Be a Child of God*

Today’s Gospel is the other side–the other dimension maybe–of the resurrection story we heard at Easter. After the women discovered Jesus had risen they ran home to tell the men, who then (of course) went running to see. Full of fear and not a little doubt, they set off to Galilee (as the women told them to do) but they did not really expect to see Jesus. As they walked along a mysterious stranger joined them, talked with them, and (surprise!) turned out to be the resurrected Jesus.

So what do we learn from this story about the disciples on the road to Emmaus? First, that Jesus is walking along with us. We might not be paying attention, but Jesus is walking along with us. When he talks to us our first impulse is to ignore him, and the second one is to ask him if he is a fool. This is pretty much how we treat each other too, which is why this is in this story … like everything else about Jesus, whose whole life was meant to teach us how to be righteous children of God, by treating each other with respect. Then, we see that Jesus explains everything. Then, the in the breaking of the bread we see that Jesus feeds us, always. Not with perishable food, but with real nourishment for the soul. And when their eyes are opened they say to each other “were not our hearts burning the whole time?” When we are in the presence of holiness we tend to know it, even if we do not understand it. In the end the disciples are invigorated by their experience of Jesus. It says they went running back to Jerusalem, where they found the others who had also seen Him.

The opening lesson from the Acts of the Apostles is part of a long sermon given by Peter to huge crowds in Jerusalem. It says 3000 were baptized that day. The core of that sermon is this line (Acts 2:38): “For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him.” By this we know not only that there is a constant message stretching from that breaking of the bread in Emmaus to this very day, but also that this message is for us. There are no conditions placed on the commandment that the promise of God’s love is for everyone. All that is required is that we listen.

In the glbt community we have a sometimes confusing relationship with God, Jesus, and the church. We quite rightly reject the abuse that comes at us from the anti-gay faction. Many of us reject church altogether, some of us participate as best we can, hopeful for the day full inclusion will come. For some few of us it seems as though that moment is just around the corner. For others it seems like it might never come. And many glbt folks reject God outright; throwing the baby out with the bathwater, as they say, because of the oppression that has come our way.

But God wants us to listen to Jesus. Jesus told us to love God and to love each other in equal measure. In fact, Jesus told us to love God and each other as we love ourselves, meaning that for us it must all begin with self-respect. And if we listen, then like the women at the tomb, like the disciples on the road and gathered around that table for bread, we too will enter a different dimension. We will enter the dimension where we will see that fullness of life for all of God’s children is God’s plan. It is not a future, it is the present, if we live into it from the strength of our own souls.

My friends Jesus is walking with all of us. Always, whether we know it or not, whether we know where we are or not, whether we are going the right way or not—Jesus always is walking with us. And his job is to call us to righteousness, to remind us to walk always in love. When we mess up Jesus is right there to teach us how to make it right. And Jesus feeds us always, as God has commanded us to feed one another, not only with bread, but mostly with God’s love.

Be the child of God. Be a lover of Christ. The fire burning in your heart will change you constantly. And this change is born not of anything perishable but of the living and enduring word of God. God has raised Christ from the dead. And God has raised us from the dead. Alleluia!

*3 Easter Year (Acts 2:14a, 36-41; Psalm 116:1-3, 10-17; 1 Peter 1:17-23; Luke 24:13-35)

©2011 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Two way Street*

Greetings from Toronto, one of my favorite places in the world. I just arrived yesterday. I always chuckle a little, because at some point, inevitably on the first day, I experience a little jangle of cognitive dissonance. You know, somewhere in the recesses of your brain you know you are in a different culture, because after all, you just off a plane and went through immigration. But then, the cars and the streets and stores look like cars and streets and stores back in the U.S. so you forget momentarily. Then, walking along you overhear conversations and think, sounds just like home. Then just as you get lulled into complacency you start to really notice what people are talking about, and you start to hear subtly different speech patterns, and then maybe you see a Canadian flag and your brain at first goes “oh, look a Canadian flag” then it goes “duh ….,” and you realize all at once that you are in a different place after all. The interesting thing I think is that you have to listen quietly in order for the knowledge to come into your consciousness. You can’t just barge about in your normal way, expelling yourself as you go. No, you have to be still, listen quietly, and let the new reality become present in your consciousness.

Of course, that’s a lot like praying, isn’t it? Or is prayer for you still of the “gimme gimme” variety? Too many of us succumb to that I’m afraid. No, real prayer is about being still and knowing God; about being still and in the quietness hearing and seeing and feeling God and knowing what God is calling you to do. In Genesis it says God spoke to Abraham, but we are being naïve if we think a guy walked up and talked to Abraham. In my experience, when God speaks it’s pretty clear; but it’s never verbal in the human sense. God tells us to “go” by being with us in the going, on the way. Like Abraham, we have to listen to God if we want to inherit the richness of experience God has prepared for us.

Lent is our time for listening. I suppose you thought it was a time for giving something up, for dreary music and dour church stuff. Well, it plays out that way if you let it. But really Lent is a time for listening—to God, of course, but also to each other. Paul says Abraham’s promise came through the righteousness of faith and that means it was through listening and action, through hearing God and knowing God along the way, because this is what the righteousness of faith means—it is in this way that Abraham’s promise was realized. And it will be in this way that we realize the promises of God as well.

This is also the substance of Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus in John’s Gospel. Jesus wants Nicodemus to understand that faith isn’t magic and God isn’t a magician. Jesus wants Nicodemus to understand that change is required to let God work through your own experience.

And that reminds me of coming out. It reminds me of the first unstable steps I made when I finally understood what it would mean not just to be gay, but to live life openly and fully in the reality to which God had called me from before my own birth. It was a little bit of cognitive dissonance at first, it was a little bit like walking in a different culture even if all around it felt just the same as before. But eventually, once I listened, I began to see, and the reality transformed me. This is what I mean when I tell lgbt folks to be proudly lesbian-gay-bisexual-transgendered. I mean let your reality transform not only you, but the culture around you too.

You have to listen to hear and see what God is calling you to. And you have to be God’s creation to be transformative. It’s a two-way street. Happy Lent. Holy Lent.

2 Lent (Genesis 12:1-4a; Psalm 121; Romans 4:1-5, 13-17; John 3:1-17)

©2011 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved