Getting Lost in the Woods

W ho amongst us is not prone to doubt and worry?   In this strange and uncertain time, who amongst us does not long to know when life will resume in all its fullness?   We each find ourselves facing an exhaustive list of questions, and there is not a single concrete answer to be found.  The agonizing and grief-filled truth is we simply cannot know.  We cannot know how long this will last...how long until we can travel to see our loved ones...how long until we can sing together safely... or how long until we can come together in large gatherings.  Particularly for those sacramental moments that keep getting postponed or minimized--from confirmations, to graduations, weddings, funerals, concerts, fairs, and annual trips to crowded beaches.  We simply cannot know, and there is no amount of overthinking or wondering that will provide us with any real sense of clarity. Yet we are not alone in our grief-filled experience with  powerlessness. ...

Today’s lesson  from the Hebrew Scriptures is one of the most beautiful, terrifying, and complicated texts within our holy scriptures.  It is known as the  akedah , or the binding of Isaac.  In the story we witness our God asking the unimaginable of Abraham.  God instructs Abraham to offer his son Isaac as a burnt offering, the same son that Sarah and Abraham had longed and waited for until their old age.  This particular year I find it difficult to hear a text about human sacrifice and not connect the dots to George Floyd in Minneapolis, MN; Breonna Taylor in Louisville, KY; Eric Garner in New York City; Trayvon Martin in Sanford, FL, and Emmett Till in Money, MS.  As our church engages in the work of taking off our lens of white privilege, I thought it might be helpful to consider this text in three different ways, starting off with some common interpretation within our own tradition. The story begins,  “After these things God tested Abraham.”...

In today’s gospel lesson we witness the apostles’ transition from students to interns.  They have abandoned their former lives as fisherfolk and tax collectors to learn from Jesus as he engages in the work of proclaiming the good news of God’s love across the region.  In what may have been one of the most terrifying moments of their lives, Jesus commissioned these twelve apostles to the work of preaching, teaching, and healing. Jesus gives the apostles some parting instructions:   First, their work should only focus on their fellow Jewish neighbors.  The work of sharing the good news with the Gentiles, those outside the Jewish community, will come later.  Second, they don’t need to pack anything.  Instead they are to rely on the hospitality of those they encounter along the way.   Third, they will meet resistance as they spread the message of God’s love.   Some are going to feel threatened, particularly those with power and privileg...

Today’s gospel lesson is taken from Luke, where we witness a Shakespearian like story on the day of resurrection. It begins with two disciples who have made the decision to travel from Jerusalem to Emmaus.  While we do not know the reason for their travel, or what life might hold for them in Emmaus, we do know what they are leaving behind.  The leader who had evoked so much hope within them had been arrested, tried, killed, and buried.  They found themselves heartbroken and suddenly lacking a purpose.  This grief was only compounded when some of the disciples discovered the burial tomb was empty.  Another strange factor, in what felt like an impossibly hopeless situation.  So these two disciples did what we all must do in the face of tragedy and uncertainty: they kept going.  They got up, bid farewell to Jerusalem, and began the seven mile walk to Emmaus.  Along the way, they encounter a fellow traveler.  In an unexpected plot twist, we the l...

  This has been a strange and wondrous week.   In every corner of creation, God’s people had to find new and adaptive ways  to make this journey to the cross and the grave . W hile it might have been our first time making this journey in isolation,  this was not the first time members of the Church have done so.   When Jesus was arrested, most of his disciples scattered.  When he was crucified, only a few dared to stand at the foot of the cross.  When he was buried, only the two women he loved most dared to keep vigil.  Over two thousand years ago on Easter morning,  followers of Jesus were holed up in their homes,  afraid and unsure of what was to come.  Yet on Easter morning, two women went to keep vigil at Jesus’ grave:  Mary Magdalene and the  “other Mary” .  To figure out who this  “other Mary”  is you have to find hints dropped by the gospel writer in previous chapters.  Looking back a c...