Sermon for Maundy Thursday ----April 5th, 2012

Imagine with me, if you will, what it must have been like to be with Jesus and the disciples on this night over 2000 years ago.

With less than 24 hours left on this earth for him, Jesus gathers his disciples together away from the crowds in an upper room.  As the fanfare and busyness of the last few days fade away, the noise of the busy streets below is muted.  There is something different about this room they are gathered in.  Though they are gathered together for a meal, there seem to be no servants scurrying around making preparations, no one waiting to wash the disciple’s dusty feet before they recline together for the meal.  This ritual of gathering for a meal is so familiar to them, yet this time is somehow different.  There’s a feeling of uneasiness in the air, and it increases to discomfort as Jesus rises from his place, takes off his robe, and proceeds to tie a towel around his waist.  Can’t you see the disciples now, turning and asking one another in hushed whispers “WHAT IS HE DOING?”  

Once a year, our worship service takes us to a meal in an upper room where a friend turns traitor, to a garden of hard-fought prayer and then arrest, to a kangaroo court, and to an execution.  Once a year, we peer into the abyss and we remember those whose suffering was mirrored on the cross: the oppressed, the dying, the unjustly accused, the deserted, and those who feel hopeless.  Once a year, we leave this place of worship in dark, ponderous silence.

The term Maundy comes from the Latin “mandatum, meaning “command.”  In today’s scripture, Jesus speaks of a commandment.  Having startled his disciples by washing their feet, he says to them, “You call me Teacher and Lord and you are right, for that is what I am.  So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.  For I have set you an example,  that you also should do as I have done to you.”

We should be on our knees washing each other’s feet because that is precisely what Jesus did at the first Eucharist, demonstrating that the Eucharist is not a private act of devotion, but a call to-- and a grace for-- SERVICE.  Both are meant to send us out into the world ready to give expression to Christ’s love, Christ’shospitality, and of course Christ’s humility!

The Gospels report numerous healings in which the sick found wholeness through physical contact with Jesus.  Tonight we are representatives of the servanthood of Jesus.  We are able through the healing touch of our hands to convey that loving contact with the divine.

As I reflected on this command this last week, I was reminded of the very first time I ever experienced a foot washing service – it was here at St Michael’s in the old sanctuary.  Just as this part of the service was about to begin, Brian leaned over and asked me if I would wash his feet.  I didn’t have a clue – how one did this - or - why me!  I guess someone had to start the process and I was the closest one to ask.

I remember well, the feelings of awkwardness, and uncertainty; but as I begin to participate in the process, a sense of being engaged in a most profound and meaningful act took hold of me.   My tears began at that moment and I wept through most of the service.  I was experiencing what it must have been like for the disciples on that night.  The humility, the love, and the sense of service was transforming!

What Jesus is saying to us is that there is no task too menial, no service so difficult, no need so off-putting that we shoule not do for each other – and also for those whom Jesus elsewhere referred to as “the least of these.”  Jesus turned his world upside down when he took on the role of a servant and washed the disciples’ feet.  I found myself thinking about how it would be to have a service on the street tonight, and to offer to wash the feet of the street people.

Last year in Miami, a church held a service on the street and washed the feet of 300 street people, gave them each a pair of tennis shoes and even had a podiatrist present to look at their feet and provide some advice.

In the 3rd century CE, the Roman emperor Valerian regularly persecuted the church.  One day he summoned a deacon of the church named Lawrence and demanded to see “the treasures of the church.”  The emperor intended Lawrence to bring the golden and jeweled vessels used for liturgical purposes.  Lawrence returned instead with a gathering of the poor, the lame, and those without a home.  Angered, the emperor demanded to know where the treasures of the church were to be found.  Pointing to these people gathered around him, Lawrence said, “these are the treasures of the church.”   

Hold that image in your mind this night “of the poor, the infirmed, those without a place to call home, as the treasures of the church”.   

What is so unexpected, and so radically loving, about this foot washing is not just that it is the teacher and master doing a servants work.  What sticks out in my mind is that Jesus held their dirty feet (which undoubtedly they were dirty indeed)…and in that moment of intimacy-- held so much more.  Jesus held their untrusting hearts, their weak spirits, their calloused egos, their unwillingness to be so vulnerable!

Jesus is quite clear that this particular act of foot-washing is not about cleanliness but about relationship.  IT IS INDEED ABOUT INTIMACY.  It is the liturgical foundation of the new commandment which he then gives them:  “love one another AS I HAVE LOVED YOU.”

So just how far does this kind of loving and making ourselves vulnerable stretch us?  Well, Jesus’ teaching on the subject makes it pretty clear that the kind of love for which he is speaking ignores all the boundaries we human beings so imaginatively create.  Political, ethnic, gender, economic, educational, age – all those lines are erased by this particular kind of divine love.  

Serve one another this night, knowing that as we participate in this sacred act, we are experiencing God’s love for us through another.  In this moment as we become truly present to one another, Christ becomes present with us as surely as He is in the breaking of the bread --  Washing away the pain and the wounds from each of us, tenderly touching us!  Let us be Christ to one another!

Let us open our hearts to receive God’s love and to give Christ’s love as we participate in the rest of the service. 

SERMON OCTOBER 9, (Matt: 22:1-14)

The king who invites becomes the king who destroys.  This man, the king, is the worst kind of brutal dictator, who would dare to fill a banquet hall by using lethal force and terror; a king who, if you cross him, will kill, terrorizing the next person into not crossing him.  

Think of the HERODS of our day, the many dictators that have been in the news in recent years, who have behaved in similar ways to the king in our parable.

Matthew, however, tags on additional parable:  (NOT PRESENT IN THE GOSPEL OF LUKE OR THOMAS) ---the parable of the guest without the proper wedding garment.  This guest is cast away for refusing to follow the customs of the rich and powerful.  He becomes the victim – the scapegoat.

The lone figure refuses to celebrate a banquet that is shrouded in violence of the dominant culture;  he is cast into the outer darkness, (like Jesus, at Golgotha) the place of weeping and gnashing of teeth.

This guest appears to intentionally, yet silently, confront this king’s brutality.  This is not the king who dishes out the violence, but rather the guest who at the end takes it upon himself ---- the Christ figure –

The man without the wedding garment was silent before the king.  He discovers a similar fate as did Christ.  In Matthew’s Gospel, Christ was silent before his judge.  In the face of the earthly authority based on violence, Jesus stood silent in the face of his accusers and allowed himself to be bound to a cross.

JESUS WAS TROUBLE:  ----  TROUBLE FOR THE RELIGIOUS ELITE-- TROUBLE FOR THE RELIGIOUS AUTHORITIES-- TROUBLE FOR THE WAR-MAKING ROMAN EMPIRE.

The gospel parable is asking us this question:  “For what do we really stand?  How much do we really care about the injustice we see around us?”

Our guest stands alone and by his silence says:  I cannot wed myself to   a culture of those who make this their creed:

Blessed are the rich; the reign of the world is theirs.

Blessed are those who cause others to mourn and to grieve.

Blessed are those who are violent, proud, arrogant.

Blessed are the powerful who dominate others and who oppress the poor.

Blessed are those who ignore injustice and benefit from the sufferings of the poor.

Blessed are those who play it safe, and secure, who do not get involved in the struggles for social change.

Blessed are those who remain silent, and turn a deaf ear to the struggles of their neighbors.

As a nine year old child, Alice Gahana accompanied her parents when they were summoned to the village square.  After surviving two concentration camps, Alice was asked what she remembered most from her horrific experience.”                

EMPTY WINDOWS, was her reply “ I walked that morning carrying my suitcase, down our cobble-stoned street, by the houses in which people lived that I had known all my life. But the windows were empty – that’s what I remembered – the empty windows.  My friends and neighbors knew what was happening.  They knew – but they were afraid.  They didn’t want to get involved.  Nobody came to the windows to see what was happening to me.”
                        
God sends us, you and me, right into our own community, to call for justice for the poor and to denounce injustice whenever and wherever we see it.

We hear again the words in our Isaiah passage this morning:
    
For you have been a refuge to the poor, a refuge to the needy in their distress” (AN EXAMPLE OF OUR OWN CASA SAN MIGUEL)

Sometimes it might mean standing alone – But ALWAYS it calls us to go to the windows and see what is happening to our neighbors!!!! Remember those in our day who had the courage to stand against injustice – Those who were willing to serve not counting the cost.  
    
Dorothy Day Founder of Catholic Worker Community who chose to tand with the poor.

Oscar Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador, who chose to walk among the disenfranchised;  denounced the death-squad government that eventually shot him while he celebrated Mass.

Martin Luther King, Jr. who demanded equality and civil rights for     all people, and economic justice for the poor.

Mahandas Gandhi who resisted racism in South Africa, rebelled against British imperialism in India, and sent out a call to practice non violence.

And of course, Anng San Suu Kyi recently released from house arrest in Myanmar, (formerly Burma) as well as the three women awarded the Nobel Peace Prize this week (one from Yemen, and two from Liberia – all who fought for human rights)

At a different kind of banquet, Jesus stands alone on the shore after the resurrection.  He calls out to his fishing buddies, and tells them where to throw their nets.

When they recognize him he says “COME, HAVE BREAKFAST.”
Jesus is serving breakfast to the very ones who had abandoned him only a few days earlier.  What a different picture than the king in our gospel story.

Who can resist Christ’s intimate love, his willingness to stand alone, his refusal to participate in a culture that ignores the call to peace and justice, and his willingness to serve everyone regardless of their station in life!

We can finish breakfast with the Risen Christ and set off on our journey of justice and peace, remembering to look out our windows – and to willingly get involved!

AMEN

“Not business as usual”

Recently, I laughed at a cartoon that someone sent me.  In the center of the cartoon, was open tomb – stone rolled to the side.  There was just a glimpse of someone’s robe at the edge of the cartoon, obviously someone departing the tomb.  Then on the other side of the rock structure were two centurions, leaning sleepily up against the sides and unable to see the open space or the missing stone, now rolled back.  The caption read:  “What do you mean YOU didn’t say “Good Morning?”

You can fill in the rest of the morning conversation – sort of a “who’s on first?”  Waking up that morning those guards, yawning and stretching, relieved that no one had come to steal the body during the night, were probably caught up in the assumption of “Back to Business as Usual.”  By the end of the day they were certainly aware that their day was anything but- business as usual!”  

Questions are a part of our daily news culture.  This week on the cover of Newsweek, the question in large black letters appeared?  Can Kate and Will Save Britain?  Why is ok to question everything else and yet somehow to question our faith, or to have doubts places us in the camp with “doubting Thomas.”  Maybe we need to rethink this label and instead join with Thomas in searching the real experience of what our faith teaches us!

I personally feel that we’ve given Thomas a bad rap –labeling him” Doubting Thomas”.  After all, Thomas’ comment was made in a setting where most likely all the other disciples had much the same questions the week before.

We don’t use labels for the “beloved disciple, who didn’t believe until he saw the grave clothes in the empty tomb, calling him the “Disbelieving Disciple.”  Nor do we call Peter the “Denying Disciple,” because he denied Jesus three times.  We don’t refer to Paul as “Persecuting Paul, or “Self-Righteous Saul”.

It’s true that Thomas doubted the story of the other disciples, but let’s look more closely at our gospel lesson.
    
As our first scene opens, the disciples are sitting behind a locked door, frozen in place, terrified of what might happen to them.  Mary Magdalene had just told them that she’d seen the Lord.  Thomas, for whatever reason, is not present in this first scene.  I would suspect that the rest of the disciples who were present were all full of doubts at various levels.  What was going to happen to them now?  How safe were they under the present atmosphere of the Roman government/ the Jewish authorities?  Who was going to lead them?  We know they had concerns, doubts, fears!!!

It sounds like they sat in a locked room full of fear and questions until they saw the risen Christ with their own eyes.  Who’s to fault them for their concerns.  

This is the context of Thomas’ doubt.  Thomas had seen Jesus die, and now he hears that Jesus has stood among the disciples!  Who of us would have readily believed that?  Thomas, the courageous, who was ready to accompany Jesus to the tomb of Lazarus, knowing he was ready to die with Jesus if they were stoned to death.

So where was Thomas when the disciples first met together and were visited by “the Risen Christ?”  Maybe Thomas had needed a week away to grieve – who knows?  The important fact in our story, however, is that the risen Christ responded a week later to Thomas’ doubt just as he had to the earlier doubt of the disciples.  I think that what is so remarkable about Thomas is where Thomas ends up – after he has expressed his doubt.  Thomas reminds us to dig deeper into our faith – to ask the questions and express the doubt and then to be open to the answers.

Thomas experiences the presence of the risen Christ and he responds by saying “MY LORD AND MY GOD!”  Thomas addresses Jesus in the same language in which Israel addressed Yahweh.

This was Thomas’ announcement and one that is perfect for our expectations this first Sunday after the Easter resurrection.

This is the way that we should always come to worship -  with that expectation that we will experience God’s presence, the wonder of meeting the Risen Lord in our midst..

On this Sunday, Easter services are over, the excitement of Holy Week is now a week in the past and the big day’ of celebration begins to fade.  We at St. Michael’s are now getting back to the business of being the Church!
    BUT
Let’s not go back to “church as usual” but rather look forward to the expectation that from this day on we will seek to experience the risen Lord in our times of worship together as well as the week ahead while we go about our lives as usual.

This particular Sunday has often been called “low Sunday.”  Why?  Is it because we’re not ready for “business as usual?”  Seems to me that this is the message Thomas brings us today.  When Thomas recognizes the Risen Lord and says “My Lord and My God,” it is ANYTHING BUT CHURCH AS USUAL!!!!!!!

Doubts and questions are not forbidden in the Christian faith?  At least in the church in which I find my home.  Digging deeper – asking questions – searching for the One who is more real than any of our doubts or even our theology.

Jesus turned to Thomas and said:  “Have you believed because you have seen me?  
Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”  I think Jesus is talking to us here today!  Jesus gave the disciples something that morning that enabled them to truly KNOW God and to continue the work that Jesus began:   and it’s the same gift that we are given in order to KNOW the risen Christ.

Jesus said to the disciples “peace be with you.  As the Father has sent me, so I send you,” and then he breathed on them and said “Receive the Holy Spirit.”  Not until Pentecost do we hear about being filled with the Holy Spirit.  Remember those words that we so often hear the deacon say at the time of dismissal on Sunday morning?  “Go forth into the world, rejoicing in the power of the Spirit”!!!!!!!

If you think you’ve reached a place in your life where your faith is merely “church as usual”, where you don’t come in the door with the expectation to encounter the presence of the Risen Christ - the presence of the Holy Spirit –then it’s time to be like Thomas and ask TO KNOW THAT CHRIST IS RISEN INDEED -- PRESENT WITH US NOW!

Many years ago I stood in the “Garden Tomb” in Jerusalem.  I was the last one inside and the last one to leave and by some miracle of timing I stood alone for some minutes in the space that may have been the temporary resting place of our Lord.

It had been a rather dry time in my life spiritually and as I stood there, I voiced this question out loud---“Lord if you really are alive and present, I want to know – I really want to know you!”

After several more minutes, I left the tomb and about two weeks later back at home, I was dusting one of the shelves in our library.  As I reached up higher than usual, a book literally fell off the shelf at my feet.  As I reached down to pick it up, I was struck by the title - Nine 0’clock in the Morning.  The author, who eventually became a good friend, was Father Dennis Bennett, an Episcopal priest from the Seattle Washington area.

I admit I was intrigued by the description regarding the men who at Pentecost were accused of being drunk at 9:00 in the morning because of their immense joy.  They were not drunk with wine but with joy from the Holy Spirit  - they were “wrapped in the Spirit of God.”

 I carried the book out of the library and for the next few hours read with a hunger and even some incredulity that God’s joy could still invade our lives with such power and presence!  I knew that God was answering my prayer and that I had but to ask God to open my heart and to fill me anew with His Spirit—releasing in me any barriers that would keep me from knowing and witnessing to the Risen Christ as my Lord and My God.

My spiritual journey did change then.  There are still valleys and, times for questions, times of doubt, but ALWAYS there is the assurance that we simply have to direct our questions to the one who was present to answer Thomas’ doubt.  

No -- this isn’t a time for getting back to business as usual – this is still Easter and we need to rise up with Thomas and say “My Lord and My God!  You are Risen Indeed!!!!! Breathe on me your Spirit this day!!!!!

AMEN

The Maundy Thursday service is one of endings and beginnings.  What was begun on Ash Wednesday is brought to a close here tonight.  What begins tonight does not end until the resurrection of Easter.  It is the ancient Triduum: “The Three Sacred Days,” which lead us to Easter:  Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday:

Listen to the words of our gospel story:        
    
“Jesus got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself.  Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples feet     and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.”

He came to Simon Peter who said to him, ”You will never wash my feet.”
    Jesus answered, “UNLESS I WASH YOU, YOU HAVE NO SHARE WITH     ME.”
    Later, after Jesus had finished washing all the disciples feet he said this:
    
“So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.  For I have set you an example,  that you also should do as I     have done to you.”

We note that Jesus did not wash the disciples feet when they first arrived.  Foot washing was very much a hospitable act of the day.  The guest would arrive for dinner and their feet would be dusty and dirty from the day’s travel.  Of course the host would not wash the guest’s feet, but a servant would do so.  But Jesus takes this simple act and creates something different in its meaning.  He waits until they are in the middle of their meal and then he stops eating and performs the task during the meal.  
Jesus was drawing attention to something much more profound than just a gesture of hospitality.

When Jesus takes the feet of the disciples and lovingly cleans and dries them, it is an act of beautiful relationship.  Jesus proclaims to each one, individually, that they are intimately connected with him.  

When Jesus reaches Peter, he meets with resistance. Peter is not rebuked for refusing to wash someone’s feet.  He is rebuked for refusing to let Jesus wash his feet. Peter expresses for many of us – that feeling of awkwardness in having someone else wash our feet.  It is easier for us to wash someone else’s feet than to expose our own vulnerability by having another care tenderly for us. .

A couple of years ago, I was sitting outside a Catholic school waiting for my grandchildren to come out and I happened to notice a sign outside the church building.  It read in Spanish:  “Deja que Dios te ame! which translated means:  ALLOW GOD TO LOVE YOU!!!!!!

Many of you know that this has become a phrase that I have taken to heart very personally and often use it in my own ministry to others --  the reason being that these words really are profound.  If you were to put this into the first person you would say:  Dejo que Dios te ami: meaning:  I allow God to love me!!!!!

Think about this for a minute.  We know that God is Love, but what would it mean to all of our lives if we truly could began each day by saying:  I ALLOW GOD TO LOVE ME TODAY!!!!!!

Just this last week I was asked to pray for someone who is having a very difficult time.  I had suggested that this person begin the day by saying I allow God to love me this day.  The following morning I was asked – Just how do I go about allowing God to love me?

It made me pause for a moment and then I realized that the answer is PRACTICE!!! PRACTICE is how we learn to allow God go love us.  Everyday, we have to practice surrender, we have to practice willingness, gratitude, openness, honesty, and trust!  THAT’S HOW WE PRACTICE EACH DAY - ALLOWING GOD TO LOVE US.

I like the words of Jean Vanier from the l’Arche community in France living with those who are mentally challenged.  He reminds us: “that Jesus came to bring good news to the poor, not to those who serve the poor.”  AND WE ARE POOR – ALL OF US –IN NEED OF GOD’S LOVE.  Vanier goes on to say: “I do not believe that we can truly enter into our own need for healing and open our hearts to others unless we have an experience of allowing God to touch us.”

Do you remember the beautiful lyrics of the Musical Les Miserables, based on the touching story of Jean Valjean set at the time of the French Revolution?  Jean is finally released after being sent to prison for 19 years simply for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his sister’s child who was starving and close to death.

Finally NUMBER 24601 is released but still on probation and no matter where Valjean turns he is met with recrimination – given half the pay for the work he does, and finds every door closed to him as well as being refused a night’s sleep in a barn.

Then Jean Valjean sits down despairingly outside a house from which emerges the Bishop of Digne – who comes out and says to Valjean:
    “Come in, Sir, for you are weary,
    And the night is cold out there.
    Though our lives are very humble
    What we have, we have to share.
    
    There is wine here to revive you
    There is bread to make you strong.
    There’s a bed to rest till morning,
    Rest from pain, and rest from wrong.

When Valjean then steals the silver from the bishop’s house the next morning and is brought back by two constables, here is what the Bishop says:
    
    “But my friend you left so early
    Surely something slipped your mind.
    You forgot I gave these also
    Would you leave the best behind?  
(And the bishop gives Valjean two silver candlesticks as well)  The Bishop truly becomes an example of the Christ figure giving so much to wash away the pain and wrong from Valjean’s life!

And then the Bishop addresses Valjean one final time –
    “But remember this, my brother,
    See in this some higher plan,
    You must use this precious silver,
    To become an honest man.
    By the witness of the martyrs,
    By the Passion and the Blood,
    God has raised you out of darkness,
    I HAVE BOUGHT YOUR SOUL FOR GOD!!!!!

Like the Bishop of Digne – ready to follow the commandment of Jesus who says to each of us:  “As I have washed your feet, so you are to wash one anothers’ feet”

Valjean has some of the same reaction that Peter had with feelings of unworthiness -- when the Bishop reaches out and ministers in love to him-- we hear Valjean saying to himself:
    
    “Sweet Jesus, what have I done?
    Become a thief in the night?
    Become a dog on the run
    And have I fallen so far
    And is the hour so late
    That nothing remains but the cry of my hate?

    Yet why did I allow that man
    To touch my soul and teach me love?
    He treated me like any other
    He gave me his trust
    He called me brother
    My life he claims for God above
    
The disciples are called to this foot washing to share in the relationship that Jesus and God have with one another.  The foot washing becomes a symbol of hope to each one of us.

When we participate in this moment of the sacred we are experiencing God’s love for us through another as we allow our feet to be washed and we are at the same time called to take off our outer robe, wrap a towel around ourselves -- to minister to those in our community -- to share our hope with another.

When we come together on this night, we meet to remember Christ’s example of servant-hood by washing one another’s feet;  in that remembrance He becomes present with us as surely as He is in the breaking of the bread!  Washing away the pain and the wounds from each of us.

We will wash each other’s feet tonight, not because we want to pretend we are in the upper room two thousand years ago but rather because Jesus showed us that washing feet is what loving one another looks like and what allowing God to love us looks like.  
God’s love is big enough to include the whole sorrowing, hurting world, but it is also exact enough to address each and every one of us personally and individually.

ALLOW GOD TO LOVE US –EACH OF US –THROUGH ONE ANOTHER.  This must become our PRACTICE --Say to yourself as you prepare for this sacred time tonight:  “I ALLOW GOD TO LOVE ME-- DEJO QUE DIOS TE AMI”!!!!!

AMEN

What does it mean to be a people of HOPE?

This morning’s gospel reading about the walls of the temple being leveled reminded me of the first time I had ever heard about this kind of doomsday message:  One summer morning in my mid school days, my friend Carolyn and I were sitting on the wall outside her house, trying to decide just what to do with our day, when two visitors approached us.  Inquiring if “the parents” were home, -- they were assured that they weren’t -- and so they decided to trust two girls with their “very important message.”

“We are finding rooms for our members,” they said, “who will gather in Albuquerque later this summer in order to prepare for the end of times and we would like to give you an opportunity to provide room and board for the five conference days here.”

Wide – eyed and a little overwhelmed with the news that we were to be preparing for the last days, Carolyn informed our visitors politely that they would be leaving shortly to spend the summer away at the lake and so their home wouldn’t be available.  She smiled sweetly, obviously relieved that using their home as a base for this ominous get together wouldn’t be possible.

To this turn down, one of the visitors responded.  “Oh that’s no problem - your family can turn over the keys for the house to us and great will be your reward when the end time comes.” Then the other visitor added this: “If we don’t find the necessary rooms we will surround the city and our trumpets will sound as in the days of Jericho and the walls of this city will fall down – and this will be a sign of what is to come”!!!!!!

The visitors then left and Carolyn and I giggled a bit at the thought of the walls falling down admitting to each other that what these “Witnesses” had said just didn’t sound right at all!  Fortunately for us, the humor of it saved us from falling into the fear and despair of what sounded terribly hopeless!

 – Jesus predicts that this temple was to be destroyed.  This temple that Josephus described as having its entire face and sides covered with massive plates of gold.  Imagine the outer walls of the Temple which were constructed with extremely large stones weighing 2-3 tons each.  The walls towered over Jerusalem, 400 feet in one area.  Inside the four walls were 45 acres of bedrock mountain -shaved flat – and during Jesus’ day a quarter of a million people could fit comfortably within the structure. It’s been said that “No sports structure in America today comes close”!!!

Jesus’ prediction that a structure so immense would be leveled to the ground seemed implausible.  But the listeners pressed Jesus for more information.  They wanted to know when this would happen.  What would be the sign that this was about to take place?  In their voice was fear -  fear of the unknown  -- fear that this structure in which they placed their hope and their security - might be taken away..

The first temple had lasted four hundred years until it was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 Before the Common Era (BCE).  Jesus’ prediction that the Temple would be destroyed did actually come true in 70 of the Common Era (CE) when the Temple was destroyed by Rome?

So what message was Jesus trying to convey in this prediction?  A temple on 45 acres of bedrock mountain - shaved flat ----a temple that appeared so secure –leveled to the ground--
Perhaps this was the key to their fear – they were putting their hope, their sense of security in the wrong place!
Perhaps the message is: that the bedrock of  our HOPE is not in TEMPLES -- is not in SIGNS!  Rather the bedrock of our real HOPE – IS IN THE  LIVING CHRIST!!!!!!!

I have heard that there were those on the islands of Japan who gave up their new found Christian faith when the bombs of Hiroshima were dropped during the war.  They couldn’t find the hope of the gospel in the midst of the devastation.

In the 14th century, in the midst of the impact of the Black Death, the Plague that swept across Europe, much theological optimism was devastated in the Western and Christian world.

A man that I greatly respect, Bishop William Frey, has said that TRUE HOPE HAS THE POWER TO DIMINISH THE EFFECTS OF ADVERSITY.

In the INFERNO, Dante tells us that the sign above the gates of hell says, “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.”
    ABANDON HOPE – can anyone here today remember a time when they were at     least tempted to abandon hope?  
    TO GIVE UP -  TO forget Paul’s reminder:  “to rejoice in hope, to be patient in     suffering, and to persevere in prayer. (Romans 12:12

Christian community is the place where we keep the flame of hope alive among us and take it seriously so that it can grow and become stronger in all of us.

Christian community is the place where we can live into the Gospel Message which is grounded in HOPE -- a place where we can live with courage, trusting that there is a spiritual power within us when we are together -that allows us to live in this world without surrendering to the powerful forces constantly seducing us toward despair.

And as Father Christopher reminded me this week:  “the idea of Hope allows us to live into a future where we can see God’s triumph and the tearing down of that which impoverishes humanity, in the form of greed, the abuse of power, the hoarding of resources, and the inequity of care and education.  HOPE for the Christian is a practice, something that we all need to cultivate and live into!   

I think that we are being invited this day to take a fresh look at what it means to BE A PEOPLE OF HOPE  -- A PEOPLE OF HOPE REGARDLESS OF THE CIRCUMSTANCES!!!!!!!

What would it mean to take a fresh look at the GOSPEL OF HOPE through a different lens ---- from a fresh perspective.  Are we willing to have a fresh encounter with the LIVING GOD?

Miller Williams, a young assistant curator at the Hermitage in Leningrad (now known as St. Petersburg), tells this story about a group of people who saw through a different lens.

They knew the Germans would come and so they had boxes precisely built to every size of canvas in that great art museum, the Hermitage,.  The boxes were then sent from Leningrad in less than a week and stored somewhere in southern Russia.

But they left the frames hanging, so that after the war it would be a simple thing to put the paintings right back where they belonged.

Each day the staff stayed on to clean the rubble after the daily bombardments which lasted nine hundred days.  Much of roof was lost and snow would lie at times a foot deep on the floor, but the walls stood firm and hardly a frame fell.

Then one dark December morning, Miller Williams tells, three young soldiers were seen waiting outside, pacing and swinging their arms against the cold.  They were from far away they explained, but all had dreamed of one day coming to Leningrad to see the Hermitage.  Now they were here to defend the city and couldn’t believe their good fortune.

Sadly the young soldiers were told that there was nothing to see but hundreds and hundreds of frames, hanging where the paintings had hung.

“Please sir,” one of then said, “let us see them.”

And so they were led around to most of the major rooms, allowing them to take their time as the staff tried to tell them part of what they would see if they could view the paintings.

The next day a dozen more waited to see the “frames” and then more and more visitors came as the staff pointed to even more details as the days passed – and so it came to be called the “UNSEEN COLLECTION.”

Miller Williams ventured to say that before the war the staff didn’t pay much attention to what they were telling.  In fact, he says, it probably sounded more like a memorized speech and they weren’t even looking at the very paintings they were describing.

Then something else began to happen.  Blind people began to come.  They listened, cocking their heads - and they even seemed to shift their eyes, those that had them, so that they could better see what was being described for them.

After the siege was over, and the Germans left and the roof was fixed, and the paintings were back in their places, the blind never came again. “It might seem strange,” says the young curator, “but what I think is that they couldn’t any longer SEE the paintings.  They might have listened, but then the lectures had become rather matter of fact again.”  There was no passion or life in the stories.  The lens had become dull once more..

It is in choosing to hope that something happens for us that is far beyond our own imaginings.  It is in giving up the control over our future and letting God define our lives   that we are able to allow” the God of HOPE to fill us with all joy and peace in believing.  …So that We can abound in HOPE by the power of the Holy Spirit.”  (Romans 15:13)

Let us not be negligent “in holding fast to the confession of our hope without wavering” because  WE ARE A PEOPLE OF HOPE – A RESURRECTION PEOPLE. Like the Unseen Collection we know that faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.  Christian hopes should include the ability -- an interior ability to laugh, perhaps even to  giggle at what looks so insurmountable, so devastating that only the power, love, and tenancity of God can overcome it  ---   to see those moments as something to smile about, or to giggle about because after all:  THE END OF TIME IS ALL IN GOD’S HANDS.                                               
AMEN

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