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Foundry is an historic, progressive United Methodist Church that welcomes all, worships passionately, challenges the status quo, & seeks to transform the world.
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Monday May 25, 2020
Monday May 25, 2020
Restored
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger Gaines-Cirelli for Foundry UMC May 24, 2020, the seventh Sunday of Easter. “Life Interrupted” series.
Texts: Acts 1:1-14, 1 Peter 5:6-11
Months ago, as I developed plans for this Life Interrupted series, I imagined that by today we’d be preparing to begin some kind of re-entry to in-person worship at 16th and P Street, NW. And I was struck by the fact that the word “restore” appeared in two of the assigned readings for today. “That’s a good word as we contemplate a return to some familiar practices,” she thought. As the reality of a much longer period of physical distancing began to sink in, my focus in our texts shifted.
“Wait for the promise…” (Acts 1:4) “It is not for you to know the times… (Acts 1:7) “…in due time.” (1 Peter 5:6) “After you have suffered for a little while…” (1Pet 5:10)
These words land like a thud. Weeks ago during my Wednesday FaceBook message I talked about how disorienting it is to not know how long this is going to last. Even then, I was already crying out with the Psalmist, “How long, O Lord?!” The fact that we don’t know the answer is among the most distressing and disorienting of the unknowns we’ve been dealing with. We’re such a time-driven culture, marking time with clocks and calendars and watches, with alerts to keep us tracking time and keep us on time.
When Bill Smith and I were working closely to mobilize strategy and witness at General Conference 2019, we would joke with one another that we could do anything for six months, four months, three weeks… We knew the journey wouldn’t end at the close of General Conference, but at least we knew how long that painful and difficult stretch of the journey was going to last. It makes a profound difference in the way we inhabit time right now to not know the time that is set for the end of this painful and difficult experience in our world. The lack of time-boundedness makes it easy to lose focus, to lack motivation, to lose track of things; the lack of time boundary means that things can easily spill out all over, become diffuse, fuzzy, foggy…what day is it today?
All this makes me more compassionate with the disciples’ question: “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”
Now keep in mind that Jesus has suffered, died, rose on the third day, appeared to his disciples over 40 days teaching them more about the Kin-dom of God—topped off with the promise that they can expect to be baptized with the Holy Spirit at some point in the future. If we think we’ve got a lot to process, just think about that community of women and men who were the first disciples of Jesus. They were dealing with a lot of stuff. And in the midst of all the possible questions they could ask, their question is about the time. Is it time for Israel to finally get our power back, to get out from under the oppressive occupation of Rome? Is it time to finally get back to the way things were?
Jesus could have expressed frustration that, after everything, the disciples are still focused there, but instead he simply responds to their question by providing a new frame. It is not a timeframe, so much as a framework. Jesus speaks not of a “when” but of a “what” and a “how.”
The “what” is to be witnesses—to testify to the love and power of Jesus, to tell the story of God’s love, mercy, and liberation extended to all nations, to live as citizens of the Kin-dom even when the empires of this world are still acting as though they are stronger than God. And the “how” is by the power of Holy Spirit at work in and through them. (Acts1:8)
After this reframing, Jesus leaves them to it. “A cloud”—a common image to evoke the presence, guidance, protection, and glory of God in the Bible—appears and takes Jesus up. I tend to think of this moment as a thin place where heaven and earth touch. Here, the Kin-dom of heaven—always near, always “at hand,” but not always visible—opens a door, a cloudy, misty, mysterious door, and welcomes Jesus home. (This past week, I’ve heard some suggest that this story tells of the time when Jesus started working from home.)
So Jesus provides a new framework—not a “when” but a “what” and “how”—and then he makes his exit. The disciples are left there looking up like, “Wait, you’re leaving us again??” Or perhaps, for some, the reaction in the moment was “OK, that was neat, but what NOW??” And two men in white—perhaps the same ones who greeted the grieving women at the empty tomb in Luke 24—emerge to nudge the disciples to grieve as they have need and to begin to adjust their focus: You’ve been given a framework and focus. He will come again just as unexpectedly as he left—you won’t know when. All you need to do now is go to Jerusalem and wait.
I think it’s fair to say that most people don’t like to wait. Perhaps we don’t mind waiting for a while. But when the waiting seems to go past what seems the reasonable amount of time for whatever it is I’m waiting for, I START TO LOSE MY PATIENCE. You? The disciples were given this extraordinary new framework and vision for their lives: they’re going to receive power through the Holy Spirit and will be witnesses in ways and in places they’ve never imagined! And then: wait…
This past Thursday, our Bible study group zeroed in on this. What if the waiting is an important piece of the journey? What if the waiting allows for the disciples to sit with what Jesus has been teaching them all along? What if, in the waiting, they will finally begin to understand that the transformation of which they will be a part is about more than their own lives, their own histories, their own nation? // As difficult as it is to be told to wait, some part of us knows that waiting, being still, allowing space for things to simmer or to settle, is part of what it takes to deepen understanding or gain insight or listen more carefully to what we have already received. The waiting is preparation for what comes next. It may be the case that if we rush forward before waiting for discernment, cultivation of spiritual and emotional resources, and wisdom, we could do damage to ourselves and to others. We might undermine a good idea or project if we try to push it forward before it becomes clear that the time is ripe.
Much of that, however, may seem more applicable to times when we choose to wait. But where we are right now is a forced waiting, at least for those of us paying attention to the science and guidance of public health experts. And it may be that the fact of waiting, of not knowing the timeframe for when we will move from one phase to another in this time of pandemic, is its own spiritual practice. We want to come up with an action plan, to know how to adjust our budgets, to strategize for what’s next. We want to fix a new date for the wedding, the Memorial or Celebration of Life service, the retirement or graduation party, and on it goes. And there is only so much of that we can do. Over these months information has trickled out and changed often, messages have been less than clear and the reality has been emerging and evolving. Without information and a firm end-date, planning simply can’t happen. We are clearly not in control. Many of us struggle mightily in this reality. The invitation is to release constant control, planning, and production mode and just be. WAIT.
The guidance given in our texts today is first to pray—the women and men who waited in Jerusalem prayed, they drew near to God to speak and to listen. And 1 Peter reminds us to humble ourselves, acknowledging our dependence upon God; to let God hold our anxiety, because God cares and wants to help us; to be disciplined and alert—that is, to pay attention, to stay awake and open to God’s presence; to resist the devilish (literally from the Greek “slanderous”) voice that will want to distract you and fill your head with lies and destructive thoughts; to remember our solidarity with others all over the world who are suffering, too. On this last point, I hope that in our waiting we recognize what I’ve been saying for months: we are all in the same storm, but we are not in the same boat. Some of us are in secure situations that will weather the storm. Others are in situational “boats” that have been waiting for generations to receive the resources they need to mend and become more safe and sound.
Perhaps, in our waiting, we might ponder what it means to be “restored.” This word that initially drew my attention, the word translated in the NRSV as “restore” in both Acts 1 and 1 Peter 5, is not actually the same word. What I discovered is that the Greek word used in the disciples’ question, apokathistémi, means “to re-establish, give back, set up again.” It’s a word that looks backward—not necessarily in a bad way—but in a way that longs for a good parts of the past to be restored, perhaps in a way that is more just than before. The word in 1 Peter, katartizó, means “to prepare, to perfect for its full destination or use.” This word leans into the future and tends to evoke a sense of equipping for a whole new reality.
As we grapple with this time of waiting, it is OK to long for good parts of our lives to be restored—singing together, dinner parties, being able to be present with loved ones who are celebrating or suffering, giving and receiving care and service, the list could stretch on. And it is also important to pay attention to the ways God is at work preparing and perfecting us for completely new ways of living together, the ways God is restoring us in ways that will enable us to flourish in a new reality.
Perhaps the message is that we are called to be restored not after the waiting, but in it. God is at work to prepare and perfect our hearts, our minds, our priorities, our awareness, our faith, hope, and love. And for what? To be open to the power of Spirit who comforts us in our pain and struggle, nudges our conscience, stirs our dreaming, touches our hearts and inspires new vision and new life. And through the power of Spirit, to emerge from this time of waiting, isolation, and struggle ready to live more gently and justly, more aware and awake, more committed to addressing the gross inequities and injustices so starkly revealed in this time, and perhaps with a more perfect appreciation for the little things that are so easy to take for granted when time seems more in our control.
Can you actively wait, open to God’s restorative power in the midst of frustration, boredom, anxiety, and grief? The promise is that fresh power, a big vision, and new life will come not just for you, but for all. In due time…
Monday May 18, 2020
Monday May 18, 2020
At Home. In God.
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger Gaines-Cirelli for Foundry UMC May 17, 2020, the sixth Sunday of Easter. “Life Interrupted” series.
Text: Acts 17:22-31
In this moment in our shared life, people are suffering in many different ways. People are suffering the ravages of COVID-19 in their bodies, people are grieving deaths of loved ones to the disease, people are losing their jobs, losing their homes, are without access to healthcare or insurance, are falling into addiction, reeling with anxiety, paralyzed by depression. People are grieving losses of all kinds, even as they continue to grapple with everything that comes with being human—messy relationships, vulnerable bodies, weighty responsibilities. Siblings of color have this collective grief compounded by exhaustion and rage in the face of ongoing, often unchecked, acts of racial aggression in our society. People of conscience who have more resources and privilege add guilt to their grief plates as they wonder, in light of what others are going through, whether it’s OK to admit that they’re struggling, too. And as is always the case, the poor and marginalized will continue to carry the brunt of the suffering; the ones already on the edge will be the first ones to fall.
Over the past many weeks, as we’ve been grappling with life interrupted by grief and suffering, I wonder how many times I have proclaimed “we are not alone,” “God is with us,” or “No matter where you are or what you’re holding, God’s with you there.” How or why, with so much that could be argued to the contrary, can I make such an affirmation?
I must admit that, at times over the past months, I’ve felt I needed to explain or even apologize for repeating it so often. I’ve wondered how many folks receive my assurance of God’s abiding presence and just get angry—because they don’t perceive that presence or feel that God has broken the promise and abandoned them. If that resonates with you, be assured of this: you share in a time-honored reaction—at least if our scriptures are any indication. There are moments in our lives when we join an ancient chorus and cry out to God—“Where are you??” “How long will you leave me alone?”
And yet, alongside this refrain, another song rises, telling stories of an ever-present God. This God is not a fairy tale, a narrative projection of the human psyche, a divine ATM machine, a macho bully, or a nebulous ball of energy. This God acts concretely in history, is relational, loving, and involved. Testimonies of this God include: The steadfast love of the Lord is present from generation to generation! God receives and responds to the cries of God’s people! Even if we try, we can’t escape God’s presence! God is with us and loves us and there is nothing we can do about it! This God proves the testimonies true by coming into the world in flesh as Emmanuel, meaning “God is with us.” Jesus reveals that “God is with us” in every experience of human relationship, joy, suffering, even death. And Jesus promises not to leave us orphaned, a promise fulfilled at Pentecost as Spirit appears with fresh energy and power in and among the disciples. It is because this particular God is the one I worship that I’m compelled to assure over and again, “You are not alone.”
The highly educated, philosophically curious people of Athens in the first century of the Common Era knew many gods but not this God. The ancient Greek gods were each connected to different parts and energies of creation. These gods had desirable qualities and special powers but were involved in all sorts of internecine drama among themselves, and—unpredictably—exacted favor or vengeance on each other and upon humans. As with many ancient religious cults, it was a quid pro quo kind of spiritual economy. You wanted to keep your gods happy! So you honor them with statues of their likeness and bring presents to their temples to curry favor. The Greeks also had to grapple with the three goddesses called the “Fates.” Clotho (the spinner) spun the “thread” of human fate, Lachesis (the alotter) dispensed it, and Atropos (the inflexible) cut the thread (sets the moment of death). This strand of religious philosophy left humans powerless. Your fate was set and you just had to suffer through it. // Buzzing in and around all these idols were many lines of philosophical inquiry, including some mentioned earlier in the story, Stoicism and Epicureanism.
It was into this religious, philosophical, and curious soup that Paul steps. After acknowledging the religiosity of the Athenians, he mentions a monument tucked among the many idols. This monument “To an unknown god,” may seem strange at first. Why would such a monument be needed? Well, if the goal was to keep the gods happy, what if you inadvertently missed one? This provides a space to cover your…bases…
In any case, Paul uses this as his opening to share that while the Athenians may not know this God, this God knows them. Paul paints the picture of this God for them: This is the God who hurled the stars into orbit and stirred the seas to make waves, who gathered stardust into earth, scooped up those crystals into shapes of creatures, breathed into them and chanted, “Live!” This God, whose name you don’t know, has known you by name from the beginning. This God, bidden or unbidden is present with you. This is the God who is not divided into discrete energies of creation, but is the life-giving energy and breath of all things. (17:24-25) This is not a God of one people, one tribe, one nation, but is the Mother and Father of all nations. (17:26) This God knows you as a parent knows their child. This God has been loving and longing for you all along. And this God, as a loving parent, is not playing with you as though your life is a pawn in a game, is not demanding sacrifices in order to give you life and blessing, but freely and joyfully provides all that you need. As a loving parent, this God doesn’t cause you suffering but draws near to you when you suffer and cries with you. And the presence of this loving God, present and at work even without your knowledge, has revealed wisdom to your own philosophers who rightly expressed: “We are God’s offspring” and “In God we live, move, and have our being.” This is the God we search and long for as a child searching for a parent, as a river searching for the sea, as a traveler searching for home.
Paul lays out this vision and then says, in essence, “Now you know! And you can choose to turn toward this God of life-giving love.” (17:30) That, after all, is what it means to “repent,” it means to turn toward love and life and mercy and grace, to turn away from the “idols” of your own making that may be beautiful, interesting, and even helpful in some ways, but that are ultimately unable to sustain you. You can turn away from the quid pro quo ways into which you’ve been indoctrinated, the ways of having to earn favor, grace, love. You can turn toward the God who loves you, whose mercies are new every morning, free of charge. You can turn away from the lie of uncaring Fates before which you have no power. You can turn toward a life of agency and creativity, participating in the mighty works of God’s mending and new creation in the world. You dwell in God and God dwells in you. And because you live and move and have your being in God who has proven to be the God of life through the resurrection of Jesus, you don’t have to fear death—because in life, in death, in life beyond death, we are in God. We are held in that steadfast, everlasting, eternal, present-before-the-world-was-a-thing love of a God who is the Lord of Lords. //
The Athenians got to ponder and wonder about what difference this newly revealed God could make. What we believe about our God—the nature of our God, the presence or absence of our God, the desire of our God—makes a difference in how we live our lives. It determines how we form community and what we do and value together.
If we believe that God is or should be formed in our image instead of the other way around, then our perspectives, desires, and prejudices will consistently, comfortably align with “God’s will!” (magic!) If we believe God is out to get us, we will live in fear and feel like victims. If we believe that God has to be paid off in order to love us, we will likely treat others as transactions, too. If we believe that the ways of God are separate from and hostile to scientific knowledge and the various arts of human discernment and understanding, then we can ignore information coming from those disciplines while claiming to be acting in faith. If we believe that God is our nation’s God and that God has destined our nation to be the best and baddest nation in the world and, further, that our nation is supposed to look, think, and worship one way, then we will dehumanize and devalue anyone or anything that hinders that vision—to the point of destruction—and we will do that in the name of God. I have written elsewhere, “In God we trust” may be written on our money, but our money serves other gods. There is growing proof that plenty of people who call themselves Christian worship at these altars.”
Today we are reminded of the steadfast presence and love and life-giving power of YHWH, the God in whom we ALL live, move, and have our being. The particular God not of one tribe or nation but the God of all, who is not vengeful or prejudiced or partial toward any (Acts 10:34), who freely gives to all love and grace, who endows all of us with minds to use well and hands and hearts to offer one another in lovingkindness. A God who has given us in Jesus an example and teacher of what life in the Kin-dom looks like, and we seek to be formed by that God instead of the other way around.
In this moment, formed in the God we know, and based on science, human study, and the teachings of our faith, our call is to love God and neighbor and that means privileging human health and life over other considerations and erring on the side of safety. This means staying home, wearing masks in public, washing our hands, sharing our resources generously if we have them so as to support those who are struggling in this time, asking for help when we need it, having patience with others, being gentle with ourselves, taking one day at a time, staying connected in healthy ways with other people—for their sakes and for our own, praying for and concretely supporting in any way we can our leaders, essential workers, and folks on the frontlines.
And staying connected with God. That last bit is in some ways the easiest of all since the assurance is that we are always, already in God. There are many unknowns in this moment in our history. But one thing that is known for sure: You are not alone. We are not alone. God is with us. Thanks be to God.
Tuesday May 12, 2020
Tuesday May 12, 2020
Life Lost…and Found
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger Gaines-Cirelli for Foundry UMC May 10, 2020, the fifth Sunday of Easter. “Life Interrupted” series. (and Mother’s Day)
Text: Acts 7:55-60
When I was growing up, Mother’s Day included cutting pink tea roses from the bush at the corner of the house by the garage, affixing them to our Sunday best before going to 1st UMC, Sapulpa (where the tradition was to wear a colorful rose to honor a mother still living, and a white rose to remember a mother who’d died), then, we’d eat out! Churches I’ve served observe a variety of traditions, often involving carnations and honoring mothers in the congregation. These are lovely memories for me and cherished traditions for many in congregations of all stripes.
But other things I experienced over the years—both as a woman and a pastor—are the extraordinarily mixed and often painful emotions that come up on this day for many—for women longing to be mothers, for those whose relationship with their mother or child is broken, for those whose children are suffering or have died, and on it goes.
Further, I’ve come to understand that Mother’s Day didn’t begin as a day to honor mothers at church or as a greeting card industry. Its origins began with Ann Jarvis who lived in Appalachia mid-19th century and founded “Mothers Work Day” to advocate for health and hygiene education to mitigate child mortality. Later, she mobilized women in Appalachia to go into Civil War camps to treat the wounded soldiers on both sides and to teach sanitation and disinfection through “Women’s Friendship Day.” Inspired by Ann Jarvis and deeply affected by the suffering and death experienced in the Civil War, Julia Ward Howe wanted to bring an end to war and equality for all people, regardless of race, religion, gender or nationality. She wrote the Mothers Day Proclamation, calling mothers to leave their homes for one day a year and work for peace in their communities and in 1872 the first “Mother’s Peace Day” was celebrated.
While I certainly honor my mother and all mothers, I will ground my words today in this original spirit of Mother’s Day. Our text helps me to do so. Stephen’s story begins in a conflict in the early church in Jerusalem. Greek-speaking widows weren’t receiving their fair share of the daily food distribution, an “oversight” possibly motivated by prejudice or conflict between the Greek and Aramaic speaking disciples.
The response was to form a ministry team of seven servant leaders to care for this social justice and direct service ministry. Stephen is described as a shining light among this group. His powerful witness in the community is seen as a threat to certain leaders in one or two of the Jerusalem Synagogues and they stir up a slander campaign against Stephen, accusing him of blasphemy, a charge punishable by stoning according to the Levitical Law (Lev. 24:13-14). In Acts 6:13 it’s clear that the whole thing is a set-up, a completely false accusation. But it works. Stephen is brought before the Jerusalem Council and doesn’t mince words when asked what he has to say about the charges. He proceeds to lay out a “history of Israel that identifies two Jewish groups: those who accept God’s message and messengers and those who reject them. The comparison Stephen develops…aligns Stephen and the church with Abraham, Joseph, the prophets, and Jesus. His [accusers] are aligned with the Egyptians, Joseph’s brothers, the rebellious in the wilderness who disobeyed Moses, and the ancestors who killed the prophets.”
If you read the whole sermon of Stephen before the Council, you might start to feel worried about the feelings of the folks he’s calling out. It might seem overly polarized and harsh. And truth is that Stephen’s sermon—along with so many passages of Christian scripture—has been twisted and perverted into a diatribe against the Jewish people as a whole causing untold suffering and loss of life for our Jewish siblings over the centuries. And that is never OK.
What I want to highlight, however, is that in the narrative flow of the story, Stephen’s sermon was simply a prophetic reminder of what Jesus himself had said in various ways. It is a call for God’s people—no matter their religion!—to align with God’s message of love and justice as many had done through the ages. The facts of this case are that Stephen is unjustly accused by those who have power, arrested on a lie, then chooses to speak out in the face of the injustice, and is brutally murdered at the instigation of some religious leaders who manipulate the system to achieve their goal with the sanction of both church (temple) and state. (This doesn’t happen anymore, right?)
Stephen had a mother. I don’t know if she was present at her son’s final sermon or outside the city where he was dragged by people with stopped ears and enraged shouts (7:57)—those who wouldn’t or couldn’t hear the truth or contemplate the painful history that set the stage for this terrible moment. But think for a minute about how many mothers over the centuries have seen their children suffer indignities, violence, and often death in the wake of injustice? /
A “disease” is a particular quality, habit, or disposition regarded as adversely affecting a person or group of people. A “pandemic” is a disease that spreads over an entire country, continent, or the whole world. Right now, the COVID-19 pandemic is the reality understandably on everyone’s mind. But I pray we will see that this pandemic highlights another one that has been allowed to fester and grow for ages in our country: the pandemic of racism, a disease from which no U.S. citizen can socially distance themselves. It touches and infects all of us. From the beginning, when the First Nations of this land were betrayed, forcibly removed, and slaughtered, to the horrific and immoral buying and selling of African siblings into slavery, to Jim Crow, to redlining, to voter suppression, and more—the racist “virus” has adapted and morphed as most diseases do in order to thrive. If those of us who feel defensiveness rising as I name these things allow our ears to remain open and our shouts of protest withheld long enough, perhaps we will notice who is bearing the brunt of this current suffering.
It is often said that when white folks catch a cold, black folks get pneumonia. And what we see in the data is that black and brown siblings are disproportionately getting sick and dying from COVID-19. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention outline multiple factors that contribute to the disparity, including housing, work, and health conditions. The CDC states, “Health differences between racial and ethnic groups are often due to economic and social conditions that are more common among some racial and ethnic minorities than whites. In public health emergencies, these conditions can also isolate people from the resources they need to prepare for and respond to outbreaks.” All these “conditions” are the result of a long, painful history that has created fault lines of injustice and inequity throughout our society—from lack of access to health care to food deserts to disparate education and school resources to a broken criminal justice system to voting access to economic divides and obscene inequalities in compensation between what we now call “essential” workers and the folks who make a phone call to make millions while playing another round of golf. Here in D.C., as of May 7th, we have had 304 deaths; 241 of those were black siblings; and 23 identified as Hispanic/Latinx. That is 264 of 304.
I can hear the voices rushing to explain this away, to defend themselves, to rationalize the reality, to blame the victims. Those voices get so much play—those voices of people who look like me, some voices of people I hold dear—and they remind me of my own ongoing, often stumbling journey of waking up to my privilege as a white, educated, cisgender, employed, woman married to a man. I know the arguments but will not give them air here today. What I will lift up is a very basic reminder as one author frames it. “Racism is a form of structural oppression. The most common way to think about racism is to imagine a person who harbors ill will against people of color or who believes stereotypes about people of color…Such discriminatory attitudes are not racism; they are prejudice and bigotry. Racism is not merely a matter of individual feelings and beliefs but also a matter of systemic oppression.” The virus touches every person in the system regardless of where you live or what you look like or what you have.
I keep thinking about Stephen telling the story of a nation—without whitewashing it. He told the good stuff and the ways people had done harm. And the people who felt most threatened by him and what he was saying became enraged, stopped their ears from hearing or seeing what was real, worked him through the system, and got rid of him so that his words and work wouldn’t disrupt whatever it is that they felt was more precious than his life.
Stephen had a mother who knew nothing was more precious than his life. And today I want to honor her and all mothers who know intimately how precious the lives of their children are, in particular mothers of color who—as women—carry the added weight of misogyny on their backs as they navigate racism and all the complicated intersections and mutations and indignities that trail along with it while also being asked to care or worry about the feelings of white people more than their own.
On this Mother’s Day 2020 in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, I invite us to honor mothers who have been living through the pandemic of racism for generations:
- mothers whose children suffer from diseases due to poverty, pollution, or food deserts
- mothers who fear for their children’s safety every single day because the color of their skin
- mothers seeking asylum from abuse and a better life for their children
- mothers forced to leave their children on their own while they work multiple jobs
- mothers who have to have “the talk” with their sons and daughters
- mothers who stay with abusers or suffer any number of other indignities in order to keep their children housed or fed
- mothers who fear for their children’s safety because of dangers in the neighborhood
- mothers in prison
- mothers who have to help their children unlearn internalized racism and learn to love their black and brown bodies
- mothers whose children have been taken from them at the border
- mothers whose lives get interrupted with the news that their child has been killed by acts of racist violence:
- Mamie Till-Mobley (Emmitt Till)
- Sybrina Fulton (Trayvon Martin)
- Lesley McSpadden (Michael Brown)
- Samaria Rice (Tamir Rice)
- Geneva Read-Veal (Sandra Bland)
- Wanda Cooper-Jones (Ahmaud Arbery)
I especially remember Ms. Wanda today as it was Mother’s Day 26 years ago when her son Ahmaud was born. And as I prepared for today, I was struck by how many of these women I’ve just named have channeled their grief and pain into advocacy, education, and public service. They, like the women who instigated the first expressions of Mother’s Day, are not simply letting a disease—in this case the disease of racism and racist violence—continue as the normal way of things, but are rather tirelessly pressing for new practices and policies, for healing, justice, and peace.
That is the intention of Foundry Church as well. We’re not going to just flare at the outrage of another lynching. We have systematically, consistently, and more slowly than many of us would like, been laboring to arrive at this day, when we enter a time of self-assessment and discernment to identify and address how our words, practices, and both conscious and unconscious bias toward siblings of color may undermine our desire to become beloved community. This work will be akin to Foundry’s “Summer of Great Discernment” around the question of marriage equality. In order for this to have lasting impact and not just be an exercise in massaging our perceived moral highground muscles, I implore all who care about the life and witness of Foundry and truly desire a more intentional and awake expression of beloved community to engage this process even when you don’t feel like it. In a moment you will hear from servant leader, Greg McGruder, to learn more about this initiative.
I want to close by lifting one detail that may be easily overlooked in our text today. Stephen, filled with Holy Spirit as he stood before his accusers, looked up and saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God. Normally, Jesus is seated at God’s right hand. Early interpreters like Ambrose and Augustine picked up on this detail. Ambrose observed, “Jesus stood as a helpmate; he stood as if anxious to help Stephen, his athlete, in the struggle…” “[Jesus] sits as Judge of the quick and the dead; he stands as his people’s Advocate.”
As those who claim to follow Jesus, let’s stand with those he stands for, those who like Stephen are the victims of injustice… Let’s do our own work wherever we are that beloved community might become more than a dream among us strengthening us for the ongoing work to change the world for the better. Let’s let the tragic loss of life wake us up and motivate us to find a new—and so much better—way of life together.
Friday May 08, 2020
Friday May 08, 2020
New Day, New Way
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger Gaines-Cirelli for Foundry UMC May 3, 2020, the fourth Sunday of Easter. “Life Interrupted” series.
Text: Acts 2:42-47
Beloved, we are living through days unlike any we’ve seen before. The interruptions of our lives are significant, the unknowns many, the depth of the fallout at every level—personal, spiritual, economic, political, relational—not yet fully realized. What we are increasingly coming to understand is that things will never be the same. This is a life-, society-, and world-changing moment in history. And here we are in the middle of it.
Our spiritual tradition teaches that whenever there is an outbreak of challenge or change, there is an inbreaking of Holy Spirit. The book of Acts is one place this is clear. This book from which we read today is often called the “Acts of the Apostles”—but from start to finish, it’s really all about the acts of Holy Spirit empowering, emboldening, encouraging, stirring, guiding, challenging, and sending a new community of God’s people to be a living witness to love and justice in the wake of a moment of profound change in the world.
Some folk of the time didn’t realize there was any real change afoot. The corrupt powers of this world thought they had extinguished the hope rising among the citizens of the occupied territory of Palestine when they crucified the one called Jesus of Nazareth. They’d reset their overturned tables, returning to normal, the normal ways of injustice and usury, preparing a feast for themselves while leaving others to live on crumbs. They’d returned to the normal exclusion and neglect based on human constructs of tribe, purity, and policy. The power brokers of church and society, those responsible for the welfare of whole nations likely didn’t give the upstart Jesus movement another thought once they’d accomplished their manipulation of the mob to lynch the so-called King of the Jews.
But God was up to something new. When Jesus got up on that first Easter morning a new day dawned, a new way of being was born. A way that enabled people to trust the promise and power of God’s liberating love to bring life into every place that feels hopeless, courage into fearful hearts, and vision for how to live together in peace with justice.
This is the context for our short passage today, a passage that immediately follows
three key moments. The first is the pouring out of Holy Spirit upon the disciples at Pentecost. The second is the bold preaching of Peter among the diverse pilgrims gathered in Jerusalem. Peter proclaims the death and resurrection of Jesus and calls folks to receive the promise of forgiveness, new life, and the gift of the Holy Spirit so that they might be “saved from this corrupt generation.” (Acts 2:40) And this brings about the third key event, the conversion of 3,000 people.
These new converts—together with the 120 disciples of Jesus who were already together at Pentecost (Acts 1:15)—are the first congregation organized around the new Way of the risen Christ. It is a way of being in relationship and community guided by “the apostles’ teaching” and grounded in prayer (2:42). And to be very clear, the apostles’ teaching is the message of the Kin-dom of God they learned from their Rabbi Jesus (e.g. Acts 1:3). That message was always an invitation to turn from ways of being that hurt and destroy and toward ways that heal and bring new life. Kin-dom living has love of God and neighbor at the center, breaks down barriers, and crosses boundaries to draw the circle ever wider. It is marked by the wonder-working power of Spirit who anointed Jesus and all who follow his Way, to “bring good news to the poor…proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor (Jubilee!)” (Lk 4:18-19).
Formed in the teaching and example of Jesus, this new community seeks to practice the new Way. It is a marked by generosity, radical love and hospitality, mutuality, friendship, and care for neighbors. It is a community grounded in prayer, praise, and worship—both in the Temple/sanctuary and in their homes. The abundance they experience does not just set a bounteous feast on their own tables but flows into the places of need around them. They share what they have to sustain and fuel their life together. This new Way is Spirit-filled and Spirit-sustained. //
And it likely never happened in such an idyllic way. This vision—according to scholars—is likely just that: a vision statement for what the writer of Luke and Acts believed the church was called to be. But, even though not without the inherent messiness of human community, this early movement of Jesus followers must have been doing something right because people were drawn to them. “Day by day,” says the text, “the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.” (2:47) And saved from what? Peter’s sermon helps us understand—saved “from this corrupt generation.” (2:40)
You see, the new Way lived in opposition and resistance to the corrupt, unjust ways of the Roman Empire and the ways of some of the religious leaders who—as Jesus had taught—were more focused on the outward appearances and getting special treatment because of their office than on matters of justice or love of God and neighbor. (Lk 11:37-44) And people longed for justice, for a way to live in friendship and mutuality. In fact, this vision of human community was desired by many in the ancient world. One scholar writes, “Terminology in this passage echoes other Greek philosophical writings that describe an ethic of friendship and mutuality that can be realized through ideal social and political arrangements. Some elements of the text also recall promises made in the [Hebrew scriptures] about the just society that God longs to see established in Israel. Certainly, then, this passage paints an idealistic portrait, proposing to ancient readers that Christian community offers the path to such a desirable vision of human existence.”
God’s activity in Jesus Christ and through Spirit’s power gives shape and life to a new thing, a longed-for thing—then and now: a community that is organized around principles and practices that reject any “return to normal”—because the “normal” thing is unjust and broken. I am struck right now by some beautiful and powerful pieces of writing that capture a longing of the human family around the world, a longing to step out of this moment having really learned something that changes the way we live. I’m also struck right now by the disturbing, violent, rage-filled images of unmasked, overwhelmingly white, U.S. citizens with guns screaming in the faces of security officers because they disagree with the actions of their elected governor. This moment highlights the existing clashes between values, the ways that different perspectives and experiences are not honored and considered, but rather used as opportunities for blame, rage, and violence. Our human family knows that things are not as they should be—and people are getting pulled all over the place, fed images and messages from God knows where, messages intended to stir distrust, resentment, fear, and all the reptilian parts of our nature. People are responding in all sorts of ways—some more helpful than others.
In this outbreak of challenge, suffering, brokenness, and struggle, there is an inbreaking of Holy Spirit doing something new. And, we know something NEW is needed for reasons we’ll be pondering together for many weeks to come. The world longs for that newness—for a vision and leadership and community with integrity, whose principles and values are not just spoken but lived, whose outrage is not focused on themselves—either selfishly or self-righteously—but rather focused on the powers and policies that systematically deny the needs, dignity, and value of whole swaths of the human family, whose core principle is love of God and love of neighbor and walking gently upon the earth.
And here we are in the middle of it all. Unable to all be together in our “temple” our sanctuary and building (likely for months to come) but filled with Spirit’s wonder-working power to be part of a new thing, a new way of offering the world an alternative vision for what life together can be, a new way of being advocates for and witnesses to the love and justice of Jesus Christ.
We begin right where we are, thinking together about what Acts 2 has to say to us today. We see that it’s Holy Spirit who creates and sustains the church, regardless of where or how we gather—in temple or in homes. I imagine that over the coming months as it becomes safe to gather in small groups of 10-20, we may begin to form “house churches” throughout our neighborhoods, with hosts who will welcome people in, using safe practices, for worship “watch parties” and follow-up discussion, fellowship, prayer, and support. As in the Acts 2 vision, we continue to pool our resources to care for the vulnerable neighbors in our region. Servant leaders skilled in public health and medical care are providing leadership for us to plan a multi-step re-entry that is not only safe but also grounded in our core values as a congregation. We are in the process of visioning an online campus for worship, learning, and small group connection that will extend our witness and invitation to those near and far for whom that way of being in community works best even after we are able to resume the full range of activity at 16th and P Street, NW. We are providing ways to reach out in loving kindness to isolated neighbors through making phone calls. We are offering messages from our pastors Monday through Friday that extend our message of love, justice, and inclusive community to the wider world. And we are continuing—even now—our advocacy and social justice work, including critical work to assess the ways Foundry can identify and address obstacles in our becoming a truly beloved community that practices equity and justice for our black and brown siblings and celebrates and multiplies the gifts received from our increasingly racially diverse community.
And you are all continuing to be witnesses to how to live with purpose, faith, hope, love, creativity, generosity, care, and good humor—as you share words, images, stories, and practices not only with other Foundry folks but with your friends, colleagues, and families through emails, texts, Zoom gatherings, social media posts, and phone calls. You extend the vision and values of the new ways we are called to be in community together through your acts of love, compassion, generosity, and justice. (#ThisIsHowIFoundry)
We are all experiencing a range of emotions, and are all over the map in terms of where we are on coming to terms with the current realities in our world. But the good news today is that God is up to something new and that means that while things will be unsettling and some will be lost, the good news is that, just as Jesus got up and moved out into a new day and a new way of life, that day is coming for us. Let’s pray for Spirit to get us up and ready to participate now and then in something that is truly new—and better than we could ever imagine.
Friday May 08, 2020
Friday May 08, 2020
Hospitality for Hope
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger Gaines-Cirelli for Foundry UMC April 26, 2020, the third Sunday of Easter. “Life Interrupted” series.
Text: Luke 24:13-35
In the midst of political and social unrest, class and race divides, gross economic disparities, and alongside religious institutions pickled in this brine and rarely able or willing to acknowledge how deep their collusion, things were beginning to look up. New leadership was emerging. Momentum was building. Resources for a new movement were growing. And though it was sure to continue as an uphill battle, big changes were on the horizon. And then it all got interrupted. Life got interrupted by death. The leaders the people looked to for order, protection, and guidance had not stayed the death sentence, but enabled it.
There are reports, proclamations of great hope, that all is not lost, that what might be imagined as the end is really a new beginning, that death has been overcome, that justice will be done. But the evidence is debatable. What isn’t debatable is the suffering, the loss, the disappointment, the anger, the injustice, the despair, the uncertainty, the fear, the grief.
The two of them are walking and talking about all these things, maintaining appropriate social distance, on their way home to Emmaus, Pennsylvania, about five miles southwest of Allentown. It is the third day—the third Sunday, that is—of Easter and the story has been told again, the promise proclaimed. But the death toll rises. The leadership at the top, of government and of some religious institutions is…questionable. The disease is everywhere, unseen until it appears in bodies—whether near or far, known or unknown. And before setting out for their hike home, they’d both spent considerable time on Twitter and reading the news. So they know that essential workers are being treated as expendable. Migrant farm workers, trash collectors, nurses, and so many more, are exposed to unsafe working conditions and struggle to acquire the personal protective equipment they need to be safe as they continue to do their vital work. The travelers have learned not only of jobs lost and long lines at food banks, but also of inequities and injustices upon which our nation has long depended to sustain the economy and the welfare of the privileged, as these have been laid bare in the midst of this pandemic. They’ve read how “Low-income communities are more likely to be exposed to the virus, have higher mortality rates, and suffer economically. In times of economic crisis, these vulnerabilities will be more pronounced for marginal groups – identified by race, gender, and immigration status.” Depression, anxiety, and addiction relapse are triggered. They know that COVID-19 is still not completely understood, that it is acting differently from other viruses and is difficult to track, and that wide-spread testing is not yet available, much less a vaccine. They’ve heard from friends who grieve loved ones who died alone and who suffer due to distance from loved ones who are alone in nursing homes or hospitals.
Easter has been proclaimed, but as they walk along, talking about all these things that are happening, they aren’t feelin’ Easter. They are feeling the strain of the situation and what they’ll walk into when they get home—one of them a marriage on the edge of breakdown, and the other an empty apartment that might be lost if the unemployment doesn’t come through. The things they were looking forward to, the momentum and potential for some movement in a good direction in their work and in the world has been shut down. As they walk along, they aren’t feelin’ Easter. They are overwhelmed with sadness and disappointment. They are distracted and anxious and exhausted.
And then their journey gets interrupted, too. Like the person seated next to you on the plane who decides to strike up a conversation when you’re really not in the mood, a stranger sidles up next to them on the way, asking what they’re talking about. They are noticeably aggravated—as if anyone right now wouldn’t know what was going on… Even so, they lay it all out there—even including the bit about it being the Easter season, new life, resurrection, hope, blah blah blah… And then the stranger also seems to get aggravated and starts schooling them as if that’s ok… “Have you completely missed what the prophets and news reports and the Easter story are saying? Did you think that human vulnerability would magically cease or that consequences of human action or inaction would be erased? That God would all of a sudden be in the business of sidestepping human cruelty, injustice, suffering, and folly instead of meeting us there to wake us up, turn us around, and bring us through? Look at the stories of your faith, from Moses to Esther to Mary Magdalene to the prophets of the 20th and 21st century…God was with them in their weakness and in their strength, was with them in the face of injustice and tyranny, was with them in their particular moments of crisis and suffering, and strengthened them to do difficult things for the cause of right. Look at what Jesus said and did—how he tried to get folks to see what the prophets had been saying all along about the wages of injustice and greed and lust for power, how he told his disciples that he would die and they didn’t believe him, how he didn’t erase vulnerability but took it on himself, how he wept for the ways that those in the power centers (Jerusalem) wouldn’t receive the peace he offered, how he went through it all and emerged alive, offering that life to all of us! Look—don’t you see?— over centuries, promises are fulfilled right in the midst of crisis, in a constant unfolding, God’s love and mercy and beauty and compassion continue as always, bringing new creation out of chaos, light out of darkness, hope out of despair, life out of death.”
Well, all this was a bit much and, at this point, the travelers near home. What will they choose to do? The thing we so often do?—just keep our head down, brush off the hope kindling in our heart, and disengage from the person who has crossed our path? (“K—bye!”) This time, who knows why, they decide to invite the stranger to join them in one’s back yard where they sit at a distance to share snacks. And as the evening wears on, something happens. Two weary and wounded friends see one another, become conscious of their gratitude for companionship in the midst of struggle. They become aware of how this unexpected new presence among them made this moment happen, how this new presence reminded them of the promises of faith (regardless of whether they can “feel” them). At one point during their evening, with candles on the patio table glowing, when the bread and cheese comes out with shouts of thanksgiving and praise (because bread and cheese are amazing) they begin to realize the person who’d sidled up beside them is gone—because the stranger is no longer a stranger but has become a friend who, like them, is simply trying to hold on to hope and to find her way. //
The story of the “road to Emmaus” is well-known in church-going circles. In this last chapter of Luke, the writer wraps up the first book of the series (Acts is the sequel) by pointing out that the Gospel itself is a “sequel,” a continuation and turning point in God’s story of saving grace. Jesus “opens the scriptures” to the travelers on the road, interpreting how the messiah has been promised all along, that the suffering, death, and resurrection should come as no surprise. And when Jesus later appears to the whole gang back in Jerusalem, he opens the door to the ongoing journey, promising to send the power they’ll need to proclaim God’s mercy in the world—a reference to the moment of Pentecost and the pouring out of the Holy Spirit. All this context matters because the road we travel today to Emmaus, Pennsylvania and to all our homes in all our contexts is not a different road from the one in the book of Luke. Our lives are a continuation of the story, the next book in the series of God’s redeeming work in the world. Injustice, corruption, greed, disease—all these things were present then and are present now, interrupting our lives in all sorts of ways. Also present then and now are countless travelers trying to find our way, all trying to live, to have what we need for ourselves and families, all at various places on the journey.
I imagine that some—maybe many of us—aren’t feelin’ the whole Easter thing right now and for a whole host of different reasons. And that, of course, is OK. As we deal with our own challenges, thoughts, and feelings, aware of the immense suffering of so many both near and far, the thing to be aware of is what those things are doing to our hearts. The travelers in our text today are at different times “slow of heart” and having “burning hearts.” Last fall, in our “Becoming Beloved” series, we pondered the question, “What do you allow your circumstances to do to your heart?” It’s a perennial question. In this intense moment of distress what’s happening to your heart? In moments of pain, the human heart always has a choice—whether to become more tender or hardened by the experience. One choice is an opening and one is wall-building. So often, we hope for something—for love, for newness, for justice—and are disappointed, hurt, humiliated… And, as I’ve heard a loved one say often, “Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me!” It’s difficult to trust when we’ve been hurt. It’s difficult to hope when our hopes have been dashed. It’s difficult to believe a promise when our hearts have been betrayed. It’s difficult to believe life and love and justice will win in the end with so much history bearing witness to the contrary. Are we willing to remain open, hopeful, trusting at all in such a hard, brutal world? Are we willing to open our hearts to hope?
What does that even mean? It means allowing ourselves to hope for those things promised in the unfolding story: freedom, forgiveness, peace, loving and just relationships, joy, new life—for ourselves and for the world. It means claiming the Easter promise—in spite of the facts—that that goodness is stronger than evil, that death doesn’t have the last word, that human life has eternal value, dignity, and meaning, and that love has the power to save someone’s life. Christian hope isn’t just a nice idea. It is embodied in Jesus—made real in flesh and blood—so that we might finally see our hope is not just wishful thinking.
Today in our story, weary, wounded travelers allowed their hearts to be open just enough to unknowingly welcome the risen Christ into their conversation and into their home. And that, in turn, brought insight, gratitude, new relationship, purpose, and identity as part of God’s unfolding story. It allowed them to welcome hope as a companion on their journey.
In a world where there is so much despair, cynicism, and suffering, one of the most powerful things we can do is to allow our hearts to remain tender and open, so that hope might find a hospitable home within us. Hope living in us might look like simply getting through another day, trusting that things won’t always be this hard. Sometimes it might look like forgiving someone—maybe yourself. It might look like giving of your surplus so that others might have what they need. It might mean doing the kind thing, the loving thing, the brave thing, the beautiful thing, the creative thing, knowing that these things might be misunderstood, rejected, ignored, destroyed, or make no discernible difference—but they might mean life for others, a sign of hope made flesh.
Sometimes, providing hospitality for hope might simply mean trusting that, with Jesus Christ alive in the world, you just never know when something strange and unwanted might bring moments of joy, revelation, purpose, and new relationship, when one thing might turn into another, a stranger into a friend, hunger into satisfaction, mourning into dancing, brokenness into wholeness, fear into trust, death into life.
I don’t know about you, but the story I want to be part of will have hope as a companion (and bread and cheese!). It will be an adventure story about the journey toward God’s promise that love wins. Maybe we can encourage one another to write and live that story together.