Sermon: Doing pottery in the dark (November 30, 2014)

Advent 1B

November 30, 2014

Isaiah 64:1-9

            This week has been for me a lot of keeping awake and waiting. As many of you know, Michael and I spent the week in Florida visiting Michael’s dad, who is sick and getting sicker with cancer. A few days before we were to head down there, he ended up in the hospital with a couple bad infections; as a result, all of our visitation with him happened in an isolation hospital room. The week was a routine of waking early to get to the hospital, waiting for word from the doctors, waiting for surgeries, waiting for recovery, and then heading home exhausted, only to prepare for the next day of more of the same.

            On top of what was going on in our personal lives, of course, we watched and read this week

 along with the rest of the country the outcome of the Michael Brown case, and the lack of indictment for the police officer who shot and killed 18-year-old Brown. I did my best to read both sides of the case, to understand why he wasn’t indicted for killing an unarmed teenager who some witnesses say was surrendering. But the majority of what I saw wasn’t so much about the details of the case as it was people aching with the realization of just how far we have yet to go in overcoming racism in our country. Watch

and wait, or do something while you wait, but either way: it has been a long wait for the achievement of racial justice, and one which is not yet over.

            "Not yet over": it’s a theme that is so often present in our lives, and in the church calendar it is especially prominent on this first Sunday in Advent. Isaiah begins his lament, “Oh, that you would tear open the heavens and come down!” Come down, already, God – where are you? Your people are suffering down here! We need you, right now! Our passage from Mark, which comes from what is known as the “little apocalypse,” describes a day when stars will fall and the sun will be darkened, a day when the Son of Man finally will come down, but also an event for which we do not know the day or hour. We simply have to wait and watch and keep awake. And our prayer of the day sums all this up, taking its lead line from today’s Psalm: Stir up your power, O Lord, and come.

            Stir up your power, O Lord, and come – who has not prayed a prayer like this? In hospital waiting rooms, watching riots breaking out again on the streets of Ferguson, wondering when all of the sadness and brokenness of life will finally come to an end… God, if you are as powerful a God as you claim to be, then stir up that power and come. We need you down here!

            The season of Advent, these four weeks leading up to Christmas, was historically a penitential time, like Lent – a time for dwelling on our sins and our need for forgiveness. But now it has become instead of a time of waiting and expectation, a time of anticipation for God coming to earth. It is a

time of not yet. Our culture tells us it is already Christmas (it has been telling us this since roughly the 4^th of July). Many of us spend the long Thanksgiving weekend preparing for Christmas, decorating, shopping, putting up trees, etc. Thanksgiving is the official kick-off to the Christmas season. But the liturgical calendar doesn’t give us that instant gratification we Americans are so accustomed to. The liturgical calendar makes us wait, for four more weeks, and during that time, we come to realize more deeply why we celebrate Christmas in the first place.

            And as I said, this week has made the primary reason abundantly clear: because our world is so full of pain and brokenness and sadness and “not yet,” and no number of Christmas carols or lighted trees is going to fill that void like our God coming down from heaven can do. And that is why we plead, with Isaiah: we want God to tear open the heavens and come down right now. We want our God to come and be with us, and know us, and truly see us.

            Isaiah’s cry in our first lesson today really captures that anguish, the anguish of feeling like God is nowhere to be found. After his initial plea that God would tear open the heavens and come down, Isaiah remembers when God was present. “When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect,” he says, “you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.” He goes on to recount the marvelous ways that God has been seen, and we have seen God. “No eye has seen any God besides you,” he says, “who works for those who wait for him.” Such faith! Such confidence! But then the tone changes, reflecting instead on the reality that God does not seem to be present now, and even blaming God, saying that it is because God has kept hidden that we have sinned and strayed: “because you hid yourself, we transgressed.”

            Isaiah’s lamenting sounds so familiar to me. It reminds me of Martha’s words to Jesus after her brother Lazarus died: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.” Lord, if you had been here, there wouldn’t have been a painfully empty seat at Thanksgiving dinner. Because you hid yourself, there is more rioting in Ferguson. If you would just stir up your power and come, already, things would be so much better!

This cry, this pleading, is a part of the waiting that is Advent. The world is sometimes very dark, and it is hard to see in the dark. It is hard to see God and it is hard to believe that God sees us when we live in darkness here on earth. But even as Isaiah seems to fall into despair, he does not lose hope. The hope peeks through first with one little word: YET. “Yet, O Lord, you are our Father,” Isaiah writes. Yes, we live in darkness, we endure pain, we sometimes feel like you are absent. YET, we know that in the midst of all that, you are our Father, and we still belong to you, and you still love us and care for us.

And then he goes on, “we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.” This is a rich, deep, and well-loved metaphor, but what struck me about it today, in this world

context and as we begin Advent, is that it is a tactile image. For God to hold us and shape us and mold us doesn’t require light. This can be done in the dark, and indeed, what is more intimate knowledge than the knowledge that comes from touch? It is in that touch, that intimate molding relationship God has with us, that we become aware of God’s presence, and so begin to know and be known, to see and be seen by God.

And so, in the hope of that tactile intimacy, we also have the courage to light candles. During this Advent season, we light candles, first one on a wreath, then another, increasing the light and shedding the darkness that pressing in on us, as we draw closer to that night when the light of the world comes down to us, lighting our way, filling our hearts, and showing us that indeed, God was here all along, holding us and shaping us as a potter does his clay.

We know the end of the story. But this time of Advent waiting helps us remember why we tell that story, the story of a God who heard our prayer, who saw our need, and so who tore open the heavens and came down to be God-with-us in our suffering.

Let us pray… Stir up your power, O Lord, and come. Come down to this aching world. Come into our darkness and be our light. Grant us strength while we wait for you, courage while we seek you, and a knowledge all along that you are holding us as a potter holds his clay, and knowing us intimately. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Practice what you preach: a post-sermon reflection

I am not ashamed to use personal stories in sermons that show my own need for grace, and hopefully to help others see their own. And so for my sermon this morning on Matthew 25, the sheep and the goats, I used a story from this past week in which I silently judged a person in need and drove off without helping him - ironically on my way to lead a Bible study on this very passage from Matthew in which Jesus tells us, "I was hungry and you gave me something to eat... as you did to the least of these, you did it to me," and more profoundly in this case, "As you did NOT do it to the least of these, you did not do it to me."

I see such people in need nearly every day, and the fact is I can't help every one of them, but this particular one really stuck with me. What a hypocrite I was, to stand up in that pulpit and tell people to see Christ in their neighbor, to help people in need because that is where you will see Christ... and then to drive off and not do the same. It's no surprise that my sermon was a little heavy on law and little light on grace today - I guess I hadn't really found grace for myself yet.

On my way home, I kept thinking about my own words: "If you have not seen Christ in 'the least of these' whom you encounter, is it possible it is because you haven't really tried?" As I got off at Carter Street, as I usually do, of course there was a man there with a sign, asking for help. "Here's your chance, Jo," I said. "Practice what you preach." I watched as someone else handed him something, and he was grateful. But soon enough, the light changed, and I had done nothing.

I was hungry and exhausted and wanted to go home, but I guessed he was much hungrier and more exhausted than I was, and didn't have a home to go to. What should I do? Should I swing into Walmart and get a gift card for him and go back? Maybe just grab him a bowl of soup at Wegmans? A banana? And then I was home, and had done nothing.

But it wasn't too late - I went inside and made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, filled a baggie with carrots, grabbed the rest of a bag of pumpkin seeds, a bag of chips and a ginger ale, and got back in the car. I parked near the corner he was at, and got out of the car.

Is this stupid? I thought. A single woman, a man I don't know... I figured on a busy street corner, nothing too bad could happen. I left my purse in the car just to be safe, and grabbed an umbrella, which could double as a stick if needed. And as I walked toward the corner, I prayed, "God, please keep me safe. Come with me."

The man was beyond grateful for the lunch. He thanked me profusely and repeatedly. I said, "I saw you here, and didn't want to give you cheap food from Walmart, so I went home and made something nice. I'm glad you were still here." I asked him how he had gotten to this point, and he shared his story with me. The gist was that his girlfriend of 12 years had kicked him out, and he was trying to find work, and hoped he could get a job instead of apply for social services. He didn't want to just get lost in the system. He'd had some luck with daily work, but nothing permanent yet, though he had applied to one about which he was hopeful. I confessed that I am a pastor and had preached on Matthew 25 this morning, and wanted to practice what I preached, so when I saw him, I wanted to help. He knew the passage - in fact, he was a Christian, and cited several of his favorite verses, including from Proverbs 3:5-6: "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not rely on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight." He said his name is Michael, and asked if I would pray for strength for him. I said of course I would. He thanked me again for the food and said he was going to eat it right now. I said, "I meant to put a chocolate bar in there for you, but I forgot." He feigned dismay. I thanked him for not being a weirdo. He said, "Nah, I'm not a weirdo. A bit strange sometimes, but not a weirdo." I said, "Well, Matthew 25 says to welcome the stranger, so even being strange is okay with me." We laughed and bid farewell.

As I walked down the sidewalk, he spoke to me again. "You know, I sometimes think in the Bible, 'What if Joseph hadn't done that? Or what if Moses hadn't done that?' I just think, you know, everything happens the way it does for a reason." I agreed. Again we bid farewell and parted ways. As I waited for the light to change so I could cross, he said from several feet behind me, as if to himself but loud enough for me to hear, "Man, what kind of Christian doesn't include chocolate..." I turned around and laughed out loud, and apologized again. He grinned and waved, and thanked me again. I had half a mind to go buy him some chocolate and come back to give it to him. But by the time I got to my car and came back through the intersection, he was gone.

Did I see Christ in that young man? I did. It was in the opportunity and ability to serve, of course, but it was elsewhere, too. I had been kicking myself all week for my selfishness, and as I mentioned, I think that resulted in a lack of grace in my sermon today. But in that brief encounter, I experienced God's grace. It was in the opportunity to serve placed before me again, a second chance. It was in the reflection this has inspired in me today and all week - I have thought and prayed about this a lot more as a result of first falling short. It was in the laughter we shared. It was in the knowledge that God loves me too much to let me fall short every time, and that when I'm ready to come around, Christ will be there, too.

I helped a man named Michael today. I gave him food, and I connected with his spirit, which I hope gives his more lasting sustenance than PB&J. But more than that, he helped me to see the face of Christ. Thank you, Michael, and thank God for you.

Sermon: Have you looked for Christ? (Nov. 23, 2014)

Christ the King Sunday (A)

November 23, 2014

Matthew 25:31-46

            This week in confirmation class we started learning about the 10 Commandments. I’m not sure I loved that unit as a confirmation student myself, but I have to say that now, as a Christian more mature in my faith and more invested in how it affects me and the way I live, what Luther has to say about those commandments is one of the most difficult, most important, and most relevant things in our Lutheran tradition. Suddenly, these commandments, which may appear archaic or irrelevant to us in our daily lives (after all, how often are you really tempted to kill someone?) become something that kicks me in the gut and forces me to really examine how I live my life.

            If you grew up Lutheran – do you remember these short, punch-throwing explanations? Take the 8^th commandment, for example: “You shall not bear false witness.” Luther explains: “You are to fear and love God so that we do not tell lies about our neighbors, betray or slander them, or destroy their reputations.” So far so good, but that’s only part of it. He goes on: “Instead, we are to come to their defense, speak well of them, and interpret everything they do in the best possible light.” Oh, that. Okay, I’m not quite as good at that, especially that last part, about interpreting things in the best possible light. I sometimes take offense too easily, assuming people meant the worst in what they said. I make people’s comments about me and then turn on the one who spoke them, using their words (which had nothing to do with me) against them. Can you relate?

            But the commandment that I have thought about especially this week is the 5^th: You shall not murder. Strange, right, since I just told you I have never been tempted to murder someone! This is the one commandment most of us feel pretty safe on keeping. But listen to Luther’s explanation: “We are to fear and love God, so that we neither endanger nor harm the lives of our neighbors, but instead help and support them in all of life’s needs.” In other words, refraining from killing someone (or for Luther, hurting them in any way) is a good start, but if you are letting someone suffer without coming to their aid, you are still breaking this commandment.

            I think about this every time I get on or off 104 at Carter/Hudson, because there is always someone there with a sign in need of help. Usually my excuse is that the light is too short to get out any money, or I’m a couple lanes away. But recently I was right beside someone at a long light, with whom I actually made eye contact, who was holding a sign that said, “Homeless and losing hope. Please help.” And you know what I thought? “All I have is a 20.” And just for good measure, “He’d probably use it for drugs or alcohol anyway.” I hated myself for thinking that, but there it was, and

off I drove, leaving this hopeless man standing in the cold, because I needed to get to the Bible study I was leading.

            I’m no sheep. I’m a goat – a 5^th commandment-breaking goat. “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?” Then he will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to the least of these, you did not do it to me.” As I drove off onto 104 E, this verse echoed in my head. Irony of all ironies, the Bible study I was about to lead was on this very text.

            Would I have stopped and helped the man, or handed him my 20, if I had known it was Christ asking? Of course! But, if I knew it was Christ, I also would know that he wouldn’t take advantage of me, that the money would be well-used, that I wouldn’t simply be enabling him. At least that is what I tell myself. “Listen, Jesus,” we say. “Helping people these days is a tricky business – it is different from when you were here. It’s very complex.  You have to understand that.”

But is it true?

            A couple weeks ago, Nov 11, was the Feast Day of St. Martin of Tours (from whom St. Martin Lutheran Church gets its name). The story that made St. Martin famous happened when he was but a teenager, shortly before he was baptized. One day, as a member of the Roman army, he was

 

riding his horse and saw a freezing beggar. Martin impulsively took off his cloak, used his sword to cut it in half, and gave half to the freezing beggar, thus saving his life. That night, Martin dreamt that he saw Christ wearing the half-cloak, and telling the angels that it was Martin who gave it to him. “As you did to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it unto me.” The legend of St. Martin has become the quintessential expression of this parable.

            Was life really so different in Jesus’ time, or in St. Martin’s time, from how it is now? Martin could have overthought his generosity, too, but he didn’t – he simply gave. I wonder: are we using all our various excuses for why we don’t help to hide the fact that there are some people we just don’t really want to help, that there are some people in whom we would rather not see Christ’s face? But that’s not what Jesus says in this parable. He doesn’t say, “As you did unto the least of these who are members of my family AND also deserve help, you did it unto me.” No, he self-identifies with all those who are hungry, naked, poor, in prison, etc. Author Kathleen Norris puts it starkly: “We are to act as if Christ is in other people, even the stranger whom we believe we have reason to fear, the prisoner whose acts we find reprehensible, the sick we’d rather condemn because we’re convinced

that their lifestyle contributed to their illness, the hungry who should have been able to fend for themselves. If we cannot recognize Christ in these others, what we have, to paraphrase the prison guard in Cool Hand Luke, is a ‘failure to imaginate.’”

            Ah, a failure to imaginate. It begs the question – if you have not seen Christ in those around you who are in need, is it possible you have not really looked? Martha Beck tells a story about a time when she was a college student, on her way to work. She saw what she thought was a piece of quartz lying on the ground, but when she knelt down to pick it up, she found it was only a piece of Styrofoam. What she thought was a treasure was only a piece of trash. But then she got to thinking: what she had first viewed as beautiful had not changed a bit. Only her perception of it had changed. She wondered what would happen if she changed her perception on other things. That day as she worked her boring job ladling out food in the school cafeteria, she decided to put aside all her preconceptions and her tendency to classify people, and look at each person she served with different eyes. “Of course,” she wrote, “this is nearly impossible, but I did make an effort – for a few minutes. After that I had to stop, because I was so overcome by the beauty of every person in that dining hall that my eyes kept filling with tears.” “I think maybe,” she concluded, “that's why we screen out so much loveliness. If we saw people as they really are, the beauty would overwhelm us.” [from Expecting Adam]

            I ask you again: if you have not seen Christ in “the least of these” whom you encounter, is it
possible you haven’t really tried? Why haven’t you tried? When you do try, you will find that Christ, indeed, is there. Just as Christ appears to us in the most unexpected place of all – beaten and bloodied and hanging on a cross – he appears to us even in the most unexpected of neighbors. As we move next week into the Advent season, we will dwell once again on God’s powerful promise to be “Emmanuel” – God with us. Where and how will you see God with us in these coming weeks? Where and how will you be surprised by this presence? How will it change your perception of the world and those around you? How will you respond?

            Let us pray… Christ our neighbor, you have told us where to find you: in the faces and lives of those who suffer. Help us to put aside preconceptions and judgment and to truly search for you in the needs of others. It takes courage and resilience to seek this, Lord; please grant it, so that we will be equipped to better know you. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Processing pain and understanding incarnation

On October 30, dear friends of mine gave birth to a beautiful, full term little boy with no heartbeat. Gideon Lucas had been a perfect, healthy pregnancy until moments before the emergency C-section. They still don't know what suddenly went wrong.

I have been thinking and praying about this event and wanting to write a blog on this, but wanted to say something meaningful, and my heart was too broken and my thoughts too scattered to do that until now. (My friends, on the other hand, started their own blog with some wonderfully thoughtful and faithful insights on the event, in hopes of processing it themselves and helping others going through something similar. I commend it to you, here.)

The journey of my own processing of this tragedy starts the day before, when I was leading worship at the candidacy committee meeting. Gideon's mom, Becca, is on the candidacy committee, but wasn't there because she was, of course, expecting to give birth any moment. I led the committee in a reflection on the Beatitudes (you can read it here), and then invited them to write their own Beatitudes, which we then read aloud for the prayers. One of the ones that I offered was, "Blessed are those awaiting childbirth, for they shall know more deeply the love of God." I offered this with an excited smile, imagining my dear friend, having just endured one of the most exhausting and rewarding experiences a woman can have, being handed a squirming, screaming baby. I imagined tears of joy and grins from ear to ear, and I imagined Will and Becca's hearts cracking open, suddenly able to love in a way they never had before - as that of our God who gives his children life. Oh, what a gift!

As I read Will's tragic Facebook post on our layover on our way to Houston to visit my infant niece, my heart broke. I could not imagine anything worse. I cried all the way to Houston. I put myself in the place of everyone even remotely involved, and my heart broke again with each one. I finally settled on thinking about my parents, who lost a son at 24 weeks, just 14 months before I was born. I suddenly realized how remarkable it was that I was born at all - I couldn't imagine losing a baby this way and then getting pregnant again, especially so soon. I thought about how my mom said my grandma sang Children of the Heavenly Father at baby Michael's grave when they buried him, and about how often my parents sang this same beautiful hymn to my brother and me at bedtime, and I gave thanks for their courage and strength to be able to do this. I started to sing the hymn to myself on the airplane - the only prayer I could think to offer. "Neither life nor death shall ever From the Lord His children sever..."

And then I thought about those words I had offered the day before. "Blessed are those awaiting childbirth, for they shall know more deeply the love of God." I kicked myself for offering those words. How stupid and naively hopeful they now sounded in the face of tragedy. How angry they made me.

Until I thought about them some more. Until I realized they were just as true, just not as I had imagined them at the time. Will and Becca did more deeply understand the love of God - the love of a God who lost a son, who loved the world so much that in fact he gave his only son so that we would not perish but have eternal life. Could it be that my friends now understood more deeply the heart of a God who watched his son die? At once that made perfect sense, and only made me more angry. I thought about my professor's words, "Be careful with intercessory prayer, because you might just get what you pray for." God is always answering prayers in ways we didn't imagine or really even want.

As I sat a week later, waiting for Gideon's funeral to begin, I found myself feeling very frustrated. I wanted so badly to understand, to be there for my friends in a way that was more than a butt in a seat, more than a card, more than a gentle, post-C-section hug. I wanted them not to be alone in their pain, in their struggle, in their brokenness. And to my surprise, I thought, "If only I could lose a child too, so I could understand." Immediately I took it back. Of course I didn't want that. Of course no one would wish that on me. Of course I never want this to happen to us. But that is how much I wanted to understand.

I had, in my mind, called this a moment of irrational empathy. But when I explained it to my spiritual director, she said, "Sounds to me like the incarnation." And it suddenly became very clear: my Beatitudes prayer, all the broken hearts, a desire to understand that led to such an irrational thought as to want to experience the same pain... This is why JESUS. This feeling of wanting so much to understand the plight of my loved ones, of wanting it so much that I would desire to experience the pain myself - this is why God came to earth as a feeble, human baby, born to peasants, in danger from his very conception, wandering homeless with no place to lay his head, enduring ridicule and pain and flogging and finally death. It was indeed because God so loved the world that God wanted to experience the pain and brokenness of humanity himself.

Well, God, that is ridiculous. What a completely irrational idea.

And also, thank you for being here.

Sermon: Risking for Life (November 16, 2014)

Pentecost 23/Lectionary 32

Nov. 16, 2014

Matthew 25:14-30

            Question: How many of you would say you are risk-takers? Or, how many of you have ever taken a risk in your lives?

            I’ve been thinking a lot about that word, “risk,” this week. Personally, I don’t really fancy myself to be much of a risk-taker. I mean sure, I may be brave in response to a situation that requires it, but I don’t tend to put myself in dangerous situations willingly. Like most people, I like the safety of knowing what to expect.

            Yet today’s parable, the Parable of the Talents, has gotten me thinking a lot about risk.  The money the wealthy landowner entrusts to the servants is no small sum: just one talent is equivalent to about 15 years manual labor! Yet the landowner entrusts it to these slaves and goes on his merry way. Now, the first two servants both end up doubling the sum they have been given. You out there who are financially clever – how do you double your money so quickly? You invest it. Perhaps in a new business, or in the stock market or some such thing. And if you know anything about investments, you know that the investments with the greatest potential reward also require the greatest… what? Risk! So in order to have doubled their money, the first two servants must have been willing to risk this money that had been entrusted to them, and indeed the payback on their investment was great.

            But what of this third servant? His response to the extravagant gift from the landowner was completely risk-free: he buried it in a hole. And not surprisingly, there is zero return on his investment, because indeed he hasn’t invested anything into it. Surely he knew that would happen, so why would he have chosen to go that route?

            Well, because it seems like the safest approach! He says so himself: “Master, I knew that with you there is no room for mistakes. I didn’t want to lose any of your money. And so I figured if I just buried it in this hole, then it would be safe. I would know exactly where it is all the time, and it wouldn’t be at risk if the market crashed.” Does he expect to be applauded for his safe move? After all, safety is one of our highest values, so shouldn’t he have been rewarded for being so careful with what had been entrusted to him?

            But of course he isn’t rewarded. The landowner is unimpressed. In fact, he chooses not to trust the servant with anything anymore. The servant loses everything.

            Why wasn’t the servant willing to risk? What was his barrier? It is the same barrier that keeps all of us from risking: FEAR. “I was afraid,” he says, “and I buried your talent in the ground.” When I think of all the times in my life where I opted not to risk, it almost always comes back to fear. Fear of judgment, fear of failure, fear of change, and especially fear of loss – loss of security, loss of safety, loss of self-image, loss of reputation… But it is a catch-22: in refusing to risk those losses, how much do we end up losing out on somewhere else?

            James Cameron is the creator of the epic movies, Avatar and The Titanic, and he’s also a deep sea explorer. I heard a wonderful quote from him recently. “Whatever you’re doing, failure is an

option, but fear is not.” To me, this defines faith. Failure doesn’t keep us from taking the leap of faith, fear of failure does. Loss doesn’t keep us from risking, fear of loss does. But in this faith, even as we may experience failures in our earthly life, we also know and trust that the end of the story is never failure, it is never death. The end of the Christian story is always life, resurrection, new beginnings. Without failure, there cannot be a new beginning. But our God, who is our light and our life, turns failures and deaths into life and hope.

            That is why in our baptism, we hear those wonderful words, “Let your light so shine before others, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” It is a command and a promise. It is a command because God wants us to let the light that is inside us shine, because when we do that, we let others see God through us and our actions. And it is a promise because letting your light shine can be terribly scary and vulnerable and risky. You could be judged, or your reputation could be damaged, or you could get hurt. But the promise is that no matter how risky the world can be, God has your back. God will catch you if you risk… and fall. God’s love is stronger than judgment, stronger than hatred, stronger than bullies. And God’s promise is that your light will always win in the end, because your light comes ultimately from Christ, who is the victor over all evil.

            Boy, I wish I could have remembered that when I was in middle school. I know this is hard to

believe, but I was pretty dorky. I remember going to school dances was the worst, because I wasn’t a very good dancer. I stood, feet planted, swaying back and forth, trying to mimic the moves of the cooler people around me. [Demonstrate] In no way was dancing a way that I felt my light shining. Maybe that is why I so appreciate the music video for singer/songwriter Sara Bareilles’ 2013 single, “Brave.” You’ll see the text of her song is printed in your bulletin, but I encourage you to watch the video instead. The song reflects on how often we are willing to just turn over and let things happen because we don’t have the guts to stand up and say what we know is true. Her rousing chorus says again and again, “I wanna see you be brave!” In the music video, we see people of all shapes, sizes, and abilities dancing in public – letting their light shine… in a word, being brave. [start video]

            As I watch these people dancing, I start to realize, “My goodness, I don’t have to be good at something to let my light shine! I don’t have to be an expert to glorify God! I just have to do it with joy!” And it makes me want to dance and not to care. [start dancing and not caring.] Can you dance with me? However you are able, can you be brave? Can you let your light shine? I wanna see you be brave! [invite others to dance, too]

            [After song] Let us pray… God our light and our life, by the resurrection of your Son, you have made it possible for us not to fear failure, and to let your light shine brightly through us. Give us courage to live and to dance in your light, willing to try, willing to fail, willing to try again, in the knowledge that your grace will always catch us if we fall. In all we do, may it glorify you! In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.