Changing the World, One Life at a Time

Sometimes you wonder if all your work really matters. I received this message from one of our church members last week that made me feel that it's worth doing the work of ministry. This church member is a professional who was laid off from her job several months ago and had nothing to cook for Christmas. We encouraged her to visit the food pantry, and this is her story.

So, this afternoon, I went to the Food Pantry at Church. It was the first time I actually stayed and went through the entire process.

Never in my life could I have imagined the love that I was shown by each woman helping me shop for items. Never in my life did I expect to receive so much food when I truly had none, as the blessing you provided me went to pay a utility bill rather than buy food. Each person I encountered at the Food Pantry who was volunteer and who, upon me informing them that I was new to the Pantry and didn't know how it worked, welcomed me and made me feel special. The volunteers not only made me feel special, but they made me feel less alone, as I sat in the back in a single chair with no one sitting beside me.

A few of the volunteers touched my shoulder; the young teenage volunteers greeted me with smiles; one young lady must have known I like to bake and gave me the last, most beautiful bag of everything a baker needs to make cookies or a great cake; the two young gentlemen who helped me to my car almost brought me to tears, as they carefully put each bag away for me - I couldn't thank them enough. As I went to each table, not knowing what to expect, each volunteer and each person made me feel less afraid, less ashamed, and just filled with gratefulness to be there.

Then, I was leaving, two of the women spoke a blessing over me by telling me that my new year would be far better. I told them I was a member of the church and had been laid off, and hadn't expected to use the Pantry but was so incredibly grateful that they were all there. I cried all the way home, thanking God at each stop light.

As I write this believing that 2011 will be a better year for me, I am already thinking of ways to give back; to give to each one of the volunteers I met today and especially the two young men who helped me to my car and the ways in which I might be able to help the Pantry, as I know a few meat business owners who might be willing to donate food as well.

Thank you for your leadership. Thank you for the Food Pantry. Thank you for being a blessing in my life. Thank you to the volunteers whose care of me and dignified treatment made my first Food Pantry experience a less frightening, troubling one. Thank you to those volunteers who smiled at me or touched my shoulder or just wished me a Merry Christmas. Thank you for First United's ministry of God's love in action.

That says it all. I'm ready for the New Year.

A Christmas Eve Message

How many people in the last month have wished us Happy Holidays or Merry Christmas? How many gifts have we shopped for, wrapped and delivered? How many cards and emails have we sent and received? How much Christmas music have we played and heard? How many cookies have we eaten?
We have tended to the outer world. Let us now be present in this moment . . . to pause for wonder.

This is the moment to feel peace. To experience joy. To know God’s love. To reflect on the mystery of the Incarnation: God takes flesh. God becomes human in the birth of Jesus.

There is a temptation as we grow older to lose our sense of wonder. We have heard this nativity story before. It may not affect us as it once did.

Let us not lose the ability to wonder.

Three times in Luke’s gospels, angels say: “You will find a child.”
This is a night for us to find the child, the child who is within us.
When God was born into the world in Jesus Christ, God came as a child – helpless, dependent and powerless.
So within each one of us is the spirit of a child – connecting us to a deeper mystery of Spirit.
There is a beloved child within each of us who remains the same throughout our lives – whether we are 5 or 15 or 45 or 75.
Christmas is God’s radical invasion into the real world, where we live.
When we say Emmanuel – God is with us – it is not an abstract idea or a vague theological truth. It actually happened!
God became flesh in a particular person who happened to be a Jewish male born in Palestine to a poor family, with parents who were forced to give birth in a barn because of decisions by the political rulers of their day.
Jesus was born into a world of political unrest, injustice, poverty, hatred, jealousy, and fear. His life was not easy.
But he performed miracles. He gave people hope. He healed people who were sick. He raised the dead. He cared about widows and orphans. He practiced forgiveness.
When people see Jesus, they learn what God is like.
Isn’t this cause enough for wonder?
You will find a child.
As we tell the story of Christmas tonight in scripture, song and story, I challenge you to find the child within yourself.
Find the beloved child of God who is wrapped in swaddling clothes and cared for by a mother and a father, by donkeys and sheep, by angels and shepherds.
Find the child within you who is wrapped in starlight, protected by the Holy Spirit.
This holy child is laid in the manger, which is a feeding trough.
And that is why we share communion together this night.
At this manger, and in the Lord’s Supper that follows, love and wonder are reborn in the human heart. God, in this baby, is depending on us.
All of us are bread for the world. Alleluia!
Let us share our bread to bring hope, peace, joy and love to all God’s children. Amen.

A word of hope from prison

At last week's Prime Time Christmas gathering, I shared several readings from poets and theologians and we sang many of the great carols of our faith. One of the readings was written by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a Protestant pastor in Germany during the years Hitler was in power. Bonhoeffer led a movement to oppose Hitler's regime and was imprisoned and ultimately put to death. He wrote these words about incarnation:

In Christ we are offered the possibility of partaking in the reality of God and in the reality of the world, but not in the one without the other. The reality of God discloses itself only by setting me entirely in the reality of the world, and when I encounter the reality of the world it is always already sustained, accepted and reconciled in the reality of God. This is the inner meaning of the revelation of God in the man Jesus Christ.

The incarnation of God in human form -- through the life of Christ -- created an unbreakable connection between the spiritual world and the physical world. We cannot know one without the other.

One of our church members was recently put on trial, and the jury found him guilty. He now waits for sentencing and prepares himself for a future that will probably include prison time. He is a prayerful person of strong faith, and that faith has given him a peace that passes understanding.

The spiritual life does not guarantee ease and serenity. Far from it. John the Baptist was imprisoned and beheaded for speaking the truth to power. Jesus Christ was arrested and crucified for claiming his divine authority.

And yet through Christ we know that God is real and that God is disclosed in the reality of this still imperfect world. It gives us hope to realize that this world is ultimately held and sustained in the reality of God.

Emmanuel. God is with us. God is with us no matter where life takes us. Because unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given. And the government shall be upon his shoulders.

Advent Joy

Joy happens.

Saturday was pretty much overflowing with joy around here.

I spent a couple of hours volunteering at the food pantry with my daughter Emma. What a fantastic place it is. Now our clients shop with small grocery carts, choosing each item they will take home. An army of volunteers stand behind the tables and smile, describing what is available. Over and over, I heard people say, “Thank you. Merry Christmas!” It felt good to give food to more than 300 people in one morning.

Afterward, we delivered a small Christmas tree to our member Henry Hulseberg, who lives at Alden Care Center in Cicero. The tree had been donated by a church family, and Henry’s room was bereft of decorations. Henry himself wasn’t feeling the best that day, either, so it was good to bring some light into his new home. The hallways were filled with children caroling, bringing gifts to the residents, and saying, “Feliz Navidad.”

When I got home in the afternoon, I got a call from my nephew Stephen. He’s 28 years old and has been deployed in the US Army to Afghanistan since January. “I’m in country,” he said. “Getting a ride from Camp Atterbury in southern Indiana. Can you meet me in Valparaiso and pick me up?” I hopped in the car and headed south. Brought him home at 10 pm last night, safe and warm.

Wrapped up my sermon in the same day, on the theme of joy. It seemed just right.