"Conversion: Living into Hope”

Act 9:1-20

January 25, 2009
The Third Sunday after Epiphany

Preached at Kingston Road United Church by the Rev. Richard C. Choe

* * *

9Meanwhile Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest 2and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any who belonged to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. 3Now as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” 5He asked, “Who are you, Lord?” The reply came, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. 6But get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.” 7The men who were traveling with him stood speechless because they heard the voice but saw no one. 8Saul got up from the ground, and though his eyes were open, he could see nothing; so they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus. 9For three days he was without sight, and neither ate nor drank.
10Now there was a disciple in Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, “Ananias.” He answered, “Here I am, Lord.” 11The Lord said to him, “Get up and go to the street called Straight, and at the house of Judas look for a man of Tarsus named Saul. At this moment he is praying, 12and he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he might regain his sight.” 13But Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints in Jerusalem; 14and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who invoke your name.” 15But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel; 16I myself will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.” 17So Ananias went and entered the house. He laid his hands on Saul and said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” 18And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and his sight was restored. Then he got up and was baptized, 19and after taking some food, he regained his strength. For several days he was with the disciples in Damascus, 20and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.”

* * *

"Broken Open"

Mark 1:4-11

January 11, 2009
The First Sunday after Epiphany – The Baptism of the Lord

Preached at Kingston Road United Church by the Rev. Richard C. Choe

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4John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. 6Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 7He proclaimed, ‘The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. 8I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.’

9 In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’

* * *

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

Mary Oliver, a poet, asks us the question in her poem, The Summer Day: “What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

Well, I spent my one wild and precious day at a Spa last Monday. Kim gave me a gift certificate for a “Gentleman’s Timeout” for my birthday in 2007. The brochure stated that it was for “an Aroma Anti-Stress Massage, a Gentleman’s Facial and an Intensive Spa Pedicure.” It took me over a year to make an appointment. And with some trepidation I finally entered the Spa on Monday.

For three hours, I was thoroughly kneaded, plucked, and filed to be beautified. At one point, right after my face was plucked; I said to the beautician that I now have more respect for women and men who take care of themselves diligently. “Beauty is pain” was the reply. I nodded to her in agreement as I was wincing from the pain. The beauty treatment may not show well on my face but I can tell you how soft the soles of my feet are. “Like night and day” was Kim’s remark.

These are some of the thoughts that whizzed by me as I was being kneaded, plucked, filed and beautified.

· I was glad that I did not have any knotted muscles. Knotted muscles would have meant more pain.
· I was amazed at the kind of high-tech machines at the Spa, such as the high frequency tool the beautician used on my face. It sparked! I realized that science was not only sending people to outer space but also helping us to look good on earth.
· And, I had no idea I was carrying so many dead cells! (At least a pound’s worth.)

I am not sure whether I would be volunteering myself to another beauty session in the near future; however, my smooth feet remind me of what is possible when I actually offer myself to be cared for. The whole experience was like being awaken to a realization that I had a body. And that it wants to be cared for and tended to. It was as though the Spa experience broke open my body to a new way of being.

On one summer day of his life, Jesus waded into the River Jordan, moved toward John the Baptizer, was pushed deeply into the water, and experienced his whole being broken open to the Spirit of God as he emerged from the water. That’s how the Gospel writer Mark opens his Gospel – the earliest one of the four Gospels in the Greek Testament.

Mark does not mention any stories of Jesus’ physical birth. There is no miraculous story of virgin birth. No animals in the manger. No Star and no Magi. Nothing about where and how Jesus was born. For Mark, it is the baptism of Jesus – the experience of the conversion of Jesus – that marks the beginning of Jesus of Nazareth of Galilee whom he proclaims as the Son of Man, who is the Son of God.

For Mark it was the spiritual birth of Jesus that was the beginning. It was the baptism – a ritual that signifies one’s death from the ordinary life (once born) into a renewed life (twice born) – that marked the beginning of Jesus’ ministry.

In the summer of his life, Jesus of Nazareth of Galilee hears the question of his life from a fiery preacher named John the Baptizer: “What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” Jesus’ first response to the question was to surrender himself to God.

In our time surrender is understood as a sign of defeat. It is a sign of weakness. It is something you have to do when you have no choice left. It is inconceivable that anyone would voluntarily surrender to anything these days. It conjures up images of humiliation. “Surrendering is for losers” is the message we often hear in our society. “Never Surrender!” is a war cry even in the peace time.

To be strong, to be tough, is what we desire in life. To be strong is to be independent. Being strong – like being healthy and wealthy – is the message we want to convey to others. Being abundant – to have much and to have more stuff – is the sign of being strong.

Surrendering things we possess, letting go of things we have, is not easy for us. I often said to myself whenever I was packing for a move that I had no idea how much “junk” I had accumulated. Something within us drives us to relentlessly acquire and accumulate.

I read a story of a dictator who had a house in every major city in his country. He also had twelve limousines, largely unused. He liked to look at them from his balcony. In the end, he died at the age of fifty after being shot during a military coup d’état.[i] It sounded so absurd that anyone could live in such extravagance while most of people in his country were eating one meal a day if they were able to afford it. But such displays of lavishness do not only happen in faraway places. Think about the displays of excess and cupidity in our country.

Look at the countless homeless people sleeping in the streets of Toronto under the gigantic TV screens that are lit up by the spectre of products being pushed as signs of wellbeing. I just read an article about Igor Kenk who is accused of being a thief and hoarder of more than 2,700 used and stolen bicycles in Toronto.[ii] Kenk may be an extreme example of cupidity in our society. Then, I realized my own lust for shoes.

My friend, Glenn, used to have a big sign in his office: “The one who dies with the most toys wins!” Although he meant it as a satire on materialism, some read the sign as an encouragement. Well, you are what you read.

If surrendering wealth and material things are difficult, surrendering things within oneself to a higher power or letting go of self to God seems impossible. Letting go of anger, resentment, pain – things you carry within you that have been damaging you and will ultimately destroy your wellbeing – is so much harder than letting go of the physical things. It is a struggle to let go of the emotions and stuff within us even when we know that carrying them are damaging our being and our relationships with others. But there are things we are totally unaware. Ignorance is not bliss when it comes to our wellbeing – both physically and spiritually.

How do we let go of the things within us that harm us? How do we break ourselves open to a different way of being?

Richard Wagamese shares his experience of conversion in his newspaper column, One Native Life, in Calgary Herald. Wagamese writes that the anger resulting from the legacy of the Indian Residential Schools drove him for a long time. When he was in his late 40s he realised how much that anger had hurt him. He had had enough. And he searched for ways to let the anger go.

This is how he describes his letting go:

“One day, I walked into a United Church and forced myself to listen. It was hard and I wanted to leave, but there’s a sense you get when the big events of your life are unfolding and I sat there. …
The minister spoke … I heard compassion in his voice. There was no inferred superiority, no judgement, liturgy or doctrine. Instead, I heard the very human struggle to be spiritual in a hard world.
I went back to that church for weeks. The message I heard was all about humanity, the search for innocence, comfort and belonging. There was nothing in the message that was not about healing. I heard compassion talked about, love, kindness, trust, courage, truth, loyalty and an abiding faith that there’s a God, a Creator taking care of all of us. With my eyes closed, there was no white, no Indian, no difference at all and exactly when my anger disappeared I do not know.
That church changed my life. … Healing happens if you want it bad enough. … Every spiritually enhancing experience asks a sacrifice of us and in this, the price of admission is a keen desire to be rid of the block of anger.”[iii]

Baptism was the event through which Jesus was broken open to the Spirit of God. The ritual of baptism signifies a keen desire to let go of a life centred on oneself and a transformative move into a life centred on one’s relationship with God, with one’s neighbours. It is about letting go of control of self focused on wants and desires of oneself. It is about healing oneself by consciously becoming part of the whole – becoming an integral part of God and the rest of God’s creation and letting them become part of you.

When Jesus waded into the River Jordan and was baptized by John the Baptizer, Jesus was broken open to the Spirit of God. In his letting go of the self Jesus experienced God with him – God in him, God around him, and being in God. And through this experience of letting go and being broken open Jesus himself became the sign of God with us, Emmanuel, for Mark and the rest of the followers.

The baptism of Jesus, the spiritual awakening of experiencing God’s immediate nearness, became the point of beginning for the ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. In and through his experience of baptism, Jesus experienced God as near and fully present, not far and beyond reach. Baptism – a symbol of emptying of self and surrendering self to God – was the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry that culminated in emptying of self on the cross.

Mark expresses it this way:

“And just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’” [Mark 1:10-11]

Author Michaela Bruzzese cites James Cone, an African American theologian, in her reflection on today’s passage – “Jesus embraces the condition of sinners, affirming their existence as his own.” And she writes, “Those brave enough to journey to the wilderness to seek salvation find it waiting for them in the form of Jesus – who walks with them.”[iv] The experience of baptism for Jesus was the experience of being one with God, his neighbours and the rest of the creation.

Our life journey is full of parched experiences in the desert and sudden turns in the night. There are times when we wonder whether we will make it to the end or when we fear that our end may come too soon. There are times when life seems to be one long solitary walk through the wilderness. In those unsettling times, we are often tempted to look to quick fixes of material things to fill our sense of emptiness or to numb our spiritual longings with drugs of our choice.

The story of Jesus’ baptism reminds us that our life truly and fully begins when we surrender ourselves to be broken open to the Spirit of God. No “Gentleman’s Timeout” or “Spa Retreat” in itself will really satisfy our longing for healing within us. No amount of outward beatification of our physical selves will genuinely fill the spiritual hunger deep within us.

What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? How do you journey to the wilderness and be broken open to God’s Spirit?

After experiencing painful upheavals in her life and experiencing a sense of transformation through her healing journey, Elizabeth Lesser wrote a book to share her insights and the wisdom of those she met in her healing journey. “Will we be broken down and defeated, or broken open and transformed?” was the question she grappled with in her book, Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow. Lesser noted how ironic it is “that the difficult times (that) we fear might ruin us are the very ones that can break us open and help us blossom into who we were meant to be. … It was only through turning around and facing (her) shadow that (she) was able to break open into a more genuine and generous life.”[v] Healing, for Lesser, is a process of rising out of the ashes of a former self and into a new way of being. Healing is about going deep within oneself.

When we take a risk to venture deep within us and face our own shadows – when we truly surrender ourselves to God – we will find ourselves broken open for the Spirit of God to enter us, to heal and to fill us. When we dare to surrender to God we will hear God’s voice of love for us. When we are open to the Spirit of God, we will relate and connect with the whole of God’s creation with a renewed life and energy.

Each day is a new day to be broken open to God’s healing. Each moment in life is an opportunity for us to experience and share God’s love. Each encounter with our neighbours is an opening to reconnect with all our relations in creation.

May God bless us a life that is wild and precious. May we be open to transformation and healing in our journey. Because with each and every one of us, God is well pleased.

Amen.

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[i] Ryszard Kapuściński, Trans. by Klara Glowczewska, The Shadow of the Sun (New York: Vintage Books, 2002), 105-6.
[ii] Anthony Reinhart, Bike theft suspect back behind bars, The Globe and Mail, Tuesday, December 16, 2008, A11.
[iii] Richard Wagamese, Embracing forgiveness, Calgary Herald, Sunday, August 3, 2008, A9.
[iv] Michaela Bruzzese, Living the Word: Reflections on the Revised Common Lectionary, Cycle B – January 11: Water and Fire, Sojourners, January 2009, 48.
[v] Elizabeth Lesser, Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow (New York: Villard Books, 2005), xix-xx.

“The Other”

Matthew 2:1-12

January 4, 2009
Epiphany

Preached at Kingston Road United Church by the Rev. Richard C. Choe
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In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, ‘Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.’ When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, ‘In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet:

“And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel.” ’

Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, ‘Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.’ When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure-chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

* * *

Wise men. The Other. The one who is outside of the familiarity of our experiences. The one who is defined by the unknown and foreignness from us.

Judea under the Roman military occupation was a harsh place to live for the local inhabitants. Other than those who were part of the political and religious systems of power, life in Judea was a life under siege, a life of poverty and threat. There was a palpable sense of fear and hatred against foreigners, especially those who represented the Roman Empire. There was a sense of a clear and present danger experienced by all colonials living under the Roman military might. The history of the people of Israel, after all, was a continuing saga of military defeats, revolts against the foreign occupying army, and mass exiles. Fear of the Other, for those in Judea in Mary’s time, was deeply rooted in their life and the lives of their ancestors.

It is difficult to trust strangers and foreigners when much of your life and much of your nation’s history of relating with foreigners resulted in conflicts, war, and subjugation. Why would you welcome strangers when you are afraid? Thus, King Herod was “frightened, and all Jerusalem with him” when they heard of the news of the new born king of the Jews. An impending Roman Emperor’s edict to replace Herod? A possible coup d’état? Images of violence and mayhem pierced through the imaginations of the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

Fear was the primary response at the news of the birth of Jesus in Jerusalem – a city that was the centre of the religious and the political universe of the people of Israel. Offerings of gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh was the response from those from the East, those considered the Other, who recognized the child Jesus as a “ruler who is to shepherd people of Israel.”

Fear of “the Other,” is not unique to our time. Xenophobia – fear of those from other nations – seems to be a constant in human history. Current attacks on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip by the Israeli military and the counter attacks on Israel by the Palestinians is current example of fear of the Other. Another example of an extreme form of Xenophobia is the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 where close to 1 million Tutsis were murdered by Hutu militia.

Racial cleansing and genocide – atrocities stemming from fear of the Other – do not usually happen between two ethnically unrelated groups living far away from each other.
Underlying the differences and accentuating the otherness of one’s neighbours often results in violence and war. What is really sad and ironic is that the neighbours who label each other as the Other often share more in common than differences. Emphasizing the Otherness often happens between two racial ethnic groups who share very close, if not the identical, racial ethnic heritage and homeland.

Palestinians and Israelis, most of them, are closely related to one another in terms of ethnicity. Tutsis and Hutus have been intermingling for more than 600 years and the physical differences of the two groups are more arbitrary than scientific. And yet, there seems to be no end to violence based on the fear of the Other in the world when in fact those we often level as the Other are our neighbours and blood relations.

Seen through the lens of fear, the whole earth is inhabited by the Other for one to be afraid of and to despise. Seen through the lens of fear, the entire earth community is nothing but a wasteland where everyone experiences being a stranger in a strange land.

My first real experience of the Other was when I moved in 1967 from a city to a small village near a de-militarized zone that divides Korea into two nations. Although I was used to moves as a child of a military officer, it was the first time I was conscious of heartache in saying “good-bye” to my friends and classmates. I was 7 years old. By then I was getting used to living in the same place for more than three years and having friends. I was getting used to my neighbourhood – the streets, houses and stores along the way to school. And then we moved.

It was the first time I understood what geographical distance meant. Besides the heartache of losing friends, moving from the urban capital city of Seoul to a remote village in the countryside was a shock. The small village was made up of farmers. The entire population of the town was less than 100.

My new home – a house with mud walls and a thatched roof – was in a village that was surrounded by rice paddies and mountains. There was no electricity outside the army base. No neon signs. No brick houses. No buildings higher than a storey tall. No pavement and no asphalt covered streets. There were no cars other than military vehicles and buses that came once or twice a day depending on the conditions of the buses. People walked or rode on a cart pulled by a cow.

Farming was done manually using wooden ploughs tied to cows. A very selected few folks in the village used small tractors they pushed with hands. There was, I think, a market set up once or a twice a month. And once a year, after harvest time, a theatre company will come to town and set up the moving pictures inside a large tent. Night meant the Milky Way strewn in the sky. Day meant experiencing nature at its natural state transformed by just a bit by farming.

I was a stranger in a strange land. I was an outsider – a city kid of an army officer. I was a stranger to my school mates as they were to me. It was my first real conscious experience of being the Other. It was the first time in my life experiencing being with people in close proximity and yet not really feeling part of their life or community.

Gospel writer Matthew recorded that it was the strangers, foreigners from the East of Judea, who searched out and paid homage to the child Jesus as the King of Jews. This is a story from their experience of the Other. It was these wise ones from afar who recognized Jesus as the King of Jews and joyfully offered gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. It was the Other who were messengers of the good tidings that the Messiah, a ruler who will shepherd people of Israel, was born as Mary’s child Jesus in Bethlehem.

People of Israel experienced how God often chose strangers and foreigners as messengers to help them. Rahab was a foreigner who recognized God of Israel as the God and helped Joshua and his people to “settle” in Canaan – the land they believed God promised to their ancestors. King of Cyrus of Persia – Cyrus the Great – was another whose spirit God “stirred up so he sent a herald throughout all his kingdom” to declare the end of the Babylonian captivity of the people of Israel. [Ezra 1:1-4]

People of Judea in Mary and Jesus’ time understood that foreigners and strangers, the Other, were often messengers and actors of God’s salvation. They understood that God also called prophets and leaders outside their own racial ethnic communities. They understood that God’s salvation transcends narrowly defined racial ethnic boundaries.

The wise ones from the East, people who were the Other, followed the star and found the Messiah in the child Jesus, while those in Jerusalem, those who were Jesus’ kinfolk, were trembling in fear of the news of his birth.

A collection of reflections of Ryszard Kapuściński, a celebrated foreign correspondent for the Polish Press Agency, recently published a book entitled The Other. Kapuściński shares his insights on the Other garnered from a lifetime of travel and encounters as a journalist with people in Africa, Asia and Latin Africa.

There are three things Kapuściński shared on Herodotus – a Greek historian in the 5th century who is regarded as the “Father of History” – that captured my attention:

“All people are different and it’s natural that each (cultural group of) people to think its own ways are best.”[i]

“Herodotus wanted to know (the Others) because he understood that to know ourselves we have to know Others, who act as the mirror in which we see ourselves reflected; he knew that to understand ourselves better we have to understand Others, to compare ourselves with them, to measure ourselves against them.” [ii]

“Xenophobia, Herodotus implied, is a sickness of people who are scared, suffering an inferiority complex, terrified by the prospect of seeing themselves in the mirror of the culture of Others.”[iii]

Kapuściński’s ideas are strongly influenced by Emmanuel Lévinas, a French philosopher, whose experience as a Jew in Eastern Europe and later in France heavily influenced his philosophy that “The self is only possible through the recognition of the Other.”[iv] Kapuściński asserts that “‘genuine’ individualism – the recognition of selfhood – can only be brought about by contact with and recognition of the Other, the being who is external to oneself and yet a reflection of oneself.”[v] For him, knowing oneself comes from knowing the Other.

A faith community is no exception to Herodotean assessment: that each community is different and that each community thinks its own ways are best. There is a strong tendency to act out a belief that one’s own faith group or a congregation is the best. I often found it strange that a faith group – a community that is formed for nurturing transformation – is often the most resistant group to change itself. It is also painful to see people around the global communities use religious beliefs as weapons to label their neighbours as the Other and wage war with one another rather than seeking to find commonalities so all can live in harmony.

Wise men left their home – a familiar place and a place of belonging – to search for the Messiah. They answered the call from God and followed the star of their passion and found the place of homage and of God’s presence. Perhaps those wise men were wise because of the risk they took to seek the Promised One by leaving everything that was familiar to them.

I wonder what that homage would mean for those of us here. How would we seek and search for God’s presence in our neighbourhood? Or in another land? How would we recognize Jesus in our life?

What about Mary? How do we learn to be like Mary whose faith and wisdom helped her to receive and accept the gifts of wise ones from the East – strangers and foreigners – who proclaimed her child as the Messiah? How do we recognize the gifts of strangers – gifts of the Other – who help us to fully know who we are in our encounters and interactions with them? How do we learn to receive from the neighbours we encounter in our ministry together?

It is not too often we get to experience deep connections with those we encounter in life. Perhaps it is because we are too afraid of strangers. Perhaps it is because we are too afraid of seeing who we might be in the eyes of the others. Perhaps it is because we do not really believe that we can connect with others and be heard.

I met many people throughout my life. My encounters with people in the remote village in South Korea helped me to understand my relation to nature and the beauty of God’s creation. My encounters with people of different faith communities helped me to deepen and widen my understanding and experience of God. My encounters with strangers who became my friends helped me to nurture empathy, compassion and belonging. But those I felt the deepest connections to were the ones who treated me with kindness and compassion; who helped me to see who I am by opening themselves to me; connections where I experienced knowing that I was understood. These are the connections that nurtured me as a human being and a fellow sojourner in God’s Creation.

The story of the wise men from the East and their encounter with Mary and her child Jesus tells of how God’s grace transcends the lines that divide human community into groups of the Other. The story of the encounter helps us to understand how our daily encounters could help us know more about who we are in relation to God and to our neighbours. It is about deep connections amongst strangers who became part of God’s community through their encounters.

May we continue to seek out the Other and discover who we are. May we be the Other and be the mirror to those searching for God’s presence.

Amen.

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[i] Ryszard Kapuściński, Intro. By Neal Ascherson, The Other (London: Verso, 2008), 4.
[ii] The Other, 19.
[iii] The Other, 19.
[iv] The Other, 4-5.
[v] The Other, 8.

“Blessings for the journey”

Richard C. Choe©

Luke 2:22-40

December 28, 2008
First Sunday After Christmas

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Preached at Kingston Road United Church by the Rev. Richard C. Choe

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When the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord”), and they offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon; this man was righteous and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit rested on him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Messiah. Guided by the Spirit, Simeon came into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him what was customary under the law, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying, “Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.” And the child’s father and mother were amazed at what was being said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to his mother Mary, “This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed—and a sword will pierce your own soul too.” There was also a prophet, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of a great age, having lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day. At that moment she came, and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem. When they had finished everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favour of God was upon him.

* * *

Blessings for the journey.

“Baek-il” – “One Hundredth Day” – is a celebration marking a child’s “coming out” party in Korea. When a child reaches one hundredth day after birth, a family celebrates by inviting neighbours and relations into the house for a party.

One hundred is an auspicious number for Koreans. Many infants and mothers did not survive birthing in Korea in the olden days. Ninety-nine days were lived in prayer for the well-being of the infant and the recovery of the mother’s health. A child’s household was virtually quarantined for the first 99 days of the child’s life for fear of transmitting diseases.

The ancient Koreans believed that surviving the first ninety-nine days was a sign that the child had overcome the trauma of birthing and would be strong enough to fight off diseases. It was also understood that a mother’s body requires that much time to heal if she survived giving birth.

On the one hundredth day of the child’s birth, a house would be open to the neighbours and relations so they could visit and share the joy of the arrival of the child into the family and the community. One of the traditions in the celebration was to make rice cakes and share them with neighbours and anyone who happened to be passing by the house. Often, grandmothers of the infant would share a piece of a rice cake with passersby at the gate of the house and invite them in to bless their grandchild. Ancient Koreans believed that sharing the celebration of child’s birth with the rest of their community was a way of seeking blessing for the child and the child’s place in the community. The practice was rooted in belief that happiness is multiplied when shared and that an individual is an instrument of God’s blessing to one another in community.

The tradition of “Baek-il” continues in Korean families. Koreans may not open their house to all the passersby, but the tradition of sharing happiness on the one hundredth day of the child’s birth with neighbours continue to this day. Joys and happiness, indeed, multiply when shared.

The ancient Jews also had a “coming out” party for children as well. We heard this morning from the passages in the Gospel According to Luke about the “coming out” celebration of a child named Jesus, the son of Mary and Joseph.

Jesus was presented to God along with the sacrifice offering of “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” Mary and Joseph brought their first born according to Jewish custom where the first to be born is considered “sacred and presented to the Lord because that child opened the womb so that other children may also take their turn in being born.”[i]

Even from a distance people would have seen that Mary’s family was of modest means by the offering the family brought for sacrifice. A more prosperous family would have brought a lamb – an animal that was required for the ritual sacrifice of atonement. The child Jesus was blessed by two aged worshippers, ordinary folks, at the peripheral part of the temple where women were allowed.

The gospel writer, Luke, stressed the lowly and marginal nature of Jesus of Nazareth as he recounted Jesus’ birth and his life. Jesus, a child of a low social and religious status, was recognized by those who were also of low social and religious status. Jesus was recognized as “a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to people of Israel” and as “the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem” even when he came from a family of low socio-economic status. It was not one of the priests or the chief priest in the temple of Jerusalem who recognized Jesus as the “One-Waited-for” but two less important but devout worshippers of the temple.

Like the time of Mary and Jesus we live in a society where we value blessings of others, and yet find it difficult to feel blessed. And like the time of Mary and Jesus, we live in a society where those who have more than others are seen to be blessed more than those who have less.

In our society where the signs of material blessings are so abundantly visible, we continue to search for the meaning of blessing – blessing of each of us as one to be cherished, nurtured, cared for, accepted as one to be loved. In a society that seems to be filled with folks driven for “success,” we continue to struggle with the voices of a “critical parent” within us that tell us that we are not good enough or that we will not amount to anybody of importance in our life. Those who hear and accept the message of the “critical parent” will eventually act out to show others that they are indeed not worthy. There is also a good chance that an adult carrying a “critical parent” within will become a “critical” mother or a father oneself to their children and even to those they encounter in their life. Those who do not experience blessing often do not live blessed lives.

How would you describe or define “blessing” in your life? Do you “count your blessings?” Do you seek blessing from others? Do you see yourself as a blessing to those you encounter in your life?

Thrity Umrigar, an American author, shares one of the most enduring and beloved Parsi legend.

A small group of Zoroastrians land on the shores of India after fleeing religious persecution in their homeland of Iran. They seek political refuge. The local Hindu ruler is wary of the foreigners and does not want to grant them entry. They do not speak a common language so the local Hindu ruler takes an empty glass and fills it to the brim with milk. The symbolism is clearly communicated to the refugees. “This land is full and cannot accommodate newcomers.” But the Zoroastrian priest is a wise man. He takes sugar and drops it into the glass and dissolves it in the milk, careful not to spill a drop. His message is also clearly communicated. “If you let us stay, we will sweeten your local culture, without displacing or disrupting it. Thus, the Zoroastrians – or Parsis, as they came to be called – find a home in India and true to their word, became a model community, their contributions enhancing the culture of their new homeland. [ii]

The Parsi story tells us of the wisdom of the priest as well as the Hindu ruler. They both were able to clearly communicate what they saw as a reality – that there was no room for them and that they came with gifts. They both were able to clearly see what they saw as a possibility – that new ways of being was possible and that they could co-exist as neighbours. The wisdom of the leaders provided new possibilities of being in community.

The Ojibway say that there are seven hills to life. Each hill is a vantage point for looking back, thought not everyone takes the time for reflection. It is only in looking back, the Ojibway say, that you discern the trail, identify the climb and rest contented in each stage of the journey. The final hill is the elevation of wisdom. It is from there you can look back on the vast panorama of your life and come to know who you are by virtue of who you’ve been.[iii]

In a land where the value of the life of a child from a poor peasant family was worth next to nothing, two elders, Simeon and Anna, were able to see a child of blessing and blessed Jesus’ life journey. In a time when hope seemed to have disappeared and God seemed to have forgotten the plight of the oppressed people of Israel, God blessed Simeon and Anna to see the coming of the “One-Waited-for,” the Messiah. From the vantage point of the seventh hill in life, Simeon and Anna came to know who they were – the ones who were blessed to recognize the coming of Messiah. From all the places they have been in life they were blessed with wisdom to recognize the Messiah in an ordinary child. And to recognize their part in blessing the Messiah for his life’s journey. The ones blessed both received and shared blessings.

We, as a congregation, have celebrated 100th year of ministry in this neighbourhood and beyond. We have heard stories of challenges and growth, we have remembered the times of pain as well as joys we have experienced together. We have looked back and realized that our community has never been perfect or that we have always been in the right. What we saw from the vantage point of this 100th year was how we were able to grow and transform together as we experienced each phase of growth as community.

Our children, through their participation in the Nativity Play, reminded us of our childhood and the times gone by – the times of innocence, the times of youthfulness, the times of wonder and discovery along with growing pains about life, death and resurrection. Nothing stays the same in life. People grow old. Relationships grow, change, at times, break apart and heal. There are joys in life as well as grief.

Our geographic location may not have changed but our contexts of ministry – our neighbourhood – has changed and will continue to change. Neighbourhoods change. Familiar neighbours move out and strangers move in and become neighbours. Along with those changes, the membership of our congregation changes as well. Looking back helps us to realize that we, too, will continue to adapt, change and find new and different ways to continue the ministry of Jesus Christ in this neighbourhood and beyond.

Seeing our children on the Christmas Eve family service was a vantage point of looking back for me. I saw our children growing in faith and maturity. I was saying to some of the parents that some of the angels dressed in white looked more like brides than children dressed as angels. Watching the play also reminded me of how God opens our eyes to see each and every child as blessing to our faith community. Watching our children also reminded me that each one of us is a blessing to our community if we choose to take that blessing seriously. Our life affects the lives of those we encounter. Like the way God called and blessed Simeon and Anna to recognize a child from a poor peasant family from Nazareth as the Messiah, God continues to call and bless us to recognize blessing in those we meet in our life.

Each child is blessed. Each child, regardless of social or religious status, is blessed was the message Jesus and his family experienced from the actions of Simeon and Anna. Each child, each life, is a blessing for every community.

I lived with my grandparents for a while when I was about 9 years old, a time when I was really fascinated by spy and espionage stories. I invented a cryptic alphabet to communicate with my friends and carried a membership card made with rubber stamps for a spy organization I invented. One of the things we used to do was to “train” ourselves by daring one another to jump over the open sewer in the neighbourhood. Each night I would return home dirty with a ripped shirt. One day my grandfather confronted me with the “evidence” of what he believed to be my involvement with a neighbourhood gang – my membership card of my imaginary spy organization. He thought I had joined a gang and was involved in something illegal. It took a quite a bit of time for me to explain to him that the spy organization was created out of my imagination. The filthy pants were due to failed attempts to jump across the open sewers. And shirts got ripped when my friends tried to grab me from slipping into the sewer after landing.

My grandparents used to laugh about that time whenever they reminisced about the time I lived with them. A time when they thought that their grandson, a model student, had gone astray and joined a gang.

Children grow, change, and show us of the blessings of change and growth. There are those who are able to see God’s child in each person. My grandparents saw a blessed child in me and they blessed me with stories of wonder and an unconditional love that helped me to know that I am loved forever. If we choose, like Anna and Simeon, we, too, could be a blessing to those we encounter.

As we journey towards the New Year may the Apache Nation blessing go with you:

May the sun
Bring you new energy by day,
May the moon
Softly restore you by night,
May the rain
Wash away your worries,
May the breeze
Blow new strength into your being.
May you walk
Gently through the world and know
Its beauty all the days of your life.

Happy New Year everyone!

Happy 101st year of ministry!

Amen.

--

[i] http://liturgy.slu.edu/HolyFamilyB122808/theword_gillick.html
[ii]Thrity Umrigar, Harper Collins, http://www.harpercollins.com/author/authorExtra.aspx?authorID=29280&isbn13=9780061240232&displyType=bookessay
[iii] Richard Wagamese, One Native Life (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd., 2008), 168.

“Truth about stories”

Luke 1:46-55

December 21, 2008
Advent 4 & Christmas

Preached at Kingston Road United Church by the Rev. Richard C. Choe
--

And Mary said,
‘My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’

* * *

Truth about stories.

“Truth about stories is that that’s all we are.”[i] That’s what Thomas King, a well known Canadian writer, says about stories. Who we are depends on what stories we live by and how we make meaning out of stories in our life.

Two sisters are remembering an event that happened over forty years ago.

“Remember the woman on the bus, Vera? The woman in the fur coat?” It was Christmas Eve in 1952. A sixteen year old and a six year old sisters are snuggled up against their mother on the backseat of a bus. They are Ukrainian refugee family recently arrived from Germany following the WW2. They remember a kind woman in a fur coat who leaned across the aisle and pressed sixpence into their mother’s hand saying, “for the kiddies at Christmas.” “Thank you, lady,” was what their mother said as she slipped it into her pocket.

The younger sister tells the older one, “It was that moment – more than anything that happened to me afterwards – that turned me into a lifelong socialist.” The older sister for whom conspicuous displays of her consumption has become a part of her life, replies to her sister, after a long silence, “Maybe it was what turned me into the woman in the fur coat.”[ii]

Truth about stories is that that’s all we are. How we experience and what lessons we learn from each event shape and mould our identity. Stories influence the way we see and experience our surroundings. Stories shape our lives. Stories inform us of who we are and how we are related to others – as friends or foes, neighbours or strangers, as part of us or them. Stories reflect the kind of values and principles we hold as truth as individuals and as part of the whole.

One of the dominant themes in stories permeating in the lives of Mary and her contemporaries was that of the power and domination. After all, she grew up and was living under a Roman military occupation. She lived in a land where displays of military might and abusive physical and mental brutality were the norm.

The rich and the powerful were known to be the ones God blessed. They have every right to be proud to be in the company of God. They were the exalted ones whose will was the will of their society. They were the ones who deserved to fill themselves with good things while many in their society were sent away empty.

More is good. Big is better. The message that might was right was the prevalent message of Mary’s time. God was in the business of blessing the rich and the powerful. The poor and the powerless were invisible even to God. The truth about those stories was that that’s all Mary was – poor, powerless, and pregnant before she was married, a morally “defiled” girl who was a social and a religious outcast – one of those insignificant undeserving and forgotten by God.

Some things don’t change. Wall Street bankers gave themselves exorbitant salaries and bonuses even after the stock market meltdown. “Because we can” was the message of their actions. More is good. Big is better. Excess is the name of the game. Three CEO’s of the largest auto companies flew private jets to Washington, D.C. to beg for billions of dollars in loans. “Because we deserve it.” A sense of self importance and entitlement seem to permeate amongst those three who led their companies into utter disaster. It seems that North American society is divided into two categories – those who get rescued by the government and those who do not. Might continues to be right even in economic recession.

Closer to home, signs and bright lights on the billboards around the city continue to feed the insatiable appetite for consumption. More is good. Big is better. Keep the economy afloat with the myth of “retail therapy” and needing the latest model. Power and domination – the message Mary and her contemporaries heard more than two thousand years ago – continues to perpetuate as a dominant story.

There is a prevailing sense of uncertainty and fear as we experience this severe economic crisis. We hear about people losing jobs as many companies are shutting down or reducing the number of employees due to the down turn in economy. People are asking: How will this crisis affect me? What does this mean for my family? What would happen to my retirement savings and to the value of my home? Do I have enough saved for my children’s education? It’s not supposed to happen this way.

If we are experiencing this much uncertainty and fear in North America, how is the rest of God’s people, especially those in the so called “developing” countries, experiencing this economic crisis?

Our lives are connected to all lives everywhere. Donations to charity organizations are drying up while needs are escalating. Shelves in many of the drop in centres in Toronto are sparse. The Mission and Service Fund of the United Church is behind its target. Our Friday lunches at KRU are packed with folks looking for a meal and warmth.

What stories do we hear as we wait for the day of the birth of the Christ Child? What stories are we telling one another in this season of hope in Christ as we experience the economic downturn in our society? What stories could we dare to imagine in this bleak winter? How do you hope for a better tomorrow when you are feeling so vulnerable and overwhelmed with so much uncertainty?

According to the Gospel writer Luke, something radical happened when Mary was visiting her cousin Elizabeth who was also pregnant. In her encounter with Elizabeth, Mary began to imagine a world that was fundamentally different than the world she was part of. Mary remembered another dominant theme of the stories that had shaped her life – stories of hope and resistance against power and domination. She remembered Hannah’s song. She remembered how Hannah, who was too old to have a child, was blessed by God and had Samuel. She remembered how God’s mercy made the impossible possible for Hannah. And Mary’s love for her child in her womb turned her to envision a world where the lowly, those like her and her child, could experience God’s mercy. She dreamt of a different world where people like her and her neighbours would no longer be sent away empty.

She imagined a society where the priority was to provide things to those who were in need. She imagined a society where justice would mean moving beyond equal share for all or equal pay for equal work. Mary’s imagination was much more radical than that. She imagined a “needs-based” economy which focuses on filling the needs of the “have nots” rather than a “wants-based” economy which focuses on the wants of the “haves” and “have nots.” She imagined a political system which would go beyond Capitalism, Socialism or Communism. She imagined a society where those who have would refrain from acquiring any more than what they need, and those who do not have enough would be provided for what they need.

God’s mercy, Mary proclaims, is much more radical and drastic than humanity can ever imagine. It is God’s mercy that will save humanity, not the excessive desire for wealth and power.

And yet, we continue to hold and perpetuate the stories focused on the merits of power and domination over our neighbours and God’s creation as the central stories to live by within our individual selves and within our society. We continue to have difficulty imagining, never mind accepting, the good news that Mary heard. We may be able to imagine a notion of equal share or equal distribution of goods but not to the extent of Mary’s vision. Mary’s story of God’s mercy and blessing envisioned in her song continues to challenge us.

Would it be possible to imagine us being part of a society where men and women working in the assembly lines in the auto industry get paid six figure salaries because they do not have enough? Could we imagine a society where senior auto industry executives are compensated a minimum wage since they already have enough? What holds us from imagining such a possibility?

Would it be possible for those of us living in North America to radically decrease our consumptions of water, gas, and electricity amongst other things – and share our natural resources with citizens of countries who do not have clean water to drink and fuel to cook with? Could we share our savings with those who are living in abject poverty and barely surviving without much hope? What holds us from envisioning such a possibility?

Would it be possible for us to convert our church building into a low income housing for the homeless and gather at a school cafeteria or at a school gym for worship on Sunday? What holds us from thinking about it as a possibility? Would it be possible to dream the undreamed dream of God along with Mary?

The Nigerian storyteller, Ben Okri says,

“We live by stories; we also live in them. One way or another we are living the stories we planted – knowingly or unknowingly – in ourselves. We live stories that either give our lives meaning or negate it with meaninglessness. If we change the stories we live by, quite possibly we can change our lives.”[iii]

We can change our life by changing the stories we live by. The quality and the content of our life and our relationship with our neighbours and the rest of God’s creation will change when we no longer take the stories focusing on the power and might as the stories we live by. The quality and the content of our life and our relationship with our neighbours and the rest of God’s creation will change when we begin to take stories of hope and resistance against power and domination as stories we live by.

Mary changed the stories she lived by as she dreamt of a better future for her child. Like any mother would, she envisioned a future where her child would be blessed and embraced by God and God’s people, open to new and limitless possibilities.

Truth about stories, indeed, is – that that’s all we are. Stories shape and reshape us. Stories inform, reform and transform us. Which stories we choose to tell and which stories we continue to tell informs us of our values. We struggle with the prevalent stories that continue to dominate our imagination – that more is always good and that less is always bad.

How do we participate in such drastic changes of imagination when we ourselves are feeling so insignificant? By changing one small story at a time.

Every evening a woman heard her neighbour’s baby girl crying through the thin walls of the apartment next to hers. She realized that the baby’s parents put the child to sleep alone in the dark. Every night the baby cried for a long time while her parents watched TV. The woman heard anguish and loneliness in the baby’s crying. What could she do? She wondered. Speaking to the baby’s parents might make things worse. Then, she came up with an idea. Just as she could hear the baby, the baby could hear her. She decided to sing. Every evening when the baby cried alone in the dark, the neighbour sang sweet lullabies, talked to the baby through the thin walls, consoled and comforted her. The baby heard the invisible voice of love, stopped crying, and peacefully fell asleep.[iv]

It is small gestures of love shared with people around us that changes, heals and saves us.

This voice of warmth and compassion is what the shepherds and Mary heard. This comforting voice, telling us of God’s remembering of each one of us, is what we hear through Mary’s Song. These lullabies of love are what we are called to continue to share with those we encounter in our life, those who are crying out in loneliness.

This is the message of Christmas – that God so loves the world that God continues to sing lullabies of hope, mercy and compassion through the prophets like Mary, the Mother of Jesus, like the younger sister on the bus. God’s lullabies continue to be sung to those who are meek and vulnerable.

Richard Wagamese, a writer and a newspaper columnist, shares in his autobiography, One Native Life. “Stories are meant to heal. That’s what my people say, and it’s what I believe. Culling these stories has taken me a long way down the healing path from the trauma I carried.”[v] “Everyone has a story. That’s what the circle teaches us. We become better people, a better species,” Wagamese says, “when we take the time to hear them. That’s how you change the world, really. One story, one voice at a time.”[vi]

May we continue to hear God’s lullabies of hope. May we continue to sing God’s lullabies of mercy, hope and compassion even to those we do not know. May we live the message of the Christmas story in all the songs of our lives, songs of good news of great joy for all people.

Amen.

--
[i] Thomas King, The truth about stories: a native narrative (Toronto: Dead Dog Café Productions Inc. and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 2003), 2 - 9.
[ii] Marina Lewyck, A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian (New York: Penguin Books, 2005), 220-1.
[iii] King, The truth about stories, 153.
[iv] Piero Ferrucci, translated by Vivien Reid Ferrucci, The power of kindness: the unexpected benefit of leading a compassionate life, (New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2007), 28-9.
[v] Richard Wagamese, One Native Life (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd., 2008), 4.
[vi] Wagamese, One Native Life, 203.

“Truth & Its Consequences”

Matthew 25:14-30

November 16, 2008
Twenty-seventh Sunday After Pentecost

Preached at Kingston Road United Church by the Rev. Richard C. Choe

* * *

Truth and its consequences.

Every community has commonly held beliefs or interpretations of stories that are accepted as truths. These commonly held beliefs are time honoured truths that inform individuals about what is considered good, as in what is acceptable for the well being of the community, and what is deemed evil, meaning what is unacceptable since it harms the community. Whichever qualities a community chooses as good or evil are derived from their common experiences as community. And the kind of choices each community makes as truth lead to consequences that the community has to bear together. Yes, every truth held by a community has its consequences.

Some of those truths are as innocuous as a stable boy becoming a king after taking a sword out of a stone like the legend of King Arthur. The legend of Arthur reveals the community’s commonly held belief that anyone could be chosen by the divine to do good, find honour in search of the holy and fight against evil. The legend portrays the ideals and the “realities” of life of the British way – pursuit of truth, finding and losing love, and the transitory nature of power as part of human realities.

Then, there are beliefs about attributes that “qualify” some folks to be “better” or “worse” than their contemporaries in the community. Every community has systems of social hierarchy as a consequence of the truths they hold about “values” and “qualities” of being a member of the community.

The commonly held beliefs in community, those “truths,” undergird and influence the community’s social conscience.

Watching the Presidential debates between Barack Obama and John McCain in the United States helped me to see not only what each political party holds as truths but also what the United States as a nation considers as truths in their country.

As a Canadian and a Christian, I found it fascinating that the word “liberal” was considered a dirty word in the US politics. Arguing about “spreading the wealth” as a “Socialist” concept was not a surprise; however, seeing socialism as something very negative by both political parties and by many of the US citizens was a surprise.

What I found most fascinating about the US Presidential campaign was that neither political party really talked about the poor. They talked about the “middle class” extensively – although the definition of the middles class was not as clear to me – but none of the candidates really spent much time to talk about the poor in the US. It was as though the poor did not exist in the US. Being a Muslim seemed to be a damaging factor, if not damning, for the political candidates in the US.

I remember a conversation I had with Frances, my eldest daughter, during the US election. One of the things we talked about was the fact that “spreading the wealth” and “taking care of the needy” were essential Christian values. We talked about the fact that before socialism or communism became a distinct political notion, Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus and most, if not all, of the religions of the global communities held “spreading the wealth” and “taking care of the downtrodden” as essential parts of their religious beliefs and practices. And we still do hold those values as essential in our faith.

Canadian politics are not much different than those of our neighbours in the South. Remember, we also had a federal election in the midst of the US Presidential campaign? A similar criticism was also raised about the poor being forgotten by the political parties in Canada.

It seems like the US and Canadian societies are deeply immersed in “the rich get richer and the poor get what little they have taken away” version of market economy.

If it is a commonly held belief in our society that the rich ought to get richer and the poor ought to get things taken away from them, the consequence of that belief will be that our society will find ways to make it a reality. One of the consequences in such a society will be that the rich will continue to find ways to worship the market economy which benefits them as God. Even most of the poor would have internalized those values that marginalize them as truth in such a society. Every truth has its consequences.

The parable of the Talents is one of the most familiar stories from the Bible. The story is so popular and influential that the word “talent,” originally one of the largest currencies in the Mediterranean in Jesus’ time – an amount worth more than 15 years of wages for a daily labourer – came to mean one’s gift or ability in our society. By the way, if you were to consider a person working at a job that pays $10/hour working full-time for 50 weeks a year, the annual salary will be $20,000. One talent in our time, thus, will be $300,000. Five talents is a modern day equivalent of $1.5 million!

We hear and interpret others’ stories by our own world view. Our own experiences of life inform the way we read, hear and interpret stories and experiences of others. Reading, hearing and understanding the stories in the Bible are no exception. As the Parable of the Talents was read this morning, each of us heard it according to our world view and the commonly held beliefs informed by years of sermons and Bible studies.

The first two slaves were faithful because they worked hard to double the money entrusted to them by their master. One turned $600,000 into 1.2 million dollars and the other amassed $3 million dollars out of 1.5 million dollars. The outcome of their faithfulness was a reward for more things and more responsibility given to them. Thus, being faithful means taking a risk and doubling the gifts you are given by God.

The third slave was unfaithful because he did nothing with the money entrusted to him. Hiding the talent entrusted to him by his master represents his laziness and irresponsibility. The end result for him was to be condemned by his master as wicked and lazy, to have everything taken away and be thrown out from his master’s household. Thus, being unfaithful will result in banishment from God’s love.

The story ends with a punch line, “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’” [Matthew 25:29-30]

It seems like a straight forward story. Those who risk and work hard for a higher return will be rewarded for their effort and those who do not risk and are lazy will be punished for their non-effort. “God is generous and rewards those who have been faithful to God” was and is one of the underlying points for interpreting the parable. “So, be faithful like the first two slaves!” preachers would proclaim in his or her sermon.

How many of you heard this in the Bible studies or sermons or interpreted it this way yourselves? Varying versions of the interpretation of the parable I just summarized continue to be common. And like any other commonly held beliefs as truth in community, Christian churches and the societies that churches are part of have been influenced by and have experienced the consequences of such truth.

But there is a nagging feeling about the way story is told.

The way the third slave described the master is particularly bothersome. This is what he said, “Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed; so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.’” [Matthew 25:24-25]

The master does not dispute the way he was described by the third slave. And he replied to the slave, “You wicked and lazy slave! You knew, did you, that I reap where I did not sow, and gather where I did not scatter? Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents.” [Matthew 25:26-28]

Jesus proclaimed and preached God as loving Daddy. Then, why does the master in the story come across as such hard headed and hard hearted? According to the third slave, the master seems more like a greedy thief who will do anything to get what he wants. He sounds like Conrad Black and other criminals who swindled millions of dollars from their clients because they could. “If you didn’t have guts to take a risk to get a 100% profit by unscrupulous means, at least you could have legally got 10% from the bank” is what the master seems to be saying to the third slave.

I am not sure whether such characteristics are the kind of characteristics of God that Jesus was portraying. And even if the master does not portray God, I am not sure whether relationships based on the extreme profit margin as the bottom line is the kind of household Jesus envisioned as God’s kingdom. There is something that does not make sense in the interpretations we have been holding as truth.

I came across an article by Ched Myers and Eric DeBode which offers very different interpretations of the Parable of Talents. One of the things they invite readers is to examine the socio-economic contexts of the first century Mediterranean world during which Jesus lived and shared the Parable of Talents.

Here are some facts:

· Most of the listeners of the parable and the followers of Jesus were poor. They were like the slaves in the parable.

· The highest legal interest rate was about 12 percent. Anything higher was considered as rapacious.[i] Those who were the original hearers and the contemporaries of Jesus would have been disgusted at the 100 percent return. They would have heard the high return rate as extortions like those they have experienced.

· The ideal in traditional Mediterranean society was stability of the community, not self-advancement of individuals. Anyone trying to accumulate inordinate wealth risked upsetting the equilibrium of society and was thus understood to be dishonourable. Usury, lending at exorbitant rates of interest, was understood by people in Jesus’ time to be responsible for the destructive cycle of indebtedness and poverty. Profiting from commodity trading was explicitly condemned by people like Aristotle.[ii]

· There are various warning about the prohibition against usury and profiteering off the poor in Torah (Leviticus 25:36).

Myers and DeBode assert that the parable is not about a stewardship where we are called to double the return but about critiquing the economic system that makes such doubling possible in the first place.[iii]

The parable is about exposing the cruelty of the market economy of Jesus’ time that was promoting “rich get richer and poor get what little they have taken away” scheme. The parable is about denouncing such inhumane market economy and those who benefit from it. The parable was told by Jesus to invite the hearers of the story to resist and dissent such an inhumane economic system that was promoting the unbridled greed and rewarding its perpetrators as “good and trustworthy” while punishing the poor by marginalizing them and labelling them as “wicked and lazy.”

Understanding the contexts of the parable brings a different perspective to the story. Hearing and interpreting the parable without being aware of the original contexts of the parable, while immersed in our Capitalist socio-economic contexts, may lead us to not fully appreciate the intent of Jesus’ telling of the parable.

Truth and its consequences. Which interpretation we choose and accept as truth or hold as common belief will shape our faith and life practices. Our commonly held belief will eventually shape and influence the way we live out our faith in life.

“Here, you have what is yours.” This may conjure up a scene where a slave is cowering and trembling with fear as he is handing over the large sum of money to his master, if you believe in “the rich get richer and poor get what little they have taken away” version of the interpretation. But if you were to interpret the parable as the social critique of Jesus on the market economy of his time, you may be able to imagine a scene where a defiant slave chooses to dissent and opt out of the economic system that enslaves people. “Here, take back what is yours!” would be what you would hear from the “whistle-blower,” who unmasked the fact that the master’s wealth is derived entirely from the toil of others.[iv]

Every truth has its consequences.

If our faith community is one that also believes that the rich ought to get richer and the poor ought to have their possessions taken away from them, then that is going to be the consequence for each and every one of us. Our life and faith will be about getting ahead of others and accumulating wealth by any means necessary. If our community believes that the well being of the whole is the priority of our community, then the consequence of such a belief is that we will be committed to building such a society. Such an interpretation would require us to fundamentally change the way we relate with one another here in the church as well as in our neighbourhood and work place. The poor and the weak will be a priority in our church and our faith practices. Those who cannot take care of themselves will be our focus in our political and economic practices. Well being of everyone in our society will be one of the truths we hold as an underlying social and religious consciousness in our community.

We have committed ourselves to receive Mayei Kojo Anite as part of our faith community today. Our interpretation of the parable and our holding of the interpretation as truth in our community will also inform and shape the way we raise her along with her family.

The concept of King Arthur’s Round Table where no one is above or beneath another is a concept many around the unequal globe still struggle to realize. The Parable of the Talents is also about the Round Table of God’s kingdom where all are cherished and valued as equals. The parable is a reminder and a challenge to each one of us to opt out of and actively dissent the systems of power that reward the powerful while neglecting and abandoning the weak. May we be enabled by God to struggle to build a society where all are cared for and everyone can share their wealth for the well being of one’s community.

Amen.

--
[i] Richard Rohrbaugh cited in Towering Trees and ‘Talented’ Slaves by Ched Myers and Eric DeBode, http://lists.joinhands.com/pipermail/midrash/2005-November/001925.html. In his article "A Peasant Reading of the Parable of the Talents," Richard Rohrbaugh notes that in antiquity the highest legal interest rate was about 12 percent; anything higher was considered rapacious.
[ii] Bruce Malina, The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology cited in Towering Trees and ‘Talented’ Slaves by Ched Myers and Eric DeBode, http://lists.joinhands.com/pipermail/midrash/2005-November/001925.html.
[iii] Ched Myers and Eric DeBode, The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology cited in Towering Trees and ‘Talented’ Slaves, http://lists.joinhands.com/pipermail/midrash/2005-November/001925.html.
[iv] William Herzog, Parables as Subversive Speech, cited in Towering Trees and ‘Talented’ Slaves by Ched Myers and Eric DeBode, http://lists.joinhands.com/pipermail/midrash/2005-November/001925.html & in David B. Gowler, What Are They Saying About Parables? http://userwww.service.emory.edu/~dgowler/chapter6.htm.

"Communicating Peace”

John 8:31-36

November 9, 2008
Twenty-sixth Sunday After Pentecost

Preached at Kingston Road United Church by the Rev. Richard C. Choe
---

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, ‘If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.’ They answered him, ‘We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, “You will be made free”?’
Jesus answered them, ‘Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there for ever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.

* * *

“If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”

A young man joined in the Canadian Expeditionary Force of 1914-1918. He served the duration of the war and sustained three wounds. He was severely wounded at the Battle of Amiens in 1918 and was sent home. He got married and had five daughters. He did not say much about the war experiences. One day, while he was fishing with one of his grandsons, he began to talk. His back was to his grandchild as memories of war swirled through and beyond him.

He recounted a story of how his patrol encountered a German machine-gun nest in a village in the Arras Sector of France. Everyone in the patrol except him died in the fire fight. When the machine-gun fell silent he fixed his bayonet and jumped into the machine-gun nest to discover one German gunner still alive. He saw a kid with “eyes like water, these watery blue eyes.” The German kid raised his hand to him, smiled and said, “Kamerad” – meaning “comrade” or “friend.” He bayoneted him in the forehead. And he carried the burden of that moment for the rest of his life.[i]

Paul Gross, the grandson of Michael Joseph Dunne, shares his grandfather’s burden and other realities of war in the movie Passchendaele. Over 600,000 Canadian men and boys enlisted to serve in the Great War. The Canadian population was less than 8 million in 1914. This means that about 15% of males in Canada fought in the Great War.

Gross believes that Canadian identity – strong, resolute and proud – was forged in the Western Front of Europe during the Great War. He asserts that Canadians “must pay honour to the 173,300 casualties, and we must do homage to the 67,000 who paid the ultimate sacrifice.”[ii]

Here are some truths about the Great War in our neighbourhood – the Beach and the East end.

Gene Domagala wrote the following in Beach Metro News:

“When I was researching this article, I went through many newspaper accounts of the war. Sometimes I just stopped and couldn’t go on reading, especially when it came to our area. … ‘Canadians winning at the Somme, at Ypres …’ At what cost? Every day for over four years, you would see pictures in the papers of our great heroic soldiers – John Smith of Lee Avenue died; Tom Brown of Queen Street died in a gas attack; Joe gave his life to save his brother in arms, and so on. … Sometimes it seemed that the Beach and East End would run out of volunteers. The parents and the community gave up so much for war and for the country. In St. John’s Norway Cemetery, we find crosses of some of those soldiers who gave their lives for the Beach and Canada.”[iii]

“Truth will make you free,” Jesus said. And we wonder what truth and how truth will make us free as we remember and honour those who fought and sacrificed in the Great War – the war that was going to end all wars – and in all the subsequent wars.

Truth is one of those over used and abused words that many of us have great difficulty accepting the way it is presented to us. We live in an age where truth no longer seems to be relevant. Truth, these days, is understood as relative, expendable, dispensable and even irrelevant. For some the word truth invokes religious and political extremism rather than conjuring up the notion of seeking ideals for human community.

This is how Wendell Berry, an American poet, expresses truths about war in his poem Sabbath 2005.

They gather like an ancestry
in the centuries behind us:
the killed by violence, the dead
in war, the “acceptable losses” –
killed by custom in self-defense,
by way of correction, as revenge,
for love of God, for the glory
of the world, for peace; killed
for pride, lust, envy, anger,
covetousness, gluttony, sloth,
and fun. The strewn carcasses
cease to feed even the flies,
the stench passes from them,
the earth folds in the bones
like salt in a batter.

And we have learned
nothing. “Love your enemies,
bless them that curse you,
do good to them that hate you” –
it goes on regardless, reasonably:
the always uncompleted
symmetry of just reprisal,
the angry word, the boast
of superior righteousness,
hate in Christ’s name,
scorn for the dead, lies
for the honor of the nation,
centuries bloodied and dismembered
for ideas, for ideals,
for the love of God![iv]

War continues in our global communities. It seems like we have not learned much from the previous wars. War is still a primary mode of resolving disputes and conflicts within and amongst nations.

We are burdened with the sin of war as we participate in another Remembrance Day worship service.

How do we remember and honour those who fought for our country without glorifying violence and war? How can our remembrances of war not be trapped in our national boundaries?

How do we begin to open eyes and hearts to acknowledge that war violates and desecrates each and all of us? How do we resist the seductive use of force – both emotional and physical – as primary means of resolving disputes and conflicts in our life?

How do we seek truth that will free us of the enslavement of “us” and “them” so we can truly see one another as relations and kin in God’s reality? And how do we dream together of God’s creation one day living in peace and harmony?

Wendell Berry continues his warnings about war in his poem.

If we have become a people incapable
of thought, then the brute-thought
of mere power and mere greed
will think for us.

If we have become incapable
of denying ourselves anything,
then all that we have
will be taken from us.

If we have no compassion,
we will suffer alone, we will suffer
alone the destruction of ourselves.[v]

There is a truth that Jesus invited his disciples to know. How do we search for truth that will make us free?

We are enslaved to half truths and political spins when we only remember one side. As long as we continue to remember “our” nation’s sacrifices and deaths without remembering “their” sacrifices and deaths, there will be war. As long as we continue to remember our side of the story as “truth” without listening to the stories of our enemies also as truth, there will be war. As long as we are deaf and blind to the innocent bystanders and victims of war, there will be war.

So remember the bombing of London, England but remember the firebombing of Dresden, Germany. 1,300 heavy bombers drop over 3,900 tons of high-explosives bombs and incendiary devices in four raids in three days, destroying 13 square miles of the city. The firebombing caused a firestorm that literally melted the city centre. Recent publications place the figure of civilian casualties between 24,000 and 40,000. Remember how those who were labelled by the Nazi government as socialists, communists, homosexuals, Gypsies and Jews were murdered as the enemies of the state. Remember how stateless Jews were given home by displacing Palestinians after the World War II and how the hatred and violence continue to this day in Palestine.

Remember Pearl Harbour but remember Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Remember how Americans and Canadians of Japanese ancestry were branded as “enemy aliens,” striped of their properties and sent to concentration camps across North America.

Remember 9/11 in the United States but remember the countless bombings of Bagdad and many other places in the Middle East where civilian casualties far outnumber the death tolls of 9/11. Remember Maher Arar, a Canadian engineer, who was deported to Syria and tortured. Remember that it was the RCMP which helped the US government to implement its policy of “extraordinary rendition.” Remember Omar Khadr, a Canadian who is incarcerated in the Guantánamo Bay Detention Camp as one of the “enemy combatants” who are not entitled to any of the protections of the Geneva Conventions. Khadr was arrested in Afghanistan in 2002, when he was 15 years old. Remember how human rights are being violated in the name of national security in Canada.

All human life is sacred. One death due to war violence is one too many. How do we discern the kind of truth Jesus talked about? How do we seek the kind of truth that will free us?

Majid Tehranian, Director of Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research, is a leading peace journalist. Peace journalism attempts to transform conflicts from their violent channels into constructive forms by conceptualizing news, empowering the voiceless, and seeking common grounds that unify rather than divide human societies.’[vi]

Tehranian proposes Ten Commandments for peace journalism.

1. Never reduce the parties in human conflicts to two. Remember that when two elephants fight, the grass gets hurt. Pay attention to the poor grass.
2. Identify views and interests of all parties to human conflicts. There is not a single Truth; there are many truths.
3. Do not be hostage to one source, particularly those of governments that control sources of information. … and he goes on to say
10. Transcend your own ethnic, national, or ideological biases to see and represent the parties to human conflicts fairly and accurately.[vii]

Truth about war is that it is violent and people die – perpetrators and innocents, soldiers and civilians, friends and foes. Truth about war is that human beings kill other human beings and desecrate the rest of God’s creation -- the land, the waters, the air. Truth about war is that human beings – mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, lovers and relations – are belittled, dehumanized, hated, maimed, desecrated, and killed in the name of national security and many other rationalizations that societies deem as “higher truth.”

But truth about war is also that we can unburden the memories of horror, violence, and pain of those who fought and suffered in wars by engaging in peace. We can choose to communicate and advocate for peace rather than war. Truth about war is that the colours of our eyes are various representations of colours of God’s love.

May we who are gathered here continue to find ways to communicate peace so that no friend has to sing of “empty chairs at empty tables.” May we who are gathered here continue to proclaim a message of Jesus – that truth will set us free of hatred of our neighbours in the global village, so no parent has to cry “bring him home” or “bring her home.” May we who are gathered here as Canadians practice gentleness, kindness and humility as part of our national identity and faith as we pay homage and gratitude to those who paid the ultimate sacrifice.

Amen.

--
[i] Norman Leach, Passchendaele: Canada’s triumph and tragedy on the fields of Flanders: an illustrated history (Regina: Coteau Books, 2008), 2.
[ii] Leach, Passchendaele, 3.
[iii] Gene Domagala, War took great toll on Beach and East End, Beach Metro News, November 4, 2008, 20-21.
[iv] Wendell Berry, Sabbath 2005 in The Best American Spiritual Writing 2008, ed. Philip Zaleski (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2008), 11-12.
[v] Wendell Berry, Sabbath 2005 in The Best American Spiritual Writing 2008, ed. Philip Zaleski (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2008), 16.
[vi] XXX quoted in Philip Lee, The No-Nonsense guide to Peace Journalism, the World Association for Christian Communication [WACC] 2008.
[vii] XXX quoted in Lee, The No-Nonsense guide to peace journalism.