’s passage from 1 Corinthians.
    It is a daunting thing to consider becoming, as Paul claimed to have done, “all things to all people, that I might by all means save some” (v. 22). Paul felt compelled by God not only to proclaim the Gospel by example but to engage in a deep identification with each person with whom he dealt.  Last week we read that Paul would never eat meat again if by eating it he was making it more difficult for someone to find God.  In this passage, Paul displayed his com+passion: his willingness to “suffer with” another in order that each might find God as he had.   
    I spent my youth in the Baptist fold (many different stripes of Baptist as the years went along) and the pinnacle of service in that tradition was to be called to a foreign mission field.  Being the rebel that I was (am?) when it came to actual sacrifice, my prayer was that I NOT be called to that particular form of service.  The thought of raising my own salary and returning to congregations after five years abroad to show slides of living in the jungle was almost more than my young mind and heart could bear. Clearly, I was not called in that way.
    But Paul said here that we are all called to proclaim the Gospel.  Not just the evangelicals and not just our clergy!  Our baptism and confirmation constitute our “ordination” into ministry and the proclamation of our faith. It was St. John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople in the last years of the fourth century who is quoted as saying, “Nothing is more useless than a Christian who does not try to save others…I cannot believe in the salvation of anyone who does not work for his neighbor’s salvation.”  No, really.  That is not a televangelist rant.  That is an early Father of the Church speaking.
    So, Paul wrote in Colossians 3:2-3, “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”  I find that a fascinating statement.  When I was younger, I used to say to God (tongue very much in cheek), “Yes, my life is really hidden…I cannot figure out what You want me to do with it!”  Now, when I read those verses, several decades closer to actual death, I think that being thus “dead” is actually an advantage when seeking to follow God.  
    Dead people do not have egoistic goals and are not self-serving.  They actually have a shot at “being all things to all people” in a way that those of us clinging to our earthly, self-filled lives do not. Perhaps this is another way to understand “he who loses his life will save it” (Matthew 16:25 and elsewhere).
    As a new creation in Christ, we have the power to freely interact with people where they are, not where we might prefer they be, and to be with them in their struggles to be re-born.  We can identify with all people in their brokenness, even as we are broken, and with the heart of our loving Savior, we can walk with them toward their salvation.  Being “dead”, we are free from our old fears of “talking religion,” of appearing foolish, of being mistaken for a fundamentalist….  We are also free of the prideful desire to impose our formula for salvation on someone else; instead we can be fully present to share the Joy we have found with those who seek what only we can offer. And that is Good News, indeed!

e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Psalm 92: 1-4, 12-15

 1 It is good to give  thanks to the LORD, to sing praises to your name, O Most High 2 to declare your steadfast love in the morning, and your faithfulness by night 3 to the music of the lute and the harp, to the melody of the lyre.4 For you, O LORD, have made me glad by your work; at the works of your hands I sing for joy.

12 The righteous flourish like the palm tree, and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. 13 They are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. 14 In old age they still produce fruit; they are always green and full of sap 15 showing that the LORD is upright; he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.

    What do blaring trumpets, cart-wheeling angels, harping harpists, and celestial hoedowns bring to mind? The Pearly Gates? Welcome "Home" parties? Heaven gone wild? Actually, I imagine that they play for every earthly sunrise and all of the moments of each day and night that follow. I believe that God and his heavenly kingdom are as grateful for His creation as we should be to Him for creating it. When you look about you and take in the absolute splendor of everyday life He has so generously blessed us with, what is there for which to not be grateful?  We live in a world that offers crimson sunrises, falling snow in moonlight, twirling dolphins, wagging tails, purring hearts, ocean mists, and bare feet in grass. Not to mention smaller things like s'mores over a campfire, in the woods, surrounded by spying deer, squirrels, and the like. Are these the small joys of life or do we just become so overwhelming blind to all that there has been put on this earth for our enjoyment we forget to see them and be thankful?
    Can you imagine your world without these simple things? What if the sun rose in the morning without creating a colorful show? What if after finishing your broccoli and meat there was no sugary dessert? What if the birds did not sing at the break of each new dawn? What if the only birdsong we heard was that of the cawing crow rather than the sweet song of a sparrow? God has given us butterflies, fireflies, rippling creeks, crashing waves, sweet tastes of chocolate and fruit; the delectable desserts of life along with the nourishing everyday foundational human needs. Yet, we forget. We don’t see, we don’t hear, we don’t taste and in return we do not give our praise as we ought to, as we should desire to.
    What if we remembered to take the time to praise God for these heavenly gifts? What if, in return for our praise, He chose to shower us with more surprises along our way? And as you move through life being grateful and praising God you were given all that you have been wanting for? It is now barreling towards you, even though you can't see it? And when it arrives it'll exceed your every expectation, because you have been grateful for every step along the way? Singing praises to the One who provides for your needs and beyond. Wouldn't you be making some really weird noises about now? Whoohoo'ing and thanking God for all that you have and are? It's true, sometimes when you've had a difficult day, or met difficult people, been let down, disappointed, or heartbroken, it's easy to completely forget the most important thing of all... you're alive. Without even trying. It's being alive that makes you rich. So easy to forget, yet such a thing for which to praise God.
    “The righteous will flourish like a palm tree…they will flourish in the courts of our God” because they have sung praises to God for the glorious gifts He bestows. “I sing for joy at the works of your hands.” So you can’t sing (or you think you can’t) – God already knows this. He does not need you rejoicing through song if that is not who you are. He only wants you rejoicing in heart and never forgetting to be grateful for Him and His gifts. Let your soul sing, let your heart rejoice and by your happiness and virtue others will see that you are grateful to the Lord and may also find themselves remembering to show their own gratitude.

 e-Devotion text by Sommar Jastorff.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Matthew 25:1-13
Gospel for Sunday, November 6, 2011 

1 "Then the kingdom of heaven will be like this. Ten bridesmaids took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.  2 "Five of them were foolish, and five were wise.
3 "When the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them; 4 "but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.
5 "As the bridegroom was delayed, all of them became drowsy and slept. 6 "But at midnight there was a shout, 'Look! Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.'
7 "Then all those bridesmaids got up and trimmed their lamps. 8 "The foolish said to the wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' 9 "But the wise replied, 'No! there will not be enough for you and for us; you had better go to the dealers and buy some for yourselves.'
10 "And while they went to buy it, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went with him into the wedding banquet; and the door was shut. 11 "Later the other bridesmaids came also, saying, 'Lord, lord, open to us.' 12 "But he replied, 'Truly I tell you, I do not know you.'
13 "Keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour."

       My all-time favorite bumper sticker proclaimed:  “Jesus is Coming…Look Busy!”  We are warned more than once in New Testament scriptures about both the certainty of his return and yet the uncertain time of that return (Matt. 24:14, 36; 40-42; Mark 13:32; 1 Thess. 5:2; etc.).
    This parable is included in what is called “the eschatological discourse” (meaning parables and stories about the end times). Here we have ten bridesmaids whose wisdom or foolishness is measured by how they planned their day! The key, however, is that it is the Bridegroom who made the judgment, not us.  The church on earth is filled with both wise and foolish bridesmaids (and, as the Bride of Christ all Christians are included as “bridesmaids”). When the foolish young women called out, “Lord, Lord, open to us,” it is poignant indeed because they must have thought that they could just coast through life and slide into home base as it were at the last minute (or the minute after, in fact) and all would be well.  The Bridegroom in this story disagrees.  We have heard this before in Matthew 7:21: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.”
    One of the tasks of the faithful Christian is to balance the desire for the coming of Christ’s heavenly kingdom with the activities that bring in that kingdom!  In other words, to pine after the “end times” instead of working for justice and peace right now is simply un-biblical. (My elders called that being so “heavenly-minded as to be no earthly good!”)  Similarly, to work ONLY for social justice with no kingdom-focus is equally futile and short-sighted.  So, how, in fact, do we prepare for the coming of the Bridegroom?  Well, to quote a popular catch-phrase, “What would Jesus do?” (aka: WWJD) If we read the Great Judgment (25:31—46) and the Great Commission (28:19-20) passages in Matthew, our marching orders are clear.
    I read somewhere that more than one psychiatrist believes that the only therapeutic question worth posing is, “How are you planning to spend your time?”  Paul instructed the Thessalonian Christians on how to approach living in the “in between times” (cf., 1 Thess. 5:1—11). Vigilance and perseverance are required during the great expanse of the “now and not yet” in which we live; the kingdom of heaven appears intermittently, almost like a dream. It is the dream for which we are asked to “Keep awake!”  That is our faith task.  In the long wait, it is too easy to lose heart, to forget to replenish the oil of our spiritual lives, to allow the distractions of this world to dissipate our hope for our true heavenly home and the eternal banquet with our Lord and the redeemed of all creation!
    As the book of James puts it, “…you do not know about tomorrow.  What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Whoever knows what is right to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin” (4:14, 17).
    Our restored free will is all about choices.  And our choices will determine before God whether or not we have been wise or foolish.  Thank God indeed for the gift of the Holy Spirit which enables us both to desire and to choose wisely for God’s glory and our great joy. 

e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Matthew 25:31-46
Gospel for Sunday, November 20, 2011

31 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory.  32 "All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats,
33 "and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left.
34 "Then the king will say to those at his right hand, 'Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; 35 "'for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 "'I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.'
37 "Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38 "'And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? 39 "'And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?' 40 "And the king will answer them, 'Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.'
41 "Then he will say to those at his left hand, 'You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; 42 "'for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 "'I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.' 44 "Then they also will answer, 'Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?' 45 "Then he will answer them, 'Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.' 46 "And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

    We are used to presidents, not kings.  We elect them and in the next election cycle, if we’re not happy, we boot them out!  Kings don’t come and go so easily; and with kings, it’s the subjects who get the boot if they are “unprofitable servants” (cf. Luke 17:10).  As Christians, we are asked to participate in two worlds, so to speak.  The earthly world where we engage a government that often disappoints or betrays our trust and the Kingdom of God where we are full citizens with responsibilities to carry out that fulfill God’s desires for both “worlds.”
    So, if Christ is King and we are his humble, obedient servants…why are the hungry not fed, the sick not healed, the prisoners not visited…at least in numbers that encourage others to find and serve our King along with us?
    It is telling that both the “sheep” and the “goats” in this final judgment scene are equally surprised by God’s decision about their action (or inaction).  Both ask with bewilderment, “Lord, when was it that we saw you…?” which seems to indicate a lack of imagination.  C. S. Lewis said that if we truly saw people as God did, we would bow down to them as to royalty!
    “The load, or weight, or burden, of my neighbor's glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship--or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people.” (emphasis mine)
   Martin Luther once wrote, “God doesn’t need your good works; your neighbor does.”  Each time we choose to feed the hungry, visit the sick or those in prison, shelter the homeless or clothe the naked we are exercising our spiritual muscles. When we neglect or refuse to participate in what have been called these “corporal works of mercy,”  we become weak and ineffective Christians and, as this gospel passage suggests, subject to a judgment we would rather avoid.  Each decision we make takes us further down one road or the other.  The road “paved with good intentions” has a great and dreadful void at its end.
    During worship we are asked, “What do you believe?” prior to our recitation of the Apostles’ Creed.  This passage of Matthew’s gospel prompts the further question, “If you believe all of this…what are you doing about it?”  In a culture that often does not want to listen to anyone who actually has a set of beliefs that have consequences and a culture in which punishment is only reserved for those “unlucky enough to get caught,” we have a hard sell in communicating Christ.
    We best communicate God’s love and desire for his people when we are imitating Christ and his compassion for others.  It is our vocation while on this earth to be the hands and feet, the head and heart of our Lord to the rest of his children.  The old adage, “Charity begins at home” is actually quite wise.  For most of us, that is our first experience of unconditional love.  Being able to receive the gifts of that love and then learning to give that love ourselves, we begin to understand what God is asking of us.  When we live out of God’s unconditional love for us, the world will know in whom we believe. And through those we serve we will come to know our Lord and King.

e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

2 Peter 3:8-15a 
 2nd Reading for
 Sunday December 4, 2011

 8 But do not ignore this one
 fact, beloved, that with the
 Lord one day is like a
 thousand years, and a
 thousand years are like one
 day.  9 “The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you,” not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance.   10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.
11 Since all of these things are to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness,  12 waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire?  13 But, in accordance with his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.
14 Therefore, beloved, while you are waiting for these things, strive to be found by him at peace, without spot or blemish; 15 and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation.

    Remember the old Snoopy cartoons where Charlie Brown would look longingly to the heavens and cry, “How long, O Lord, how long?” (And we know Lucy was the source of his anguish!)  I have found myself crying out in a similar fashion, especially when I’m in pain or afraid for our world or just fed up with things.  And yet, this sense of “When are you coming back?” began very early in the Christian era.  As the original followers began to die off, so did the hopes and expectations of some believers.  This is what Peter is addressing in this passage.  The reasoning seemed to be: If there really isn’t going to be an imminent return (or perhaps any return at all), then we really are on our own and can pretty much do whatever we want; no judgment expected.  How very familiar this sounds even today!
    As a child, the common refrain on our way to visit our relatives in Minnesota was, “Are we there yet?”  Truly, for us kids “a day was like a thousand years.” But we firmly believed we would eventually arrive in Minneapolis.  It appears as though these early believers were having a crisis of faith and Peter is forcefully displaying what will indeed happen and how they (we) should live in preparation for “the coming day of God.”
    Peter is affirming God’s righteousness when he emphasizes the certainty of the Lord’s return even as he admits it will come like a thief (See also, 1 Thessalonians 5:2 where the return is as a “thief in the night;” and Matthew 24:44 and Luke 12:40).  Because the Lord’s return hadn’t happened shortly after Christ’s resurrection (and of course, has yet to happen), Peter reminds us that God’s time is not our time.  What we think is taking “forever” is, for God, like a day. God operates  outside of time and prefers, as Peter states in 3:9, to tarry until as many as possible come to know and trust him.  As the psalmist says in 90:4-12, “For a thousand years in your sight are like yesterday when it is past, or like a watch in the night…so teach us to count our days, that we may gain a wise heart.”
    In fact, Peter is reinforcing this Psalm as he urges the early Christians (and by extension, all believers) to continue to live upright lives to prepare us for our lives in the eternal kingdom of God where all evil will have been swept away and only Love remains.  And each of us is given ample time for the amendment of our lives and growth in grace and peace with God and each other. 
    The depiction of the fiery end of all things is not so much to strike fear in our hearts as to give us a graphic picture of the end of all unpleasantness, evil and misery.  It is an image to let us know that something unimaginably better than what we know now will be put in place by God for his eternal glory and our eternal joy.  And so Peter delivers in this passage the admonition to live as though this has already taken place because indeed it will.  
    Earlier in this epistle (2:2), Peter makes the connection between a lack of faith in Christ’s return and the eventual devolving of one’s moral life. Blaise Pascal, the Christian mathematician and author of Pensées, wrote what has come to be known as “Pascal’s Wager.”  He said, “Live as if you would see God in the end.  If you see God, your faith has been justified.  If not, you have lost nothing.”  That is the safest bet there is.

 e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Luke 1:26-38   
 Gospel Lesson for the 4th
 Sunday in Advent,
 12/18/11

 26 In the sixth month the
 angel Gabriel was sent by
 God to a town in Galilee
 called Nazareth, 27to a
 virgin engaged to a man
 whose name was Joseph, of the house of David.  The virgin’s name was Mary.  28And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one!  The Lord is with you.” 29But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be.  30The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.  31And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus.  32 He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David.  33 He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”  34Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?”  35The angel said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy, he will be called Son of God.  36 And Now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren.  37 For nothing will be impossible with God.”  38Then Mary said, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”  Then the angel departed from her.

     The first two chapters of Luke contain some of our most treasured songs/prayers, all of which have been included in liturgies for centuries.  The Magnificat (1:46-55), the Benedictus (1:67-79), the Gloria (2:14) and the Nunc Dimittis (2:29-32). These canticles joyously express the entire scope of salvation history, from the first Advent of Jesus to the second Advent when Christ returns in glory.
Luther wrote about Mary in his Commentary on the Magnificat,

“Tell me, was not hers a wondrous soul? She finds herself the Mother of God, exalted above all mortals, and still remains so simple and so calm that she does not think of any poor serving maid as beneath her.  Oh, we poor mortals! If we come into a little wealth or might or honor, or even if we are a little prettier than other men, we cannot abide being made equal to anyone beneath us, but are puffed up beyond all measure.  What should we do if we possessed such great and lofty blessings?”

    But, we DO possess such great and lofty blessings, because even as Jesus physically entered into Mary that she might bring him forth as God’s Son on earth, so he enters each of us as by faith we accept the call of God in Christ Jesus.  We are called to be like Mary, en-fleshing God’s love for the world.
    Mary’s Song harks back to Hannah’s Song in the Old Testament (1 Samuel 2:1-10), voiced on the occasion of her dedication of her son Samuel to God. Both are songs of praise to a God who not only provides, but who provides and sustains those who are least able to sustain themselves. “His mercy is to those who fear him” (v. 50): It is the upside-down, tables-are-turned Gospel message of God’s faithfulness and provision for his children. And it is sung by each of us as it was sung by Mary; that is, by any humble servant who is willing to receive the Word of God.
    We not only sing these realities, we are called to help enact them by our participation in God’s activities in the world.  Mary’s “Yes” was anticipated by all of creation and it inaugurated the entrance of the Kingdom of God into our lives and into our world. Our “Yes” to God continues the Holy Spirit’s activity in the world.  It is not a cliché to remind ourselves that we are the hands and feet, eyes and ears, head and heart of God.
    Noted author Kathleen Norris writes about this passage,

“It is the barren Hannahs, the young Davids and the innocent Marys who hear and believe, and further God’s reign on earth.  As many times as we turn away from their witness, God has put us together on the road to Jerusalem. It is never the right time, and we are never ready. We have other, more important things to do and places to be.  The burden is too great for us to carry.  But once we say, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord,’ the angel will depart, and the path will open before us.”

    In Luke 1:37, the angel declares that nothing is impossible with God.  That was proclaimed to Mary but, as fellow bearers of the image of God, we also must hear that declaration and live faithfully out of its Truth.  God waits for us to join with Mary who responded, “Be it unto me according to your word.”

      e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

Numbers 6:22  
Lesson for 01/01/12

The Lord bless and keep you;
The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; The Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.”

    The words of a loving God to His people. This is not ordinary love… a love that would demand love in return. This is a real, nourishing love that just simply IS! It is not pretentious or demanding; it just is. God tells Moses to bless His people with this love, real, nourishing and strengthening love. God is thankful that we, His people, allow and receive His love. He has no expectation; He does not even need your love in return for Him to share His love with you. What if we, in turn, could also share our love in such a way that the receiver is not obliged to love us in return?  What if our love could be shared just simply because it is easy to share and give love? 
   It seems we are more equipped or capable of this around the Christmas season… a time when we take the time to remember others, give of ourselves, our finances, our smiles and Christmas greetings.  At Christmas and a few surrounding weeks, we find ourselves and others sharing the light and love of God that has been shone upon us. (“The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you.”) In lyrics by the Trans Siberian Orchestra it is stated, “Christmas stays if we don’t forget its meaning.” What if its meaning is knowing that God shines his face upon us, is gracious to us, gives us peace and all that we must do with it is receive it?   But the greatest gift is what we CAN DO with it, share all of this with others! 
    Let His light shine through you; be gracious to others; help others find peace. “If our kindness this season [Christmas] is just pretending, if we pretend long enough never giving up, it just might be who we are!” (Trans Siberian Orchestra lyrics). As this Christmas season comes to a close, remember whatever it is you do in life, you always end up touching others. So, let the light and love with which God has blessed His people since the days of Moses shine through us as we become vessels of His real love.    

 e-Devotion text by Sommar Jastorff.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

 Psalm 139:1-6
 Scripture Reading for 
 Sunday, January 15,
 2012 

 1 O Lord, you have searched me and known me. 2You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from far away. 3You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. 4Even before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it completely. 5You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. 6Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it.”

    Is there anyone in the world who feels adequately loved and appreciated?  I have spent precious years of life in creative attempts to fill that “God-shaped vacuum” (Blaise Pascal’s phrase) with everything under the sun so that I won’t despair or be forced to face any sort of existential aloneness. St. Augustine, alas, had it right: “Thou hast made us for Thyself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.”
    However, as anyone in any significant relationship knows…as much as we desire intimacy, we also run from it.  We don’t actually want anyone to know absolutely everything about us.  As soon as Adam and Eve ate that fateful fruit, they hid from God and abandoned the intimacy they had experienced with the Almighty. We, in fact, often hide the truth of ourselves from ourselves! 
    The Samaritan woman called for everyone to come and see the Man who told her everything she had ever done.  I don’t recall a long line forming.  One of the reasons our forebears joined the chorus to “eliminate” Jesus was precisely his laser-focus on who we really are; humanity in its fallen state does not want to be “hemmed in” (Psalm 139:5) by God.
    Francis Thompson’s poem The Hound of Heaven captures this sense of our futile quest to find an easier god than God.  From the first stanza: 

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears
I hid from Him,

But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat—and a Voice beat
More instant than the Feet—
‘All things betray thee, who betrayest Me.’

    Luther wrote that whatever we fear or love or trust the most is, de facto, our god.  And if that is not God himself, inevitably, it will fail us.  To paraphrase Thompson, ‘All things betray us if they substitute for God.’ The Living God will be God in our lives, one way or another.
    The very thing we fear most (intimacy with God) is also the thing we most need.  As someone once said while going through extreme trials, “At times like this, I am glad I don’t have to go to God as a stranger.”
    Foolish children we who flee from our own salvation!  God knows us minutely and fundamentally from the first moment of our conception and before. And still he loves us with an all-surpassing, all-encompassing love we cannot even pretend to understand or fully apprehend.
    How freeing it is to know that we cannot hide from God!  When the reality begins to dawn, what we fear to lose by giving it to God (our very self) is given back “pressed down, shaken together and running over” (Luke 6:38) for such is God’s great love for each of his creatures.
    Paul was convinced that absolutely nothing on earth or in heaven could separate us from the love of God (Romans 8:38-39). And Jesus—Love Himself—said, “Lo, I am with you always” (Matthew 28:20).  For God’s relentless interest and pursuit of us, thanks be to God!

     e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

1Corinthians 8:1-13 

 2nd Reading  for
 Sunday, January
 29, 2012

 
1Now concerning food sacrificed to idols: we know that “all of us possess knowledge.”  Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. 2Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge; 3but anyone who loves God is known by him.
4Hence, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that “no idol in the world really exists,” and that “there is no God but one.” 5Indeed, even though there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth – as in fact there are many gods and many lords - 6 yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.
7It is not everyone, however, who has this knowledge.  Since some have become so accustomed to idols until now, they still think of the food they eat as food offered to an idol; and their conscience, being weak, is defiled.  8“Food will not bring us close to God.”  We are no worse off it we do not eat, and no better off if we do. 9But take care that this liberty of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak. 10For if others see you, who possess knowledge, eating in the temple of an idol, might they not, since their conscience is weak, be encouraged to the point of eating food sacrificed to idols? 11So by your knowledge those weak believers for whom Christ died are destroyed. 12But when you thus sin against members of your family, and wound their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ.  13Therefore, if food is a cause of their falling, I will never eat meat, so that I may not cause one of them to fall.

    The older I get, the less I know.  And the easier it is to be humble about it.  I remember my arrogant youth and how I could solve the world’s problems in one evening over two drinks—why didn’t everyone else see how right I was when it was so clear to me? And now I see how little I really knew and how comical I must have been at times. The biggest thing I did not yet see was that in the Christian scheme of things, love must always trump knowledge.  The gridlock in Congress could be broken if they realized that dialogue and cooperation are required to avoid self-righteousness, moral blindness and other all-too-common relational blunders that affect millions of people. “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up” (v. 1).
    Paul, in this wonderful teaching epistle to the young Corinthian Christians, is attempting to form their spiritual character and conscience amidst a diverse culture which we can surely identify as similar to our society today.  Our world is hamstrung on the one hand by “political correctness,” and, on the other, by a lack of social parameters around appropriate behavior.  We need Paul’s guidance as much as the Corinthians did. Paul is attempting to introduce what I think of as “moral etiquette” into our interactions with our fellow Christians and also with the world as Christians are forced to defend or explain other Christians’ actions on the public stage.
    Paul uses the presenting issue of eating food sacrificed to idols to guide believers into a picture of how mature Christians deal with seemingly intractable issues. Apparently, in those days it was hard to find meat to eat that hadn’t been sacrificed to idols. The problem was that Christians who had been practicing the faith for awhile understood that this meat was not tainted by its original use as the idols themselves did not really exist. The new Christians, however—fresh from their idol worship—held too many bad associations with this meat and for them this was a very difficult, uncomfortable issue.
    What is juxtaposed in this passage is our freedom in Christ with our responsibility toward others…the knowledge we have with the love we share.  The thrust of it all is that people are more important than practices and there is more involved in any issue than simply winning (or being “right”). Doing the right thing, even if we must sacrifice something (often a bit of pride or convenience) to avoid hampering another’s faith, seems to be the lesson here. As any parent knows, you love your children more than those things you give up for their sakes. To be able to say we will never again do something if it jeopardizes the faith of a “weaker” brother or sister is Christian maturity—agapé love—in full flower.
    One of the gifts of the ecumenical movement has been to learn how other groups of Christians have responded to various issues and challenges of life and how they can help us more fully discern God’s will in the world.  This keeps us from becoming imperious know-it-alls who even repel Christians from Christianity! No matter how much we think we know, God’s ways are not our ways; therefore, we must impose love -  not judgment -  in our dealings with each other. We’re not called to give up our convictions; but to truly listen to the convictions of others and devise a path where each may walk with integrity, without becoming a stumbling block (Romans 14:13).
    May our only goal be to clear the path for others to come near to God.

e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.

1Corinthians 9:24-27

 2nd Lesson for
 Sunday, February  12, 2012

 24Do you not
 know that in a race the runners all compete, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win it. 25Athletes exercise self-control in all things; they do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable one. 26So I do not run aimlessly, nor do I box as though beating the air; 27but I punish my body and enslave it, so that after proclaiming to others I myself should not be disqualified.

    The past several decades have produced a mountainous pile of books, DVDs, and flyers touting various approaches to self-discipline, physical fitness, vitamin and mineral regimes for life-extension. Even Christian books have their own slant on these same themes.  Being physically fit is the mantra of the day.
    Paul, in this short passage, is building on his previous admonitions concerning how Christians are to live.  He uses the metaphor of the athlete because his original audience was very familiar with the Isthmian games, played in Corinth, which were quite similar to the Olympics.  But Paul was not necessarily endorsing a physical regime so much as a spiritual and mental “game,” if you will, that focused the Christian on the endurance race of spreading the Good News of Jesus Christ. I believe he really did “punish and enslave” (v. 27) his physical being to bring it into the service of his spiritual goals.  Paul wanted neither a flabby body nor a flabby faith!
    I generally think reality TV is an uninviting way to spend an evening…with one exception. I really enjoy “The Amazing Race!”  Granted, some of the tasks they must undertake are a bit bizarre, but the concept of using your wits and your physical strength to travel the world and arrive at your final destination successfully (and in first place) is fun to watch.  I have seen contestants that, by rights, should not be able to tackle such a journey and have watched them stay in the race week after week.
    And so it is with us in our most amazing race: the Christian life!  As a recovering couch potato, I would rather use a different metaphor for my life in Christ, but Paul is quite fond of this metaphor (see also his several writings to Timothy: 1 Tim. 4:8, 2 Tim. 2:5; 4:7-8 and in Philippians 3:12-16).
    In our sports-saturated world, we know exactly what it takes to be a star athlete: near-fanatical levels of discipline, sacrifice, teamwork, and encompassing it all: self-control.  As a veteran dieter, I understand both the reality of self-control and the elusive nature of maintaining it without a thorough-going dependence upon the Lord.  Paul is calling for this same dependence so that we will each win the prize which, in this instance, is the prize of souls redeemed.  This will be our crown, our imperishable wreath: that we persevered through any and everything that faced us as we lived out (in the words of a popular Christian book) “the purpose-driven life” of one called by God.  We don’t even have to take “first place;” we must simply finish the race God has set before us.
    Americans are still recovering (or not) from the excesses of the latter half of the twentieth century, as well as the spirit of the age that said “If it feels good, do it.”  It can make this passage from Paul a hard saying to absorb.  And yet, if we think about those times in our lives when we have had a singular focus on something or someone we loved, we will remember that no sacrifice was too great in service of that love.  And that is what Jesus also thought and felt about us as he first set aside his godhead to become like us and then, through his death, sacrificed all that he might save all.  He is our model and our motivation.
    We know we can’t run this race alone and cannot even be relied upon to do so. We need our friends in Christ to run this race alongside us so that, when we stumble, we can be lifted up. “Let us run, and not be weary” (Isaiah 40:31) so that when we cross that final finish line, we can say, along with Paul, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith (2 Timothy 4:7).”

 e-Devotion text by Nance Wabshaw.
If you are interested in becoming an e-Devotion author, please contact Carole Becker at cbecker@allsaintsphoenix.org or 602 866 9191 ext.105.