SERMONS

Ivory Casten 9/28/25 Ivory Casten 9/28/25

On Jesus and the Poor

Luke 16:19-31

TranscriptioN

Good morning. I'm Alexi Laushkin, a member here at Corpus Christi Anglican Church. Let's pray together.

“Gracious Father, we thank you for these words from the Gospel of Luke. May they touch our hearts. May what is from you and throughout the centuries of the Church meet with us who live in a relative place of prosperity today. In the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.”

This is not the Gospel of Luke passage, a particularly easy passage of Scripture, and it's not one that's often preached on or talked about, in part because we don't necessarily like, as modern Christians, this conflict between the rich and the Gospel. It's uncomfortable. Does it literally mean that someone who is rich and unable to think about the poor and who has oppressed their neighbors will go to hell? Feel that tension. Does this Gospel really mean that? Is this another in the line of the teaching of “it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than to inherit the kingdom of heaven”? Is this one of these teachings out of the Gospel where you have the rich ruler, and another teaching of the Gospel, come to him and say, “Lord, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” And Jesus says to him, “Sell all your possessions and follow me.” Does that mean that the rich must sell all their possessions to follow the Lord? Feel the discomfort of this Scripture.

I certainly did in preparing for it. So I'm going to give kind of three overviews as we go through the Scripture. One, talking about the text itself in light of the tradition of the Gospels: Luke, Matthew, Mark, and John. The second, the tradition of the Church as it relates to the poor, talking about Franciscans, Methodists, William Wilberforce, part of what we should think about today. And third, practical application for what it means for us in Northern Virginia, in our personal habit, in our close personal relationship, and the practical vision of our Church, which is to be a people transformed by the Book of Common Prayer, uncommonly together.

So the Gospel of Luke passage—what do the Scriptures have to say about the poor? Well, Luke, if you're a student of the Gospels, is particularly focused on the least of these, the poor. In parts of the Church and the tradition of the Church, you might hear Roman Catholic brothers and sisters talking about the preferential option of the poor. What do they mean by that? That God has a special place in His heart for the poor, the least of these, the marginalized. And the Gospel of Luke tradition—certainly I do a lot of racial reconciliation work in ministry. If I go to a historic black church, the Gospel of Luke proclamation, where Jesus is starting his message that He has proclaimed the good news to the poor in the year of the captive and the release of the captive, a year of Jubilee. It's an essential part of how they think about mission and ministry. And Luke takes on this focus.

Mark and John, the Gospels, also take on this focus of the God's people doing incredible acts of loving service. The Gospel of Matthew talks about acts of sacrifice and forgiveness as part of the testimony of the Scriptures. So all four Gospels agree that there is something specific and special about the kingdom of God and how it transforms our understanding of relationships.

Ancient Israel, as well as much of the ancient world, was a relatively hierarchical place. And so if we were visiting at the time of Jesus, we would notice the difference in the ancient world between those of means, those who have riches, and those who do not have means, and those who do not have riches. The Old Testament text tries to deal with this sense of the have and the have-nots through this concept of Jubilee, a specific pattern in the Scriptures that debts ought to be forgiven after a certain period of time. You know, some will say seven years, but the actual practice of Jubilee actually varied quite a bit in terms of Israel's history. What I'm trying to say, though, is the Old Testament talks a lot about debts, and land, and wages, and the importance of those things. And the prophets themselves—Amos, certainly Daniel, and in various ways certainly Micah—talk about God's people neglecting matters of justice, matters of the least of these.

And I, myself, and I've talked previously about concepts of injustice in the American context. I've often talked about immigration, that we have a segment of people in the United States who are not under the law, but are asked to work for lower wages, and they often can't access the justice that they need in things that happen to them.

So the Testament of the Scripture often talks about the poor, but what does the Gospel of Luke really do about this witness? Well, it is in a fundamental way, both what Luke 16, this rich man, and the rich man who goes and asks Jesus, “How might I go and inherit eternal life?” are honing in on something that is an important part of a kingdom myth-busting, is how I would describe it. Which is that both this man and the rich young ruler who goes to Jesus, we're not meant to think of them in this text as unholy, sinful, impious. In other words, we're meant to think of these as fairly pious Jews, since they have followed the law, they have honored their mother and father, they have tithed, they worship the one God of Israel. We're not necessarily meant to think that they are not necessarily pious, but what Jesus is pressing into is that they can't leave their own personal injustices aside and inherit—be part of the inheritance of God's people. They can't leave it aside.

So let's get into the text. How bad is it? Well, there's a rich man who's dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. So what are we supposed to think about that? Think about someone who lives in Aspen, Colorado, a very wealthy part of the United States, who has no burdens. Maybe they live in Hollywood. Maybe they live in—cough, cough—McLean. But perhaps every day they have inherited wealth, or you think of a modern American today whose inheritance is from their parents or their grandparents, and they don't need to work per se. They can set their agenda every day.

And this young man—well, this is not necessarily a young man—but this man loves fine clothes. He loves shopping at Tysons, too, every day. At his gate lay the beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores. So, friends, if you've ever seen the poor and the least of these in this area, you often might see them maybe as not having a regular bath, but usually you have to go out of the United States to see someone who's truly beaten up and covered in sores. And so if you've had a chance to do missionary travel, or sometimes you will find this or come across someone in the United States who is badly in need with open sores. I myself have been able to witness someone with sores, but also someone who recently had been tortured, and it's a ghastly sight. So the text is not trying to help us pull away from the fact that it would have been pretty obvious to this rich man that Lazarus was in need. You know, there was no excuse. He was literally bleeding outside of his gate, longing to eat what fell from the rich man's table.

Can you imagine that the text here is giving us the example that this wasn't a one-time thing, or perhaps he just ignored it one day, and he was just too busy. Ah, he didn't do it right at one time. That's not what the text is saying here. The text is saying that this was constant. So for the sake of our time, let's imagine that maybe Lazarus was there for a year and a half, okay? A year and a half. Every day, the rich man would have seen this. You can imagine what he might have thought about Lazarus: like, oh, again? At my gate? Oh, I don't want to look at him. Oh, fine. Here's something for him to do. Here, Lazarus, you know, go do something. Clean the house a little bit. I'll give you maybe a little bit of a scrap. Imagine that there's a relationship here that's ongoing, because this is what the text is calling us towards.

The time came when the beggar died, and the angels carried him to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. So it's interesting. There's a communication happening here in the life to come. And the rich man sees Abraham and Lazarus. And what does he do? Just to show you the sense of unrepentance here in the text. He goes, Abraham, my equal, time for me to talk to you, right? Look at the pride here. Abraham, my equal. He doesn't talk to Lazarus—Lazarus, he knows. Abraham, he does not. But he addresses himself to Abraham. “Father Abraham, have pity on me.” Then look what happens. “Send Lazarus. Send the servant. Send that poor man who was there to serve me once again to serve me again. Notice the insidiousness of this unrepentance. Send him to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.”

And so yes, the text talks about the reality of hell, the difficulty of hell, the torment of it. And it is a real reality. It is part of our witness as Christians. It is serious. And now the rich man, who in his days had luxury, is hoping beyond hope, because he was a man who lived with dignity, that another, who he perceives as his equal, might be able to help him. What does Abraham say? “Son, remember that in your lifetime you received good things, while Lazarus received bad things. Now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. And besides all of this, between us a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from here to us.” The importance of Jesus, friends, the chance to decide, is in this life, not in the life to come. These are the days. These are the hours. These are the weeks that separate one destiny from another. Even Abraham can't change that—he makes that clear. There's no change. It's a grave text.

He answers, “I beg you, Father.” Again, who does he say to send? Lazarus. Send Lazarus. Send the servant. Look at how unrepentant this is as an attitude. He doesn't say send Abraham, send yourself, send an angel. Send Lazarus. The contempt in this relationship. “And send Lazarus to who? To my family.” So this man obviously had love in his heart for his family, but not for the poor, not for the wretch in front of his door. “For I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so they will not also come to this place of torment.”

Abraham replied, “They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them.”

“No, Father Abraham.” He's really serious—more serious than he ever was about helping Lazarus. Really serious about this. “But if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.”

And Jesus, in His own foreshadowing, because this is a teaching of Jesus, says it this way: “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”

The Gospel of the Lord will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.

This pattern in humanity to disregard the poor and the least of these, the other, is so deeply ingrained that the gospel reverses it in such a marvelous way. And we have trouble with it, both in the personal sense of having trouble with it, because in the American society we like to distance ourselves from this problem to the degree that our whole cities are planned. If you do public policy advocacy, our cities are planned to be away from the poor.

The most contentious city council meeting in America is low-income housing, let me tell you, and that's true everywhere. We don't want the poor near us. They can be another part of town. We don't want to hear their plight. We don't want to know about their problems, because their problems are not our problems. This is the same rich man's spirit that infects us.

And it's not just an American phenomenon. I was in Rome, the Lord being my helper this week. It's an Italian phenomenon. I've been in parts of Africa. It's an African phenomenon. This impacts all of humanity, which is why the gospel is so serious about the upside-down kingdom, about the kingdom of God and God's people, where the rich are not honored more than the poor, where there's a level set.

And that needs to impact how we think about the mission of our church. It needs to impact our personal attitudes. And in the gospel of Luke, it's not just the material poor, but the Hebrew word used is outcast for the poor.

And so the poor also include people we don't really want to talk to. So in Luke's gospel, that includes tax collectors, not necessarily people of no means, per se, but people outside of our orbit. And so at the most basic sense, the four witnesses of the gospel tell us prejudice has no place in the Christian life.

Prejudice has no place. Animosity has no place. Greek, Jew, Gentile, white, black, Asian, Republican, Democrat, has no place. And this is why, when we look at contemporary things, we have to, when we engage in these political questions, because sometimes, especially in the 20th century, we can hear the poor and we can think, oh, it's about politics, right? So I've been in many churches where, when we talk about the poor, someone will pipe up, oh, but Jesus said, the poor we will always have with you. It's not that serious. Oh no, it's that serious.

Luke makes it that serious, my friends. And it's not a political question, though it can be used politically. But it's why the kingdom of God can't align itself with any temporal power. Not right, not left. Not to say some get it closer in a small age and some get it further in another age, but we have to resist the temptation that fundamentally the future of the world depends on a nation or a political party.

In the book of Revelation, towards the end, the fall of Babylon, the fall of the earthly kingdoms of the world, and what happens? Well, at the end, I was reading it as part of my morning devotion. There's a mourning for Babylon, and I want you to think of Babylon as political power, the political power of the earth. Why? Because people can't get rich anymore. That's why they're mourning. The second reason underneath it is that it comments that Babylon had still contained within herself slavery, the oppression of people to people, the disregard of the poor. Same witness. Same witness.

The beginning of the text, for the Bible, it's Cain and Abel. The end of the text, it's Babylon falling. Same witness. Same text. Talking about that no earthly kingdom will be free totally of exploitation, but by God's help and the help of Jesus, we are to be free of that type of attitude in our heart and to the best of our ability and the best of our choices, free from it in our decision-making. So when we don't get easily captured by left or right, by the glories and the bad days, we are in our own way reclaiming our kingdom of inheritance that says ultimately the kingdom of God engages in the world but is above the world, and that we are a people of hope, even though the American church has not done very well with this, that we believe that this is a place where neither Jew nor Gentile, neither Greek nor slave, neither black nor white, neither Asian or Hispanic, have to be in separation, that there is one gospel, one Lord, one faith, one baptism.

That's what we proclaim as God's people. We live into it in sometimes in an imperfect way, but that is the vision. It's the vision that Luke calls us back into.

Jesus himself calls us back into. Why? Because fundamentally people like to exploit each other. They like to get away with it, and yet the gospel doesn't let us, and it won't let us. Whether we talk about it or not, it won't let us. Jesus is so serious about it. He contains this teaching within a teaching about heaven and hell. That's serious. It can't get more serious. It's that serious for us as well. What do we do with this? Well, we have witnesses within the church.

St. Francis, the way that he took this teaching out of the Gospels, is they would go out and he sent his disciples out, and he did not pay them. Can you imagine unpaid clergy? He did not pay them. They were to go out in simple wear, much simpler than what I'm wearing. They were to go out in essentially what I would call today street trash clothes in plain color, so you can imagine old clothes, maybe your oldest clothes in your wardrobe.

A Franciscan would go out. They would go out together, men and women, and they would go out and just preach the gospel, and they would minister to people without food and without money, and what would they do at the end? They would go for the humility of begging for food for dinner. Can you imagine begging for food? Could you imagine encountering someone on the Washington Metro subway?

They say they're a priest. They pray for you.They heal, you know, they comfort you. They're able to really encourage you in the faith, and at the end of that, they say, can you buy me some McDonald's? That was the Franciscans, their witness in the early days. It's uncomfortable to think, you know, clergy person asking me for food at the end. This is what the Franciscans did, but it wasn't just the Franciscans.

In other generations, you had the Jesus Passionists. In other generations, you had the Methodists, John Wesley himself, preaching to workers in England who were fed up with being oppressed for their wages, and he would preach to them where? In the open air, which was humiliating in that context.

It was seen as something you shouldn't do, and yet he did it, and people's hearts were transformed. In our days, further on, you had the witness of William Wilberforce speaking out about the injustice of slavery, and today we have many smaller works and acts of justice radically caring for the poor. Does that mean I'm saying, everyone, we need to go become Franciscan or Methodist and just follow, you know, the latest, what sounds really good? No, I'm not saying any of that.

What I'm saying is, God has sent witnesses about this teaching, and some of their teachings are really radical, and so when we think about the personal application, what does this mean for us? We have to think about what are some of the habits that are from church history that might apply to us today. Well, one big habit is to avoid one of the easiest Christian sins that's out there, which is the sin of Christian prejudice, to hate your brother and sister because you don't understand their politics, or you don't understand their background, or you don't understand why they think the way that they do. It's a personal growth to repent of the prejudice that we have towards our fellow Christians of various backgrounds, and to seek to learn from great sources. There are great sources in the Anglican tradition. Yesama Kali is an ACNA priest.

There are great sources there, just ways to get started on how to think about how to grow in heart posture, or ask the person you might have a prejudice towards, what are some things that help me understand how you follow Jesus better? Because much of these things aren't over doctrine, though those are there as well, and doctrine is important to defend.

It's important to follow the canons and institutions of the ACNA, but oftentimes what I discover is people just have prejudice, and it's mostly over politics, friends. I've been doing this for 15 years in various churches, mostly over politics at the end of the day. How could you believe that? How could you think that? All of that.

So we have to have a heart posture of openness, and listening, and prayer. Second, more practically, on the actual poor that we see in our world, Jesus's teachings, you know, we're gonna have a Lent coming up during Advent. You could do it now.

You do it during the small group formation time that you have. A personal commitment to give to everyone who asks of you, in some way, according to the measure of grace that you have for them. Oftentimes when we're encountering the poor, we can think, ah, they're gonna use the money for their drug addiction, and they're not gonna do it right, and this and that, and you think about how God must think of answering our prayers.

Well, if I give grace to this daughter, they're just gonna do it again. How could it be they're just gonna do the same sins? And so we have to have mercy, as much as God has had mercy on us. But prudence.

So if you don't want to give funds, buy a meal. You don't want to do that, give water. You don't want to do that, you can approach myself or Father Morgan, you know, we'll give you ministries that you can refer them to, you know, whatever it might be.

There's just this personal habit of being grace-filled. Whether the person's in a good spot or not a good spot. Of course, this is not a teaching to radically abandon your sense of safety or any of that.

It has to be according to who you are. God gives us for generosity of the heart according to the person. So use prudence within all of that.

The second is a little harder, which is we are to remain open in our closest relationships that give us the most heartache. And that could be another sermon, so I'm just going to be brief on this. But it means that the people who give us the hardest time, we are to remain forgiveness oriented and open to their needs. Oftentimes you will find people who are in need.

I encountered a gentleman maybe about 16 years ago who walked into our church at the time, and they were certainly hallucinating, not in their right mind. Another member and myself put them up in a hotel room. We reached out. They had a lot of family. Part of what had gone on is the family was so tired of the person not wanting to address their own illness that they had created some distance to the degree they didn't know where their family member was.

And so this requires part of the daily taking up of our cross when it's long-term need from a close family member where it's just hard, you can't convince them to do the right thing. And yet the Gospels ask us to be tender enough that that they might not become truly abandoned, because oftentimes this is the case with some of our most severe homeless and difficult folks. So there's part of the grace that we need for those who have wronged us 70 times 70 times, right? That's part of the grace there.

And the third is an important understanding that God can help us and in prayer with these difficult matters. It's not about perfection, which is so much a part of our American Christian mentality. We just want to check the box.

We did it, Lord. We've loved everyone. We've overcome all our prejudices. We've done it all, Lord. I've done it all for you. What more should I do? We have this sense that the Apostles oftentimes have. We've done it right. Bless me, God. This is not the attitude of a father towards a child. I don't want any of my five children to be like, “I've done it right. Bless me, Father.” Instead, it is a relationship deepening.

And this is also part of our witness according to how we're made, according to our station in life. And to remember what is radically true of the Gospels, more true than any political promise, that Jesus has accomplished in himself the reconciliation of all things, that the injustices of this life have an answering point, that all the things that we would like to be true of God are actually true in Jesus himself. He's good and personally good to each of us, whether we are rich or poor, things have gone well or not gone well.

And he asks us as his children to be open to blessing those around us that we might encounter who are the least of these, the outcasts, the unfortunate ones, and not to close our voice to them, whether they be nearby, which is sometimes the hardest, or a chance encounter, which is oftentimes how we experience this more often.

And so all we do at the end is say, “Lord, be with me. Help me.” And it pushes us into the daily patterns of prayer.

“Let me be open, Lord, if I encounter you in a stranger today. In the name of Jesus. Amen.”

Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Edited using ChatGPT.

Morgan Reed 4/17/25 Morgan Reed 4/17/25

Maundy Thursday: Kingdom Expectations

TranscriptioN

Good evening. Good evening. I'm Alexei Laushkin, a member here.

Let's pray. Gracious Father, we thank you for this holy set of services. We ask that you would be with us and help us not to miss the many things that happen in these next several days.

In the name of Jesus, amen. Kingdom expectations. You may, with the uncertainty that many people have faced in the Washington area, or you could think about a time where you've also faced uncertainty, maybe recently or in the past, you may remember the day before an uncertainty began, right? Things seemed normal and fine.

I was recently at a conference, and the conversation centered around 9-11, and we heard from a speaker who was in the White House in the morning, and it was prior to everything that happened on that horrible day, and he had sent an email to another colleague saying, most boring day of the Bush presidency, not knowing what was about to happen. Calamity, uncertainty, expectation, kingdom expectations. We're moving from Palm Sunday into this moment with Jesus and his disciples, the reclining at table, and I want you to get into the disciples' minds as best we can, ask God to be in our hearts and maybe think about what might be on their minds.

They've been with Jesus going on now three years. They've seen him perform miracles. They've seen him stay away from Jerusalem for the most part.

They've seen him recently raise someone who was dead, right? They've seen the crowds in this big festival say, Hosanna, Hosanna. And they think to themselves, this is it. This could be the time.

I want you to imagine this could be the time that the Messiah returns, the kingdom is restored. Just think what's about to happen and what verses might go through their minds. What do they think might happen next? Maybe they think about King David, right? If you can think about how King David ascends to the throne, there's a variety of calamities and difficulties and wars and battles, and perhaps they think to themselves, this is the time.

Or they could think about, in the passage we just read, the Exodus, the many motions that it took for deliverance from God's people to finally make it to the promised land. What they're probably not thinking about is betrayal that same night. That's probably not what they're thinking about.

That what would happen next would be an instantaneous collapse. They're probably not thinking about that. And so they're in this moment thinking about what will occur next.

They're in Jerusalem, and Jesus gives them something surprising to think through, and I'll get to that in a moment. But I want to get at some themes as we think about Easter and we think about our time with Easter. I think we have a tendency, and certainly I do, where we'd like the triumph of death over life, the triumph of Jesus over sin.

We'd like, and we have a tendency to think in very kind of binary ways. It's a celebration of good over evil, and in some ways that's very true. It's a celebration of life over death, and in some ways that is also very true.

But it is also a restoration of God being present with his people over a time in a way that the temple itself wasn't really able to do. And Jesus is the holy temple, and I think this gets to a bit of the meaning about the foot washing and why we have the foot washing this particular night. So if you think a little bit about the children of Israel, it's not by accident that in our reading tonight, this is another way to put it, that Judas is present.

It's not by accident that in the epistles, when we're asked to push away evil, that we're also given teachings to judge not least we be judged, or not to, if you know the parables of the wheat and the chaff, not to necessarily pull up that which is evil among us. And I want us to meditate a little bit on this as we're thinking about this new commandment that in many ways is being given in the midst of a betrayal that's going to happen that very night. And I want you to think about this in relation to our Christian life and that process for these next several days of what it looks like to have our inner hearts cleaned and cleansed.

Jesus is doing something wildly unexpected. And I think that when we often think about the Easter story, a story that's so familiar to us, the foot washing also somewhat familiar, the vigil pieces familiar, I want us to invite us to enter into the shock and expectation of the kingdom of God as we start this evening, the wildness of what's about to happen. And the first wild thing, just to repeat it from as I started, is that the disciples don't expect what's going to happen.

There's a shock process that happens. The second thing I think with foot washing, remember we're getting ready for service tonight and someone in my family was like, oh, foot washing, it's kind of, it's a little gross. It's uncomfortable.

But I think for those of us who've done foot washing before, it's also very familiar. So there's this tension of like it's a little bit of a stretch, but it's also a bit uncomfortable, but it's also a bit familiar. And I want to get us back into the shock, the expectation of the evening, the shock of the evening.

So this is from Bishop Barron. He was doing a sermon a few years back, and he was talking about the shock of what it would be like. And I want you to imagine that you've been invited to a very fancy dinner.

If you're a sports person, pretend your favorite sports star is there. If you're someone who likes shows, pretend someone very famous. You know, very fancy house.

It's a home for the sake of conversation. It's in McLean. It's a big home.

Someone, you know, with a nice suit. They've invited you in. The car is taking you out.

It's a table. Let's make it close to what's happening this night. So maybe it's about 15.

You're one of the 15. And your favorite star, and let's pretend we all have shoes that, you know, could be cleaned, takes out shoe polish and decides to go person by person before appetizers are served to polish your shoe. You would find it shocking.

You might even say you don't need to do that. It's a little bit, you know, shoe polishing is something people do, but it's not something people do all the time. And to have someone take off their tuxedo or make it a little easier for them to get at your shoe, it would feel really uncomfortable.

And this is the setting that we have when Jesus is taking out his outer garment. Jesus is taking his place, is putting himself in the position not just of a servant but of one of the lowliest servants. It's not every servant who would do the feat.

It usually was the lowliest servant. And you can see that Peter is just shocked. He says, I don't want this.

This is Peter who has seen Jesus do some pretty incredible things. And Jesus gives him this kind of a bit of a get thee behind me Satan sort of moment. Like this is something you must do to be part of the kingdom of God.

And then Peter says, well, okay, all of me. He says, no, it's okay. We don't need to do all of you.

And so it's this command and it's this flipping. And in many ways, it's the cleansing of the temple that we saw happen in Palm Sunday, but we see happen with his disciples, a cleansing of the temple. And I want us to think a little bit about this and a bit about the brokenness that all of this represents and Jesus' hope for this night in ways that are really unexpected.

This is not, again, a narrative the disciples are thinking about or think what would happen. So the temple is a place and just where God's glory is dwelling for Israel. It is the center of the worship life of Israel.

And I'm going to go out of Ezekiel a little bit here just in a moment. But I want you to think about the history of Israel for a moment. The history from the Exodus through Solomon is not necessarily a history where everything's going well.

It's not just a positive, joyful moment. You have enmity. You have sorcery.

I'm just giving you some of the highlights. You've got people who make our current day politics look nice and easy. It's a difficult set of generations in terms of what's happening in Israel.

And through all of that, God is still present with his people and eventually with the temple under Solomon's time. So it's not the case. I think sometimes we get the sense when we're reading the Old Testament where we sort of think, well, they sinned.

They just weren't good enough. God left them. And so then he needed to send his son.

And thank goodness we don't have to deal with all that religion in the way that they had to deal with it. I'm being very simplistic just to get us into that mindset. But what I'm trying to help you think about with the radicalness of Jesus and God's rescue plan for all of us is that God is not— but he's also very patient.

There are things happening in Israel that are really difficult and bad, and his glory hasn't left. He hasn't abandoned his people. There's judgment, but there's not abandonment.

But there is a portion, and I just want to give you a sense of what some would be thinking about around Jesus in Ezekiel 10, where there is a pronunciation that God's judgment, God's presence would leave the temple. So I want you to think about that. We're going to be tying this into foot washing in a moment.

This is Ezekiel 10, 15. Then the cherubim rose upward. There were the living creatures I had seen by the Kibar River.

When the cherubim moved, the wheels behind them moved. Did it pause there? So if you hang around Anglicans long enough, you're going to realize that the angels aren't just like the little creatures— the cherub—they're not just like little babies. It's a very Western picture.

You're going to see a much more complex picture of what angels look like. So if you're wondering what Ezekiel is referring to, he's actually talking about the angelic, not what you might see at Hallmark. When the cherubim stood still, they also stood still.

When the cherubim rose, they rose with them, because the spirit of the living creatures was in them. Then the glory of the Lord departed from over the threshold of the temple and stopped above the cherubim. While I watched the cherubim spread their wings and rose from the ground, and as they went, the wheels went with them.

They stopped at the entrance of the east gate of the Lord's house, and the glory of Israel was above them. These were the living creatures I had seen beneath the God of Israel by the Kibar River, and I realized that they were cherubim. Each had four faces and four wings.

And so in this Ezekiel passage, it's heartbreaking. And Ezekiel itself is a bit of a mysterious book of prophetic writings. But it's heartbreaking.

You see the spirit of God leave by the east gate. Now we have something in Ezekiel 43. A little bit further.

This is a prophetic utterance about the future. And in Ezekiel 43, you see, this is verse 3. The vision I saw was like the vision I'd seen when he came to destroy the city, and the vision I'd seen by the Kibar River and fell face down. The glory of the Lord entered the temple through the gate facing east, and the spirit lifted me up.

And so Ezekiel's talking about a time when the glory of the Lord will return. And in our gospel reading for Palm Sunday in Mark, it makes mention that Jesus himself is coming from the east, very intentionally. That the spirit of the Lord will be returning to the temple.

Jesus himself says, I am the temple. Right? And so on this night, where you might expect a plan to, the disciples might expect an eventual plan to reassert temple worship in a new way. I mean, there's lots of ideas about what would it look like for the Messiah to return.

Instead, you get this cleansing element where Jesus himself embodies what is to occur next. That instead of a dynamic where you need to be, and I'm thinking about these unexpected moments, maybe these moments that you've been in. But instead of pushing into, I need to do everything I can to make sure, you know, let's think of American things that we want, right? That there's provision for my children.

That I'm able to have a sustainable job. If you're in a different life circumstance, that I have a good and fulfilling career in future. That I do well by doing right.

That hard work, fair play leads to a good life. All these American isms related to success and how, when we feel uncertain, we want to cling to that success. And here is Jesus in this act of foot washing, actually giving us the opposite example.

We don't have to be held captive by the sin that so easily entangles our lives. We don't have to be focused on any other reality besides the temple and the spirit living in us through Christ. This night, before he is betrayed in just a few hours as we go through it, he is not coming with an army.

He is not coming with a political agenda. He's not coming with, here are the 30 ways that we're going to chase the Romans out of Jerusalem. All these things could have been on the disciples' minds.

I'm not saying they all were. But this is a way that God had reinstituted his kingdom in the past. Instead, he's coming to turn our very desire to put ourselves in the center of our lives and say, no, I who could say that's what we should all be doing, instead I'm going to humble myself.

The God of the universe is going to humble himself and wash his disciples' feet and say, go and do likewise. He's going to be ultimately emptying himself out completely and totally. And in those words of communion that are also related to this evening, that's what we have week after week, this emptying of self, this turning and cleansing of the temple.

But it's not the sort of turning and cleansing that says, well, all the evil, out the door. All that is wrong, be gone. In many ways, it is a seedling that will grow and outgrow the sin that's in the world.

But the difficulties, the Judas's of our life are still present at this same table. And so as we enter into this Easter season and we start thinking to ourselves, I'm not yet, Lord, the sort of person I ought to be in Christ, which is sometimes maybe this can come up for you. I'm not yet where I wanted to be this Easter.

If you're like some of the folks I interact with day to day or week to week and pray with, I had a terrible Lent. I did nothing for you, Lord. Very Anglican problem.

However you enter into this evening, know that this is not the table or the process for the very, very good and those who try very, very hard. Instead, it is the grace to enter into your life as it is right now. It's the unexpected presence of God in our vulnerability, in our difficulties, in the moments that don't seem to add up.

And yet the glory and the grace of the Lord is present with us tonight. And as we move into the foot washing in a moment, I know it is it is a vulnerable act. It is uncomfortable at times, but however you enter in, whether you come up or you sit and pray, let the Lord touch you and know that this is the way he wants to serve you.

Let the foot washing be an example of the of the way that God is ultimately serving your greatest need in this moment. Because at this night of greatest importance, in this time that is commemorated for all time, our Lord Jesus Christ takes the path of humility and the path of service and commands us to do likewise. Let us pray.

“Gracious Father, we thank you for this evening and we thank you for this holy time. We ask that you would meet us whatever has happened in our weeks and in our days and wherever we are with our walks with you so that we might have Easter be born in our hearts into everlasting life. Amen.”

Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Edited by the Vicar.

Morgan Reed 12/22/24 Morgan Reed 12/22/24

Advent 4: Jesus in the Everyday Mess

Transcription

I'm Alexei Laushkin, a member here in on the vestry. Please pray with me. Gracious Father, as we approach you this fourth Sunday of Advent and our hearts are in preparation for this Christmastide, be with us and illuminate our hearts through your Spirit. In the name of Jesus, Amen. We're at the fourth Sunday of Advent and for many of us, mentally, we are in the Christmas season in our minds. Gifts wrapped, hopefully, family here or at least travel anticipated, hopefully, and all the pieces that go along with this season

Our scripture today talks about, in this fourth Sunday of Advent itself, our candle focuses on love, God's love for us in Jesus. In our scripture passages from Micah, the Psalms, Hebrews, and Luke, focuses on the meaning of Christ and many themes related to the fulfillment of God's promises to Israel and the foreshadowing thereof in this famous passage we have with Mary in the Magnificat. And one of the things that kind of animated my week and perhaps part of yours as well, is this idea of what does it mean perhaps to be Anglican.

So I was at a holiday party this week and we're talking to believers of different backgrounds and I was asked, well what does it mean? Corpus Christi, that sounds very interesting. And if you've been attending here for some time, were people set apart for uncommon prayer, right? Common prayer, uncommon transformation. What does it mean to be Anglican? And the question was, well does it mean that you have very stuffy services? That was the question that was asked to me.

I said, well no, it's not necessarily in the service type. But to be Anglican is to look back at the church's tradition and to think about what are the elements of the Christian life. Confession of sin, the partaking of the Eucharist, the disciplines and habits that cleanse our hearts and prepare us to live the Christian life.

And so one of the reasons that our tradition can have a C.S. Lewis, who many of you probably know, but the school my children attend is Charlotte Mason, also an Anglican. And our catechesis is a Good Shepherd, a Montessori type focus. It focuses on the person.

I said one of the reasons you can have a Charlotte Mason or a C.S. Lewis come from the Anglican tradition is they're really focused on the things that are uncommon for the Christian life and a remembrance of those things. So what are some of those things? What can we be thinking about as it relates to the season of life that we're in? When we look at our Micah passage, we see this focus on the restoration of the kingdom of God. Micah 5.3, therefore he shall give to them until that time when she who's in labor has brought forth, then the rest of his kindred shall return to the people of Israel.

And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord and the majesty of the name of the Lord his God, and they shall live secure. For now he shall be great to the ends of the earth, and he shall be the one of peace. And so in this sense of God relating to his people, there is this anticipation in this hope that God will return and restore the temple.

And what does it mean for the temple? Have any of you here been to Jerusalem? Just a little bit of, a few of you have been to Jerusalem. The temple system in Jerusalem was focused on a place, it's not like our sense of when we hear the word temple. When we hear the word temple, we might think, well it's just a really nice church, a really big church.

This may be one way we think about temples. Maybe it was a beautiful church, maybe like the National Cathedral, or perhaps the National Basilica in town. But that's not necessarily the role of the temple, which is this glorified place of just a nicer way to worship God.

No, in the temple system, you had a whole system of worship and sacrifice really for the remission of sin. And so you would come, there'd be various feast days, you would come to a place which was the Holy of Holies where God would dwell, in the sense that God being present and close to his people wasn't something that was easily thought about or thought on. And the people, you know, in this temple system, and if you think about the temple system itself, if you're a student of the Old Testament, this was foreshadowed in the tabernacle, foreshadowed further in the commandments given by God, in the sense that there are certain things that are required to bridge the relationship between God and man.

The temple system was meant to be a place where the restoration of true worship would happen between God and God's people. If you look at the sense of what Israel was asked to do, be a people set apart for the nations, be a people who exemplified the truth and the love of God to the least of these, right worship, what you quickly find is, in the Old Testament, something that you may find today, which is that God's people were not living up to the promise, right? And so you may come here today in the season of Advent, and you may look at religious people and religious institutions, and you may feel very similarly that God's people don't quite live up to that promise. So there's hypocrisy within the people of God.

There's hypocrisy, by the way, that they treat the least of these. They say one thing and maybe do another. There may be hypocrisy as it relates to, are they really that loving as a people? What does God do with this problem of religious people not living up to the way he has asked them to live? Well, throughout the Old Testament, because in Micah in particular, a disregard for the poor, disregard for the least of these, a profiting out of wealth, certainly in the prophet Jeremiah, the sense of the rich and the righteous doing many things with the temple, but their lives not reflecting a holiness of life, you were faced with this real reality of exile, meaning the temple is destroyed and the people of God are then put into exile.

And so a good chunk of the Old Testament writings about restoration, restoration of Messiah, is the sense that when will God restore his relationship, the temple, but also restore his love for his people in the sense of what the temple might mean for the nation. So when we're in the season of Advent and we're thinking about what is this meaning of Jesus's love that we have, what we have is a restoration of the temple in Jesus himself. What does that mean, a restoration of the temple in Jesus himself? Well, it means that when you discover the right relationship between God and his people, that the real focal point of that right relationship being made available to you is in Jesus himself and not necessarily in a temple system.

In other words, that gap between how we desire to live and God's ability to meet us in that desire is now placed in Christ. And this is a great miracle. This is a great cataclysmic change in our ability to approach God.

On a personal level, it's exemplified in profession of faith. So I grew up in a Christian household, meaning Christmas this time of year was probably one of the most magical times for me growing up. So I would tell, I'm an only child, I would tell my parents in Los Angeles, you know what we need to do? We need to go to midnight service.

Maybe you have kids like this. We go to midnight service and I want to hear all the songs because the songs of Christmas are joyful songs. This season is filled with the sense of joy.

And you can see even the world around us kind of reflects that joy in a way that's a bit unusual, in a way that's a bit magical. You'll see stores, I mean just right next to the church, we have a whole gas station, right, that plays Christmas songs. And you can turn on the radio and the lights go with the songs and there's a sense of joy and peace that's reflected in our culture that really isn't quite there in other parts of the year.

You'll have people who aren't necessarily people of faith or particularly religious who celebrate Christmas. You may have relatives for whom this is true. Christmas is this joyous time.

And for me, prior to confession of faith, Christmas was one of my favorite times of years. The songs were wonderful. There are songs that we would start playing.

I mean you even see it in the reflection of the culture of when do we start playing Christmas songs, right? But as in the Anglican tradition, we have this hopeful tension point, so we're not quite at Christmas, but it's because of the gift of what Jesus is as it relates to faith itself. So for me, by the time I'm 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, I would say that I had some experiences of God, a deep love of Christmas, but no real sense of the anchoring that faith can provide. The anchoring that it can provide.

What do I mean by anchoring? Because I realize part of when you talk about faith, it can be hard to potentially relate to if it's outside of your experiences. So I want to take a little bit of time about this in this extended meditation on Jesus and his significance in illuminating some of the scriptures as it relates to the temple. Well, one of the things that I think is easier to relate to if you have not had an experience of God is that, and even if you have, how to deepen that experience of God is a sense that when we love something, we tend to put a lot of focus and attention on it, right? So whether that is a spouse, whether that's a dating relationship, whether it's something that interests us, could even be a hobby, we put a lot of attention to it, right? It could be, for some, I know that it can even be gaming.

It takes a lot of different forms where we put our attention and where we put our time. And why do we do that, right? We even have the phrase in the culture, mindless scrolling, or we're going to have the Netflix binge. Well, what is that about? We're looking for something to either engage our interests or to help fulfill a need.

And part of what it means to have Jesus as the center of those things is that we're putting time and attention in with Jesus within our life circumstances. Well, that sounds really lovely, Alexei, but what does that mean? What does that look like? Well, I can narrate the last day and a half for me. So my household, I'm a father of five children, and we're now in the break season, so most of the gifts are ready.

But with our household, when we're on break, a lot of stuff can just kind of happen, right? Well, what do I mean by that? Well, you wake up early and one spouse didn't get any sleep. Why didn't they get any sleep? Doesn't sleep come naturally to a father of five? Well, no, not if your kid wakes up and has a nightmare or needs Tylenol or any number of things. So in this particular instance, it's Casey who didn't get the sleep, so I'm up early.

So what am I doing? Well, breakfast making. Okay, and then I'm thinking about the sermon, and then I'm thinking about preparation for that. And then what happens? Are kids just magically happy because it's break and it's time off? No, they're not.

They want to know what's going to happen today. And who's responsible for what's going to happen today? Well, in my household, it's the parent that has the energy, right? So that's me, right? So what am I going to do? Well, then you set aside plans. You're going to go outside, and hopefully it's going to be a nice little outing outside.

Was it a nice outing outside yesterday? No, it was really cold. The kids could only last about 10-15 minutes. So what is dad supposed to do? He's got a sermon tomorrow.

And then God's supposed to enter in. How's that all supposed to look, Alexi? These are nice words, but what does it look like? Well, for me, with my disciplines and love of Jesus, it was just a very short, Lord, have mercy. Lord, have mercy. Please help. We did some hot chocolate. We did dinner.

We played a board game of candy canes, which was a lot of fun. A lot of discipline, though, to get through that board game. And then it's the bedtime routine, right? And what's the bedtime routine? Is it just joyful and easy and peaceful? And where's Jesus? And where are all these disciplines in the bedtime routine when the kids are screaming? Well, it's another small prayer, Lord, have mercy.

Why is that prayer meaningful to me? Is it just to make me feel good? No, because in my teenage years, I had an experience with the living God, right? The living God. And maybe you've had these experiences in your life where the Lord comes to meet you and it's awe-inspiring. It's as wonderful as opening presents on Christmas morning, even more wonderful than that.

It's something you want to devote your whole life to, your whole interviews to. But if you're like people, going back to hypocrisy, our desire to do good, to orient towards God, to experience the grace of God, does not match the reality. Does not match the reality.

So we have to double, triple focus, be in a community where repentance and the communion, the Eucharist, which is not just a simple meal. It's the strengthening of our faith in encountering Jesus himself. It is a strengthening, if you're from this kind of background, it's a strengthening of the gift of the spirit in your heart so that you might be empowered.

But then you need reminders. So this morning I wake up going back to, what does this look like, Alexi, really? I wake up and I think, I'm gonna have lots of time to think about exactly what I want to say. Does that happen? No.

It's seven o'clock. After seven o'clock, people are sick. We're trying to figure out who's going to stay home.

Breakfast has to be made. What does this look like, Alexei? What does this faith look like? Well, worship. So I put on worship music so my heart can connect.

But honestly, you know, you end up feeling a lot of anxiety. You're running out of time. It's a car ride.

What do you do with the car ride? We're going listen to N.T. Wright, right? You listen to a little bit about these questions about the temple, what the temple means. And, oh, okay, but what does this faith look like, Alexi? Well, just before the sermon starts, I turn to Father Morgan. I say, well, what about water out of the Old Testament? Because that's where my headspace was.

And he encourages me to look it up. But there's no time, right? And so this sense of not having time is not a hindrance to the worship of God. It's not a hindrance to our orientation of what Jesus means in this love that we're asked for.

As our lives grow deeper in faith and as our lives become more complex, perhaps you're dealing with, your story is different than mine. Perhaps you're dealing with an illness at home. Perhaps you're dealing with severe loss.

Perhaps you're dealing with depression. Perhaps you're dealing with unmet expectations, financial concerns. All of these things can be difficult and weighty in a season that's supposed to be joyous.

However, seek ye first the kingdom of God is still the same. That God can come and meet us in our mess. That God can come and meet us in our dissatisfaction.

And when we encounter the Holy Spirit and we encounter this faith, our hearts are captivated by it. Our hearts are captivated by it. And our hearts are worshipful towards it.

And so what does this mean as it relates to the kingdom? Well, there's two songs that are lifted up before us. The one out of Luke for the Song of Mary and then another one that comes to mind is Exodus 15, the Song of Moses. What is the Song of Moses? Well, the Song of Moses is the song that happens when Israel escapes Egypt.

And he bursts out into worship, into thanksgiving. And it's a spontaneous praise of the Lord. And it makes sense.

I think if we were there and we had left Egypt and we had just escaped an army that was pursuing us, our hearts too would be prone to give thanks. And there are times in our lives where big things happen. Big, big things happen, even either collectively or money comes through when we didn't expect it or we were saved from something that seems just really difficult, an illness or I'm glad I wasn't there type moment for which our hearts give thanks.

But the Song of Mary is a different song. The Song of Mary is a different song. It's a very ordinary song.

It feels very much like it could come out of an Advent type season or a Christmas type season. What's happening? Mary is going to the hill country of Judea. And she is greeted by Elizabeth.

It's a family setting. And Elizabeth gives her this encouraging news. You know, she speaks in a loud voice, which if you're in a family gathering would definitely get your attention, would it not? If someone spoke to you in a loud voice.

And Elizabeth says, blessed are you among women and blessed is the child you will bear. But why am I so favored that the mother of my Lord should come to me? And I think we have a tendency sometimes to read the scriptures in religious words and almost think that we're like watching a play, maybe a great play out of Hamlet or Shakespeare. And we say to ourselves, of course that's what Elizabeth should say to Mary.

That just makes sense. It fits the beauty of the season. But that's not what's going on here, right? Elizabeth is saying something deeply personal to Mary.

With Elizabeth's words, Mary is experiencing a God moment, the kind we've been talking about, the kind Moses sings about, the kind I've been talking about just in the daily habits. And Mary breaks out into song over a very ordinary family encounter. It's ordinary and extraordinary.

It's ordinary in context. It's extraordinary in conviction. She is having a big God moment.

And Mary says, my soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble estate of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the mighty one has done great things for me. Holy is his name.

His mercy extends to those who fear him from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds of his arms. He has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.

He has brought down rulers from their thrones, but he has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry of good things, but he has sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and descendants forever, just as he promised our ancestors.

What an extraordinary response. It's related to the family context and it's beyond the family context. It's words for all time.

It is a profession of faith. Her faith that God had done great things for her, who was doing great things to the fulfillment, this fulfillment of longing. So what is happening in these verses? What does this have to do with temples and Advent and Christmas? Well, in these verses Mary is becoming a bridge from the Old Testament to the New Testament.

She is becoming a bridge as the mother of God, exemplifying what we will do in this age until the time of our passing, which is the true worship of God in our hearts. And these themes, I want you to notice, are not just themes about how wonderful it is that we have a connection with the living God. For me, one of the reasons I confess faith was the love of God was more real than the love I was experiencing on earth.

And so it was very compelling to me. It's extraordinarily compelling. And it captured my heart.

It made me want to read scripture right away. And if that's you today, meaning some version of that, go ahead and read the scripture. Talk to Father Morgan.

Approach people who can help walk with you in this journey and we'll be praying for you. But within that context, it's not just about good news for her personal soul, though that's there. Notice the good news for creation, the good news for creation, the good news for restoration.

He has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things. He has sent the rich away empty.

This is a news of restoration that the right things would be, the wrong things would be made right. That those who are in destitute would experience freedom. That the worship of the Lord would be matched by the way the Lord's people lived.

That they would be righteous and kind. What does that look like practically? Well, one of the things the scripture teaches us and one of our challenges is to give to all those who ask of us, right? Give to those who ask. That's hard, isn't it? Give to those who ask.

Ooh, going to that grocery store, I've got a meal to prep. I don't know this person's background. Words of Jesus, judge not, least you be judged.

I'm saying exercise prudence, of course, but prudence should not get in the way of kindness and love. This is love, Advent Sunday. The restoration, right worship, planned giving and spontaneous ability to love people who are in need right before you, right? We are not asked to be so busy as a society and a culture that we don't live the Christian life back to the beginning.

The Anglican way of life and service walk us through all aspects of the life of the church so that we might remember we are in need of repentance. We are in need of community. We are in need of generosity.

All flowing from the living head, Jesus himself, that transform our hearts. Not that we would be some righteous people removed from the world, living lives that cannot be emulated, but instead that Jesus would come and enter into our mess, our absolute mess. Mess made because the world is not well ordered.

Our lives are not well ordered. But the love of God dispels fear and brings wholeness of life. That's what we celebrate on Christmas.

We celebrate in this Advent season that we don't have to triple and quadruple our efforts to get close to God, but instead that God has come to us in our mess and has met us. And we pray that that love would be so available in us and to those who are in need of connection and hope from the living God, that they too would have a Christmas miracle. What is the biggest miracle? Faith.

Faith that animates and dispels all the difficulty. And it's not because religious people are good or righteous or do the right thing. They often don't.

But they follow the one who can and does meet us in the mess. Let's pray. Gracious Father, we thank you for this Advent season.

We ask that you would meet us in extraordinary love. We thank you that you're so gracious, so kind, that in following this Christian life, it's not about effort, but about our response to spontaneous love, just as it was with Mary, exuberant love, overflowing. May that be part of our lives during this Christmas season. Amen.

Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Edited by the Vicar.