A God Who Listens

A God who Listens

 

Aidan and I took Alice, (pictured above) our Australian Shepherd puppy, to her first obedience class last night. She did really well, I am happy to report.  She’s a smart pup. What makes Alice smart, however, is not so much that she is obedient. What our trainer, Allison, told us last night was that Alice watches and listens. When we tell her to “sit” or lie down, she looks us in the eye and awaits her next instruction. When we look at her, we can tell she is waiting to hear what we have to say. Alice is a good listener.

Keep in mind, though, that she is pretty keyed in to the fact that the whole time we are working on her obedience stuff, I have a treat concealed in my hand. The technique we have been taught is all reward-based, so whenever she sits, or lies down, or stays, she gets a nice treat. As long as she thinks I have a treat in my hand, Alice’s eyes never leave mine.

The young humans we live with are no different many times.  One of the things I have noticed about young humans is that requests for assistance in the kitchen, or with the laundry or with the trash, must be repeated several times. I cannot throw any stones in the listening department, however, because I sin frequently. I usually have to ask someone his or her name at least twice. I also will catch myself during intense conversations thinking of what I will say next to my conversation partner. I don’t know about you, but I am not always a great listener.

How great it is, then, that we follow a God who always listens. Unlike many of us, God does not have “selective hearing.” In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus hears and sees people who are sick, and he responds with deep listening. Namely, he heals them. In our Gospel reading from Mark 5 this week, he walks through a crushingly large crowd and he “feels the power go out of him” because a sick woman touches the hem of his garment. “Your faith has made you well…” he tells her. She brought her need literally “out in the open” and tugged not only on Jesus’ ear but on his robe!

What might you share with Jesus if you were in the crowd? We cannot always listen well, but God can and does. A listening God is one who urges us to be honest and open with our pain. Many times, we feel as if we cannot share some things like anger, broknenness or sickness with God, but our Gospel for this week shows us that we can! We do not have to hold "treats" in our hand, either. We feel many times that we must be righteous, or prayerful or good in order for God to listen to us. God does not listen selectively- God listens, all the time!  AMEN

God is Messing with Us!

I love it when God “messes with us.”

 I recently read “Jesus Freak,” by Sarah Miles. Sarah does some gorgeous theological reflection about her work at the food pantry at St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church in San Francisco. She describes how she begins to notice God’s presence in the every day. When she would tell her priest, Paul Fromberg, about the times when she felt that God was showing up, he would say, “God is messing with you…”

As followers of Christ, I think we believe in a God who “messes with us” and who is with us and among us and within us. However, we sometimes become blind and deaf  to God’s work with us and for us. (Some  might even say that we should call anything that makes us blind or  deaf to God “sin”). The air we breathe and the sunshine that filters down upon us in the morning is God communicating with us. The question is, do we notice God's work around us?

So, I challenge the notion that anything is coincidental. A friend of mine used to call coincidences “God-Incidents.” I am not that corny, but I think he had a point. Yesterday, for instance, I was standing in line at a government window. I was wearing my collar, so the man in line next to me asked me where I worked. I told him about Incarnation,  gave him my card and invited him to church. Later, when I asked him what he  did, he told me (with some discomfort) that he was a priest in a ACNA Anglican Church (one of the groups that broke away from TEC in the last few years).  Weird!

As we waited in the slow-moving line, we  had a great conversation. (I think we might have even struck up a friendship). I imagine that I am one of just a few Episcopal priests he has talked to recently , given some of the realities of how estranged certain branches of the Anglican family have become. However,  we agreed about many things and even stumbled upon some places where we probably would not agree. However, in that government queue God made a new connection  that could someday further her kingdom or even (one can dream) help to heal some broken places in the Church! (Plus, I met a nice person who is passionate about the Gospel of Jesus Christ!) 

If I say that all these "weird" coincidences are just happenstance,  I am really behaving as a "functional atheist." If I do not acknowledge God at work in happy meetings like the one I had yesterday, I am saying that God is not at work. What abundant grace we find, however, when we become conscious at all times that God is "messing with us!"

Look at your life and see where “God is messing with you.” Perhaps she is talking to  you through a friendship, or something you are reading, or even on the radio. When we cease to see the miraculous as “coincidental” we begin to find God at work in our lives and in the lives around us. God is still speaking  (and messing) with us!

Thanks be to God!

As always, I Love you and am praying for you-

Father Tim+

Is Greed Good?

IS GREED GOOD??

I recently watched the Oliver Stone film “Wall Street…” again. There is an iconic speech from the antagonist of the film, Gordon Gecko (pictured above, and played by Michael Douglas). Gecko is a Wall Street financier who will do anything for a buck- even if it is illegal or unethical or harmful for people who get in his way. Gecko says, in a key scene in the movie in which he gives a shareholder speech:

“The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind.”

 But is greed really good? Is greed in accordance with who we really are as followers of Christ?

 Greed is the hoarding of resources that we all do out of fear of not having enough (or needing more). What lies at the heart of greed is fear and anxiety. Greed happens when we are afraid of losing what we have!

I should know, because right now, I am sitting in the living room of a huge, luxurious house we built about 8 years ago. One evening, Patricia and I were talking, and we figured out that we only really use about 1/3 of the space we have in our house! We determined that one of our goals in the next year is to move to a smaller, more manageable house.  Why do we want so much space that we cannot possibly ever use? We are greedy for space!

Also, owning a big house means that we often have felt compelled to fill it with “stuff.” So, we have been gradually emptying out unneeded “stuff” and are trying to be more conscious of what we buy and bring in to our home. We have spent hours disposing of all the “stuff” that has collected in our too-big house by giving it away and (in a couple of weeks) having a yard sale, and will have to spend many more hours until we get it down to manageable levels. Greed for space and “stuff” has resulted in our spending many hours we will never get back dealing with all our "stuff."

With God's help, however, we are offered liberation from greed.

 In Mark 10 a “rich young man” asks Jesus what he must do to enter God’s kingdom. Jesus says, “ … Go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor. Then you will have treasure in heaven. And come, follow me. ”  Jesus later says that it is “easier for a camel to squeeze through the eye of a needle” than for a rich man to go to heaven (and by the standards he was using back then, we are all rich!) If we stop there this spells doom for us all. However, there is grace and mercy aplenty, because Jesus  says, in verse 27, that “it is impossible [to be saved] with human beings; but not with God. All things are possible for God.”(CEB)

Our challenge, especially as Christians who live in a place as wealthy as the USA, is to be grateful for what we have while being conscious of how much we have. As we cut down on our consumption, it frees up more of our resources to spend on building God’s kingdom. When we get God to help free us from the bondage of  having “too much stuff” we have more time, energy and money to share with those who have very little.  The gospel offers us hope and a way out of the greed that we all struggle with in our lives.

Oh, and by the way, Mr. Gecko, greed is definitely not good.  However, God is!

Shalom

Father Tim+