“Breakfast with Jesus”
Luke 24.36-48 The Rev. Hal Chorpenning, Plymouth Congregational UCC Fort Collins, Colorado 14 April 2024 Eastertide keeps on rolling with this story about the disciples’ encounter with the Risen One. Just so you know the time frame for today’s text, it happens on Easter Monday. Previously, Luke’s gospel offered us the wonderful story of Jesus meeting a couple on the road to Emmaus on the previous evening, a Sunday, and how they didn’t initially recognize Jesus, but “he was made known to them in the breaking of the bread.” And just as rapidly as the couple recognized Jesus, he vanished. That couple hurries back to Jerusalem, they find the disciples and fill them in on what had happened and shares the news that Jesus was alive. So, the disciples receive the news, and then Jesus appears before them. Now, imagine if Jesus were to appear to you. In Luke’s gospel, he tends to show up around mealtimes. So, imagine him appearing while you’re preparing lunch. Wouldn’t you think that he was a ghost or a spirit, even if he asked for a BLT? (Okay, maybe not a BLT since bacon isn’t kosher.) I would certainly assume it was a spiritual presence. What Luke describes is a mystical encounter with the risen Christ. Most of us protestants don’t like dealing with mystery because it’s difficult to quantify, observe, or measure. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t real. I don’t know how many of us have sensed the presence of Christ in our midst, but I am aware that some of us have. For me, the most significant encounter I had involved my call to ordained ministry 30-some years ago. I was sitting at our dining room table in Boulder reading a book that was recommended to me by my mentor, Bruce MacKenzie, who was senior minister at First Congregational UCC in Boulder. The book was a key work by John Dominic Crossan called, Jesus a Revolutionary Biography, a book that stirred up a lot of public controversy because it described the historical Jesus in ways that many Christians never imagined him. At the time, I still had my own communications business, but I could sense that change was on the horizon. So, as I read, I had the distinct sense that there was a hand on my shoulder, and I heard the words, “You can do this.” I had the distinct sense that it was Jesus speaking to me. The experience was life-changing, which is why I am where I am this morning. For me, there was no visual encounter…just a touch and a voice. I had no sense that Jesus was PHYSICALLY present. He certainly didn’t sit down and have a meal with me, and I was not in the company of others who could have vouched for the experience I had. I am certain that there were a lot of post-resurrection experiences the disciples had individually of the risen Christ. But is it any wonder that Luke chose to describe two scenes — at Emmaus and with the disciples in Jerusalem — that involved Jesus appearing to multiple witnesses and that both involved a meal, thereby proving that they were not experiencing a ghost, but rather one who has a body, even eating with them? Among Jews in the first century, there were different ways of interpreting resurrection, but for the Pharisees, it clearly involved resurrection of the body. Classical Judaism understood resurrection of the dead as God’s ultimate vindication of the righteous. Interestingly, Paul of Tarsus was a self-described Pharisee, presumably one who believed in the resurrection of the body. Yet, Paul’s flash-of-light experience on the road to Damascus was a forceful, spiritual experience of Jesus that involved a voice but no body. The plot thickens further in Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth: “So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. … It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body.” Wait a minute…Paul the Pharisee is saying that we are born into a physical body, but that we also will have a spiritual body? This sounds like a divergence from the tenet of Pharisaic Judaism that it is our physical bodies that are to be raised. Paul was born and raised in Tarsus in today’s Turkey, speaking Greek rather than Aramaic like Jesus. The culture that surrounded him meant that he was immersed in Greek philosophical assumptions, including the dualism of Plato, meaning that one’s physical body and soul are separate entities, and that the soul lives on after the death of the body. This is an idea that is common even today in the west. (How many of us think that we are both body and soul?) But, it was utterly foreign to the Judaism of Paul’s day, which saw no division between body and soul. “In classical Judaism, resurrection of the dead was a central belief, essential to defining oneself as a Jew. ‘Today,’ writes Jon D. Levenson, professor of Jewish studies at Harvard, ‘that fact comes as a shock to most Jews and Christians alike.’”[1] I appreciate what the great preacher, Fred Craddock, has to say about the biblical record on resurrection: “The resurrection was not an unambiguous event that could have been captured with a video camera, but was a mysterious phenomenon that could have been interpreted more than one way and could evoke doubt and fear as well as faith and joy…. The New Testament pictures the reality of the resurrection in different ways that are not to be harmonized [or blended]. Each image brings out some theological meaning of resurrection…a divine mystery that cannot be captured in one representation.” That allows us plenty of latitude for interpretation. Yet the question arises with Easter, what will happen to US? I grew up in a family that was quite antiseptic about death: no visitation or viewing or open caskets. No funerals…always a memorial service. (I don’t recommend this!) So, the first time I saw a dead body outside of a college anatomy lab was when I was a Stephen Minister in Boulder. I had been paired with Roy Bramell, a lovely 95-year-old man who had been the founding dean of the School of Education at UConn (which has more than just great basketball). After Roy’s death, I went to the visitation with his family, and as I looked at his lifeless body, it was obvious to me that it was an empty shell. Yet at his memorial service, his adult children read selections from his voluminous writing about topics ranging from family to education to faith to patriotism, and as they read, tears began streaming down my cheeks. For me those tears flowed because the ideas and emotions Roy’s words expressed revivified him. His spirit was no longer attached to a body, but the essence of who he was continued on without interruption. I sense that this is true for all of us: that we continue to exist in a different plane or realm. I don’t know whether we will experience an embodied resurrection or a spiritual resurrection or something entirely different. I’m not interested in ruling anything out in this great mystery. I take this seriously: “With God, all things ARE possible.” I know what happens to our bodies when life ends: they degrade or are cremated. And I know that we are not alone but still are within God’s love. I don’t know what happens to the life force, the spirit, the soul, the divine spark when life ends, but I know we are not alone. God is with us each step of the way, within us, among us, and infinitely far beyond us. God has brought us this far on our journey, so why would we imagine that God will not be with us beyond death? Why should we be surprised by anything that happens after death when every one of us is a first-hand witness to the miracle of life? Think about it: we are self-aware, sentient beings, and we are sitting here on a Sunday morning because we know that there is something greater than we are, that there is more to life than can ever meet the eye. That’s miraculous! And miracles are everywhere if we take the time to listen and look and feel with our hearts as well as our eyes and ears. Resurrection is a powerful metaphor for us as we continue to live this life. It is a metaphor for new beginnings, for ultimate liberation, for ongoing presence of those we love, and the continuing presence of Jesus in the world. May we live fully as people whose lives are empowered and made beautiful by the presence of God. And may we be always on the lookout for mystery and everyday miracles. Even at the breakfast table. Amen. © 2024 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact hal at plymouthucc.org for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses. [1] Peter Steinfels, “What comes as a shock…” in NY Times, September 30, 2006.
“Ultimate Liberation”
Mark 16.1–8 The Rev. Hal Chorpenning, Plymouth Congregational UCC Fort Collins, Colorado Easter 2024 The Bible has macro-stories, broad brush strokes, that tie its core messages together. (Understanding of course that the Bible is essentially a library of the ways our ancient Jewish and early Christian forebears experienced the holy.) The Creation stories in Genesis shouldn’t be read as a geology or cosmology textbook to have meaning. Instead, we understand Genesis as speaking some essential truths that are more-than literal. While some civilizations in the ancient Near East had creation stories that placed humans in the role of being fodder for their deity, and while Greeks and Romans suffered at the whim and caprice of their gods, YHWH creates everything and declares that it is very good, providing all that the humans in the garden will need. Why would God provide for humanity, rather than reversing the roles and having humans exist in eternal servitude to God? Paul, a Pharisee and follower of Jesus, answered this way: “Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.” God creates life in love, for love. That is one of the great macro stories of scripture. The God of Exodus is faithful to Moses and the people who are in captivity in Egypt, who suffer in bondage under the boot of Pharaoh, and God shows up as one who delivers people from grave injustice and oppression. That is one of the reasons that the narratives of Exodus are so critically important to the Black church in this country: our national history is replete with captivity, enslavement, injustice, and oppression. YHWH is no Egyptian god of the underworld! No! Our God is a force for freedom and deliverance. Liberation is another of the great macro stories that has a broad sweep across our sacred texts. Liberation says something essential about the character of God and humanity. And so, we find ourselves at the conclusion of Holy Week. We have waved palm fronds as Jesus enters Jerusalem. We have lived through to poignant Last Supper with Jesus, witnessed his arrest and torture, and ultimately his ignominious death on a cross. It is difficult for any of us to imagine the shame, the pain, the utter devastation of death on the cross. Where are the macro themes of love and liberation? Most of us would prefer to jump from the triumphal parade on Palm Sunday to the glory of Easter Sunday without having to reckon with the intervening tragedy. We probably don’t think too much about what happened on Saturday, between Friday’s crucifixion and Sunday’s resurrection. But that is not universally true. Martin Luther wrote a hymn to reflect that in-between time, “Christ lag in Todesbanden,” “Christ lay in the bonds of death.” Luther talks about a personification of the power of death, which attempts to keep us all imprisoned. Then he claims that Jesus breaks the bonds of death and that nothing remains but the faint outline of death, which has lost its sting. This may not be the Easter story you had in mind, and part of the reason for that is that most of us have been shaped by the western understanding of resurrection as Jesus being raised and leaving an empty tomb on Sunday morning. Yet that is not the way Eastern Christians have primarily understood the story. For them, the narrative is not just about an empty tomb, but rather breaking down the gates of the underworld and removing the power of death that keeps humanity fearful and unable to reach fullness of life as those who love like God loves. I included an image on the cover of your bulletin where you will see the eastern vision of Jesus overcoming the forces of death, which in Greek is called anástasis, the Greek word for resurrection. Jesus has one hand on Adam and one hand on Eve, pulling them up from the underworld through the broken gates of Hades. And they aren’t simply the first two humans, but rather they represent all of humanity. If you look below the broken gates, you’ll see fragmented locks and keys. And while you are studying the icon, hear how Luther’s hymn continues: “How fierce and dreadful was the strife when life and death contended; for death was swallowed up by life and all its power was ended.” It isn’t that Jesus put an end to our physical dying as human beings. We know that each of us will eventually succumb. While composing this sermon I visited one of our beloved members, who was actively dying as I wrote. And that experience drove home for me that our physical dying is real, but it isn’t the last word. So many Christians fixate on eternal life as being delivered safely to heaven after we die, and perhaps that’s the way it will be. I’m more or less agnostic about whether there is a place we go if we have lived virtuously and another place we go if we’ve been bound up in self-interest and self-deception. I am okay leaving what will be up to God. But, what if eternal life has already commenced for us? What if it’s up to us to live into our most profound and eternal selves that somehow continue even through the broken-open portal of death? We are given a choice in this life about where we will devote our effort, either supporting the forces of love and life or giving our energy to the forces of hate and death. None of us does it perfectly, but each of us can approach eternity with loving intention that echoes the way Jesus lived his life. What do you say about someone who dearly loves life and doesn’t want to die? What do you say about someone who is willing to face and endure a painful death in spite of loving life? What do you say about someone who is willing to lay down his life for his friends? It sounds to me like someone who says yes to life and love, but who is willing to confront death for the right reasons. Anyone who can do that has disempowered death. It’s not that physical death won’t happen, but perhaps as we say in the UCC, “Never put a period where God has placed a comma.” Maybe death is a comma and not a full-stop. Death won’t get the last word in the conversation of life and love. If you had to sum it up in one word what Jesus is doing in that anástasis image, what would it be? For me it is liberation! Liberation is breaking the bonds that hold us back from living and loving. Liberation is saying NO to the forces of death and YES to the divine power of life and love. Is it liberating for you to know that Jesus went through about the worst death before us and continues to be present within us and among us? Is it liberating for you to know that we are empowered to work for love and life and to know that God is with us? Is it liberating for you to know that there is nothing in this world or the next that can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus? You can shake off the shackles that have been holding you back from living life to its fullest. They have been unlocked! You can remove those handcuffs of fear that have chafed at your wrists every time you are ready to reach out and take a risk on being more loving. You are unbound! The most profound words I have ever heard about resurrection were spoken from this pulpit, not by me but by my mentor and friend Marcus Borg 12 years ago. “Jesus is loose in the world!” What does that say about the power of death? If Jesus can’t be held back even by death, what does it say about God’s great stories of liberation, love, and life? Jesus is loose in the world, and so are we! This is the good news! Thanks be to God! Christ is risen! Alleluia! Amen. © 2024 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact hal@plymouthucc.org for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses.
“Love & Suffering”
I Corinthians 1.18-25 The Rev. Hal Chorpenning, Plymouth Congregational UCC Fort Collins, Colorado 10 March 2024 Buddhism holds four Noble Truths: the first is the inevitability of human suffering; the next three involve the cause of suffering, its end, and the true path to end it. Unlike our Buddhist sisters and brothers, suffering is something that many Protestants don’t talk about too often, perhaps because it is difficult. Our Catholic siblings are far more conversant with the topic, and some see suffering in itself as redemptive. Most Catholic churches feature a lot of images that illustrate the suffering of Jesus, including the crucifix: the cross with the corpus attached. Crucifixion is a horrific form of torture and execution that involves a painful and ignominious death and can be seen as human suffering at its worst. Imagine yourself as one of Jesus’ followers in the days, the years, the centuries after the crucifixion. How do you explain the suffering of Jesus on the cross? How do you make sense of what happened? Paul writes extensively about it, saying that in our baptism we die and rise with Christ, and he acknowledges that the cross is “scandalous to the Judeans and foolishness to the Gentiles.” There is something powerful there that Paul is trying to convey by reappropriating the cross, pairing it always with resurrection. Early Christian theologians continued to try to work out the “why” of Jesus’ death. Being a threat to the rule of empire and to Roman collaborators in Judea apparently was not reason enough for some. Tertullian, writing in the 3rd century espoused an idea that Jesus’ death happened in order for humanity to receive salvation by satisfying God’s need for an atoning sacrifice. (Dom Crossan once quipped that this is not the kind of god he’d like to meet in a dark alley.) And St. Anselm of Canterbury in the 11th century more clearly espoused the idea that “Christ’s death on the cross functioned as a gift to God on behalf of humanity to restore the order of justice subverted by sin.”[1] Where is the evidence that God would demand a sacrifice of his own son in order to restore relationship with humanity? What does this explanation do to describe a God who is merciful and loving? All of these theories are trying to work out a reason for suffering, in this case the suffering of Jesus on the cross. Perhaps the “why” is that the Empire was morally bankrupt and thrived by military domination and extracting wealth from those who could least afford it. But lots of revolutionaries have given their lives for a cause. Jesus was a different kind of radical, who in John’s gospel says, “No one has greater love than this than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”[2] The way of love can lead to suffering. Why all of the theological muddle over the millennia to try and explain that Jesus loved his friends and followers so much that he was willing to give his own life for them? His suffering is rooted in his willingness to engage in self-sacrifice, which itself is grounded in love. ---------- The truth is that all of us suffer. And we suffer in different ways at multiple points on our journey through life. In 1960, Dr. King wrote, “My personal trials have also taught me the value of unmerited suffering. As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways that I could respond to my situation: either to react with bitterness or seek to transform the suffering into a creative force. I decided to follow the latter course. Recognizing the necessity for suffering I have tried to make of it a virtue. If only to save myself from bitterness, I have attempted to see my personal ordeals as an opportunity to transform myself and heal the people involved in the tragic situation which now obtains. I have lived these last few years with the conviction that unearned suffering is redemptive. “There are some who still find the cross a stumbling block, and others consider it foolishness, but I am more convinced than ever before that it is the power of God unto social and individual salvation.”[3] While Dr. King’s self-sacrifice and his suffering were grounded in love and justice (and Cornel West reminds us that justice is what love looks like in public), I don’t think that all suffering is redemptive. Physical suffering due to disease is not, in my view, redemptive. It is something that we can and should ameliorate. Karen Lebacqz, an ethicist and UCC minister writes, “The only redemptive suffering is that voluntarily undertaken in the cause of justice and the effort to combat disease. While the moral obligation to relieve suffering is not distinctively Christian, it is certainly central to Christian belief. Christians who, out of compassion, risk their lives by exposing themselves to contagion in an effort to heal others can be said to be modeling Christ’s compassion.”[4] But what are we to say about everyday suffering that comes with simply living? I invite you to think of an occasion when you yourself have suffered. (As long as it is not so acute or recent that it is retraumatizing.) It might be grieving the loss of a spouse, a child, a parent. It might be rejection by a loved one. Perhaps a professional setback. Or when the physician delivers an unwelcome diagnosis. Maybe when someone has betrayed you. It might be an unrealized dream that haunts you. The ghost of loss can get into us and cause suffering. What is that time or occasion for you? Many times when we suffer we feel alone in that anguish. Sometimes no one knows that you are suffering because you keep a stiff upper lip and keep on going. But inside, a piece of you feels as if you are dying. Each of us suffers in this way. Even when we feel alone, we are not. God is with us, we are not alone. Jesus tells us at such times to come with your heavy burdens and he will give you rest. Jesus himself underwent one of the worst forms of suffering imaginable, and in doing so, he had the full human experience of agony. “Come bring your burdens to God, Come bring your burdens to God, Come bring your burdens to God, for Jesus will never say no.” Not only is God there when you are suffering, so are your fellow Plymouth members. We form a family that supports one another, lifting up one another’s suffering and joy in prayer and in action. Paul writes in Galatians that we are to “bear one another’s burdens, and in this way, we will fulfill the law of Christ.”[5] What is the law of Christ? It’s love. We can’t get around suffering, because it is a part of life. But we can show up for one another with love, and that helps our kindred to get through the suffering. Sometimes that means a warm embrace or a comforting pot of soup or listening compassionately or a note of encouragement. Just showing up is something any one of us can do for another. Even if we don’t think we have the right words, simply showing up can provide the solidarity and love that helps alleviate a bit of someone’s suffering. I see people at Plymouth do this all the time! Our Congregational visitors drop in on some of our elders to say hello. Our Stephen Ministers have ongoing caring relationships with others in our congregation. And our Faith Community Nurses provide amazing, compassionate visits to those experiencing medical crises. I was with a family recently who have been going through a sequence of major medical issues — suffering — and they told me how helpful it was to have a faith community nurse guide them through the process and offer a prayer. The English word compassion has two Latin roots: cum + passio, which means to suffer with. When we share someone’s burden, we do share a bit of their suffering with love and empathy. That isn’t to say we should be doormats or lose our footing by overidentifying with another’s suffering. We may not be called to lay down our lives for those we love, but being present for another, acknowledging their anguish, letting them know they are loved and cared about can be a great help. Suffering is a real part of life. So is God’s presence. So is the love we share. May it be so. Amen. © 2024 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact hal@plymouthucc.org for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses. [1] Brandon R. Peterson in Angelicum, Vol. 93, No. 4 (2016), pp. 875-894. [2] John 15.13 [3] Martin Luther King, Jr., in Christian Century 77 (27 April 1960): 510. [4] Karen Lebacqz in Suffering and Bioethics, ed. by Ronald Green and Nathan Palpant (New York: Oxford, 2014). [5] Galatians 6.2
“Now Is the Time!”
Mark 1.9-15 The Rev. Hal Chorpenning, Plymouth Congregational UCC Fort Collins, Colorado 18 February 2024 You’ve probably noticed that we have made a shift in worship, having Brooklyn introduce and read the scripture so that it is a bit more accessible to our younger worshipers… and some of our older worshipers as well! I really appreciate how she does this and how engaging she is. More often than not we have used the New Revised Standard Version for scripture readings, but Brooklyn has been using a newer translation, The Common English Bible, which is a bit more understandable for all ages, and was edited by our own David Petersen, a renowned Old Testament scholar. I really appreciate some of the ways the Common English Bible translates the New Testament Greek, and in today’s reading, “metanoeo” is translated not as “repent,” but “change your hearts and lives.” That’s exactly what I was getting at in last Sunday’s sermon on transformation. It also translates the verb “pisteuo” not as believe, but as “trust in.” Here is what it sounds like in the NRSV: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” You hear two loaded words: repent and believe. And here is the CEB translation of the same verse: “Now is the time! Here comes God’s kingdom! Change your hearts and lives, and trust this good news!” Do you hear the difference? So often clergy have asked us to believe – to give intellectual assent – to “six impossible things before breakfast” just like the Queen of Hearts speaking to Alice in Wonderland. But “pisteuo” in Greek has a stronger sense of “putting one’s trust in” rather than simply believing. I think anything that can crack open scripture and help us internalize – like a new translation – is wonderful. Are you willing to open your heart and mind and put your trust in the good news of God’s realm? Please remember that question in the context of your Lenten journey. If you’re reading Mark’s gospel along with us during Lent, one of the things you’ve probably noticed is that the author is succinct, VERY succinct. The way Mark describes Jesus’ 40-day trek in the wilderness takes exactly two sentences: “And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.” Short and to the point. No extraneous details. Matthew’s and Luke’s accounts are more extensive and include the dialogue with the tempter, Satan, who offers Jesus bodily sustenance, all the kingdoms of this world, and putting God to the test as part of the 40-day quest that is preparing Jesus for something. Mark doesn’t even allow Jesus to say, “One does not live by bread alone!” Lent is a contemporary reflection of that story of Jesus undergoing a time of preparation. His time in the wilderness was an example of the mythic hero’s journey that Joseph Campbell described: departure, encounter and testing, and return. I wonder if it was something akin to an initiation ritual or vision quest for Jesus, because immediately thereafter he begins his public ministry. What is Lent really about for us? Is it a time of fasting and penitence in the forty days that precede Easter? Or is it more of a re-enactment of the forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness? The answer will depend upon the person responding. There is no evidence that the apostles observed Lent, and the church didn’t do so for at least its first four centuries. The origins of Lent are sketchy at best. It certainly was not something Jesus or the disciples observed, unless you go for the “vision quest” explanation. My own tendency is to see the story of Jesus’ forty days in the wilderness as the paradigm for our Lenten journey. For Jesus, this was a time of spiritual awakening. And for us, it can be a time of blossoming spiritual awareness. We don’t get a very clear picture of Jesus’ forty days from the gospels. It isn’t as though we have six weeks of closed-circuit video to go through, examining his every movement and thought. But imagine yourself for a moment on a vision quest. The Spirit leads you out into the wilderness: a place where there are no distractions: no internet, no email, no cell phone reception, no streaming, and no social media. Just you and the Holy Spirit…and temptation. I wonder if we encounter a lot more temptation than most of us are willing to admit. (I’m not talking about chocolate or sex.) More often than not, our temptations involve making something that isn’t God the object of our worship, whether that is economic security or power and influence. It may not be that we set up an altar to economic security, and it may not be that we build a golden calf to serve as an emblem of power and influence. We are not quite that obvious, and temptation is more subtle than that. One way to think about it is what you over-give influence and attention to. Do you allow fear to predominate your thinking? There is plenty of news to draw your attention in and cause you to be upset; does that dominate your thinking? I can tell you that it sometimes consumes more of my attention and emotional bandwidth than I’d like. If we allow God to lead us, and if we put our trust in God, then the other stuff can take a back seat. Sounds simple enough. But, if it took Jesus forty days of internal struggle to work through the temptations of having bread (what we might call fear about our economic security) and authority (the things we refer to as power and influence, often in our careers), how long will it take you and me to work through these issues? A lifetime? Fortunately, God has given us more than forty days. But these forty days can be a good place to start. Even though few of us are preparing ourselves for a ministry like Jesus’, Lent affords us the occasion and opportunity to do some spiritual deepening. Our Plymouth Reads Bible study and our Matisse-based devotional and Christian formation classes are mean to provide an opening for you to take a step further on your journey, to see what else might open up for you spiritually. I grew up primarily in a Congregational church that didn’t observe Lent or Ash Wednesday…I think they considered it “too Catholic,” which meant that some of the baby got thrown out with the bathwater. For me, Lent is a season of invitation to explore “changing my heart and my life” and putting more trust in the good news of God’s realm, here and now and still unfolding. It’s a time when we all are invited to go a bit deeper through a spiritual exercise here at Plymouth. Part of the idea for me is doing something that helps us feel more connected to the Spirit. There are no guarantees that any of it will work, but we’re purposefully aligning ourselves more deeply with God., and that’s enough! Other people like to give something up for Lent, seeing what it’s like to strip away some of the baggage. I applaud that, too, if it enhances your awareness of the holy. The other phrase that struck me in the Common English Bible translation is rather than Jesus saying, “The time is fulfilled,” he says, “NOW IS THE TIME!” If you have been waiting for an invitation to go deeper in your spiritual quest, consider it done! Pick up a copy of the Lenten devotional booklet or a Plymouth Reads bookmark at the back of the sanctuary and dig in. You are invited on our Lenten journey, and now is the time! May it be so. Amen. © 2024 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact hal at plymouthucc.org for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses.
“Inviting, TRANSFORMING, Sending”
Mark 9.2-9 The Rev. Hal Chorpenning, Plymouth Congregational UCC Fort Collins, Colorado February 11, 2024 When was the last time you saw someone’s appearance change radically? It seems to me that something phenomenal — or at least peculiar — happened on the mountaintop, either to Jesus or to the disciples who were with him. Did Jesus undergo some sort of metamorphosis that caused him to be radiant? to shine like the sun? to have an aura? to beam? Or do you think that he was always radiant, but people didn’t notice until his followers — Peter, James, and John — go up to the mountain and literally see Jesus in a new light. I suspect that all of us have at times observed the change visage of a friend or loved one after they have had a life-changing experience. There are outward manifestations of inner changes in us that our friends and families notice. Assuming for the moment that Jesus did change, why is that important? Does it mean that he was surrounded by the divine light? Did something in his life shift at the moment he began to glow? Does it mean that this was a moment of transformation for him, as was his baptism by John? God speaks at the moment of transfiguration, just ask God speaks at Jesus’ baptism, saying, “This is my son, the Beloved, in whom I am well pleased,” using exactly the same phrase. Christians are asked to be baptized as Jesus was, but has anyone asked to go through some sort of metamorphosis or transformation? Maybe? When we join Plymouth, we commit to give ourselves unreservedly to God’s service, which is a big deal, but it isn’t quite asking us to be transformed. In many Congregational churches in New England in the 18th c., prospective members needed to have a “visible sign of conversion” in order to be admitted to membership. (Of course, you could attend worship, but being a member was [and is] a big deal.) So, if you were the town ne’er-do-well, a shift in your attitude and habits might be taken as a sign of conversion. In a few weeks, you will hear that thorny line in John’s gospel, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above,”[1] or in the language of the King James Version, “born again.” No, I’m not about invite you to come forward for an altar call, and I’m also not going to dismiss the idea of you having a spiritual transformation or many spiritual transformations. I’m not going to try and tame the idea of your having a metamorphosis. Marcus Borg writes, “The metaphor of rebirth, being born of the Spirit, is an image of radical transformation. An old life has been left behind and a new life has begun…Being born again is utterly central to Christianity, one of the main images for the goal and promise of the Christian life. It describes our transformation and, ultimately, the transformation of the world, for those who are born of the Spirit of God as known in Jesus share God’s passion for a more just and peaceful world.”[2] By a show of hands, how many of us really want to be changed, transformed, pushed out of our comfort zone by the spirit of transformation? It’s not easy, and it’s not without consequences. Transformation means changed hearts and changed lives. What would you expect if you, yourself, saw Jesus in the flesh? Would you expect it to be a transformative experience? Many years ago, I was in a therapy group for Adult Children of Alcoholics in California, and for me it was a transformative experience, and helped me to get a fresh start on my journey, and it marked a new beginning. I know others of you who have gone through the process of recovery, and it can be an incredible transformation. What are the moments of transformation in your life that have turned you in new directions or offered you a fresh start? It doesn’t have to be recovery, it could be the birth of a child, starting a new career, finding a hidden talent or a new avocation. But having a fresh start on life because of a new relationship with God is something incredibly powerful and different. Most of you know Plymouth’s mission statement that says “It is our mission to worship God and help make God’s realm visible in the lives of people, individually and collectively, especially as it is set forth in the life, teachings, death and living presence of Jesus Christ. We do this by inviting, TRANSFORMING, and sending.” That middle element, transformation, can be difficult, don’t you think? …especially if we think that we’re already done transforming into new persons or that we simply have no need to change. The Kingdom or realm of God is about transformation of THIS world into the world as it would be if God were immediately in charge, instead of the forces of Empire. Doing the work of justice is about transformation. Loving the unlovable is about transformation. Moving away from self-interest and radical individualism is about transformation. Giving yourself to something bigger than consumerism and acquisition is about transformation. We cannot try and tame transformation without taming the Kingdom of God. And we won’t be part of the Realm of God unless we are transformed and born of the Spirit. And that requires openness to new beginnings, to change, to transformation of our lives, to letting go of some old burdens, to adopting some fresh practices and ways of being Christian. We are about to enter the 40-day season of Lent, which mirrors Jesus’ 40 days in the wilderness; it was a period that was anything but tame: a period of radical transformation for Jesus, even without the radiance he experienced later. Wilderness can be a place for transformation, where we come face-to-face with our truest selves. Perhaps rather than being seen as a period of penitence, we can see Lent as a transformative journey into the wilderness, a time of gestation, of metamorphosis, of new beginnings, of being within the chrysalis — ready to emerge reborn. And it isn’t something we have to do alone…we have companions on our pilgrimage of transformation. I invite you to open yourself as we finish this season of Epiphany and walk together into the season of Lent next Wednesday evening. I invite you to join all of your sisters and brothers at Plymouth on a pilgrimage of transformation as we walk through the wilderness for these 40 days. May you be transformed in the midst of your life, knowing that new beginnings are possible. May you see change as an opportunity instead of a threat. May you be blessed as you uncover new truths about yourself. May you know that you are journeying with kindred spirits through the wilderness. Amen. © 2024 Hal Chorpenning, all rights reserved. Please contact hal at plymouthucc.org for permission to reprint, which will typically be granted for non-profit uses. [1] John 3.7 (NRSV) [2] Marcus Borg, Speaking Christian. (SF: HarperSanFrancisco, 2011), p. 169. |
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