August 17, 2025

I'm really not much of a sweets person. I think many of you know that about me by now. But without fail, every year that we go back to Arkansas, at least on two or three occasions, we buy donuts for breakfast. And so it was that I found myself in Beebe, Arkansas, my wife's hometown, a town that is 90% white or black, and actually even over 80% white. So whatever diversity there is, is very limited. But I found myself at Star Donuts in Beebe, Arkansas. And donuts are an interesting idea. They're quintessentially American.

Donuts as we have them today were developed in the early 19th century by the mother of a seafaring captain in New England. And she took these exotic spices he was bringing home, cinnamon and nutmeg, and started incorporating them into millennia-old practices of taking dough and frying it in oil. And somewhere along the way, either she or her son had the idea of creating the center hole to the modern donut we have today. But it was an amalgam, a mixing of different cultures, different ideas, different concepts, all brought together.

And this particular donut shop in Beebe, Arkansas, lives into that ideal even more fully. The man who runs it is Arab-American. His wife, who was tending the shop the morning I went in, is herself Chinese. And not only do they sell donuts, but they sell kolaches, which are these kind of Czech-Texan pastries with meat filling. And they have breakfast burritos. So it was all over the map. And then, after I had ordered and received my goods, as I was leaving, the lady behind the counter said, safe home, which is the literal translation of the Gaelic-Irish slán awália. And so we have this beautiful blending of all of these cultural dynamics at play from the diversity of the pastries to the people in this interaction, to the usage of language. It was that perfect encapsulation of the American ideal of the melting pot that all of these things come together in some kind of new iteration.

It's that finding unity in diversity that I talk about so frequently from this pulpit. And there is a goodness in that. But, but, if that is true, what do we make of today's gospel passage? If this is our ideal, how do we make sense of this challenging and disorienting set of verses from St. Luke's Gospel today? Well, I want to step back for a moment and remind us all where we were last week. And especially, friends, those of you joining us online who weren't able to hear my sermon, I want to take just a moment to outline my remarks from last week and to kind of frame us where we are in this present moment.

Last week, we were in the middle of chapter 12 in St. Luke's Gospel, and we had the parable of the watchful slaves waiting for their master to return. I observed that in this rendering, and it's parallel in St. Matthew's Gospel, there's this admonition not just against alertness and diligence versus apathy and inattentiveness. But there is also this reflection on good action versus bad. And if we look carefully, the ending of our gospel passage from last week and where we pick up this week, we have nine verses that are cut out. And these nine verses are particularly difficult. Last week's passage and this week's passage bookends this section where Jesus talks about a slave. A slave who is put over his master's household. And when he is in charge, initially he does good things and performs well. And so the master departs. And upon that departure, the slave begins to mistreat the others in the household under his authority. And there is much, there is much we could talk about narrowly in the concrete dynamics of that passage. About how we mistreat each other when we don't think additional eyes are on us. How we take advantage of each other when we think we can get away with it.

But, if we step back from the literal senses of those nine verses, there's a more figurative sense in which there's this dichotomy between right action or good action and bad action and inappropriate action. Action that is framed out of anxiety and fear versus action grounded in trust and belief in the good news of God and Christ. As we discern that difference, it can often be hard to know whether the action we're undertaking is one that is action to bear fruit or one that is action that is reactionary to the forces of oppression and injustice that we see in the world around us. Inasmuch as we constantly feel like we need to be reacting to the present moment, sometimes those actions do no more than spin our wheels and exhaust us and deplete the energy that we are called to reserve as we wait upon the movement of the Spirit and further discernment.

It's a difference. It's a difference between acting out of our own volition and acting out of the depth of faith that we hear explicated and so richly described in St. Paul's portion of Hebrews that we heard last week and this between chapter 11 and chapter 12. It is this difference between discernment and a deepening of our spiritual life and an embrace of faithfulness over freneticism. So last week I said we can't really understand the gospel admonitions that we hear without seeing this fuller picture as developed in St. Paul's letter to the Hebrews. And the faithfulness, the faithfulness that we are called to always and forever ground ourselves in.

And that holds true today as we encounter this particularly difficult and challenging passage from St. Luke's Gospel. But even at that, there are some ways in which, if we pay close attention to this reading today, that it's a little bit more complicated than what we hear just at kind of a surface, superficial level. For one thing, and I have to credit Audrey West at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago for identifying this, it is an error if we see Christ's statements in teaching today as prescriptive. That we are to be these kind of antagonistic rabble-rousers in the world around us. That we are to cause this discord, to sow dissension, to be in adversarial relationship with one another. And instead, the more fruitful, the more coherent understanding of this passage, if we take all of what Jesus teaches us throughout the gospel tradition. It's that this is not so much proscriptive as it is descriptive. When we live into the faithfulness of what it is that Christ is calling us into, when we live into the ideals of love and charity and compassion, there will be times of discord and dissension. There will be fraught relationships, even amongst those we most deeply and closely love and cherish, even in our own households.

And this is seen no more clearly than in the great parable of the prodigal son. Because in as much as we like to focus on that resulting reconciliation, between the father and the second son. That reconciliation springs forth. Brings out of it a separate level of conflict. This new place of contention. Between the older son and the father. So even as the father is living into the ideals of the gospel. There is this new conflict that springs forth. And when we are attuned to that, we find the truth of what Jesus says to be not so much a difficulty as it is an authentic and honest recognition of what we face. when we embrace the love and charity and compassion that we are called to consume ourselves with in preaching and proclaiming the good news of God in Christ.

We see that further in a second sense, in a very specific linguistic turn that we have in our gospel passage today. And I often don't go down linguistic rabbit holes, but I found this one specifically captivating. The word that we hear in verse 50 is that I have a baptism, and this is Jesus speaking, with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed. But that word stress is not really all that helpful or necessarily accurate to what is rendered in the Greek. It is the passive present form of the verb synecho, which has a multiplicity of meanings and can be translated as stress or distress, but can also be interpreted as absorption of consuming attentiveness, compulsion, or preoccupancy. And so, if we think about Jesus saying, not what stress I'm under, but what preoccupancy I have, with the gospel until it is completed? What preoccupancy consumes me until my work is finished?

When we consider today the call we have in being proclaimers of the gospel, the invitation we have is to have that same level of passion and commitment. To be so consumed by, so preoccupied with the gospel that even when we face challenge, even when we have difficulty, even when the road gets tough, we can be so consumed that we stay single-mindedly focused on the goal and the goodness that lies ahead. So what are we compelled towards in our call to be purveyors of the gospel? What is the work that is called out of us and that we are to strive for until completion?

Again, just as in last week, I think St. Paul's letter from the Hebrews today offers our answer. We are again to be a people apart, a people sojourning in faith, even as we encounter and experience times of challenge, oppression, and difficulty. And yet all of these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, St. Paul says. We are to continue striving even when the results of that striving aren't necessarily clear. And there's, too, a pitfall that St. Paul alerts us to that is important for us to be mindful of today as well. Verse 12, 1, we hear, Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely. The sin that clings so closely. And here I found John Shelley from Furman University particularly evocative when he says this mention of sin in 12.1 invites reflection on the nature of sin. The singular form challenges our popular tendency to think of sin as a list of acts or deeds that cause trouble and for which one is worthy of blame.

If we do think of sin in the singular, he says, it is usually a reference to the basic orientation of the self. That we get caught up in these senses of presupposition, arrogance, pride, presumption, the will to dominate. But scholars on the margins have challenged us to consider that maybe the fundamental sin is a bigger temptation of our sense that we are the ones that matter, that we are the ones that fix things, that our eagerness to volunteer for soup kitchens for other social service agencies to assist those living in poverty are the sum and completion of our work. Instead of addressing the real, structural, overarching challenges and changes that must be brought forward in order for lasting and true peace and justice to reign. And what might it cost us, he asks, if we were to commit to such a work? Going back to what I was saying at the beginning, that sense of spinning our wheels on fruitless and facile kinds of efforts can sometimes exhaust us when the real and lasting work His work we are called to in a structural and overarching sense.

And that brings me, in a final sense, back to donuts and dreams. To pastries and progress. How often we take our ideals, the things of this world, that we are so consumed by. The places in which we want things to be just so in our own view, our own perspective. And we do not orient ourselves more fully, more importantly, more foundationally to the work of the Spirit. The work that calls us out of our own. Spaces and places. And ideologies. In as much as we help to disorient others. To a new alternative. A more fuller and richer world of the spirit. And I do not say any of this. To dismiss or discourage. The important works of action. of justice, the important places of witness to inequality and injustice. But my prayer for us this morning is that we take to heart the important points that we hear in this admonition from our gospel and in the teachings from St. Paul in Hebrews that we heard last week in this. that no matter those places of action we have in our lives, no matter the work that we undertake to build a more just and loving and compassionate world in this material space and time, we nevertheless are ultimately called to have our focus over the horizon. On the things of true and lasting importance that are the things of the kingdom.

That the wellspring of our energy, our sustaining ability to work in spaces of justice and peace. Ultimately comes from that reality of being a sojourner. Of being one who is here only for a season. and to center and surround ourselves with this great cloud of witnesses who teach us in their own lives how to be the people of action that are nevertheless a people apart, a people with a gaze and an orientation fixed upon the kingdom that is to come, not on the things of the world in this very hour. So may we, even in this moment of difficulty in the society around us, even in this moment of encountering very difficult and challenging words from our Savior in our gospel today, may we be ever more sustained in our own work of being a people of the kingdom. A people called to be consumed with a preoccupancy on the things of goodness, the things of love, the things of lasting importance. And in being that, and in so doing, may we ever be more nourished, strengthened, and committed to our God. and through our God, to the work that lies ahead. In the name of our Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

August 10, 2025

I speak to you this morning, friends, in the name of God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. Please be seated. Have you ever had a moment of inaction or indecision that gnaws at you, that you know you should have acted but didn't? Or, conversely, have you had the experience of feeling like you need to do something, even when there is nothing to be done? I invite these questions this morning because I think they are the polarities of Christ's message to us in our gospel passage from St. Luke.

As I was reflecting on this reading from chapter 12, I was reminded of two moments of profound impact in my life that speak to each of these emotional experiences. While I had gone off to college with a sense of call to the ministry and this well-thought-out roadmap for completing a bachelor's degree in religion and going on to seminary and then becoming a minister, I didn't count on having a crisis of faith and identity that would throw all of that into upheaval. In the midst of processing and working through that stressful time, I felt myself unmoored and full of indecision.

Then, in a heartbeat, everything changed. A friend from college invited me to a house party in Little Rock, and sometime late into the night, a group of us were gathered on the front lawn chatting when a speeding car came flying down the street, lost control, and careened into seven or eight vehicles parked just a few houses down. Like most of us gathered on the lawn, I stood there dumbstruck and shocked at the scene, while at the same moment, a small group of maybe four or five bolted into action and raced down to check on the driver.

I didn't move from my spot that night, but almost immediately I felt a weight of guilt that my instinct in that moment wasn't to help but to watch and observe as a bystander. I had always thought of myself as a helper, and I was crushed that I didn't act in the moment. I became obsessed for a time with understanding why I froze. It just so happened that this occurred right as I was considering switching my focus of study to psychology. Eventually, I became that person I wanted to be, the person whose instinct is to jump in when folks need help. But it was in that failure that I found new strength. In this time of great need in the world around us, there is a real and present danger of being bystanders when we are very much called to be alert and prepared to be people of action.

But then again, as is frequently the case with Jesus and his many teachings, the truth is not so singular or linear. There is also a pitfall in obsessing over action, so much so that we lose sight of the reason for which we act. Fear. Fear of what is happening around us. Fear that we are not doing enough. Fear, for all sorts of reasons, can sometimes cause us to act simply for the sake of doing something, anything at all, when maybe—very likely—the more impactful course would be to wait and conserve our strength for a time in which our actions would be most impactful. In point of fact, Jesus calls us to be alert and attentive, but sometimes to wait and be patient with that alertness and attentiveness.

One particular week in the spring before Julie and I moved to Northern Virginia, I found myself in the throes of this particular pitfall. We both had pending applications in with our respective graduate programs, and we had submitted our housing materials for an apartment but still hadn't heard anything. On top of all of that, my work as a hospital chaplain was proving especially grueling with the number of patients actively dying in ways that could not be helped or fixed. Fear was there, to a degree, but also, and maybe more importantly, the anxiety of having to wait, to be patient, to accept the unknown. In the parlance of psychotherapy, I caught myself over-functioning out of the depth of this fear and uncertainty. I was simply doing things for the purpose of feeling like I was doing something to alleviate the weight of the fear and the anxiety.

Action is so critically important in a world that needs care and compassion. But Jesus highlights for us this morning the importance of not acting out of fear and out of anxiety for the unknown. Action for the sake of the kingdom is action that truly transforms and brings new life into broken realities. Action for the sake of action just exhausts us and wears us down and makes us unprepared for the time in which we are truly needed.

If we read just a bit further in our gospel passage today, we see the danger of getting worn down and complacent before the time for action arises. In St. Matthew's rendering of this same parable theme, there is another story of ten maidens, some of whom fall asleep waiting for a delayed bridegroom and then are unprepared to do what they need to do when he finally arrives and action is required. If we burn our oil lamps down with activity, spinning our wheels of energy on things of little consequence, how will we be prepared for the time when action is actually required of us?

So, how do we navigate this discernment? How do we know when to act or when to wait? Or when we are called to act, how do we know what action to take? This is the last thought I want to offer this morning, and the answer comes to us through St. Paul and this beautiful so-called Hall of Faith passage from Hebrews chapter 11. It is called the Hall of Faith because it recounts for us the great heroes and ancestors in faith who have shown us the way forward in ages past. It is by faith that these ancestors knew what to do and when to do it. It is through the wellspring of their faithfulness that they stayed centered and sane in times of great upheaval and uncertainty.

It is by faith that they had the strength and energy to go on day after day, year after year, century after century, doing the work of the kingdom of God that they were called to do. And it was ultimately by faith that they could keep their gaze affixed on their true homeland in that kingdom and not get mired again and again in the fickleness of this world's allure and power.

I don't think I am saying anything out of turn when I say to us this morning that we, as the people of St. Anne's, are a community with a long and storied history of action. But we are also a community that has never quite figured out our spiritual rootedness and the wellspring of our faithfulness. Three years ago, when we did our parish survey for the Tending Our Soil initiative, we self-identified one of our weaknesses as a lack of deep spiritual identity and a lack of connection between our actions and our understanding of them in the context of our faith journey and our relational connection to God. We can sometimes too easily be a people of this world and not a people of the kingdom.

Don't get me wrong. By being a people of this world, we have been attuned to a great many needs and issues in the community around us. But by not being a people of deep spirituality with a rootedness in the faithfulness of God's kingdom, we have often found ourselves overworked, exhausted, and frankly, burned out.

God desires us. God has dreams for us. And God wants us to act with compassion, love, and transforming kindness in the world around us. But he wants us to do all of that as citizens of his kingdom and as people with a deep faithfulness and an ever-more deepening connection to him.

So friends, this morning as we are invited to join Christ in acting with deeper love and compassion in the world around us, as we are invited to release the chains of fear and anxiety which so easily trap and enslave our thoughts and emotions, as frequently people of this world, may we find our way forward in these times through a deeper faithfulness and spiritual relationship to our living God as people of the kingdom who are sojourners in this world but nevertheless share with the world the ceaseless center of all of our energy, all of our love, all of our compassion. That is the God who has made us, sustains us, and is evermore drawing us into himself. Thank you, friends. And in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, may we hear and receive these words today and always. Amen.