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This past Sunday we didn't do church the usual way. We had a baptism, a baby named Charlie, and a room full of kids (young, and old) who were not interested in sitting still for a sermon about Matthew 18 and the king who forgives but then takes it back and throws a slave into prison to be tortured. So, we skipped that, and instead I invited the kids over to play with the baptismal water with me.

They did, immediately and without hesitation (which is the correct theological response to a bowl of water, by the way). Little hands went in. Water got swirled, scooped, spilled. One of the kids poured a cupful from the pitcher into the bowl, and we all just listened to that sound for a second, water finding water. I asked what water does. They knew: It helps you when you're thirsty. It helps plants grow. It washes the dirt off. It's what animals and people and trees need to live. None of that is complicated theology and all of it is exactly right.


Then I asked whether anyone remembered their own baptism. Most of the grown ups in the room don't, not really, not the way you'd remember a birthday or a first day of school. Charlie certainly won't. So I told the kids that's part of the whole point: nobody has to hold onto the memory of being loved by God all by themselves. God gave us water. And with that water, we remember all these good things, and can remind one another. That's one of the things this whole enormous, strange, beautiful family of God is for, reminding one another we are loved just as we are, we are never alone. We help each other when we're thirsty. We find each other food when we're hungry. We stay next to each other when we're lonely. We help make things fair when they're not. I encouraged the kids to help their parents remember all these things, too-- and one truly grabbed one of the squirt toys and took it right over to her dad for a quality little splash. It was good, for all of us.


Our texts this week, Paul writing to the Romans and Jesus telling that hard parable about the servant who wouldn't forgive a debt after his own had just been forgiven, are both about people who've gotten so busy keeping score, who owes what, who's right, who's clean and who isn't, that they've stopped noticing what the person in front of them actually needs. Water doesn't do that. Water doesn't keep score. It just keeps moving around between people and creation. 


So we poured some of that water on Charlie's head and welcomed him into a family that is, frankly, still learning how to do that movement and loving behavior. We don't always get it right. Charlie's family won't always get it right. I won't either. But that was never the bar. The water isn't there because we're good at this. It's there because every time we touch it again, washing our hands, jumping in a pool, catching rain on our faces, we get to remember something true whether or not we did anything to earn it: I belong to God. I have a huge family, in this room and well beyond it. And we belong to each other.




A Practice for the Week
Next time you touch water, on purpose or by accident, washing dishes, caught in the rain, a kid splashing you in the bath, let it be a small reminder. Take a second to think: You are loved just exactly as you are, imperfections and all. You, and all those around you, and al of creation. Perfectly, wholly loved.  And if you forget once in a while, that's ok because somebody in this huge, strange family can remind you. And, you can remind remind people in this whole big global Christian family, too. 

So, remember your baptism, friends. And rejoice- baby Charlie has joined the family!


with joy,
Pr. Sam

Ash Wednesday | Based on Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

Holy Hilarious, Batman

Has anyone else noticed how ridiculous this scene is? I enjoy picturing Jesus talking to people with a sly smirk, eyebrow raised,

“Oh no— now, you, you don’t be like those people”

You know— the ones marching up and down the streets with their brass bands? Just playing a fancy kick each time they are about to do something? You know— those types.

The ones who …publicize, when they are going to make a major donation. OR- you know, the ones who get out there with their megaphones? Shouting about salvation?? Don’t be like those types, either…

AND— the people who make a big production about working soooooo hard on behalf of…people…— rather than, say, just getting the work done? Don’t be like THEM. Either.

And you know— WE are NOT like them. Not at all. We, about to smear ashes all over our foreheads and then go out in public like this……oops. 🙂

It’s not the Same as what Jesus was talking about— right?

I mean— It’s just LENT, right?
That famous season where everyone knows Christians do things like …

Fast! Give up coffee-or sugar— and then bonus points: BLOG about it!
Collect cash for people who need food— and make it into a competition! Announce the results!

DO NOT eat meat on Fridays!
Definitely keep ourselves a bit more serious here in church— it’s a serious season. No alleluias. No hosannas.
Maybe even just avoid any instruments at all- just chant. Only chant. Because it’s lent.

In fact— maybe give up anything that brings you joy- because its lent.

This is one of those places where not a one of us escapes Jesus’ ability to reach through 2000 years and multiple translations of scripture to give us a nice little loving and teasing slap in the face.

And— don’t think that any one of us escapes the critique—I must admit, friends:

There have been years even ritual-loving Pr. Sam over here has watched carefully to see how the person doing the ashing did the ashing— and let me tell you, some of these people out there are putting that stuff on with a trowel and I would have NONE of it on my face.

Thank Goodness, Travis knows what he’s doing. 

You know, As a kid, I hated Lent and its absurd requirements. To me, this whole concept was entirely foisted upon me. Friday nights spent doing absurd stations of the cross, and then caught up in these vegetarian spaghetti dinners (ok, admittedly, my first kiss did happen in the back stairwell at one of those dinners, but STILL)… on the whole, I resented all of it, and to me- it was in fact all a show. Why even be there, if I didn’t have a desire to be there. Why be told I was giving up sugar if I had no reason to be giving up sugar?

This is, I think, one of those fundamental places our Christian tradition easily goes wrong while trying desperately to do right by people. We land in productivity and shame-based actions in place of faith foundation.

There is a significant difference between a Lent foisted upon you, acted out because it is demanded of you, and a life rooted in lent because you find value in simple practices that help you renew your commitment to Jesus’ way of being people of integrity, people of justice, people of love.

And- don’t get me wrong here- bodily practices are not the problem. Jesus was a good Jew, he knew interiority and exteriority are not a binary. Both matter and work together and inform one another.

Our church elders, somewhere along the way, had the wisdom to know that an annual reminder that we are not immortals— that we too will die, and there’s no luggage rack on the hearse— would be a good thing for us to engage. Recalling that our smallness, despite our immense power, can help us re-orient to what matters, and who matters. To get back to that Christian commitment to the way of Jesus is important.

But wow oh wow, how easily we even manipulate these things, with hardly a noticing--or worse yet, trying to obfuscate the manipulation with overt seriousness that is rooted in false sense of ourselves. No?

So, the thing is, you have to choose your own focus for this season. As for me:

My prayer for us, this season, is that we might take ourselves far less seriously. That we might look at ourselves from the outside, and laugh at ourselves far more and enjoy that laughter, and even have some good playtime. That we might, in that joy and amusement, let the Holy Spirit in to do her work, too.

I’m going to pray that we might find and renew the strength of our collective and individual hunger for God and let it drive us right into the heart of our desirous, adventurous, explorative nature to grow and nourish one another and our world.

And- I'm going to pray that we might realize in new ways that lent is not a singular season at all, but an opportunity to check in on the foundation of our Christian life, inspect the cracks and crevices, see what maybe needs some TLC, giggle about our funny construction methods. Appreciate how God comes right on in and holds us together, good, mediocre, or downright poor.

And you know, I imagine, if we can do just that much… if we can sort of reach a little more deeper depth of soul in these kinds of ways?

We might discover yet another pathway that leads us back to that singular empty tomb, and a very full and alive communion composed not of “me” but of “we”— and that is the kind of resurrection treasure worth holding in our hearts, and celebrating come easter Sunday.  Amen?

with joy,
Pr Sam