Sermon: Have life and have it abundantly (Apr. 26, 2015)

Easter 4B

April 26, 2015

John 10:10b-18

         Alleluia! Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed!

Karl and our family at our wedding

         This week has not been an easy one for the Rehbaum family. Michael and I had both been sick for days, and just as we were starting to round a corner toward health, we got the call that Michael’s father, who has been battling cancer for five long years, passed away Saturday morning. By that evening we had packed up our sick selves and whatever clothes were closest in reach, and flown to Florida to be with family and to remember and give thanks for the life of Karl. As anyone who has lost a loved one knows, these times are draining and difficult, even as they are full of love and laughter and beauty as we remember together the life of someone loved so dearly.

         Perhaps this is the reason I was drawn this week not only to the words and images of Christ as the Good Shepherd – words in the 23^rd Psalm (which, of course, we sang at the funeral this week) as well as from John’s Gospel – but also the verse immediately preceding Jesus’ declaration of himself as the Good Shepherd. You probably noticed I added that to our reading today: “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” That verse actually closes the previous section of John’s Gospel, but I think it powerfully sets up the concept of Christ as the Good Shepherd. And it certainly spoke to me

this week, as I tried with Michael to process the deep grief that comes with losing a parent.

         You may wonder: how could I be so focused on abundant life when we have just watched someone we love continually decline from cancer? Perhaps it is because this is an image that repeatedly finds new meaning for me in the various situations I have encountered in life, and this week has been no exception. The question this week was: how is abundant life experienced in the midst of death? I can tell you a bit: It sounds like loved ones gathering and sharing stories, stories that have shaped who they are and their view of God and of the world. It feels like the only grandchild of the deceased, moving around in a belly and reminding us of new life, even in the midst of grief. It looks like a church full of people there to remember a dear friend. It smells like so much food, enjoyed amongst loved ones who have traveled great distances to be together. It tastes like bread and wine, shared with all the communion of saints from every time and place, all around the table of a God who promises and shows us again and again that He is a God who will lay down His life for his friends, in order that He might be there to take it up again for us, through us, and in us. Christ came that we may have life, and have it abundantly, in our most joyful times as well as the most difficult times of our lives. He came that we may have life, and have it abundantly.

         To me, this is God’s most powerful testament of love to us: to show us again and again what life looks like, even in the midst of grief and sadness. Such sad times can make us feel depleted and empty – not at all like the image of a cup running over that we get from today’s Psalm. We often feel like empty cups. We feel that life is anything but abundant, that all around us is scarcity. All around us is the need for more: more rest, more time, more power, more control. All we see is lack.

But abundance, the abundance that God promises us, is not like that. Abundance is a way of life that is ruled by gratitude and the recognition of the many gifts God provides for us, physically and spiritually. Abundance is the possibility of knowing plenty in the midst of want, of seeing and experiencing life in the midst of death. One of my favorite moments this week was when Michael and

I were driving home from some gathering or another, and Michael said, with amazement and a grateful sigh, “I am surrounded by so many good people.” That’s abundance, experienced and acknowledged in gratitude. Abundant life.

         For obvious reasons, I have been considering all of this in context of losing my father-in-law, but our ability or inability to see and know abundance extends beyond these major life events; it happens every day. Sometimes, recognizing abundance is easy, but there are so many things that keep us from noticing that abundant life God promises, that take our mind off of abundance and put it on scarcity, on need, on longing, on dissatisfaction. So my question for all of us today is: what is it that keeps us from having the abundant life that God intends for us?

         A few years back I watched a talk by Brené Brown, a researcher and storyteller, who studies shame and unworthiness, and this week I have been reading one of her books on the same topic. Though I know it seems a strange choice for this particular week, it was actually exactly what I needed. In the book she talks about how shame and unworthiness are feelings that keep us from living what she calls “Wholehearted” lives. Or to use Jesus’ language, they keep us from experiencing abundant life. Shame is the belief that not only do I not have enough, but that “I am not enough” – that whatever I am, whatever I have to offer, it is not enough. This in turn leads to a sense of unworthiness, a sense that because I am not enough, I am not worthy of love or goodness. What Brown discovered in her research on shame, though, and what ties so well into our Gospel reading today, is this key point: those who have a sense of love and belonging, who are able to get above the shame that holds us captive, actually believe that they are worthy of love and belonging. So those who believe that about themselves, who believe they are worthy of love and belonging, do not experience the potent disconnectedness of shame, but rather are able to live happier, more Wholehearted lives.

         Or, to use the words of Jesus, those who understand that they are worthy of love are able to have life and have it abundantly. And here we see the connection between these words and Jesus’ description of himself as the Good Shepherd. There are so many things that get in the way of us experiencing Wholehearted, abundant life: shame, yes, but also loss, infidelity, depression, illness, hunger, unkind words, violence, injustice. Any one of those things can cause us to doubt our worthiness, any one of those things can cause us to see ourselves as unworthy of love, even God’s love. And God knows that. And that is why God sent us Jesus, who laid down his life for us to show us that in the midst of all those struggles we face, and whether we feel worthy or not, God loves us. Four times in today’s Gospel lesson Jesus says that!

·                     The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep – so that they will know how much I love them, and have life abundantly.

·                     I lay down my life for the sheep – so that they will know that they are worthy of
love, and have life abundantly.

·                     I lay down my life in order to take it up again – so that my sheep will know that I will never leave them, that they are worthy of my continuous and unconditional love, and they will have life abundantly.

·                     No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord – so that they will know that my love is true, that I choose to love them this much, that they are worth this much love… and so that they will have life and have it abundantly.

         You see? We need not be made smaller and lesser by the shame the world piles on us, or that

we pile on ourselves. Because God loves us. We need not find ourselves trapped in the many worldly things that try to take away the ability to live life abundantly. Because God loves us. We need not let the world convince us that endings and death are stronger than beginnings and life. Because God loves us!

         What a comfort this is in times of grief and loss. Grief can carry with it all kinds of doubts and baggage and guilt and distress. It can so easily push us into an attitude of scarcity and not enough, even the belief that not only do we not have enough, but in fact that we aren’t enough. But friends, it isn’t true. We are enough. We are so enough that Christ has vowed to be our Good Shepherd, who lays down his very life for us so that we would know abundant life. We are so loved that, even though we don’t always behave in a way that is deserving of that love, God chooses to love us anyway, providing us with so many ways to experience abundant life. We are so enveloped in God’s grace, that nothing, nothing can keep us in the land of scarcity – abundant life will always win.

         Let us pray… God our Good Shepherd, you want so much for us to know your love that you will go to any length to show us your abundant life. Give us hearts to know your abundance, so that we will see it even where scarcity tries to win. Help us to believe that you came so that we would have life, and have it abundantly. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen

Eulogy for Karl Edwin Rehbaum

At my father-in-law's funeral this week, my dear, thoughtful, amazing husband offered a eulogy - his best effort to capture his dad in just a few words, and to honor him as a worthy send-off. I am honored to post his beautiful words about his father here on my blog.

Eulogy for Karl Edwin Rehbaum,

February 2, 1947 ~ April 18, 2015

Given by Michael Timothy Rehbaum, April 22, 2015

Welcome family and friends. 

I can be stubborn and thick headed at times. Due to this, a very common refrain about me in Sharon and Karl's household was, "Who raised this kid?!"

Well I can tell you who raised me to be the man I am today. Two amazing parents. One is sitting here today grieving and supporting me. The other of course is the reason that we're all here today. It is his life that I want to celebrate.

Karl Edwin Rehbaum is someone that is truly difficult to put into words. A perfect dichotomy of complexity and simplicity. Someone that you really had to get to know to even begin to understand, and even then part of him was an enigma. Someone that was always learning, growing and exploring. Someone that could be simultaneously a wise man and have childlike wonder.

Karl with his Nikon

Fortunately for me I got to know him in the way that only a child can know their parents. Add to that the fact that I am an only child. For only children relationships take on slightly different roles than they appear to in other families. For me that meant that Karl Rehbaum was my father, my big brother, one of my best friends and at times, my little brother. Somehow he managed to fill all of those roles in my life with effortless ease.

Passionate

My father was an incredibly creative and passionate man. He expressed this in many ways. Art took a prominent role in how he expressed his zest for life. Can anyone name his favorite art? Yup! Photography! I grew up with a camera in my face and in my hands in a time when not everyone took pictures of every moment of everyday. But my dad did. I think that I was 7 or 8 before I realized that my father had two eyes. As a child I could have sworn that he just had one large manual focus eye and had "Nikon" tattooed on his forehead! My father photographed his life and the life of those around him. His camera took him all over the country and all over the world. It's hard to separate the man from the camera.

Karl (right) on his Plymouth Barracuda

But he wasn't just passionate about photography. His passions were wide and varied. Stained glass, cars, trains, planes, travel, RV's. He loved machines that moved. A Corvette would come towards us and he'd say "ah...a 58 or 59". And then it would pass and he'd pick out some little detail from the tail lights and say "'59." I stopped double checking him. He was always right.

Loyal and forgiving

My father was an incredibly loyal and forgiving man. He loved his Nikon cameras. I don't think that he ever forgave me for buying Canon, although he did easily forgave me for my many, many other faults and mistakes. Detailing his forgiveness seems incredibly appropriate during Easter.

One of his and my favorite forgiveness stories came when I was 17 and living with him. Two of my friends and I had gotten into the habit of rolling other people's houses with toilet paper. We'd become rather masterful at it (I am my father's son after all). Our ultimate job was going to be rolling our high school Principal's house. But there was a problem, we didn't know exactly where she lived. So late one night we dressed in black and started walking around the houses we suspected to be hers. We ended up with a rather angry homeowner coming out of his house holding a .357 and telling us to sit on the curb until the cops came. We sat. The cops did come. And I was brought home to my father at 2 in the morning in the back of a police car. The officer explained things and my father had me walk in the house and sit on the couch. His first words to me were "where's my car?" We'd left it in a driveway on the other side of the city. "Crap

Michael and Karl at Genesee Country Museum
near Rochester, NY

Michael." So at 3 in the morning we went and got his car. The next morning he said, "I'm never going to have to worry about the cops bringing you home again, am I son?" He looked at me with his eyes, the ones that he only used when he needed to look through you, deep into your soul. I met his penetrating stare the best that I could and I said, "No sir." He forgave me for the incident. It became a treasured story that he would tell. "Remember that time Michael got brought home by the police?" I'd hang my head in shame and he'd chuckle.

Importance of work

For my father work was something that was incredibly important. There's a quote from the late 19th century that says, "Whatever you are, be a good one." He lived true to this in all of his jobs. His first love was the United States Navy. He was career Navy through and through. He loved the sea, his fellow sailors and the ships that carried them all to defend our nation. First and foremost he was a really great sailor. But it didn't matter if he was wearing his Navy uniform or he was managing the facilities of a church or school, driving a big truck or tour bus, being a journalist for WCTV, running his own photo studio or selling the latest and greatest Saturn car.

Karl being sworn in

He was great at what he was doing. He was proud to wear the uniform of whatever job he was undertaking. He was loyal to that institution or company. He lived true to the quote no matter what job he had. He did his best to "be a good one."

Loving

The final quality that I want to speak about is the one that I will always carry with me in my heart. My father was an incredibly loving man. He loved his god and had a deep faith in the good news of the resurrection. He loved that his soul was in God's hands. He truly loved his family. He loved his parents, his sister Mary Gayle and his brother Rick. He loved his nieces and nephews especially Roger and Catherine who he treated like they were his own children. He loved his wife of 19 years Sharon, who took meticulous daily care of him as he courageously fought cancer for five non-stop years. And he loved his step-children Robert and Ian and their kids. And he truly loved me.

Rose, Sister Mary Gayle, Karl,
Nephew Roger, Dad Bill, Michael, Wife Sharon

But his love was big enough to extend beyond just his beloved family. He loved Florida and was extremely proud to be a native son. Shoot he loved Florida so much that he seemed to feel that South Carolina would be too cold to live in. He also loved his pets. The Collies he had over his life and his dear cat Misty. He once told me that he'd saved Misty from a box, but that she'd saved him with how she loved him. He truly loved that cat and her dear, sweet soul.

Influence on me

My eulogy for my father would not be complete without telling you how his spirit will live on. My father passed on so much to those that he loved. He passed on so much to me.

When I list my passions and hobbies, all but one tie directly back to my father. I'm a photographer, a historian, a lover of aviation, I'm a leader, an artist, I love machines, and most importantly I love my family and friends.  I didn't end up following his footsteps into the military. But I did follow him into public service and being a leader. I am the man I am today because of my father. Because of all the good in his life and all of the good that he passed on to me.

This August, for the first time, I will get to walk down the road of fatherhood myself. I truly pray that I've learned enough from the lessons that he gave me about being a father. Sadly I won't have him to redirect me during this part of my journey. He won't be able to give me that stare to fix what I'm doing wrong. But I know that if I can be half the father that he was, my daughter Grace Victoria Rehbaum will turn out just fine.

Karl Edwin Rehbaum lived life to the fullest. And I'd like to end with a quote from Abraham Lincoln that I think sums up my father's life perfectly.

"In the end, it's not the years
in your life that count. It's the
life in your years."

Godspeed, Dad.

Karl and Michael, 1976

A reflection on death during the Easter season

I spent last week flat on the couch, miserable with the flu. (Michael spent two of those days in bed as well, trying to nip in the bud whatever was starting to plague him.) Just as I started to overcome that, I caught some stomach bug that kept me from eating anything. And just as my stomach started to settle and I could keep rice down...

we got the call that Michael's father, who had been fighting cancer for four years, had died peacefully at home.

Suddenly, sickness no longer mattered; a new priority took shape. The death wasn't unexpected, but

Karl Edwin Rehbaum

such news is always a shock on some level. On that beautiful, warm spring afternoon, Michael and I started making the necessary calls, even as we tried to process the news we had just received. I found a flight that left for Florida in just a few hours, so we packed up our sick selves and whatever clothing we saw first, and a friend drove us to the airport (and took our doggie to her house for the week - thank you!!).

Michael's step-mother lives here in Florida, but the rest of the Rehbaum family will start coming into town tomorrow, and it will be wonderful to be with them all and swap some stories and relish in our shared love for this dynamic, loving man. I am trying to figure out how to go through a death from the side of family, instead of the side of the church. How many funerals have I walked beside grieving families, and yet I have little clue how to be a wife in this scenario. Luckily, I have an emotionally aware and communicative husband who is usually able to tell me what he does (or does not!) need at any given moment, and I just try to read his cues. We've been doing okay, especially since we are both feeling in much better physical health after a good long sleep last night. (That's to say nothing of the night we arrived in Orlando, during which the fire alarm at the hotel went off, starting at 1am and continuing 2-3 hours, and we were allowed in our rooms to try to sleep through it. Not quite the restful and peaceful night I had prayed aloud for us before we fell asleep!)

Even as I am trying to be the wife/daughter-in-law here, however, I am ever the pastor, and so not surprisingly this experience made it into the newsletter article I just wrote. I share it below, in case you are interested.

Many of you have been praying for us during this time, We are grateful for that. Keep it up! The funeral is Wednesday, and we have every hope of it being a meaningful opportunity for worship and a celebration worthy of a man with a great zest, love, and determination for life. Thanks be to God!

*       *        *

            “Peace be with you,” in the name of the Risen Christ.

            As I write this article, I am in Florida, having just learned of my father-in-law’s death following a long and courageous fight against cancer. We as a congregation have been praying for Karl for quite a while, and many of you were aware of his declining health. Though his death was not a shock to us, we didn’t expect it to be quite so soon; we thought we had at least a few more weeks if not months. Whatever the case, it is difficult ever to be fully prepared for the death of a loved one.

            Experiencing a death during the Easter season has always made this season so much more real and important to me. Easter, you see, if not just one day, but a full “week of Sundays,” a season seven weeks long. During that seven weeks, we continue to reflect on the Risen Christ and what this means for us and for our faith. It certainly brings a sense of hope to what can otherwise be a devastating time of loss. As one person quoted on my Facebook status announcing the death, “We do not grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13). Because the whole point of the resurrection is to show us that death is not the final victor, it is not the end. It is the beginning of a new life, basking in the light and love of our glorious God. Whatever we may imagine “heaven” to be like, we can be certain of this: that death means the beginning of an eternity being in the glow of God’s love, where cancer doesn’t hurt, where brokenness doesn’t prevail, where fear has no say.

            I am reminded of this when I feel (or even see!) Karl’s granddaughter moving inside me – an active new life in the midst of grief! We can experience this when we share stories and love and compassion with family and friends who share our love for Karl. We can know the magnitude of God’s love and promise when we gather around Christ’s table and hear once again those words that Christ was given “for us,” knowing that when we gather, it is with all the communion of saints – those still with us on earth and those who have gone before us. We can remember it every time we hear those oft-uttered words of the risen Christ: “Peace be with you.” The peace he offers to us these difficult days is the peace that comes from knowing the promise of the resurrection! What a gracious God to have given us so many ways to know life, even in the midst of death and sadness.

            Even as we cling to this hope, this peace, Michael and I have been extremely grateful for your prayers and support during this whirlwind. We have been so blessed by you in our lives, over and over again. Thank you for being such beautiful witnesses to Christ’s love and grace in our lives.

                                                                                    In peace and hope,

                                                                                    Pastor Johanna