Homecoming Worship at Thiel College - Prayers and Homily

Author's note: because I haven't preached a full service since I left Minnesota and due to the nature of the spectacular service and the astounding mishap that happened right before Holy Communion, I thought this really did qualify as a Campfire Chat blog post. 

Prayer of the Day

Holy God, your mercy is great and your love endures forever. We are mindful of the many paths, roads and sidewalks we’ve traveled to join together on this morning. No matter the distance or the means of our travel to Homecoming, keep us ever mindful that our home is always in you, O God, and that you welcome us on this morning as we come to remember, to pray and to gather as the Beloved community of Jesus. Be with us all and hold us fast, in his gentle, holy and blessed name we pray. Amen. 

Luke 17:11-19

On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

I don’t know if you just walked down Brother Martin’s walk to the Chapel or came up on one of the many sidewalks that brings you from down campus to this place. Alumni and friends, maybe you crossed stateliness or journeyed from the next county. Since I’ve moved to PA, I noticed that I’m crossing little boundaries often on a daily basis: from Mercer County to various townships and boroughs, not a day goes by that each of us journeys over lines that we may not even notice. As we’ve come to huddle up in this place of grace, we are all one in Christ Jesus, gathering here to pray...
       God of all journeys, we've come from near and far to gather this Homecoming weekend and blessed by you, we wait for your word of hope and renewal. Be with us all and may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable, O God, our rock and our redeemer. Amen. 

Yes, there is a Chicago Street in Greenville, PA

Last weekend, it was a great blessing to travel with twelve Thiel College students to the Installation of the new Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton. If you don’t know much or anything about her, she is our neighbor just to the west of us in Cleveland. On August 14, at the ELCA Churchwide Assembly in Pittsburg, she was elected to be the first female presiding bishop in the history of Lutherans in the USA. 

Getting ready to head out to Chicago at Chicago and Alan Streets with Louie, Audra, Liz, Cheryl, Amanda, Ivey, Rachel, Bess, Stephanie, Sean, Saba, Robert and me

Many of the Thiel College students are here on this morning. Some of the students are Lutherans who are very active or some by their own confession are, “not so much” active. There were students of other Christian communions and our friend, international student from Pakistan and the disputed region of Kashmir, who was a joyful traveler as well. We visited our friends at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago, met friends at the installation and also traveled to Valparaiso University on the way home. Everywhere we went, we made friends. Some of our students had never been out of PA. So the fun tradition of our trip was to stop – yes, stop – at each state border, jump out and to take a photo by the new state sign welcoming us across the border (two of them are in the back serving as greeters and they are laughing).  No one stopped us. No one asked for our credentials, ID’s or documents as we made our way west, state-by-state-by-state-by-state-by-state. 

First year student, Robert, and international student, Saba 

Saba, Rachel, Sean, Bess, Cheryl and Robert

Saba, Robert and me

Bess, Sean, Rachel and Cheryl

The city of Chicago, Illinois' welcome sign is over the toll road

Uneventful border crossings aren't always possible. There was no way to get out for a photo-op coming into Chicago. As you can see (or may know) the sign is across the toll road. It would be dangerous to get out here and plus it was raining. Happy border crossings aren't always the case across the world on the borders between peoples, governments and nations. Like between: 

Israel/Palestine 

India/Kashmir

North/South Korea

US/Mexico

Galilee/Samaria…for Jesus.

On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee…

Jesus was traveling through a border region. The kind of place that wasn’t very safe. Not then, not now. Disputed border regions are thin places where tensions run high. Thin places where mistrust and suspicion are the rule of the thin, tight line between the one place and the other.

Somehow, perhaps because no one wanted them on “their side,” ten lepers (outcast, unclean and unwelcome in any community) found themselves in betwixt and between…a real no man’s land…for the untouchables, the incurable and the banished. There, they were stuck. Until Jesus passed through their hellish tent city.

Jesus had been traveling around and about Palestine and Israel (that’s how we’d know those places today). He went to places he wasn’t really supposed to go and met with people he wasn’t really supposed to meet – like lepers – and people he wasn’t supposed to touch – never touch.

No wonder they called out to the traveling healer-rabbi. News had spread of his healing power and compassion. Keeping their distance, as they knew they ought, the gravely, terminally ill lepers with flesh falling off their bodies, cried out. Jesus commands them to go, as was the custom in Jewish law when one had leprosy, one would go have it checked out by the priest. Maybe it was a sprint to the priest’s place. Maybe they thought it was a test to see who could get there the fastest. I don’t know – if Jesus told you to do something and you believed in his power to heal – I think I might take off running, like many of our 5K racers did yesterday morning. Maybe, just maybe the foreign dude (the hated Samaritan, for Jews and Samaritans did not get along), had second thoughts about showing up on the door step of the Jewish priests knowing that he’d be turned away yet again. So, he slows down – just a tad to notice that – yes! – he’s been healed! So, it wasn’t a race to get to the priest’s house after all. Everything’s back to normal, no skin is falling off his face or limbs – he’s just healed. And with that he turns on his heals to race back to Jesus.

To Jesus. 

In absolute humility and profound gratitude, the Samaritan leper guy falls to his face. Not just his face to the ground kneeling, but he lies prostate – flat, his entire body laid out belly-to-the-ground in gratitude before the healer-rabbi guy. And he was, as Luke reminds us, a Samaritan. A nobody. A ne’er-do-well sort of fellow. But this guy is filled with gratitude to the marrow of his bones and he wants to thank Jesus.

They other nine are long gone of to Chez Priest/Casa Priest, but the dude, the guy who people wrote off as a loser all the time – he gives thanks. Jesus takes note of this. “Where are the nine – didn’t they notice and turn around to give praise to God?” Humph – Jesus must have shrugged noting this guy who had done pretty much a belly flop in front of him. “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

But, wasn’t he already well? What about his behavior made him – more well? My hunch is that Jesus thought about healing in bigger terms than anyone around him then or anyone who hears this story now can comprehend. I think that healing has more to do with our entire beings than just our mere physical healing, that is so sought after and important. Sometimes that kind of healing doesn’t come…it’s true, we know this having lived our lives. But other kinds of healing come when we let go and commit entire beings to a life of gratitude to God and to God’s beloved community – the people of God with us on earth.

“…your faith has made you well…” Jesus told the once-leprous man. It may be a bit of a cliché, but if we have an attitude of gratitude, it can make all the difference in our world and to those around us. Our ability to turn back, turn around and give thanks to God at the feet of Jesus can make the entire difference in our lives. An attitude of gratitude, not one of privilege and haughty behavior will win the day, every time.

With the grace and leading of Jesus we are called to journey with him to the thin, border places our lives and our world to bring healing and hope where is only misery and despair. Jesus has gone before you and he is with you…so, gather up the discarded people, scoop up the throw-away children and cherish the moth-balled seniors. All are treasured and precious in God’s sight. Love and cherish them as God loves and cherishes you!

And above all, be thankful, truly and deeply thankful for all, here at homecoming and all places. 

Journey with Jesus and love the world in his name. Amen.

October 13, 2013: Prayers of the People

Bess: With grateful hearts we come before you, O God, to praise you and give thanks for your great compassion which covers the whole earth: Hear our prayers, O Holy One, as we life up your creation, and especially as we pray for those who are ill, those who feel unclean and the ones who are alone and outcast. God of grace; Hear our prayer.

Sean: Gracious God, we give thanks to you with our whole hearts: Raise up prophets within your Church to heal and renew your children, that those who live with stigma and prejudice may feel your mercy, and those who stay at a distance because of fear and rejection may be embraced and healed. God of grace; Hear our prayer.

Bess: Almighty One, fill our leaders with compassion and vision, that they may recognize the suffering of those beyond our borders, in border towns and places of despair.  Empower and inspire each one of us to reach out to them with empathy and care. God of grace; Hear our prayer.

Sean: Compassionate One, look upon the lepers of the world, upon those who suffer from HIV/AIDS and other devastating diseases throughout the world: Comfort them with your grace, and empower humanity to use our abundant resources to bring healing and love to our most vulnerable neighbors. God of grace; Hear our prayer.

 Bess: Cleanse our hearts, O God, that this community may be a haven of faithfulness and service, free from arrogance and division, reaching out with gratitude to reconcile and heal the earth. God of grace; Hear our prayer.

Sean: Wondrous God, strengthen those for whom we pray with your comforting Word. We turn back to thank you for all the abundant blessings and grace.
 Raise us up to new life with Jesus, we will also live with him and follow his ways of healing and peace. God of grace; Hear our prayer.

PJ: Fill our hearts, minds and imaginations with such expectancy and thanks, O God, that we may walk in deep gratitude for all around us and that we would practice this gratitude with glad and generous hearts. Keep us ever mindful of your healing presence that comes to us through Jesus Christ. Into your loving arms we commend all for whom we pray, fill them with your healing peace through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Facebook post following the worship service:

Well, it's just hard to know how to describe this morning's Thiel CollegeHomecoming worship service of remembrance at The Chapel at Thiel College. It went from wholly amazing with incredible music by the handbell choirs, choral tones and harmonies by the Thiel choirs woven with the voices of the Alumni Choir and worshippers alike, to holy beauty in word and song to holy pyro-fire, Batman!, as the 100+ candles in remembrance of the alumni who died last year since Homecoming melted down into the sand to become a melted pool of wax with 100 tiny, little flames floating that caused the glass rim to crack - no, crack is not right - snap, explode off the bowl sending the wax river with little flames over the edge, the bowl breaking, the college President and his wife in the front row and Chapel staff standing right there at the ready to feed the people with bread and wine turning around to feebly blow at the little flames, when a wonderful choir alumnus who is a chemistry teacher comes bounding forward down the aisle like a super hero with a fire extinguisher ready to douse the flaming wax river flow - when all the flames went out in the sand just as he bounded into action and I whispered to him, "I think it's out." He said, "Well, yes it is..." So, he went back and communion continued and the choir kept singing and the Chapel staff was calm in the face of danger and it was lovely, wholly amazing and holy. No one was hurt and as worshippers left the Chapel, they were so kind and grateful and said the loved the service in spite of the candle-wax lava flow and one elderly woman whose husband we had named because he died last year and was there with her daughter (also a Thiel alumna) said that he was an outspoken, feisty fellow and that he would have loved the service and would have loved the candle-explosion and she was convinced that he was there in spirit and must have had something to do with the careening, flaming wax flow. So, all was well as I led my first large Homecoming worship service at Thiel College. It was a blessing and I am wholly and holy blessed to be at this place of grace. Cody Danner took a photo of the remains of the candle-explosion - too bad we didn't get a pic before, because it was really quite pretty. 

The Chapel before Homecoming worship via Saba Pervez

The Candles of Remembrance table via Cody Danner

Candles of Remembrance table via Cheryl Marshall

30 Years of Ordained Ministry June 5, 2013

On June 5, 1983, I was ordained into the ministry of word and sacrament as a pastor of the Lutheran Church in America. As a new pastor at synod assemblies I would sit and applaud in utter amazement at the pastors who were recognized for 25, 30, 40 or more years of service. It seemed incredible to me then, just as it does now. Except now the pastor is me. When I look at the photograph of me with my sisters, I smile. I was twenty-six years old, a new mother and fresh out of seminary. I had completed my last year of seminary at Vanderbilt Divinity School in Nashville, TN. When I look at my bright, smiling face I see the young woman who had big dreams for serving God and loving all people, especially the hurting and lonely children, teens and young adults, in Jesus’ name.

June 5, 1983: My sisters, Kathy (left) and Carol (right) with me on ordination day.

When I’m asked to give talks about my life as an ordained woman-pastor with various groups, I usually divide up my life in the before-I-was-ordained life and the after-I-was-ordained life. In high school, I was one of the girls nominated for homecoming queen, served at the vice president of my class (in those days all the class presidents were boys), and was voted “the girl most likely to succeed.” I excelled at sports, music, academics, theatre, art, leadership and being a good friend. I spoke out against discrimination against girls, and back then there was plenty that we were told we couldn’t do.

At Our Savior Lutheran Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, I loved almost everything about church: hymns, singing the pastor’s communion liturgy parts under my breath once a month, playing hide-and-seek after confirmation class, youth group (we kind of had a small youth group), and Vacation Bible School. I watched the boys serving as acolytes and I wondered why the girls didn’t’ get to do that? I asked why. The answer: because we were girls and not boys.

This didn’t make sense to me. In confirmation class I was just as smart, maybe even smarter than the boys, I could outrun them on the playground and was stronger than some of them, played jacks with the best of them and I was in church almost every Sunday with my family. That job didn’t look too tough. So, I politely asked the pastor if I could be an acolyte. My query was met with a look of incredulity, the pastor shrugged and walked away. I asked again and this time he took the request to the church council, all of whom were men (one of them being my father). Many years later my dad told me about this and that the men talked about this for about an hour. I think that my dad, a champion of his daughters being able to do anything, helped them and they voted, yes, I could be an acolyte.

I was proud that day I was the first girl acolyte. I knew exactly what to do. I loved wearing the red cassock and white surplice holding my acolyte staff lighting the candles in order, carrying the communion trays as I gathered up the tiny glasses from the people of God kneeling at the altar rail. But I knew I wanted to be a pastor before I was an acolyte. I just didn’t tell anybody until later.

Later, I told that same pastor I wanted to be a pastor. Eventually, my home congregation changed the seminary fund from "Sons of the Ministry," to "Sons and Daughters of the Ministry" and they sent me to seminary. I am the first and, to date, the only daughter of the congregation who is a pastor. I wanted to be a pastor well before 1970 when the LCA and the ALC voted to welcome the gifts of women to ordained life. I always talk about that vote this way: it wasn’t that they “let” women be pastors, though I would hear people discuss it that way. To hear some male pastors and some of the laity talk about the ordination of women, it was like listening to people sounding Eeyore-ish go on and on about how, “oh no, how horrible it was that these uppity women wanted to be pastors,” and “oh no, the church is going to fall apart and the no one will come to listen to a women preach,” and “oh no, don’t they know their place and the orders of creation; what if they get pregnant, what if they’re having their monthly time…” Really, they said all that and much more that I won’t repeat in this post.

To my mind it was more like: finally the church had come to the understanding that it would welcome women to the ordained ministry because it was a good thing for the church, not just because some women thought they wanted to be pastors. Throughout the centuries from the very early beginnings of the Church, there have been women who felt called to serve as pastors. It was just that some men in the church wouldn’t let them – for a very long time. So, for me it’s like finally recognizing that no one should stand in the way of qualified people who feel called to serve God and our Savior Jesus.

“So, what happened to the girl most likely to succeed in her after-ordination life?” you may wonder. That is a very good question (she replies, buying a little time to collect thirty years of thoughts and memories)!

 

June 5, 1983: Chaplain Richard Elvee, Bishop Herb Chilstrom, random man, the Rev. Joy Bussert laying hands on me in Christ Chapel, Gustavus Adolphus College, Saint Peter, MN - also my internship site.

Well, as you might expect it’s mixed, but not really balanced, as if one were looking at the wonderful yin-yang symbol of balance. 

It’s not like the theatre masks either, the happy/sad faces balanced together. 

It’s more like the yin-yang black and white all swirled together all messy-like and the faces merged as well.

 

Shall I start with the happy-sad or the sad-happy mess? Both? Yes. I think I shall start with death because, while the heart of the pastor always carries the joy of the living, we the ones who are called to the thin places of life. We come and minister to the dying and we also gather with the broken hearted in the death of their beloved ones. More often than not, we bring our own tears and smiles to the mix. For all of my love of joyous ministry moments, I feel closest to the bone of my calling while ministering to the dying and the grieving. Since I’ve seen the face of death up close, I know how important this is.

This isn’t morbid. For me it’s a holy-to-the-bone sense of being where God needs me to be. Every day, people are swept into days of trial and tribulation by circumstance and happenstance. Pastors travel into to these moments by choice. We are sort of like the storm chasers, but not exactly. We are like the pilots who fly into the eye of a hurricane, but more than that. We fly solo (well, with the Holy Spirit as the wind under our wings). We soar like a mighty eagle with no outer protection into the eye of sorrow. Then we land and nestle near the heart of the one close to death and the loved ones who worry and wait.

In my heart, mind and soul I carry the holy and blessed memories of all saints who died, some too soon and some too painfully. These are so many stories that are tucked in, close to my heart. Here are some:

I was with Joan, who had long suffered from breast cancer. I held her hand, her family out in the waiting room, softly whispering to her that they were ready and it was okay if she needed to go to Jesus. And then, watching her breathe in deeply – and then let go, breathing out her last breath. I stared. I said, “Joan?” And then, stunned that she was gone, I went to get her family.

There was the young man gay man who died from AIDS. Rejected by his priest and church, one of his aunties asked me if I would come to pray with him and talk to him. Despondent, thin as a rail and too sick to care, he believed he was, as the priest told him, bound for hell and that God had abandoned him. My heart was breaking at the callous way he was treated. So, I mustered up courage and care and told him that God loved him no matter what and that I would be there for him and his family, though he wasn’t a member of my congregation.

As a campus pastor, I’ve wept over countless deaths of students who took their own lives or died in horrendous car accidents. But nothing prepared me for the gut-wrenching news I received in a midnight phone call on September 30, 1998. My former student Sheri, who was beginning her second year at Luther Seminary, called to tell me that her beloved high school sweetheart husband was dead. He was up on a roof for his job and was electrocuted. Matt was one of our Lutheran Campus Ministry Peer Ministers. I loved him and Sheri dearly. I presided over their wedding. They were part of my family, friends of my children and I was also devastated. Three memorial services later, we laid Matt to rest, picked up the pieces and moved on, slowly, day by day.

And there were the triple deaths of three young men who drowned while sailing on a balmy December day in Kansas and that long journey of sorrow. I traveled with three grieving families for the many days as the divers searched for two bodies. I attended all three funerals and I presided over the university-wide memorial service.

Nothing can compare to the deep sorrow I experienced after the murder of my former LCM Peer Minister Margaret Kritsch Anderson. 32-year old Margaret was the national park ranger shot by an angry, young Iraqi war vet on his way to the visitor’s center atop Mount Rainier National Park on January 1, 2012. Attending her law enforcement memorial service was incredibly moving, deeply sad yet profoundly beautiful. It was a-swirl; a jumbled mix of great honor for her service, sorrow as she left behind her park ranger husband and their two small daughters and respect for her sacrifice.

The knock-your-socks-off-amazing ministry moments are just as moving, but in a different way. There are the thousands of children, teenagers, young adults and grown-ups with whom I’ve been graced are spectacular.

Like 10-year old Hank, who came to my church in Florida. His mom, Jodi, grew up in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, where she said things were pretty formal in worship. Hank loved the sharing of the peace during worship. We shared the peace all over the sanctuary with reckless abandon. He would turn to folks on either side of him and announced with gusto, “Peace be with you!” This made me smile every time I’d see him out of the corner of my eye. Then one Sunday, unbeknownst to me, Hank launched himself out of his aisle to go share the peace with a dear elderly woman in a wheel chair named Joyce. I found out later as Jodi told me the story, she was mortified that he went out of his row. She said she was still getting used to “The Peace” and not sure how she felt about it. Then, Hank did that! Jodi hissed at him in church-mom speak, “Hank – Get. Back. Here.” But he didn’t hear her. After he got back to his seat, having exuberantly sharing the peace, she asked him why he did that. Earnestly and sweetly he replied, “Mom, I need to share the peace with my Joyce (that’s how he talked about her). She can’t come to share the peace with me, so I needed to share the peace with her. I just love her. I just love sharing the peace of Jesus.” Jodi said that’s what convinced her that they needed to be members of that church. When I hear people grumble about sharing the peace, I tell that story.

Two thirds of my after-ordained life and twenty years later as a Lutheran Campus Pastor (I put it in capital letters because it’s a title I joyously claim), I don’t know how I could begin to tell you all the fantastic miracle stories. There are so many wondrous tales of young adults celebrating their faith, wrestling with the big questions of life, coming to know and love Jesus and caring about his body - the Church - here on earth and learning how to love one another deeply, profoundly, tenaciously and how to love others and the world.

Of course I’m pleased about the dozens of young adults and not-so-young adults who have discerned their callings to serve as ministers in Jesus’ Church. But I’m equally pleased when people embrace what it means to live out their baptismal vocation in all that they say and do. I love it when people can hear the stories of the scripture echo into and through their own lives. I especially love it when the gospel of Jesus’ love carves out and breaks open up new places of compassion in someone when it wasn’t there before. I love it when people get changed from being judgmental and indifferent about suffering, to inching closer to God’s heart and God’s care for the tattered souls of the world. That’s true conversion that opens new conversations, friendships, love and shared work.

I embrace and celebrate all the sad-happy, happy-sad moments of my ministry. What concerns me the most though, and what has scarred me forever is - Ugliness. I was not prepared for Ugliness to grab my ankles trying to suck me under, into the muck. The bright-faced, love-the-world, smiley girl in the photo with her sisters had no idea that some seemingly well-meaning people were actually Gollum-esque and horrid. There is no way to talk about being a pastor without naming the dark underside of the belly of the Church. It’s where the ugly, pale-faced, sickly creatures lurk. 

Their names are Meanness, Passive-aggression, Two-faced-liar, Conniving, Dysfunction and Heartless. They brood, sulk and scheme, their sole mission is to abuse and torment the clergy. They conspire to undo and harm you. I know a lot of pastors who are very wounded, beaten people, through no fault of their own. I guess they weren’t prepared for the onslaught of Ugliness either. This happens to male and female clergy, but I think that most of us in pastoral ministry would agree that the level of intensity and vitriol is heightened when it’s directed toward a woman pastor. 

Since I became a martial artist nearly 25 years ago, I learned how to defend myself in real time and how to protect my ankles a little better from the attacks of Camp Ugliness. Scarred tissue is stronger, they say. Those places in my soul are stronger, but they’re not as attractive as my unscathed spirit; the one that just wanted to shine for Jesus. Some of the scars just come with everyday living. But some of them come from the unwarranted, unexpected and unwelcome hazards of pastoral ministry. There are many things that get me through those dangerous times.

This is when I have to remember two things:

1)   The Church is not God. The Church is us – the broken, mixed up people, struggling along seeking redemption, trying to put itself together out of its shards and fragments. Sometimes we hurt each other. Sometimes we try to kill spirits – intentionally and unintentionally. Even so, this is never okay. I am never okay with others trying to murder my soul or my body. As I pastor, with great compassion and with brutal honesty, I’m always going to stand up to bullies no matter whom or where they are – even in the Church.

2)   Do not let anyone take my sense of humor. If that happens, all is lost and I might as well throw in my stole, toss my alb in the trash, kick the dust off my Birkenstocks and lock my communion kit up forever.

I know that I number 3 should be about my faith in Jesus and how it’s sustained me through these thirty years. But for me, that’s a given. You can’t be a pastor and not throw your lot and your life with Jesus. Well, I guess some people pretend and do it all the time, but I can’t. I love Jesus and following him. I love walking a sacramental life, intentionally pouring my life out for others, choosing to have my heart be broken open more and more so that I can love more deeply, more fully and more calmly. I love that I can love even my enemies and sometimes in that love, they become friends. I love my life and my ministry and give thanks to The Great I Am of the Universe (my name for God) for carrying me, calling me, cradling me, covering me, and giving me courage when I thought I just could Not. Do This. Anymore.

The heart of a pastor is broken apart by love and beauty; by the innocent words of children and the insistent questions of teens; by the late night struggles of young adults and the morning cries of the elderly. We accompany you when you think no one will come and we pick you up when you thought you were left by the side of the road to die alone. We splash you with a water-welcome and toss the dirt of the earth upon you when you go back to God. I live my pastor-life, not because the yin-yang shape is perfect-pure and the theatre masks hang all pretty-like on the wall. I choose this life because it is a life of heartbreaking, breathtaking beauty graced by the One who holds us fast and who calls us into a life of love, however feebly I may live it. It is a beautiful life because God brings new life out of all the dead places over and over again. It's happened to me and I've seen it happen to others. 

So, Dear Ones, I offer this tender reflection and give thanks to all of you, especially my beloved family members, who have blessed me along the way. Here’s to the next thirty! 

June 5, 2013: My wonderful spouse, Jack Hayes, who has been my rock and has been with me all this time, at times when we've only had each other, standing the Rock whose name is Jesus.

June 9, 2013: Me in the pulpit of Christ Chapel, Gustavus Adolphus College, following synod assembly. 

Sunday after Boston bombing

Jesus, The Good Shepherd 

                                                                                     

Easter 4, Good Shepherd Sunday 
April 21, 2012, John 10:11-16 

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. ¹²The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. ¹³The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. ¹⁴I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, ¹⁵just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. ¹⁶I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd."

There are so many examples of art depicting the Jesus as the Good Shepherd. This is

one that I remember from Sunday School. I loved it. Maybe you saw this one...or one like it. There is something so powerful about this image for us. Seeing Jesus cradling this lamb, holding it close. Most of us have no idea what it means to be a shepherd. Most of us don't know any shepherds or sheep for that matter. But we know what this must be like, how we yearn to be held close by the arms of God. The Good Shepherd is so much more than a Sunday School picture. The Shepherd is not some sentimental image all cleaned up and pristine. Shepherds got dirty, stayed out for long periods of time without much sleep guarding the flock. Sometimes they were smelly and tired...like rescuers working long hours, sometimes throughout the night.  

So, how fitting that this Sunday comes after a horrible week. We need a Good Shepherd Sunday in a bad way, O God, in a big, bad way…into this night, let us pray: 

God of love, grace, mercy and care - we gather on this night to hold fast to one another, to share tears of sadness for other and for ourselves. Gather us into your arms of care - and may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts, be acceptable O God, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.

“It’s been a tough week.” That’s how President Obama began a press conference as he sought to sooth the tears, fears and frazzled souls of the community of Boston and beyond. If he had said, “It’s been a terrible week,” or “It’s been a horrific, horrible, horrendous week,” it wouldn’t have been an understatement at all.

Last Monday not only did two brothers, for some unknown reason, place and detonate two bombs at the end of the Boston Marathon finish line killing Martin Richard, Krystle Campbell, Lingzi Lu and maiming hundreds of others. But later on Thursday into Friday morning they were involved in killing Officer Sean Collier and injuring other officers on the scene. The older brother died that night. Finally the younger brother was captured while hiding in a boat in a backyard in Watertown.

Meanwhile, in a small town called West, TX, a fertilizer plant fire caused a massive explosion on Wednesday killing at least 14 people and injuring hundreds of others and decimating the entire town. This was the same day that the US Senate failed to pass universal background checks. There were several earthquakes across the world; avalanches in Colorado and Bishop Bruce resigned his post on Friday since he is facing charges of intoxicated vehicular homicide in WI.

A tough week? Yeah. And it was tough for some of you here – you’re facing end-of-the-semester exhaustion and stress. Tonight, one is grieving the death of a beloved auntie. There are relationship questions, housing and where are you going to live questions? What am I going to do with my life questions? All of these personal questions slosh into the bigger questions about our world, the seemingly increasing role of violence and the speed by which we are able to know all of this as it unfolds in real time with instantaneous tweeting and photo/video sharing. There were so many things the media got wrong – on all sides from suspecting Saudis and Middle East Muslims to Right Wing Neo-Nazi tea baggers. Turns out – none of them were right. 

Sometimes folks wonder, I wonder, while all this can be good – at times it can be adding to the stress and horror to be bombarded with such terrible news 24/7. I was up on Thursday night into Friday morning watching the #Watertown twitter feed, listening to the online police scanner feed and checking Facebook posts from my friends in Boston as well as watching live-streaming video from news sites. All of this because early Friday morning (in the middle of the night) my high school friend, Jenny, posted this:  

                                                     MIT and Watertown police shot.

Small explosives

Hundreds of police presence...

"All hell is breaking loose," say officials.

Into and through all of this, the Good Shepherd walks with intention, care, courage and faithfulness. It is a true comfort to hear these words, “I am the Good Shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep” and "the Lord is my Shepherd." 

In the midst of all the horror, there were those who rushed into harm’s way. We saw their pictures.

Former New England Patriots Joe Andruzzi carries a woman from the scene, Bill Greene

Boston police officer carrying a wounded child, Bill Hoenk

Victoria McGrath being carried to a tent by a firefighter, David L. Ryan

They were the arms of the Good Shepherd, we’d say also Good Samaritan types, who scooped the injured up in their arms and rushed them on gurneys and in wheel chairs to medics and into hospital tents and ambulances on the scene. 

And then, there was this:

An emergency responder and volunteers, including Carlos Arredondo in the cowboy hat, push Jeff Bauman in a wheel chair after he was injured in an explosion near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, April 15, 2013, Charles Krupa 

What you can’t see well (for good reason) and may not know is that Jeff was near the bomb blast. Both of his legs were missing when Carlos, a 52-year-old Costa Rican immigrant, saw him on the sidewalk and scooped him up, wrapped a tourniquet above his knees and rushed him to a wheelchair. Carlos, who was first known as White Cowboy Hat Guy, is a peace activist dad whose son was killed in the Iraq war. His other son later committed suicide because he was so depressed about the death of his brother. So, Carlos, in the midst of his sorrow, goes to events handing out US flags in memory of his sons, just like he was doing at the finish line at the Boston Marathon.

Carlos holds his flag that has become soaked with blood, Darren Mccollester 

John Mixon, who also ran to the fence to tear it down so they could help the injured said to Carlos, "We needed to help this man who lost his legs get into a wheelchair." The man was Jeff Bauman. Carlos was talking to Jeff, saying, “My name is Carlos. We are going to help you,'" recalls John. "The man was mumbling, saying, 'Help me. I can't feel my legs.' Carlos was saying, "You're going to be all right," as they wheeled Jeff to the medics. 

Carlos was a real hero," said John. "He didn't know if another bomb was going to go off. Carlos just said, “God help us. We need to help them."

       

The arms of the Good Shepherd scoop up the frightened, the wounded, comforting the terrified and dazed ones, sharing words of support – I’ll be with you all the way. These are the ways that God sends the Good Shepherd among us, Jesus cloaked in the frail flesh of the helpers, as Mister Rogers’ mother told him to look for, the helpers who come when they could and maybe should just run the other way.

Jeff is in the hospital after successful surgeries, Facebook Jeff Bauman - Boston Stong

So, Jeff is recovering and not only that, he was able to identify one of the suspects who he saw before the bomb went off - amazing!

       

And just as God walks with the wounded in body, mind or spirit, so also God walks with those who commit despicable acts of destruction, urging, cajoling, pleading with them to turn around, to repent into an honest confession, seek forgiveness (as the two brothers’ uncle begged them) and do the right thing and give up to face the consequences. Like my friend Bishop Bruce must do. As Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson said in a video of comfort to the people of Boston and to the world, “The risen Christ goes ahead of us, (I would add, the Good Shepherd walks with us) because there are no God-forsaken places, and there are no God-forsaken people."

       

I repeat, there are no God-forsaken places, and there are no God-forsaken people. Jesus says, “I am the Good Shepherd. ¹⁶I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.”

People around the world shared their sorrow with Boston and the rest of us. The photo memes came from Kabul, Afghanistan and Bagdad and then there was this one from Syria, reminding us that there are many, many places throughout the world where the bombing of bodies and buildings happens everyday and that we ought not forget them either.

From Syria to Boston with love, Reddit

Jesus reminds us all that his way of compassion and care, courage and kindness are God’s way. This Jesus, whom we follow, calls us to love ourselves, love our neighbors and even, yes even in this instance and all times, love our enemies, even them. Because hating them will only bring more hatred in the world that is desperate to hear the words of hope and love, of healing and care. Choosing love doesn’t mean a gooey sentimentalism that ignores the atrocious behavior. It does not mean that he should not be charged and tried in a court of law. But rather this Jesus-love, this Good Shepherd-love, is a love that recognizes that a human heart can become so darkened by hatred that only the light of love can bring a turn around, only a profound, deep, tough-as-nails love can do that. Only love...

So, at this – the beginning of a new week – we remember those who died, those who mourn them and cities in recovery; cities like Boston, MA and West, TX; Bagdad, Iraq and Kabul, Afghanistan; for nations like Syria and China where they wait for the arms of the Good Shepherd to come and scoop them up, to share kind words and for the help to sustain them for the long haul. We cling to our trust in the Good Shepherd of our souls and trust that he will work through us and empower us also to scoop up the broken ones along our way. 

In loving memory of Krystle Campbell, Martin Richard, Lingzi Lu and Sean Collier

Finally, into the evening hours of this night, we rest on Martin’s words from his school poster: 

Martin Richard holds up his handmade 'Peace' poster

“No more hurting people – Peace” in Jesus’ name. Amen.