Year B Lent 2 I Choose You

Year B Lent 2, 25 February 2018

St. James the Less Episcopal, Ashland, VA

“I Choose You”

Collect: O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy: Be gracious to all who have gone astray from your ways, and bring them again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of your Word, Jesus Christ your Son; who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16
When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him, “I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless. And I will make my covenant between me and you, and will make you exceedingly numerous.” Then Abram fell on his face; and God said to him, “As for me, this is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you. I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.

God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her, and moreover I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall give rise to nations; kings of peoples shall come from her.”

Romans 4:13-25
For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.

For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”) —in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. Hoping against hope, he believed that he would become “the father of many nations,” according to what was said, “So numerous shall your descendants be.” He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was already as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. Therefore his faith “was reckoned to him as righteousness.” Now the words, “it was reckoned to him,” were written not for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.

Mark 8:31-38
Jesus began to teach his disciples that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

I got my hair cut this week. If I get it cut often enough it does not show. The same lady has been cutting my hair for about 12 years. This last week we were joking about how we are in the same business, helping people look their best. She does it for the outside, while I try to do it for the inside. Both jobs are all about people, and we both also joked about how we could not do either job well if we did not like people.

In fact, Margaret ( our Parish Administrator) and I were commenting this last week how we are in the people business.

And being in the “people business,” there is a price for that. Like getting my hair cut. I have to make an appointment WELL IN ADVANCE, and then I have to show up ON TIME. Then, when all is said and done, I have to PAY THE BILL. And TIP, too. All of these exact a toll, whether monetary, time, or inconvenience, there is a cost for services rendered.

In fact, having any relationship takes a toll. For most relationships, we do not count the cost. It is more than worth it.

I think of the days when my wife Stephanie had been home with the kids, long days, hard days. I think of how much she gave out of love for them. It humbled me, and it honored them. We have all been there, an end of a long day when we are soul-weary from caring for others. And would we do it again? In a second. Because of Love.

In our Genesis reading, God chooses to be in relationship. Noah’s promised covenant was more generic, Never Again will I flood the whole earth. But this one, this one gets personal. God picks out a family to be a blessing to the whole earth. In a parallel to today’s reading, God shares the intent of this personal relationship…

Genesis 12 1 Now the Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2 I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’

Abraham was called by God to follow him. And in it, we see a specific promise to a specific man, and through him all the world will be blessed. God is weaving a chain of righteousness that will follow down all the succeeding years. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, through Moses, Joshua, and Samson, and Deborah, Ruth and Boaz, and David, and Solomon, and Isaiah, and Jeremiah, and Jonah, and Joel. Down throughout history through Mary and Joseph, Jesus and the disciples, even to you and me. We all hearken back to Father Abraham, including our Jewish and Muslim brothers and sisters. We all point to  the faith of Father Abraham as being the beginning of a line that leads to us, and hopefully through us.

It cost God and Abraham to decide to be in relationship with one another. Heartache and heartbreak, time, energy, and effort, often blood, sweat, and tears. It adds up over the millenia. And it was worth every penny and every second.

Jesus reminds us very clearly of the cost of discipleship. And remember how he put it today…

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life?”

We follow, and there is a sacrifice to follow. But what is the price of your soul?

Folk singer Tracy Chapman, sang it this way almost 30 years ago...

And all that you have is your soul
Don't be tempted by the shiny apple
Don't you eat of a bitter fruit
Hunger only for a taste of justice
Hunger only for a world of truth
'Cause all that you have is your soul

So far we have looked at the costs of relationships, but I hope that none of us view relationships solely from an economic model. Transactional relationships, might be clean, but they are not relationships. They are more like brokerings, or deals. How many of us want to be a deal?

It has been shown repeatedly, though, that too often we break down our interactions into these brokerings. It can help society function and flow. And there is a science to it. When you go to a restaurant and the offer you a “free sample,” it has been shown that that will create an obligation in your mind. You did this, so I should do that. Olive Garden knows what they are doing when they want you to “sample” the wine that goes with your meal. Statistics have shown how many times over they sell a glass of wine for every “free sample” they give out. It makes it more than worth it, economically.

Because of these interactions, these brokered exchanges, we often move that over into the spiritual context as well. WE ONLY KNOW WHAT WE KNOW, and we live in a tit-for-tat world. And part of growing in faith is moving from a model of economic brokering, this-for-that thinking, and moving to a model of abundance, a model based on Grace.

Even people who have been followers of Christ for years seem not to get it. Grace and forgiveness is at our core. In all 4 gospels, it is recorded that Peter took a sword in the Garden of Gethsemane and struck the servant of the high priest, Malchus. After years with Jesus, he thought that violence was okay. And even then, in the most divisive but also the most teachable of moments, Jesus stops, heals one of those coming out to seize and KILL HIM. If this is not a model of different way of being, I do not know what is.

Jesus moves us from the transactional model of relationship, do unto you like you did unto me, to one of Grace. I do for you what I would want from you. It is the model God shows. It is a model that most of us understand.

There is nothing my children could do that could make me love them any more. But also, there is nothing my children could do that would make me love them any less. I love them not for what they do and or do not do. I love them for WHO THEY ARE. I love them because they are mine. I love them for who I see them becoming. I love them because they are pretty darn cool. There will be times when they break my heart, by choices made, but my heart aches out of love; the choice could never take the love for them out of me. Now they cost a fortune, if I stop and think about it. But love does not count the cost. If they had a need, a real need, I would not consider the cost. Done. Period. I will work it out. No matter what it is. That is the nature of love.

And that is the nature of God. God modeled it for us long before we modeled it for others. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus put it this way for us:

Matthew 7 7 “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? 10 Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

In this relationship with God, God does not love us for what we do. And think about it, what could any of us possibly do that would help God? Ridiculous. Abraham was loved and chosen for who he was, and when he entered willingly into this new way of being, he was loved for WHOSE he was. This is what St. Paul was getting at in his regular, convoluted way. From today’s reading, Romans 4:

[Abraham] grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. Therefore his faith “was reckoned to him as righteousness.” Now the words, “it was reckoned to him,” were written not for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.

Like Abraham, we can elect to enter into this relationship. We do it because of who God is, his Glory and Grace come into the picture as we grow in that faith.

For Love we will do anything, and from those outside it just does not make sense, S-E-N-S-E, and for those woefully stuck in a transactional approach to life, it certainly does not make cents, C-E-N-T-S.

My mind has been going back to some of my favorite stories from childhood lately as we have been reading The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Margery Williams Bianco perfectly described the cost of discipleship, the cost of loving, really loving in her classic The Velveteen Rabbit. (If you have never read it, you owe it to yourself to do so.)

In my favorite scene, the young Velveteen Rabbit is speaking with they Skin Horse, a very old, worn, and well-loved toy in the nursery. In the quiet of the night, the share truth about the nature of real love. The Velveteen Rabbit asks what it means to be Real:

“Real isn't how you are made,' said the Skin Horse. 'It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.'

'Does it hurt?' asked the Rabbit.

'Sometimes,' said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. 'When you are Real you don't mind being hurt.'

'Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,' he asked, 'or bit by bit?'

'It doesn't happen all at once,' said the Skin Horse. 'You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand.”

Brothers and Sisters, as we look at our relationship with God this Lent, know that our acts of devotion are not appeasing or shifting how God views or thinks of us. We do this acts of devotion to change us for God, not God for us. We do these things to draw us deeper into this relationship of faith, where God is working it out for our best. Little do we realize the machinations at work RIGHT NOW for our best and highest selves. The little fasts and pieties we do are to remind us of that almighty loving God who actually cares about little ol’ you, and me, and him, and her. God loves us for who we are, meager, finite, images of Godself, “work[ing] out our salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” [Philippians 2:12-13]

As we continue to delve into these covenants with God through God’s mighty acts, remember, God does not want to smite us, and God chooses to be in relationship with each and every one of us. What a thought. What a God! When God thinks of each and every one of us, God says, “I choose you!” Amen.