The Call of Ananias

On Sunday, we hear the story from John 21 of Jesus and Peter on the beach.  Jesus asks Peter three times, "Do you love me?" and three times Peter answers, "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you."  Then Jesus calls him, "Feed my sheep."  We also hear about how Saul became the apostle Paul, on the road to Damascus.  Here he was, on the way to persecute the followers of The Way, and out of the blue, Jesus speaks to him, too:  "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?"  There he is struck blind, and when he sees again, he has a new calling as a follower of Jesus and a missionary to the Gentiles.

On one Sunday, we hear stories of two of the main characters from the New Testament.

But I can't help being drawn to Ananias.

Who is Ananias?  In all of the drama of the story of Saul, we might not notice another drama taking place on the sidelines.  It is the drama of God, telling Ananias to go and heal Saul.

It is clear that Saul is the main character in this drama.  God even says that to Ananias.  "Go, for he is my chosen instrument," God says.  We are supposed to focus our attention on Saul.  We are supposed to consider his turn-around life, his passion, his calling.

But I can't help being drawn to Ananias, instead.

Perhaps it is because, in my extremely brief theatre career, I mostly played small parts.  I was the 2nd maiden from the left, a member of the crowd.  Sometimes I had one glorious line.  Once, in a church production of Camelot, I got to sing a wonderful solo as Nimue, the enchantress who lures Merlin away near the beginning of the play.  Unfortunately, my part was heard but completely unseen, from behind a curtain.

I am good at playing the small parts.

Or maybe it's because I tend to look around the edges of things, at the margins, even outside the margins sometimes.  Maybe it is because I am just a little bit subversive, deep down inside.  I am always wondering about the people who get left out, whose stories are not told, whose names we don't know.  I can't help being suspicious of what seems important.  We know so much about Paul, and his adventures, and his churches, and his letters.

And then there is Ananias.  He just gets this short scene in one chapter of the books of Acts.  God tells him to go to Saul, and heal him.  God is sending Ananias into the lion's den, right into the jaws of the man who has vowed to eradicate the followers of Jesus from the earth.  Ananias understandably has a word of protest.  He has this brief, "Wait a minute...." moment, where he questions God's wisdom.

And then he goes, and he heals Saul.

It's a small part.  It's off on the margins, something you notice out of the corner of your eye.  Or maybe Saul is so loud and passionate and such a force for the church that you don't notice Ananias at all.

I can't help thinking, though, that a lot of God's work in the world is like this.

I once did a project where I asked people to send me their faith stories, which I would publish in a booklet and distribute to the congregation.  So many people told me, "I don't have a faith story."  But then we got to talking and it turned out that they did.  It may have been the story of their prayers during their child's illness, or how God guided them from work in one city to another.  It may have been a story from their courtship and marriage, something they learned from their great-uncle or taught their niece.  But they were small stories, not big ones.  

Still, when I think of the scene back in Damascus, when I imagine the hands of Ananias, I can't help imagine that they are really the hands of Jesus, in a cameo role.

A lot of God's work in the world is like this.  It looks like a cameo role.  But it is really the main thing.

Ministry of Reconciliation

It is probably in my top five favorite scripture passages in the whole Bible.  We are reading it this Sunday, the fourth Sunday in Lent.  It comes up every three years.  It is from 2nd Corinthians.

"So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!"

It is the middle of Lent, but this verse makes me feel like it is Easter:  the eighth day of creation.  It is the middle of Lent, but I want to go to the tomb and mistake Jesus for the gardener, planting seeds of the new creation.

It is probably in my top five favorite scripture passages in the whole Bible, but I'm not preaching on 2nd Corinthians this Sunday.  Instead, I'm preaching on Luke.  The prodigal son.  Again.

You would think I would run out of things to say about the Prodigal Son, or his older brother, or his father.  You would think that I would be chafing at the bit to preach on one of my top five favorite scripture passages in the Bible instead.

But the story gets me every time.

Every time I read I see a new detail that I never saw before.  (The older brother mentioned prostitutes in his speech to his father.  Who said anything about prostitutes?)  (Why does the story say the younger son 'came to himself' instead of 'repented'?  Is it possible that the younger son didn't repent after all?)  (What about that father?  Is he loving, or is he just a soft touch for his younger son?)

For some reason, tonight I can't help reading this story in the light of one of my top five favorite Bible passages.  It's the next verse, right after the one that I quoted, "All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself in Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation."

The Ministry of Reconciliation.

So right now, when I think of this story from Luke, this story about a family, I'm not thinking about a particular verse, or a particular detail, or even a particular character in the story.  But I'm thinking about a scene.  The younger son is inside, at the feast.  The older son is outside, with the father.  You can hear the music in the background as the father pleads with his son, whom he loves.   Then I think of the scene earlier, when the father runs to the younger son, who may or may not really be repentant, who might be home for a few weeks and then take the money and run again.  Or, he might truly be transformed by the father's love.  It could go either way.

The Ministry of Reconciliation.

I love this passage from 2nd Corinthians, where Paul tells us that God has given us the ministry of reconciliation.

And then I read the parable of the prodigal son, and I realize how messy and risky reconciliation is.  Many things could go wrong.  You could get hurt, taken advantage of.  You could be disrespected, rejected.  You're not in it for the prestige, or because the pay is good.

So I am haunted by the end of the parable of the prodigal son, because it ends with estrangement, not reconciliation, with one son outside, and the other son inside.  They do not know yet that they are brothers.

Who will tell them?  Who will tell us?

It is messy work, and risky, but God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, all of us:  the winners and the losers, the repentant and unrepentant, the refugees and the homeless and the rich and the successful, the workaholics and the con artists.

Who will tell them?  Who will tell us?

Cut Off

It was unusual to have visitors in my little churches in South Dakota, unless they were visiting and related to someone else in the church.  This was not because the church was so unwelcoming; there were just about sixty-three souls in the town (give or take a few), and most of them were already members of my parish.

So that April morning in 1997 I couldn't help but notice the new couple, sitting on the aisle, near the back.

"We'll be back," they told me as they shook my hand at the end of worship.  "We're refugees from Grand Forks."

Refugees.  That's the word they used.  And I knew what they meant.  There was water everywhere that spring, and not just in that good, life-giving way we think about.  It had been a terrible winter, and now there were roads under water, and detours around the roads under water, and some places where you could not go.  But it was worse in Grand Forks and in East Grand Forks.

This couple had left their home and left their church.  They were staying with relatives in a small town nearby.  They were told to go.  They were not sure how long they would have to stay.  They were not sure when they would be told they could go back.  There were not sure what would be there when they returned.

They were refugees.  That's what they called themselves.  They were cut off from their home and their church.

They didn't know anyone at my congregation.  But, for about a month, they worshipped with us.  One evening they made an appointment and came by the church office, just to talk, and to pray.

I remembered then that the community of John's gospel included Jewish believers who had, at some point, been told that their confession of Jesus as Messiah made them unwelcome in their synagogues.  They were cut off from the community that had sustained them and given their lives meaning and were struggling to know who they were now apart from that identity.

Cut off.

"Abide in me," Jesus says to his disciples in John 15, "as a branch abides in the vine.  Apart from me you can do nothing."  It makes sense, but it also seems harsh, thinking about those dead branches, cut off.

I thought of all of the places we call "home" -- the farms of South Dakota where my farmers earned their livelihoods and made their lives, the city where my Swedish grandparents moved and learned a new language and raised their children, the congregation that has called me to be their pastor.  They are all places.  We can be cut off from every single one of them.

But when you are cut off, when you are a refugee, when you are told you are not welcome, when you are kicked out, Jesus says, "I am the vine.  Life is in me.  You can bear fruit anywhere."

That's what he says.

Eucharistic Prayer for Pentecost 5 Year A

Gracious and Holy God,

Creator of farms and seeds and soil,

You have given us so many things:

Sun and rain, flower and fruit,

All green and growing things,

All animals leaping or swimming,

Crawling or flying.

Let all who have eyes, see

The abundance of your love.

You came among us, in the hands and the eyes

And the feet and the words

Of our friend and savior Jesus,

Who healed the sick

And forgave sinners,

Who welcomed children

And who spoke to us in parables.

Let all who have ears, listen

And hear the story of your love.

We give thanks to you,

For the scattered words,

For the scattered seeds

Of Jesus’ love for us

Poured out for us

And for this whole creation.

Send now your Holy Spirit to us

As we share this meal. 

As we share your life.

Prepare our hearts to receive you.

Open our Hearts to share your extravagance, your life,

Your love.

Amen.  Come Lord Jesus.

(to Words of Institution)

Uncommon Conversation

I remember not too long ago listening with interest to a radio program about -- of all things -- plane crashes.  What fascinated me most about the program was that the studies were dealing with crashes caused (at least in part) by pilot error, and how communication patterns between the pilot and copilot might have contributed to the crash.  Sometimes, the pilot found, the copilot found it difficult to speak directly to the pilot when he found a problem or an error that he had to speak up about.  He either didn't speak about it at all, or spoke in an oblique, roundabout way, trying not to offend the pilot.   Even in a situation of an emergency, sometimes it seemed like it was impossible for the subordinate to speak up.

That was fascinating to me. 

It sometimes seems impossible for the subordinate to speak up. 

I thought of this when I read the story of Naaman from 2 Kings again.  Naaman is a great general but he has a problem -- he has leprosy.  Though he is not an Israelite, the prophet Elisha is called to come to him, so that he can be healed.  The problem is, Naaman is not wild about Elisha's directions:  go wash in the river Jordan.  "Aren't there many fine (actually, better) rivers in my own country?  Get real!" 

We often focus on Naaman, the general who finally sucked it up and went and washed in the river Jordan.  It didn't make sense, but he did it, and he was healed.  But lately, when I've read this story, I've noticed someone else:  Naaman's servants.

Do you know what they did?

They spoke up.

Sometimes it seems impossible for a subordinate to speak up.

You have to wonder about a servant who dares to talk back to his Master.  "Come on, what's the problem?  This isn't so hard.  You just don't want to do it!  What's your problem with the river Jordan, anyway?"  You might even call it an "uncommon conversation", when a servant talks back to his master.

But this was a serious matter, a matter of life and death.  Naaman had leprosy. 

You have to wonder about a servant who dares to talk back to his Master.

Maybe they knew it was a matter of life and death, and that somehow, Naaman's fate and their own was linked.  You have to wonder.  Because, sometimes it seems impossible for a subordinate to speak up.  It's an "uncommon conversation."   Maybe they think, "What do I know?  The experts have it all figured out."  or maybe they think, "No one will listen to me anyway."  Or maybe they think, "It won't make any difference anyway.  People go wash in the river Jordan all the time, and no one is ever healed.  It's just a dirty little river."

In our faith community, we're having some uncommon conversations this fall.  They are conversations about the future of our state and the future of our communities, and even (dare I say) the future of our faith community.  And they are also conversations about race, and about the racial disparities in our state, and I think that they are a matter of life and death.  Our futures are linked, and our hopes are linked.

But we need to speak up, to believe that we can make a difference.  We need to speak up, and we also need to listen:  and to go down to the river Jordan, where God can heal us, where God will give us courage, where God is waiting, waiting for us, to raise us from the dead.