WHEN FREEDOM ISN'T - MEMORIAL DAY MEDITATION



Galatians 5:13-26

"For you were called the freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another.  For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

Freedom!  The word is on everyone's lips.  Home of the free!  Trouble is, for too many of us freedom means you can do anything you darn well please.  Paul is telling the Galatians, and us, we've got it all wrong.  And then shockingly he tells us freedom means becoming slaves! 

That didn't sit well in ancient Galatia, and it sure doesn't fly today!  Anyway, we say.  Yeah.  Freedom.  The law will take care of bad guys who overstep the bounds.  Paul is saying the law isn't what one can or should rely on.  verse 18: But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law.   

Huh???  Of course Paul means the law of Torah, which was spelled out in great detail, and known by the Jews of his time.  What to eat and not eat.  What to wear, etc. Even circumcism!  However, Paul's words are a great teaching for us today.  Those many centuries ago Paul spelled out the evils of the day, which still speak loudly and clearly to our society today.  Fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels dissensions, factions. Sound familiar? 

He goes on. verse 22. "By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control."  Paul has told us here what it is to be led by and to live by the Spirit- to be truly human joining ourselves to God's will for us. 

Now, on this Memorial Day we honor our Service men and women. In defending our Freedom they have had to do horrific things they never would have done in private life.  I'm thinking now of the many who are today returning from battle to depression, anxiety and stress disorder, suicide.  We are not as people, as a society, doing enough to help these wounded warriors.  As Christians we have faith in God's abiding Spirit, in God's prevenient Grace.  God alone reads the very wounded hearts of those returning from the horror of war.  Paul has lived both sides of persecutor and persecuted.  Paul the cruel persecutor has come to Christ.  He knows and affirms to the Galatians and to us today the abiding love of God.  We can do no less but pass on the Spirit this Memorial Day!  Let us honor those who have given their lives for our Freedom.  Let us do whatever it takes to support the men and women returning from battle, and their families.  Let us demonstrate in our support our faith that a greater Freedom than we ever imagined is offered to all in Christ Jesus.   

OLDE ENGLISH MAY DAY

 Archive pictures of Olde English May Day in the 1900s at Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana. 

For thus it chanced one morn when all the court,
Green-suited, but with plumes that mocked the may,
Had been, their wont, a-maying and returned,
That Modred still in green, all ear and eye,
Climbed to the high top of the garden-wall
To spy some secret scandal if he might

--Alfred Lord Tennyson, Idylls of the King, Guinevere  1859



Traditional British May Day rites and celebrations include Morris dancing, crowning a May Queen and celebrations involving a Maypole. Much of this tradition derive from the pagan Anglo-Saxon and customs held during  (the Old English name for the month of May meaning Month of Three Milkings) along with many Celtic traditions such as Beltane celebrations. May Day has been a traditional day of festivities throughout the centuries. May Day is most associated with towns and villages celebrating springtime fertility and revelry with village fetes and community gatherings.

At Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, where I did my undergrad work in the 60s, Olde English May Day was celebrated in glorious style once every four years.  Everyone in the college was given a role to play.  Hundreds of costumes were distributed for The Green Man who led the parade, gypsies, artists, jesters, musicians, Queen and her Court- all dressed in period costumes.  There were some 1500 participants in all. The year is was held when I was there the white gossamer dress was hanging on a hall mate's door in the morning, signaling that she had been chosen Queen of the May.  The entire hall was in an uproar as the news travelled.

The initial parade that wound its way around the campus was led by The Green Man. Animals joined too.  Domestic geese who gave the Goose Girls fits as they refused to stay in line!  Horses, sheep, goats on tether, and quite a few dogs brought by townspeople added to the festivities and fun. The May Pole Dance was held soon after attended by the Queen and her Court and all other participants gathered around to watch as May Pole dancers held their bright strips of fabric and danced a circle to weave them over and under to a thick rainbow braid on the pole.  The day was filled with more dancing, music of antique instruments and singing- choir and madrigal. The play Pyramus and Thisby was performed in the afternoon, followed by a Medieval banquet. The revelry lasted until dawn. It is a memory to last a lifetime.

Sadly, to me at least, the practice was mostly abandoned in 2008. 

APRIL



1 John 3:11,18

"The message you heard from the very beginning is this: we must love one another....My children, our love should not be just words and talk; it must be true love, which shows itself in action."

April is action. People wake up, bears begin to roam to neighborhood garbage pails.  Blooming trees signal the arrival of Magnolia and Dogwood shad. The nets are set just off the sea lane on the Hudson River. The tides have mostly carried away winter flotsam. 

Good Friday, Easter, Passover. Endings. Beginnings. The first sound of leaf blowers and lawnmowers. Friends of the Library announce trips to public gardens, lunches. One hot day a cicada can be heard. Seems everyone and every thing is busy. 

One has to be committed to April.

After a few tantalizing summer-like days in March, April is not only bone dry, but chilly. Close to freezing at night. A cheat for the plants trying to awake. Day by day the Hostas furtively push out spikes. Ferns Struggle to unwind. Only the Lenten Rose has in inhospitable conditions bravely bloomed their purple and white glory.

 The birds however wake us us with newly hopeful spring choruses. They began to tune up in March. 

April 23 We find ourselves marveling at fleeting time as we all must eventually do. Happier to do so on this our son's 34th birthday. We remember his first attempts at describing his world. See! He throws his arms out and lies back against the pillowy Boxwoods. See, the blooshers! Our granddaughter's first sentence was, Daddy! The leaves falling! They were born, it seems, with a commitment to life and life's wonders.

April 25 The Wisteria has graced us with its spectacular amethyst dangle earrings. The Dogwoods, white and pink have made a run for glory at last. The ancient pink has held on for yet another spectacular act. We hold our breath in March to see if her last act has come. Applause when once again, for perhaps the 60th time, the curtain opens and out steps the grande dame  once again in the splendor of advanced but victorious old age.

April in Paris.  1985 . Just my husband and I.  Glorious inspiration of troubadours ancient and modern. Long walks among expertly pruned Chestnut trees leafing out in their allées above masses of tulips in the Tuileries. The happy trip in 2004.  We flew our son there to be with us. It was so amusing to see his surprise at how well I spoke French. He took four years of French at the high school where I taught. I made sure not to teach his class. I knew you spoke French, but not that good! April in Paris.

I was never in Paris in April with anyone I was in love with as a young woman going to school there. I wasn't all that comfortable alone with myself back then.  I suffered a bit le mal du pays.  No matter. I walked there happily decades later in summer with the man I am married to now some 40 years. Commitment is a good thing.

The fountain we made from a Pennsylvania Dutch copper boiling kettle  is cleaned and filled with fresh water now babbling away. A small brown bird takes a drink then flies as if to rest on our deck railing. It makes numerous trips, preening each time on the railing unconcerned by me watching its ablutions a foot away.  

Great hawks are riding April's breeze today overhead. The smart and mighty crows are ganging up on the hawk with loud barks no doubt in protection of their young. A doe feeds beside this year's fawn in a thicket not 200 yards from where I stand.

All of this is treasure within sight on my acre. I am committed to April.

The Sunday School lesson this week is about Commitment.

The Bible passage reminds me of a wider commitment. I am rich here on my acre. I must do more than talk about love. I must renew commitments I've made to Save Our Sisters, Polaris, the Food Bank, my church mission, to family and friends in need.

 Renewal. Growth. Commitment to the Light in Whom there is no darkness. The power of Jesus whom God raised from death. It is April's song.

WALK IN THE LIGHT



1 John 1:1-2:2

This was one of John Wesley's favorite passages in the New Testament.

The writer of this letter or sermon lives in a cultural 'stew'.  The neo-Platonists are talking about the "pleroma" in which the ideal exists out there somewhere in space, far beyond human habitation.  The Stoics believed that everything was 'material'- even God, and that nothing transcends this material world. The Jewish tradition taught that the true aspect of God is incomprehensible and unknowable- that only God's aspect interacts with mankind and the world. The Gnostics preached the flesh was evil. 

And here is John testifying that They have seen God of all things- not out there somewhere, not a material non transcendent being, and certainly not incomprehensible and unknowable.  He testifies that they have seen the Word of Life, The Logos with their own eyes. 

He testifies that there is fellowship with this Person.  Fellowship!  Not with some ideal, or unknowable God, but companionship in a company of close associates, partnership, friends.  Little wonder that their joy was complete.

Furthermore, John testifies that this Person is Light, and that in Him there is no darkness- this at a time when the Stoics at least thought they could conquer the darkness with reason alone.  John tells us this is folly.  Everyone sins.  To believe otherwise is a lie.  And in God there is no strange mixture of light and dark.  The dark is merely lack of God.

Sin, wrongdoing, is common to all.  And John testifies that indeed we can be purified not by our reason but by the purifying blood, the very life, of Jesus who purifies us from all sin.  This Person that the witnesses have seen the eternal life which was and is this man.  We have in Him an advocate, not a mean person, a person who was with God from the beginning, God's beloved Son- prevenient Grace in Wesleyan terms- who supports us and pleads our cause on our behalf, who along with our fellowship with Him releases us from the prison we are in.  And not only for a select group  or club, but the "whole world". 

Have whatever ideas about how the world is, this is the Christian message of hope in a nutshell. 

Read the passage and think on it.

1 John 1

The Incarnation of the Word of Life

¹ That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. ² The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. ³ We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. ⁴ We write this to make our^[a] joy complete.

Light and Darkness, Sin and Forgiveness

⁵ This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. ⁶ If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. ⁷ But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all^[b] sin.

⁸ If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. ⁹ If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. ¹⁰ If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.

1 John 2

¹ My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. ² He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.

SIGNS OF REBIRTH

Holy Week.  The Gospel of Mark.  11-15

How about a different look at Holy week? 

Look around your home especially for cast off items.

An empty jar?  A woman poured a jar of ointment over Jesus' head.  Some were upset.  Jesus said, "But you will not always have me.  She will be remembered for what she has done." 

A tree branch?  People threw leafy branches on the road before Jesus on the road to Jerusalem.  "Blessed is the one who comes in the name of God!"

Bread?  "Take this.  This is my body."

A plant? Jesus went to a garden to pray. 

A feather?  "Peter you will deny me three time before the rooster crows twice."

A wooden post?  A soldier, who was standing at the foot of the cross, said, "Truly this one really was sent from God.!"

A rock?  A large rock was rolled across to seal the doorway of Jesus' tomb.

Zack Pine, a sculptor, takes things found in nature and creates sculptures from things he collects.  Critics call his work environmental art.  Zack Pine likes to resurrect things that most would simply discard and make something   He doesn't expect the sculptures to last.  In these dead things, there is new life, which then changes again to something new.  It is the present reality- ourselves, our relationships, our world.  It is Easter.  Look for the signs. They are everywhere to be found.

I wish all an especially happy and blessed Holy Week leading us to Easter minds and hearts- in our lives. 

CURE FOR HEART TROUBLE

The world is in trouble- global warming, animals and people in danger of their lives, cultures clashing. Space junk is falling. The weather is crazy, the Sun is exploding sun storms we see in the Northern Lights. We are suffering heart failure. 

A meditation on this week's Lectionary texts.  Jeremiah 31:31-34 reveals the organic sense of what it means to be a human being.  33b "I will put my law in their mind and write it one their hearts, I will be their God, and they will be my people.  34, "Not longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest," declares the Lord.

A message came this morning from my church: Everyone come  All invited! A time to discuss, and set those SMART Goals for our church. SATURDAY, March 31, 9:00 – 2:00

This is the latest initiative for growing the Methodist Church.  Will it bear fruit? One hopes so.  However, we have seen this kind of thing many times before.  And still the congregation continues to shrink. 

In Jeremiah's time the Temple is gone or about to be destroyed. The teachers, rabbis, are scattered.  Imagine if the great organized Church, and all our churches were destroyed.  What then would be our call to action? 

Jeremiah has related God's plan of what it means to be an authentic human being, a true child of God, living in His reality.  God will not be found in any  exterior structure.  God is in every person wherever they go.  It's an organic affair: God's law is written in our very minds, written on our very hearts.  It travels wherever we go.  What a radical Call to Action that is!

John 12:20-33. John is writing in a region in what is now Turkey. A Jew, he has accepted Christ and has written what is called the most 'Christological' Gospel. His Call to Action is presenting the case for a new order come into the world. He lives in a cultural stew. In this passage he relates that some Greek Jews had come to worship at the feast of Passover.  They went to Philip (a Greek name) asking to see Jesus. Philip tells Andrew and together they tell Jesus about the Greeks who wanted to see him.

In the fashion of John we  abruptly brought to Jesus' answer to these Greeks.  It's astounding to hear Jesus explain his mission to them:

²³ Jesus replied, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. ²⁴ Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. ²⁵ Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. ²⁶ Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.

²⁷ “Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. ²⁸ Father, glorify your name!”

Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.” ²⁹ The crowd that was there and heard it said it had thundered; others said an angel had spoken to him.

³⁰ Jesus said, “This voice was for your benefit, not mine. ³¹ Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. ³² And I, when I am lifted up^[a] from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” ³³ He said this to show the kind of death he was going to die.

The Greeks must have been shocked.  They lived where the Platonic dualism of Soul versus Body as set down in the Timaeus and Republic were known. And they must have had some experience in that culture with the Gnostic teaching that the soul will be collected by a heavenly redeemer and brought to  heaven without any corruption of body.  Perhaps they knew of the Egyptian gods such as Thoth, translated Hermes in Greek, and the many mystery schools out of which came the Corpus Hermeticum.  All had differing views of God.

As Jews they came from the Hebrew view of the creator: It is not a question of a flight from the world to God; God comes into the world and gathers redeemed people on a redeemed earth, in a perfected fellowship with God.  The Greeks in John's passage must have been intrigued enough by what they heard of Jesus to go to Jesus' Greek apostle to arrange to talk with Jesus.  That meeting would not have pleased their Jewish community, struggling to maintain their own identity.

Jesus tells the Greeks that he is that Redeemer in the flesh.  He is the seed that must die to produce many seeds.  He will die, but when He is lifted up from the earth, body and soul, He will draw all men to himself.  Notice the all.  A man, sent by God to die for the salvation of humankind is not the Jewish idea of Messiah.   We are not told what the reaction of the Greeks was, but the voice from heaven, some said was an angel, and some heard thunder.  Certainly this news would bring on a storm. 

The Gospel of John has been used and misused for all manner of things:  the evil of anti-Semitism, as well as the who is in, who is damned crowd.  But in John we know that the word, Logos, will go out to the ends of the earth.  It is said that a god that does not encompass the total of reality is no god at all. In John's Gospel we read of God, the seed that is born, dies, and is reborn.  It is the story of all creation.  It is our story as human beings. Our reality.

Do we have the heart or mind to be the seeds to carry the saving message? 

AN EASTER SPRING

Lenten Rose

AN EASTER SPRING

Psalm 24:1 The earth is the LORD’s, and everything in it the world, and all who live in it.

Native people say they did not distinguish between the physical and supernatural because everything was viewed as a vast  continuum, whether it be animate or supernatural, the world existed in 'real time' and in a conscious state of existence.  Every living thing was a member of one large family, the elements- earth, air, fire and water- plants, animal and human worlds were connected to each other in complex ways.  The storytellers passed on this 'real' life to the people so that all would live in perfect harmony with all other living beings.

This is not far from the Orthodox teaching of 'perichoresis' or coinherence of all things.  Bishop Kallistos Ware writes in his book, The Orthodox Way:  "I cannot contemplate with nature or God without learning to be present where I am, gathered together at this present moment, in this present place.  Stop, look and listen." 

We stand on holy ground.  "This material object, this person to whom I am talking, this  moment of time - each is holy , each in its own way unrepeatable and so of infinite value, each can serve as a window into eternity." If we are sensitive to God's world around us, we become more conscious of God's world within  ourselves.  We begin to see our" own place as a human person within the natural order."

photo Kimberly Harding

A new show on FOX, Touch, has an interesting theme. Kiefer Sutherland talked about the attraction of the show and the Red Thread of Fate connection that underpins Touch.  " At the beginning of the story we discover Martin who has a son named Jake who in the course or our story we realize has been misdiagnosed with severe autism and in fact is actually just a truly, truly evolved human being that is years and years beyond where my character is and our society is at. And in an effort to communicate with my son, I discover that he has this unbelievable skill set that allows him to interpret numbers and symbols in a way that kind of explain our past and to some degree predict our future and that’s where we start the show off. My journey, very much like the Chinese fable that the story is based on, which was called, “The Red Thread” and the red thread is basically a red thread that is loosely looped around the ankles of all the people that are supposed to come in contact with each other over the course of a lifetime. This thread can stretch and it can bend, but it cannot break, and somehow in our society we have broken this and my son is taking me on a journey to try and put the thread back together."

Facebook, the Internet, show people who understand connection of humans with each other and with nature.  They are the keepers of the Red Thread.  Every day I see postings about protecting our oceans, plant life, animal welfare and rescue, food banks, shelters for the homeless, action against human trafficking, battered women. People are speaking out, giving of their treasure to help the world. I do think the consciousness and conscience of the world is being awakened.  We are beginning to understand that all of nature is connected, and that with God as mediator, we humans must do what we can to protect the connection. 

So happy Spring!  Happy Easter! I believe it is more than coincidence that the two coincide.  New beginnings!  People have celebrated the Vernal Equinox ages past. Still today celebrations go on in woods and fields where people gather to dance and marvel at Creation and the Creator.  Let's all do the same tomorrow!

CURE FOR SNAKE BITE



CURE FOR SNAKE BITE

 

The lectionary this week lists three passages for which it isn't that all that easy to find a common thread.  Numbers21:4-9, John 3:14-21 and Ephesians 1:1-10

Scholars date the oral tradition of the Numbers passage from about 1400 BC and recorded in around 800 BC. To have been around that long, it must have been memorable to say the least.  The people brought out of Egypt and slavery begin to complain.  Not only did they complain against their leader Moses, they complained against God.  Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to this desert?  We would have better stayed in Egypt.  Have they forgotten that they were owned by people there, had no choice in their lives, treated as possessions, objects?  They gripe there is no food here and no water.  And we hate that miserable food, manna.  Things were reaching the point of revolt.  Something  had to be done.  The story teller relates that God took drastic action against the ingrates.  He sent poisonous snakes among the people who bit them and that many Israelites died. Now the people repented of their sins of speaking again the Lord and begged Moses to pray to the Lord to take the serpents away.  The Lord told Moses to take up one of the poisonous serpents and set it on a pole.  And that everyone who is bitten will look up at it and live. Moses made a serpent of shining bronze, set it on a pole and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.  Bronze, a bright alloy of copper and tin that must have shone bright light as the people looked up.

Snakes.  We see this symbol today of a snake on a pole as the caduceus- a universal symbol of healing.  Snake.  A animal mostly feared.  Used as a metaphor as a snaky deceitful person.  A snake in the grass, treacherous, lying, dangerous. 

But the snake is an amazing creature.  It sheds it old skin and emerges a new creature.  Thus, down through the ages the snake has been a symbol of rebirth. The Ouroboros is an ancient symbol of a serpent eating its own tail. The symbol represent the perpetual cycle of renewal of life, and infinity- the symbol of life, death and return, leading to immortality. The Israelites coming out of Egypt would have recognized the symbol.  Furthermore at the time of the setting down of the text in Numbers many traditions were in the mix.  Iranian and Iraqi civilizations were in the midst of a golden age or art science, new religions.  The Mediterranean civilizations were on the rise and were meeting: Phoenicia, Carthage, Etruscan, Greek.  Yet through all of this 'mixing' the Israelites, the Chosen People, were led to be faithful to their God.  Or die.

John 3:14:21  So, it not surprising that the author of the Gospel John begins this passage with a reminder that Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness.  But preaching that the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life infuriated the Jews.

John is writing in a period of upheaval also.  The Temple is no more.  The Rabbis are meeting to make the canon of the Torah.  It is a seriously important task.  They will be the People of the Book now that the Temple is gone. And here is John, born a Jew himself, preaching that Salvation will not come from Torah.  Salvation has come in a person, who is God.  The Son of Man who is Christ Jesus.  He is telling the society in which he lives that there is a choice to be made between Darkness and Light.  And the light is Christ Jesus who God sent into the world not to condemn the world but to save the world. This outrage the Jews, of course, who were hard at work attempting to preserve their faith by preserving God in The Book. For them, John was a heretic deserving of beating or even stoning to death for his teaching. 

Interesting that the Acts of the Apostles introduces a Pharisee and celebrated scholar of Mosaic Law name Gamaliel.  Peter and the other apostles are being prosecuted and beaten for continuing to preach the Gospel.  Gamaliel presents a powerful argument against killing the apostles reminding the Sanhedrin that killing them might touch off a revolt.  His argument is recorded thus in Acts 5:39:

"if it be of men, it will come to naught, but if it be of God, ye will not be able to overthrow it; lest perhaps ye be found even to fight against God".

Later in Acts we are told that Paul of Tarsus says that he was "educated at the feet of Gamaliel".  So it with wonder we read in Ephesians 2:1-10, the third lectionary text, the very Cure for Snake Bite.

Ephesians 2: 1.As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, ² in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. ³ All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh^[a] and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. ⁴ But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, ⁵ made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. ⁶ And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, ⁷ in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. ⁸ For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— ⁹ not by works, so that no one can boast. ¹⁰ For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

----------

Who were snake bitten and dead are now alive

Who lived for pleasure, doing whatever, playing whatever deceitful games of interest, are now offered by God the gift of grace.

Grace totally unmerited and unearned, just by the faith and belief in the light of Christ Jesus who was from the beginning, from Eden to the present day and for eternity, the only Cure for Snake Bite. 

Prayer:  God heal the broken and bring them to life and light.

RIDDING OUT

'Ridding out' is what my great grandmother called Spring cleaning.  The process would begin about this time of year, once the snow had gone and theweather turned milder.  Everyone in the family was marshaled and the riddingout began.  Room by room, first all pictures were taken down from   thewalls.  The furniture was moved to the shop to be polished or repaired and refinishedif needed.  The rugs were taken up and hung out on the line where the kids took a wire rug beater with a wooden handle and beat the rugs until not a speck of dust came out of them.  This was great fun.

Meanwhile the ceilings were dusted with feather dusters on long broom handles, or the brooms were covered with rags for the job.  Then the walls were washed down.  Grandmother would rather sternly direct the process.  "Top to bottom!"  "Top to bottom!  And catch those drips!"  Then the floors were washed and the boys would sand the scraped parts where chairs may have gouged the fir floors.  Then they were mopped again, and waxed.  And this was no spray wax out of a can!  This wax came in a hard cake and hand to be scooped out of the can with a knife.  Then came the backbreaking rubbing of each board- with the grain, until the entire floor was shining.

The kitchen cabinets were emptied and cleaned.  New shelf paper installed.  Each dish and glass was washed, silverware polished.  Pots got the steel wool treatment.  The cook stove got a new coat of black. 

The process took a week or more.  But oh!  The satisfaction of a brand spanking clean house!

The Gospel lectionary for this Sunday of Lent is John 2:13-22

Jesus Clears the Temple Courts¹³ When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. ¹⁴ In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. ¹⁵ So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. ¹⁶ To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” ¹⁷ His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.”^[c]

Jesus quotes Psalm 69:9 It is worth reading the entire Psalm to put Jesus' words in context. 

This has always been for me a shocking picture of Jesus, whip in hand, driving all from the temple courts, animals for sale for sacrifice, people selling these animals, and changing money for customers, and generally trashing the place, overturning tables and scattering the money.  I sang 'Gentle Jesus meek and mild' in Sunday School from a very young age.  This picture of Jesus simply never scanned with me.  He must have been angry?  No?  A holy rage.  How does the picture fit? 

¹⁸ The Jews then responded to him, “What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?”

The Jews seem so calm in their response.  There must have been an uproar not recorded in the Gospels.  In actuality the priests were seeing an utter abomination happening in the Temple- the very house of God.  The system of authority they held, the mandated sacrifice of animals bought and paid for was a lucrative business- one that the entire lives of the people revolved around.  God in a house; God's mercy bought and paid for with the blood of animals.  Pretty horrendous when you think of it.  Bawling and bleating of animals, blood all over the place in a hot country. No Mr. Clean!

 Jesus has come to put an end to that kind of wrong practice. What will happen when your precious Temple, your house of God is torn down, seems to be Jesus' message. Do you mean to say that God dies with a brick and mortar structure built by human hands?! 

¹⁹ Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” ²⁰ They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” ²¹ But the temple he had spoken of was his body. ²² After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled that he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.

Jesus has something entirely new to tell the Jews.  It must have been not only shocking to them, but they must have been thinking, 'We have to get rid of this guy.  He's means to destroy us all, our authority, our livelihoods, our power over the people. Without the Temple the whole point is lost! 

Yes.  They had reason to be afraid; be very afraid.  The focus is now on Christ Jesus. And we know that indeed the Temple was destroyed, only one wall remaining to this day.  And the cult lost its center.  The people who once called this place God's house now are The People of the Book.  God has left the house. There had to be a new focus. 

So what about all of this?  We've all got ridding out to do.  Spring cleaning.  I know I do!  I took a large bag of clothing to the Goodwill.  I've been discarding things that I have kept for who knows what.  But that is only skimming the surface of the Spring cleaning I need to do in my life.  That's just the easy ridding out.

  I need to get rid of worry, anxiety, disappointments, anger, resentments, woulda, coulda, shoulda.  I've spent  far too much time on unhelpful things- memories to be healed and replaced with hopeful, helpful things such as gratitude and joy in real relationships. I have to go through the rooms in myself left far too long to gather dust. Life isn't like Facebook: hit the Friend or Like button or Hide, Unsubcribe, BLOCK.  That isn't real life. The real ridding out is akin to being whipped into driving out the dirt, being driven me to one's knees.  "Top to bottom. And don't forget those drips!"  The real cleaning is to clean out one's whole house- body, mind and spirit. 

Psalm 69

¹ Save me, O God,
for the waters have come up to my neck.
² I sink in the miry depths,
where there is no foothold.
I have come into the deep waters;
the floods engulf me.
³ I am worn out calling for help;
my throat is parched.
My eyes fail,
looking for my God.
⁴ Those who hate me without reason
outnumber the hairs of my head;
many are my enemies without cause,
those who seek to destroy me.
I am forced to restore
what I did not steal.

⁵ You, God, know my folly;
my guilt is not hidden from you.

⁶ Lord, the LORD Almighty,
may those who hope in you
not be disgraced because of me;
God of Israel,
may those who seek you
not be put to shame because of me.
⁷ For I endure scorn for your sake,
and shame covers my face.
⁸ I am a foreigner to my own family,
a stranger to my own mother’s children;
⁹ for zeal for your house consumes me,
and the insults of those who insult you fall on me.
¹⁰ When I weep and fast,
I must endure scorn;
¹¹ when I put on sackcloth,
people make sport of me.
¹² Those who sit at the gate mock me,
and I am the song of the drunkards.

¹³ But I pray to you, LORD,
in the time of your favor;
in your great love, O God,
answer me with your sure salvation.
¹⁴ Rescue me from the mire,
do not let me sink;
deliver me from those who hate me,
from the deep waters.
¹⁵ Do not let the floodwaters engulf me
or the depths swallow me up
or the pit close its mouth over me.

¹⁶ Answer me, LORD, out of the goodness of your love;
in your great mercy turn to me.
¹⁷ Do not hide your face from your servant;
answer me quickly, for I am in trouble.
¹⁸ Come near and rescue me;
deliver me because of my foes.

¹⁹ You know how I am scorned, disgraced and shamed;
all my enemies are before you.
²⁰ Scorn has broken my heart
and has left me helpless;
I looked for sympathy, but there was none,
for comforters, but I found none.
²¹ They put gall in my food
and gave me vinegar for my thirst.

²² May the table set before them become a snare;
may it become retribution and^[b] a trap.
²³ May their eyes be darkened so they cannot see,
and their backs be bent forever.
²⁴ Pour out your wrath on them;
let your fierce anger overtake them.
²⁵ May their place be deserted;
let there be no one to dwell in their tents.
²⁶ For they persecute those you wound
and talk about the pain of those you hurt.
²⁷ Charge them with crime upon crime;
do not let them share in your salvation.
²⁸ May they be blotted out of the book of life
and not be listed with the righteous.

²⁹ But as for me, afflicted and in pain—
may your salvation, God, protect me.

³⁰ I will praise God’s name in song
and glorify him with thanksgiving.
³¹ This will please the LORD more than an ox,
more than a bull with its horns and hooves.
³² The poor will see and be glad—
you who seek God, may your hearts live!
³³ The LORD hears the needy
and does not despise his captive people.

³⁴ Let heaven and earth praise him,
the seas and all that move in them,
³⁵ for God will save Zion
and rebuild the cities of Judah.
Then people will settle there and possess it;
³⁶ the children of his servants will inherit it,
and those who love his name will dwell there.