The parable of the talents is probably the most abused and misused piece of scripture in the entire Bible. It is probably on the top ten list for many preachers because they will first of all allow you to hear the word “talent” as is commonly understood; one’s special abilities. In fact the word talent here is a quantity of silver equal to a vast amount of wealth. Some scholars have said a talent would be close to 6 million dollars today. Other sources determined that one talent was equivalent to twenty years of pay for an average worker at that time.

Secondly, this parable is abused by many preachers because they put God in the role of the wealthy landowner and exhort the congregation to invest the things God has given you and you will not only see your investments grow, God will reward you for it. This corruption is often referred to as the “prosperity Gospel.” Let’s take a closer look to see why this is such a corruption.

If we put God in the role of the landowner, then you have God telling the third slave he should have invested the money with the bankers. This practice of investing money with interest is actually forbidden in the Bible, so here you would have Jesus telling a parable where God in the story is telling people to violate Jewish law. Not likely.

Finally, when the landowner berates the third slave, he says “You know I reap where I did not sow and I gather where I did not scatter.” Part of the promise of the “promised land” was that every tribe of Israel received an allotment of land forever. This reference of reaping and gathering implies taking profit on land that does not belong to the landowner. In other words, on land that was stolen.

Why would Jesus tell a story that put God in the role of violating Jewish law AND one of the Ten Commandments? Notice that Jesus does NOT introduce this parable with “The kingdom of heaven is like …” He begins this story with “It is as if a man going on a journey…”

What if the “it” in this story simply refers to the way the world works? The landowner would be a Donald Trump kind of figure. His two top lieutenants would stop at nothing to deliver a good profit, including taking more land from the peasants. The practice of burying money may seem odd to modern people but it was quite common in Jesus’ day.

Jesus was simply saying that the way the world works is that people will break the law and even break the Ten Commandments in order to get ahead. And if you don’t play along with them in their pursuit of wealth, you will be punished. Jesus was telling this to his disciples to let them know that while they are waiting for Jesus’ return, the world out there is nasty and brutish.

Where is the Good News in all this? This story is not about a God that throws us into outer darkness; it’s about living fully and faith-fully. You can choose a life of taking from others, following the siren call of this world. Or you can choose a life of faithful giving to others. It’s not always the easy way, but it’s the best way.

Somehow it doesn’t seem like Advent to me. We haven’t even finished our turkey sandwiches. I cannot deal with the bell ringers at the stores, the Christmas music on the radio, and the relentless march of Christmas lights on every house in town (including ours). I’m not ready for Advent. let alone Christmas. I just want to shout, “Enough already”, but then nobody wants a Grinch to steal Advent.

I had prepared a sermon focusing on our Gospel, Mark 13:24-37. But the words of the earlier verses kept running through my head all weekend: the words about the “desolating sacrilege.” One of the problems with our lectionary and sermons based on the lectionary is that it is way too timid. For example we pick up today’s reading in the middle of the action. Jesus says. “… but in those days, after that suffering …” Doesn’t that make you want to know what days, what suffering?

If you base your sermon on today’s text alone, you will either get a nice Advent sermon about God’s love and waiting expectantly OR you will get a sermon that sounds a lot like those awful “Left Behind” books. In either case we completely miss what Jesus is trying to tell us. If you were hearing this entire chapter from verse 1 to 37, you would note the parenthetical command “let the reader understand” right after Jesus talks about the desolating sacrilege.

Mark is telling us in giant red letters, “This is significant. It is in code. Have you figured it out?” The exact phrase “desolating sacrilege” that Jesus uses is also found in the book of Daniel and in 1 Maccabees. referring to a time when the Roman Emperor Antiochus IV Epiphanes set up an altar to Zeus in the Jerusalem Temple and sacrificed pigs on that altar. Not only were Jews at that time outraged by the action of the occupying Romans, two hundred years later in Jesus’ day they were still outraged by it. And the hated Romans were still there two centuries later. Now do you understand? These words of Jesus are radical, subversive words.

If the explicit connection between the words of Jesus and the events described in Daniel were not enough, you also have to understand that Mark’s gospel was written about thirty years after Jesus’ death and resurrection during a time of Jewish revolt and Roman destruction of the temple. This passage in Mark occurs right before the crucifixion and resurrection, so we could look at another layer of meaning where Jesus effectively says, “Don’t look for God in the Temple anymore. Don’t look for God in the big cities or centers of power. Look to the cross.”

The cross, an instrument of Roman execution, becomes a subversive statement about the power of God over the powerful government. For another three centuries, you could be executed for making a sign of the cross. Early Christians disguised it using an anchor as a kind of cross.

As with so many symbols, over time they become used and worn and lose the power of their original meaning. They say there is no Easter without Good Friday, but I say there is no Advent without the cross. Have we bit by bit undermined the real power of the cross? Have we diluted it so much that we print it on Tee shirts, tattoo it on our bodies, make it into jewelry, and use it to ward off vampires? Talk about a desolating sacrilege!

Many of us go to church but we hedge our bets. We pin our hopes on a variety of things that we think or we believe will save us. I’ve got news for you. The power of the government will not save you. Doctors and hospitals will not save you. Changes in tax policy and paying down the debt will not save us. The military will not save us either. The only thing that will save us is the real power of the real cross in your life.

God who set the planets in motion and fashioned you in your mother’s womb chose to become human like any of us. That same God willingly submitted to a painful, brutal execution on trumped up charges because there was a greater plan. That same God would defeat the powers of death itself and live among us again. That same God has plans for you. Plans to give you hope and a future. A future that goes beyond death itself.

Where are you going to look for god this Advent?

What kind of salvation do you really hope to find?

Bill and John were co-pastors of a mega-church in downtown Baltimore. Years earlier the building had been part of venerable Episcopal congregation, but a succession of rectors there lived off the endowment until it ran dry and the bishop was forced to close the church and sell the property. Bill and John had just graduated from seminary, and they saw an opportunity.

They purchased a beautiful 200 year old sanctuary that seated 800 people, along with classrooms and just about everything they needed except for parking. The purchase price was pennies on the dollar of the real value of the property. The bishop could not see any kind of proper church growing in that crime-infested corner of the city, so the new church bought the entire property for $20,000.

It took a few years and they had to buy buses to bring people in from the parking lots outside the center city. Now the old sanctuary was packed for several services every Sunday. A large video display was tastefully inserted in front of a statue of Mary. Another video display dropped down in front of the chapel entrance on the opposite side of the nave. The chancel was rearranged so the choir and praise music band faced the congregation behind the pastors.

Sunday after Sunday the message beamed out of those displays. “God loves you and will bless you with all kinds of riches if you will just turn your life over to Jesus.” Powerful, emotional testimonies from talking heads on the video displays reinforced the message. People streamed down the aisles for altar calls. The scripture used was a select cut from the Bible, all designed to emphasize individual salvation by grace alone. Yes, grace is an unmerited gift, but somehow Bill and John taught their flock that they had earned their seat on the last train to heaven.

Money poured into this church and it became a powerful political machine in the city. Bill and John wrote books about church growth and attended prayer breakfasts with the rich and powerful.

One day they read from Matthew 21. Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.” Bill and John launched into a discussion about the former owners of the building, and how some churches have strayed from the “true mission” of God. They implied that the Episcopal diocese deserved to fail in that location because it was God’s plan. They portrayed themselves proudly as the new tenants who would give God a tremendous produce of all these people at harvest time.

Down the street in an area the police called “the shooting gallery”, named after all the heroin users there, Joe gathered his flock into an abandoned shoe store. There was no sign on the windows except for the neatly lettered sign of its former days as a shoe store. The front door hung wide open. People shuffled into Joe’s church stooped over at the shoulders as if they were carrying heavy bags. Some of the baggage they carried was physical, from a life on the streets. Some of it was mental, from a life of alcohol and drugs. Some of it was spiritual, in the form of cut off from God – no hope, no human connections, no future.

Joe didn’t have a lot of training, but he loved his people. He didn’t try to change them. He told them about God’s love for the poor. He didn’t paint rosy pictures of how God would bless them because he knew better, and the Bible didn’t really say that if you read the whole thing. Joe just tried to live like Jesus: simply, with gratitude, and a hopeful outlook for all God’s creation.

That same Sunday Joe’s church also read from Matthew 21. Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.”

Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the scriptures: `The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes’?

Joe talked about his own experiences of rejection. Members of his congregation talked about how the rich were buying up buildings and converting them at great profit much like the greedy tenants in the story. At the same time the only grocery store for miles around and the health clinic were both closing. Joe listened while each member told their story of loss and rejection. A woman in the group looked up and said, “This gathering is all I have. We’re family. I love our meals together. We take care of each other.” Everyone nodded in agreement.

They say that every preacher preaches the same sermon every Sunday. Joe’s sermon was always about God’s love. He entered the discussion and said “God sent his only son to be tortured and die. It was God’s way of telling us, ‘No matter what you do, God will forgive you and love you.’ God’s love for us is crazy. It makes no sense. But when you are at the end of the line no matter whether you are rich or poor, that crazy love is all you’ve got.” People responded with “yea” and “amen.”

A shiny new bus rumbled down the street headed for the mega-church. An old man straightened up and asked if anyone knew how to take a city bus to the suburban clinic. His arthritis had become unbearable.

[pause]

Now I must tell you that some people have asked me to talk more about what these scriptures will do for each one of us in our everyday life. I tend to shy away from this kind of preaching for several reasons: Ever since I responded to a call to ordained ministry, life has actually been more difficult in many ways. It would be a complete lie for me to tell you that once you decide to follow Jesus, everything will be rosy. That has not been my experience. But at the same time I would not trade these years for all the money in the world. They have been the most difficult years AND they have been the best years. Our time so far in Muskogee has been very positive.

Secondly most of the teachings of Jesus are addressed to the plural form of you, not to the individual. Even today’s lesson where he says, “Have you never read in the scripture …?” his question is posed to a crowd. So the idea of focusing sermons on the notion of personal benefits or individual salvation is quite a stretch.

When we try to follow Jesus as a community, when we try to spread the love of Jesus to others, and when we make a difference in the lives of other people – then we are producing the fruits of the kingdom. That’s all Jesus wants us to do

While in seminary in 1997 I attended the General Convention of the Episcopal Church which was held in Philadelphia that summer. I have never been big on conventions and huge gatherings, partly because my hearing makes it such a challenge, but this event was nearby and worth attending. The governing body of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States of America (that’s our official name) is the second largest governing body in the world, even among world governments. We are second only to India.

The Eucharist for the entire convention of 12,000 people was a grand spectacle to observe and participate in. It was held in the basketball stadium for the Philadelphia Eagles. It was a Eucharist in the round with the altar and presiding bishop in the center of the court. I sat on the second row very close to the front near the aisle. When the elements were brought forward, I estimated that nearly fifty gallons of wine were brought to the altar. But the most interesting and amusing part was the offertory.

Each row (and there were at least 250 rows) seated about 50 people. At the offertory an usher appeared at the first row in front of us and sent a basket down to the other end. An usher at the far end simply turned the basket around by handing it to the row behind. By the time the basket made one trip down and back traversing a hundred people, it was brimming with cash. No, it was overflowing with bills falling out of the pile in a rather undignified way.

The usher with the overflowing basket of cash was within reach of me. I handed him the basket and smiled knowing that what followed would likely be amusing. Panicked he looked back up the aisle at the head usher for the section standing about 50 yards away. They made frantic sign language at each other. Finally, the usher near me squished all the cash he could into the basket with one hand and walked briskly up the aisle while trying to contain the bills from falling out. I turned my head to look up the aisle and see what happened next.

The section head usher ran away and came back shortly with a very large dark green garbage bag in his hands. They dumped the cash from the basket into the garbage bag and my usher walked briskly back down 50 yards to start the basket down the next row. At this point things got even more amusing. Each pair of rows generated the same amount of cash and the same brimming basket was walked briskly up the aisle to be dumped unceremoniously into the garbage bag. I imagined that later in the day the janitors would find piles of garbage out in the halls of the stadium and wonder where their garbage bags went.

But isn’t that just classic Episcopal Church planning? We are so focused on making our liturgies “decent and in good order” that we fail to account for the bounty of God’s Grace. We fail to imagine that 100 people would over-fill the kind of wicker basket that any of us might have at home. We fail to think about the next step that given all this cash, what do we do with it? Our problem in the national church AND here at Grace Church is not whether we have enough cash for this or that project or for next year’s budget. Our challenge is now and always has been a lack of faith just like that day in 1997. Our baskets and our expectations are simply too small for God’s gracious bounty.

I began to look at today’s Gospel in the same way. The king is about to throw a wedding banquet. Now that word, “banquet” just doesn’t begin to describe what Jesus means here. If you imagine the recent royal wedding between Kate Middleton and what’s his name? It was a wedding feast of epic proportions. God, the king in this story, has thrown out the rich and powerful. Into this feast we are all invited, the middle class, the students, the poor, the retired, those with health problems, those with financial worries, ALL of us are brought into the grand wedding hall. Most of us feel honored and even humbled to be in such a grand place.

Now instead of focusing on the jerk wearing baggy cargo shorts that fail to cover parts of his backside, I want to stop us right here at the wedding feast. Our Eucharist every Sunday and our community gatherings are supposed to be JUST LIKE THAT. Do you feel awed to be here today? Do you feel a bit humbled in the presence of the Almighty? Do you feel honored to be invited? After the service are you eager to tell your friends about the incredible party you attended on Sunday? These should be our goals for every Sunday celebration.

Yes, it is my responsibility to structure Sunday worship so it meets these goals. But I now think these goals have been so watered down by church tradition and “the way we always did it”, that we have lost the sense of the epic banquet thrown by the king.

These are open questions for us. What would happen if we could really throw an awesome party every week in honor of what God has done for us? What would happen if people were caught up in our party like folks on the streets of New Orleans at Mardi Gras? Would your faith grow stronger if you saw all kinds of people streaming forward to receive the precious body and blood of our Lord? Would a tear form in the corner of your eye when you realized you just caught a glimpse of heaven?

I only have a few conclusions to share: Our baskets and our expectations of each other are WAY TOO SMALL. In the same way, our parties on Sunday are WAY TOO LAME. Thirdly, we must do something radically different. We must throw parties on Sunday that become the talk of the town in a positive way. People will come to our parties at Grace because Jesus is truly present.

I invite you to help us throw parties on Sunday fit for a king because it is the king and his son that we celebrate. I welcome new ideas, volunteers, iconoclasts, and rule breakers. I welcome those who cherish tradition too. If we make our celebrations fit for the king and raise our expectations of one another, I guarantee you your faith will grow. The church will grow. All because your hearts will be open to what God is doing with us right now.

I have always had difficulty with the idea of salvation. The word itself comes from a Latin root meaning “to be made whole.” From before seminary to the present day, I wonder, “How are we saved?”, “What must we do to be saved?”, “What happens when we are saved?”, and “Does this kind of salvation really matter?” If you want to dive into some of these questions, then join me for Sunday adult forum starting on the 18th when we read the book Going to Hell, Getting Saved, and What Jesus Actually Said About It.”

Here in the buckle of the Bible belt, we know there are huge churches placing great emphasis on the concept of salvation. One person told me years ago that in order to be saved, I had to stand in front of the congregation on a Sunday and tell them that Jesus was my personal Lord and Savior. When I heard that, I began to look on that formula for salvation: kind of like eating a Twinkie – overly sweet on the outside, gooey on the inside, and not very satisfying in the long run.

September is “Hunger Action Month.” Recently Nathan Adair, an MBA student at a university in London, decided to experience for himself what 1 billion people around the globe do every day. They live on food costing one dollar a day or less. Mr. Adair decided to eat for an entire month on what could be purchased for $30. In the middle of his experiment he noted, “When you are really hungry, one raisin is like eating an ice cream sundae. Twenty-five-cent canned vegetable soup tastes like it came from a five-star restaurant.”

In the other direction from here, San Francisco chef Karl Wilder was challenged by the manager of a local food bank to “Take the food stamp challenge”, and live on food provided only by the amount of money food stamp recipients receive, or $4.32 a day in California. This diet is luxurious in comparison to the dollar a day food ration a billion people receive around the globe. As a professional chef, Wilder carefully managed his food stamp budget diet so that he ate healthy, nutritional meals. He ended up taking the challenge for nearly two months.

At 5’ 4” with a 29” waist, Wilder lost seven pounds during the two month challenge in spite of managing his calorie and nutritional intake carefully. Can you imagine what people who do not have graduate training in nutrition do on $4.32 a day? What they do is to purchase inexpensive non-nutritious junk food that is high in calories and sodium. The three hundred pound ten year olds you see walking around town are living on food stamp budgets or even less.

Now we can talk about politics and government programs all day long, but we are in a Christian church and we need to shift the conversation to “What does our faith have to do with hunger locally and internationally?” and “What are we called to do about it here and now?”

In his letter to the Romans, Paul says, “Love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbor.” So the basic question boils down to this: right here in Muskogee, Oklahoma, where many of us have more than enough to eat, is it right to allow others to starve or not have enough to eat? Love does no wrong to a neighbor. If we say that it is right to allow other residents of this town to starve or live in what is called “food insecure” conditions, then we do not love our neighbor. The Grace Episcopal Tee shirts we wore last week proclaimed to the community that we “love our neighbors as ourselves.” Can we walk the talk?

As long as we are not working towards a solution at least to local hunger, are we really loving our neighbor as ourselves? As a first step we need to look outside the bubbles we live in.

Reflecting on his dollar a day diet, the London MBA student said, “I hope people choose to look outside their bubbles and realize that this very moment, kids are digging through trash looking for food, that children are being sold into slavery and prostitution this very minute, that widows are being spit on in the street because they are seen as worthless.” He continued, “I want them to realize that the Western way of life is luxurious compared to most. I have been very blessed in this life, and I want to give back as much as possible. We can’t take anything with us.”

You may be thinking this is a sermon about food, hunger, and feeding people, but it is not. This is a sermon about the love that flows from our baptismal promise. In that promise we agreed to “respect the freedom and dignity of every human being.” In effect we promise to love others as we love ourselves. As Paul says, we “work out our own salvation with fear and trembling.”

Jesus posed our response to his gospel in black and white terms. “He that is not against us is for us.” Either we are moving towards a solution on hunger or we are not. Either we are living the Good News of Jesus Christ by loving our neighbor OR we are just taking up space.

Yes, Grace Episcopal Church has two very good meals programs and we should continue and expand those programs. But take a trip with me to and dream much bigger than where we are today. Dream about feeding not hundreds, but thousands in this county. Dream about empowering others with skills, knowledge, and hope. The first two steps on this journey are the things we need to carry us through to the end: compassion and gratitude. These are the underpinnings of real Christian love.

Suppose for a minute that we could leverage our own Grace Church financial contributions by obtaining grants. All we need is a grant writer. We could develop a community garden across the street. We could develop much more permanent cooking and food distribution facilities. We could partner with other churches and local resources to build programs that not only feed people but help them understand good nutrition and change lives as a result.

Suppose for a minute that we could engage a wider segment of the community in helping us. In a sense we would be living out the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000 – every week. Isn’t this what the Gospel compels us to do? Isn’t this loving our neighbor as ourselves?

Suppose we leaned back on our proud 29 year history of a GED education program and we decided that teaching people is also feeding them, and that education is essential to get this community out of its current doldrums.

It may take us two years, three years, or even five years to set all this up. Some of us who start such an ambitious dream may not get to see it to completion, but is that a reason not to start? In the near future we may find the opportunities for facilities we never dreamed of. We may find that once a few engaged and compassionate people start, that people from all over will want to come help. We may find that our youth will finally make the connection that this strange faith of ours that we talk about in worship on Sunday actually translates directly into helping others. We may find contributions beyond our wildest dreams.

This is the United States of America in the 21st century. We should not be seeing 300 pound malnourished ten year olds. We should not be seeing people getting their food from restaurant dumpsters. We should not have children born to malnourished mothers in Muskogee.

But we do.

All the resources we need to address these issues are either in this church or connected to it socially. All we need is a couple of compassionate people who want their faith to make a difference. All we need is to look outside our bubble and start with gratitude, saying, “I have been very blessed in this life. I want to give back as much as possible.”

After all, wherever you are going next, you can’t take it with you.

Today is national “Welcome Back Sunday.”

Welcome Back!!?? Have people been away for a vacation?

Can you imagine the Israelites in hot pursuit by the Egyptian army? Chariots and horses are gaining on them. God is out in front of them in a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night. All of a sudden the pillar of cloud just disappears and a voice comes from heaven (in Hebrew of course), “Sorry, I’m on vacation. Check back with me in a month.”

Some people are actually comforted to know however that God really doesn’t take vacations. The church does not go on vacation. We are always here and that is a good thing.

Today is the day we talk in plain language about the nuts and bolts of this parish. I’ll tell you the Good News first: The last shall be first and the first shall be last … and the harvest is plenty but the laborers are few.

It’s really all good news but some folks are perplexed and even concerned about the situation we are in right now. Look back at the Israelites in the desert. The whole congregation of the Israelites (200,000) complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness, “If only we had died in Egypt. We may have been living with uncultured pagan people, but at least we had food to eat, but you have brought us out to this barren place to kill us with hunger.”

Moses risked his own life when he killed the Egyptian guard. He did not want to lead this ragtag band of Hebrew speakers. He tried to tell God that he had a speech impediment and could not articulate things well. God in turn said, “No problem. Your brother Aaron will speak on your behalf.”

With the Egyptian army about to close in on them, God intervenes again and they cross the Red Sea as if on dry land. The sea closes in on Pharaoh’s chariots and they all perish. The whole assembly of Israel did not have a very difficult decision when they chose to follow Moses out of the country. It was either follow the guy who had funny speech or be killed by the army.

By the time we get to today’s reading, the Israelites have been wandering in the desert long enough to get very hungry and wonder just where in the heck are they going. Some of them want to return to their days as slaves in Egypt which they consider to be better than their time in the hot desert sun.

Every leader, if they are doing their job, will encounter resistance which comes in two forms. Overt resistance is what Moses experienced. People complained directly about their situation. Covert resistance can be more subtle, ranging from secret plotting against the leader to just saying no to everything that comes along.

One of the first pitfalls people encounter with new leadership is assuming “We now have a great leader. Now we can return to the good old days the way it used to be.” This is a natural assumption, but it is wrong. No matter how good your leader may be, the future does not contain the good old days that this church or any church can return to. EVERYTHING has changed and continues to change rapidly. Grace Church can never return to the 1980s, or 1960s, or whatever period was the golden era. We MUST reinvent ourselves and with God; we will create a new golden era.

Reinventing ourselves involves change and risk taking. Not all change succeeds. Not all change is good. But without change there is NO growth. All churches that resist change fall into decline. So we must embrace change knowing that not everything is going to be helpful. We must be willing to laugh at what we tried that didn’t work out. For example, last year we tried “This Church Rocks” with contemporary music on Sunday nights. That effort did not succeed. What we learned from it is that promoting Grace Church activities in the Muskogee community is nearly impossible especially without a sign or any attractive presence at 6th and Broadway.

For Episcopalians change poses an even greater conundrum. How many Episcopalians does it take to change a light bulb? The answer is “You can’t change that light bulb. My grandmother gave that light bulb.” We really like things to be stable with fixed form prayers, worship, music, etc. But what good is stability when you are declining?

How do we preserve the best of our traditions, Episcopal culture, and worship styles while changing into something new, exciting, growth-filled, attractive to outsiders, and sustainable?

First I need to convince you of the urgency of our situation: We are getting our financial accounting and management into excellent shape for the first time in many years. We can now see clearly what we need to do. A year ago I was convinced that modest growth of four to six new people a year along with modest increases in income would keep us going. Now I can tell you that will not work. We need to grow in attendance, in financial contributions, and in ministries. We need to grow in time, talent, and treasure. We have about two years to make this happen.

How will we grow? What will we become? Where are we going?

You will grow Grace Church through your network of friends and contacts. I know many of you have invited friends already. While the building is being reconstructed in 2012 we need to be planning programs for the following year that will be very attractive to those outside the church. When we have attractive buildings, attractive programs, and personal invitations, more people will come.

What will we become? I can stay at Grace until I retire. I have plenty of ideas, energy, and drive. But I cannot do everything. Right now we need help with pastoral care and visitation of the sick and shut in. We need office volunteers even for just two hours a week to answer the phones. Nearly every ministry of Grace Church needs additional help and even leadership.

I know that many of you already do a lot for God at Grace Church. To all of you I can say “Thank you.” Also, look again at the Israelites in the desert. God did not feed them because they complained. God fed them to show them God’s power and how their faith made all the difference. So I tell you, “It’s hot out here in the desert. It’s a long ride. Hang in there. Your faith will make all the difference.”

Where are we going? What Muskogee lacks is a religious institution that is open to everyone without condition, and that encourages people to think for themselves. We do that very well. What we need to do is organize, advertise, gear up, and promote Grace Church as THE place for thoughtful people that accepts everyone.

Grace Church was the fourth church established in Muskogee. We are not the biggest church today. Jesus tells us however that the last shall become first.

Please attend the ministry fair. Roll up your sleeves. Get involved. Grace Episcopal Church in Muskogee has a fabulous future. Your faith and your participation will make all the difference.

Having a hearing impairment can be fun at times. I have what my wife calls “creative hearing,” that is, the words I think I heard may not be anything remotely similar to what was said. Occasionally it can be pretty funny. The same is true for children as they learn their native language. One time at our church in California, the processional was Lead on, O King Eternal, the same as we sang today. As I passed a pew, I could distinctly hear a child singing enthusiastically at the top of his young voice, “Lead on O Kinky Turtle.” It made me smile and pause for a second as I wondered what a Kinky Turtle might look like.

But isn’t that the way we all want to sing in church? We want to sing enthusiastically. We want to sing with everyone else. We want to sing stuff that makes us happy, regardless of whether it is about divine kings or bent turtles.

In a small town trying to do traditional high church Episcopal music, we are challenged on so many sides you can get dizzy thinking about it. Like many of you, I was raised with high church Anglican music. It is what I know and love. It is for me the norm for good music in church. I married a Roman Catholic, and thought I was doomed to guitars and bad music for the rest of my life.

When he was in Athens, the high point of Greek culture and learning, the apostle Paul said, “I must be all things to all people.” By that he meant that he must talk to the Athenians in their own culture and language in order to win them over to the Good News of God in Jesus Christ. Paul did not try to impose a foreign language, culture, or music on the Athenians. Instead he showed them how their temple to an unknown god was really the God of the Good News in Jesus Christ. He met them on their own terms.

I often look at the church trade magazines and shudder when I read about theatre seats and “entertainment industry” video displays. I break out in hives thinking about church as entertainment. But then I think about Paul and the Athenians. He converted hundreds or thousands by meeting them on their own turf. How many do we convert by forcing people to sing music that is as strange and foreign to them as Dixieland would be to an African tribe?

Is there anything wrong with your church if it is entertaining to newcomers while they are slowly won over to the gospel of Christ? What about music? One kind of music may make one generation or existing church members comfortable and happy. Another kind of music may be attractive to people who know nothing else about the Episcopal Church. Is one of these musical styles “right” and the other “wrong”, or could they simply appeal to two different audiences?

Part of the genius of our Anglican tradition is that it is broad in every scope. We can embrace polar opposites in theology, in worship, in views on human sexuality, in politics, and even in music. We do not force people to do or think any particular thing. We invite them to use their own hearts and minds. Of all the things that make us Episcopalians, this is the primary gift we bring to the people of Muskogee – a place where people can think about their faith.

So I ask you, do you feel good about the fact that our teenagers come and ask all kinds of questions about their faith and they are encouraged to explore and challenge the prevailing views of their friends? Do you feel good about the fact that our adult forum is studying a book titledGoing to Hell, Getting Saved, and what Jesus Actually Said About it? Do you feel good knowing that this book is essentially banned in Muskogee because it clashes with the predominant views on the Bible from other churches in town? You can only buy it here on-line. Do you feel good knowing that ANY human being who walks through this door will be treated with dignity and respect?

We have what is called a “lively faith.” Yes we have a relationship with Jesus and yes, our understanding of scripture includes more questions than answers. It is the questions, the thinking, and wrestling with scripture that can be off-putting to some people who think they need to come to church to be told what to think; they want a step by step formula for salvation. But I guarantee you, there are many other people out there who avoid coming to church because they have questions and they do not want to be told what to think. Do we have room for them here?

Where will Grace Episcopal Church be in three to five years? I see a church nearly twice our size today. I see a church that continues the best of music and Anglican worship while at the same time offering another Sunday service alternative with more contemporary music. I see a much larger, more active youth group. I see us more involved with education in Muskogee. I see us going on mission trips, doing more fund raisers, being recognized in town, and with full parking lots on Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings.

Do you feel good about who we are and what we do? Do you feel good about where we are going? Can you see the future with me? Can you roll up your sleeves and help make it happen? This is what Paul meant when he said to the Philippians, “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” because God is at work in you.

On Easter this year I studied the church advertising page in the Muskogee Phoenix. I counted 33 Baptist churches and 42 non-Baptist churches advertising. Just on the basis of that rough count, 42% of the churches around us are Baptist. Now there is nothing wrong with the Baptist church. Our Episcopal tradition stands in sharp contrast to the Baptist tradition, so today on the Feast of St. Mary the Virgin, we could use a little refresher to help us understand and appreciate our differences with some of the other church traditions around us.

A few months ago someone noted our devotional candles in the back and they wondered as to why we would do such a “Roman Catholic thing.” There are many different purposes, intentions and meanings behind devotional candles, but I can assure you that devotional candles are not the unique prerogative of Roman Catholic tradition. Even Methodists and Lutherans can have them. Also in the realm of things Roman Catholic, did I mention that in our Anglican-Episcopal tradition we have a kind of Rosary called “Anglican Prayer Beads?” Did I mention that some Episcopal parishes in the NE United States have confessional booths and statues? Again, we might want to understand where the Episcopal Church fits between Baptists at one end and Roman Catholics on the other. We are in the middle and I like to think that we have the best of both.

How did the wider church through the ages develop such a tradition around Mary? For example, Mary is referred to as a virgin, yet there is the question of the brothers of Jesus. In another case, the Gospel of Matthew quotes Isaiah 7:14, saying the familiar words from Advent, “Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called ‘Immanuel’.” Jerome who translated the Bible from Hebrew and Greek into Latin in the 400s later acknowledged that he knowingly used “virgin” for the Hebrew word “young maiden,” because he was preserving the existing tradition about the Virgin Mary. There is another word in Hebrew that ALWAYS means virgin yet that word is not in the original Hebrew source text – only the word for “young girl” or “young maiden.”

The doctrines of the virginity of Mary and even the “perpetual virginity of Mary” before, during, and after the birth of Jesus apparently were well established long before Jerome produced the Latin Bible in the early 400s. Miraculous and virgin births were important to major world religions centuries before Jesus. Even the birth of the Roman Emperor Augustus was reported to have resulted from a virginal pairing of his mother and Apollo. You notice by now that we have neither denied nor accepted this doctrine. Scripture is just not clear on this matter.

There is another speculation about the development of Mary in the church. By the third century, the church was led by an exclusively male hierarchy. Although little is written about it, the feminine aspects of God needed to be integrated into the church of male priests and an even more masculine-centric Trinity – Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The elevation of Mary to “God-bearer” and prayers directed to her as healer and life-giver would be a natural development for the official church of the Empire as it waged war and took human lives throughout the world.

Regardless of your beliefs about Mary, the Song of Mary you heard from Luke contains a true miracle that YOU/WE can participate in today. When Mary says that God has “looked with favor upon his lowly servant”, the Greek text does NOT imply “lowly” as “humility.” It is about POVERTY. Mary is dirt poor, pregnant, and unmarried. This social status in her world would be equivalent to the kids who scavenge the giant garbage dump in Honduras. She is at the bottom of the social ladder. If we saw Mary on the street, we would scurry by her, trying not to notice or look her in the eye. She too is wretched and despised; rejected by her status as unmarried and pregnant. And yet for this unlikely, impoverished, dirty, desperate young woman, God has chosen to change her status forever. She will give birth to the son of God.

Mary sings a song of liberation not just for her but for all of the world’s poor and despised. Because of the child she carries, the faithful poor will have hope where there was no hope before. God will give them a future where they had no future before. She sings a song of justice brought about by God who has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts and who has brought down the powerful from their thrones and who has lifted UP the lowly; God who has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty.

By the world’s standards, we are ALL rich. HOW can we sing Mary’s song when we are not like her? We are not poor. We are not dirty and desperate, and we are in good social standing. Yet Mary sings of God who raises up those at the bottom of the ladder. Can Mary’s God be our God? Can Mary’s song be our song?

Realization of God’s justice means that for those of us who are rich (and we are all rich), it will cost us. Can we really praise this God Mary sings about?

Her song sums it up. If we who are rich cannot praise this God, then we are empty and we will be sent away.

So I ask you who have been watching recent events in our nation and the world with justifiable anxiety; what does the future look like given our godless politics and self-centered businesses? Do you see hope for many people? Does the future you see make you proud or anxious?

Mary’s God and Mary’s song gives ALL of us hope. God’s future and God’s promise to us will cost us. But so will the future the politicians and business leaders have in store for us. The choice we have before us is not about cost, it is about faith.

Mary’s God will raise ALL of us up: the homeless, the uneducated, those living in rough places, the disabled, those in prison, and the rest of us who have wealth but need a purpose. Mary’s God will raise ALL of us up if we to whom much has been given will learn how to join with Mary and the lowly of the world. And from their perspective at the bottom of the ladder we need to learn to look up and say with boldness to God, “May it be done to us according to your word.”

When we can truly join with Mary and the poor of the world and when we can submit to God in her way, then, as the prophet Jeremiah proclaimed, God will give us “hope and a future.”

In order to obtain animals to put on our cardboard boat AKA Noah’s Ark we put out the call for people to contribute stuffed animals. One person brought a bag of stuffed animals and on top of it were several cute little sheep. My dog took a liking to them and curled up around the bag as if he were guarding them. I told our administrator that “All we needed was a bottle of Bombay Sapphire gin in the bag and we would have ‘dyslexic scripture.’” She looked at me the way she does when I say something crazy. “You ready?” I asked. She nodded and I said, “Behold the lamb of dog that taketh away the gin of the world.”

I want to thank everyone who helped build the boat, race the boat and come out & cheer – We had 200 person-hours of labor building the boat. We had forty people show up over the weekend to cheer us on. THANK YOU!

[Show trophies – 3rd place in two events.]

We learned a lot. We know much more how to build the boat, how to race it, and how to promote it. Next year we are going to clean house!

When was the last time Grace Church brought home trophies? 1960-70s.

When did we install these memorial windows? 1920-40s.

The old trophies came from the children of the people memorialized in the windows. Our new trophies are going to come from the people here now.

Churches go through natural cycles of birth, near death, and rebirth. I think we are in a period of rebirth right now. We are going to score a lot more trophies. As we sing in the hymn All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name: “Go spread your trophies at his feet and crown him Lord of all.” Here are the first two trophies, Jesus.

But as I watched the events of Friday and Saturday transpire, I realized how much about the life of an individual and the life of the church we were seeing played before us. It was almost like God poking me in the ribs saying, “Do you get it now?”

Lesson 1: Location, location, location. We arrived about 5:00 on Friday. That was way too late. All the prime positions had been taken. For the Friday night contest on the most attractive boat, people go up to buy beer and get voting tickets. The secret is to have your boat as close to the beer as possible. We were just too far away.

Lesson 2: Get out there and get others to believe in you. The Pink Pirates were a bunch of cute 7 year old girls with a killer boat closest to the beer. We were a bunch of demure Episcopalians far away from the action. We had our one manila envelope taped neatly to the boat with a note: “Vote here for Noah’s Ark” How does that compete against a squadron of 7 year old girls wearing matching pink pirate Tee shirts right after you purchase your beer?

Lesson 3: Have faith. Last week the vote here seemed to be roughly equal between faith and doubt. Faith would have us get in the boat the first time and paddle to victory. Doubt is the engineer in me that said we needed a brief field test. So Friday night we paddled the boat across the inlet to our display location. Unfortunately that exposure to water got the bottom hull a bit soggy. I needed to have more faith.

Lesson 4: Practice, practice, practice. A week earlier we did some rehearsals in my canoe. That helped the youth team a great deal. Glenn Bibelheimer and I decided to enter a two person event. We should have practiced more. A couple of times in the race I doubted Glenn’s directions and we suffered precious seconds of time as a result.

Lesson 5: Just relax and hold on tight. It’s a game. It’s a contest. It’s fun. It doesn’t have to be so serious. Yes, when you combine engineering and a competitive event, you hook me on several fronts – but it is just a game. Have fun. Enjoy life. Grace Church knows how to have fun!

All these lessons can be applied to our life as a church, as a community in Christ, and as individuals. Glenn and I hoped that the youth would go first but that’s not how the race turned out. Glenn and I went first, which meant the boat was much more waterlogged and damaged for the second event with the youth.

The youth did exceptionally well. They displayed great courage and faith that they would cross that finish line. The bottom of the boat was completely waterlogged. Even though the bottom was 1.5 inches thick, it was more like a wet blanket than a rigid bottom. As they made the turn, the internal keel was the only thing floating that supported them, along with their faith, as they paddled through this event and life itself. The boat was watertight, but the bottom was barely able to keep their knees from poking through into the water.

They finished the race. The bottom of the boat was no longer able to perform its functions. Soggy cardboard was torn off the bottom so that only the duct tape remained. When we loaded the boat into a pickup truck to bring it to church, we folded it in half lengthwise.

Isn’t that the way life is? We start out fully functional, with high hopes and excitement. Some people are like some of the boats we saw. They could not paddle in a straight line so they went in loops. A few sank within a few yards of the launching point. Many completed the race. Nearly everyone who finished the race did so with their boat diminished in some way.

Don’t we cross the finish line of life with less than we had at the beginning? Don’t we end up a bit soggy and worse for the wear? Are we not ready to go home after the race?

Earlier in the day I joked with someone about different ways we could have cheated and built a better boat. She smiled and said, “But there is just no glory in winning when you cheat.”

So what is our glory when we finish the race of life? [pause] When we reach out to help others and when we devote our life so that others may be better off, then we will receive the crown of victory. THAT is our glory.

What we experienced this weekend was absolutely glorious. The time, energy, and talents of everyone involved showed the strength and faith we have as a community. Even at times when our own faith may falter, this community is always present, full of faith and courage to cheer us on to that finish line – all to the Glory of God! Hallelujah!