July 25, 2021 at Saint Peter, Saint William, & Saint Ann Churches in Naples, FL

Kings 4, 42-44 + Psalm 145 + Ephesians 4, 1-6 + John 6, 1-15

For the next five weeks, until mid-August, we set aside the Gospel of Mark and take up the Sixth Chapter of John’s Gospel. I encourage you to read and re-read that chapter often in the next several weeks. It’s only seventy-two verses. Less than ten minutes. It will help you move more deeply into the identity of Christ Jesus and draw you into the mystery of the Holy Eucharist which is John’s goal. The First Testament Readings during this time are accounts of extraordinary feedings that will open our hearts and minds to this Chapter of John’s Gospel in which Jesus gradually reveals his true identity and invites us into a life of union with him through Communion. First, today, he feeds the multitude. Next, he claims that those who believe in him will not hunger, because he is the bread of life. Then he will boldly insist that if we do not feed on his flesh and blood we will not have life. 

This chapter of John’s Gospel is probably the most important revelation we have been given about Jesus Christ and his presence with us in the Holy Eucharist. Because I am so convinced of this, and because so many people do not grasp or understand what we have in the Holy Eucharist, I have to switch roles for a few minutes and teach rather than preach. Since Mark and Matthew record two occasions when Jesus feeds a crowd, with Luke and John having one, important details in each one get mixed up in our minds. That does not help us get to the heart of what the writer, Mark, Matthew, Luke, or John is doing. They are all different.  Of them all, John’s is the most powerful and concise revelation.

In John’s Gospel, there is no eucharistic last meal in an upper room. This chapter is John’s equivalent of the “last supper.”  There are several details here unique to John’s Gospel that are very important. There is something special here:

They are in Galilee, not Jerusalem, and it is near the Passover. Every Jewish male was required to celebrate the Passover in Jerusalem on a certain day in the first month with sacrifice of a lamb followed by the Passover meal. When that requirement was laid down by Moses, some complained that it was not possible to make the journey in the first month. So, Moses allowed for a second Passover to be celebrated in the second month outside of Jerusalem. No lamb was required since there was no Temple for the sacrifice. What was required was unleavened bread. Now, connect the dots here with me. Jesus has just crossed the lake. Think of Moses passing through the waters at the exodus. Jesus goes up a mountain and sits down to teach which is the posture of a teacher like Moses, and the mountain reminds those who first heard John’s Gospel of the mountain where Moses received the covenant and God was revealed as the great, “I AM”. Now, hang on to that “I AM” because it’s going to come up later in the chapter. Think too of how, through the intercession of Moses, God fed the people in the desert with that Manna. What we end up with before anything happens in this Gospel is a deliberate attempt on John’s part to cast this scene and what follows in the framework of the Exodus with Passover, Moses, and the Covenant. 

Then comes the feeding. There are important details here too unique to John’s Gospel. This time, and this time alone, it is Jesus who initiates the action. In the other Gospels, it is the Disciples who bring up the need to send the crowd away to get something to eat. Not here, Jesus starts it all as he asks a question of Philip. 

Important to notice also is the matter of five barley loaves. There is bread in the other accounts, but here it is barley. According to Jewish law, the barley could not be used for ordinary eating until it has been offered on the second day within the Passover liturgy. This detail suggests that this feeding is that second Passover allowed for those not able to get to Jerusalem in the first month. In other words, while Matthew, Mark, and Luke have a Last Supper Meal in Jerusalem in the first month, John has this meal in Galilee, and look who’s there. This time, not a select few, but huge crowd of Galileans. Here, Jesus does exactly what he does in the other Gospels in Jerusalem, He blesses, breaks, and shares. Catch one other detail here. In the other Gospels, he tells the disciples to do the sharing. In John’s Gospel Jesus does the feeding.

So, you see, this chapter is loaded. Read it. It is as important to us who come this table as those other last supper accounts, but even more so. In John’s Gospel the identity of Jesus and how he chooses to remain present to us and what happens to those who consume the food he gives cannot be ignored or missed. Next week then begins what we call, “The Bread of Life Discourse”. Listen intelligently and be hungry for what will be proclaimed. 

For today, let’s leave here fed on the Word of God mindful that we do not live on bread alone. Yet, we turn to be fed here with the Bread of Life. Remember that there is more to this Gospel than a simple story about the compassion of Jesus for a crowd. There is also a reminder that when we offer what seems to be too little God can make more than enough with what we have. It’s like jars of water that seem so inadequate at a big wedding feast with no wine. They end up with a lot more than they expected and it was twice as good. It can be that way for us the more deeply we dig into the Word of God, for in discovering the real identity of Jesus, in discovering how and what he has provided for us in the Eucharist, we shall discover who we really are in the sight of God, a people loved, redeemed, and called to holiness and paradise.

July 11, 2021 at Saint Peter and Saint William Churches in Naples, FL

Amos 7, 12-15 + Psalm 85 + Ephesians 1, 3-14 + Mark 6, 7-13

Choice is a big deal these days, and a lot people seem to be very concerned about protecting their rights to choose. The consequent hysteria that this causes has led to a great deal of conflict. It seems to me that this fuss over choice is at the root of the abortion crises, the challenges over sexual identity, who may receive Communion, and perhaps even over voter’s rights, and countless other hot-button items that are driving us apart, making us unable to tolerate opinions that differ from our own, and turning ordinary decent people into fanatics who would choose to destroy another rather than understand and make a friend.

Choice is the issue that the Word of God puts before us today with a strong and clear reminder that before we make choices, God makes choices. Forgetting that God’s choices come first leads to chaos. Failing to acknowledge choices God has made will set us at odds with God’s Will and God’s plan. 

Amos was a prophet chosen by God. He did not choose to be a prophet. Living at a time of extraordinary prosperity of Israel, and living at a time of great corruption and crushing poverty, he started out by condemning Israel’s neighbors. Everyone cheered. Then when he condemned the crimes and injustice of Israel, it didn’t go over very well. Just like those living at the time, we like to enjoy our success, and we don’t like to face our sinfulness, especially if it produced our success. Amos was attacked by the High Priest and the King. They told him to get out. He told them that he was just a man involved with livestock and fruit trade who spoke because God had chosen him. He was thrown out, but today, we know who Amos was. We know his name, and we’ve just listened to him again. I would bet that there are not five people in this church who know the name of the king against whom he spoke. So much for fame and power. 

In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul reminds anyone who listens that we ought to be praising God for the blessings we have received. Nowhere among those blessings is economic prosperity listed. The blessings are spiritual, and the first among them is the fact and the truth that we are chosen people. We are chosen to be holy, he says, and without blemish. We have been chosen, says Paul, and we exist for the praise of God. That’s powerful stuff and high expectations to which most of us have not paid enough attention.

Chosen to be “holy” does not mean chosen to be “pious.” What is holy is something set apart or different from this world. When God chose us to be “holy” there was no plan to take us out of the world, but to make us different within the world. A question arises: “Are we different?” “Are we making a difference?” In Jewish sacrifices, to be worthy of being offered to God an animal had to be certified by inspection to be unblemished. People chosen by God have to be certified not just respectable. They are worthy by their perfection. They don’t just meet human standards, but rather the standards of God, and they do this by living in his love.

One of the tragic things about our times is that so many people perceive life as mindless and meaningless. For that reason, so many young people choose drugs, alcohol, and suicide. Nothing in the media, in school, or among most of their peers prepares them to seek life’s meaning. They see nothing worth dying for. If there is nothing to die for, then there is nothing to life for. As a result, too many people look at their future and think of how they are going to make a living rather than think about how they will live their life. It isn’t just young people trapped in that pit. Even those of us in the last half of our lives might reflect carefully on why, how, and for what reason we have been chosen to live this long. 

Jesus choose those disciples and sent them out to provide the world with a meaning to life, with hope to a fragmented world, and to restore God’s creation which has been in such chaos to order and beauty and peace. They went two by two, not alone. They were to go simply to present the meaning to life that Jesus proclaimed: conversion of heart and a radical reorientation. Suddenly life is not just a stumbling walk to death, but rather an intense loving service to others on behalf of God.

Chosen by God, chosen to be holy, chosen to be unblemished, we might all do well to quite fussing about our choices and get on with the purpose for which we were called into life and chosen by the great gift of our faith to make life’s meaning known, protected and treasured. Facing that mission, we can do no better than simply throw up our hands and say: “Come, Holy Spirit” and then get on with it. 

July 4, 2021 at Saint Peter and Saint William Churches in Naples, FL

Ezekiel 2, 2-5 + Psalm 123+ 2 Corinthians 12, 7-10 + Mark 6, 1-6

Telling the difference between good and evil is serious and difficult challenge to many of us. We have all been conditioned by artists and movies to think and expect evil to look terrible and frightening like monsters ugly and deformed becoming the stuff of nightmares. If that was really the case, we would all be safe since no one in their right mind would have anything to do with evil. But the truth is, evil is anything but frightening and ugly. It is, on the contrary, usually quite nice looking, polished, and attractive.

All of us know evil. It is not specific or individual sins that make a person evil. We all sin, but we are not all evil. It is the refusal to acknowledge sinful behavior that evil people. It is that repeated, consistent pattern with no thought or desire to change that leads to evil. Evil people are to be pitied, not hated. They are always sad, lonely people hiding a great and terrible emptiness known to only a few.

When Jesus got to Nazareth in today’s Gospel, those in that synagogue had to make a choice between good and evil. They made the wrong choice. They rejected goodness. That rejection was not from a personality clash, immaturity, or some political difference. It came from the faith and commitment of Jesus. It was easier for them to do nothing than to do something. It was easier for them to be negative than positive. It was easier to be destructive rather than creative and imagine some new vision of the Kingdom of God and a new concept of a Messiah.

His rejection was also due to the growing opposition from authorities who so inflamed the townspeople that they wanted to kill him. So, he moved his mother and his base of operation to Capernaum for safety. He worked from there rather than Nazareth. So, returning there was risky. Yet, I think, he loved his old friends and home-town neighbors.

They thought he was not worthy of a hearing because he was just a guy who made things with his hands. He was a carpenter. Some of them, just like some people today, think that people who work like that are not capable of anything intellectual or really great.

His rejection was also due to the fact that they were close to him. They knew who he was and they knew his whole clan. By mentioning his family members, they probably intended an insult. Assuming that his family was not held in high regard, they ask a good question: “Where did he get all of this?” They come to the wrong conclusion. The result is resentment, and therein lies a source of evil. Their minds are made up and their hearts are closed. They were offended by goodness itself, and thereby revealed their own self-hatred. They could not believe that from them, from Nazareth, something this good could rise up. 

The truth is that he is just too ordinary for them. He is just a young man who grew up there, worked with his father, became restless and left town to discover himself like so many others had done before him. They just could not believe that out of an ordinary life anything extra ordinary could possibly happen. They could not grasp that God works in ordinary ways day in and day out, and neither can we sometimes. The result is that we often miss the hand of God at work, and sometimes even deny the possibility. 

We cannot afford to make their mistakes. We need to recognize evil and choose good even when evil looks attractive, is easy, and might make us look good. We cannot afford to do nothing, to be negative, and to fail to imagine that God might actually plan to do something with plain old ordinary people like us. We cannot let resentment ever keep us from seeing goodness in all God’s people. 

My friends, if our faith, our religion, our traditions are ever to thrive and have a future, 

• We must do more than just belong. We must participate.
• We must do more than just care. We must help.
• We must do more than believe. We must practice
• We must do more than be fair. We must be kind
• We must do more than forgive. We must love.
• We must do more than live. We must grow.
• We must do more than be friendly. We must be friends.

When we embrace this truth and this way of life, Jesus Christ will be able to work great wonders here in this very place.

Ezekiel 2, 2-5 + Psalm 123+ 2 Corinthians 12, 7-10 + Mark 6, 1-6

Telling the difference between good and evil is serious and difficult challenge to many of us. We have all been conditioned by artists and movies to think and expect evil to look terrible and frightening like monsters ugly and deformed becoming the stuff of nightmares. If that was really the case, we would all be safe since no one in their right mind would have anything to do with evil. But the truth is, evil is anything but frightening and ugly. It is, on the contrary, usually quite nice looking, polished, and attractive.

All of us know evil. It is not specific or individual sins that make a person evil. We all sin, but we are not all evil. It is the refusal to acknowledge sinful behavior that evil people. It is that repeated, consistent pattern with no thought or desire to change that leads to evil. Evil people are to be pitied, not hated. They are always sad, lonely people hiding a great and terrible emptiness known to only a few.

When Jesus got to Nazareth in today’s Gospel, those in that synagogue had to make a choice between good and evil. They made the wrong choice. They rejected goodness. That rejection was not from a personality clash, immaturity, or some political difference. It came from the faith and commitment of Jesus. It was easier for them to do nothing than to do something. It was easier for them to be negative than positive. It was easier to be destructive rather than creative and imagine some new vision of the Kingdom of God and a new concept of a Messiah.

His rejection was also due to the growing opposition from authorities who so inflamed the townspeople that they wanted to kill him. So, he moved his mother and his base of operation to Capernaum for safety. He worked from there rather than Nazareth. So, returning there was risky. Yet, I think, he loved his old friends and home-town neighbors.

They thought he was not worthy of a hearing because he was just a guy who made things with his hands. He was a carpenter. Some of them, just like some people today, think that people who work like that are not capable of anything intellectual or really great.

His rejection was also due to the fact that they were close to him. They knew who he was and they knew his whole clan. By mentioning his family members, they probably intended an insult. Assuming that his family was not held in high regard, they ask a good question: “Where did he get all of this?” They come to the wrong conclusion. The result is resentment, and therein lies a source of evil. Their minds are made up and their hearts are closed. They were offended by goodness itself, and thereby revealed their own self-hatred. They could not believe that from them, from Nazareth, something this good could rise up. 

The truth is that he is just too ordinary for them. He is just a young man who grew up there, worked with his father, became restless and left town to discover himself like so many others had done before him. They just could not believe that out of an ordinary life anything extra ordinary could possibly happen. They could not grasp that God works in ordinary ways day in and day out, and neither can we sometimes. The result is that we often miss the hand of God at work, and sometimes even deny the possibility. 

We cannot afford to make their mistakes. We need to recognize evil and choose good even when evil looks attractive, is easy, and might make us look good. We cannot afford to do nothing, to be negative, and to fail to imagine that God might actually plan to do something with plain old ordinary people like us. We cannot let resentment ever keep us from seeing goodness in all God’s people. 

My friends, if our faith, our religion, our traditions are ever to thrive and have a future, 

• We must do more than just belong. We must participate.
• We must do more than just care. We must help.
• We must do more than believe. We must practice
• We must do more than be fair. We must be kind
• We must do more than forgive. We must love.
• We must do more than live. We must grow.
• We must do more than be friendly. We must be friends.

When we embrace this truth and this way of life, Jesus Christ will be able to work great wonders here in this very place.