Wednesday, 2 July 2025

Hit the Road

Imagine being a follower of Jesus. In person. Not one of the chosen twelve, but one of the many others who heard his teaching and witnessed his ministry and became part of The Way with Jesus. There were lots of those. Sometimes “his followers” can mean a crowd, or a few or even just the twelve.


So, you’re enough a part of the movement that when Jesus picks a small group, seventy people (or seventy-two, depending on which manuscript is your source), to go ahead and bring the good news, healing for the sick and God’s peace to the villages he’s coming to, he picks you. You’re chosen. Then you and a partner are sent off to do that without any food or supplies. Not even so much as a business card or a pamphlet. And no food or travel supplies. Basically nothing. 


That’s the story the Gospel of Luke tells (Luke 10:1-20) as Jesus turns from his ministry in Galilee and begins the journey to Jerusalem. It’s time to get down to business training disciples and here’s where we start: go and do.


The only social media in those days is literally social: it has to be in person. There’s no live-streaming Jesus’ message, no texting to schedule a meeting and no tour bus. Jesus can’t just phone it in, nor is he able to be in more than one place at a time. It’s up to you and your partner - a partner that you likely just met. And you’re not supposed to take anything with you, Jesus says, because you’ll rely on the hospitality of strangers. Assuming, of course, that they want to hear what you have to share. Oh, and it gets even better because Jesus says “I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves.” Bon voyage.


That sounds like a lot of work and not a lot of fun. Is Jesus just not very good at sales or could it really be all that bad? 


Well yes, it probably could. It almost sounds like one of those reality tv shows like Survivor or, worse, Naked and Afraid. “Alone and unprepared, facing the wilderness with nothing but your wits. How will you survive?” Except this isn’t a story of survival and hardship in which you have nothing but your wits. It’s a story of life and grace and generosity, and you have everything you’ll need for that.


Just because Luke says that Jesus told them not to take any luggage or supplies doesn’t mean they went with nothing. They took the only thing they really needed: Jesus. The spirit of love and grace that was alive in Jesus went with them. The good news, the message of hope and wholeness, and the power of what the spirit can do. The same spirit that Jesus took into the wilderness, the spirit that empowered his ministry, went with them into the world.


Those seventy, Luke tells us, returned to Jesus “with joy” (Luke 10:17).  I doubt that everyone they met welcomed them with open arms, but when they were done, they had shared a mission, built some relationships and did good. In a very practical way, they built community by being both disciples and apostles: learners and teachers, listeners and messengers, followers and leaders in action.


Jesus calls us to be both disciples and apostles throughout our lives. Each of us living, breathing, sharing the spirit is what builds relationships, creates community and brings love to the world. It starts with just a few.

Thursday, 26 June 2025

Face Forward

When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.”


You might think that’s describing a moment near the end of Jesus’ story. But it’s not. The author of the Gospel of Luke (who likely also wrote the Book of Acts) has a lot more story to tell. But in their account of Jesus’ life, this is a turning point, a moment when Jesus turns from an itinerant ministry of preaching and healing to purposefully teaching discipleship and how to follow the way Jesus taught to live. After his departure, that’s what the followers of Jesus called themselves, the People of the Way.


I say his departure because that’s what the author of Luke is referring to here. Not specifically the city of Jerusalem, not his death or resurrection, but his being “taken up” - the ascension, a part of the story only found in Luke and Acts. When Jesus is physically gone, the disciples will need to carry his message. So he “set his face to go to Jerusalem” with purpose, intent on a journey of making genuine disciples, disciples who will be Jesus in the world when he’s gone.


The very first steps on that journey are a series of vignettes setting the most basic requirements of discipleship. They may seem almost dismissive at first, but discipleship is challenging.


Jesus is rejected by some Samaritans who offer him no hospitality. (He was headed to Jerusalem, and Samaritans believed Mount Gerizim was the holy place, not Jerusalem. It’s one of the reasons Jews hated Samaritans, making them a key part of the Good Samaritan parable which is just a few verses ahead.)  The disciples ask if they should "command fire to come down from heaven and consume them.”  Of course not, says Jesus. Right from the start, he warns against intolerance. There are many ways to God.


Then they meet someone who wants to follow wherever Jesus is going, to which Jesus replies “foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” Jesus is on the move, God is at work in the world.


He calls another who wants to first bury his father and Jesus replies "let the dead bury their own dead." The rituals and structures of society need to change. Letting go of conventions and routines is part of the journey to letting love in.


Yet another wants to say goodbye to his family first and Jesus replies that “no one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” Forward, the Way is forward. Looking back can only offer learning, looking ahead is where we must go and where we must live. We can’t live in the past or make it be again.


So following Jesus entails more than just the practical, finite trip to Jerusalem. It means living a life in which the teaching of Jesus, "the way," is the way of living.  It's not easy, and that means some structures will change, that we may need to let go of what is dead in order to find new life, that we may find that no matter how hard we try to hold on to each moment, there will be another one right away. It's a journey, after all, and putting up walls and having a home just isn't the same thing.


Life’s a journey. Jesus invites us to travel together.

Wednesday, 18 June 2025

Free

There’s a story in the Bible that tells of how Jesus cast demons out of a man and into a herd of pigs. It’s one of my favourite Jesus stories. There are versions of it in three of the gospels, but I like the version in Luke 8:26-39.


It’s one of my favourites because it’s full of important things to wonder about, like healing and restoration and community. It’s a bible study dream, too, with really interesting details about the location, the characters and the pigs. You have to love a story with pigs. 


This isn’t the place for a bible study, though, so I’d just like to highlight a couple of things worth wondering about today. 


I think identity is a key part of this story. When the possessed man confronts him, Jesus asks his name and he says it’s “‘Legion,’ because many demons had entered him.” But that’s not really the man’s name, is it. We never do learn his name, only the name of what possesses him, the name of what Jesus frees him from. Because that’s what’s happening here. It’s not about Jesus casting demons into pigs, it’s about Jesus freeing a man to be himself, to find his own identity and live it out. And what’s more, once “in his right mind,” the man wants to go with Jesus, but Jesus tells him he must return to his home and share with others what God has done for him.


Labelled by others as possessed, Jesus frees this man. The gospel only says that the demons asked Jesus not to torment them “for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man.” Here’s what I imagine happened: in those moments with him, Jesus offered the man such profound love, compassion and safety, that the man was able to find his freedom. I don’t think that detracts in any way from the miracle nature of this story, far from it. I think Jesus is showing us a miracle that we can make happen, too. The kind of miracle we need a lot of today. 


I think that’s why Jesus tells the man to stay behind and share his story. He wants to go with Jesus, but he knows the man could do so much more for his community by sharing his story with them. And that’s the other thing I wonder about.


The man had been like this for a long time and when he’s healed, the people of that community wanted Jesus to leave because they were afraid. Of what? The man they had tried to lock away, the one who had been possessed wasn’t possessed any longer. Why’s that so scary? Were they afraid of the change in the man? Were they afraid of the power that made the change happen? Were they afraid that more may now be required of them, to understand and grow from this miracle moment? Yes, to all the above.


It is often so difficult to move us forward into growth and understanding, especially around healing the spiritually, emotionally and mentally broken. It is so much easier to stay where we are and hold fast to what we know - good or bad - than to embrace change and, more importantly, the power that makes it happen.  Ironically, it’s the experience of that power, of that love, that moves us.


And when we experience love, embrace it and are freed by it, we might still face the hostile environment of the unchanged, the unmoved who have yet to share that experience. But then, isn’t it all the more important that we share it and, in our own ways, return to our homes and declare what God, in Jesus, has done for us?

Wednesday, 11 June 2025

All My Relations

The United Church of Canada was officially 100 years old on June 10th. A newbie, for sure, when it comes to faith communities, but still, these days, it’s pretty significant. Especially for a denomination of the church that’s only in Canada. The United Church partners with other churches around the world on mission and service work, and has a particularly close relationship with the United Church of Christ in the US and the Anglican Church of Canada, but it’s not part of a world-wide denomination.


I mean, other than how we’re all one, right?


Yes, we are. No matter how many traditions, institutions, religions or no religions at all, I still believe that we are all connected. And not just to each other as human beings, but with all living things in creation. Yes, I know that’s big. Too big, perhaps, to comprehend completely. That’s why we create structures to understand it better. I’m going to call that religion, church, God and Jesus and the Spirit, and use language that suits that because that’s my way to better understanding. That’s my way to God. It may or may not be yours.


Others may use different language, traditions, structures, they may call it something other than God, maybe even say there is no God, but I believe there’s still something that connects us and that power is spirit, it’s love, it’s God. This is my way to try and understand how we can all be so different, creation can be so diverse, and yet there is “life.” Each of us is trying to find our way to understanding that, I think, and we each travel our own way. But we come to the same God, however you know God. That’s how we are one. Unique and individual as we are, but we are connected by this spirit of life.


But acknowledging that connection isn’t enough. I’ve often said that, for me, the main point of Jesus is that he shows us how the divine spirit that is in him is in all of us, in all living things. It always has been. But we’ve become disconnected from it. We are all created both of spirit and the earth. Jesus, like figures in other traditions and other religions, shows us that connection is there and how we can reconnect with it.


But the thing is, acknowledging that we are connected, that there is a sense of “we are one,” as the gospel of John quotes Jesus saying repeatedly, and living that out are two different things.  “That all may be one” is on the crest of the United Church of Canada and has been part of the church’s ethos from the beginning, but it has to mean more than we are connected, it has to mean that we live it. 


The crest got an update in 2012 when the colours of the indigenous medicine wheel and the phrase “all my relations” in Mohawk were added. I find that phrase to be a great reminder that we are not just related, but in relationship. That’s what Jesus - and others in other traditions - shows us: a life lived in relationship with God, alive in all things by the Spirit. To live well is to know that connectedness, to embrace it, engage it and live into it. That requires we open our hearts to others, be vulnerable, find empathy, be curious and compassionate. Those aren’t weaknesses. They’re the power in relationships that are, themselves, life-giving.

Wednesday, 4 June 2025

A Little Nudge From the Spirit

Sometimes, I feel the need to talk about something. Sometimes it’s to talk about something again, perhaps, and again. It just seems like I’m getting a little nudge, a little push, a little voice that says “it’s time to say something about that.” You’ve probably felt that, heard that little voice.


I think that’s the spirit in me trying to get out. I think the divine spirit is present in all creation, in you and me and all living things. Jesus show us that in his life and teaching. Many others have, too, whether they were followers of Jesus or used other language or other traditions. That spirit is in us, it inspires us, it connects us, it gives us life, and yet we often struggle to find it in ourselves, to listen to it, to let it out and, most importantly, connect with the spirit in others.


I think that’s what the story of Pentecost is really all about. The story is that, after Jesus has left them for the last time, his disciples felt the spirit, symbolized in a rushing wind and tongues of fire, and began to speak to the diverse crowd around them in their own languages, telling them about God and Jesus (Acts 2:1-21). Perhaps we focus on the wind and fire because it’s energy and enthusiasm, but the key part of the story, I think, is that the spirit moved the disciples to communicate in a way that each person, unique and individual, could understand. And not just understand, but as if they were hearing it in the language of their home, the place of their birth, the place they knew they belonged. It’s as if the spirit didn’t just tolerate difference, but embraced it, engaged it, and found a way to connect with it.


Hmm. Tolerance. Just the other day, someone, in a meeting I was at, brought up tolerance. I think it was in the context of saying that our church is very tolerant, perhaps too tolerant, but to be honest, I’m not really sure. Soon as somebody uses the words tolerance and church in the same sentence, I have trouble listening. I’m not very tolerant, I guess. That’s what the Spirit’s moving me to talk about.


Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the compliment - yes, it’s a compliment - and I know it was intended to be positive. But I don’t think Jesus taught tolerance. Ever. I think being tolerant implies that there’s something to be tolerant of and, especially when it comes to people, Jesus never showed, suggested or asked for tolerance. Jesus only ever asked for love.


Radical, engaging, challenging, spirit-led love. Jesus didn’t tolerate anyone for being different, he engaged them, communicated with them and learned about them, connecting to them, building a relationship and building community with them. There was nothing to tolerate, only love. That’s not easy, it can be challenging and not always successful or satisfying. That didn’t stop Jesus, though, and it shouldn’t stop us.


I wonder if, when we approach people with tolerance, it isn’t giving us an out, a way of recognizing that they’re different but keeping them at a safe distance. If we can acknowledge them and put up with them, we don’t need to engage them. We can feel good about the fact that we’ve noticed and let them have their own space, but not welcomed them into ours or tried to relate to them and learn more about them. Worse, we might welcome them, but with the expectation that they’ll be “just like us.”


That’s not the story of Pentecost. I think that’s a story of the spirit inspiring love, inspiring connection that recognizes diversity and uniqueness and embraces it. Similarly, Paul later wrote to the Corinthians about how we each have our own gifts, unique, distinct and different gifts, but they are all inspired by the same Spirit. In the Spirit, we are one body, Paul says, each of us a different part, but still part of one body (1 Corinthians 12). Not only do we need all the parts, we need them to work together.


Whether it’s your own body, the body which is your faith community, your town, your family, your home, your team, your work, your world, don’t treat it like there’s something to tolerate. Let the spirit move you to love.

Thursday, 29 May 2025

We Are One

Ut omnes unum sint.


This latin phrase has been on the United Church of Canada crest since it was officially adopted in 1944, 19 years after the church was formed by a union of Methodist, Congregationalist and Presbyterian churches in 1925. I don’t know if it was top of everyone’s mind from the beginning, but the text it comes from was read at the inaugural service, June 10, 1925.


If you’re not up on your latin, it’s a quote from the Gospel of John, chapter 17, verse 21: “that all may be one.” An ideal expression of what it means to be united and uniting.


But I imagine (at least, I hope this was the case) that there might have been some discussion around it. I wasn’t there, but surely someone must have pointed out that, taken out of context, “that all may be one” might easily be misconstrued as implying uniformity, not unity. Those are two very different things and the United Church has never been about uniformity. Another expression for which the church is known is “unity in diversity.” That’s the difference. Unity acknowledges the diversity and uniqueness of everyone and invites inclusivity, seeking the most meaningful of common ground, that we are all children of God, one in spirit. 


I’m not suggesting that the United Church has cornered the market on inclusivity. In fact, I forever wish it were the norm and not something special. After all, I think that’s what Jesus was on about when he said it. When he lived it.


The context of that phrase is Jesus praying for his followers on the night that he was arrested. John tells a very different Last Supper story than the other gospels. At the end of the meal, Jesus talks to the disciples at length, a speech called The Farewell Discourse. I think it would have been more of a conversation than a speech, but the highlights are some pretty important and meaningful things and he offers the disciples affirmation, support and the challenge of living Jesus into the world after he’s gone. At the end of it, he prays.


He asks God to support and care for his disciples who he now sends into the world. And then he says “I ask not only on behalf of these but also on behalf of those who believe in me through their word, that they may all be one.” Just as he’s taught his closest followers that the divine spirit of God is in him and he’s shown them it’s in them as well, he knows that they will share that with others. 


That’s the “one-ness,” that Jesus has shown us the spirit of God is in him and he has shown the disciples that it’s in them and they will show others that is in them as well. In other words, Jesus prays not just for his followers, but those who follow them and come to know the divine spirit of God through them. And their followers. And their followers. 


They are all unique individuals. Paul will later share this with the people in Corinth by saying there are many gifts, but one spirit and that there is one body and we are all unique members of it. Our diversity isn’t just a gift, it’s an incredible strength to be embraced, engaged and celebrated.


That’s how all may be one. One Spirit which is inclusive of the great diversity of all creation and the connectedness of “all my relations.” One Spirit which is love.

Thursday, 22 May 2025

Where Are You Going?

Where are you going? I don’t mean physically, right this minute, or your summer vacation plans or what store, place or event you might be attending. I mean do you know where your life’s going?


I’m not always sure, myself. I think we can plan the next day or week, even months ahead, even have “life goals” and things we want to experience, a “bucket list” maybe, or a career path. But the journey to that destination may not be the straight path we were hoping for, and destinations can change. We live in a creation that’s constantly creating, a universe of variables, and change is happening in every moment.


When I was fifteen years old Anglican boy, I knew I wanted to be an Anglican priest. This month, I’ll have been an ordained minister in the United Church of Canada for only fifteen years. The journey’s been long, with many twists and turns, and the destination wasn’t what I thought. And yet, it is, in a way, and the journey has been full of ministry in many different forms.


On June 10th, the United Church of Canada will celebrate 100 years since Canadian Methodists, Congregationalists, two-thirds of Presbyterians and a small group of Union Churches (they’d got tired of waiting for everything to be settled and just went ahead and did it themselves) got together in a hockey arena (how Canadian is that?) for the first service of the new church. The church of 2025 may not be exactly what they envisioned in 1925, but I bet they’d see how we got here and recognize the threads that have united us from the beginning. The journey’s been long, with many twists and turns. There’s lots of good to celebrate and many times we can only celebrate in terms of what we can learn from failures, flaws, hurts and mistakes.


Maybe you’re not experiencing anniversaries or milestones right now in your journey, but, given the world of today, I imagine there’s more than a few people wondering, even with some anxiety or fear: here we are, where are we going now?


I think that’s the scene in John’s gospel when the disciples are all gathered around Jesus for the Passover meal that last night before he was arrested. This isn’t the same story as the other gospels. After supper, Jesus tells them that where he’s now going, they cannot go. He tells them they should love each other as he has showed them to love. That’s how people will know you’re of me, he says. He reminds them again that God is in him, just as he is in them - and us, and all who love him and believe. He has shown them the way, a way that is true and life-giving. Now, it’s time for him to go.


But he doesn’t just drop that and leave. He tells them he’ll always be with them in a different form. He offers them words of comfort and inspiration and a promise of support: when I’m gone, Jesus says, the Holy Spirit will come and be with you and will teach you and lead you and remind you of all that I taught you. “Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid,” he says.


That Spirit has been from the beginning. It’s the Spirit of creation and inspiration, it’s the Spirit that Jesus shows us is in us, just as it is in him and all living things, it’s the Spirit of love and life, it’s the Spirit of God-with-us. It’s the Spirit that says don’t be afraid, you’re not alone. Step boldly into tomorrow.

Thursday, 15 May 2025

Who I Am

I’ll be honest. I struggle sometimes with being called a christian.


I suppose it could be the struggle of any label for any community. Even as the word “diversity” is taking a bit of a beating these days, the fact is that we are, on so many levels, diverse. Everyone is unique and different and, even when we are united in our beliefs, ideology, culture or any other arbitrary metric, or we simply conform, labels never fully describe any community.


Sure.


That being said, christian carries a lot of baggage. That baggage includes a history of hurt, abuse and just evil behaviour that is the complete antithesis of Christ. Jesus’ heart has been broken so many times. And still is.


That baggage also includes great acts of kindness and grace, care for the sick, the poor and the homeless, and courageous acts of resistance to injustice, even standing for the rights of all human beings and the creation in which we live. Jesus’ heart must be bursting with joy so many times. And still is.


Hmm. So it’s tricky. How will we know what kind of christian we are?


“Love one another,” Jesus says. “Just as I showed you how to love, so you should love each other. That’s how people will know that you are from me.” (John 13:34-35)


These aren’t warm, fuzzy words of niceness and comfort, they’re a challenge to change the way we live. Jesus’ life shows us what we’re capable of: love. I know the words aren’t there in the stories, but I imagine Jesus frequently telling the disciples, and anyone who would listen, “if I can do it, so can you.” The same divine spirit and earthy humanity that’s in Jesus is in all of us - Jesus was trying to show us how to reconnect with that spirit, with the energy of the earth and each other. That’s the point: we are capable of love, just like Jesus.


Jesus never said we should make people behave a certain way (our way), Jesus never said that we should control people or tolerate them. He said we should love them, just as he loved us. If a so-called “belief” hurts people, denies them basic human rights, dignity and respect or disempowers them, it’s not Jesus and it’s not the spirit of God and it’s not love. When Jesus loved, he challenged those things. He lived love and challenged hate, he lived love and treated all with dignity and respect, he lived love and brought healing to brokenness, he lived love and empowered people to live true to their hearts, trusting that they would come to see the good there.


Maybe our first mistake - our original sin, if you like - was to tie “christian” to traditions and flawed interpretations that didn’t grow with knowledge and understanding, to religion,  rather than Jesus, to what we made of Jesus rather than Jesus’ own story. The Jesus who loved. And loved and loved.


We make mistakes. God knows, and Jesus never demanded perfection. He only offered more encouragement and more love. Look who Jesus chose to be his closest companions. He didn’t choose “holy” men or women. He chose ordinary people, flawed and weak people who made mistakes. Very human mistakes.


Let people know who you are. Love like Jesus.

Thursday, 8 May 2025

That's How You Know

Whose voice should you listen to?


It’s not my place to tell you. It’s not really anyone’s: you should discern that for yourself.


I have a few thoughts, though, that might help.


Please don’t just hear the loudest voice and go with that. There’s a lot of shouting going on right now, much of it in anger with a side of hate, so please, take a moment and listen. Listen for the quiet, calm voices, too. They’re much harder to hear and, quite frankly, we’re not always as good at listening as we are at shouting out an opinion.


Bishop William McGrattan, President of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops has described the new Pope, Leo XIV, as a person who listens first before speaking.” Be like the Pope.


That doesn’t mean voices are more trustworthy or true just because they’re quieter. We need to be discerning and - this is super important - curious. Listen to people’s stories, ask questions, be discerning and find out what’s true. Get to know them. Bishop McGrattan described the Pope that way on the basis of meeting him numerous times in a setting where that skill would be critical.


That curious and discerning part is so important. 


In John’s Gospel, there’s a scene in the temple when Jesus describes himself as a shepherd, a shepherd who cares for his sheep and protects them and the sheep know his voice. He gets into an argument with a group of people in the temple who demand to know if he’s the Messiah. “If you’re the messiah, tell us plainly,” they say. Jesus replies “I have, but you don’t hear me. My sheep hear me because they know my voice.”


That just seems to infuriate them more and they’re tempted to stone him. But I think Jesus’ point is simply this: the people who “know” his voice haven’t just listened, they’ve seen what he’s done. They’ve been discerning about his words, seen that he’s living them, and found the love, kindness, compassion and grace in his actions matches his words. They’ve seen him engage people and build relationships, recognized the authenticity of his teaching and found it to be true. 


Maybe if the crowd put their stones down, they could too.


But see, here’s another thing.  Just like those questioning Jesus in the story, we so often listen to react and reply more than to learn and grow. They were ready to stone Jesus, probably even before he finished speaking, because he answered their question and they didn’t like the answer. It was contrary to everything they already knew and were conditioned to believe. It challenged them and disturbed them in ways that moved them to reject it without consideration.


So stop clenching that rock so hard, relax and open your heart and mind, Jesus might say to us. Open your eyes as well as your ears, experience what I’m doing, be discerning. Get to know me better.


Could we all try that?