Dickie, David, Alan, Ray and Jesus

I hear the word "icon" being used a lot lately.  And not in a tech savvy computer user way.

Tech users know an icon's the little thing on your screen that represents what you're going to get when you touch it or click on it.

It's also the proper name for a venerated painting or pictorial representation of a saint or religious figure, particularly in the Orthodox and Eastern Christian churches.

But the origin of "icon" is in the Greek, meaning a likeness or an image.  Our contemporary use is to mean a person or thing that represents something meaningful to us.

So that's how it came up when I ran into somebody at the gas station just after David Bowie died.  We talked about him being an icon, not just for his creative musical artistry, but for being faithful to being himself.  He inspired artists and musicians and anyone who was unique and different to be true to who they are and to believe in their imagination and creativity.  Sadly, we also noted, icons, just like everyone, leave us.  What we have is their image, indelibly printed on us.

That's undoubtedly why we've been hearing it so much lately.  We've lost some pretty important icons in the last little while, like  Dickie Moore, David Bowie, Alan Rickman and Ray Daley.

There's lots more, to be sure, but the point is that we acknowledge their iconic nature based on what they represent to us, personally.  That can then become collectively recognized, depending on their fame or their appeal, and to whom they appeal and how.

Dickie Moore, for example, was a legendary hockey player with the Montreal Canadiens, a Hall of Famer who, with Jean Beliveau and the Richard brothers, led the Canadiens to six Stanley Cups in the late 1950's.  He was a gifted player and a determined competitor.

David Bowie was an amazing musician and an innovative artist who challenged norms in music, art, gender and spirituality, inspiring other to do the same.

Alan Rickman was an actor who's distinctive voice and style took him from Shakespeare to Harry Potter in a wide variety of roles, creating "iconic" characters.  He was also known to be generous and supportive of other actors and is remembered by colleagues and critics as one of the greatest actors of his generation.

Ray Daley was a good man.  He'd probably be embarrassed to be included here, although I'm pretty sure he'd be shocked to be mentioned with David Bowie (and not in a good way).  You might not have included him, either, because you might not know who he is.

Ray died just before Christmas after a long and stubborn battle with cancer.  Ray was a little bit rough around the edges and he certainly had his struggles in life.  I only got to know Ray in the last six years, but to me he's an icon.  He loved his family, the Royal Canadian Legion and his church.  He was one of the best "not-a-church-goer-s" I ever met.  He didn't care much for sitting in a pew, but he was, as he said, a "believer" who would rather be doing something than sitting, listening to someone talk about it.

At his memorial at the Legion, there were stories from others of how Ray touched their lives in ways they'll always remember, always live out.  Of course, Ray wasn't famous, not beyond his community, but then, he wasn't trying to be.  He was just trying to be Ray to one person at a time.

This time of year is the season of Epiphany, the season of "revealing" when we hear stories of Jesus being, well, Jesus.  There was no PR campaign or global broadcast.  The angels came to a few poor shepherds.  It was a few magi who followed the star.  When Mary and Joseph took Jesus to the temple to be named, it was only Simeon and Anna that knew him.  How big, really, was the crowd who saw John - one on one - baptize Jesus.  At the wedding in Cana, who knew Jesus had turned the water into wine?  Only a few.  And when Jesus proclaims "the Spirit of the Lord is upon me" in the synagogue, it was to a small, hometown crowd who knew him.  

I don't think fame was on Jesus' agenda.  I think he was more concerned with personal, heart felt contact, with being Jesus to one person at a time, bringing love and compassion to one person at a time, bringing people closer to God one person at a time.  Jesus' fame grew as those who experienced him shared their stories and their lives, living as Jesus showed them, one person at a time.

It's so easy for our eyes to be drawn to the famous and perhaps they are, sometimes, deserving.  But look at the people around you: I bet there's an icon of Jesus there.  And look at you: can you, too, be an icon of Jesus to those around you?  Maybe even one person at a time.

A Fish Story

I wonder what it feels like to be a fish.  One day you’re swimming around, minding your own business, maybe hanging out with some other fish, just getting comfortable in a nice little eddy, snacking on stuff floating by, when - BAM! - you’re hooked.  Next thing you know you’re eye up in a frying pan.

Oh sure, you can fight it.  You might even break the line or dislodge the hook and get away, but you’ll always feel it.  And the other fish will always be looking at you sideways and wondering if it might happen to them.  Soon you’re off on a shoal by yourself wondering what happened to those lazy days in school.

I think that’s sometimes how people see the church.  After all, didn’t Jesus call his first disciples - who were fishermen - to come and fish for people?  (Matthew 4, Mark 1, Luke 5.)  For those who find themselves to be spiritual, but not religious, I wonder if this isn’t a key part of that - that they’re not interested in being hooked.  And for those that used to attend church and now don't, have they found it to be as boring as being, well, dead in the frying pan, or have they been left scarred by the experience?  For some, evangelism seems to mean that aggressive “catching” of people who then become one of “us,” saved from the sea of the real world.  Maybe they don’t see that kind of fishing as being saved.

But look at the story again and we might be able to describe the image a little differently.  The fishermen Jesus called as his first disciples didn’t use hooks, they used a net.  So what if we did that.  Our net is the love of Jesus that we are called to live out.  If we live that kind of life, we bring love to the world.  Not just the warm, fuzzy romantic stuff on Valentine’s Day, but the deep, difficult love that calls us to care for the poor and the sick, to be kind and compassionate even to our enemies and to love the seemingly unlovable.  That’s a net that holds people up but doesn’t hold them back, that embraces them but doesn’t imprison them, that includes all and excludes none.  That’s what evangelizing means, by the way: to proclaim the gospel in life, to tell the story and to live it, too.  In sharing that experience with the world, we build a net that connects people with each other and with God.

That’s not just the “capital-M” Minister’s job, by the way.  We all minister in our own way when we love and care.  So if we’re living and sharing that love, the “net” isn’t a thing we wield, it’s the people.  All the people.  And I know this because some pretty great things are happening at my church right now and I’m not even there, I’m on sabbatical.  It’s the people: they’re being ministers.

And they're not the only ones.  Perhaps you should jump in and see.  I’m pretty sure they’re doing it on porpoise.

Starry, Starry Night

I was standing in the church kitchen when I saw the stars.   They were just there, on the wall by a back door.  One silver and one gold.  I wasn't really sure why they were there, except that it was Epiphany and I knew Fern was going with "what's epiphany?" for a theme, it said so on the sign.

I should explain that I wasn't at my church on Sunday.  Fern did the service and the sign out front said "What's Epiphany?" so I assume since January 6 is Epiphany, she meant "the" Epiphany not just any old epiphany.  Although … hold that thought, I'm having an epiphany.  I'll come back to that.

I'm on a sabbatical leave for the next three months.  In the United Church, a minister has an opportunity, after five years of ministry, to step away from the regular week to week church work in order to work on something different, for which you wouldn't normally have time.  The idea is that it be time to refresh and renew, be creative and inspired, and bring that back to your ministry at the end of it.  I'll be doing some work around children's stories and learning resources.  But I'm getting away from my point here a bit, so ask me about it sometime.

So, the stars.  I looked around and there was another one over the office door.  And then there's the three really nice big ones we put up at the front at Christmas time.  Stars everywhere, it seems.

Yes there are.  And there were, too.

In the wonderful Christmas story we tell, the magi arrive at the stable with their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh, having followed a bright new star from distant lands.  Except: they wouldn't have arrived at the manger, would they?  The star had to appear, they had to interpret the sign, get things together and travel.  Then they stop to see Herod and move on.  That's going to take some time.  Matthew (in whose gospel we find this part of the story) even says "and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was.  When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy.  On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage" (Matt. 2:9-11).

So, okay, the magi were a little late to the party. They still get the job done, though: Jesus is revealed (it's an epiphany!) as the promised one, the messiah.  And they brought gifts to acknowledge a king.  But, wait a minute, what about that mobile star?

The way Matthew tells it, the star moved.  The magi didn't just navigate their way to it, the star led them.  It went ahead of them and "stopped over the place where the child was."  That's a pretty amazing star.  And, even more amazing still, only the magi seemed to be aware of it.

Surely, if everyone could see it, at some point Herod or his people would have gone "hey, what's that in the sky?  And why is it moving this way?"

So maybe the magi could see it because they were looking.  Just as the angels in Luke's story appeared to the shepherds, the lowest of status in society, maybe the star appeared to the magi because they were already seeking it.  Matthew doesn't suggest that it was the biggest star, just that the magi "observed his star at its rising."  They noticed it, it got their attention and it meant something to them.  And they followed this sign to Jesus.

Look around you.  The sky is full of stars.

Thurman says it better

Well, that's Christmas.

I'm pretty sure I say that every year, as many do, but I hope you understand that I say it in jest.  The day we anoint as Christmas may have passed, but Christmas isn't over.  It's just begun.

Pretty sure I say that every year, too, probably in some long-winded, explanatory way.  But not this year.  I want to talk about beginnings for a moment, not endings, so here's some words from the great Howard Thurman that I'm pretty sure covers the "Christmas is over" thing.  If they seem familiar, they're the basis for Jim Strathdee's hymn "I am the light of the world."  It first appeared in Thurman's 'The Mood of Christmas and Other Celebrations' in 1885.

When the song of the angels is stilled,

When the star in the sky is gone,

When the kings and the princes are home,

When the shepherds are back with their flocks,

The work of Christmas begins:

To find the lost,

To heal the broken, 

To feed the hungry, 

To release the prisoner, 

To rebuild the nations, 

To bring peace among people, 

To make music in the heart.

That's the thing about Christmas, it's just a beginning.  It seems like the culmination of weeks of preparation - and celebration - and now it's done, but it's not.  It's a birth.

"In the beginning."  The same words open both the book of Genesis and the Gospel of John, each a story of creation and light coming into the darkness.  We draw our Christmas Story, the birth narrative, from the gospels of Luke and Matthew, but John has a birth story to tell, too.  A story of God becoming flesh and of love being birthed into the world, of light coming that cannot be overcome by darkness (John 1:1-20).

There is life ahead for this love birthed into the world, just as there is for Jesus.  Just as there is for us.  Here we are at the beginning of a new year, witnesses, like John, to the love, the light and the life that is at the heart of the Christmas story.  

Well, that's Christmas.  Now, let's get living.

There needs to be an Innkeeper

We tell a story at Christmas.  The story we tell is full of angels and shepherds.  There's a man and his very pregnant wife who rides on a donkey all the way to tiny Bethlehem.  There's a manger full of hay and assorted animals standing around.  There's a baby born in the night and three kings who followed a great star to find this baby.  Oh, and there's an innkeeper who turns Mary and Joseph away because there's no room, only to then have a change of heart and offer them a stable out back.

Except there isn't.  An innkeeper, I mean.  There just isn't.

It's the Christmas Story we tell by putting together the accounts of Luke and Matthew.  Then we throw in some creative interpretation and maybe even add a detail or two that's not actually in Luke and Matthew and we get the picture perfect scene that makes a Christmas Creche (or nativity set), a beautiful card and a beautiful story.

I don't want to belabour the point that it's the story we tell, not the story that's in the Bible.  I think there are valid reasons to tell the story the way we do, just as there are valid reasons to examine more closely what the Bible really says.

Maybe the most important reason for the story we tell might be this: surrounded by the world of today, we need to hear a pastoral story of hope and peace.  Perhaps then, we might step out of our crazy, hectic, stressful, hurting and broken world and spend a moment at the manger with a quiet, smiling baby who represents the coming of God's love into the world.  After all, the world around the manger that night wasn't really so different.  It was hurting and broken, too.  And that story we tell is about God doing something different from the world we know.

There's a wonderful Christmas prayer from the Iona Community in Scotland that says "you crept in beside us.  And no one knew.  Only the few who dared to believe that God might do something different.  Will you do the same this Christmas, Jesus?"

That's why we need to imagine the peaceful fields of sheep, even with an angel host above it.  Or a cozy stable with a nice warm and comfy manger full of hay.  Or the glow of candlelight while we sing "Silent Night" before going out into stillness of a moonlit Christmas Eve.  God's love doesn't explode on the world, it creeps in.  The moment at the manger is just the beginning.

Oh, and about that innkeeper.  There's no innkeeper in Luke.  It just says that "there was no place for them in the inn" (Luke 2:7).  But, just imagine, whether it was a busy and crowded town or a single overwhelmed innkeeper, it helps us to put a face on that.  Because that face could be ours.

Mary and Joseph were guided by angels, messengers from God, who told them what to do and to not be afraid to do it.  Same with the shepherds.  The magi (the three kings) followed the star, a celestial guide of a prophecy.  But the innkeeper and the people in Bethlehem that night, they didn't know who was coming or what was happening.  All the innkeeper had to do was answer the door and decide whether to let them in.  And a manger was enough.

Find a quiet moment to wonder about the Christmas story and the child in the manger.  Will you make room?  Not just on Christmas Eve, but each day ahead, will you make room for God's love?

Finding Joy

Shrek's been in the house the last few weeks.  Our church in Bashaw has hosted nine performances (and all the costumes, sets and rehearsals) of Shrek: The Musical.  And it was awesome.  "Really, really," as Donkey says.

After the final show, one of the audience came up to me and said "are you the pastor of this church?"  I said yes and he said "well that was just wonderful.  I think it's great that you allow this here."

Not the first time I've heard that comment and I'm still so surprised to hear it that I don't really know what to say.  I said "thanks."

The thought never crosses my mind that we "allow it."  I think we treasure it.

I should mention, if I haven't before, that Bashaw Community Theatre stages its performances in the church itself, not in the hall.  The swamp and castle for Shrek cover the cross (and most of the front of the church).  Just as the sets did for all the previous plays.  So I can see why some people might think that there's an issue of appropriateness.

Not to mention content, right?  Shrek's full of ogres and fairytale characters and, well, there's that burp and fart competition that Shrek and Fiona have.  Oh, and Pinocchio says "crap" and Little Red Riding Hood says the swamp "smells like butt."  But I'm pretty sure I've talked about this kind of thing before.  This isn't our first play with farting.  Or fairytale characters, or fighting, running, yelling or anything else that people might think is inappropriate to a sacred space.  Don't even start me on the symbols of ancient Egyptian religions in Aida or the man-eating plant in Little Shop of Horrors.

Yes, I can see why there may be some questions and we've had them, too.  There has even been times that we changed a thing or two.  What's always been important to us, I hope, has been that we are true to our understanding of what makes a space sacred.

And that has been on my mind this week, because the third Sunday of Advent is joy and I think that is a big part of it. 

It would be easy to point to the enjoyment of everyone in the audience, it's really good entertainment.  How do you value the smiling and wondering faces of children and adults enthralled with Shrek, Donkey and Fiona only a few steps away from them or the fun the cast and crew have in putting it all together?  There's a lot of happiness to go around.

But, more than that, there's a deeper and more profound joy. A place is not made sacred because we say so or because we put a label on it, it's made sacred by the spirit of those who gather there to create a community in which everyone's gifts are acknowledged, encouraged and embraced.  It's made sacred by the sharing of struggle and success, the moments of achievement and fulfillment, the lifting of spirits, the warmth of relationships and yes, even the happiness.  When people feel welcome, appreciated and safe, then amazing things happen.

You might enjoy a great show, you might feel touched by the ideas and themes or even the performance itself.  One person at Shrek said that it's so great to see something that's so much fun for kids, but has such a great message about how we judge others and about knowing who we really are.  But there's more: there's a sense of family.  For cast and crew, it comes from all those hours together, from all the hard work, the learning and growing and, most importantly, the relationships we build.  That's the deeper joy of knowing a place where you belong because you're you.  That's a place where love is shared.

We call it community theatre, but I'd hope that might be how we'd talk about church, too.  And, yes, I know that not all churches are like that, nor are all groups that call themselves "a community."  I also know that the ideal that we call a "family" can struggle as well.

But, listen, here is good news: the joy of Christmas is that very thing.  It isn't about the stuff that will make us happy for a moment, but the moment that will stick with your heart through happiness and grief, struggle and success, comfort and conflict.  In that moment will be love, shared.

That's what makes the family or community.  Or church.  That's what brings true joy, that love is present and we belong in it.

In the darkest moment, light came. 

In the meanest moment, love came. 

In the quietest moment, the Word was spoken into life.

And in the loneliest moment, we found belonging.

Turn to Peace and Goodwill

A good opening line's important.  This week, mine was going to be "is it just me, or is everyone a little edgy lately?"

That could be a good opening line, but it's not right now.  Right now, it's trite, foolish and dismissive.  Because the answer's "yes."

And it's not hard to see why.  Look what's happening in the world: another mass shooting, terrorism, violence, climate change, the economy, unemployment, poverty, hunger.  Perhaps, though, it's not because any of that's new, but because it's not.  And it's become significantly closer and more personal.  We're getting "wore down," as my wife would say, and we're showing it.

We're becoming overwhelmed with fear, hurt and anger.  And we're expressing it.  Look beyond the usual generalizations we make about media and government, and look at what people are saying and how they're saying it.  Look at social media and the day to day conversations we're having in coffee shops and meetings, even street corners.

Facebook's always been a place where people will post - and believe - pretty much anything, but lately grumpy cat's been replaced with vitriolic and often personal attacks, not always based on substantiated fact.  "Trash" or "smack" talk isn't just isolated to intimidating opponents in a competitive sport, it's made it's way into everyday use.  And we're responding.

But it's not just talk.  It's confrontation and fight.

Remember the movie The Untouchables, way back in 1987?  Jim Malone is talking to Eliot Ness about Al Capone - in a church, no less - and he says, "you wanna know how to get Capone?  They pull a knife, you pull a gun.  He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue.  That's the Chicago way!  And that's how you fight Capone.  Now do you want to do that?  Are you ready to do that?"

No.  Say "no."   The right answer is "no."  That wasn't Ness's answer, but, to be fair, in the end they got Capone on tax evasion.

Still, it's tended to be our answer for a very long time.  So let's just pause and take a moment to remind ourselves that we have a choice.  That choice should be informed by love, not hate and by hope, not fear.  Those are the things that bring peace and goodwill, things that should be on our mind at this time of year.

As part of our Advent, preparing the way for Jesus, we meet John the Baptizer, too.  The gospel of Luke describes him with the words of the prophet Isaiah, as a lone voice, "crying in the wilderness" that people should prepare with repentance.  Please don't be taken aback by that word.  We've loaded it up with guilt and sin, required certain behaviour from it and made forgiveness conditional on it, but that's not what it's about. And God's forgiveness isn't conditional, anyway.  But to repent simply means to turn away from behaviour that's hurtful and destructive and turn to what is true.  John called people to turn towards the love that was coming their way in Jesus.

As we turn towards Christmas, take a moment and make a choice.  In the face of all that overwhelms us, choose to hope.  Choose to bring peace.  Choose to love.