Fourth Sunday of Easter
John 10
7 So again Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9 I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly."
At first it is only mud. You can see the scene repeated across the 905 as houses are built and people move in. Inside the home building industry, there is a sequence of events that must be followed. Every developer is the same: wait until the last home is done, and then do the landscaping.
As quickly as it starts, it is complete. The space between the houses is filled with long rectangles of grass, a living carpet that –
with the right care – will become a seamless lawn. At first, homeowners are pleased: the field of mud and discarded building material has become something akin to a fairway.
Excitement builds from the youngsters up. Kids love the room, and what was once muddy and off-limits has become a large public space. Parents begin to wonder aloud about the logic of a fence, when everyone is enjoying the new space. “It’s not fair to the kids,” they say, reluctant to impose such limits on the little ones.
Then it starts. Too many visits from a certain dog or cat. Stuff strewn about, uncollected by busy owners. And the varied notions surrounding lawn care, the length of grass neatly illustrating how much time some people have on their hands. Some are more practical, knowing that fences make a nice backdrop for flowers, or protection for an unattended pool. “Good fences make good neighbours,” someone will say, and the undivided world comes to an end.
***
The early church began without fences. Our reading from the Acts of the Apostles paints a picture of just how idyllic the early days were. Fear passed into a general calm, and the rhythm of life resumed. The followers of Jesus were still active in the synagogue, attending each Sabbath. Later, perhaps on the first day of the week, they would gather in homes to “break bread together” and recount stories of their risen Lord.
The first attempt at fence building comes further in Acts. The good news is impossible to contain, and non-Jewish believers claim a place in the fellowship. How will this work? They can’t go to Temple, and even sharing a meal is problematic for some. The famous debate that follows will open the church, and another fence-building moment is thwarted.
But is it? By allowing for non-Jewish Christians, the early church erected the first and most tangible fence: These followers of Jesus would never be Jewish, and for this reason, become the beginning of the end of religious landscape without fences. The difference between synagogue and church became too great, and the Jewish-Christian era came to an end.
This, then, is where we locate John’s Gospel. Written in the last years of the first century, John’s Gospel describes the transition from movement to church. Where an earlier gospel describes a tangle with “religious authorities,” John says simply “the Jews.” The fence is mostly built, and siblings go separate ways.
***
So again Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved…
We’ve entered unfamiliar territory here, with language that we have largely abandoned. We don’t talk much in the United Church about being saved, and I can tell you exactly why: A week or so ago I received an email from a minister of another denomination, a tradition that shall remain nameless. In his email, he expressed delight that a very inflammatory Dutch video was still available online. The video, he said, showed the “truth” about Islam and could prove an excellent tool to convert Muslims here in Scarborough.
I wrote back. I didn’t use ALL CAPS as angry people do, but I was tempted. I expressed shock that such and email would arrive in 2008. I told him that the only route to peace in this world is learning to respect each other, and that Muslims worship the same God and have the same ancestor in Abraham. I told him that my little theological college (Queen’s) was the first theological college to appoint a Muslim board member, and that Dr. Bayoumi is one of the finest people I know.
Maybe I should have used ALL CAPS. It angers me that people read “I am the gate” and can only see the fence. It reminded me that we have been misreading this passage and passages like it for generations and need to stop. But the misreading has been on all sides, left and right, and needs to stop. Let me explain.
On the right interpreters read about gates and sheep and see the word “saved” and a whole set of assumptions kick in. They assume that they have the truth, that Jesus is the only way, and that the end goal of life on earth is a very narrow concept of salvation called “saved.” They take the most literal approach that this gate will close and those outside will be excluded from a life with God. They read gate and imagine “gate-keeper,” Jesus neatly dividing lost from saved.
On the left interpreters explain (like me) the unique character of John and the context of its composition and allow us to disregard it because it is not Matthew, Mark or Luke. Most students leave theological college with disrespect for John: he coloured too far beyond the lines, he drifted too far from the “historical Jesus” and put words in Jesus mouth he would never have said.
But there is a problem when you start lobbing off entire books of the Bible: it gets pretty thin pretty quickly, and if you look hard enough, you can find a good excuse to reject all of it. So we end up in an all-or-nothing world of biblical interpretation, some reading it literally and some not reading it at all. Pretty poor choices, if you ask this preacher.
There is a third way, and it’s through that very same gate Jesus names himself. Imagine if there is no fence, only a gate, and the gate is open to whoever chooses to enter. Imagine Jesus is not campaigning for the Jesus team, but the God team, and wants to be the gate we pass through on the way to a fuller life with God. Imagine setting aside all talk of being saved and looking ahead to the end of the passage and one of the most eloquent blessings in scripture: “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly."
Now, let’s do a little bit of free associating: I’m going to throw out a few things and tell me what comes to mind:
Abundant life
Finding pasture
The shepherd of the sheep
Let’s say it together:
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures:
he leadeth me beside the still waters.
He restoreth my soul:
he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil: for thou art with me;
thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me
in the presence of mine enemies:
thou anointest my head with oil;
my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
all the days of my life:
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.
The Bible is a gate and not a fence. The Bible is not meant to divide the literalists from the liberals or the saved from the rest of us. The Bible is a source of abundant life, a place where we can go to be refreshed and filled. It is not a book to be worshipped or carelessly discarded. It is a book that makes a million connections between the words on the page and the life God wishes for us. It is a book that takes story and poem and parable and grafts them to the deepest part of us.
Surely, somewhere is a subdivision without fences. This is the place here I want to live. The place where we remain undivided, the place where people are free to come and go. A place where lines may exist but go unmarked: where we enjoy the people around us rather than try to make them like us. Abundant life is the promise, and God is busy extending it to everyone: all we need to do is enjoy.
Scarborough Presbytery Service
Toronto Scarborough Presbytery – 6 April 2008 – Michael Kooiman
Luke 24
13Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, 14and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, 16but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?” They stood still, looking sad. 18Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” 19He asked them, “What things?” They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, 20and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. 21But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place. 22Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, 23and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. 24Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him.” 25Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! 26Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” 27Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures. 28As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. 29But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” So he went in to stay with them. 30When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. 32They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” 33That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. 34They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” 35Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
I stand before you amazed by the passage of time. Eleven years spent in you midst, serving two pastoral charges. I am blessed that I can call many of you friends. We have prayed together, we have worked hard, and remained faithful to the Gospel call in this small part of the garden we call Scarborough.
Not long ago, I received another reminder of the passage of time. Staring blankly at an alphabet soup of letters projected on the wall, I was given the grim news: you’re gonna need these. How did this happen? How did this happen to me? Clearly it was time for further research.
It turns out I have fallen victim to a condition call “presbyopia.” Wikipedia says it stalks people “in the fifth decade of life,” a condition whereby the near-point of the eye is too remote to read with any comfort. Like a man obsessed, I needed to know more. Struggling, I read on: “Similar to grey hair and wrinkles, (can anything good come from an article that starts “similar to grey hair and wrinkles?”) presbyopia is a symptom caused by the natural course of aging.” Now I’m really hurt.
But there’s more. From the Greek, presbyopia means literally “old person’s eyes.” Now, that’s just mean. But it gets worse. Through this path of discovery I learned that “presbytery” means “old person’s meeting.” And that’s just cruel. It’s one thing to insult me, but to insult all my friends is just too much.
And so I speak to you this afternoon, humbled but mostly happy: happy to be invited to share the Word with you today.
***
When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?”
Then their eyes were opened: they were given new eyes to see. Breaking bread they gained new sight, they recognized the presence of the risen Christ in their midst and they were changed. Suddenly everything fell into place for them:
The identity of this stranger made sense.
The suffering of Jesus made sense.
The words of the women made sense.
Moses and all the prophets made sense.
Resurrection and new life made sense.
Their eyes were opened and whatever myopia or presbyopia that burdened their sight was suddenly gone. In the breaking of bread comes new sight. In the midst of brokenness they received new sight, and their perspective on the world was forever changed.
***
What did he teach them on the way? How did he “open the scriptures” as they walked the dusty road and night began to fall? Imagine the blessing of doing Bible study with the “Word of Life,” identity revealed or no. Where to begin such a look? The answer is in the text.
“Beginning with Moses and all the prophets,” he found himself in the scriptures and taught them to see. The pattern began in worship. We know that every Sabbath unfolded the same way: a reading from the Law, one of the five books of Moses, and a reading from the prophets. The custom was to read all five books over the course of a year, averaging five chapters a week. And they sat on rock.
So where else does Jesus mention the “law and the prophets?” A pattern begins to fall into place: In Matthew 7 Jesus says “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” We have a golden rule.
In Matthew 22 we are told to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” But there is more: “’Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” We have our great commandments.
And our last example comes from Nazareth: the law has been read, the scroll of the prophet unrolled, and Jesus begins to read a passage that will both anger and amaze:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4)
We have a description of our mission: the very essence of God’s Kingdom in poetic form. But this poetry gets a bad review, the people are not pleased, the hometown boy did not make good: the day of the Lord did not come to Nazareth that day.
So we have a golden rule and two great commandments and a mission project that is more relevant today than ever and a Saviour to put it all together to help us see. But do we see? Can we see the project Jesus describes, the simple rules of human love explained upon the road? Or is the near-point just beyond our vision, our eyes too weak to see?
***
I worry about our ability to see. Our friends at the University of Toronto have been busy tracking the changes in our city, using calculators and census tracts to study our income and how we relate to one another. They have looked over time, and plotted it on maps and added colours and released their work.
Imagine in your mind’s eye a map of Toronto, circa 1970, the rich tracts in blue, the poor tracts in red and the middle-income tracts in a lovely pale yellow. Imagine the blue zone running up the middle, veering past a future IKEA and all those meatballs. Now look to the core, and a sea of red, the old downtown and parts of the Yorks, east and west. Finally we see ourselves, in the right-hand column, a vast region of pale yellow, like a newly-painted house you’re about to sell. Can you see it? Do you know this place?
Now, imagine in your mind’s eye a map of Toronto, circa 2000, the shape of the map is familiar, but little else. Except, of course that band of blue in the centre, the band of blue that makes the riders of the Yonge line the best-dressed riders on the TTC. The core is different, more to yellow than red, with places like Riverdale and the Beach flirting with blue. And then to us, the pale yellow bastion, now almost completely red, meaning that our residents live, on average, 20 to 40 percent below the what we once called middle income.
Scarborough, the city that once provided the dictionary definition of “middle-class suburb” is dead and gone. Did we see? Or is the near-point just beyond our vision, our eyes too weak to see?
Dr. King died forty years ago this week, having visited the mountaintop, he got a glimpse of his country beyond the curse of racial segregation. In the last years of his life he took a turn, become more “radical” they say, having suggested that America has no business fighting in foreign adventures and even suggesting it was time for the richest country on the planet to consider some form of guaranteed annual income. Ending segregation, you see, is one thing, challenging the economics of war and the economics of inquality is quite another.
If Dr. King were alive today, still only 79 years of age, he would no doubt look at our map and say it looks like segregation. A city where the rich get to live in the middle and the rest of the map is red, the middle-class all but gone and the economic gap growing every day. In America they say that the only place racial segregation continues is in church, every Sunday morning. We look at our own churches and we scratch our heads that the neighbourhood’s changed but the churches didn’t. We may be the church for the poor, but will we ever become the church of the poor? How can we “bring good news to the poor” if the poor don’t hear the Word proclaimed or witness Christ’s body broken for them?
***
Soon, our convivial little grouping of 18 churches will pass into history. We will be broken into a bigger omelette, and after June 30, 2009 become an entity that takes up fully half of that aforementioned map of Toronto. We’ve already met once, and what I originally described as the birth of a new presbytery was more like a contraction. And however the labour goes, we already know that the outcome of this process will be a very large baby presbytery. And like a baby, this presbytery will take time to develop, crawling, walking, speaking, and understanding how to relate to others.
The benefits are obvious: new vision, more fellow travelers on the road, a look beyond our immediate area of concern. But there are dangers. Like Woodward and Bernstein, churches tend to “follow the money” and most of the money is not here. Nor, it would appear, are the greatest areas of need, with a raft of agencies downtown to fight poverty. Our job will be to point another map, this one by postal code, that shows that fully half of the poorest neighbourhoods in this new presbytery are in Scarborough. Five postal codes where up to 70% of the residents live in poverty.
***
The SpiritWork project will be spoken about and studied for years to come. People across the church know about us and the amazing thing we did. They marvel that a brave little presbytery put itself on the couch for seven years, learned more and grew more than was every thought possible. They marvel that we grounded ourselves in the Acts of the Apostles, that we developed leaders and learned to work together in new ways: that clergy became colleagues and congregational leaders became friends and through it all we were transformed.
These are things we cannot lose. We have a message to share, my frends. We are called to describe the ways we reinvented ourselves and remained faithful in the midst of all that change. And we are called to keep the project going, finding new ways to connect to our neighbours and make them friends.
***
I worry, at times, that our eyes are too weak to see. I worry that the near-point of our vision will drift further and further away. I worry until I look around.
I look around and see committed people gather to hear about the Kingdom project of Jesus, to understand his way.
I look around and I see the thousand ways we partner to solve the very problems that Jesus preached so long ago.
I look around and I see Bibles open and hearts open as we continue to bring the Word of Life to the very people God numbers as children.
I look around and I see the power of God at work in Scarborough as we lift up our prayers and give voice to our praise.
I look around and I see bread broken and wine poured to reveal the risen Christ who appears among us, encourages us, and promises that we never walk alone.
I look around and I see friends. I see the face of Jesus in every face here, and my heart burns that we are so richly blessed. Amen.
Third Sunday of Easter
Luke 24
28As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. 29But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” So he went in to stay with them. 30When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. 32They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” 33That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. 34They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” 35Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
Our evening meal usually begins the same way: Food is served, family gathers, and we reach for the “Billy Book.”
The book is actually called “A Year of Grace,” a book of table graces edited (and several written) by our friend Bill Kervin. There are, as the title suggests, 365 prayers of blessing from a remarkable variety of sources.
We often take turns selecting the prayer, the idea of following Bill’s order long since out the window. My son, of course, has found all the short ones. An example:
Gratitude is heaven itself.
Amen.
(William Blake)
Or the poetic and fun:
For every cup and plate full,
God make us truly grateful.
Amen.
(Anonymous)
When I get a turn, I tend to go historical or cultural:
Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest,
And may our meal by you be blest. Amen.
(Martin Luther)
O God, who makes a thousand flowers to blow,
Who makes both grains and fruits to grow,
Hear our prayer:
Bless this food
And bring us peace.
Amen. (Dutch)
And Carmen, our resident Hebrew scholar, will turn to the Psalms:
The earth is God’s,
And all that is in it;
The world,
And those who live upon it.
(Psalm 24)
There is a wonderful variety of prayers in the book, something that landed Bill in some hot water with conservative book distributors. Bill included some non-Christian prayers in the book, which is not kosher among our conservative friends. He was even removed from the catalog, which could have ended badly, had the story not made the newspaper. As a banned author, his book started flying off the shelf.
The turning point in our Gospel lesson happens at table:
When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight.
The language of the passage sounds so familiar because it became the basis for many Great Thanksgiving prayers. The pattern was adopted for communion, and with Paul’s description of the Last Supper and became the basis for this symbolic meal.
When we begin to unpack the poetry of this passage, there is quite a bit happening at table. There are four steps:
He took bread.
He blessed the bread.
He broke the bread.
He shared the bread.
When I imagine the blessing, my mind immediately goes to Matthew 26, and the blessing over the bread in the upper room: "Take and eat; this is my body." This may be possible, but my sense is this blessing would have been more traditional, something comfortable and familiar. In that case, it would likely have been something like:
“Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth.”
This is the traditional Jewish blessing over the bread, a blessing that dates back many centuries and provides an echo of the prayer Jesus would have shared with his friends. It’s an echo but also a pointer, it opens up a larger story hidden in a few words.
Whenever you hear “who brings forth bread from the earth,” think omer. More specifically, think Exodus 16 and the miracle of the omer. It goes like this:
The Israelites cried out and complained that Moses had brought them to the desert to starve. God heard their complaining, and answered with the gift of manna from heaven. But God also sent a test. The test was to see how well the Israelites could follow instructions. You can probably guess the answer.
There were actually three miracles here, if you count the gift of manna itself. So the first was the gift of manna, next came some directions. The manna would come each morning, enough for every member of the tribe to have a single omer of manna (my smart bible naming this as about two quarts). The summary of the first miracle (second if you count manna) goes like this:
The Israelites did as they were told; some gathered much, some little. And when they measured it by the omer, he who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little. Each one gathered as much as he needed.
In other words, the manna had some miraculous property whereby it would automatically redistribute itself, ensuring that every one got their omer. Think of it as an early version of Revenue Canada. The Israelites would be out early, gathering quickly before the heat of the day, and perhaps some were too weak or too tired to gather their entire omer. Not to worry, because God was already redistributing the manna that all could eat.
The second miracle of the omer (third by the manna-first count) is much more fun, the kind of fun usually associated with boys around eight or nine. You see, the second miracle of the manna involved trust, and the Israelites were having some difficulty trusting that the manna would appear every day. Some were shrewd, and decided to eat only part of their omer on gathering day and save the rest for the following day, just in case the manna failed to appear that day. Here’s what happened:
Moses said to them, "No one is to keep any of it until morning." Some, however, paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but when they awoke it was full of maggots and began to smell. So Moses was angry with them.
You might call this the “miracle of the maggots,” of “the miracle of the smelly food,” perhaps another name for Toronto’s pioneering green box program. Whatever you call it, it was gross, as the kids might say, and swift judgement from the God who said “trust in me.”
There was one exception to the gathering rule, that being that every Friday morning there would be a double portion, two omers for everyone, one for today and one for the Sabbath, the day where the command was do not labour. This one seemed to go more smoothly, and the Israelites stopped their grumbling until, of course, they became tired of manna. But that’s another story.
The miracle of the omer shows up in another rather famous place, another case where something is hiding in plain view. Jesus prays about the miracle of the omer, one day, when he teaches his disciples to pray saying “give us this day our daily bread.” He is praying that each of us receive our omer, no more, no less. He is praying that we have the bread we need. It is deep in tradition and radical in it’s simplicity. It is God’s wish that we each receive our daily bread, that we each have the omer we need to be healthy and thrive.
***
“Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth.”
The other little bit of context here is the experience of wandering in the desert. Everything that happens in the desert, manna, water from the rock, receiving the law, everything that happens relates back to rescue. These are freed slaves, the very people that God freed “from the slave pens of the delta,” the rescue of captive Israel. Bread is the sign of liberation, and the manna in the wilderness is continued care as this rescue continues.
And what about us? We are heirs of the liberation that Moses led and God provided, forever provided with the model that oppressed people should be free and basic human needs should be met, because the entire fabric of God’s desire is woven with freedom and justice.
But there is more. The most basic freedom God brings is from ourselves. We collect more manna than we need, we hoard the manna, we curse the manna when it is maggoty and we easily tire of the very thing sent to save us. We fail at every step of the story, and we continue to fail as children continue to go hungry in our nation, one of the richest every known.
And there is still more. When Jesus broke the bread, which is his body, our brokenness entered the life of God and somehow we were forgiven. And this is the most amazing miracle of all, that you and me, in all our sin and failure, would receive the forgiveness of this God of miracles.
This day, like every day, is filled with miracles. The miracle of bread shared, and Saviour revealed, and forgiveness extended. The miracle of daily bread, and cup of blessing, and the gift of a table to gather and give thanks. Amen.
