Upside Down Kingdom

There’s a puzzle I recently learned about a cat and a piece of toast. We all know that cats always land on their feet when they fall. It’s so amazing and complex that even Physicists have studied it, and discovered that cats have survived falls even from the 23^rd story of high-rise buildings. We also know that toast that falls off the plate falls butter side down, and if there’s any dust on the floor, it will stick to the toast. Scientists tested to find out why the buttered side ends up on the floor so often. It turns out that 81% of the time, the toast will land butter side down thanks to physics and the aerodynamic properties of bread smeared with oil. So the puzzle is what happens when you tie a piece of buttered toast onto the back of a cat and toss them both out the window? Which will happen, the cat land on its feet or the butter land on the sidewalk?  People want to know!

Cats perform a complex gymnastics feat to land on their feet. They twist their bodies to make sure their feet are under them before they land. You can’t see it happen unless you have a stop motion camera recording it in slow motion. It’s worthy of an Olympic gymnast at their peak performance. For those of us who can’t even do a cartwheel, it’s miraculous!

The beatitudes are just as much of a miraculous cartwheel as a falling cat. Think about the people in your life that seem successful to most people. Taylor Swift, Elon Musk, Elliot Page, Connor McDavid and numerous others are measured in terms of their assets, their fame, their talents and their relationships. They are successful by all measures, they have landed on their feet and millions of people idolize and respect them.

All except Jesus. The measuring stick that Jesus used was upside down to anything anyone had heard. It was more twisted than a cat with a piece of toast tied on its back. It upended the idea that the biggest, strongest, richest or most famous people are the ones that are successful. If we look at what the word blessed means, it means fortunate, happy, lucky.

Seems like a pretty big twist in what we think of people who are happy or blessed. And it’s not just any kind of feeling of happiness, it’s supposed to be a deep-seated sense of contentment with one’s self and their place in the world. “You are fortunate when others insult you and persecute you, and utter every kind of slander against you because of me. Be glad and rejoice.”

We’ve seen a lot of persecutions over the years in our world, but it’s been especially vivid to watch the protests in Minnesota the last couple of weeks.  People are feeling blessed when they stand watch over daycares or protect teens on their way out of school or drive around following ICE trucks ready to honk, whistle and record any cases of arrest they might witness. They are feeling energized and full of purpose. They are feeling in their bones the kind of blessedness that Jesus was getting at. Jesus was mindful of Micah's teaching on living a blessed life. It’s not about getting a Nobel prize, or an Oscar or a Stanley Cup. It’s not about great sacrifices or huge gifts or deep financial generosity. Micah, writing in the midst of economic chaos, military powers and leaders who bullied their people into states of fear and apathy, said that the reason for wars and political uncertainty was not that we had to treat God like a king or emperor with an appetite that can never be satisfied. It’s not about stuff. It’s not about bribes. It’s not about bankrupting ourselves to keep a heavenly bully from looking our way. It’s not about groveling in front of a warlord in hopes that he will protect us.

Jesus says it’s not about following rules, it’s about twisting expectations. Seek justice, love kindness and walk humbly in relationship with God. Seeing the people we meet differently than the world does. The happy ones, the lucky ones, the fortunate ones are not who we think.

Jesus was pointing out that the people whom we love to look down on are the ones that God cares about. The ones who need kindness. The ones that may have no more energy for pretending. The ones who survive from hour to hour, living precariously for reasons that we don’t know. The people who we think are the last and least. The people we think don’t deserve compassion. The ones who are so fragile that they don’t care who sees their suffering. Sometimes we are the suffering, we are the ones who are starving for hope or purpose or courage or direction. The last line in these upside-down beatitudes are for us today. “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven.” When we take these words seriously like the people in Minnesota do, we will find ourselves speaking in truth against oppression. Against the lies that try to undermine democracy, the lies that attack our human rights and demonize the meek and the poor and the sick and the grieving. The petitions that pit neighbor against neighbor, that try to make people feel oppressed when they are living in one of the most tolerant democratic countries in the world. God sees us as blessed when we speak up for those who don’t have the skills or abilities to speak out. When we take the sign out of the window that tries to pretend everything is okay when it’s not.  When we speak up against bullying attitudes and people twisting the truth because they are feeling entitled to rage and fearmonger. And God helps us, when we seek justice, love kindness and walk humbly, to land like a cat, lightly, on our feet, with grace and love and joy as we follow in the footsteps of our Jesus, the leader of our upside-down kingdom.

Love over Hate

If you ever want to know how a town or a village or a city is doing, ask a hairdresser or a cashier or a school bus driver.  They have their fingers on the pulse of the community in a way that others might not.  They are the ones who see us at our worst.  Bus drivers see our kids when they are sleepy or after a hard day’s work at school.  Grocery store clerks find one more turkey for the foodbank, or one more toy for Santa’s Anonymous.  They are the innkeepers of the Bethlehem story, the ones who make room for people who show up at inconvenient times.  They are not the star of the show, no one is going to write carols about them, or have saints’ days named after them or give them Nobel prizes or medals of bravery.  They are quiet people who show up, day after day, enduring long shifts, aching feet, and impossible customer requests while on minimum wage. The innkeeper barely gets mentioned in the Christmas story, and yet in some ways, he or she was the first person to respond with generosity and creativity to the Christmas Story.  Welcoming the stranger becomes the first act of the world responding to the good news of Jesus being with us.  Before the shepherds, before the three kings, there is the humble innkeeper, trying to come up with a creative solution to an impossible situation. 

Even though Mary and Joseph ended up in a barn, it was a shelter from the woes of the world that were pressing down on them.  According to Luke’s gospel, they faced a government that made unreasonable demands on ordinary people, ordering a census based on place of birth without regard for where they lived.  They had to travel in a time when the roads were not safe from wild animals or wilder bandits.  They had to travel through a country run by a foreign army speaking a foreign language.  They travelled to a town where there were no hospitals or ambulances if there was an accident, and no police to intervene in cases of violence.  Justice and healthcare came for the wealthy and influential, not for a poor family forced to relocate unexpectedly because of politics.

Today, we live in a world that glorifies powerful people.  We live in a world that promotes fear of anyone that doesn’t look like us or talk like us or live like us.  We live in a world where rumors spread faster than ever before, and stories that teach us to be scared multiply like snowflakes in a blizzard.  This year, we have heard political figures insulting Canadians and threatening our independence.  We’ve seen the return of measles causing many children to become sick.  We’ve seen the notwithstanding clause used to limit people’s fundamental human rights and pitch the public sector against the private sector.  We’ve also seen people responding with elbows up to rally behind our economy.  We’ve worked together to shop Canadian, and to keep Alberta in Canada.  We’ve spent tourist dollars in Canada, learning how beautiful our parks and cities are.  It hasn’t been easy.  It hasn’t been peaceful.  But it has been inspiring to see how we all, working together, do make a difference.

The story of the birth of a baby in a stinky barn with straw and dirt all around, is a reminder that God comes when we least expect it, into the messiness of our lives.  Whether our homes look pretty, and the tinsel and lights are just perfect, or whether there is clutter and wrapping paper everywhere, God shows up.  Or maybe we are struggling to keep the lights on and the heating bills paid.  Even in the direst of situations, God shows up in love. God shows up despite the messages of fear or anger, despite war and violence. God shows up at your door with an unexpected turkey, or at the post office, with a package you didn’t know was coming.  God shows up with a hug or a small box of chocolates.  God shows up in a phone call from someone you hadn’t heard from in a while.  Or God shows up by saying, hey, send a card to Auntie, it’s been ages. Go deliver Meals on Wheels. Help put on a Christmas dinner for folks who may be alone.  Call your family member, not to get into a big debate over vaccines, but just to say, I love you.  Or shovel your neighbor’s walk if they’ve been sick. We’ve seen what hatred and fear can do to a country, but we’ve also seen what love can do.  Even when we feel like we live in a barn, surrounded by animals, God still shows up in love to make a difference.  We can too!  Just like the innkeepers, the hairdressers, the bus drivers, the cashiers, let’s all do our part in 2026 by standing for love, compassion and empathy for all.  Spread the good news that Love is stronger than Hate, and be the love that someone else desperately needs to see.  

What's in your wallet?

Anyone got a membership card to a pottery club?  Or a loyalty card?  Tim Hortons?  There are loyalty cards for grocery stores, fast food shops and more.  All promising extra freebies if only we stay loyal to them.  Loyal to the brand, but not necessarily their loyalty back to us.  It can earn companies lots of profit.

Loyalty is something they research too.  What is the best level of reward that won’t eat into the bottom line?  When is the reward too little, too late, too infrequent to retain customers?

Our scripture this morning has described what happens when a community forgets what they think deserves the most loyalty.  Like shopping at Shopper’s Drug Mart for back to school clothes, or looking for groceries at Staples, Jeremiah pointed out the problem with misplaced loyalty.  He shared a metaphor of God, working away on the clay to make a useful pot.  Like any good potter will, God finds that the clay is a little too wet to hold its form, or maybe it’s a little too dry.  Time to start over, kneed the old clay again, center it on the wheel, and give it another try.  God is loyal to the image of a healthy community, a healthy country, even when the country is not.  God isn’t afraid to get involved in politics, in Jeremiah’s mind.  This metaphor challenges people’s egos, pushes them to realize that God cares when politics shapes an arrogant attitude of superiority.  God is not challenging one person or another, God is challenging the political culture of the day.

Jesus, too, questioned people’s loyalties.  Challenged them to think carefully of what they prioritized.  And the top priority that superseded all others was to be the loving community of God.  Jesus didn’t promise frequent flyer points, he didn’t say that the people who sold enough Jesus merchandise would earn a pink camel like a Mary Kay Cadillac.  His loyalty program didn’t promise perks, but would cost people time, influence, even their possessions.

Our society is addicted to perks.  We like earning free things, not recognizing that the price for those things are included in our purchases.  When I went to Tim Hortons to get coffee, I would flash my loyalty card to earn points.  Then I discovered that to redeem those points, I had to download an app, and I had to pre-order the free item before I came to the store.  This gave them information on where I was, what I liked, and how much money I spent.  Not only that, but my points expired regularly, and you have to buy a lot of double double to earn a free cookie or donut.  We give away a lot of marketing information to multinational corporations who then use it to design even more addicting loyalty programs.  It has become a vicious circle.

Jeremiah saw that the loyalty that people had to power was destroying their relationship with God.  And when that was destroyed, it led to cultural and political chaos.  Babylon was looking at Israel with lustful, hungry lips.  They saw Israel as a potential 51^st state in their empire.  Sound familiar?  Political chaos is dangerous.

Jeremiah could have been writing for us, describing the destruction of societies that are having hospitals and schools bombed or children starving in war-torn countries while dictators paraded massive armies.  He could have been reading the newspaper about cities under military occupation by their own armed forces.  He could have been hearing about massive forest fires, floods and heat waves, or listening to farmers struggling with drought.  He could have been learning about girls, librarians and teachers caught in political upheaval that they never asked for.  And his words are still as pertinent today as they were back then. 

“At any moment I may announce that a nation or a dominion is to be uprooted, pulled down or destroyed. But if the nation I threatened abandons its depraved ways, I will change my mind and not inflict on it the disaster I planned.”

We don’t want God’s disaster to come.  It’s time to turn our loyalty cards in, and remind ourselves that when we are loyal to God, great things happen. We can trust that God is the good potter who shapes our future.  We can turn to God to help us persevere in difficult times like these.

There are many successes we can see along the way, where God is shifting our perspective on creation.  The Thames River in London had developed a large island of diaper wipes and garbage.  Thanks to a persistent grass roots organization, the City of London is removing the island, and the government is looking into banning baby wipes with plastic content.  The bays around New York City are becoming cleaner by the day, thanks to installing artificial clam reefs that purify the water and are restoring the fishery industry.  Even here at home, the upsurge in people shopping Canadian, travelling in Canada and signing the forever Canada petition has made an impact.  Our government is pausing their book ban.  Rather than coming out and saying they want four specific graphic novels removed from the high school libraries, they came up with such vague guidelines that schools would have no ability to teach biology, for example.  And they made it sound like teachers were pushing obscene materials on kids starting in kindergarten.  They are pausing because we are speaking up, taking risks to tell them when they have crossed the line.

Our culture is at a crossroads, our world is asking us to choose our loyalty.  Do we believe in living with respect in creation, and compassion for our neighbors? Or do we continue to choose apathy and safety?  Jesus asked us to think about loyalty to God.  It’s not easy, it’s not safe, but in the long run, when we choose love, we choose a better world for all.  Let us continue to speak up for justice and compassion, knowing that God is with us, we are not alone, thanks be to God. Amen.

Curiosity over Criticism

This past week people have been going through a rollercoaster of emotions as we process what happened in a different country.  This is probably the only time where someone else’s politics have led me to the brink of preaching a sermon that is peppered with F- bombs!  For those people who believe that women deserve to be treated with respect and equality, for those who believe that no ethnic group deserves to be called garbage or accused of stealing and eating pets, for those who believe that joking about putting women in front of a firing squad because of a difference of opinion, for those who believe that immigrants are humans not problems to be returned en-masse to countries that may abuse them, for those who know that 2sLGTBQIA+ people are not choosing an alternative lifestyle, Tuesday was a day of fear for many.  It felt that all our work towards a society based on human rights for all, for respect and dignity, had been wasted.  And many people worry that the same political tactics that worked in the states will work here in Canada as it already has in Alberta.  Tactics of focusing on fear and scarcity and how things aren’t the way we think they should be.  Tactics of talking about how hard done by we are, how the future is uncertain, inflation is scary, jobs are threatened, and let’s target the most vulnerable people for our fear and wrath.  Those unnamed and unknown others, you know, ‘those people’, them, they, that we tell stories about to prove that the world is in danger and they are the ones at fault.

It deflects people’s attention away from harder conversations that some politicians are uncomfortable with.  Harder conversations because they are complex and address issues that have no clear solutions. Why talk about the war in Ukraine or climate change when I worry about paying my rent?  Why talk about gender equality or racism when it’s easier to talk about how dangerous the homeless are?  Why talk about the state of education when I can’t go buy a bag of groceries for under $100 the way I used to?

And then there’s healthcare. Last week we had 591 cases of Covid reported in Alberta, 313 of them taking up valuable hospital beds and doctor and nurse time. 15 patients are in ICU, and 4 people died last week from Covid.  Since August we have had 4,462 covid cases, and 119 people died. Athabasca Hospital declared a Covid outbreak on one unit on Oct. 17, 2024.  Four days later, Northern Lights Regional Hospital in Fort McMurray also had an outbreak.  On the bright side, both outbreaks have cleared, and about 20% of Albertans have gotten their Covid booster shots this month.  But it was hard to find these stats.  It was hard to find out how many hospital beds were being used for Covid patients when they could have been used for other medical situations. The statistics were buried in the Alberta HealthCare website.  Shouldn’t this be something we know about and hear in the news?

We talk about politics the day before Remembrance Day because it was fear and scarcity and inflation that Hitler used to get elected in Germany.  It was that kind of rhetoric of “Us vs Them” that he used to set up his internment camps where millions of Jews, thousands of LGBTQ individuals, the physically and mentally disabled, Roma (gypsies), Poles and other Slavic peoples, Jehovah’s Witnesses, priests, clergy and members of political opposition groups were experimented on and murdered.  Nazis first practiced involuntary euthanasia on hospital patients with mental and physical disabilities, people that they decided did not make a valuable contribution to society.  This was ‘us vs them’ rhetoric and justified for a variety of reasons.  When we say, “Lest we forget” tomorrow, let us not say it glibly.  Let us remember why Canadians and allies went overseas to kill other human beings.  They went to fight totalitarian governments.  They went to fight racists.  They went to fight people who believed in dehumanizing those who didn’t have the same ethnic roots as they did.  They went to stop a power-hungry megalomaniac who thought his ideas of racial purity could justify brainwashing and euthanasia.  They went to stop this kind of thinking and this kind of politics.  This “us vs them” thinking.

Jesus rejected “us vs them” thinking.  Jesus rejected racism and assumptions of superiority.  Jesus rejected snobbish attitudes that suggested some people should have the privilege of power over other people.  But Jesus didn’t just point his fingers at the religious and political elites of his day. Jesus was preaching to us!  We think “Us vs them” too!  Them republicans, them Americans, them racists, them homophobes.  Jesus rejected it all.  Jesus challenged our tendency to think that we are right and people who think differently than us are wrong.  Jesus rejected our own addiction to power and control. Jesus rejected our tendency to shame, blame and judge others.  We find it easy to go about fixing, saving, advising and correcting others.  Jesus rejected that too.

“You have heard it said, 'Love your neighbor-but hate your enemy.'  But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for your persecutors.  This will prove that you are children of God.  If you remember that your sister or brother has a grudge against you, leave church at once and go to reconciled with them.”

How do we love our enemies?  How do we reconcile with people we have a grudge against? By being humble!  We have got to stop thinking “we” know all the answers, and “they” are wrong, stupid or evil.  That’s hard, I know.  Building trust starts by being curious first and foremost.  By wondering why they have the opinions they do.  By learning how to not overreact to their anger, which for many of us takes time, practice and counselling from professionals.  By listening to them without judgement, which I know is hard.  By taking care of yourself when it’s too hard and do your own humble healing.

Tomorrow we will hear lots of speeches about “Lest we forget”, a reminder that people died so we can live in peace.  But Peace doesn’t come easily.  And it doesn’t come if we instinctively react with fear and anger.  Curiosity and humbleness will help us understand why the politics of our time seem so ugly.  Curiosity and compassion and empathy are the tools to help us prevent future totalitarian states in our country.  Some of us are able to roll up our sleeves and listen deeply to those who have opinions different than our own.  Some of us need to take care of ourselves and heal our own deep wounds.  Some of us can step up and speak up.  But first and foremost, let us never forget that Jesus, the prince of peace, calls us to choose the way of curious compassion above fear.  Every day!    Amen.

Checking the Polling Numbers

Doesn't today's scripture sound like Jesus was doing a post-debate poll of how his message was going down?  He was trying to find out what the crowds at his rallies thought of him.  Let's check out the undecided listener, let's do some number crunching, let's do a survey and see how our messaging is landing, and if it's making any impact on the folks who are sitting on the fence.

Not too much different than an episode of the West Wing where everyone is wondering about approval ratings and spin doctoring. Is the message getting heard?

For Jesus, the core question he wanted his consultants to ask was 'Who do people say that I am?" He wanted to know if people thought he was the equivalent of a demented cat lady or racist convicted felon. The disciples didn't know those terms of course, but responded with what they heard, prophet, famous teacher, reincarnated baptizer and so forth. Even when Peter came up with the answer Jesus was looking for, Jesus challenged his interpretation of that title. It would be like Jesus saying to us, "it's all well and good to call me your Premier or Prime Minister but I'm going to be living under a bridge, picking bottles so I can buy food, and I'll get arrested on a picket line and stabbed to death in a homeless encampment riot. Wait! What kind of Prime Minister does that?

No wonder Peter challenged him.  What is the point of public opinion declaring that Jesus was an influential person, a political and theological expert, if he was going to use such a ridiculous campaign strategy. It was ridiculous! In fact, in some ways the whole claim he made sounded ridiculous.  Die and rise again on the third day.  What kind of politician would center their campaign on that? Even Paul said that this message sounded foolish.

C. S. Lewis once wrote, "A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said wouldn't be a great moral teacher. He'd be either a lunatic on a level with a man who says he's a poached egg or else he'd be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse."

I don't know about you, but I'm not keen on believing in someone who is delusional. I want to follow someone who shows clear leadership, deep compassion, and determination to consider the welfare of all people, not just his cronies or wealthy friends.

People today are looking for leaders they can trust and don't know where to find such leaders. Some are so cynical that they don't believe that anyone cares at all about them. They have given up on humanity. They've been hurt too much, failed too often or seen their dreams crushed too much. One person claims that 'apatheism’ is the biggest challenge facing Christianity today. Not atheism, not believing in any God, or agnostics who are not sure, but apatheists who are apathetic to the question of whether there is a God or not. Why bother to care? They might be assuming that Christianity is all about saving yourself from Hell and that they know they're going there so what's the point in trying or caring?

Jesus wanted to turn that apathetic attitude upside down. He said that those who tried to save their lives would lose them, and those who lost their lives would find them.  People who only think of themselves, "me, me, me" instead of "you, you, you" or even "us, us, us" would find that they did not have a life of significance or impact. People who go beyond their egotistical attitudes and opinions, who love and serve others, who work towards the common good, they're the ones who will make an impact bigger than they could foresee.

The question Jesus asked his disciples so many centuries ago is still important today. Again, Lewis wrote, "You must make your choice: either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher."

This world has a lot of people promising all kinds of nonsense.  No wonder so many are experiencing apathy, depression, and anxiety.  Teachers talk about a mental health crisis.  Estimates are that 1 in four adults are wrestling with depression, one in five have thought about suicide, and 32% of people are addicted to some kind of substance.  Apathy is a way of letting ourselves off the hook, a way of telling ourselves that there’s nothing we can do to change the world.  We are stuck and life sucks, end of discussion.

Jesus taught a different way.  Those who are trying to be safe, trying to control their world, will spiral down into despair and apathy.  Those who try the way of Jesus, will let go of their own lives, and look at what they can do to help others.  People have found when they start looking for opportunities to help, it makes a world of difference.  Ask any grateful member of AA or Al Anon, and they will tell you the importance of service in their recovery.  Jesus calls us to consider who he is for us too.  Maybe we too have struggled to find hope, maybe we too have struggled to find someone to trust, who cares about us, and who helps inspire us to do better and be better.  Maybe when we answer that big question, “Who do you say that I am?”, our stories will inspire us anew.  May we find the strength to share our stories with those who need to hear them.  Amen.

Bragging Rights and Power Trips

Have you ever read an autobiography of a famous person simply because it promises to deliver all kinds of dirty little secrets about other people?  Some of them almost delight in bragging about their crazy stunts and bizarre, outrageous behaviors.  They go from one scandal to the next.  You can read all about Prince Harry’s life and resentments of his family, the media, his school and anyone else in too much detail.  His oversharing has not been appreciated by royal watchers who have been watching him live in royal splendor since he was born.  There’s not a lot of sympathy for someone you’ve watched all their life who decides to tell you how rough life really is.

Maybe that’s why Jesus had such a tough reception in Nazareth. The hometown crowd was too cynical.  Here he was back again, after a long absence where he disappeared into the wilderness for a long while, and when he came back, he brought strangers, city folk, tax collectors and stinking fishermen, as his best buddies.  It was obvious he had gotten too big for his britches and needed to be taken down a peg. There are many tales of the young city slicker coming back home after an education and being snubbed for their highfaluting ways.

This was surprising to Jesus, and his efforts to heal people fell flat in front of people who could tell stories of when he was in diapers.  And they snidely insulted him, “Is this Mary’s son, coming here thinking he can impress us?” Calling Jesus “Mary’s son” instead of “Joseph’s son” hinted at him being illegitimate without directly coming out and insulting him to his face.  Being called a carpenter wasn’t much better. The Greek word used here for "carpenter" was a handyman that could be called on to do the typical tiny jobs around a household, replace the hinges, get the hair clog out of the sink drain, that kind of thing.  Not the kind of person who would carefully craft a beautiful piece of mahogany into a one-of-a-kind coffee table for a wealthy patron and post the time-lapse video on TicToc to drum up likes.  There’s a different Greek word for that kind of carpenter.

The fact that this story doesn’t show Jesus in a good light after building him up as doing amazing things, is one of those signposts that Jesus was a living, breathing human being, and that the disciples around him often were as confused by what he taught as we are.  The trip to Nazareth has all the hallmarks of a failed trip.  Not quite as bad as a disastrous political debate broadcast around the world, but close.  The astounding thing was that Jesus didn’t let it shake his confidence.  He didn’t come up with a new marketing plan, a better advertising campaign, a new strategic vision. Instead, he sent his disciples out to go and practice what he had shown them.  He gave them authority to care for the people they met on their travels.  That authority was not shaken by Nazareth.  It wasn’t disrupted.  Jesus just carried on and said to his followers to remember to focus on the loving and healing part of the message.

The message Jesus was sharing wasn’t to get him elected to take over the Roman Empire and free the Hebrew people from their oppressors. Or how he was hard done by his family growing up.  It was to proclaim that God was in their midst, bringing new hope and new healing to their broken culture.

Paul also was clear that his preaching was not about him either. He wasn’t trying to impress people with his superpowers as a great disciple.  He wasn’t bragging about his debating skills or his mental sharpness.  He was writing to remind them about the teachings Jesus shared.  The teachings of caring for one’s neighbors, of being a community of equals, of working together, of looking after people whom the culture regarded as worthless and unimportant.

Our world today still struggles with these teachings.  We like to focus on people who are glamorous and powerful.  We idolize characters like Ironman, set aside as special, showing off how important they are for the survival of the world.  They are the only ones who can stand between the average joe and the powers of corruption.  Paul rejected that kind of hero worship.  He would have been the last person to build a Crystal Palace kind of church and plunk himself in the middle of it and bask in the power and adoration he felt entitled to.  Instead, Paul chose humbleness and caring, just as Jesus had.

We too have choices. Do we talk about ourselves and how great we are, or do we talk about how God shows up in our lives despite our weaknesses and challenges?  When Christianity is at its best when it remembers to be a channel of God’s love.  When it’s at it’s worst, selling $60 bibles to promote a political party or inflicting the 10 commandments in every classroom, or controlling women’s bodies or setting up cult-like mega churches with charismatic personalities, it degrades the message that God loves us all.  We think that we can’t talk about our faith unless we are smooth and practiced like a great political debater, but Paul and Jesus remind us that we can share that God is stronger than our weaknesses, and shines through our imperfections.  When we focus on caring for our neighbors, reaching out to those who are seen as insignificant, when we volunteer on Canada Day to serve our community, we are, like the disciples, living into God’s plan in amazing and beautiful ways.  The disciples never thought that they would teach millions of people about Christ, Paul never thought his humble words of compassion would topple an empire and last for centuries.  We never know when our simple small acts of kindness might do the same.  May we be inspired as Paul and the 12 were, to live our lives bragging about God’s love for us all. Amen.

Setting Our Minds on Divine Things

Poor Jesus!  He was wanting to be honest and open and transparent, and Peter wanted to play politics.  “None of that honesty, Jesus, let’s say whatever it takes to build influence, you know, friends in high places” Peter said, and Jesus was so committed to brave, bold talk that he got hot under the collar with Peter, and scolded him in public. Hardly a Christian thing to do.  But Jesus was making a point that they weren’t waging a popularity contest or a political campaign, they were building a new way of living in the world.  One of radical rejection of what the world thinks is success, money, influence, power, none of that could hold a candle to what Jesus intended.  We see this still happening in our world on a daily basis, people willing to say anything and promise anything for the sake of fame and fortune.  People willing to poison their political opponents or sabotage their planes, destroy hospitals with children in them for the sake of peace, willing to promise anything in order to get elected.  Or promote misinformation agendas that will hurt vulnerable minorities for the sake of power.  People wanting to eliminate crosswalks intended on showing support to bullied teens.  Jesus flatly rejected and denounced that when he scolded Peter.

Peter wanted Jesus to be as influential as the religious leaders.  Jesus rejected that.  It wasn’t about comparing himself and building up a reputation.  It was not about setting his mind on human things, but on divine things.  What does that look like today?

Last month I had an opportunity to set my mind on divine things with a wonderful group of ministers.  31 United Church clergy from BC to Newfoundland joined with our Moderator the Right Reverend Dr. Carmen Lansdowne in Five Oaks, Ontario, a retreat centre like Naramata Centre in the Okanagan.  Lansdowne is the first female indigenous leader to be elected Moderator, and only the second indigenous leader ever elected to that role.  She is also warm, funny, and passionate about the United Church.  Using her indigenous lens of looking at the world, she brings a fresh perspective to what it means to set our minds on divine things.  We spent a week wrestling with what it means to be a Christian leader focused on taking up our crosses and letting go of the need to be successful, or even worse, the need to be right.  We talked about and learned about leadership best practices, ideas like figuring out what our strengths are.  We talked about what we loved doing and what was not so lovable about our jobs.  We talked about how all of us felt intimidated by the other bright minds in the room and how we all came feeling like we were not good enough to be in such an important program.

We also talked about the world and how it has changed.  In the sixties, ladies wore hats and gloves and dresses to church.  Jellied salads with everything from canned peas, lettuce or marshmallows would show up at potlucks.  No one had microwave ovens and a trip on an airplane was a rare and special event where a complimentary meal was served by women who looked like models.  Today, we still have potlucks, but the hats and gloves are long gone.  And jellied salads might still show up, but they tend not to have vegetables any more. 

We talked about how hard it is to preach good news in this changed world.  It’s like we keep serving jellied vegetable salad and the world looks at it and goes yuck.  Another analogy was that of the goldfish swimming in their bowl.  Do we know what the water tastes like that we are swimming in?

We talked about how worship has become something that is done privately.  And how it’s become something that people spend money on, crystals, candles, and the like.  It’s often an individual focus – my faith in me is what makes me well.  And I don’t need to do it with other people, because that can lead to conflict.  We’ve lost faith in social organizations.  Guides and scouts, Canadian Legion, Rotary, Lions, even the armed forces and the RCMP struggle to recruit new people.  We’ve also lost our sense of the sacred and focus mostly on the practical, the measurable, the obvious. No wonder congregations are struggling in today’s culture!  We stand for values and community and public spirituality.  Everything that our society has moved away from.

Jesus would have said to us, even though Society has moved away from God, even though the world focuses only on the material, even though it’s only about the individual, that we are to set our minds on divine things, not on earthly concerns.  Our last day in Ontario, we heard that message from none other than Rev. Michael Blair, who is the United Church’s General Secretary.  He told us that we have become focused only on the decline of the church, something that has been happening since 1964.  And yet he is seeing new opportunities and new missions rising up.  The church is committed to planting 100 new communities of faith, one of which has already started in Edmonton, a first-nations led group that meets in the old Beverly United Church.  Other projects and groups are doing exciting things in the name of Jesus in our denomination. He said that we are too focused on the cross, and not on divine things.  It’s easy to only believe in death and it’s hard to believe in resurrection.  Even Jesus struggled with that.

Rev. Blair called us to keep focused on divine things through our faith communities because that's where we find Christ with us.  We are not alone in our spiritual journeys.  God is with us.  We easily forget that as we swim in our fishbowls or serve jellied salads or learn better recipes to serve.  But in the cross and the resurrection, in life, in death, in life beyond death, we are not alone.  Thanks be to God!

Stinky Night, Holy Night

Ever wonder what that first night was really like?  What it would be to travel back in time to Bethlehem when everything was happening, the chaos of a baby’s birth in such a strange place in an insignificant town in a tiny remote province of the great Roman Empire?  It wouldn’t have been as pretty as a Christmas card, that’s for sure.  The mom and dad were wandering from place to place, looking for a roof over their heads for the night and not even finding a tent to keep the snow off.  No cell phone to find an Air BNB either.  The desperation Joseph felt searching for somewhere safe, the frustration Mary had, and maybe fear of having to go through an ordeal she had never personally experienced before, and to do it far from her family and community, is not what we talk about when we think of the first Christmas.

And the stink would not have been mentioned either.  Animals kept indoors will do what animals do.  No litter boxes back then, no paper training or air freshener there.  No toilet paper either.  All the time travel novels don’t mention that the hardest part of going back in time would be the smells because our plumbing systems and soap for personal hygiene didn’t become popular or affordable until the crusades!  

We don’t think about stinks and spirituality combining, and yet isn’t that the picture we see when we look deeply at a Christmas card?  A holy baby, glowing with a special radiance, right beside the animals, the cows and sheep and donkeys and camels and probably a few rats as well, hiding in the hay.  That is the scandal of the Christmas message.  The scandal that when something so special, so unusual, so surprising, so hopeful comes into our world, that you would think belongs in palaces or beautiful places, that’s not where it comes.  It comes into our messy everyday lives even in the midst of chaos and confusion.  We may be living the stress of finding a place to live, or the frustration of feeling out of control of our world.  We may be living in the fear of what may happen next, of politics being done to us rather than with us, of decisions being made far away that will impact our daily lives.  All these frustrations and fears and anxieties were present in Mary and Joseph’s world.  They knew war and hunger and strife.  They lived in a land where they had no vote, where the only police were the occupying army, and where there was only justice and law for wealthy Roman Citizens.  Into this time of uncertainty, a baby was born.  He grew up to be a man of such extraordinary ideas and incredible vision that his followers wrote stories to try to put into words all that he meant to them.  In a time when very few people had the skills and knowledge to read, never mind write, this would have been astonishing.  More writing was done about Jesus than any other person until that time.  Writing was also for keeping track of records or sending instructions and was expensive.  Hard-working peasants who had to work to keep from starving, were not going waste their precious time or money to get someone to write down their memories of some guy they knew, any more than they had time to take a bath with a bar of soap.  

And yet this man turned their world of fear, anxiety, hopelessness, and conflict on its head, so much so that they wrote that on the day he was born, the first good news was that humanity was not to be afraid, that there were tidings of great joy.  This surprising message of hope was delivered to the stinkiest place in town, a stable full of animals and homeless refugees.

We need tidings of great joy.  We may have soap and sanitizers and air fresheners, but our souls, our character, our thoughts may be needing a thorough scrubbing.  What would it look like if we could hear those words of the angels with fresh ears, “be not afraid” in ways that gave us life and energy?  These words have inspired great change and great hopes.  Where would Gretta Thunberg be if she let fear hold her back?  Where would Barack Obama be if he let fear hold him back?  Where would Mother Theresa have been if she had let fear hold her back?  Where would Volodymyr Zelensky be if he let fear hold him back? 

In 1961, Dr. Howard Thurman wrote: The symbol of Christmas… is the brooding Presence of the Eternal Spirit making crooked paths straight, rough places smooth, tired hearts refreshed, dead hopes stirred with the newness of life. It is the promise of tomorrow at the close of every day, the movement of life in defiance of death, and the assurance that love is sturdier than hate, that right is more confident than wrong, that good is more permanent than evil. And from a German prison during World War 2, Dietrich Bonhoeffer said: “Human beings are dehumanized by fear but we should not be afraid.”  Living fearless compassionate lives changes the world for the better.

The surprise of the Bethlehem story is that the strength to live fearless lives comes even in the strangest, stinkiest places, and if it comes in a manger, that surprising gift of hope will come even into our lives no matter how chaotic or painful, like the most gloriously surprising song of angels and shepherds, cows and sheep.  Thanks be to God for this wonderful Christmas present, given freely to us all! Amen.

Bear Traps

Ever hear these words coming out of your mouth, “honey, do these pants make me look fat?" Or maybe you've heard them said to you. This little phrase has been known as a bear trap. No matter what the other partner says, they are going to get in trouble!

Often the question is asked in all sincerity. There's a delightful scene in the Disney movie "The Incredibles" where Helen Parr, known as the superhero Elastigirl, tries to look at herself in the mirror and can't tell if motherhood has expanded certain portions of her anatomy. How is a loving partner supposed to respond? "Actually sweetheart, you have added some weight, but you are still gorgeous in my opinion" is truthful but not likely helpful.  The answer that’s right may not have anything to do with pants or weight gain, because the question may also have nothing to do with pants or weight gain.

Jesus was facing a similar bear trap. The Pharisees teamed up with the Herod supporters and figured out a game plan. The two groups didn't like each other much but had a shared interest in embarrassing Jesus in front of his followers. It was worth working together to put this rabble rouser in his place. What better way to do it than challenging him on the question of separation of church and state?

It's an age-old conundrum that humans have struggled with for a long time.  St. Augustine in North Africa wrote a massive book called “On the City of God Against the Pagans” that is over 400 pages long. He wrote it after Rome was destroyed by Visigoths.  It shocked everyone that hordes of barbarians waltzed in under the noses of the Roman Army right to the centre of Rome, pillaging and stealing as they went.  Many blamed Christians for this terrible event.  They were being punished for forsaking the Gods of their ancestors.  Praying to the false God Christos instead of Jupiter, Mars and Minerva was what had caused it.  Augustine, busy setting up the first refugee camp ever built by Christians, found time to sit down and write his massive book to counter that.

Being a Christian in a non-Christian world is still not easy.  Today, consumption is the most important God and Amazon makes so much money that its owner can build his own floating city to be emperor over. How do we live in this world? We imitate Jesus.

Jesus knew the Herodians and Pharisees were up to something as soon as he saw them.  The question of taxes was also a question of which side he would choose?  Herod’s political side or the Pharisees’ spiritual side?

In it’s extreme form, do we go and live in the wilderness, being completely self-sufficient, or do live in community with all its rules and regulations?  Do we become so heavenly focussed that we’re no earthly good?  Augustine suggested that there are times when Christians were to co-operate with the state, and times when Christians were to resist the state.  He was the first one to come up with the phrase “Just war” to make it okay for Christians to become soldiers and even to kill other humans despite their allegiance to Jesus.  Augustine challenged Christian pacifism for the sustainability of civilization through war.

Jesus was the Prince of Peace, not the prince of hair-splitting or populism.  He didn’t prevaricate or pander.  He didn’t try saying, “now dear, those pants are ugly and they don’t flatter your gorgeous derriere”, nor did he say, “why don’t you go to the gym and work out?”

The only way out of the bear trap Jesus took was to go to the highest principle.  What is God’s priority in the situation?  Jesus was the master of the “Yes And”.  “YES it’s important to live according to societal expectations around things like taxes and laws, AND it’s important to live according the values and principles that a follower of God is called to put into action.  When they clash, we are called to act with steel in our convictions, to live by example with faith and expectation.

Jesus taught us that it was all about God’s priorities.    Paul saw the Thessalonian community putting these priorities into action.  They did it so well that Paul thanked God for that powerful witness and told them it was inspiring others to do the same.

We live in a world where empathy is the last thing on many people’s minds.  On Thursday a teenager told me that many of her classmates were self-absorbed and only cared about what was in it for them.  This was frustrating to witness and no one was inspired and thankful for their lives.  Kids are not the only ones.  We all know of adults who don’t know or don’t care that some people don’t have cars and getting to doctors appointments is a real struggle.  We know of people who have so much mental illness that they can’t hold down a job.  We know of people who have so much fear and anger that they have become addicted to conspiracy theories.

Jesus called the Pharisees and Heriodians to live bigger than bear traps.  He called them to live according to God’s priorities first and foremost even in things as mundane as taxes.  He calls us to do the same.  When we imitate Jesus in all that we do, putting God first, we will inspire others to do the same.  What would it look like if people wrote how grateful they were for our presence, for our example?  What would it look like if we could find ways to be thankful in our lives that inspired others to do the same?  What would it look like to be so courageous and bold in our faith that we made a real difference, and a positive one to everyone who knew us?  May we find the courage of Jesus, the thanksgiving of Paul and the example of the Thessalonians to be a light of hope to all the world.  Amen.

Being invisible

There’s a picture book about a kid who feels invisible.   Every day Brian goes to school, and no one notices him.  He draws pictures that nobody sees, and he eats lunches all by himself and no one picks him to play on their team in gym class.  Even the teacher doesn’t see him, and he feels safe that way.  Then a new kid moves to town and gets laughed at for bringing his favorite lunch to school.  Brian thinks it’s worse to be laughed at than to be invisible, so Brian draws a picture with an encouraging note and leaves it where the new kids will find it.  That’s the day things start to change.  The new kid starts to see Brian and treats him with the same kindness Brian showed in his note.

There are days when we may feel invisible.  And there are days when we feel like we are living under the spotlight.  The election has spotlighted a whole bunch of people who we may never have heard about before they ran for power.  There are people in our world who are terrified of being invisible, of not having their votes and their opinions count.  There are a couple of fundamentalist churches in Canada who are quietly working to make our country more restrictive, with a racist and homophobic agenda to elect politicians and influence both educational and judicial systems, according to a CBC research report.  They want to work invisibly to have their political views imposed on all.  There are others who desperately want to be in the spotlight, they crave the attention they get when they make controversial statements and end up in the media.

I wish I knew what the answer was in our argumentative world where we are all struggling to breathe, never mind argue over who is better than whom.  When the smoke from our forest fires reaches all the way to New York, surely we should all be working together to save our environment?  But no, let’s get upset at how an oppressed and generally invisible minority uses paint in public so they can feel seen as is what is happening in Westlock this week.

Maybe that was the same feeling the Pharisees had when they saw Jesus talking to the tax collectors. People like Matthew would have been seen as irredeemable by the religious scholars of the day, a lost cause, and worthy of being treated as if they were invisible.  And no one asked the question of why they chose such a career that made them invisible in the first place?  Why were tax collectors so shunned?

When we think of traitors, World War 2 comes to mind, especially after the June 6 commemoration we observed this week.  Did you know that for months after the troops landed on Normandy beaches on D-Day, some 20,000 women in France were forcibly attacked by men, often French men, and had their hair shaved off?  This was done so everyone knew that they were collaborators with the Germans.  The shaving was not part of a legal investigation, or a Truth and Reconciliation hearing, but a vigilante action by men wanting to prove their loyalty to France.  Like the medieval witch hunts centuries before, the women who were targeted were often single, widowed or with husbands away in a prisoner of war camp.  Invisible women that no one would protect. No one asked them if they had collaborated or why they had collaborated.  Sometimes they were punished or even killed simply because someone said they saw the woman talking to a German soldier in public.  It’s an ugly and invisible part of the aftermath of the liberation that happened across Europe.  As one novelist pointed out, many of these women had no choice.  The Germans would invade a town, pick out the nicest houses and force the inhabitants to serve them unquestioningly day and night.  If the woman had children, the officers would threaten the children to ensure obedience. 

Going back to Matthew the Tax collector, why was he seen with such disdain? We don’t think of Canada Revenue Agency workers in the same class as collaborators and traitors, though we may like to grumble at bloated government departments and overpaid federal employees; maybe we even make sweeping generalizations about invisible people we may never meet in person.  The tax collectors in the time of Jesus were seen as traitors working with the Roman occupiers.  Not worthy to be seen by Jesus.  Nor were women who had hemorrhages.  They were not to be seen during their monthly menstrual times.  They certainly weren’t supposed to be sneaking out in public to grab the fringe of Jesus’ cloak!  And a little girl who was dead was also seen as unclean, something a good rabbi should never touch.  If Jesus had been a proper religious expert, he would have ignored all three of these kinds of people.  He would have treated them as invisible.

But Jesus didn’t just see Matthew and his co-workers, or the sick woman, he called them to join his new community!  Just as God didn’t just see Abraham in his crowded city, God called Abraham out of safety to start a new society.  Abraham was invisible to his father’s culture as a second-born child who would inherit nothing and would have had nothing to lose by venturing out into the wilderness.  Abraham brought invisible people with him, a wife that had little say in where he would go next and brought who knows how many unnamed slaves.  The country he moved to had invisible people already living in it.  Even though the land was occupied, God chose that Abraham’s family would inherit it, not the indigenous people.  Suddenly this is not a comfortable scripture, but one to be wrestled with.

Still, the tension of who is seen and who isn’t is important to reflect on.  Who do we choose to see?  Who do we wish were more invisible?  Do we feel invisible like Matthew, but are we truly invisible? Do we ask ourselves who God calls us to see? Do we crave the spotlight or crave invisibility?  Do we have the courage to hear God’s call to us, regardless of who we are, to see others as Christ sees us?  Is our church invisible or seen by all? Are we ready to risk being a bold visible community that welcomes all? And how do we do that? 

Through deep spirituality first and foremost.  Spiritual practices, prayer, humbleness, intentional times to think about our faith and our call will build the deep empathy and resilience that we need.  Then we can practice bold discipleship where we take courageous steps to welcome the invisible and bring healing good news to those who are hurting. And lastly, we can choose to heed the call to step into the spotlight that daring justice needs, in order to heal God’s beloved creation. Like Abraham, we are called to go into an unknown world which needs so much healing.  Like Matthew, we are called to new communities of faith, like Jesus we are called to help the invisible be seen.  May God bless us and keep us on this journey we are called to be on.  Amen.

Changing hearts and minds

I love pears!  I think that they are my favorite fruit.  But I hate pears, there’s nothing I turn up my nose up more, they are so disgusting.  “Wait a minute, Monica!” you may be thinking, “How can pears be both your favorite fruit and your least favorite fruit at the same time?” Easy!  Pears that are fresh and ripe and just at their peak are incredibly sweet and juicy, their skin is nice and thin, and their flesh is soft and easy to bite into.  What better fruit can there be?  You can’t take a bite out of a coconut or pineapple or watermelon without a lot of work first.  But when we were kids, fresh fruit was very seasonal.  Mandarines at this time of year, apples and pears in the fall if we were lucky, and berries in the summer.  The rest of the year, it was canned fruit.  There was nothing worse, in my humble opinion, than the dreaded can of fruit cocktail that we had for dessert far too often.  The maraschino cherries were fine, the peaches were a little slimy, the oranges were okay, the grapes often were split and mushy but the pears?  They tasted like chunks of jello that had sand sprinkled throughout.  It was like eating a mushy bit of beachfront property, and Mom always knew which bowl of fruit cocktail was mine as I would assiduously eat around every single piece of pear in the bowl.  No amount of persuasion could convince me to eat those little cubes! They were the worst fruit in the world as far as my 10-year-old self was concerned, and even today I will do anything I can to avoid canned pear.  Yuck!

I’m sure other people have similar opinions around fruit, maybe even pears, that might echo either my love for this fruit or my loathing.  Strong opinions are easy to find on a variety of topics.  In fact, to be human is to have strong opinions on a variety of topics, right?

One of the complaints I hear is about how polarized we have become.  That we have such different opinions from our neighbors that we can’t have a civil conversation any more.  Whether it’s vaccine mandates or the causes of earthquakes in Alberta, it is hard to talk about what is weighing on our hearts and minds.  We want to think in binary absolutes – either something is good or something is bad.  Just like pears, are they my favorite or are they my least favorite, make up my mind and stop sitting on the fence, Monica! Take a side, join the club, cheer on the right team!

Isaiah dreamed of a time when this kind of division ended.  The wolf will lie down with the lamb, the wild will coexist with the tame, the carnivore with the herbivore, the poisonous with the helpless.  There will be no more villains and heroes but one creation where all will coexist.  The Green Party and the Wildrose Party will find things they can agree on, and oil workers and environmentalists will be friends. The warmongers and the peacemakers will live calmly side by side in safety and security.  It’s quite the utopian vision and Isaiah sees it as a real possibility worth working towards.

Matthew’s story of John the Baptizer is a similar message.  “Change your hearts and minds,” he preached.  Start looking at the world with different eyes.  John calls us to examine how we think of the world around us, our community, our neighbors, our family and our friends.  Just as he called out the religious leaders who came to see him, he calls us to challenge our assumptions.  How do we see ourselves?  How do we see others?  Are we caught up in either or thinking, us vs them, winners and losers, bad guys and good guys?

John calls us to think in new ways: we are to have a spirit of wisdom and understanding, a spirit of counsel and strength, to stop judging based on appearances, or make decisions because of gossip and rumor. 

What is wisdom, then and how do we think in these new ways?  Some theologians say that wisdom is about changing how we think and act, whereas knowledge is solely about gathering information and data.  Data is easy.  With google, in seconds we know that the experience we had of the earth shifting under our feet wasn’t imaginary, and we can even put a number onto it, 5.8.  That’s data.  Knowledge.  Wisdom is when we stay calm and don’t buy into alarmist theories or wild speculation about why the earthquake happened.

How do we grow in wisdom?  Two things are helping me – reminding myself that an issue might be a ‘both and’ topic like pears.  I can like them and dislike them, it doesn’t have to be ‘either or’.  What if I am right and you are too?  That is helping me stay calmer in the midst of conflict, not perfectly but slowly better.  Another thing I do is a mantra many life coaches encourage their clients to use.  “I tell myself the truth and frequently ask myself what I’m pretending not to know”. I think that is the ultimate wisdom, when we ask deep and honest questions of ourselves and our own opinions.  John sensed that the religious leaders were coming for baptism because they had deep questions of themselves that they didn’t even knew they had.  By visiting John, they challenged their own thinking.  Some may have even joined the Jesus movement, like Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus who buried Jesus in the Tomb on Good Friday.  By asking questions of ourselves, looking for both and, and listening to the call of prophets to work towards God’s vision of Peace on Earth, we can follow the path of wisdom God wishes for us all.  And when that happens, fruit of the spirit come to us, especially Peace, a gift of the Creator for us all.