Saint Mark's Church

You may listen to Father Mullen's sermon here.

This evening, when we are gathered here for a service of Advent Lessons & Carols, some of our friends and neighbors will be lighting the fifth candle on their Chanukah menorahs.  Much bally-hoo was made of the confluence of Thanksgiving Day and the first day of Chanukah (which had begun the night before).  But among those not still celebrating the Jewish festival interest quickly waned.  This is a shame, since, to my way of thinking, the coincidence of the beginning of Advent with the on-going Jewish festival of lights is more interesting, and more fruitful for reflection.

Although you will find the historical context of the festival in the apocryphal book of 1st Maccabees – namely, the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucid Empire, - you will not find any mention there of the miracle that is commemorated with the lighting of the menorah.  For that story - the story of the cruet of oil that miraculously kept the Temple lamp burning for eight days, when the Maccabeans re-dedicated the Temple - you have to look to the rabbinic tradition of the Talmud, where the miracle is asserted.  The rabbis tell us: “they searched and found only one cruse of oil which possessed the seal of the High Priest, but which contained sufficient oil for only one day's lighting; yet a miracle occurred there and they lit [the lamp] for eight days.”  (Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Shabbat, page 21b)

And so the blessing is said to this day:

Baruch attah Adonai, Eloheinu, melekh ha'olam asher kidishanu b'mitz'votav v'tzivanu l'had'lik neir shel Chanukah. (Amein)

Blessed are you Lord God, King of the universe; who has sanctified his commandments, and commanded us to kindle the Chanukah light.  Amen.

Blessed are you Lord God, King of the universe; who performed miracles for our ancestors in those days at this time.  Amen.

Blessed are you Lord God, King of the universe; who has granted us life, sustained us, and enabled us to reach this season.  Amen.

When it came to Chanukah, the ancient rabbis showed little interest in the military victory of a small group of rebels over the army of an empire.  Their interest focused on the dedication of the Temple and God’s provision to keep the lamp burning till more oil could be prepared.  Perhaps the rabbis knew that men will always fight wars, and the victors will nearly always claim that God is on their side – this was not a matter that required much investigation.

If war is perennial, however, then so is the question of whether or not there is enough oil, whether there is enough light, whether God can keep the light burning, whether darkness will encroach and prevail, whether time is running out.  These questions were far more important to the rabbis than the military victory.  And perhaps they remain important to us today.

I have just finished reading a remarkable and heartbreaking account of one military unit’s experience in the Iraq War.  And the book does recount a few discussions about military tactics, etc.  But the concerns that it presents as foremost in the minds of the men who were fighting, and suffering, and bleeding, and dying are those same concerns about their lives, their families, their friends, and the world around them, that are prompted by the Chanukah prayer:

Is there enough light in the world?

Will God keep it burning?

Will darkness encroach and prevail?

Will time run out?

Of course, the questions the soldiers ask are not so abstract, they are more specific:

Will I ever be able to sleep again without these nightmares?

Will I ever be able to forgive them?

Will I ever be able to forgive myself?

Will I ever be able to see again?  Or walk again?  Or hold my child again?

Is my time running out?

But men at war are not the only ones who ask such questions.  The rest of us do, too – more often in the specific than in the abstract.  If some of you had not recently been wrestling with such questions, on your own terms, I would be surprised.  So let’s boil it down to one question:  Is there enough light?

I propose that if that is the Chanukah question, and if it is a question that pervades our lives in this difficult and dangerous world, then it is also the Advent question: Is there enough light?

How easy it is to feel as though we live in a world that requires eight days of oil, but we have only enough for a single day.  Of course, we live in a world that also wants to tell us there is no God to worship, so why are you worried about oil, which, by the way is a tradable commodity, for which there is an active and accessible market, so what are you worried about anyway?

Is there enough light? 

Advent seems to want us to sit with the question: to acknowledge it; to give it real space; to recognize it as a significant question that deserves careful consideration.  Advent does not seem to want to rush to an answer.  Advent seems to appreciate these shorter, darker days when flickering candles are both more suggestive and more vulnerable than they are in the long days of summer.  Advent wants to be your chaplain for questions about the pervasive quality of the dark, allowing you to ask these questions:

Does it seem this dark to everybody?

Why can’t I sleep?

Will things ever get better?

Will the pain, the grief, the memory, the sadness ever go away?

Advent hears the panic in your voice when you report that you have been able to find only a single cruet of oil, with barely enough in it to keep your lamp burning for a single day!

But Advent is not silent in response to these questions, to this worry.  Advent has something to say in response to all of them.  Advent has a reply to the question, “Is there enough light?”  Advent says:

Child, light your candle, and see.  Pour the oil into your lamp, and light its wick, and behold.  The warfare has been long.  The night has been long.  The darkness has been with us for a long time, it’s true.  But now, lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.

Advent says, the night is far spent, the day is near, and there is oil in this cruet; who knows what God will do?

The rabbis allowed for the possibility that instead of lighting one candle on the first night of Chanukah and lighting an additional candle each night thereafter you could do the reverse: begin with eight candles and light one less for each night of the festival.  But Rabbi Hillel maintained that the former pattern should be kept because “we increase in matters of sanctity but do not reduce.”  I am thankful that Hillel’s pattern prevails most often, and I am thankful for his reasoning, too.

And if I am to borrow the flame of Chanukah this Advent, I am doubly grateful, since the Advent light does, indeed grow stronger and stronger as the days progress.

And the answer to the question becomes, I pray, more clear with every passing day, as God works his healing and acceptance in our hearts and souls, as he opens our eyes to see paths that lie before us with hope and expectation, as he banishes fear, despair, and loneliness from us, and begs us make room for him – for the Child who is coming, the Friend we have waited for, the Love we so much need, the Master we might at last obey, and the Savior who finally shines with brightness to overcome the darkness, and who is himself the Light.

Advent promises that the light is coming – coming again.  But about that day and hour when it shall finally come, no one knows.

Till then, we could do worse than to learn from the prayers of our brothers and sisters for these eight days.

Blessed are you Lord God, King of the universe; who has sanctified his commandments, and commanded us to kindle the light.  Amen.

Blessed are you Lord God, King of the universe; who performed miracles for our ancestors in those days at this time.  Amen.

Blessed are you Lord God, King of the universe; who has granted us life, sustained us, and enabled us to reach this season.  Amen.

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

1 December 2013

Saint Mark’s Church, Philadelphia

You may listen to Father Mullen's sermon here.

O sing unto the Lord a new song, the Psalmist encourages us.  But what exactly does this mean?  We Episcopalians are well-known to prefer old songs to new ones – even though we allow the occasional new song into the mix.  How can we take this verse of the psalms seriously?First of all, we accept that the Psalmist is speaking metaphorically.  A new song doesn’t have to be a song: it can be a soup recipe, or a coat of paint, or the hinge on a door.  It could be the first time you went to church on a day other than Sunday.  It could be the way you said grace silently before you sat down to your food last night, or maybe out loud.  It could be the way you called your mother for the first time in months.  It could be the urge you are feeling for forgiveness – either to give it or get it.

A new song doesn’t have to be composed of music, it could be the dusty Bible you picked up for the first time in ages and actually read.  It could be the $5 bill you slipped into the hand of someone begging on the street.  It could be the way you finally un-crossed your arms when he talks to you.  It could be your decision to finally go see the doctor.  Or it could be your willingness to try giving up the … whatever it is you need to give up.  It could be the gym you just joined, or that you finally stopped coloring your hair because why not let people know you are going grey?  It could even be your pledge of support to this parish – maybe you never made one before.

O sing unto the Lord a new song, the Psalmist says.  But it doesn’t have to be a song made of music.

Here’s a new song for you:  Several months ago our property manager, Mark, who had heard me griping about how hard it is to see in church, now that my eyes are well and truly middle-aged, did something extraordinary.  He went around to all the lamps that hang above the pews there where you are sitting, and he retro-fitted them with am amazing piece of technology.  He took out the old 300-watt bulbs, and he checked the circuitry carefully, and then he replaced those 300-watt bulbs with 500-watt bulbs.  And do you know, that with brighter bulbs in the lamps, it got easier to see!

Recently, our weekend sexton, Jason, noticed that it was not so easy to see the image of the crucified Christ on the Rood Beam, there in the chancel arch.  Jason is comfortable on a ladder, so he dragged out a tall one, and he took the old bulbs out of the lights that shine on the Crucifix, and he replaced them with brighter bulbs.  Almost immediately I was hearing comments about how much easier it is to see this central image of our faith!

It’s amazing what you can do with brighter bulbs!

The church needs to go through this process from time to time.  We need to look around and find the old things that worked perfectly alright, but which may have become dim or outmoded with age.  It is a matter of wisdom to be careful about discerning the baby, splashing there in the midst of the bathwater, but it is process of discernment that needs to be tended to one way or another.  It’s called singing unto the Lord a new song.  And it helps!  Brighter bulbs have put a new song on my lips – it’s easier to read the words in the hymnal as I process up the aisle each Sunday.  I hope you find it easier too!

But, of course, it’s one thing to say that brighter bulbs are a good thing.  But it is quite another thing to realize that the brighter bulb, too, is a metaphor.  Under normal circumstances in the church these days, a metaphor like this one would be deployed for a singular purpose.  Normally, someone in my position would sketch out a metaphor to people in your position, distinguishing the dim bulbs from the brighter ones, because I needed you to see what dim bulbs you have become.  And I confess that as I survey the church beyond Locust Street, I sometimes despair at the dim bulbs I see flickering around us.

But today I have a different reason for deploying this metaphor.  Because sometimes when you change the bulbs, and it gets easier to see, but you haven’t bought new lamps or anything obvious like that, people notice a difference, but they can’t quite put their finger on what it is.  And today, my purpose is to tell you that it’s brighter bulbs.  But remember, it’s a metaphor, so I am not really talking about the bulbs!  What am I talking about?!?

I’m talking about you!  Do you realize what bright bulbs you have become on this block, in this city, and for our larger church?

Yesterday morning, after our 20s and 30s fed nearly 200 hungry people soup, dozens of you were outside making the gardens look as good as they have looked in years, and the Choir and dozens more were in here singing Choral Mattins.  A few weeks ago, I was serving drinks in my office, following a lovely service of Evensong & Benediction, while AA meetings met in the Parish Hall, the Choir was using the Choir Room, the Ministry Residents were congregating in the Rectory kitchen, and the Boys & Girls Choir rehearsed in the Rectory Parlour.  This is to say nothing of ministry that continues to go on at Saint Mary’s, Bainbridge Street, the Church of the Crucifixion, the Welcome Center on 22^nd Street – all of which this parish has contributed to meaningfully one way or another – and, of course, at St. James School, and City Camp, which we founded.

I want to tell you that it takes some bright bulbs to do all this work for the kingdom of God; it takes some people who are ready, willing, and able to sing a new song!  And I want to tell you that Saint Mark’s has not always looked like this; our lamps have not always been so brightly lit!

You probably know that today is Commitment Sunday, and if you do, you may have come to church expecting me to talk to you about money, and the importance of your pledge of financial support – which is, indeed, important, so I hope you have come today prepared.  But generous giving, good stewardship, meaningful discipleship all begin with a new song on the lips and in the hearts of God’s children.

Brighter bulbs shed more light.  And sometimes you have to stop and realize just how much more light is shining around you.  You, my friends, have somehow increased your wattage, from where I sit.  And it is something to behold, I can tell you.  You have become brighter bulbs!  What more can I say to you?  I can encourage you to continue to sing unto the Lord a new song.  Or, to put it another way: keep those brighter bulbs burning brightly!

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

17 November 2013

Saint Mark’s Church, Philadelphia

Although I have sung Rejoice in the Lamb since I was about ten years old - first as a treble and then many times as a tenor – and I have listened to it more times than I can count, it was not until I recently reflected on the work, during this centennial celebration of the anniversary of Benjamin Britten’s birth, that I realized how economical was the composer with his notes in this cantata.  The score is forty pages long, the duration of the piece is about sixteen minutes.  The music is often exuberant, and the tempo markings are specific: the piece begins, Britten tells us, “measured and mysterious,” it advances “with vigor,” the “Hallelujahs” are “gently moving” (the English marking here allowing levels of meaning oddly absent in the Italian, andante con moto).  Britten’s version of the Italian, vivace is delightful; he says it should be “very gay and fast.”  The piece finishes “gently moving, as before.”  Nevertheless, there is a striking economy of notes in relationship to the words.  To an astonishing degree, Britten allots only one note per syllable, seldom more.  Very occasionally he allows a word to possess two notes, but throughout the entire score only four words, by my count, are allowed to be true melismata, in which a single syllable of text is stretched out and held aloft on a string of varying musical notes.

It seems far-fetched to me that this careful rationing of notes is not very deliberate on the part of the composer.  And in the work, the shear dearth of melismatic words or phrases has the effect – once you notice it – of drawing your attention to the few words on which Britten lavished such attention.

The first such occasion is found early on in the work, on page 3, where the first syllable of the word “magnify” is allowed to lengthen out over the space of three notes, spanning a minor third.  “Let man and beast appear before him, and ma-a-a-gnify his name together.”

The next instance occurs a few pages later, in the following musical section, and accompanies the only time the composer repeats a word in the score (other than Hallelujah).  And the word, this time, is “dance.”  “Let Jakim with the Satyr bless God in the dance, dance, dance, dance, dance” – and if you don’t think Britten makes the music dance here, then your ears must work differently than mine.

Next, in the lovely tenor solo on the language of flowers, the tenor is allowed to sail luxuriously along on the word “poetry,” when telling us that “flowers are peculiarly the poetry of Christ.”

Finally, in the lively section where Christopher Smart’s quirky poem recites for us the rhymes of various instruments - the flute rhymes, the shawm ryhmes, the harp, cymbal, and dulcimer rhymes – the poetry arrives at the conclusion that “the trumpet of God is a blessed intelligence, and so are all the instruments in Heav’n.”   Here, the music reaches its climax, and the word “all” – describing all the instruments in heaven – is given five notes of its own, before the music starts to come back down to earth.

So what’s going on here?  What could be the significance of this esoteric analysis of the music?

Of course, I think there is some meaning to be found; in fact, I think there are lessons to be learned specifically from the observations I have made about the four melismata to be found in Rejoice in the Lamb.  To begin with, the entire work is a lesson in stewardship.  It was written in 1943 – the middle of the war years, when resources and the basic necessities were scarce in Britain.  It was not the time to be flinging notes about as though there were lots of them to spare, on the one hand.  It’s more like Britten had coupons for only four flights of melisma, and he was determined to use them carefully.

On the other hand, Britten provides a case-study in the availability of music, even if you restrict yourself to a lean diet of notes.  Only one per customer?  No problem: there is still music to be made.  And even when resources are scarce, the score seems to teach us, there are times when a bit of profligacy are called for; there are times (even if they be few) when you need to find a few extra notes and sing them in succession.

So, first we learn that the privations of war are no cause to stop making music, and, in fact, cannot silence music.

Then, of course, there are the four words themselves.

The cantata begins with the choir singing together on a repeated, unison middle-C.  For the first two pages of music, no voice leaves this note, and monotone recitation is the only rejoicing they are allowed to do: one note per syllable, of course.  Until, at the top of page 3, the voices are allowed to magnify God’s name together.  It doesn’t take much: just three notes, rising only the short distance of a minor third.  But then, Mary didn’t have many resources available at her disposal when she lifted up her voice to magnify the Lord, either.  And the lesson this music teaches us is how readily to hand is our own solidarity with Mary’s voice, how little we need to accomplish the feat of magnifying the Lord.

Next, we get to “dance.”  I’ve no idea whether or not Britten was much of a dancer.  I cannot quite picture him being twirled in the arms of his lover, Peter Pears; I cannot envision them pacing out a fox-trot together.  But here, his music seems to invite the rest of us to push the furniture to the side of the room, roll up the rugs, and start moving; to find a different rhythm of life, to break out of the awful two-step of war-time marching and remember what it’s like to live with the blessings of God – to remember that David danced before the ark of the covenant, and that God’s merciful kindness always and still gives us reason to dance, dance, dance, dance!

Once we have finished dancing, there is a long span of music – 11 pages – during which we are back on the strict diet of nearly one note only, per syllable.  Eventually we get to the tenor solo.  And who can disagree, in the face of this gliding melody that floats through the air on the tenor’s voice like pollen being wafted from flower to flower, that flowers are great blessings, that the flowers have their angels, that the flower glorifies God, that there is a language of flowers?  And who knew that poetry could be spelled out in musical notes using only the three syllables of its own lyric?  But here, Britten spells out his own sparse poem with nine notes – one for each of the choirs of angels, (the last three of them, admittedly repeated).

A “slow and passionate” section comes next, leading eventually to the Bass solo, in which, curiously, the word “musick” is itself confined to the rule of one note per syllable.  And then we are led to the ‘very gay and fast” enumeration of the poet’s notion of the rhymes of various instruments.

I suppose that the war had rendered England far gloomier that it normally is, its grey clouds grey-er than their customary grey.  I suppose the black-out curtains rendered the normal dreariness of life far drearier.  I suppose life was thread-bare and hungry.  I suppose it was the shared loss of so many husbands, brothers, fathers, and sons that really unified the nation more than anything: the relentless news of death, its sadness tamped down only by the need to respond to the next air-raid siren, to take cover, and plan for things to get even worse.

Shared suffering may unite a people, but it leaves you wondering who you are.  It leaves a nation fractured and scarred.  It separates those who stayed home from those who served, old from young, and those who survived from those who were killed.

The war in question finished off an already limping empire.  And by 1943, left them wondering if they had enough blood, toil, tears, and sweat to endure.  Britain had imagined itself to be a holy land, blessed by God, and possessed of a royal priesthood of the Gospel, which she had carried to the ends of the earth.  And now she was broken down by war and suffering.  Her song of praise was stuck in her throat, her trumpets would soon lead her men to their slaughter on the beaches of Normandy.

But for a moment, in 1943, all this suffering, uncertainty, and death was lifted up on the wings of five notes proffered by Britain’s own homynymous composer – recently returned from his own self-imposed exile from the war, because he realized he needed to be in England during its hour of trial, he needed to help lift his countrymen from their grief and sadness (which would grow deeper still before the war ended).

“For the trumpet of God is a blessed intelligence, and so are all, [all, all] the instruments in Heav’n!”  he bade them sing.  All the instruments of heaven now sing the glories of God.  In the span of five notes, the gulf between heaven and earth is narrowed, and we are not so far from those who have gone before us – so many of them, too soon.  And aren’t our voices, too, among the instruments of heaven?  Can’t we hear the blessed intelligence of God’s trumpet blasting a new song into our ears, our hearts, our wars, our world, our lives?

The story we write for ourselves is a story that separates us, one from another, by means of race, religion, and resources.  But Britten’s war-time music reveled in a moment of blessed unity under the unified music of heaven – all find a voice beneath the one, equal music that an earlier English voice had declared reigns in heaven above.

As a lesson in stewardship, then, I rejoice in Rejoice in the Lamb.  From its carefully rationed resources is great beauty wrung.  From lunatic verse does it find a way to make sense, and to teach its listeners to magnify the Lord, to dance even when you feel crippled, to treasure poetry above all other language, and to remember that all, all, all voices are enlisted in the blessed intelligence of heaven!

And should all else fail, even in times of deep austerity, when we cannot possibly imagine expending more than one note per syllable, still this great anthem leaves its song in our hearts and on our lips:

Hallelujah, hallelujah,

Hallelujah from the heart of God,

And from the hand of the artist inimitable,

And from the echo of the heavenly harp

In sweetness magnifical and mighty.

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah.

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

16 November 2013

Saint Mark’s Church, Philadelphia

You may listen to Father Mullen's sermon here.

Of necessity, along with preaching the gospel and celebrating the mysteries of our Lord’s sacramental Presence among his people, I have, in my ministry as a priest of the church, been learning to raise money.  Almost no one that I know of offers his or her self to the church for the work and ministry of the Gospel because he or she feels called to raise money, but all the clergy are expected to do it anyway.  Like learning about building maintenance, and fund accounting, raising money is just one of those things you have to do if you want to build up God’s kingdom and strengthen his church in the world today.  I’m not complaining here; I’m giving you context.

One of the things I have learned about raising money is that you need a case.  A case is not a valise into which you place all the money you have raised.  A case is an argument – hopefully a compelling one – that lays out why a person might want freely to make a contribution of his or her money to your cause.  Arboretums must make the case for growing trees.  Orchestras must make the case for playing music.  Museums must make the case for displaying art.  Schools must make the case for educating children.  Hospitals must make the case for caring for the sick and curing illness.  And so on.  Churches, I suppose, must make the case for their various ministries: the worship, the music, the outreach, the pastoral care, the teaching, the preaching, the buildings, the gardens.  And so on.  I would like to think that by so doing, churches are making the case for the kingdom of God, but I suppose that remains to be seen in many cases.

An essential, underlying pre-condition of making the case is the tax-exempt status of an organization.  Philanthropy in America – which is to say charitable giving in America – is enabled largely by a tool supplied by the federal government, namely the charitable contributions tax deduction, facilitated by the granting of 501c(3) status to churches and other charitable organizations.  This arrangement has not always been in place – Rodman Wanamaker received no tax benefit when he paid for the construction of the Lady Chapel (then again, there was no federal income tax then, either!) - but for nearly 100 years the tax deduction has defined the landscape of giving in America.  Again, I’m not complaining; I’m giving you context.

And in any context, Saint Mark’s has been a parish that has benefitted from extraordinarily generous giving.  From our founders, to men and women who are sitting in the pews today, this parish has known the enormous blessings of a community of cheerful givers – some of significant means, but many of lesser means.  And you and I are the inheritors of a great legacy of Christian stewardship in this place, where the case for the Gospel and for God’s kingdom has been made for 166 years.

It is surprising to see how inept Jesus is at the basics of fund-raising, and how un-informed he seems to be about the need to make his case.  In today’s reading from Luke’s Gospel, Jesus encounters a rich man, Zacchaeus – someone who in fund-raising terms would be called a “prospect.”  There is a suggestion that Jesus has done some prospect research on Zacchaeus, maybe he has even gone to seek him out as he passed through Jericho, for he knows the tax-collector by sight when he spies him in the sycamore tree, and he calls out to Zacchaeus by name, and Jesus invites himself over to tea at Zacchaeus’ home.  (This is a lot like an Every Member Canvass visit!)  But here, if Jesus has any acumen as a fund-raiser, there is no evidence of it.  Saint Luke mentions not a word of the case that Jesus may have made to Zacchaeus, he says nothing of the glossy brochure that Jesus brought with him, or the well-produced video he showed on his iPad.  Not so much as a PowerPoint presentation is made, as far as I can tell!

And yet, astonishingly, Zacchaeus stands before Jesus and announces in the hearing of onlookers, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” 

I have been looking for a couple of parishioners like Zacchaeus!

Now, I hear you fund-raisers in the congregation objecting silently.  How do we know Jesus didn’t make the case to Zacchaeus?  Maybe that’s what he did inside?  Maybe it was his miracles and his teaching that Zacchaeus had heard about that had already made the case, and Zacchaeus was ready to offer his gifts!  Maybe one of the disciples had some bullet-points scratched out on a slate, or a scrap of parchment that they discussed inside?  And I suppose any of these scenarios is possible.

But I want to suggest another possibility to you:  I want to suggest to you that as far as Zacchaeus was concerned there was no case to be made, for Jesus was himself the case.  His presence, his call to Zacchaeus, his desire to be invited into the tax-collector’s home, his sitting down at table with him, and his friendship – all these seem to have been the elements of their encounter, and the steps that led to Zacchaeus’ astonishing act of generosity, his extraordinary gift!  Jesus makes no case to Zacchaeus; Jesus is the case!

In this parish, we are currently in the midst of what we have been calling a “season of stewardship.”  Such a season demands that we talk about money, demands that the Vestry and I make the case for your financial support of this parish and its ministries.  And we are happy to do so – for a lovely and compelling and happy case there is to be made, I have no doubt!  But the truth is that Saint Mark’s has always been a parish that has tried to make Jesus the case, because we know that when all is said and done, he is the case, and the only case to be made!  We are here to meet Jesus: to let him into our lives, and allow him to change us, to perfect us, to lift us, to hold us, to enlighten us, to forgive us, to delight us, to mold us, and to love us.  Jesus is the case!

I want to make up a story, now.  I want to tell you a fanciful tale of how the wood that was used to build our pews in this beautiful church was harvested from a grove of sycamore trees in Jericho that is thought to be the place where Zacchaeus climbed up into the tree to see Jesus.  But the tree in question in the scriptures is a sycamore fig tree (ficus sycamorus), not very useful in furniture making, unlike the American sycamore (platanis occidentalis) from which furniture can be made.  And anyway, anyone can see that our pews are made of oak (genus: Quercus).  So my story-telling is squelched by the intrusion of facts and real life.

Neverthless, I wish you would imagine that the uncomfortable wooden planks on which you sit are, in fact, the branches of a tree – never mind the species.  I want you to imagine that you have climbed up into those branches to see Jesus.  This is not so far-fetched, after all you have made your way here this morning for some similar reason.

While you are up there, enjoying the view, I want you to imagine - not that you are Zacchaeus, not that you are a tax-collector, not that you are short of stature - but that you are rich!  And for many of us, this is not so far-fetched either, but for some, I know it is a stretch.  But we are just imagining, so don’t worry!

And since you are perched up there in your branch, and I am perched up here in my pulpit, we have time to talk.  And since you are feeling rich, I want to make the case for your support for Saint Mark’s.  I want to remind you of our elegant liturgy and our glorious music.  I want to recite for you the numbers of hungry people we feed.  I want you to recall the fine work at St. James School – founded by this parish and still supported by us in so many ways.  I want you to look around at our historic and lovely buildings.  I want you to see how the gardens continue to become lovelier.  I want to count with you the growing number of children who are becoming a part of the life of this parish. And I want to listen with you to the Boys & Girls Choir.  I want to talk with you about the importance of the Ministry Residents.  And so on.  I want to spend time with you, up in your branch, making the case for Saint Mark’s – and I know this would be time well spent, and I believe you would respond well to it.

But I sense another presence below us, calling us each by name, as we sit here in our perches.  And as he calls, I know that there is nothing else really to talk about, for it is Jesus calling, as he always does.  And Jesus is the case, and he is calling you and me.  It’s almost as if he has researched us as likely prospects for the kingdom of God!

It is because of Jesus that we come here day in and day out to worship, which means to open our hearts to God’s living presence, to beseech him to inhabit our lives, and to listen for his call to us to ask him into our homes.

It is because of Jesus that we lift our voices in song, and work to perfect that song with careful preparation.

It is because of Jesus that we care for the poor – not only because he tells us to, but because he was poor himself.

It is because of Jesus that we have been trying to bend our ministry toward children – because we remember how he called children to himself, and how he taught that the kingdom was meant for them.

It is because of Jesus that we want to ensure that the ministry of this place continues for generations.

All for Jesus, all for Jesus, as the old hymn says.

Remember that up here in our branches we are feeling rich!  But Jesus is calling us down, asking to come home with us, to be invited into our lives so that he can invite us more deeply into his life.

And if we hear him call, and if we are feeling even a little bit rich, the question is: what are we going to do about it?

What did Zacchaeus do?

Zacchaeus gave away half his money, and then some.  And remember that Zacchaeus didn’t even receive a tax benefit; in fact he gave others a four-fold tax benefit by his generosity!  And Zaccaeus didn’t give away his money because of the great case for support that Jesus presented to him over tea, so far as I can tell.  No, Zacchaeus gave his money away because it was good for him to do it; because Jesus is, himself, the case.  Zaccaeus must have discovered that in a world that encourages us to be greedy, selfish, murderous, and mean; Jesus calls us to be good.  In a world that enables our sins, Jesus calls us to repent.  In a world that revels in darkness, Jesus calls us to bask in the light of his love.

There is no greater case I can make to you for the support of the work of this parish than the case that is Jesus.  And there is no greater promise I can make to you than that we will always work to make Jesus the case here at Saint Mark’s.  And there is no better place I could be with you at the moment, than up here in this tree with you.  To help you hear the voice of Jesus calling you and me.  And to encourage you to get down out of the tree with me, to bring Jesus home with us, just as Zacchaeus did.  To let him into our lives, into our homes, to let him make his case of love and self-offering.  And then to do as Zacchaeus did: to open our hearts, and to give.

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

3 November 2013

Saint Mark’s Church, Philadelphia

As the sun rose upon Penuel, Jacob crossed back over the Jabbok River, collected his two wives, two maids, and eleven children, and continued on his way home, limping back toward the Promised Land, repeating his new name over and over in his head: Israel, Israel, Israel.  He knew that his brother Esau – with whom he had a bad history – was waiting for him somewhere along the way with an army reported to be 400-strong.  Jacob had every reason to believe that Esau was holding a grudge and had amassed the army with the express purpose of getting even with his twin brother after all these years.

On the one hand, Jacob was feeling pretty good about himself.  After all, he had just spent the night wrestling with someone who he strongly suspected was the angel of God – or maybe even God himself (though how such a thing could be was, frankly, beyond Jacob’s imagination).  He had spent the night entwined in conflict – a conflict, he knew, that was about something bigger, something beyond himself, something deeply existential - and he had prevailed.  And even after he’d been injured in the wrestling match, Jacob had held on to the angel (or whoever it was), and refused to let go without a blessing from him.  And the blessing he received was an affirmation of his fortitude, and more than that, an affirmation of his destiny: it was his new name, Israel, and the explanation that the angel gave with it (“you have striven with God and with humans, and have prevailed”).  So, on the one hand, he had been tested by God and had done well, so well that he’d been given a new name as a reward.

On the other hand, he was limping badly, because the angel had struck him in the hip socket and put his hip out of joint.  And the resulting limp tended to take a little bit of the shine off of the victory of the divine wrestling match, and also made him a slightly less formidable opponent for his brother, whose anger would have been seething for years in anticipation of the meeting that was about to occur.

This well-known episode of Jacob wrestling with the angel (or God himself) takes up about the last third of the 32^nd chapter of the Book of Genesis, and goes to the end of the chapter.  But for reasons at which I can easily guess, the Episcopal Church has omitted the last verse of the chapter from our reading this morning.  It’s a verse that follows the description of Jacob limping away because of his hip, and it says this: “Therefore to this day Israelites do not eat the thigh muscle that is on the hip socket, because he struck Jacob on the hip socket at the thigh muscle.”

Now, I assume that we do not read this verse because almost no Episcopalians these days keep kosher.

Were I to delve into my understanding of kashrut, the kosher laws, I wouldn’t get very far, so I should be careful here.  But my research leads me to understand that, indeed, the prohibition against eating the thigh muscle of an animal is still in force amongst Jews who keep kosher.  In fact the rules require such a complicated preparation of the meat from this area of a cow, and so few people possess the knowledge and skill to perform it, that the hind-quarter of the cow is often simply sent off by kosher butchers to be sold to Episcopalians and other Gentiles.  Be that as it may, what remains in the consciousness of at least a certain set of Jews who forego eating the meat from the thigh muscle is a tangible link to the lingering memory of Jacob’s test under the stars beside the Jabbok River, when he was all alone, about to face the music for his past dishonesty with his brother, worried for the lives of his wives and his children, and he didn’t really know what lay ahead of him.

The story of Jacob wrestling with the angel is a little mysterious, a little complicated, and full of interesting details.  It has many possible points, many possible morals, many possible conclusions to be reached, including the possibility that Jews should no longer indulge in rump roasts.  Asking what is the singular point of this story is a little bit like asking what’s the most important color in a kaleidoscope?  But if I have to choose, today I’d say the most important points of the story are these:

…that God tests people – it is a regular feature of the way he deals with those he calls into relationship with him.

…and that the community of faith is given a blessing through the tangible links of the lingering memories of our encounters with God.

It is commonplace these days for people to reject the idea of God because getting to know God is not so easy.  Part and parcel of the difficulty of getting to know God is God’s tendency to test people.  Abraham was tested by being asked to sacrifice his son Isaac; Noah was tested just by being asked to build the ark; Moses was tested by being asked to confront Pharaoh; David was tested in his confrontation with Goliath; the prophets were constantly being tested; Jesus himself was tested during his forty days of fasting in the wilderness.  God tests those he calls into relationship with him.

It is important to see that God does this testing not for his own benefit (God already knows the outcome) but for the benefit of the one being tested.  This tendency of God’s offends modern sensibilities, since today we think that God ought to be selling us on himself, and all this testing really is off-putting.  But Jacob would never have become Israel without his test.  Not because God needed him to pass the test, but because Jacob needed it himself.  Jacob needed to know that he could prevail, not through trickery or deceit, but through his own determination and fortitude.  Jacob needed to know that he could prevail on his own.  Jacob needed to overcome his own self-doubt.  Jacob needed to know that God wished to be entangled with him.  God already knew all these things.  But Jacob only discovered them in his test by the Jabbok River.

And, of course, Jacob needed to be ready to receive a new name, to take on an identity bigger than his own, to become the third patriarch of God’s chosen people.  Jacob needed to become Israel.  And the moment that Jacob does become Israel is commemorated for him by his injury, and by the limp that impedes his footsteps as he crosses back over the river, toward both his past and his future, and toward the destiny that God has in store for him.  Jacob’s destiny was to become Israel and to return home to the Promised Land.

So Israel adopted the commemoration of the limp by refusing to eat the meat of the thigh muscle of the hip socket in order to remember all that Jacob learned in his test, in order to fix that memory to the daily routines of their lives, in order to have a constant reminder that even if you must do so limping, you should follow God’s call back to his Promised Land.

All of which might or might not be interesting to you and to me.  But that is not the question.  The question is this: Have you ever felt tempted to reject God because of a night, or a season of torment?  Have you grappled with God, found him difficult, confrontational, maybe even wounding to you in some way, and concluded that God is not worth the angst, not worth the struggle, not worth the injury?

Jacob limps toward you to beg you to consider otherwise; to remind you that the struggle was not for God’s benefit, but for his own; to tell you that he wouldn’t even know who he was, had it not been for his night of testing by the Jabbok River.  And he wants you to know that he wouldn’t trade his limp – by which the memory of that night of wrestling is brought constantly to mind – for anything!

Where God is concerned, sometimes we need to embrace the struggle, to refuse to let go of it until God gives us the blessing that is meant to come from it.  Our tendency to think that religion ought to deliver Nirvana on demand from a standstill is naïve, childish, and has little basis in the human experience.  But of course, it’s what we all want!

Is God testing you?  Don’t let go of him!  Don’t give up on him!  And don’t assume that the test has no purpose.  You have no more idea what God is going to show you than Jacob did.  For all you know God may have a new name to give you!  Hold on to God, and demand from him the blessing you seek.

It’s true that Episcopalians are not so good at keeping kosher.  But we are quite good at rehearsing the tangible link of our lingering memories of our encounters with God.  If you let your imagination go for a minute, you can see how the Mass is its own little set of dietary laws – controlling only these two ingredients: bread and wine.  Why do we fuss with them so?  Bread is baked into little, crumb-less wafers.  Wine is poured into elaborate chalices.  They are carried into the church, just so.  We dress up in this out-moded gear when we gather this way.  We ring bells, sing hymns, and then pronounce the prayers – the same old prayers, time and time again – just for this Bread, just for this Wine.  But we do not remember Jacob, wrestling with angel.  We remember Jesus.  And with these tangible links – the Bread, the Wine, the words he used, the bells, and the smoke, and the gathered people - our memory comes alive, so that Jesus is really with us, right here among us.

And maybe last night was a night of struggle for some of us.  Maybe you felt alone, entangled in conflict.  Maybe you feel separated from everyone you love; maybe they have crossed over to the other side of the river, but you have had to stay on your side alone.  Maybe you are feeling unimpressed by God, who has not been doing a very good job of selling himself to you lately.  Maybe you suspect that, in fact, all this God talk is just so much talk about angels and rivers, but that it doesn’t make much difference in your life.  Maybe there is an old enmity – with your brother, or your sister, or your parents, or your spouse, for which you feel angry, or guilty, or both, and that has dogged you for years.  Maybe you fear that inevitable confrontation lies ahead of you tomorrow, and you just wish you could get away from it.  And maybe all this has happened before, and you have been left limping – but to what end and for what purpose?  Maybe God is testing you  - I don’t know why, it’s just the way God does things.

But remember that God is not testing you because he does not know how things will work out for you; God is testing you to teach you how things will work out for you.

In the story of Jacob wrestling the angel, it is not entirely clear that Jacob has won the match when the sun begins to rise over the Jabbok River.  What is clear is that Jacob refuses to let go.  Even when injured by the angel, he refuses to let go.  Even when the angel will not answer his question, politely asked (“Please tell me your name.”) he will not let go.  He will not let go until the blessing comes.  And he is right to hang on, for the angel blesses him; God blesses him right there, in the place of his loneliness, his anxiety, and his struggle, God blesses him.

And Jacob gets up, limping badly.  But there is a joyfulness to his step, nonetheless, as he limps across the Jabbok, reciting his new name over and over, and collects his two wives, and his two maids, and his eleven children.  And, knowing that his angry brother Esau awaits him, he sends gifts ahead - camels and flocks and herds - acting with generosity toward his brother for perhaps the first time.  And Esau tells his men to stand down, and embraces his brother instead of attacking him.  And they part company, and Jacob continues on his way home, toward the Promised Land he’d left behind, teaching everyone to pronounce his new name: Israel, Israel, Israel.

God tests his people from time to time – not because God needs to, but because we generally do need to be tested, though it is highly frustrating, and sometimes much worse than that. 

And God has given us a living memory of the gift of salvation – he gives us his Body and his Blood over and over again, to bring to mind the journey he calls us all to make: across the river, past all our fears and doubts, and all our enemies, and all our old failures, probably limping as we go.

And there is a name has given to each of us – a new name that he hopes we will keep repeating in our heads till we have learned what it means: Christian, Christian, Christian.  Which reminds us of the new name he gave to Jacob, when he called him Israel, and of the Promised Land that we are so ready to forget, because we left it far behind so long ago.

And it turns out that the test is mostly this: to see if we are willing to keep limping toward the Promised Land that God is building in our hearts.  This is our destiny, if only we will refuse to let go of God till he has given us his blessing, which he will surely do, as surely as the sun rises over the river.  And we give thanks to Jacob, we give thanks to Israel, for teaching us over and over again that important lesson in our struggle with God: that the most important thing to do is to refuse to let go to be confident of the blessing, to hang on till you receive it…

… and then to go limping toward the Promised Land with your new name rolling around in your head: Christian, Christian, Christian.

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

20 October 2013

Saint Mark’s Church, Philadelphia