Come And See

Posted on January 26, 2015 by npc-reese

January 18, 2015
John 1:35-51
“Come and See”
Rev. Dr. David A. Davis

Early Wednesday morning I was trying south on Rt206 to go the weekly bible study I attend with several Presbyterian pastor colleagues. Of course there is always quite a bit of traffic at that time of morning and shocking as it may seem, I found myself there on 206 behind a really big truck. It was a construction vehicle, a huge dump truck. I was behind it all the way down to the Lawrenceville Presbyterian Church. The truck had a big orange road construction sign on the back tailgate. The sign read “Construction Vehicle Do Not Follow.” Since that was exactly what I was doing (following the truck), it occurred to me that the sign, though it seemed crystal clear, was actually much more ambiguous or complicated or in need of interpretation: “Do not follow at a close distance”, “Do not follow into a major construction site”, “Do not follow as the truck moves into a lane on the highway already shut down for roadwork.” I followed the truck for several miles in apparent violation of the sign. “Construction Vehicle Do Not Follow”. Well, it’s just not that simple.

Jesus’ call of the disciples as told in this morning’s gospel text, it is John’s way, John the gospel writer’s way of telling the reader, “it’s just not that simple.” Usually when you and I ponder how Jesus issued that call and how the fisherman dropped and went, thoughts turn to the miraculous, the divine, the work of the Spirit, something extraordinary. That may be partly because Matthew and Mark make use of the word “immediately”; “immediately they left their nets and followed him.” There’s more here in John to chew on, a bit more ambiguity, it’s not as clear as one would think. For John, when Jesus said “follow me”, the following part, it’s just not that simple.

The two disciples of John the Baptist, they were with John when John saw Jesus and said “Look, here is the Lamb of God!” They followed even before or without Jesus saying “follow me.” Jesus asked them what they are looking for and their response was to ask him where he was staying. That seems a bit odd, a bit non profound, sort of a biblical missed opportunity. “Hey, he says you are the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. So, where are you staying?” Andrew went to tell Simon Peter. He told him that they had found the Messiah. Andrew brought Simon Peter to Jesus, again with no “follow me” from Jesus and Jesus called him Cephas, Peter. On the way to Galilee, Jesus found Philip who was from the same city as Andrew and Peter. Here we get the expected “follow me” from Jesus. Philip went and found Nathanael, sort of like Jesus found him, and told Nathanael that they had found the one Moses and the prophets wrote about. They had found the Messiah; even though Philip had been found by Jesus.

Nathanael then has that great line about how can anything good come out of Nazareth. Probably that’s less a knock on Nazareth and more a testament to Nathanael’s faith and understanding, his knowledge of teaching and texts. The Messiah would not be coming from somewhere up around Galilee. No; Jerusalem. Bethlehem. The lineage of David. Despite the question, Nathanael joined Philip. Philip didn’t give the “follow me”; he gave the “come and see”. When Jesus saw Nathanael coming, he said of him, “Now here is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.” Jesus didn’t say “follow me”. Affirming Jesus’ praise of his character and faith, in what might be interrupted as a lack of humility, Nathanael said to Jesus, “So where did you get to know me?” Jesus told him he saw him before under a fig tree. Nathanael, with still no “follow me” directed to him, offered his affirmation, proclaimed his belief, agreed with what Philip had said, what Andrew had said about Jesus. Son of God! King of Israel!

Jesus must have shook his head a bit at Nathanael. Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these…very truly I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.” And Nathanael and Philip and Andrew and Peter and the other disciples, and anyone who was listening, and all of us who are reading, looked at Jesus and all at once said, “What?” “You will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.” Greater things than this. Follow Him. It’s just not that simple.

The call to discipleship in John’s gospel. Whether those two following even before Jesus called, or the call coming from one to another, like Andrew telling Peter, or the promise from Jesus that there is going to be a whole lot more to this than just him knowing a name, the call to follow Jesus is more than a child-like follow the leader, duck, duck, goose, kind of game. One New Testament scholar suggests that this last verse, v.51, the one with Jesus talking angels ascending and descending, that it has caused as “much trouble for commentators as any other single verse in the Fourth Gospel.” In other words, it’s complicated. Jesus and his teaching to Nathanael that when you follow me you will see greater things; angels ascending and descending upon the Son of God. The following part. It’s not so simple.

A first reaction is to think that the greater things to come, and the divine action of angels on the move, that it is one of those typically cryptic references that Jesus offers in the gospels to his death and resurrection. You think this was something, wait to you see me rise from the dead.

Another option, when it comes to this last verse is to kind of write it off; not quite ignore it. But chalk it up to one of those beyond understanding mysterious phrases that Jesus drops every now and then. That John’s Jesus here gets a little apocalyptic, a little Book of Daniel, Book of Revelation. You follow me, and this whole Son of Man, Son of God thing eventually is going to end up in a great cosmic drama that affirms the very reign of God and my part in it. You follow me and you will see how this greater thing unfolds.

Or you might conclude that the angels going up and down on the Son of Man and how Jesus at this point seems to self-identify as the Son of Man, that what we have here is John wrapping a bow on the acclamation of Jesus as the Son of God, the Son of Man, the Messiah. On the front end the Baptist describes the Spirit descending like a dove. On the back end Jesus tells of the angels of God. And in between Andrew attests, “We have found the Messiah” and Philip attests “We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote” and Nathanael attests “You are the Son of God”. And this chapter that starts with “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God”, the chapter comes to an end with Jesus announcing that the rest of these chapters will tell of the greater things said and done by the Son of God who “became flesh and lived among us.”

By far the most common interpretation and attempt to make sense of v.51 is that it is Jesus offering a reference to Jacob’s Ladder in the Book of Genesis. Angels of God ascending and descending: a subtle, maybe not so subtle reference when one acknowledges Nathanael’s faith and understanding. If he knew the Messiah wasn’t supposed to come from Nazareth then he must have known about Jacob’s Ladder. You remember the story of Jacob’s dream at Bethel, where he saw in that dream the angels of God ascending and descending on a ladder, a ramp that was set on the earth and the top of it reached heaven. Here we have Jesus in the context of the baptismal divine affirmation and in the context of his call to a life of discipleship and just on the threshold of his performing signs like turning water into wine in chapter two, here we have Jesus pointing to himself not simply as the Son of Man but as that ladder, that ramp between heaven and earth. The angels of God ascending and descending, not on a ladder; on him.

The greater things than these for you to see. His death and resurrection? Yes. The cosmic, timeless fulfilment of the very reign of God? Yes. All that the Jesus of the gospels says and does, his teaching, his witness, his touch, his compassion? Yes. But even more, the greater thing to see in him, heaven and earth being one. Seeing in him. God with us. Seeing in him how God came all the way down. Seeing in him the very glory of God made known on earth as it is in heaven. Seeing in him the glory of God revealed here and now. Seeing in him God’s glory. Jesus said to Nathanael “You will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.” And Nathanael and Philip and Andrew and Peter and the other disciples, and anyone who was listening, and all of us who are reading, looked at Jesus and all at once said, “wow!”

A close reading of v51 in terms of the Greek reveals that the “you” is plural here. Jesus is talking to Nathanael but the “you” as in “Very truly I tell you, you will see heaven opened”, its plural. It’s footnoted in some English versions. Jesus is talking to Nathanael but his intended audience is much greater, much wider, much more timeless. You. All of you. All of you who follow Christ will see and bear witness to the glory of God. You will see and bear witness to the places where through the gospel and in the power of the Holy Spirit, heaven and earth touch. You will see and bear witness to the ordinary places of life where the body of Christ reveals and makes known the extraordinary and sacred presence of God; God coming all the way down. You. All of you who follow Christ will see and bear witness to how in and through him the glory of God is revealed here and now.

I’ve been listening to the song from the movie “Selma” by John Legend and the Rap artist Common. A remarkable blend of rap and black gospel. Like it comes right from church.

One day, when the glory comes
It will be ours, it will be ours
Oh, one day, when the war is one
We will be sure, we will be here sure
Oh, glory, glory
Oh, glory, glory glory

Now the war is not over
Victory isn’t won
And we’ll fight on to the finish
Then when it’s all done
We’ll cry glory, oh glory
We’ll cry glory, oh glory

I haven’t seen the move yet but when you listen to the song while watching the video which includes clips from the movie that portray Dr. King and the march on Selma, you can’t help but be taken, moved, inspired, reminded about our part, the church’s part, the body of Christ’s part when it comes to revealing God’s glory. God’s glory then. God’s glory now. God’s glory yet to come. It’s in the following part. And it’s not all that simple.

Follow me. It’s not all that simple but the promise is wondrously profound. The weight of the responsibility is lifted by the joy that overflows. For by God’s grace and in the power of God’s Spirit, we not only have been called to follow, we have been marked, shaped, and sent as the Body of Christ. And when hearts are filled with joy, and love overcomes evil, and a child knows she is loved by God, and graduate know deep down he will always be accepted by God and an executive on the rise realizes she can’t serve God and mammon, and forgiveness catches fire, and strangers are welcomed, and acts of compassion are contagious, and justice rolls, and the hungry are fed, and the poor are lifted up, and the broken find comfort, and the immigrant embraced, and someone lost in spirit finds a home, and the wanderer finds a path, and relationships are healed, and when the praise and worship in a community of followers offers you the experience of the embrace of Christ himself running to welcome you home, in all of it, through all of it, God’s glory seeps in, God’s glory shines. Or to sound old school, “oh what a foretaste of glory divine” or as the bible puts it, it’s like the angels of God ascending and descending.

Look…here

Posted on January 15, 2015 by npc-reese

January 11, 2015
John 1:19-34
“Look…here”
Rev. Dr. David A. Davis

The baptism of Jesus here in the Gospel of John, it’s different. “Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him.” Matthew, chapter 3. “In those days, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.” Mark 1:9. And in Luke: “Now, when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized…” When it comes to the Gospel of John and the baptism of Jesus, it’s different. The heavens opening, a voice speaking from above, a crowd gathered, that’s not John. A scene blocked out, a story told, a narration offered, that’s not John. The baptism of Jesus in John, it’s just different.

It’s John the Baptist making sure everyone knows he is not the Messiah. John the Baptist pointing to Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. John the Baptist telling about how when he baptized Jesus he saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove. In John’s gospel there is no “baptism of Jesus” narratively speaking. It is only John the Baptist referencing his experience of baptizing Jesus. John the Baptist saying to those around him, and to the gospel’s readers, and to the church, and to you and to me. “Look….here.” The baptism of Jesus in the fourth gospel, it’s the Baptist’s testimony. “I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.”

One of the theological affirmations embedded in the baptism of Jesus, a theological takeaway is the identity of Jesus and the confirmation of him as the Son of God. So in the story-told, plot-driven drama of the first three gospels, the narrator describes a voice coming from heaven with the divine attestation: “you are my Son, the Beloved.” Here in John, there is little to no narration, no visual painted with words. Only John the Baptist, stage center, the proclamation that Jesus is the Son of God doesn’t come from heaven, it comes from John the Baptist: “this is he of whom I said, ‘after me comes a man who ranks ahead of me, because he was before me.’ I myself, I didn’t know him; but I came baptizing with water because of him, so that he might be revealed to Israel…..I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it rested on him, it remained on him. I didn’t know him. But the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘the one whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ I myself have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.”

No thunderous voice coming from the sky, no miraculous parting of the heavens, no scene portrayed, painted, or even really told. Just John, saying “So, let me tell you what I saw” John the Baptist confirming the identity of Jesus by telling of how he experienced him, “look….here, the Lamb of God who takes the away the sin of the world.”

On Thursday night I participated down at the Princeton Library in an event staged by McCarter Theater’s Education and Engagement program. The evening was entitled “Unrelenting Voices Read In: A Celebration of Freedom, Justice, Mandela, and More.” I was one of dozens of community members recruited to read selections from Tutu, Mandela, King, Sojourner Truth, Langston Hughes and a whole lot of others. There were many readings and most were brief. A collation of the readings was provided to both readers and listeners alike; a fairly extensive script as it were. My reading of a selection of Archbishop Tutu’s Nobel Price acceptance speech came early. As I found myself engaged with all the readings that came after, it was the spoken word that captivated me. I looked at the paper less and less and at each reader more and more. Finally I put my script under my chair and leaned forward to experience each one as they read.

Without question, the most compelling reader of the night was young teenage girl. She was the only one among us who memorized her piece. Her words were those of Claudette Colvin, and African American woman who back in 1955 when she was 15 was arrested for refusing to move her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. The text came from an interview Claudette Colvin gave in 2013 as she recounted what happened. But to hear it Thursday night in the voice of young black woman in our community whose voice was shaking both with nerves and with the historic weight of what she was saying “I could not move because history had me glued to the seat…It felt like Sojourner Truth’s hands were pushing me down on one shoulder and Harriet Tubman’s hands were pushing me down on another shoulder, and I could not move.”

That night down at the library, it was one young woman’s testimony to the courage of Claudette Colvin. It was so much more than words on a page, more than a script long since tossed under my chair. Thanks to the effort of an African American girl in our community, for me, history became palpable, it was made present

In some way, I think that’s how we are to receive John the Baptist’s testimony this morning. The script of Matthew, Mark, and Luke goes under your chair, and you lean forward and listen as the Baptist tells you of his experience of the Son of God. So much more than words on a page. Lifting your nose from the book, even THEE book, and lean in to receive someone’s testimony to an experience of the Son of God; faith becoming palpable, being made present.

Over the holiday I went to see “Unbroken”, the film version of Laura Hillenbrand’s book about the life of Louis Zamperini. I have not read the book but there was enough chat out there about the movie that I expected it to cover the breadth of his long life. The more than two hour movie, though, was almost all about his experience in a raft at sea and then in a Japanese prison camp until the end of the war. The rest of his life is summed in those credit like lines on the screen at the end as the music starts to play. It was an op ed piece in the Wall Street Journal that filled in the gaps for me since I hadn’t read the book. How in 1949 at a Billy Graham Crusade in Los Angeles Louis Zamperini came forward, professed his faith, and with his experience of Jesus Christ began a journey toward healing, wholeness, redemption, forgiveness, and abundant life. Since I saw the movie I have also heard second and third hand that Mr Zamperini was a Presbyterian, a member at Hollywood Presbyterian Church, and helped run a youth group that included Professor Darrell Guder.

The easy move here is to join the bandwagon of preachers and writers pointing to a Hollywood conspiracy and the cultures anti-Christian agenda. “You see what they’ve done to Louis and Jesus!!” The harder step is to admit that it is not a movie producer’s call to offer a testimony to the Son of God, it’s ours. And then to ask how often we miss the chance to do that in our own lives, to point to our experience of Christ Jesus and his gospel. According to the Op Ed piece, Louis Zamperini was quite specific in his 2003 memoir about his faith journey, his encounter with the Son of God. More than a published memoir, more than some kind of saint, my guess is that Louis offered the quite testimony of his life; and folks all around him, grandchildren, friends, fellow church members, they lifted their nose out of the script and leaned forward to receive from him, in him, faith becoming palpable, being made present. I can say that, not because I ever met him but because I have seen it happen, seen testimony like that over and over and over again in the church, in you.

There will be some preachers, I am sure, who want to go on the circuit railing against Angelina Jolie and the conspiracy that she represents. Other good people of faith will want to take on the New Atheist and the op ed pieces they write that lump all religion together as purveyors of myth and violence, hatred and bitterness. Still others will excel in an attempt to answer every question and address every doubt, thinking that intellectual perfection is the linchpin of faith and that winning the argument is the way to give glory to God. But what if? How about? What would it look like if you and I, if we fostered a community of people who don’t want to miss the opportunity to bear witness with the ordinary, fullness of their lives? If we nurtured in one another the yearning to lean forward and listen as faith becomes palpable and present in one another. What if the buzz on the street about Nassau Presbyterian Church was that we were a congregation full of folks called to live our lives in light of our shared experience of the Son of God.

Over the years I have found myself in meetings with various community leaders and non-profits talking about our shared calling in Mercer County to work for economic justice, and to advocate for the poor, to work for affordable housing. Usually someone at the table, or in the room will raise the macro question and challenge us to all work on the big picture and in a subtle, sometime not so subtle way point out how direct services like food pantries and hot meal programs and clothing drives and homeless shelters might actually hinder the process of getting the bigger picture fixed. Sometimes that is a macro-economic comment, sometimes it is a political comment, and sometimes it is tinged with uncomfortable implications about poor people and race. I remember one meeting years ago where a staff member from Crisis Ministry spoke up and responded, “Yes, but people are hungry now.” I find myself convicted and freshly determined for the next conversation when it comes, and you know it will come. That I, or someone, in the room would say to the impressive gathering of folks who want to make a difference and bring change…”You know, when it comes to feeding the hungry, and serving the poor, and clothing the naked…..I do it because Jesus teaches me and commands me. Our direct service, comes from our experience of the Son of God. Let there be no misunderstanding, or gap, or waffling in our story. It is part of my testimony to Jesus.”

A community of people who don’t want to miss the opportunity to bear witness to the Son of God with the ordinary, fullness of their lives: bearing witness in how we teach our children, bearing testimony in how we grieve, bearing witness in a yearning for racial reconciliation, bearing testimony to a life of integrity at work, bearing witness to a life of praise and worship, bearing testimony to uncommon generosity, bearing witness in praying for an end to terror and violence, bearing testimony to higher calling and deeper meaning, bearing witness to the palpable and present faith in one another. Faith in the Son of God at work in one another.

Bearing witness. Bearing testimony.

The Baptist said, “I myself have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.”

Gifting

Posted on January 15, 2015 by npc-reese

Matthew 2:1-12
January 4, 2015
“Gifting”
Rev. Lauren J. McFeaters

O those wonderful Wise Men. They finally, devotedly, arrive on the scene and Bethlehem can rest. The tableau is set and like every pageant that ever was, the three kings seem to float down the aisle, walking like brides with that step and a half, step and a half, swathed in gaudily embossed robes and carrying in outstretched hands gifts for the baby Jesus; gifts in glass bottles that had once contained aftershave and perfume.

And yet, just when the wise men have been reduced to pointy hats and empty bottles of Old Spice and Chantilly; just when the church is ready to pack up the candles and the Advent Wreath, we receive a final Christmas Message from the Gospel of Matthew.

There’s wonderful story about a crotchety biblical scholar, who had spent his entire academic career de-bunking Matthew’s story of the Wise Men. This scholar, almost an Ebenezer Scrooge character, believed the journey of strangers from the East was embedded in the biblical text as folklore and legend. In fact he believed the entire witness of Jesus’ birth was fairy tale; mythology. Well one Christmas he received a Christmas card in the mail. And when he opened it he saw a glorious hand-painted depiction of three kings in full regalia standing in front of the scholar’s very own office door. The Wise Men on the front of the Christmas card looked distressed and perturbed, worried and frantic – pounding on the professor’s door, bellowing his name, shouting “Let us in! We’ve traveled so far and followed the star! We’ve brought gifts.”

I choose to believe upon opening that card and allowing the Gospel to flow over him, that the scholar’s small heart grew three sizes that day. And like Dickens’ Ebenezer Scrooge:

He ran to the window, opened it, and experienced golden sunlight; heavenly sky; sweet fresh air; merry bells. “What’s to-day?” cried the Scholar, calling downward to a boy in Sunday clothes. “Eh?” returned the boy, with all his might of wonder. “What’s to-day, my fine fellow?” said the Scholar. “To-day?” replied the boy. “Why, Christmas Day.” “It’s Christmas Day!” said the Scholar to himself. “I haven’t missed it.” The Wise Men have done it all in one night. Now I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.” [ii]

Far from being dismissed as an irrelevant fable, the “Wise Men” or “Magi” have remained beloved and revered characters on the Christmas stage of congregations around the world. So when we receive Matthew’s Christmas letter we do not see three mysterious star-gazers, but “Wise Men,” pounding on the door of our church, demanding to see us; and by their mere presence, revealing God’s salvation for all of God’s people. This Christmas letter sings out, that rather than being the glittering end of the show; that conclusion to our holy days, the Magi come to turn our awe into a staggering joy.

So who are these Wise Men? Magi is the Greek word used in Jesus’ time to identify Babylonian and Zoroastrian astrologers. And only in Matthew’s Gospel do these stargazers play a role. We know them as wise and discerning; persevering and adventurous. But it is oral tradition and not scripture that has given them the title of Kings, has chosen their number as three, and has given them names and kingdoms: Balthasar from Arabia, Caspar from India, and Melchior from Persia. We don’t even know that they were men.

But whatever their number or identity, most important to our Gospel lesson is that the wise men are Gentiles, the first seekers and travelers to find the holy child are those outside of the covenant. God’s coming in Christ becomes of ultimate significance to all people. All people will see it together. All people are given the gift of this newborn king.

And yet for all their wisdom, they are of course not mind readers. The wise men possess no special knowledge that allows them to travel directly to Bethlehem. And they are naive. Dealing with stars and charts, their eyes on the world above them, they have not understood the likes of Herod – the very one who would use their plotting of the stars to plot a death.^{^[iii]}

In his poem, “Journey of the Magi,” T.S. Eliot paints for us a picture of the Wise Men, very unlike the ones we’ve come to know through our pageants and Christmas cards. Eliot writes this:

‘A cold coming we had of it,

Just the worst time of year

For a journey, and such a long journey:

the ways deep and the weather sharp,

The very dead of winter.’

All this was a long time ago, I remember,

And I would do it again, but set down

This set down

This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death?

There was Birth, certainly we had evidence and no doubt.

I had seen birth and death,

But had thought they were different…. ^{^[iv]}

Eliot has it right. There is perhaps no other biblical narrative that sets before us both the joys of birth and the terrors of death; the delights of a new hope and the despair of the crucifixion to come. “Birth or Death? I had seen birth and death, but had thought they were different.”

A harsh reality for the Christmas season when what we want most is to surround ourselves with family and friends, to keep our children safe; to keep that crèche up at least one more week. A harsh reality for the Christmas season when what we want most is to hold onto the good cheer that will get us through the days ahead. But we are jarred out of our tender contemplation into the stark recognition that the Christian life is not birthed in sweet gentleness.

Poignant and stirring, yes. Sweet and mild, no.

Instead we are confronted, before we even know what hits us, with the sobering message that there is always sacrifice in our life of faith; at the center of our belief. There is a foretaste of the passion even in the innocence of the Nativity.^{^[v]} There is a promise that stubbornly clings to our hearts:

And announces in the face of birth and death;
Announces in the face of any Herod the world can produce,
Announces as all the doors of the inns are slammed in the face;
Through all the dark nights of the soul,^{^[vi]} that Jesus Christ is the true light; which enlightens everyone.

As the world erupts with suffering and anguish, God’s Epiphany comes crashing in to reveal the only One who can save us.

In this we rejoice; with heart and soul and voice – a rejoicing that doesn’t end, even with the end of life itself.

With the Wise Men we are staggered by joy and open treasure chests before him. A gift of gold. A gift of frankincense. And a gift of myrrh. Christ was born for this! Thanks be to God.

ENDNOTES

[i] Matthew 2:1-12: In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men^* from the East came to Jerusalem, ²asking, ‘Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising,^* and have come to pay him homage.’ ³When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; ⁴and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah^* was to be born. ⁵They told him, ‘In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet: ⁶ “And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd^* my people Israel.”’7 Then Herod secretly called for the wise men^* and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. ⁸Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, ‘Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.’ ⁹When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising,^* until it stopped over the place where the child was. ¹⁰When they saw that the star had stopped,^* they were overwhelmed with joy. ¹¹On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure-chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. ¹²And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

[ii] Charles Dickins. A Christmas Carol. London: Chapman & Hall, Stave 5, Part 1, 1843.

[iii]. John Indermark. Setting the Christmas Stage: Readings for the Advent Season. Nashville: Upper Room Books, 2001, 68-70.

[iv]. T. S. Eliot. The Complete Poems and Plays: 1909-1950. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1971, 68-69.

[v]. Wendy M. Wright. The Vigil: Keeping Watch in the Season of Christ’s Coming. Nashville: Upper Room Books, 1992, 122.

[vi]. Ann Weems. Kneeling in Bethlehem. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1987, 51.

Expecting

Posted on December 22, 2014 by npc-reese

December 21, 2014
Galatians 4:1-7
“Expecting”
Rev. Dr. David A. Davis

Our text for this morning comes from the first seven verses of the 4^th chapter of Paul’s Letter to the Galatians. Throughout the letter Paul offers a detailed theological argument on the relationship of law and gospel, how the followers of Christ are liberated from being keepers of the law, how in Christ Jesus one is a child of God through faith, not by works or ritual. As Paul puts it, “a person is justified not by the works of the law but through the faith of Jesus Christ. These verses I am about to offer for your hearing, they come after Paul writes that “there is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

Galatians 4:1-7

I was working a crossword puzzle the other day and one particular clue had me stumped. It was six letter word and the clue was “rubberstamped”. My mind could get away from a board action, or some kind of decision, or a leader just going through the motions. Anyone who works on crossword puzzles has had the experience of being stumped by clue. You rack your brain. You try to work all the answers around the missing word. It’s just not happening. You put the puzzle down, walk away, take a break. When you come back, that same blasted clue is so obvious, so easy, you never tell another soul that for 40 minutes you were spinning in a complex maze, making no progress, missing what was so obvious. “Inkpad” that was the answer when I went back to the puzzle. The answer to “rubberstamped”. I said something to myself I can’t repeat here and the rest of the puzzle fell into place rather easily.

When it comes to the 4^th chapter of Galations, Paul is trudging through some thick theological territory here. Paul’s reader could trace his argument with pencil and pad in hand as if you were studying his rhetoric with the debate teams. His level of critical thought, a logic with which to follow along: heirs. minors, slaves, owners, guardians, trustees, elemental spirits. The Apostle’s students could take notes, diagram the argument, underline words, frame what’s at stake; whether in order to be a disciple of Christ one has to be a keeper of the law faithful to Jewish practice. It is as important of an argument there can be in the formation of our theological tradition. A profound thread of thought to trace not only here in Galatians but in all of Paul’s thought: justification by faith.

But then you take a break. Put down the reading. Go about your business. Clear your head a bit. Have a sip of coffee. When you come back ready to jump in the deep waters of scripture, there is tucked in here in Galatians 4 a blasted clue so obvious. A refrain fit to be sung. A verse that leaps off the page just like “Do not be afraid, for see I am bringing you good news of a great joy…” and “For unto us a Child is born” and “Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son and they shall call him Emmanuel.” When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son, born of a woman, born under the law. That’s Paul on Christmas. Amid his timeless, carefully crafted argument to the Galatians about Christian freedom from the law and the faithfulness of Jesus Christ, Paul drops a bit of Christmas on them.

When it comes to the birth of Jesus, the bible of course by definition, is predictable and consistent. Tradition conflates the stories of the birth of Jesus; “pageant-fies” them. But scripture’s readers know that Luke has all the details about the Angel Gabriel, Mary’s visit to Elizabeth, and the shepherds, and the heavenly host and the child wrapped in swaddling clothes. Matthew, Matthew is the one who tells about Joseph, and his worry about Mary being pregnant, and his dream, and Immanuel, and naming the child Jesus, and King Herod, and the star, and the Magi, and the gifts, and their going home by another way. As for John, John offers the poetry about light and life and the Word becoming flesh. Mark? Mark brings absolutely nothing to the table when it comes to the birth of Jesus. Mark is “mum” on Christmas. As for the Apostle Paul. Paul, who for all his wordiness and quote-ability, for all his theological arguments, and memorable lists, and beautiful rhetoric about the cross and the resurrection, when it comes to telling of the birth of Jesus, it’s this: When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman…..When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. The Apostle Paul on the birth of Jesus. Paul on Christmas. When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son.

Scholars, historians, and close readers of the bible would point here that the birth narratives found in the gospels had probably not taken shape yet, that those established patterns of biblical communication had not been formed yet, nothing beyond oral tradition when Paul was writing to the Galatians. So went it came to Jesus and his birth, maybe this was the best Paul could do. When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son. Others would remind us of that specific and pointed theological argument Paul was trying to make. So maybe it is a stretch to find a little Christmas here in chapter 4. But you don’t have to let that forest full of trees block out what is a clear Christmas affirmation. It’s not a bad refrain. It’s not a bad Christmas refrain. When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son.

When the fullness of time had come. The fullness of time. It’s more than “when the time was right”. It’s more than a biological reference like when Luke writes about how “the time came for Mary to deliver her child.” The fullness of time. The Greek dictionary uses the phrase “the state of being full” or “being complete”. When it comes to God and God’s relationship to humankind, God’s mercy, God’s love, God’s promise, at that moment , God’s promise was complete, full to the brim, overflowing. The fullness of time. With some sense of a greater cosmic timeline that reflects God’s plan of salvation, the time came for God to deliver on God’s promise in and through the Christ Child.

Mary wasn’t the only one expecting. According to Paul, God was expecting too. When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. Children of God. In and through Jesus Christ, God’s Son, our Savior. Children of God. As John affirms it in the prologue to his gospel, “To all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.” As the writer of First John puts it, “See what love the Father has given us that we should be called children of God…and that is what we are!” We are who God says we are! We are who God claims us to be. In the fullness, the completion of God’s promise, we belong to God. We are a God’s children. Some days the clue is so obvious, the low hanging fruit so ripe, the message so clear. For Paul, the takeaway for Christmas is right there….you are a child of God. When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son.

Back when my parents were alive, my phone calls to them followed a remarkably consistent pattern. It wasn’t that we had a steady day and time for the call. I know families do that. No, with my parents it was rhythm of the conversation that was almost always the same. To say it was a call with my parents is a bit misleading. It was my mother on the line and my father close by listening to one side of the conversation. My mother could go into the greatest of details about what was happening with then out there in Pittsburgh. She could tell me who they sat next to in church, what the sermon was about, what they both ate the night before at the “Eat n Park”, how the bridge game went, what the mother of an old girlfriend of mine said when she ran into her at the grocery store, what my brother and sister were up to (as if I didn’t talk to them at all) and all sorts of details about her health and way too many details about the health of every one of their friends. Sometime near the end of the call, my mother would always say to my father, “Do you want to talk to David?” And he would always say, “No, tell him that I love him.” which of course I could hear because he was sitting right there. Always predictable; a twenty minute call with my mom where she was pretty much dictating life’s journal and my dad finishing with the same refrain.

When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son. Here in Paul, when the light bulb goes off and you get the “captain obvious” clue hidden in the theological threads: justification by faith and saved by grace and the righteousness of Christ, when Paul drops a little Christmas on you, it is the Spirit of God speaking to the followers of the Christ Child through the words of Paul, “Just tell them I love them!” They are mine. No longer captive to the ways of the world. No longer bound by how the world defines you, what the world expects of you, you are mine. You are a child of God. It is who you are!

You, with all the complexities and challenges and deep-seated anxieties that come when ever your extended family gathers for the holiday? You are a child of God. You, with your bones aching and your energy gone, and all the weariness that comes when you feel older than your age? You are a child of God. You, home from a whirlwind of a semester where sleep is hard to find, grades are even harder to get and jobs in a year or two, well? You are a child of God.You who know this season of year to be the absolute most difficult and joy the last thing in your heart and feeling more distant than ever from friends or someone to love? You are a child of God. You who have your doubts and go through the motions around here to keep you family happy? You are a child of God. You who are struggling at work knowing that one more year feels like eternity, let alone 20? You are a child of God. You who are waiting to hear from this college and that college; at the mercy of worldly words like “admit, defer, deny”? You are a child of God. You who the world says have everything together, when it comes to money, and things, and influence, and love, and family…yet inside, your empty? You are a child of God.

You who…….you are a child of God.

Just tell them that I love them.

When the fullness of time had come, God sent God’s Son.

God is expecting you.

Yearning

Posted on December 22, 2014 by npc-reese

December 14, 2014
Isaiah 58:6-12
“Yearning”
Rev. Lauren J. McFeaters

In the vibrant but chaotic days before Christmas I like to get out of the office for a walk and I often make my way to the other side of Nassau Street to the Paper Source, you know the store that sells cards and gifts and all things paper. They also sell calendars. I have a little problem with calendars. I love calendars. I love the fresh start of January and the dreaming of the days ahead.

So as I was drooling over the 2015 selections I overheard a couple at the Christmas card table. Even though my back was to them, I could tell they were looking at the boxes of Christmas cards; they were foraging and I could hear the man say: “No. Ugh-ugh. Mmmm. Nope. Nah. NO, NO, NO.”

Finally, the woman said, “What’s wrong?”

The man answered,

“I just don’t want anything about

Christ in our Christmas cards.

Aren’t there any Christmas cards without Jesus?”

Then silence and additional foraging.

“Well here’s one,” said the woman.

“This just says ‘Longing for Peace’ and look,

it’s blank inside. Will that do?”

“I guess so,” said the man.

“Longing for Peace will have to do.”

Longing for Peace, yearning for peace will have to do.

For Isaiah who is testifying to God’s yearning, believing that anything “will have to do,” just won’t do.

Where is your zeal and your might? Your yearning and your compassion are withheld from me…Where are the yearning of your heart and your compassion? Isaiah 63
Thus, yearning over you, we had found our delight in having imparted to you not only the glad tidings of God, but our own lives also 1Thessalonians

You would call and I would answer, and you would yearn for me and for your handiwork. Job 14

For God is my witness; how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus. Philippians 1

And yearn like newborn infants for pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up to salvation. 1 Peter

All examples of scriptural yearnings: from the Prophets to the Psalmist to Paul, the Bible is pieced together by the glue of yearning – the longing, the hunger, the eagerness, the thirst, for restoration.

Yearning.

O how we yearn.

We’re a people of yearning.

We are created to ache for better things.

We crave, we desire, we yen for God to set us on new paths;

to give us a sign; to make life a bit easier, a bit calmer;

and to serve a world that has forgotten how to yearn;

that would rather live in nostalgia and wistfulness

instead of the present here and now.

Your light, it shall break forth like the dawn,

and your healing,

it shall spring up quickly;

your vindicator shall go before you,

the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.

Then you shall call,

and the Lord will answer;

you shall cry for help, and the Lord will say, “Here I am.”

On the afternoon of Christmas Day 1531, Martin Luther preached a sermon on Isaiah and began his sermon by saying:

Earlier today on Christmas morning

we heard the Christmas story.

Now, enough of that.

Now you will hear how to make use of it.

So we take up the words of the prophet Isaiah

who sings us a song;

a song of yearning and longing for the coming kingdom

and the little child who will lead it.

But in these days as we draw closer to the manger we’re all like a woman who approaches a baby’s cradle and says,

“Oh, it’s a baby!

And I answer, says Luther:

“It is a baby – and he’s ours!”

That baby is given to us as though he were our own son.

And how proud and honored we are that he is our son,

that he belongs to us.

But it is not enough that he is “born” to us;

he is also “given” to us and he yearns for us.^{^[i]}

O how he yearns.

As we balance between the messes we live in, and our hope for the bliss to come, Isaiah’s Christmas card, is anything but blank inside. There’s no vague “LONGING FOR PEACE” beautifully scrolled on the outside and an empty page on the inside.

For Isaiah there’s no blotting out cruelty and brutality with port and plum pudding.
There’s no hiding behind a manger scene while a seemingly passive infant smiles and coos for his guests.
There’s no luxuriating in sentimental feelings or believing that just yearning for a just world filled to brimming with freedom and healing “will have to do.”

Isaiah tells us of God’s design for us: the smashing of burdens and troubles; pulverizing the abuse of oppressors; crushing the cruelty of tyrants – all whips and cudgels and curses – are lifted away. ^{^[ii]}

Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;

you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;

you shall be called the repairer of the breach,

the restorer of streets to live in.

On this edge of Christmas, how will the Yearning One make use of us?

You who are undergoing rigorous medical treatment, awaiting surgery, enduring the ache and sting, fighting the good fight, waiting for news to live by: you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail.
You who are sure that God could not love you, that you have done something so incomprehensible that you are a lost cause. You who stare in the mirror and don’t recognize yourself; there is One who knows you through and through and loves you still and still; who gives himself as a gift: Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly.
You who grieve, you who are ashamed, you who are young with your life ahead of you, and you who are older with your life ahead of you: your vindicator shall go before you and the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.^{^[iii]}

You see, there is no secret of the heart so buried that the God of yearning cannot find it. There is no soil so sterile that the seed of holy wonder cannot grow in it. There is no path so dark that the Light of the World cannot light the way.

Is not this the fast YOU choose:

to loose the bonds of injustice,

to let the oppressed go free.

Your ancient ruins they shall be rebuilt;

you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;

you shall be called the repairer of the breach,

the restorer of streets to live in.

Thanks be to God.

ENDNOTES

[i] The original text for this sermon (in Latin and German) is in WA34/2:508-514. The translation is by Frederick J. Gaiser. A contemporary German version is available in Martin Luther, Ausgewählte Werke, Vol. 3, Ausgewählte Predigten (Stuttgart: Calwer Vereinsbuchhandlung, 1935) 54-58.

[ii] These verses from Isaiah have been adapted from Eugene H. Peterson’s translation of Isaiah as found in The Message: The New Testament in Contemporary English. Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress Publishing Group, 1993.

[iii] Jon M. Walton. Inspired by and adapted from his sermon, “Christmas at John’s House: A Breakthrough.” The First Presbyterian Church in the City of New York, December 24, 2002.

Sermon20141207Watching

Posted on December 18, 2014 by npc-reese

December 7, 2014
Mark 13:28-37
“Watching”
Rev. Dr. David A. Davis

I hear it over and over again during visits with folks after knee surgery or hip replacement, or in conversation with someone in cardiac rehab. They share the message from the doctor about how quickly muscles can deteriorate while you’re leg is in cast or how long you can expect it to take to really get back your strength after you’ve been flat on your back due to surgery. The numbers differ and doctors say it various ways: it will take a week for every day you were in the hospital, a full day of rehab on your quad for every hour you sit and can’t move your knee. Over and over again the message is about how easy it is to lose whatever tone, shape, breath, strength you have when you find yourself suddenly doing nothing for a few days. Atrophy is the word. So make sure you work hard.

Some of you know my children have both been college athletes. One of the challenges to playing a sport at that level is that no one on the team is used to spending time on the bench. You don’t get to play in college by spending a whole lot time off the field or the court watching in high school. So I had the same conversation with both Hannah and Ben that my father had with me, that coaches everywhere have with their players. You have to be ready when your number is called. It’s a long season, people get hurt, some don’t play well. You never know when the coach is going to call your name. And when that happens, you want to be prepared physically and mentally to get in the game. You want to be ready.

Just a few weeks ago Cathy and I had dinner at the home of some friends. There in the living room of the house was a gorgeous Steinway piano. I play little bit. A very little bit. A few favorite songs I have played since high school. The songs I play when I am alone at my house, or over in Nile Chapel. The songs Cathy has endured since I played them for her late one night in Miller Chapel over at the seminary the year we met. After dinner I sat down at the Steinway I sat down to play those few songs. It seemed like with every piece I could only get so far; the fingers couldn’t find the right keys, the ear couldn’t hit the right tune. I couldn’t even pound out “Precious Lord” by Thomas Dorsey which I have played since I was 16. Cathy had the right response, “Wow” she said, “you really need to play more.”

Jesus said, “What I say to you, I say to all: Keep awake”. Here in Mark’s gospel, at the end of the 13^th chapter; keep awake. Beware, keep alert…It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts all the staff in charge. The man commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. Keep awake. Evening, midnight, cockcrow, dawn? You don’t want the master of the house to come suddenly and find you asleep. Keep alert. Be on the watch. Keep awake. What I say to you I say to all: Keep awake. Make sure you work hard. You want to be ready. You really need to play more.

When it comes to our scripture lesson this morning, it is so easy for the gospel reader to get distracted by an apocalyptic fascination. The images, the language, it’s all here in the 13^th chapter of Mark, here in the teaching of Jesus: wars and rumors of wars, nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, earthquakes, famines, persecution, brother betraying brother, the sun darkened, stars falling from heaven and the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. The good news must first be proclaimed to all nations, Jesus says. And the one who endures to end will be saved. And heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass way. Therefore, keep awake.

Distracted by an apocalyptic fascination. Not as if the unique literature isn’t worthy of further study, not as if a theological affirmation of the power of God amid the world’s chaos and turmoil isn’t important, not as if God’s ongoing and unfolding plan of salvation in Jesus Christ isn’t worthy of our thanks and praise; but distracted by apocalyptic fascination as if this were all like one of those disturbing shoot them up video games that you supposed to master (Grand Theft Auto: Mark 13). Or distracted by apocalyptic fascination in terms of endless conversation about overly complicated theological terms and categories fairly distant from the Christian life here and now. Or distracted by apocalyptic fascination to the point of spending all your energy worry about what you personally believe in or what you don’t; what “i’ you can dot and which “t” you can’t cross. Distracted from what at the end of the day, is a simple imperative from Jesus: keep awake. Keep alert. Be on the watch.

It is worth noting that the little apocalypse of Mark 13 is framed on either side of the chapter by two women acting on their faith. At the end of chapter 12 it is the poor widow who dropped two copper coins in the offering, the one who put in all the living that she had. And at the beginning of chapter 14 comes the woman who broke open the jar of costly ointment to anoint the head of Jesus. “What she has done”, Jesus said, “will be told in remembrance of her.” Two nameless women seeking to live the gospel. Two daring acts; one of generosity, one of devotion. Two women, who received the praise of the Savior. You and I can talk apocalypse until Jesus comes again but those two, they were living the faith. They were watching.

When it came to the moment, to the here and now, in the life of faith, they were watching, like a doorkeeper who is commanded to be the keeper on the watch. Surprisingly the term doorkeeper isn’t all that common in either the New or the Old Testament. “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than live in the tents of wickedness”. That’s Psalm 84. And that’s pretty much it for the Hebrew scripture. In the New Testament, the only other use for the Greek word for “doorkeeper” is the description that Jesus offers of the gatekeeper and the sheep in John’s gospel; “the gatekeeper opens the gate for the shepherd.” The gatekeeper. Same Greek word as doorkeeper. The doorkeeper. The gatekeeper. The guard. The porter. Not just standing there, but serving, working for the shepherd. On the watch and doing the work. There’s more to doorkeeping than just passively watching like a devoted pet who holds the pose, or sits in the same place, or has a favorite spot waiting for the owner to return. You can’t take the whole of the gospel seriously and think that watching for Jesus is just about twiddling thumbs and passing time and predicting gloom and doom and watching the horizon, all until the sky starts to fall and Jesus comes again. Doorkeeping, gatekeeping is in service to that Great Shepherd of the Sheep. Watching is about dropping coins and breaking jars. Keep awake. Keep alert. Be on the watch.

You would be surprised how many former Presbyterians I meet along the way. It happens on airplanes, at weddings, at funerals, at a non-profit board meeting, on the sidelines of a soccer game, at party far away from church just making conversation with a stranger. Meeting the former Presbyterians that might be symptomatic of a declining denomination. Or it may be that some deeply implanted button is pushed in folks when they find out what I do for a living. More likely it is a result that God put a sticky on my back years ago as part of my call to ministry; a sticky note that says, “good listener.” The former Presbyterians. They offer an explanation even though I never ask. Yes, a few moved to another church by marriage. Every now and then someone tells me about a falling out with a pastor or with God. Once in a while it involves finding another church, a theological shift, or a different culture in terms of worship. But over the years, most often, far and away, what I hear over and over again, is some version of what the person said to me not that long ago at a reception after a funeral, “well, you know how it goes, don’t you. I guess you hear it all the time.” And what came next was a description of spiritual atrophy. A falling away from faith and the body of Christ and worship. There’s usually no reason, no crisis, no blame. It starts in such a simple way and before you know it, you don’t even know where to begin to find your way back. It can happen so fast. Atrophy is the word. So make sure you work hard. Keep awake. Keep alert. Be on the watch.

I read a newspaper account of four rabbis in New York City who led a crowd in the mourner’s prayer, the kaddish, on the steps of a synagogue. The prayer was the held at the beginning of one of the marches, the protests this last week since that second grand jury decision. Later in the protest all four were arrested. During the prayer the rabbis read the name of Eric Garner and dozens of other young black men killed by police, security guards, or vigilantes in the last few months. The rabbis’ explained the prayer as a “religious act”. In their own words, “a prayer of hope, a prayer about the vision of the world redeemed. It was a desire to express in Jewish terms our outrage, our concern and also our vision for a brighter future.” None of those rabbis could have imagined offering the mourners prayer on the steps of a synagogue for a black man from Staten Island. But there are those times in the life of faith when you just have to be ready. In your own life, one of those opportunities when you are called on to welcome the stranger and in so doing entertain an angel unawares (Hebrews), or when you are called on to love your neighbor as yourself, or when you are called on to offer a witness to the matchless grace of Jesus, or when you are called on to cross the aisle to someone whose opinions are different than yours and show a little love, or when you are called to just sit and listen to a person of color tell you about their experience of the police growing up, or when you are called on to speak for those who have been long silenced, or when you are called on to sit with someone in the lunch room long shunned and bullied by others, or when you are called on to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God. You have to be ready. Keep awake. Keep alert. Be on the watch

I have told you before of the prayer walk I participated in early in the fall down in Trenton. I described a group of clergy leaders from around the county who went to visit each place where murders had occurred in the city since January of 2014. What I didn’t describe to you were the three women from Shiloh Baptist Church who went on this prayer journey with us. When we started I figure they were praying to send us of. I thought it was going to be an hour long prayer vigil. It was more like three hours, ending after ten o’clock at night up on a road behind a liquor store in the West Ward. Those three senior women, they led the way to every stop. They were introduced to us as part of Shiloh’s prayer warrior team. I learned that night that it wasn’t a hyperbolic title. And to listen to them pray, oh, my, my.

This fall our deacon’s ministry and our adult education small groups initiative combined to offer a small group on Sunday mornings devoted to prayer. Nikos and Francis led the group. On Monday morning if you were a part of the ministry of Nassau being prayed for that Sunday, you received a wonderful email explaining that you had been prayed for when the group gathered Sunday morning at 9:15. The challenge, as you might guess, was that it was always a very small group. From what I’ve been told, some Sundays just Francis and Nikos. The group has stopped for awhile as we try to discern a pathway forward. After Ted Vial’s funeral a few weeks ago, I was reminded of the Wednesday noon time prayer that we started in Niles Chapel after 9/11. It started as a prayer service for the community, for folks working in town. Mostly it was Ted and few others coming faithfully to pray for the world, for the church, to pray for the congregation’s list of pastoral concerns. But Wednesday noon time prayers, they stopped too.

With all that’s going on in the world, and in our country, with all the loss our congregation has experienced in recent months and weeks, as someone said at our gathering on Thursday night with the Westminster congregation, “you have to pray. We can’t forget to pray.” Some days when you don’t’ know what you can do, you can pray. And some days when it comes to prayer, it’s hard to find the notes, even get a tune, and your thankful for that promised intercession of the Holy Spirit. But that’s when Jesus says, “wow….you really need to pray more.” Keep awake. Keep alert. Be on the watch.

According to Mark, Jesus said, What I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.

If We Are to Overcome

Posted on December 1, 2014 by npc-reese

2 Corinthians 5:16-21
November 16, 2014
“If We Are to Overcome”
Rev. Dr. J. Herbert Nelson II

Text is not available.

Waiting

Posted on December 1, 2014 by npc-reese

Isaiah 40:25-31
November 30, 2014
“Waiting”
Rev. Dr. David A. Davis

Waiting. You can learn a lot about yourself when you have to wait. Others learn a lot about you when you have to wait. Waiting. In a crowd, in traffic, at a ticket counter, it’s never hard to find those who think the waiting is only about them. Waiting.

When it comes to God and scripture and the spiritual life, there are a few definitions, expectations about waiting. On this first Sunday of Advent the waiting is traditionally labeled as a waiting for Christ to come. Waiting in a Christmas/Incarnation kind of way, waiting for the Christ Child to come again in our hearts. Waiting for Christ to come again; that Second Coming of Christ. “But about that day or hour no one knows, neither angels in heaven, nor the Son but the Father. Beware, keep alert” (Mark 13). Waiting as being ready for Christ the Savior, the Redeemer, the Judge.

In the Hebrew scripture, the psalmist portrays a different kind of waiting when it comes to life in God. “Wait for the Lord, be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!” Psalm 27. Or Psalm 130: “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope, my soul waits for the Lord, more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning.” Waiting as a discipline of prayer. Waiting on God as spiritual discernment. Waiting for an answer. Waiting to experience God’s presence. Waiting for peace. Waiting for courage. Waiting; not so much as being ready and on guard, but waiting as listening, waiting as a posture of submission before the Lord. Waiting to receive and yearning for the Spirit of God to fall afresh.

And here in the prophet Isaiah, the 40^th chapter, another kind of waiting. “Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount of with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” Waiting as the yearning for a newness of life, a strength that comes not from within but from beyond. Waiting for a healing and fresh start after a season of weakness and struggle for health.Waiting amid grief for a resurrection hope that will surely carry those who mourn to brighter days. Waiting for an anointing from above that will bring an end to despair and a robust embrace of life. Waiting for God to fulfill the promise of life; abundant and eternal. This expectation and definition of waiting in a few verses in Isaiah popularized by Josh Groban or the local church soloist singing about how God will raise you up on “Eagles’ Wings. “Bear you on the breath of dawn, Make you to shine like the sun, And hold you in the palm of His Hand.” Waiting for God to lift and carry you through.

Waiting. Waiting/ready for Christ to come. Waiting/open to the leading of God’s Spirit. Waiting/looking to God to intercede with the sustenance of life. All of it as if waiting were all about you. But the waiting here in Isaiah is different. The prophet’s waiting is different. When it comes to god and scripture and the spiritual life, the prophet offers another understanding. Waiting. To study the prophet on waiting this last week with a knot in the stomach as a grand jury’s decision was announced and protests and riots broke out all over, casts a biblical approach to waiting in a whole different light. The prophet’s light. The week waiting changed.

At this point in the Book of Isaiah, the prophet is writing to the people of God in exile in a foreign land. Exiled to Babylon, away from their own land, faced with the reality and the lure of all the other gods, questioning whether or not the God of their ancestors had deserted them. In exile; the land God had promised them now faded in a horizon far behind and any vision of a peaceable kingdom yet to rise from the horizon that lies ahead. In exile, betwixt and between, asking the proverbial God-question. As the prophet puts it to the people, “Why do you say it, why speak it? ‘My way is hidden from the Lord, and my right is disregarded by God’”? Why are you asking whether or not God has forsaken you? In exile yes, but why question God?

“Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. The Lord does not faint nor grow weary; God’s understanding is unsearchable. The Lord gives power to the faint and strengthens the powerless. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”

Isaiah’s waiting, it’s different. The contrast, the opposite of those who wait for the Lord, it isn’t the faint and the weary and the exhausted. The tired ones are set in contrast to the Lord who never wearies, the Lord who doesn’t faint. The opposite of those who wait for the Lord are the ones who question whether God has abandoned them, God has forgotten them, God has deserted them. Those who wait on the Lord are the ones who belief that God is present, that God hasn’t finished yet, that God is still at work even in betwixt and between, surrounded by the lure of other gods, when the past seems as bleak as the future. Yet even then, even here and now the Living God is present, moving God’s people forward toward a kingdom of justice and righteousness and peace.

This prophetic kind of waiting isn’t a solitary spiritual discipline. No, it is collective waiting for all who, with renewed strength, will continue to worship God and God alone, a corporate waiting for any who, with a vision of God’s kingdom come on earth as it in heaven will soar to the mountaintops where there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free, for all are one in Christ Jesus, a God’s people kind of waiting for those who will run and not be weary, walk and not faint; knowing that any present suffering and discontent shall not eat away at a yearning to live into what the Apostle Paul describes as “a more excellent way”.

This plural form of waiting, it has purpose. The purpose is to be runners and walkers for God’s kingdom. A kingdom where swords become plow shares and swords become pruning hooks. A kingdom where God is about to do a new thing. A kingdom where the wolves and lambs shall lie together. A kingdom where a little child shall lead in the way of peace. The prophet Isaiah, the prophet changes the waiting game. You can’t read Isaiah this week and come to the conclusion that waiting is just about you.

On Tuesday morning staff members here at church told me it was probably better that I don’t Facebook. Their point was that the level of rhetoric about the events on Monday night in Ferguson had escalated and was alarming in content. Later in the day I was on PCUSA website and the comments and posts even there were beyond troubling. That same morning, I checked in with a few pastor friends, folks of color; one was in tears, the other told me of the gut wrenching conversation he had with his son watching television Monday night, still another was honest and said he just couldn’t talk to me about it just yet. Instead of watching cable news, instead of posting, every one of us should find someone to talk to; someone different from us to talk to.

Announcing a grand jury decision after dark at 8:00pm local time and therefore insuring that the media would be covering not just a legal decision but unrest and violence, it necessarily underscored our nation’s inability to talk and listen in a meaningful way when it comes to race. In my lifetime, the discussions in the public square have become worse not better. The Civil Rights era and groundbreaking accomplishments like the Voting Rights Act fade in past horizons while our children and grandchildren’s ability to dream together of a future is crushed again and again by violence and a deep-seated racism and statistics on incarceration, poverty, education, economics that skewed by race, and the brutal anonymous rhetoric of social media isn’t helping. Our nations state of exile when it comes to race and racial justice and equality for all. And you and I, God’s people, the followers of Jesus faced yet again with the lure of other gods, the powers and the principalities of this world, living in time and place that is so unlike what God intends.

You can’t read Isaiah this week and think waiting is just about you. The prophet changes the waiting game. The people of God, the followers of Jesus, the church no longer has the luxury of waiting on the sidelines; or as Dr King put it in his Letter From the Birmingham Jail when he was lamenting the silence of the white church, being simply a “tail-light” while others work to lead the nation to higher levels of justice, understanding, reconciliation for all. Waiting on the Lord is for those who believe God is still at work, and God hasn’t given up, and God’s vision will still come to be. Waiting on the Lord, is for those of us who believe that the Living God is present, moving us forward toward a kingdom of justice and righteousness and peace.

This prophetic kind of waiting, it is so far from a waiting game. It is time to call on God to renew our strength, to lift us to a higher and better places, to run and not be weary, to walk and not faint.

Just to start, for goodness sake, for God’s sake, find someone to listen to, to talk to.

Remarks offered by David A. Davis at the Princeton Rally for Justice & Nonviolence

Posted on November 26, 2014 by npc-reese

Like so many of you, as I watched the distressing events of last night unfold in Ferguson on the television before me, the knot in my stomach grew, the despair in my heart deepened, and I kept saying to myself, and sometimes out loud, “Oh my God.” I don’t mean “Oh my God” in a flippant OMG kind of way, but “Oh my God” in a lament kind of way, the kind of lament passed on to us by forebearers in faith, the kind of lament attested to in the prophets and the psalmist of the Hebrew bible, the kind of lament modeled by Jesus of the gospels when he wept over Jerusalem. The kind of lament that comes when despair and sorrow and prayer are all mixed up in a way that goes so far beyond words…more like groan….”oh my God.”

Early this morning, as I tried to bring some order to my lament, to give expression to that groan, it was helpful for me to make a list, a prayer list.

I pray for Mike Brown’s parents.

I pray for Officer Wilson.

I pray for the community of Ferguson, for it’s people, for it’s leaders.

I pray for peace in Ferguson and around the nation.

I pray for justice too; a justice that will rise up and shatter the racism that divides us, a justice that can heal the history that defines us, a justice that can give each and every one of us a path forward to that world we dream about where our children won’t be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of our character.

I pray for a day when African American parents won’t have to have that conversation with their children and especially their sons, a conversation I didn’t have to have with my children, about how to be careful and respond appropriately to law enforcement any time anywhere for anything.

I pray for a day when white people of power like me will be able to just sit and listen to people of color without judgment, without defensiveness…because as I have learned since August, every black and brown man has a story to tell about their encounter with police; fathers, teenagers, college graduates, professors, deans, business men, unemployed…it doesn’t matter.

I pray for day when deadly force isn’t the acceptable response to an unarmed 18 year old who stole a pack of cigars; when a young black man isn’t immediately judged by an officer, or a security guard, or a self-appointed vigilante to look suspicious, or to be dangerous, or to “look like a demon”.

I pray for the day when parents of all color can have the same dreams for their children as I have for mine; when parents living in poverty can have the same dreams for their children as I have for mine; when parents with no education of their own can have the same dream for their children as I have for mine.

Oh my God!

In his Letter from the Birmingham Jail, The Rev Dr Martin Luther King Jr, offered his lament for the church, the silence of the white church amid the struggle “to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice.”

He described the twentieth century faith community that was “largely adjusted to the status quo, standing as a tail-light behind other communities of agencies rather than a headlight leading men and women to higher levels of justice”.

So, tonight, on behalf of the Princeton Clergy Association, I offer my prayer, that amid the 21^st century struggle to rid our nation of racial injustice, and economic injustice, and justice injustice, that our faith community in Princeton might shine a light, a godly light, on a higher level of justice for all.

David A. Davis

Princeton

November 25, 2014

The Song That Never Ends

Posted on November 25, 2014 by npc-reese

Psalm 100
November 23, 2014
“The Song That Never Ends”
Rev. Dr. David A. Davis

Make a joyful noise to the Lord all the earth.

Worship the Lord with gladness;

Come into God’s presence with singing.

A long time ago I listened to a lecturer who pointed out that the organ is built for singing. An organ breathes just like us; pushing air through the pipes to make and sustain sound. The sounding board in piano is built within the frame and the sound bounces from within. There is no sounding board in an organ. The sounding board is the room, the hall, the sanctuary. The main stop on an organ, the musician pointed out, is intended to match the voices of a congregation. The organ is built for singing. You and I are built to praise God; to make a joyful noise, to worship the Lord with gladness, to come into God’s presence with singing. With the very breath we have, and our ability to sustain a note, our lips shall show forth praise. The sounding board of our praise isn’t simply the blue sky on a bright morning or the glowing red mountains at sunset, some part of the frame of God’s creation. No, the sounding board of our praise is the community of faith. We are intended to praise God together.

You can imagine it as well as I can. A preacher glancing out at the congregation during the singing of the second hymn. They are singing “How Great Thou Art”. So the pastor, she has the opportunity to look out at the congregation instead of the words printed in the hymnbook. Like most ministers she enjoys the chance to look out at the many faces in the congregation. It is one of the privileges of standing up front; especially when the church is singing. This particular morning the church is a bit more crowded because of the baptism that was earlier in the service.

“O Lord My God when I in awesome wonder consider all the works thy hands have made.” The pastor sort of sighs to herself. She has long since grown tired “How Great Thou Art” but boy, the congregation loves to sing it; every time. She stands looking out like a farmer surveying the field a daybreak. Some folks catch her eye and smile. Others sing with their eyes closed. Still others never look up from the book. She chuckles in her head when she see the long time member who couldn’t sing lick, but he was belting it out. “I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder, thy power throughout the universe displayed.”

The pastor is jolted from her wistful trip through the congregation, jolted by the stare coming from a man back on the right in the middle of the pews. She didn’t know who he was, maybe a family member or friend of the baptismal family who didn’t want to sit down front. She is taken aback by his glare. He held no hymnbook. His lips moved not one bit. He just stared, right at her. When she caught his eye, he didn’t even look away. “Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to thee. How great thou art, How great thou art!”

She can’t stop thinking about the man with the stare. Was he angry? Mad at having to be in church? Did he have God-issues? Maybe he just couldn’t sing? As she kept scrolling through the possibilities, the preacher notices a church member in the pew who taps the man on the shoulder, whispers something, and offers him a hymnbook opened to the page. He smiles, mouths thank you, and takes the book. “Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to thee. How great thou art, How great thou art!”

The man never did sing but he followed along for the last few lines of the hymn. After the service, in the hallway the minister calls out to that member who spoke to the visitor. “I’m just curious, what did you say to that guy that convinced him to take the hymnbook. Judging from the look on his face, I would never guessed he would have accepted it”. The member sort of smiled, “I would have been more discreet if I would have known you were watching! “No, really, what did you say?” “I just leaned forward, held out the hymnbook and said “Here, you ought to try, this is who we are”. The pastor and member enjoyed that moment together; the man accepting the hymnbook. As they headed off in different directions the pastor stops and turns around, “By the way, did you mean singing hymns is who are, or that hymn, “how great thou art” is who we are”. The member stops, thinks just a second. “Yes” was the response…..It is who we are.

Know that the Lord is God

It is God that made us, and we are God’s

We are God’s people, and the sheep of God’s pasture.

We belong to God. Some things you can never repeat enough. You can never tell someone enough. You can never sing enough. A pastor with a child in arms standing at the fount; “you belong to God.” A gaggle of kids gathered here on the chancel and the story teller week after week after week; “you belong to God”. Upstairs on the third floor, Sunday mornings, Sunday nights, overnight retreats, the message from the youth director, it’s not all that complicated; “you belong to God”. A chaplain working on campus, a pastor sitting with someone in the office, a deacon taking flowers to a home where grief abounds, “you belong to God.” At the bed side, the pastor prayers and whispers, “It’s okay, you belong to God.” You can never repeat it enough, tell it enough, sing it enough.

When I was in seminary, I did my field education up in Montclair at Central Presbyterian Church. There was a member at Central named Arthur Northrup. Arthur always sat in the third pew so he could hear better. He was a stately man with no shortage of opinions; especially when it came to the sermons that seminary students preached. The pastor told us early on not to worry about the scowl on Arthur’s face during worship, or when we were preaching, that’s just how God made his face. “He’s really a sweetheart”, the pastor assured us. Because we could see him up there in the front, not far from the chancel, I learned early on that Arthur never sang a hymn, except maybe in his head. One Sunday morning my seminary colleague who was also an intern, called the children down for the time with the children. At the end of her message she invited the children to sing “Jesus Loves Me.” The children sang it once and then the intern invited the congregation to join in a second time. I looked over and there was Mr. Northrup singing every word, with quite a smile. You can never sing it enough; we belong to God.

Enter God’s gates with thanksgiving,

And God’s courts with praise

Give thanks to God, bless God’s name.

Give thanks to God, bless God’s name. At all times. In every season. Give thanks to God, bless God’s name. In joy and in sorrow. On the mountaintops and in the valley. Give thanks to God, bless God’s name. When you’re on top of the world and when the world seems like it is falling apart around you. When you feel like singing at the top of your lungs and when someone else here this morning has to sing for you. Give thanks to God, bless God’s name.

The hymn setting of Psalm 100, our opening hymn this morning, the tune name for “All People on Earth Do Dwell: is Old Hundreth. Old Hundreth. A familiar tune for the doxology as well. Old Hundreth. “Old” and “Hundreth”; it’s sort of self-explanatory. Psalm 100 and a tune that has been around since 1551; the Genevan Psalter. Maybe you read the footnote in our new hymnal, Psalm 100 and the tune have been paired in almost every English-language hymal for the last 450 years. That’s old….hundreth.

But its also “old” like old uncle Charlie” or “my old friend Millie” or my old favorite sweatshirt with holes in the elbows and fraying all around the collar. Old as in familiar and well-worn and trusted. “Old hundredth” because the follows of Jesus have sung it for 450 years over and over; no matter what, no matter where, no matter…old hundredth. Give thanks to God, bless God’s name. Even when the song of praise is a daring, defiant, act of resistance when the world’s song of chaos, destruction, and death comes with such a loud blast. Yet, even then, give thanks to God, bless God’s name. Psalm 100 as a persistent, counter-intuitive word of assurance and hope juxtaposed to life’s very real struggles for peace, or justice, or righteousness. In life and in death, give thanks to God, bless God’s name.

A beer commercial came on as I was watching a football last week. The scene is a local tavern where the bartender pours a beer and sets it upon a table in front of an empty chair. It seems one of the regulars is serving in the armed services and the commitment there at the bar is to pour the beer every day until he returns. It’s a moving scene when the veteran returns and everyone lifts a glass to him without saying a word. What most caught me off guard in the commercial was the music, the solo piano, the tune that was playing all through the commercial. I actually hit rewind on the DVR so I could listen. “What a fellowship, what a joy divine, leaning on the Everlasting arms.” I decided not to over-interpret the music choice; it was a commercial after all, a beer commercial. The jarring juxtaposition of a beer advertisement and a gospel hymn was enough.

Give thanks to God. Bless God’s name. Those moments of juxtaposition; praise and life, singing through tears and with clenched teeth. Maybe the most memorable, and meaningful, old psalm 100.

For the Lord is good;

God’s steadfast love endures forever,

And God’s faithfulness to all generations.

When our daughter Hannah was young, she always liked having a song sung to her as part of the routine. Sometimes the song was the prayer. Often she fell asleep while her mother or I was doing the singing. She is 23 now but I remember one night when she was about 5 or 6 she asked me, “Daddy will you sing that song we did in church?” It took a while for us to figure out which one she wanted. We went through several selections. She couldn’t remember the name. Eventually we figured out she meant “Lift High the Cross”. I started singing: ‘lift high the cross, the love of Christ proclaim.” Hannah joined right in. “the love of Christ proclaim”. We sang it together. My typical fatherly response back then? It would have been to say “Hannah, it’s late. You let me sing. You roll over, close your eyes. I will sing. You try to go to sleep.” But that night, we sang together all the way to end, a few times. “the love of Christ proclaim….till all the world adore his sacred name.”

It’s who we are. Instruments intended for God’s praise. Intended to praise God together. And when you have the chance to share that praise with the next generation, to all generations…well, that’s just perfect. Absolutely perfect.