Here is the email that I used to forward her a copy.
Sara,
Thank you for letting me preach. Now that more people have had a chance to meet me and my family, I will send some updates from time to time for the e-notes. And I will let you know about my meetings with the diocese when they start happening. If not sooner, I will see you at diocesan convention.
Blessings,
heather lee
May
the words of my mouth and the meditation of all our hearts be always
acceptable in your sight, O Lord. Amen.
About
10 years ago, I came back to church. When I told family and friends
about this, I got all sorts of responses. A strong theme seemed to
emerge. Christians can’t do an awful lot, and they can’t do
anything on Sunday.
“Can
you say that word?”
“Aren’t
you supposed to pray before you eat?”
“Well,
it was on a Sunday, and I know you only go to church on the Sabbath.”
To
be fair, the church told me plenty of things about how to fit in and
what we didn’t do on the Sabbath as well.
“We
will seat you between the collect and the first lesson.”
“Acolytes
cannot wear flip flops and their shirts must never show above their
vestments.”
Please
come back tomorrow, the person who handles our assistance program is
not here on Sunday.”
All
of these examples speak to our assumptions about the Sabbath. One I
expect every one of us shares is – Go to church on Sunday morning.
And as glad as I am to see all of you, it doesn’t really answer the
Sabbath’s most pertinent question.
Why
are we here?
The
gospel lesson this morning offers two explanations for why we are
here and what the Sabbath is all about.
In
it, we find Jesus teaching in a synagogue on the Sabbath. This is
something he doesn’t do very often. It’s sort of like being a
guest preacher in church on a Sunday. And in comes a woman who is not
really socially acceptable. Maybe she comes every Sunday, sneaking
into the back pew and leaving early. Maybe she just came because she
heard Jesus was going to be there. And Jesus, who isn’t a regular,
who isn’t doing his regular Sabbath routine, notices her. He
notices a woman, a woman who is in pain, and he is moved by his
compassion for her suffering to walk right up to her and heal her.
“Be healed, be forgiven, be loved.”
And
she was.
And
maybe she started dancing and clapping her hands and singing.
And
maybe she wanted to join the vestry and the altar guild and the
healing ministry team and all those other things we say we want to
happen for a visitor in our church on a Sunday morning.
I
want that. I have been relieved from suffering on a Sunday morning
and I want everyone to feel that at least once in their lives.
But
I have been coming to church for a long time now, and I think I know
how that synagogue leader feels, too.
I’ve
been exhausted at the end of a very long week and just wanted some
peace and quiet – someplace to pray where I don’t have to think
to hard about it.
I’ve
been annoyed by contemporary music during a Rite 1 service.
I’ve
been angry at God for the ability of an outsider to see and to fix
things that I can’t see or I can’t fix.
I’ve
been laughed at and shamed for being totally wrong.
And
I’ve noticed this happens in the gospels a lot. We do the right
thing and Jesus tells up we have it totally wrong.
Jesus
doesn’t do this because the Pharisees and the synagogue leaders are
bad people. He does it because they are, in fact, hypocrites. They
have forgotten that there is a WHY
WE ARE HERE to go with the HOW WE DO THINGS.
Jesus
isn’t mad at them for keeping the Sabbath, he is angry because they
have forgotten why we have one.
Now,
I am fairly certain that in my library at seminary there is a right
answer for the question ‘Why is there a Sabbath?’ Unfortunately,
I left all those books in Berkeley. But that’s ok, because I think
Isaiah gives us the answer.
“If
you refrain from trampling the Sabbath, from pursuing your OWN
interests on my holy day,” says the Lord, “then you shall take
delight in the Lord and I will make you ride upon the heights of the
earth.”
Which
sounds to me like perspective. The Sabbath offers us perspective. It
reminds us that we are lovers of God and why we are followers of
Christ all the other days of the week. Which is the exact opposite of
a break from being lovers of God and followers of Christ. And we have
a choice of what to do with that perspective. We can apologize for
the last six days, or we can get some perspective in preparation for
the next six days.
We
can practice Sabbath through our fear. As the letter to the Hebrews
reminds us, we can be like Moses and the Israelites at Mt. Sinai –
too scared to climb the mountain, too afraid to be vulnerable before
God and accept God’s miraculous healing. We can learn to be
complacent about the things we cannot change.
Or
we can watch out for the things we can. Instead of cowering at the
base of Mt. Sinai, we can climb Mt. Zion. We can be like the woman,
stooped over but willing to take a chance. We can be like the crowd,
witnessing a miraculous change in the life of our neighbor. We can be
like Jesus, empowered to reach out and heal all that is within our
power to heal. Mt. Zion, the letter to the Hebrews tells us, has a
party going on. And it sounds like a marvelous place to gain
perspective.
It
sounds like a place, where maybe there is dancing and clapping and
singing and all those things we say we want to happen on a Sunday
morning.
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