June 22, 2014, Genesis 21:8–21

June 22, Genesis 21:8–21, Page 16

Our text begins in the middle of a longer narrative. Abraham and Sarah are married. Sarah is barren but asks God for child. Then Sarah encourages Abraham to take her salve Hagar, rape her, and from which Hagar becomes pregnant. This child is Ishmael. Afterward, Sarah too becomes pregnant with Isaac, and Hagar and Ishmael become despised by Sarah. Hagar has already run away once, during her pregnancy, to which God has told her to return, and Hagar praises and names God, “a God of seeing.

Genesis 21:8–21, Page 16

The child grew, and was weaned; and Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. 

But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, playing with her son Isaac. So she said to Abraham, “Cast out this slave woman with her son; for the son of this slave woman shall not inherit along with my son Isaac.” 

The matter was very distressing to Abraham on account of his son. But God said to Abraham, 

“Do not be distressed because of the boy and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for it is through Isaac that offspring shall be named for you. As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation of him also, because he is your offspring.” 

So Abraham rose early in the morning, and took bread and a skin of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered about in the wilderness of Beer-sheba. 

When the water in the skin was gone, she cast the child under one of the bushes. Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bowshot; for she said, “Do not let me look on the death of the child.” And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept. 

And God heard the voice of the boy; and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, and said to her, 

“What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is. Come, lift up the boy and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make a great nation of him.” 

Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. She went, and filled the skin with water, and gave the boy a drink. God was with the boy, and he grew up; he lived in the wilderness, and became an expert with the bow. He lived in the wilderness of Paran; and his mother got a wife for him from the land of Egypt. 

***

There is a quote going around Facebook that read, “When you are going through a hard time, and wonder where God is, remember, the teacher is always silent during the test.” I thank God, that this not my experience, nor the experience of which our scriptures tell. I know a God who does not administer tests and stand back with arms crossed, lips sealed, red pen in hand, to watch us either fail or succeed. My experience of God, is that when life throws us a test, God hears, and God seeks to provide answers or at least a hall pass. The old adage, that the works of God become more clear the harder our trials, is the quote to which I would rather subscribe. I believe in a present God, and an active God, who works for healing and reconciliation of the universe. And though this scripture makes any school test inconsequential, those hands on, caring, teachers were my favorite anyway, and that same nurturing Spirit is the lens through which I read the character of God in this text. 

I grant that, one could read this text either way. One could see the character of God as encouraging Abraham to send away Hagar and Ishmael into the desert, as if it were a test of faith to the mother, and child, and to their father. Instead, the example provided, is one of care for all. Abraham, our text reads, is distressed on account of his son, and God begins by reminding Abraham that Abraham is accountable for more than his Son. That Hagar the slave woman whom Abraham took is also worthy of care. So much so, that even God promises to care for the slave woman, along with the boy, and that instead of death, the offspring of this slave woman’s son will become a great nation. The outcasts will share in Abraham’s inheritance, the very thing for which Sarah sought to them cast out. God is not a God of the test. God is a God who provides answers of grace when there are only unanswerable questions and dire solutions. 

Yet, still, one could read this text either way. It is easy to picture the scene of Hagar placing the baby Ishmael under the bushes as a test of her faith, as she cries out, “Do not let me look on the death of this child.” It would be easy to pull out the read pen and see the angel’s answer of, “Do not be afraid,” as a correction, one more point knocked off Hagar’s grade. But I don’t think God wants us to fail. I think God is striving for our perfect score, “Do not be afraid,” faith is not about a test, it is about grace and our God is not silent, God speaks. The angel of the Lord comforts Hagar, “God has heard the voice of the boy.” God has answered her cry in the middle of the test, God in fact, answered this cry, from Ishmael’s birth. Ishmael will always be heard by God who Ishmael his name, meaning, ‘God has heard.’ This naming was not a foreshadowing of this test, otherwise it might mean, “God will hear,” Instead, God names Ishmael with the understanding that the weakest and most vulnerable among us need to be intensionally heard. God took special care to name and hear this slave child conceived by the rape of his master and father, raised in by a helpless mother. God knew that their voice would be marginalized, and therefore God was not silent but listened and spoke not in red pen, but with comfort and grace.

Still, once could read this text either way, seeing God’s instructions to Hagar as a reprimand, “Come lift up the boy, and hold him fast with your hand.” One could read this text as if she had failed the test of faith and was now writing the correct answer on the chalkboard 100 times. But I don’t read this text that way, nor do I expect a powerless mother to hold her baby in her arms and watch it die, perhaps the heaviest of burdens. Instead, I see God offering a powerless Hagar, God’s power, to lift up and quench thirst. God simply opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. She went, and filled the skin with water, and gave the boy a drink. This is not a silent, stoic; God, this is a God who responds to life’s tests with an open book of more than one could ever google; this is a God who sees life’s tests as partner work with divine intervention. 

I am not sure how one could get to the end of this text and still see God as silent, and testing. God is a hands on compassionate teacher who teaches that we might graduate and overturn the life’s tests into flourishing in God’s creation. During Ishmael’s childhood, our text reads that, ‘God was with the boy.’ Ishmael grew up and became an expert with the bow, transversing the same distance which once separated he and his mother in their near death. Likewise, Hagar the one who could never be called wife, but was wife with out choice, was given the power to choose her son’s wife from their own people so that it was true wife rather than a slave. These answers God gives are so far beyond the test life gives, beyond extra credit, beyond school, beyond our knowing. They are are the answers from a God who has named us, hears us, empowers us, and is with us. “When you are going through a hard time, and wonder where God is, remember, the teacher is always answers during the test.”

June 15, 2014; Genesis 1:1-2:4a

In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.

Then God said, “Let there be light;” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness God called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

And God said, “Let there be a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” So God made the dome and separated the waters that were under the dome from the waters that were above the dome. And it was so. God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.

And God said, “Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together God called Seas. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, “Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it.” And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind, and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.

And God said, “Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, and let them be lights in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. God set them in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.

And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.” So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm, and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.

And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.” And it was so. God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind, and the cattle of every kind, and everything that creeps upon the ground of every kind. And God saw that it was good.

Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created humankind in God’s image, in the image of God, God created them; male and female God created them. God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.”

God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so.

God saw everything that God had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude. And on the seventh day God finished the work that God had done, and God rested on the seventh day from all the work that God had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that God had done in creation.

These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created. In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

***

What runs through is a peptic beautiful gift of good. generations

I don’t believe the earth was made in seven days, and to me it matters not, if this account is historical or scientific. In fact, I prefer not, because proofs push aside the poetry and explain away the mystery. I don’t want to have our Genesis figured out, just like I don’t want to know the exact measure of the universe. I want there to be Jed Rembolds studying the stars for eternity, just like I like to think, generations and generations ago, people looked up at those same stars and told and retold stories to imagine answers to the unimaginable and unanswerable. To me, I want there to have always been imagination and there to always be mystery, and I believe there was, and there ever shall be, and this mystery is more important than any fact, or proof, of history, or science, or otherwise. 

And I think God too wanted the mystery because God created a world without exacts, without only day and night, but also with evening and morning. God created the way the world glows amber in the long shadows of dusk, and the cobalt that darkens to black with the setting sun, those in-between colors and times and lights, which speak of the mystery of our being and the mystery of time, from that first day. And I look out at that amber light, and cobalt sky and I see the poetry in which we live, and poetry from which we were created, and the poetry echoed in this scripture, the poetry of evenings and mornings, and to me, having proof doesn't matter, I believe, like God, that it is good, and I call it so. 

June 8, 2014, John 7:37 - 39

John 7:37-39 

Background: “Although not mentioned often in the New Testament, the Festival of Tabernacles was one of the “big three” annual festivals (along with Passover and Pentecost) for which adult Jewish males were expected to make the pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and it was generally the most joyous and popular of the three. Originally a harvest celebration, by the time of Jesus it had also taken on the significance of remembering God’s provision for the people of Israel during their wilderness wanderings. Water ceremonies were an important part of this celebration. A priest would draw water from the pool of Siloam with a golden pitcher, then carry it back to the temple and pour it into a silver bowl next to the altar, accompanied by musicians and choirs. As the priest poured out the water he would pray to the Lord to send rain. In some rabbinic traditions, the water-drawing of Tabernacles is interpreted as the drawing of the Holy Spirit.” http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=2046

John 7:37-39

On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, 'Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.'" Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive.

***

Like the temple priest, as your pastor, I have the privilege of standing by the rivers of living water with you. I watch in awe, as the Holy Spirit flows, mighty and strong, from the faith of your lives. In this church, you have rolled away one another’s stones and boulders, that a Powder River of care might be but a tributary to a greater faith. You have carved canyons through your community through both your public service and private acts of care, that a Snake River of might join with others in a confluence of Christian service. You have traveled, as have your spiritual gifts, and become like the Columbia, so wide, and so grande, that a greatness beyond itself it witnessed as a river of living water moves to the sea of God. I cannot hold the Pacific in a golden pitcher, nor can I pour the ocean in a bowl, but I can take a small vessel, fill it, and carry it back to this pulpit, and pray my words pour out before you as water for the thirsty, that you may see but a drop of the Spirit at work in your heart.

On the last day of the festival, middle schoolers and volunteers arrived in droves, so much so, that someone quipped that LaVonne and Gary must have ridden the school bus, as they were shuffled in by the heard of students eagerly approaching the counter. I watched Shannon Moon and another volunteer actually serve up plates with not only smiles, but also with the names of each student, the laughter of knowing them well, and the nostalgia of catching up after a week and saying goodbye for a summer. I thought, this atmosphere is what every McDonalds, Denny’s, Lone Pine, and Sumpter Junction business model wants, but it is only what can be achieved through the passion of a calling, and the ministry to those in need. Around the table, heaping plates of eggs, hash browns, english muffins, ham, cheese, cereal, sausage and smoothies were practically speaking that which would spoil, but symbolically the plethora of food was really a culmination of the last day of festival of Open Door after a plentiful harvest season. Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, out of the believers heart shall flower rivers of living water

On the last day of the festival, that great day, a stumpy, smiley eighth grader, Carlos, passed around his container for the day’s Egg Drop Contest. From the top of the fire truck’s reach Carlos’ after thought of a plastic jar air freshener, half full of, overly fragrant, apple cinnamon gel beads, would be dropped and surely make a gooey mess of splattered raw egg and hot pick ooze. Carlos planned to add some cotton balls upon arrival at school, but even with my prompting, was not exceedingly interested in the engineering and rather enjoyed offering others sniffs of the candy scented container. Our own Evan, proudly opened up a black messenger bag briefcase, full of his grandmother’s manilla colored upholstery foam. Describing its rarity in middle school circles, and its brilliance in eggs tests, he stuffed the material bag in his bag as if it were contraband. Later, as the students bustled off to school, I noticed Carlos’ air freshener, held tight in his hand, a now pink and manilla gel/foam combination, of forethought and collective wisdom. Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and and let the one who believes in me drink. Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.’

On the last day of the festival, that great day, Carlos had also brought a bright pink megaphone, which may have garnered sneers outside of Open Door, but Sam Sullivan picked it up and used it to corral the students and volunteers for the newspapers’ picture. Somehow she made the megaphone more coveted then confrontational. She then walked around making sure each student could be seen, calling them by name to scoot one way or another, telling the kid laying down in front of the group just how to position himself in that center, ‘look at me spot,’ He was one I had to redirect earlier from some disruptive behavior, and was most likely not whom the school wanted to in the limelight of the newspaper, but Sam, despite this, or perhaps because of this, recognized his need for some extra attention, and so she helped, not worrying about her own place in the picture until all were ready. She was Jesus was standing there, crying out, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. I later texted Sam, how I saw God in her that morning, to which she responded, “Thanks, I prayed this morning for God to talk through me and touch a child.” As the scripture has said, 'Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.'" 

On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, down at Backpack, the same plethora of food greeted us with tables full, which led to plastic bags barely able to be tied, and as we were tying them little paper gifts of coupons to Charlie’s Ice Cream were slipped in by Eth Carr, like a cherry on top.  Likewise, the group chatted and caught up, and smiled, not from a last day of work, for they all came back to clean the stock room, but from a festival at its peak and a river of living water. Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.’

On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, the Safety Policy Committee met again to tweak some of its final procedures. Having met for at least two years, and dozens of drafts and amendments, the Child Protection Policy was now functional. Throughout its many iterations questions had been raised, often with the response, of another question, “If this was Maddie and Alex, what would we do?” This question brought policy into practicality, and purpose into providing for loving protection. That night around my kitchen table, Maddie and Alex ate with the committee. After Alex asked to sit by, the merely more familiar, me, Melissa encouraged them, “Do you know whose Mom that is? Ma-Kourtney’s  So, do you think she is nice?” Over dinner, Nanette and Bob and Mark, all engaged the kids, and I watched the group again live into its baptismal promise to nurture these children in faith with love. With each Child Protection Policy amendment, and each dinner table question to the kids,’Out of the believer's heart flowed rivers of living water.'" 

The great day, while Jesus was standing there, during Committee Meeting Night, Trisha and I would have wondered about how to pick hymns without the ability to read music, but Katya came singing and reading hymns.  "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. 'Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.'"

During the Mission Committee Meeting, I watched in awe while two topics that could have resulted in people taking sides, instead was approached in partnership and support. "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. 'Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.'"

Then, going upstairs, I found the Christian Ed. table covered in pictures, scrapbooking scissors and the committee joined around them, not only meeting, but telling memories of the ministry they share, and the prayers of their concern. The mess of the table echoed the fellowship in the room, as Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.’" 

The great day, while Jesus was standing there, Jake and Silas shared a chair in the fellowship hall, and sitting on its not so much for room but with anticipation about the Youth Dinner Theatre going on before them, Jake turned to Silas and said, “This is so funny!” Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.’" 

On the last day of the festival, the great day, during our Church Work Day, Jason and Greg tightened up the playground, while Travis Talbot and Annalea worked together on the sanctuary doors, and Dr. Bob showed me the tool which measures the top of our steeple by an isosceles triangle. Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.’" 

On the last day of the festival, the great day, Kate’s parents brought an amazing meal to youth group, and surprised Kate with a cake and candles and her friends singing her the song. Downstairs in the basement, our youth group had created such community that the PYG pen had became a place meaningful enough to celebrate the bounty of a life. Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.’" 

In our scripture, the pilgrims to which Jesus speaks, have joyfully journeyed from their homes, to come to this celebration. As a congregation we have journeyed from the High Holy Seasons of Advent with its Children’s Pageant  WSG cookie gatherings, Longest Nights, and a candle lit Silent Night. To Epiphany's with wise men and All Church Ski Days, to a Lent of Tone chimes and Joint Worship Services with the Methodist Church. We have moved to Easter with Egg Hunts and fabulous brunches, to an Eastertide of Youth Auctions, and Ginger Rembold preaching Earth Day, and now like those pilgrims we are at Pentecost. I cannot name all the work of the Holy Spirit on our journey. Instead, I have taken merely the water that I could carry in this small pitcher, and it is simply a week and only my view, rather than a collective. I pour it out before you knowing I cannot carry the Ocean of God, of which we are all a part. I cannot name the volumes in the Columbia, nor the turns along the Snake, or even each source of the Powder, but I pour out before you a river of living water, the Holy Spirit in our midst. May it quench your thirst, and may you drink, for from you flow rivers of living water.

June 1, 2014, John 17:1–11

After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, 

“Father, the hour has come; 

glorify your Son, so that the Son may glorify you, 

since you have given him authority over all people, 

to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. 

And this is eternal life, 

that they may know you, 

the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. 

I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. 

So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence 

with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.”

I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. 

They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. 

Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; 

for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them 

and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. 

I am asking on their behalf; 

I am not asking on behalf of the world, 

but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. 

All mine are yours, and yours are mine; 

and I have been glorified in them.

And now I am no longer in the world, 

but they are in the world, 

and I am coming to you. 

Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, 

so that they may be one, as we are one.

***

It is true, you never know how you are going to react in a life or death situation until your in one, and so there I was, sitting in my window seat, overhearing the pilot say the kind of sentence I recognized from my stint as a hospital chaplain. Like predictions from doctors to patients, when a diagnosis was not definitive, but was possibly deadly, the pilots words were nuanced with both a litigious carefulness and a compassionate urgency, his intensionally measured speech saying nothing conclusively, but saying everything in the emotion between the lines. 

We had taken off from Denver, and as we ascended, we were accompanied by an increasingly loud sound of metal against metal. Now we were heading back to DIA, never a good sign on its own, but increasingly ominous as the flight attendants again recited the safety procedures, detailing the air masks, the correct click and tightness of seat-belts, ‘worn low and sung across your waist,’ and the illuminated lights leading to the exit row where the stewardess squatted down to whisper to the passengers seated there. 

I was twenty-eight, to be married in a couple months, having just finished my chaplain residency and was attempting to sneak in the last bits of an Indian Summer by traveling to see my best friend Anne, who was doing seasonal work, as a kayak guide, in Seward, Alaska. Coupled with a, ‘school’s out for summer,’ type feeling, and my being a frequent enough flier to have a uniform of warm socks for the floor air vents, hoodie to lean against the fingerprinted portal window, and pashmina scarf to double as a blanket, the Katy-in-a-plane-crash-setting seemed unlikely and surreal, and yet fitting, as unpredictability seems a hallmark of tragedy, and unfulfilled life events their playing card. Groaning with cliche, the sarcastic voice in my head played out the news blip with my picture and mention of an unworn wedding dress and an unfulfilled calling as a pastor, as if the unfinished life that was to be somehow held more weight then the life that was. 

Yet, despite satirical coping skills, I could not keep from crying. Opposed to the wails that ask questions, mine were the soundless tears that come with acceptance. As my eyes stung and salt water found its familiar path of least resistance over my rounded cheeks, and fell to my lap like the first giant drops of rain, I was thankful for my window seat, that I could turn from the crowded plane to the boundless universe in the airspace that seemed to connect one world to the next. I remember brown flat farms and forested jagged Western Rockies, and wispy clouds that looked as if this late afternoon was just another summer daydream. I didn’t want to leave this and that is what the tears were. I didn’t want to die yet. I loved life too much. 

I loved the way water sounded when you cut through the surface with a long rolling freestyle pull. I loved the smell of pine upon the first steps of a hike and the feel of tired legs on the last. I loved a good meal in a new place and a glass of wine and candlelight and company. I loved the feeling of being known when friends would tease, and likewise, when they would listen to my overly sensitive verbal processing. I loved my family, my librarian mom creating summer projects for my sister and I as kids, and as an adult hugging me so tight in San Antonio’s baggage claim that my ears would hurt from the reached up, squeezed out strength of love, and my dad, and my being Daddy’s girl, and talks on the couch about the ways and the whys of life, that somehow shaped me beyond his knowing, and my sister, my playmate, my pupil, my younger than me role model and counterbalance. I wanted swim more, travel more, be with my family more, see how my friends more. Life was so good, and I didn’t want it to end. But also knew if it ended, it had been good, and it was enough. I surprised myself with this.

I surprised myself for what I didn’t grieve. There weren’t regrets of what I didn’t do and didn’t say. Though had been through enough to have legitimate enemies, and felt periodically pressured about providing forgiveness, I felt no burning desire for reconciliation. Though I have done enough to be an enemy of few, I felt no need for a final confession or last rights. Instead, 40,000 feet in the air, I wondered if my phone worked, and whom would I call. I started thinking through every person I loved, Will - no, Mom - no, Dad - no, Diana - no, Anne - no, Lisa - no, Susie - no, Michael, Zach, Doug, - no, Anna, Amber, - no. I went through the list of every person I loved, and I knew each of them knew, and that was all I would have wanted to tell them anyway. 

And that, likewise, was all Jesus wanted to share. Knowing his hour had come, he looked up to heaven, as if out an airplane portal window, measuring the space between this realm and the next, and connecting the two through the words of prayer and the act of love. Jesus too went though his list. He said to God, “You have given me authority over all people,” and I imagine he, like me, listing the ones he loved. 

I imagine the twelve, Peter, Matthew, James and Judas, and Judas Iscariot, Phillip, Thomas, Andrew…I imagine him listing the women Mary Madelene and Martha. I imagine him listing his family, Mary and Joseph, Elizabeth and Zachariah, John the Baptist. I imagine him listing Zecchaus, the Samaritan woman, the lepers and the tax collectors. I imagine him listing each of the children who came to him. I imagine him listing all the children who were slaughtered at his death by Herod’s decree, and all who slaughtered them and Herod himself. I imagine him listing Adam and Eve, and the twelve tribes of Israel, and all whom begot all else. I imagine him listing Noah and Emzara and every animal two by two, and all that were to come, and are to come, and all who paw, and hoof, and swim, creep, slither and fly over this earth today. I imagine him listing our names, yes our names, Denny, and Ernie and Ivy, and Jake, MaryAlys, and little Kathryn and Carl, Tanya, and Louise and tiny, tiny Mae, and your name too, and the names of those you love, and the names of the names, of the names of all creation. And I imagine him saying, ‘No.’ Mark - No, LaVonne and Gary - no, Silas and Sydney - no, Yvonne - no, Georgia - no, Carolyn and Tom - No, Katy - No. 

No - Jesus didn’t need to tell them then, doesn’t need to call us today from somewhere beyond 40,000 feet above. He has lived that his life that they might know he loved them. He lived his life that we might know he loves us. He lived his life to be able to answer - no. He prays, “I have glorified you on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do.” I am sure, Jesus too would have liked to live longer. I am sure he had the things he loved, the casting of nets and the way they spread a web in air, the drinking of wine over a good meal with lamps burning, the telling of parables of laborers and seeds and sheep, the healing of the blind, the crippled, and even the dead, the justice delivered by the turning of tables and the putting down the first stone, the travels town to town, the welcome of strangers, and the parade of palms and cloaks on the road. I think Jesus too would have said, “Life is so good, and I don’t want it to end. But I also know if it ended, it had been good, and it was enough.” I wonder if he felt surprised at the contrast of loving life, and being okay with death. But, I think loving life, is part of what makes us okay with death. That we have done our imperfect best and somehow in the midst we have shown love, that those whom we leave, know we loved them. 

I watched the woman in the middle seat take her license and credit card and put them in her back jeans pocket. I understood, if we had to exit and go off those big ballon slides in the sky, and somehow if we reached ground and our limbs were intact, and our clothes not burned, and if the EMT’s did not have to cut our jeans off, it does always helps to have an ID and money, but I had what I needed, and I preferred to spend my last moments not searching for the things of this world. I looked out my little window and prayed for peace for the world, for the moment itself, and the moments that would come, whatever they might be, and I prayed for the life to be lived by those I loved, and those who loved each one on the plane, and those who loved those, who loved those, and I prayed for peace for the world I adored. I think this simple prayer is transcendent, because its themes ran through the last words Jesus lifted here too. Jesus prayed, “And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.” It is the prayer for peace, for the ones you love and the world you adore. It is the last connection you have from this world to the next and back again in the space between. 

Yet, Jesus and I were lucky. Denver International Airport came into view and evenly spaced along the runway firetrucks and ambulances ran their lights letting us know they were ready. We landed with the same slashing, splitting sound from which we departed. Yet, after settling, still and silence clapping and cheering created a converse caoughany of thanksgiving and praise. On that airplane, we were one. The woman next to me, a psychotherapist, and I debriefed, she recognizing her busying coping skills and concern for a handicapped elderly woman a few rows up, and me sharing my introspective grief, surprises, and prayer for peace. When I returned to the terminal and checked my phone, a handful of friends had called to catch up and left messages of love. They were letting me know, what I already knew, and they did too. That we loved one another, that we cared for one another, and that we were one in this world. Moreover, the call’s uncanny timing was a reminder that I, and we are also one with the next world, that there is a God who loves us all and seeks our protection. Jesus, did not get to go back to DIA and land safely, but this scripture from John, is the voicemail left behind. I pray it is something you’ve heard before, something you already know, that this message is just part the reminder, a part of this life you adore. That you know you are named by God, known and loved, and that God is praying for your protection. I hope you in this moment, you know that we are one.