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“The Saints Sheltering Us” based on Isaiah 25:6-9 and Revelation 21:16a

Our guts are clenched

We aren’t sure what comes next

Terrible options abound

It would be nice

to be on that mountain

or in the new Jerusalem

To be past the fears

to be assured of life

for things to be as God would wish

To be beyond sadness

to know no more grief

to be together in joy

Though the prayer echoes through the ages

thy kingdom come

on earth as it is in heaven

it isn’t

yet

Instead we gather

to remember the Saints

Bob who loved his wife too much to let her go

Harold who enjoyed absolutely everyone

Lois whose pure goodness flowed everywhere she went

Nancy who thirsted for knowledge and connection

Pat who loved kids to her core

Beryl whose devotion cared for many generations

June whose personality was its own source of gravity

We loved them

They formed us

They taught us

They loved us

These, the newest of our saints

now form the great cloud of witnesses

with those who where already there

So many we’ve loved and lost

and been formed by

So many saints

So much wisdom

resilience

humor

faith

care

love

joy

hope

Enough, it might seem

to make it through today

and tomorrow

This week

this month

this year

Enough to shelter this storm

Enough

There is love enough.

In them.

In us.

In God.

Thanks be.

Nov. 3, 2024

All Saints Sunday

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

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“Love God” based on Exodus 20:1-17 and Luke 10:25-28

The Gospel retelling of the central laws of Judaism are used in Luke as the opening to the parable of the Good Samaritan. I appreciate this opportunity to hear it stand alone though, a reminder that the central ideas of Judaism and Christianity line up.

Jesus says the answer that is in the Torah still stands, and then offers commentary on it, making sure that his followers remember that the neighbor who is to be loved is a neighbor in the most expansive of definitions.

The key commandments “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”’ I particularly love the way this is constructed as one commandment with two parts. There isn’t a separation between loving God and loving neighbors, they’re two sides of the same coin. We love God by loving our neighbors, when we love our neighbors, we are loving God. And yet, also there are ways that the two can be approached differently. Around here we LOVE taking care of each other and our neighbors in tangible ways, and showing God’s love by offering care and resources.

Sometimes, some of us, are less clear on what to do with that first half. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind,” What does that mean?

Perhaps sometimes we get confused by those who say that loving God is about living a particular type of pious life – one that doesn’t seem right to us. Or we get turned off by those who declare their particular prayer practices are THE WAY to connect with God, when clearly there are lots of paths. (For instance, those people who think getting up at 4AM to pray before starting the day. It is a valid choice, but not the ONLY valid choice.)

I’ve been enjoying reading about Celtic Christian Spirituality, and one of the big ideas in that world-view is that that the world is permeated with the Divine Spirit – that the world itself sparkles with wonder and awe and delight. That existence itself is an amazing miracle and everything we see – especially in nature – is glimmers with holiness.

Celtic Christianity also talks about the spiritual path as being one of remembering the sacredness of all creation, the value of all human life, the love of God that is everywhere in everything. It emphasizes that we are made good, that we know what we need to know already, we just need to remember.

Then, Celtic Christianity says, when we remember together, we can do things differently. We can build societies that reflect holiness and love and goodness and hope and mercy and grace. But first, we remember, and we remember by noticing the sacredness all around us and listening to it.

These days when I think about loving God, I think about it in those Celtic terms. I think about savoring goodness, noticing wonder, making space for awe. As you may have heard me say in other sermons, I’m all for other spiritual practices too! However, today, I want to focus on that attention to holy wonder.

It isn’t pious or self-righteous or prescriptive. It is just being, with gratitude. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength – and notice the wonder all around. Oh, and share love with others, because everyone is a part of God and beloved by God and worthy of love. (But we are already practicing that part.)

The 10 commandments as found in Exodus offer a further explanation of ways to live so that people love God and treat neighbors with love too. The first ones focus on loving God, the latter ones focus on treating each other well, and to my delight the middle one is the appropriate transition between them as it is both. The transition is the Sabbath:

Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. For six days you shall labour and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it.

That Sabbath is everything! It is a time for noticing the wonder and awe, for loving God, for rest, and for SHARING rest with everyone else. John Dominic Crossan reminds me that in the Bible the first resource that is distributed is REST, and all the other distributions follow after rest. First, rest, for everyone. First, wonder for everyone. First, space for everyone to be human, that is to stop working and just be, that is to connect with each other, that is to connect with God, that is to connect and BE and not be distracted.

Loving God and each other. See, its all over that Bible of ours.

Our essay from We Cry Justice today reminds us that societal laws should be laws that protect everyone, especially the vulnerable. That just laws create justice. And, that the “laws” of the Bible set good precedent for this – I’d note, including that EVERYONE gets rest regardless of statues.

It also reminds us of the Social Principles in the United Methodist Church and our stance on Civil Disobedience, in this case the new principle sounds a lot like the old one:

We support those who, acting under the constraints of moral conscience or religious conviction and having exhausted all other legal avenues, feel compelled to disobey or protest unjust or immoral laws. We urge those who engage in civil disobedience to do so nonviolently and with respect for the dignity and worth of all concerned. We also appeal to all governmental bodies, especially the police and any other institutions charged with protecting public safety, to provide appropriate training and to act with restraint and in a manner that protects basic rights and prevents emotional or bodily harm to those engaged in civil disobedience.

That is, there is an affirmation that the rule of loving God and neighbor is the highest order of law, and we have a right to stand for it, although there may be consequences.

I think that for many people hearing the stories of others, and sitting in nature, and singing the songs of God, and regular experiences of Sabbath, and all those ways people can love God and nature, can FORM US into people truly able to follow the most basic commandment:

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”’

It is easy to understand, and worth pursuing, but it isn’t exactly easy to live, is it?

Well, the more we love God and the more we love God’s people and creation, the easier it gets. Thanks be to God for that! Amen

October 27, 2024

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

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October 13, 2024
by Sara Baron

“For Everyone Born” based on Luke 14:7-14

Today, in our gospel lesson, we hear Jesus giving dinner party advice. Which is, let’s be honest, kind of unexpected from Jesus. To be fair, the Jesus Seminar thinks this narrative is Luke’s creation – it fits both Hebrew literature and Jesus’s priorities but seems a little bit too much like a narrative device. That said, it does fit both the values we hear throughout the Bible and from Jesus, so I think it is plenty worthy of our attention.

According to my beloved commentary A Social Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels:

“Dinners were important social occasions that were used to cement social relations. … It was very important who was invited. Moreover, accepting a dinner invitation normally obligated the guest to return the favor. Sometimes guests refused invitations knowing that the return obligation was more than they could or wish to handle.

… Table fellowship across status lines was relatively rare in traditional societies. In the inclusive early Jesus groups, it was an ideal that caused sharp friction on several counts. It was especially difficult for the elite, who risked being cut off by families and social networks if seen in public eating with persons of lower rank. That was especially so in the city (the setting for the text), where status stratification was sharp and members of the elite were expected to maintain it.”1

Well, that helps make sense of why this is in a gospel – this reflects the radicalness of the early Jesus movement and just how significant it was for people to dismiss the social norms. The early Jesus movement mixed people across class lines and dismissed the concept that anyone mattered more than anyone else and it was … well, just the opposite of how things worked then.

And maybe now.

While sometimes I want to think things are better now, when I look at social policy, I notice that our systems and structures treat those living in poverty as expendable. When it would be easier, cheaper, and more just ease people’s lives and we don’t – I can’t find many explanations other than we CHOOSE to enrich the elites at the cost of the lives of the poor and marginalized.

Maybe there isn’t social cost to going to the wrong party in the same way anymore- although that may depend on one’s social circle – but we still function as if some people are expendable and that’s the same core problem.

Thank God the Jesus movement saw through it. Thank God the Hebrew prophets saw through it, and Jesus helped too.

Thank God for each and every person who refuses to be at peace with anyone being expendable and truly believes we are all made in the image of God! My goodness it matters, and my goodness it requires us to keep reminding each other to pay attention!

It requires that we let go of hierarchies – for ourselves and for others. The gospels tells us to always sit at the bottom, instead of fighting for the top. And, we are to invite those whose presence will lower our social standing, instead of those who can help pick us up.

I wonder, if someone had followed Jesus’s advice in this (and I think they did), what it would be like to be one of “the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind” invited to a fancy dinner party for the elites. It seems like it might be terrifying. Would people have declined because they were playing by the rules and couldn’t repay the invitation – or agree because they were too hungry to care? Would they worry about what to wear and who else would be there? Would they be comforted or upset when others in their own social class were the other attendees?

Because, it turns out that the narratives of who matters are also taught to those society says don’t matter, and it isn’t easy to let go of it even when you know it is a falsehood.

What would it be like to be a host used to formal dinner parties with people engaging in social climbing, to suddenly be at a table with people you are used to ignoring and dismissing? Might it be uncomfortable? Refreshing? Would there be a lot of laughter? What might the host learn?

One of the things I learned in seminary studies of urban ministry is that people do best in mixed income housing situations. And they mean all people. Because we have so much to learn from one another. It benefits kids of families who are living in poverty to see other ways of life. It benefits those who are well off to see that those who are struggling are real people with gifts and passions, and to see their way of life. It creates stronger communities, with more empathy and more creative solutions when we don’t segregate ourselves – by any measure. Further, it encourages everyone to be generous with what they have which benefits all the givers and all the receivers. It makes generative space for everyone born.

It is funny to think of this dinner party. The host might teach about expected table manners, but the guests might be honest enough to admit what doesn’t taste very good 😉 Or exclaim with delight at a delicious bread the host had stopped noticing years ago. Or just be happy to be full, and remind the host that such a gift is one to be truly thankful for.

In our We Cry Justice reading, Carolyn Jean Foster imagines that shared table as a place for meaningful conversations between equal conversational partners – a pretty beautiful image that fits the Jesus movement well. She reminds us that people who are well off often try to solve issues of systemic poverty – but don’t actually understand them, “People who live in poverty know the solutions that would alleviate their suffering; they just do not have the resources. They need to be at the table.”2

In the world, this is still an oddity!! The world still seems to believe that those who are successful are more capable of solving problems for others instead of trusting that those who have experienced injustice are most capable of identifying their own problems.

But what a wonderful thing it is when people follow God’s way instead of the world’s ways! What a wonderful thing it is when we refuse honor, invite the unexpected guests, accept unexpected invitations, and learn from each other!

Now, you may not have noticed it, but socio-economic differences are not the only kind that exist. Around here they may not even be the ones we struggle with the most. I think for many of us, listening to those whose values differ from ours can be incredibly difficult, and even triggering. What would this gospel passage feel like if it said, “don’t invite those who already agree with you, invite those who are voting for a party line you abhor?”

Feels a little harder to me already. But, then I remember all the times God has worked in me to undermine my assumptions.

These floods and hurricanes recently have had me thinking about 2011 when there was major flooding in the town where I was pastoring. I ended up coordinating volunteers who came to help people, some of the holiest work of my life. It also put me in some positions I wouldn’t have otherwise agreed to be in. Some of the volunteers came from churches that didn’t permit women clergy, and refused to accept women’s authority – but they cared more about helping people than avoiding my leadership role. Some of the UM volunteers came from what are now GMC churches and we’d sit down and eat lunches on muddy former lawns and talk about things and realize how many places we disagreed – and how it didn’t seem to matter one little bit when we were both there to share love.

A few weeks ago I shared on facebook a recommended set of questions for just such a dinner party, “How to have conversations with people who disagree with you” which suggested asking:

Which life experiences have shaped your views?
Imagine for a moment that you got what you wanted in regards to this issue. How would your life change?
For those who disagree with you, what would you like them to understand about you?
What do you want to understand about those with whom you disagree?
What is this personally important to you?3

Those aren’t questions about changing each other’s minds, but they are about actually hearing each other- about re-humanizing each other – about learning! I may never agree with someone who wants to cut SNAP benefits, but it is entirely possible that I can learn form their perspective and come to a more nuanced understanding of what could work better than what we have now!

We are in conversations right now about creating some spaces to talk with those with whom we think we disagree. I think those are exactly the holy places Jesus wants to invite us into. The Gospel tells us so.

Thanks be to God for holy moments when we can speak and listen and be formed by our compassion into people even more able to love all of God’s people – everyone born. Amen

1Bruce J. Malina and Richard L. Rohrbaugh Social-Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003) “Textual Notes: Luke 16:1-16” p. 285-6.

2Carolyn Jean Foster, “50: Band-aids or Justice” in We Cry Justice, ed. Liz Theoharis (Minneapolis: Broadleaf Books, 2021) p. 217, used with permission.

3Source: Solutions Journalism, posted by “Unfundamentalist”

October 13, 2024

Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hers

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

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October 6, 2024
by Sara Baron

“Don’t Get in the Way” based on Psalm 133 and Romans 14:13-23

Every year when we prepare for World Communion, we ask ourselves where in the world our hearts are already extended. Which of our siblings in faith are we thinking of the most right now? Whose plight are we especially worried about? The whole world is hard to focus on – its just too big – but when we notice the reality of some of our siblings who are struggling, the compassion we send out to them helps us extend our compassion to the world.

This year we knew that our siblings in Western North Carolina and the whole swarth of the US Southeast impacted by Hurricane Helene hold our heartstrings. But so too do the Gazans, the West Bankers, the Lebanese, and those living fear in Israel. We hold the Ukrainians near and dear, but know was well that Russian citizens are struggling in the war path. Gaza and the Sudan are in the midst of catastrophic hunger, as are the Democratic Republic of Congo, Afghanistan, Yemen, and Syria.

So, given all that, we still listened to our hearts and let them lead us to our neighbors in the Southeast first and foremost. I looked up Western North Carolina bread and discovered Appalachian salt rising bread. It is a bread with a history of struggle – believed to be created by pioneer women on what was then the frontier who needed ways to help bread rise as they moved west. This is, of course, a story complicated by the fact that Native Americans lived in the lands they moved to – and there is an irony that the bread itself is made with ingredients that the European decedents moving west wouldn’t have known about if not for their Native American neighbors (cornmeal.)

We set the table to reflect those without abundance, even as we believe in God’s abundance. We thought about those who might not have tables, or whose tables likely lack tablecloths. We thought of those who now lack water, and may be drinking from bottled water for months.

Compassion has a way of leaking out. Because even as we think about those with damaged water systems, we thought of others who never had access to water, and of refugees trying to fill canteens along their way, and of those living in droughts, and of those whose water systems are unsafe… and the table expanded.

We picked one bread, even when sometimes we fill the altar and the table with bread and wheat in abundance, even when one bread can’t represent all the breads of the world, because while God has made abundance, many can’t access it. Some because of natural disasters, some because of human disasters, some because of the structures of human society. But also, one bread may represent all bread just as well as 10 or 20 do, because humans are SO diverse, and we make food in a lot of different ways. I didn’t know about this Appalachian Salt Rising Bread, and I’ve lived in the Appalachians for almost all my life. (I’m told Western New Yorkers may be familiar with it in some cases.)

Paul, in Romans, admonishes the followers of Jesus’s Way to avoid judgment and avoid hindering each other. I’ve always been particularly fond of this passage, and the way it acknowledges different places people may fall on their faith journey. Someone may need to avoid alcohol to be whole, if so, don’t tempt them with alcohol. Someone may need to avoid meat to meet their moral conscious. If so, feed them without giving them meat. If possible, avoid drinking alcohol or eating meat in front of someone who needs to abstain. Let people be faithful as they need to be faithful but most importantly DO NOT GET IN THEIR WAY.

I like the pragmatism of it, and the open-mindedness. I also adore the reminder not to judge, including not to judge how someone chooses to be faithful.

It fits this World Communion mindset of remembering how different we are. Some denominations will set their tables with wine – we don’t to make our table accessible to alcoholics, but each tradition has its value. Some will kneel at a rail, some will gather for actual meals, some will receive God’s gifts in groups, and the words of blessing will be offered in so very many different languages. And yet, in all the differences, one table remembering God’s love as known though Jesus.

Psalm 133 nails it.

How very good and pleasant it is
when kindred live together in unity!

Amen, and may God help make it so, and may we help too! Amen

October 6, 2024

Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hers

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

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September 29, 2024
by Sara Baron

“Kindom Come” based on Luke 14:16-30 and Revelation 21:1-4

Last Sunday several people mentioned that someone has been sleeping under the window to the church office. They weren’t complaining, just mentioning. Mostly because it is a bit of an unusual place for someone to sleep on this property. We all bemoaned the reality that we live in a society that doesn’t HOUSE all people, despite our collective wealth.

I’ve been thinking about it this week though. I’m simply aghast. The more I study the Bible and spend time with those who love God, the more the meta-narratives of capitalism lose their power. Because capitalism says life is a competition and you can win or lose. Worse, capitalism pretends it is an even playing field and blames those who can’t win for their burdens in life. Capitalism says the solution to hunger is to let hunger motivate people to work, the solution to people being unhoused is to let people get motivated to be housed, etc. Blame those who struggle. That’s the collective capitalistic narrative. Along with celebrate and praise those who “win” – even if the hoarding of wealth is exactly the reason so many people struggle so much.

In the face of the myths of capitalism, I am grateful to be a person of faith. I am grateful to spend time with people whose lives are defined by compassion. I am grateful to spend time with the Bible, and with the stories of Jesus calling out the “pre-industrial domination system” of his day so that we too can see the domination systems of our day.

More than anything though, I’m grateful to be able to hold a different vision of what things should be. It keeps me safe from those myths of capitalism that if we “just tweak it a little bit, everything will turn out fine.” I’ll admit it, sometimes it hurts to think about how things should be, because it clarifies how far we are from it. And yet, I’d rather dream with God of true justice than simply numb myself to the realities of the present.

In the end of Revelation, we are given an in depth consideration of the kin-dom of God on earth. That is, of God’s dream. The central idea is that there is no longer any distance between God and the people, and once that is true, all kinds of goodness flows. In fact, Revelation says sadness and even death will fall away. I guess, perhaps, the idea could be that if afterlife is union with God, then once there is no distance between God and people there is also no difference between life and death? I don’t know.

I do know that dreaming of life as God would have it be really matters. It grounds us. It aims us. It keeps us dreaming and hopeful. The Bible is full of clues about what God dreams for us. In the stories of the feeding of the 5000 we are reminded than when we trust enough to share what we have there ends up being more than enough for everyone. In the healing stories are are told that God cares about us being well – and being connected to each other so our communities can be well.

And in the gospel lesson today we are shown what it can look like to respond to violence with nonviolence. Jesus did set things off. He did. He was sharing God’s dreams and claiming them:

‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
   because The Holy One has anointed me
     to bring good news to the poor.
God has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
   and recovery of sight to the blind,
     to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’

The people respond, “isn’t this guy a poor man’s son, what right does he have to claim this dream as his to fulfill?” And then Jesus pushes their buttons by reminding them that God doesn’t care about human hierarchies – who is wealthy or important, who is powerful or healthy, who “matters or doesn’t.” God cares about PEOPLE, and Jesus claims God’s dreams as a person who also cares about people.

Time and time again we see that turning the world right side up is deeply threatening to those who hold undue power in the upside down world we know best. And those who hold undue power will keep it through any means necessary – usually starting with violence. So Jesus sets them off, they respond with violence, and he simply walks away.

How?

We don’t know. I mean, I like thinking of it like one of those cartoons where the people trying to harm someone are so chaotic that the intended victim just crawls out of the pile unscathed, but that’s probably only because I can’t think of any other way to conceive of it.

In a story that will become repetitive though, violence comes for Jesus. And violence is used to getting its own way. But Jesus sees through it all. He sees the violence for what it is, and what it intends to accomplish and he simply dismisses it. Maybe this story is really just foreshadowing his death and resurrection. Violence can bring its worst, and it can wreck incredible havoc, but God’s love CANNOT be stopped. Not even death stops God’s work in the world. You can’t beat it down. You can’t threaten it into obedience. You can’t stop God’s love.

You can take it to the top of the cliff intending to throw it off, and God’s love just walks away.

Violence is the domain of the empowered, but violence holds no power over God’s love.

I think, for me, remembering that nonviolence is the way of Jesus and the expression of God’s love is an inroad into understanding the kindom of God.

A place with no violence. No one is raped. No one is murdered. No one is abused. No one is neglected. No one is bullied. No one is threatened. No one is poked and prodded into being a smaller, weaker version of their full selves. No one lives in fear.

And to be without fear would imply that basic needs are being met. People are clothed, housed, medically cared for, fed well, and able to get good sleep. Because when you don’t have those things, fear creeps in.

I remember hearing Walter Brueggemann lecture on Pharaoh and the power of the Empire – and being surprised when he started to talk about the importance of universal healthcare. But for him, the Empire keeps people down with fear and violence, and to be free from that fear and violence includes being able to be healed when sick or injured. He then went on to talk about what would happen in our society if people weren’t obligated to work full time jobs to maintain and pay for healthcare. He talked about artists being able to make art, and parents being able to give attention to their children, about those who were sick being able to stop working to heal, those who had dreams for making things better being able to take the leap to follow their dreams. That all of that got easier if health insurance wasn’t tied to full time work.

The kindom. The fear-free kindom of God.

You see how nonviolence is an inroad, and once we start walking that path all sorts of wonders become possible? For me that idea of death and sadness going away is just hard to fathom, it is so far away. But the wonder that can come with each step towards nonviolence, that’s worth seeking.

What if society weren’t so scary? What if it wasn’t a competition to live? What impact would that have? I think perhaps it could improve everyone’s mental health, lower the desire to numb out with addictive substances, and make a whole lot of space for the true delights of life – chats with friends, games, walks in the woods, gardening, … laughter.

Jesus set things off. MLK Jr. did too. So, too, does this church. Its in your DNA. We travel the path of nonviolence, we travel guided by God’s unstoppable love, we travel towards fearlessness and resilience. We travel the way of the kindom of God, bringing others along with us and trodding down the path to make it easier for those who will follow us.

Dear ones, each and every time we choose love and nonviolence in our words and our actions, in our decisions and our values, we build the kindom of God. Our lives matter because we too are asked to turn the world right side up, and God is working with us to make what we do matter for the long run.

Imagine. Just imagine, what it will be like when fear can take the backseat and love can be in control! Its worth dreaming. Amen

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

September 29, 2024

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September 22, 2024
by Sara Baron

“Who We Are” based on Exodus 3:1-14a and Mark 9:30-35 (Homecoming Sunday)

I was once lucky enough to spend a term studying at Oxford, specifically at Magdalen College, where a portion of the campus was referred to as the “New Quad” and dated to about 1733. The day after I arrived back in the United States I heard on the radio about a “great historical find” of a 100 year old Buffalo Bill poster. I remember wondering what the people at Magdalen would call something so new as to be only 100 years old.

This congregation was founded in that same century as the new quad… although a little later. We were founded in 1789, and our current church building dates to almost a hundred years later, in 1872. We’ve now been in this building for 152 years, although like Americans, we don’t refer to it as the new church anymore 😉

Our history books tell wonderful stories of the faithfulness of our fore-bearers in faith, and their commitment to God and each other. They also tell stories of change! This is the 3rd church building this community built – 4th location, and as it was being built the first worship space as over the fellowship hall in a space we mostly don’t use anymore. The now Wesley Lounge was the original church office, and the education wing didn’t come along until the 1950s. Bill Isles once said he’d been fighting leaks in the roof since then.

I’m often awed as I look at the long list of pastors who have served this church – found on the walls just before you enter the Narthex. It is also notable how many years of one-year service there was in those early days. Maybe the biggest change in the list of clergy is the relatively recent inclusion of women, staring 45 years ago with Rev. Eileen Demming.

I also think about the technological changes that have happened over the course of this church’s history. When the church began the US Postal Service was brand new and Post Offices were just beginning to be build. This church saw the advent of the telegram, the radio, the telephone, electric lights, television, fax machines, the internet and email, cell phones and text messages, social media, and even Zoom. Thanks Thomas Edison and GE! These all impacted how life was lived, and thus how ministry played out. Honestly, 5 years ago we lacked live-streaming and Zoom meetings – can you even remember that??

This week we had a meeting to plan our fall retreat – and it was so interesting to hear the beloved traditions of the past meet the needs and values of the present day. I loved it because that’s pretty must the gist of everything. In Christianity we talk about the “Living Tradition” where we honor and respect the past, and use its wisdom, while bringing it into the present day and leaving behind what no longer serves us while adding in what we now need. Everything in church is Living Tradition as I see it – from the church retreat to the worship liturgy, from coffee hour to the church library.

We have this constant awareness of and gratitude for the past, while also holding the present and the future together. Over the course of the past year we’ve made some plans for more change. While this building was bustling with ministry activities in the 1950s, it is now more building than we really need. The maintenance and upkeep of the building take a lot of energy and resources, we love it, but it drains us. This church has decided to go forward, looking at ways this building can be a resource for the community while also becoming a source of financial stability.

I’ve was awed and amazed to watch the Holy Spirit at work in this community as this way forward was discerned. The part I loved best was watching various groups of people gather together with fear and trepidation about the future, and then think about what it could mean if our building could be used fo provide low-income housing AND financial stability, and see each group get excited and hopeful.

It is a huge change, and it is going to take a lot of work, but the decision is one that was made with incredible faithfulness. And, it is a continuation of the history of change and the reality of the living tradition.

In Exodus this morning we heard the familiar story of Moses encountering the burning bush and hearing God’s name. The New Interpreter’s Bible emphasizes the verbs of God in this passage. God says, “I have seen… I have heard… I have known… I will send…. I am.” It may just be me, but I hear the living tradition right there! God is “The Great I Am”, or “I Am Who I Am” or “I Will Be Who I Will Be” but God is also impacted by what God sees and hears, and acts accordingly. God’s nature is constant – loving mercy all the way through AND God is responsive to human needs and activities.

I loved that our “We Cry Justice” reading reminded us that after Moses saw the burning bush, and went to do what God directed, and the people were freed, and they came out to the wilderness, they returned to the burning bush. And it is there, in the place they are told that God heard them, saw them, considered them, cared for them, and that God simply was, that they work together to figure out the future as God’s beloveds.

In this story, the burning bush is sort of interesting in that it’s only purpose was to get Moses’s attention so that he’d listen to God. Also, there is an angel, but the angel does say or do anything, the angel’s only purpose is to get Moses’s attention so that he’ll listen to God. The bush isn’t the message. The angel isn’t the message. God just wants Moses to pay attention.

I suspect that God puts burning bushes in front of us multiple times a day. Thich Naht Hahn taught that in the communities he founded every time a bell rang the community members were to take a moment to stop, listen, and pay attention to the wonder all around them. He said that it changed the way they answered the phone. I believe there may be fewer bells and notifications in monastic life than modern life, but perhaps that makes it far MORE important for us to try that exercise. Every time a bell rings, a phone vibrates, or an app gives us a notification we too could stop, listen for a moment, and be grateful for the wonder around us.

I don’t know about you, but that’s a lot of times a day for me. And that’s just BELLS. It is also true that in every other human being we encounter a beloved of God, and they may each be a burning bush inviting us to attend to the wonder of each human.

Sometimes God calls us to sit still, and just be. Sometimes God calls us to move, and just be. (I think all of us are called to both at various times.)

I suspect we all could get better at listening to those calls. How do you get them? What is your burning bush? Could it be bells? Notifications? Other people? An internal sense of unease? Maybe just hungry – it may be that we want to think anew about the tradition of table grace, and face each time we nourish our bodies as the true and wonderful miracle it is, and take a moment to be grateful to God and all the people who make it possible for us to eat and drink each thing before us.

I wrote in the August newsletter about my hopes that we would take this election cycle and time of uncertainty as an invitation to deepen our spiritual practices so that we can respond out of being centered in God’s grace. I intended to keep talking about it through August but… well, life went ahead and changed on me and here I am back in the pulpit as of today.

It is so easy to be pulled off kilter by the truly concerning realities around us.

I believe the question for us today, the question of who we are becoming, is how we can care as deeply as ever, while also being able to hold our center. Psalm 1 talks about the people who delight in God as being like trees planted by streams of water, “which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither.” It is my conviction that God is a constant source of love, hope, peace, and joy. God is always with us, God is calling to us with our own burning bushes, God is accessible. We are able to connect to the source of love, hope, peace, and joy. We are able to be like trees planted by the streams – with deep roots in God’s goodness. And when do so, we are able to be stronger in our compassion for others AND our centeredness that cannot be shaken.

Many of us are worried about what will happen. We are also, of course, worried about what is happening and what has happened. Things are not as they should be, and even the most optimistic outcomes aren’t going to solve issues like hungry, homelessness, war, and violence. We are people of faith in the midst of a broken AND beautiful world.

The Bible is full of stories of being in a beautiful and broken world, and finding God in the midst of it. This is just how things go. We don’t get to wait for things to be OK before we deepen our faith. Faith happens in the midst of reality.

In Mark, we hear the line, “whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Jesus saw the hierarchies of his world, and he had no patience for them. He inverted everything he could, and led people to question the very idea that someone should be at the bottom (or top) of a hierarchy.

This is one of the core messages of our faith. This is part of who we are becoming as we connect more and more deeply with God. God’s unconditional love for all people becomes the most important truth and everything else fades away. Along with changing how we see others, this also changes how we see ourselves and loosens the grip of the narrative that we are supposed to compete to be “good enough to be loved.” We are loved. That’s the first thing we teach each other in faith. God loves us. All. That’s where it all begins, and I think even where it all ends.

We have a long history of sharing God’s love with each other and the world. And the changes that are coming are yet another expression of love. And, no matter what the world throws at us – let’s deepen our roots into God’s goodness so we are ready to respond with love and love alone. Amen

September 22, 2024

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

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July 14, 2024
by Sara Baron

“Leave a Little” based on Deuteronomy 24:17-21 and Luke 12:22-34

Our essay today started with a quote from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I want you to hear it again, it is very important:

“The church must reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool. If the church does not recapture its prophetic zeal, it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority.”1

Some of us, these days, are struggling a little bit with “the state” and both how it is in present and how it may be in the future. Dr. King reminds us of our role. Guide, critic, conscience, prophet. Dear ones, things are not as we nor God want them to be, and it is possible they’re going to get worse before they get better. Still, called to be guide, critic, conscience, prophet. In some ways we have little power. Doesn’t matter. The world won’t get better if we stop dreaming God’s dreams and sharing them. In these roles, we are people called to speak to the power of nonviolent, peaceful change.

We are to be a lovelight to the world. That lovelight shines out hope into the world, reminds people of the love in which we were all formed, directs us to peace – AND that lovelight illuminates injustice and brings attention to places love is needed, that lovelight doesn’t become complicit with harming the vulnerable, it seeks the common good, it shows us all the way when we fear there isn’t a way.

Our passages today remind us of God’s visions and what the lovelight is meant to illuminate. Deuteronomy tells the people how things should be, and that includes careful care of those who are struggling. Everyone is told to only go through their crops once to harvest, and whatever is dropped or forgotten should be left for those who are hungry. The people are told, as well, to be careful with widows, to offer justice to the ones without legal standing – the immigrants and the orphans. Those who had once been without power are told to treat those without power well.

Dear ones, we can’t create that world by sheer willpower, but we can love on it until it softens and moves in that direction. And our own actions can matter along the way – however it is that we practice “leaving our fields for the poor to be able to glean.” These are the means of peace.

In Luke we hear Jesus speaking – and I am reminded that he is speaking mostly to people who are vulnerable. Where in Deuteronomy the vulnerable were those without standing and without power – the widows, orphans, and immigrants, by the time of Jesus the Roman Empire had ensured a much larger portion of the population was struggling. Jesus mostly spoke to, for, and about those who were poor.

And he tells them not to worry. Which doesn’t really make sense. Hungry people worry about food. Those without clothes worry about clothes. But Jesus says, “don’t worry.” Jesus reminds them that God’s wish is for them to be well fed, well clothed, and unafraid. It is, I think, a retelling of Deuteronomy – God’s way is for everyone to have enough. Live your lives so those who have less than you do will still have enough. Leave a little, and everyone will get a little. God is interested in a society that cares for those who are the worst off, God judges society by how they care for their most vulnerable.

So, dear ones, that’s how we focus our interest and how we judge societies too. That guides where we shine our lovelight, and how long we hold it where people need to see.

The fields left for the poor to glean is a hard thing for me to wrap my head around – maybe it was for Jesus’s followers too. I think about lawsuits I’ve heard about where gigantic seed companies sue small farmers for growing crops without buying their seeds – when the seeds could well have been carried by the wind. I think about no trespassing signs, and gated communities, and even ancient Roman compounds presided over by a patriarch, and all of it sounds so different from an assumption that you should leave a little bit in your field, and let anyone who needs it come and gather it.

In the book of Ruth one of the plot points centers around this gleaning. Ruth and her mother-in-law were widows and had no one to advocate for them in the legal system of their day. Ruth went out to glean in Boaz’s fields and Boaz was unusually generous. He instructed water to be share with her, he asked the field workers to drop more than they needed to. He fed her lunch, he told the workers not to bother her even if she gleaned first. All very generous, all – we’re told – a form of courting. But nevertheless, the assumption in the story is that Ruth had the right go into the field in broad daylight and gather whatever she could, and take it home to feed herself and her kin. The gleaning wasn’t done in secret, or under the light of the moon, or under the threat of violence. The fields were left for those who needed them, and those who needed were WELCOME to come gather what they needed. Without fear. Without accusation. Without having to hide. Maybe even without shame. Just – able to get what they needed from anywhere they could find it.

Meanwhile, in our society, our Supreme Court ruled that it is ok to arrest people for sleeping outside – even when they are homeless and have no place to sleep inside. We made it ILLEGAL to be a person who has to sleep. Pretty much the poplar opposite of this Deuteronomy passage and the society it sought to create, huh?

Friends, things are not now as they should be. Things may get worse. The very purpose of a society – to care for the vulnerable – may continue to get lost in the shuffle.

What we can do is remain steadfast. Listen to God’s dreams, and let them soak in. Shine our love-lights. We can see and name what isn’t write, see and name how things should be. We can support each other in our dreaming. We can keep on listening for God’s nudges in our lives. We can soak in peace, hope, and love so we have them to share, we can seek out joy so we can keep on keeping on.

Gleaning is an old, old concept, but it is a beautiful one. It is one that maybe we can play with, work with, consider how it might be lived out today. Gleaning can give us hope about other ways to form society, about remembering that God’s dreams are reachable.

We can give each other hope. We can be peace.

We can give the world hope. We can be peaceable.

And the best part is that God’s dreams are available to us in the Bible, through each other, in nature, and through modern prophets. God’s goodness is everywhere, God’s love knows no ends.

The world may say there isn’t enough, but we say there is so much that even the gleanings are enough for those in need.

We can be people of abundance even in a world that believes in scarcity. We can be people of peace, no matter what the world brings.

We can be a lovelight. Let’s keep on shining. Amen

1Claire Chadwich “A Harvest for All People” in We Cry Justice (Minneapolis, 2021), p. 33.

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July 8, 2024
by Sara Baron

“Shared Burdens, Shared Resources” based on 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13 and James 5:1-6

When we gather at the communion table, we are reminded time and time again that we are united by sharing from one loaf, by receiving from one cup. We receive the body of Christ to be the Body of Christ. We TOGETHER do the work of Christ in the world, we are fed together so we can act together.

We also talk a lot in the church about being church family, it happens enough that it becomes a struggle in hymn selection! I love kinship language, but I want us to use the more inclusive “siblings” and instead of the far more common “brothers and sisters.” Not that brothers and sisters is bad language, its good, its just not BEST.

Our Biblical passages today are also about being united in Christ, and becoming family to one another, although they come at it from a slightly different angle.

As we heard in Rev. Dr. Theoharis’s essay, the often abused quote “He who does not work shall not eat” is not about condemning the poor and declaring it a person’s own fault they live in poverty. Instead, 2 Thessalonians calls out the rich who aren’t doing their fair share to care for the community. Because, those who can do so have been resting on their wealth without worrying about those who are starving. They are called on to share the burdens of the community, and to share the resources they all have.

Get up, the writer implores. The writer isn’t calling everyone to labor in the fields, but he is calling everyone to contribute.

Sometimes, I find my internal voices telling me that only some work counts… and somehow the work that “counts” is NEVER the work I’ve been getting done. That’s my own internal voices not God 😉

The writer is urging followers of Christ to interdependence. If one person has enough not to work, but their sibling in Christ does not, then the work is not done until the sibling can eat too!

John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist movements, grew up in poverty as a preacher’s kid and became a preacher. He was an unusually good preacher though, enough so that his sermons were printed and sold, and made a lot of money. John Wesley was convinced by his understanding of God and the Bible that his wealth was not his own, and so he gave it away. He shared what he had with those who were struggling the most. One winter, when he was 80 years old, the cold was especially bad and the poor were struggling immensely. John Wesley begged on the streets of London – not for himself but for those who were impoverished – the ones he’d already given his own wealth to.

I’m pretty sure that fits with God’s vision.

You may have noticed that as much as 2 Thessalonians pushes on the rich, James is harsher. James is vicious against the rich. (For some of us, this is pretty squirmy stuff. I’m not going to resolve that reality, but I am acknowledging it. It turns out following Jesus is hard.)

James says that those who are rich now will suffer later. All their wealth will rot and rust, and they’ll be held accountable for the ways their wealth was accumulated. “The wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.” James warns those who live in luxury build on the labor of others that they are culpable for the harm done to the others.

These passages are saying the same thing. We are responsible for each other. We are community, kin, interconnected. And if we treat others unfairly, that’s on us. If we are in community, we need to work for everyone’s well being. Following Jesus isn’t about getting comfortable or “taking care of number 1.” It is about expanding our hearts and our lives until we are able to truly “love our neighbors as ourselves.”

We now live in a world with fairly permeable boundaries. Where once it was easy to think of a neighbor as a person in one’s village or neighborhood, there are many ways we live in a global village now, and the needs of neighbors are immense and overwhelming. The degree of concentrated wealth in this world is also immense and overwhelming.

We are mean to help each other, inter-personally, and even when it is hard.

I do want to say that it is possible for a society to organize itself in DIFFERENT ways than the ones we’ve chosen. It is possible to have tax codes that move wealth down rather than up. It is possible to house all the people in our country, and in our world. It is possible to feed people healthy and delicious food. It is possible to take care of everyone. It isn’t even that hard. What isn’t possible is to take care of everyone while consolidating all the resources at the top. It can’t be done. This one can’t be both and. We can share and take care of each other or we can let a few people have ridiculous wealth. But the ridiculousness of the wealth at the top right now – it makes it impossible to care for the many.

The writers of the New Testament lived in a world like the one we live in. Jesus and James at least had very little power in that system. They all called on the rich to see and care about the poor, to notice how they’re treated, to take responsibility for not trampling on the poor.

Don’t trample each other, God says! Also, seek the goodness that comes in a society that cares for all of God’s beloveds.

And also, eat this bread, drink this cup – they united us, and that unity is a holy and wonderful gift. (And challenge.) Amen

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

July 7, 2024

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June 30, 2024
by Sara Baron

“God’s Subversive Tactics” based on Matthew 5:38-42 (please read!)

The groundbreaking scholarship on this Matthew passage isn’t new, it was published in 1992 by Walter Wink in his book “Engaging the Powers: Discernment and Resistance in a World of Domination.” I remember hearing it in High School, I’ve preached it before – here – and some of you have ridiculously good memories. But also, not all of you have heard me preach it before, and it is SUCH GOOD STUFF and so central to how we understand the entire Jesus movement. So, anyway, if you already know this stuff, prepare for an excellent review. And if you don’t, hold on to your pew – this is going to be fun.

Those of us who have heard this passage without Wink’s scholarship have probably heard it as an invitation to be doormats, right? “Don’t resist. Let someone hit you repeatedly. Be passive. Be… weak.” And, heavens that’s concerning, that anyone would teach such things in a church. What a way to empower domestic violence, maintain the status quo, and teach those in positions of less power (women, racial and ethnic minorities, children) that the Godly way is to accept the harm that comes their way.

However, if you accept a perspective that the choices are violence or nonviolence, I can see how you might conclude that following Jesus is NOT a violent way, so you have to pick passivity. BUT, this passage doesn’t mean that AT ALL, this passage is about a third way. This is about how to engage in nonviolent resistance to undermine the powers that oppress. This is Jesus speaking to people who lived lives of oppression. This is the way called nonviolent ENGAGEMENT.

It seems especially fitting on this day when we are also thinking about Juneteenth because when we celebrate the freeing of those who had been enslaved, it also makes sense to talk about the ways that people who were enslaved resisted. We sometimes read in history about slave rebellions, but there were lots of ways that people engaged in regular, consistent resistance of the oppressive power of slave holders too. They pretended to be ill. They worked slowly, and badly. They “lost” or “accidentally damaged” equipment. They took what they needed, or just what they wanted. Papers were displaced. Things caught on fire. I suspect a lot of individuals were geniuses at such work, engaging in subversive actions that created immense disruptions without ever seeming to be fault.

Slave holders tried to break the spirits of those they enslaved, but the core human dignity, the reality of imago dei (that we are all made in the image of God – ALL OF US), seems to be quite resilient. And I think that’s the core of what Jesus was talking about too.

Let’s unpack each of Jesus’s suggestions. “Turn the other cheek.” First thing to know – you didn’t use your left hand for anything in ancient society because toilet paper wasn’t a thing yet and left hands were used for “unclean tasks.” This was a hard and fast rule, even gesturing with the left hand was illegal and carried a strict punishment. So, we are talking only about right hand hits. Which means that a person who is hit on the right cheek has been backhanded, which was ALWAYS AND ONLY diminutive. It was a common and normal way of putting people in their place. “A backhanded slap was the usual way of admonishing inferiors. Masters backhanded slaves, husbands, wives; parents, children; men , women; Romans, Jews.”1 Most people would cower.

One did NOT backhand a peer, it was actually illegal.

But if people can only hit with their right hands, and one has already been backhanded on the RIGHT cheek, then to turn the other cheek – to invite another hit – is NOT to passively accept violence. It is to invite the person who is trying to humiliate you to either back down, or treat you like an equal. “This action robs the oppressor of the power to humiliate. The person who turns the other cheek is saying, in effect, ‘Try again, Your first blow has failed to achieve its intended affect. I deny you the power to humiliate me. I am a human being just like you. Your status does not alter that fact. You cannot demean me.’”2

Which, then, puts the one who hit into a conundrum. Which is EXACTLY Jesus’s point. (Can you now see how this advice fits the one who also told parables?) “In that world of honor and shame, he has been rendered impotent to instill shame in a subordinate. He has been stripped of his power to dehumanize the other.”3

The second image is to give cloak along with coat, right? We are going to call them the outer-garment and the inner-garment so we can track it. Note that impoverished people only had those two garments, their were not backups. And, Hebrew Scriptures provide for someone to be sued for their outer-garment:

If you lend money to my people, to the poor among you, you shall not deal with them as a creditor; you shall not exact interest from them. If you take your neighbor’s cloak in pawn, you shall restore it before the sun goes down; for it may be your neighbor’s only clothing to use as cover; in what else shall that person sleep? And if your neighbor cries out to me, I will listen, for I am compassionate. – Exodus 22:25-27

Note that even in this passage it is clear that only a poor person would be in this situation, and it is so tenuous that you can’t even take the outer-garment consistently, you have to take it for only the day so they can sleep with it at night. It seems, even in this passage, that the creditor is being pretty severely demonized for deciding to demand retribution on the poor, right? (Matthew’s language is wrong in implying it is the inner-garment, just ignore that – Luke gets it right, it is the outer-garment.)

Back to Wink, “Indebtedness was endemic in first-century Palestine. Jesus’ parables are full of debtors struggling to salvage their lives. Heavy debt was not, however, a natural calamity that had overtaken the incompetent. It was the direct consequence of Roman imperial policy…. By the time of Jesus we see this process already far advanced: large estates owned by absentee landlords, managed by stewards, and worked by tenant farers, day laborers, and slaves. It is no accident that the first act of the Jewish revolutionaries in 66 C.E. Was to burn the Temple treasury, where the records of debts was kept.”4 And Jesus is talking to people at the bottom of this system. “Why then does Jesus counsel them to give over their undergarments as well? This would mean stripping off all their clothing and marching out of court stark naked! Imagine the guffaws that must have evoked. There stands a creditor, covered with shame, the poor debtor’s outer garment in one hand, his undergarment in the other. The tables have already been turned on the creditor. The debtor had no hope of winning the case; the law was already entirely in the creditor’s favor. But the poor man has transcended this attempt to humiliate him. He has risen above the shame.” You may remember that there was a taboo against nakedness in ancient Judaism, but it turns out the larger taboo was against SEEING someone’s nakedness, not being naked.

“Jesus provides here a hint of how to take on the entire system by unmasking its essential cruelty and burlesquing its pretensions to justice. Here is a poor man who will not longer be treated as a sponge to be squeezed dry by the rich. He accepts the laws as they stand, pushes them to absurdity, and reveals them for what they have become. He strips naked, walks out before his fellows, and leaves the creditor, and the whole economic edifice that he represents, stark naked.”5

The third one – the “second mile”. Roman soldiers had the right to require civilians to carry their heavy packs for a mile – a form of forced labor. People hated it. However, if they asked someone to carry it for MORE than a mile, they were subject to discipline, and the discipline could vary immensely, including really severe punishment. So the soldiers regularly demanded their packs be carried a mile, but ONLY a mile. As he has in the two prior examples, Jesus recommends to the disempowered that they reclaim their human dignity even in the midst of oppression.

Wink says, “Imagine the soldier’s surprise when, at the next mile maker, he reluctantly reaches to assume his pack, and the civilian says, ‘Oh no, let me carry it another mile.’ Why would he want to do that? What is he up to? Normally , soldiers have to coerce people to carry their packs, but this Jew does it so cheerfully, and will not stop! Is this provocation? Is he insulting the legionnaire’s strength? Being kind? Trying to get him disciplined for seeming to violate the rules of impressment? Will this civilian file a complaint? Create trouble?”6 By messing with the soldiers head, the pack-carrier has taken back their human dignity and reclaimed their own power to choose! Regarding the soldier “If he has enjoyed feeling superior to the vanquished, he will not enjoy it today. Imagine the situation of a Roman infantryman pleading with the Jew to give back his pack!”7

He continues, “Jesus does not encourage Jews to walk a second mile in order to build up merit in heaven, or to exercise a supererogatory piety, or to kill the soldier with kindness. He is helping an oppressed people find a way to protest and neutralize an onerous practice despised throughout the empire.” Now, one final note on these suggestions, all of them. “Such tactics can seldom be repeated. One can imagine that within days after the incidents that Jesus sought to provoke, the Powers That Be would pass new laws: penalties for nakedness in court, flogging for carrying a pack more than a mile! One must be creative, improvising new tactics to keep the opponent of balance. To those whose lifelong pattern has been to cringe before their masters, Jesus offers a way to liberate themselves from servile actions and a servile mentality. And he asserts that they can do this before there is a revolution.8”

That is, Jesus so deeply believed that everyone was created in the image of God and deserved to have utterly wonderful lives, that he took the time to assess the situations and come up with some really subversive answers to the problems people faced, solutions that restored their dignity. There is, you may have noticed, one more piece of advice, and it is one that is a challenge to many of us. “Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.” Wink says, “Such radical egalitarian sharing would be necessary to rescue impoverished Palestinian peasants from their plight; one need not posit an imminent end of history as the cause for such astonishing generosity. And yet none of this is new; Jesus is merely issuing a prophetic summons to Israel to observe the commandments pertaining to the sabbatical year enshrined in Torah, adapted to a new situation.” That is, for those who were poor to break out of the realities of staggering interest and taxes, they need to work together and not apart. They needed to overcome the stragety of divide and conquer with radical sharing.

In each of these recommendations in this tiny little piece of the gospel, Jesus recommends third ways. Neither passively accepting the oppression that dehumanizes the people nor fighting violence with violence. He recommends, wit, humor, solidarity, and making visible the problems that the system created. We don’t face exactly the same issues, but the SPIRIT of these commandments are a gift to us as a playbook for how to deal with oppression. Violence begets violence. Passivity in the face of violence changes nothing. But there are third ways, and I will say that I think God is really in favor of third ways and I’ve noticed that when I am stuck between two unacceptable options, and sit with them (and with God), God often nudges me toward a third way – a far more creative one that I could find on my own.

God calls the world from violence and oppression to peace and the radically embraced humanity of all. And the way from here to there, it turns out, involves creativity, wit, and humor. Let’s go! Amen

1 Walter Wink, Engaging the Powers; Discernment and Resistance in a World of Domination (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992) p. 176.

2 176.

3 176-7.

4 178.

5 179.

6 182.

7 182.

8 182-3.

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

June 30, 2024

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June 23, 2024
by Sara Baron

“Step One: Prepare the Soil” based on Hosea 8:1-7, 10:12-13 and Matthew 13:1-9

In my household we are determined, amateur gardeners. To be fair, we like it that way, we are well aware that there is a whole lot of knowledge out there if we wish to consume it. But mostly we like putting seeds in soil and watching to see if they’ll grow, and putting plants in soil and seeing how they’ll grow.

We’ve learned SOME things along the way. Among them: it is unwise to plant a garden in a place it is hard to water it. It is even more unwise to plant a garden in a place it doesn’t get enough sun. Oh, and also, not getting enough sun isn’t a problem that can be overcome. Let’s see – we’ve learned seedlings can’t be ignored for very long 😉 We’ve learned you CAN have too many tomatoes (but it is still a fun problem), and raspberry bushes grow AMAZINGLY fast – in the sun 😉 We’ve learned that full grown, orange pumpkins can HIDE in high clover. That was fun. This year I learned that I can mess up seeding soil, hopefully I won’t repeat that one.

And, of course, we’ve learned about weeds. Weeds are a funny – thing they’re very localized. Every time I’ve moved in my adult life I’ve had to learn by trial and error which things growing were weeds and which weren’t, and when we moved two years ago – all of 0.8 miles from our last home – we found ourselves fighting some very different invasive species. I’m not terribly fond of using the label weeds lightly – dandelions are a delight after all, but I’m OK with using it for invasive plants. Mostly. OK, I worry even then. God did create us all, even the ones labeled weeds.

But when I think about all I’ve learned about gardening – and heavens all I COULD learn about gardening – I’m also reminded of how radically different growing things is HERE versus in the climate of the Bible. To be fair, I haven’t attempted to grow anything in the Middle East., but I did spend 3 years in Southern California and on our seminary campus we had a Biblical garden because the climates were so similar it was easy to cultivate plants we wouldn’t otherwise know but read about in the Bible.

And Southern California, if you don’t know, is DRY. As a Northeastern-er, it boggled my mind how DRY it was. Much of the populated area is watered, so you see these green lawns that look a lot like the ones here (but take a lot more chemicals to maintain, and are really a terrible use of water…anyway…) but sometimes along a stretch of a road there would be spots that weren’t watered and they’d just be … barren. Like rocks and sand and nothing growing there. And my northeastern brain was just …. shocked? Amazed? Horrified? Mesmerized? I don’t know. It was really weird. I mean, we have raspberry pushes that sprout up in between the concrete blocks of a garden wall, or in mulch barely covering that plastic weed cover stuff. You can’t stop life around here if you TRY. Right? I mean, I’ve used a weed-wacker in the non-existence space between the road and the sidewalk – MANY TIMES.

But in the desert, where there isn’t water, there is just… space.

Which is helpful for me to remember when I hear this parable. Indeed, it is hard enough for things to grow in that climate that they can’t overcome being in rocky ground where roots can’t get down far enough to reach enough water. Plants can’t overcome being in the midst of thorny weeds, it is just too hard to fight for survival.

But oh, the seeds that do get into good soil, the things that they were able to do! Step one – good soil!

Yet, I think, it didn’t just take getting the seeds into good soil – although that part is imperative. It took getting them into good soil, and then getting water to them. It took getting them into good soil and then keeping those thorns from grown into the field. It took tending.

The sower did the first part and WOW, look what happens when seeds fall in the right spot. Seriously, this is why I garden – because I like this part. It is amazing, and wonderful, and also reminds me of the great mysteries within life itself, and the wonder that is life, and the ways that God is more than what we can perceive. We know that seeds need soil, water, and sun, but the something that helps a seed sprout is still a little miracle, every time, one that I imagine makes God smile too.

The growing isn’t done by sowing alone, but the sowing and the spouting is a particularly awe inspiring part. And, as Paul tends to remind us, it can be OK that one person sows and another waters and another tends, each part matters! And I think there is wonder in ALL of it. In each and every step.

Hosea urges the ancient Israelites to pay attention to what they’re planting. To stop plowing wickedness, so they stop reaping injustice. So they can stop eating lies. And instead to sow righteousness, and reap steadfast love. To see the harvest that can come come from sabbath and rest (for the land just like the people), to seek God and God’s goodness and let the kindom come.

Sow the seeds of goodness and wonder, says Hosea.

And watch the miracles unfold, says Matthew.

And then, in our book of modern day prophets, We Cry Justice, we are told to keep on sowing despite it all. To sow hope as an act of faithfulness. To plant peace because of war – because alternatives are needed. To seed love so that we can grow it long enough for it to bear more seeds to grow next time around.

There are a LOT of weeds in our societal garden – thorny ones. There are a lot of hungry birds swooping down to steal the seed. There are plenty of huge rocks, and there are places with too much sun and some with too little and heavens but most of the best soil is being cash-cropped by huge corporations spraying poisonous insecticides onto our food and into our water.

Which, I think, is the 21st century version of what Matthew was talking about anyway!

But God’s abundance made a lot of good soil, plenty of rain, and enough sun that shines on all of us. We can grow our contemporary versions “victory gardens” of peace, hope, and love. Even better, this applies both to the physical gardens some of us tend, and even more so to the metaphorical ones in our beings and our society.

Perhaps this is a good reminder to consider how our lives are being seeded -and with what. And what we are able to do to nurture the seeds we want, and to weed out the ones we don’t. How God is always there to help us tend the goodness within us, any time we’re ready to tend to things with God.

With God, we get to chose to hope, “despite of all the evidence.” We God, we get to pick peace, because God has planted it in our souls. With God, get to share love, because we have been lucky enough to know love.

Dear ones, I really do mean it. I think every seed that grows is a little miracle. Tomato, pepper, eggplant, hope, peace or love. And I’m grateful for our writer this week who said, “Whether we win or lose in the short term, we struggle against the wickedness of immoral policies. We sow righteousness as we plant seeds of organization and leadership and nourish them for times of even greater possibility.”1 That plants seeds in me – of hope, peace, and love. Thanks be to God! Amen

1Daniel Jones “A Hurt and Angry God” in We Cry Justice (Minneapolis, 2021), p. 149.