Sermon: Oil and Anointing for End of Year

Sermon Preached on June 17, 2018

Proper 6B RCL

The Rev. Vicki K. Hesse

Academy for Vocational Leadership

Colombiere Retreat and Conference Center

In the name of God, Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer

Amen

Wow. The final HE for our year together.

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes[1]
Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments so dear

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?

In daylights, in sunsets
In midnights, in cups of coffee
In inches, in miles
In laughter, in strife

In five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure a year in the life

How about love?
…Measure in love
----

And we have loved a lot this year. So thank you.

And today is the last day.

Does that mean you are done? you stop learning?  you have arrived? 

Of course not.

Does that mean you might be sad for this experience ending?

Sure.

So you can relate to Samuel’s grief.  For,

Today was the last day for Saul, the very King that Samuel had anointed.

Samuel must have felt like it was the last day ever.

“Samuel grieved over Saul.

And the Lord was sorry

that he had made Saul king over Israel.”

You know the story:  The Israelites rejected God as their king.

They wanted a king in flesh and blood that sat on a real throne.

They demanded a king and God listened,

appointing priest Samuel to anoint Saul as the king. 

In that anointing, Samuel poured a vial of oil over his head. 

And their life in ministry together began;

they were bound together into God’s story. 

But you know what happened.

Along the way, Saul rebelled. 

By sparing the Amalekite’s cattle

and offering it as a sacrifice,

Saul’s version of sacrifice

became more important to him

than obedience to God. 

So, God rejected him as king over Israel.

And Samuel mourned. The Lord was sorry. (pause)

Only twice throughout the bible

does God seem to regret anything. This was very unusual.

You know the first time, in Genesis,

the matter of the, ahem, little rainstorm and subsequent flood.

Then, here, we read The Lord was sorry. 

God regrets having anointed Saul –

 The one who had promised to keep covenant but did not.

What strikes me today is the nature of missed expectations.

Saul did not live up to The Lord’s expectations.

Samuel grieved the loss, the seeming end of his (Samuel’s) purpose.

I wonder if we, too, grieve over “Saul.”

·        We expected answers that AVFL didn’t have:

o   like the meaning of life or why the pit of an avocado is so large.

·        We expected our parish discernment committees

o   to recognize our untapped gifts. 

·        We expected sooner ordinations,

o   or quicker responses of COM interviews,  

·        We grieve the friendship expectations we will have to re-make

o   as we become ordained pastoral leaders and that changes relationships.

·        Broader, we ache for a Benedictine hospitality

o   to be extended to families at the border who seek refuge.

·        We grieve the way that

o   people who are perceived as “other” are invisible,

§  or worse, targeted with phobia.

·        We mourn the loss of civility in public conversation

o   and now recognize a lack of Benedictine humility

o   in much of our governmental leadership.

What expectations do you have for others, now at the end of this year?

We grieve over “Saul.”

pause

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?

What about love? Oh, right, LOVE! And grace!

The good news in today’s text? 

This text demonstrates so well,

God knew the story was not over.

There was a lot of Love to be spread around! 

The Lord was not done looking for a new king yet.

The Lord said to Samuel, ‘How long will your mourn for Saul,

since I have rejected him as king over Israel?

Fill your horn with oil and be on your way’. 1 Samuel 16:1 

Fill your horn with oil!

This time, it’s not a little vial, but an entire HORN of oil. 

“I want the guy to be drenched in oil – make it stick!”

you can imagine The Lord remarking.

“Don’t spend any more precious time mourning the past when I have moved on.”

God had a new king for Samuel to anoint. 

God could not do God’s work

as long as Samuel was stuck in disappointments and missed expectations. 

Because you know, there was a shepherd boy

waiting in the fields

for Samuel to relinquish “what had been”

so he could be part of “what was to be.”

King David was part of Samuel’s future

but he couldn’t have gotten there while still mourning Saul.

On that day

the Lord told Samuel, go to Jesse and – don’t worry,

I’ll tell you what you shall do

and you shall anoint for me the one that I name.

I’ll tell you what you shall do….pause

Today’s good news? The Lord is asking you to become new. 

Fill your horn with oil!

This time, it’s not a little vial, but an entire HORN of oil. 

“I want the YOU to be drenched in oil,”

you can almost imagine The Lord remarking. 

Yes, it’s the end of the year,

the end of these relationships,

the end of the AVFL community as we know it.

AND God anoints you in this ending, so that you can anoint others. 

Your mission through these texts

to co-create the world in a fresh way.

You go and fill your horn with oil. 

God will tell you what you shall do with God’s love and light and blessing.

God chose you, at this time, to go

and anoint God’s people in

Grayling, Otter Lake, Lapeer,

Gladwin, Mt. Clemens, Lansing,

Belleville, Novi, Chelsea,

Lake Orion, Saugatuck, Grand Rapids,

Grand Haven, Kalamazoo, Sturgis and Marshall.. go and anoint!

Guide them in community work.

Guide them to provide radical hospitality.

Guide them to honor their precious style of worship.

Guide them to break the mold and do something new.

God chose you, your unique gifts, your special perspective,

for a new church,for a new society, to make God’s dream come true.

God values your unique set of ears

that will hear when God says,

“rise and anoint that one, chose that one to continue my dream.”

One of the best lessons a mentor taught me was this:

Church will nearly always fall short of expectations. 

People will disappoint you.

No rector will meet your expectations.

You will work for some goofballs. 

You will have to do menial work.

You will be surprised by grace.

You will be embarrassed.

And you will SHINE!!

Today’s good news?

God has not stopped looking – there is no last place. 

Not until the day of Resurrection where all things are made new –

For today God pours out God’s love and oil on you. 

Out of the ending of our program year,

new beginnings can come forth.

“Because you are in Christ and there is a new creation –

see, everything has passed away – see, everything has become new!”

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes[2]
How do you measure a year in the life

Of a woman or a man?

In truths that she learned
Or in times that he cried
In bridges he burned
Or the way that she died

It's time now to sing out
Tho' the story never ends
Let's celebrate
Remember a year in the life of friends

Fill your horn with oil and be on your way’

---

[1] Seasons of Love, Song by Donny Osmond, Lyrics cited at https://www.musixmatch.com/lyrics/Rent-3/Seasons-of-Love on June 14, 2018

[2] Seasons of Love, Song by Donny Osmond, Lyrics cited at https://www.musixmatch.com/lyrics/Rent-3/Seasons-of-Love on June 14, 2018

Sermon: Human Need Knows No Law

Sermon Preached on June 3, 2018

Proper 4B RCL

The Rev. Vicki K. Hesse

St. John’s Episcopal Church, Clinton

Video found here.

Good morning.   

Thank you for the invitation to be with you today. 

My name is Rev. Vicki Hesse and

I serve the Diocese as the Director of the Whitaker Institute.

Who here has taken a class from the Whitaker Institute? 

The Whitaker Institute is the educational arm of the Diocese.

Our overall purpose is (slowly)

to form disciples to carry on the ministry of Jesus Christ.

(that’s a big mission but we have a big God!)

We do this forming in three ways:

by educating, equipping and empowering

members of our faith community with lifelong formation.

Three programs you may know include Safe Church courses,

“Exploring Your Spiritual Journey” for anyone (lay or called to ordination) and

“Academy for Vocational Leadership,” a local school for ordained ministry.

These are only three of several programs.

Perhaps there will be time at coffee hour

to learn more about learning and working together

for mutual transformation.

So thank you Rev. Susie, for your invitation to be here today. 

Now, we take a deep breath and remember

we are always in God’s loving presence.

May the words of my mouth

and the mediation of all our hearts be acceptable to you,

O Lord, our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

Sabbath.  Our first reading offered an exposition

on this 4^th of the ten commandments,

“Observe the sabbath day and keep in holy.”

The gospel text, set on the Sabbath,

challenges us with a message

of love and compassion in the face of human need.

Sabbath.  What is the Sabbath?

The dictionary says,

“A day of religious observance and abstinence from work,

kept by Jews from Friday evening to Saturday evening,

and by most Christians on Sunday.”

In his book, The Sabbath[1],

Rabbi Abraham Heschel defines Sabbath

– that portion of Torah “Law” as,

“…a Divine paradigm of understanding time.” (show book)

In the prologue, Rabbi Heschel’s daughter

describes the “anticipatory delight” of preparing for Sabbath as a child.

She writes:

When my father raised his Kiddush cup on Friday evenings,

closed his eyes and chanted the prayer sanctifying the wine,

I always felt a rush of emotion. 

As he chanted with an old, sacred family melody,

he blessed the wine and the Sabbath with his prayer,

and I also felt he was blessing my life and that of everyone at the table….

I felt transformed, emotionally and physically. 

The sense of peace that came upon us

as we kindled the candle lights

was created, in part, by the hectic tension of Fridays. 

Preparation for a holy day,

my father often said, was as important as the day itself. 

When suddenly it was time, twenty minutes before sunset,

whatever hadn’t been finished in the kitchen we simply left behind

as we lit the candles and blessed the arrival of the Sabbath. 

My father wrote,

“The Sabbath comes like a caress, wiping away fear, sorrow and somber memories.”[2]

Rabbi Heschel teaches about this spiritual practice of sanctifying time.

Perhaps a book study for your next group?

In our Christian tradition, certain practices evolved from Judaism,

such as confession, worship, and adoration

– all of which mark time as holy.

You know, of course, that in the book of Genesis,

at the end of the creation story, “God blessed the seventh day and made it holy.”

Heschel, “…for six days a week

we live under the tyranny of space:

on the Sabbath we try to become attuned to holiness in time. 

It is day we are called to share what is eternal –

from “the world of creation” to the “creation of the world.”

This sacred time invites you

to hear the soft whisper of God’s voice,

“ye shall not kindle any fire.”

No fire, not in my heart, or for my needs, or with others.

For many years, my Sabbath agenda

has been rest and renewal, soft and gentle.

So there we have context

why the gospel today made me squirm:

a confrontation between holy law-keeping and holy people-saving.

The clue for me was Jesus’ anger.

The Gospel begins with the Pharisees confrontation.

They valued that law-to-keep-Sabbath over human need.

With a little exploration, it turns out that

“unlawful eating of food on the sabbath” was fake news.

Jesus didn’t break a sabbath law.

The law about which the Pharisees had a problem

was one that forbids harvesting a neighbor’s crop

(Deut 23: 24-25 if you are interested).

Jesus explains that what David did

(eating the bread of the presence when they were hungry)

was far worse than just rubbing kernels of grain together for a snack.

And although the Pharisees mixed up the details of their complaint,

Jesus knew their intentions.

Then, real trouble began.

He blew their socks off with this new paradigm:

“the sabbath was made for humankind,

not humankind for the sabbath.”

Jesus’ offered a new idea: human need knows no Law. 

Mercy and compassion overruled compliance with the 4^th commandment. 

Jesus turned the Law upside-down.

Then, Jesus did it again. He provoked them:

“Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath?”

But they were silent.

Jesus then conveyed his humanity

– looking at them with anger.

Time stopped. Jesus kindled a fire in his heart!

He was grieved at their hardness of heart.

The bubble over Jesus’ head was surely written in all caps:

“HUMAN NEED KNOWS NO LAW!”

and afterwards, the man stretched out his hand, it was restored.

And… Jesus’ upside-down gospel tests us.

Sometimes, our society, our institutions, or our government,

also value the law over human need.

See, the validity of any institution

lies outside of itself. 

Just as

“the sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the sabbath,”

The Church was made for humankind, not humankind for the church.

So, the church’s true and only authority lies in its service to humankind.

The holiness of the church arises, surprisingly,

from the church’s own power

(from a faith community’s ability)

to adjust to changing times,

through ministries that respond

to the community’s human needs.

When we, in the church, ask, “Does this ministry fit into our tradition?”

– that is when Jesus asks us to turn the question upside down with,

“Does this ministry do good to humankind?”

Sometimes, we wonder how can we keep Sabbath

with all the need in the world? 

How can we serve others

when we are aging and less able? 

Jesus turns the question upside down when human needs are at stake.

Because in human-serving ministries,

the Holy Spirit invigorates participants

and provides the will and courage

to become the beloved community.

To be concrete, a little research on “human need” in Lenawee county

revealed that the “meal gap” is large.

The Meal Gap is the difference between

those who actually receive meal assistance

(~11% of county residents who are on SNAP, or WIC, or free lunch at school)

and

those whose income level qualifies them to receive assistance

but they do not pursue it, for many reasons

          (~75% of county residents[3])

The human need right here is for nearly 65,000 people

who live in this Meal Gap zone.

These people can use assistance to meet their hunger. 

You, the congregation of St. John’s in Clinton,

can make a difference with this potential “freezer meal ministry”

or by partnering with an organization like “Neighbors of Hope.”

Our gospel text today offers a timeless perspective:

God prioritizes human need over human law.

So what if…

What if the sanctity of keeping sabbath law in Jesus’ day

is like the sanctity of our national anthem on Memorial day? [4] 

I wonder if Jesus would take a knee while everyone else remains standing.

What if the sanctity of keeping sabbath law in Jesus’ day

is like the sanctity of our national immigration law,

which punishes people who “break the law” seek refuge at the US border

by separating them from their children?

I wonder if Jesus would welcome them with hospitality and offer an abundant life.

Today’s Gospel message to prioritize human need over human law

might trigger anger to arise in us. 

That anger – grounded in the yearning for God’s justice –

might fuel us to respond to the human need. 

That anger – fueled by our feeling out of control

might invite us to discover how our personal power might be threatened. 

That anger – manifest in our own atrophied hands

might be just the boost we need to respond to human need.

And turn our world upside down.

The good news today is that Jesus stretches out his hands to us. 

He is with us in the holiness of this time,

empowering us to offer our whole lives

to serve human need above human law. 

So today, during communion,

I invite you to come forward,

to stretch out your hand,

to be blessed and empowered in the name of Jesus

to join with him in the business of

serving human need over human law. 

Stretch our your hands. 

Become the beloved community

that makes God’s love real in the world. 

Come, stretch out your hands

so that Jesus can meet you in eternity of Sabbath

and delight in your presence with all of God’s creation.

Come, be restored!

---

[1] Abraham Joshua Heschel, The Sabbath: its meaning for modern man, (New York, Farrar Straus and Giroux, 1951)

[2] Heschel, vii-viii

[3] According to the 2017 Mind The Meal Gap by Feeding America, downloaded on May 28, 2018.

[4] Facebook posting by friend and pastoral mentor, Tommy Airey author for Radical Discipleship, following his work in the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival in Lansing, MI on May 31, 2018.