Monthly Archives: April 2020

Monday Matters (April 27, 2020)

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Jay (or better yet, plug in your own name), I lay my hands upon you in the Name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, beseeching him to uphold you and fill you with his grace, that you may know the healing power of his love.  Amen.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, who consoles us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to console those who are in any affliction with the consolation with which we ourselves are consoled by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ are abundant for us, so also our consolation is abundant through Christ

-II Corinthians 1:3-5

This is another day, O Lord.  I know not what it will bring forth, but make me ready, Lord, for whatever it may be. If I am to stand up, help me to stand bravely. If I am to sit still, help me to sit quietly. If I am to lie low, help me to do it patiently. And if I am to do nothing, let me do it gallantly. Make these words more than words, and give me the Spirit of Jesus.  Amen.

-page 461, Book of Common Prayer

Healing Prayers

Early in my ministry, it was my privilege to serve in a big, lively church in Washington. One of the active (and surprising) ministries I found upon arrival was a ministry of healing. This was the surprise. This church was filled with some of Washington’s most accomplished leaders. If they had needs for healing, they seemed pretty well disguised.

In this ministry, clergy and lay people would pray with people who came forward to a chapel after receiving communion. I observed this for a while, a steady stream of people each Sunday. I was surprised because I had been prejudiced about healing ministries, imagining with some good reason that it was a tool of charlatans and show-people, snookering snake handlers, people profiting from pain, raising false hope, toying with the peril of promise, misleading people in moments of vulnerability. But I changed my mind.

One Sunday, one of the healing ministers didn’t show up. Coach pulled me from the bullpen. I was put in that person’s place, asked to offer prayers for healing, which I did so a bit reluctantly. After a brief tutorial, I began. Person after person came forward, offering their name and the concerns on their hearts. I prayed with them, using the form of the prayer found above and then adding a prayer for the moment.

It was a turning point for me, as I witnessed folks who seemed like they had life together coming forward. It made me realize we all have needs for healing. Scratch the surface of the most put together person, talk to that person for 5 minutes, and you can find an area of brokenness, of body, mind, spirit, memory, relationship, a concern for healing of our society, a concern for healing of creation.

Since that time, I’ve come to believe that just about everything we do in church has to do with healing, with making things whole, which is just one way of describing the word salvation. And while I’ve come to regard healing as a central ministry of the church, the more I think about it, the more I realize we enter into mysteries. Why do some prayers for healing seem to result in cure and others don’t? Where do healing and cure overlap? Where do they diverge?

I note in the gospels that Jesus was, among other things, a healer. It was a sign of divinely anointed status (a.k.a., Messiah). But it’s also a mystery, as he doesn’t approach healing in the same way with every person. Sometimes he has to be asked to heal. Sometimes he approaches people and asks if they would like to be healed. Sometimes he links healing to faith. Sometimes he links healing to forgiveness. He doesn’t heal everyone. He heals old people and children. He heals rich people, people of influence. He heals outsiders, foreigners and lepers, who bring nothing to the table but need. And he passed on healing ministries to his disciples. And they have passed those ministries on to us. Which brings us to pandemic. Healing is on everyone’s mind.

So where do you see need of healing in your own life this week? If it’s helpful, make a list of those needs (short or long) and pray that list each morning. Maybe even share that list with someone you care about and have them pray for you.

And ask: Who are the healers you see around you? Make a list and pray for them each morning, with thanksgiving. They may be health professionals, people shaping policy, church folk, family and friends. Pray in thanksgiving for them. Pray that they be strengthened to continue with courage (bravery and heart).

Then think about your call. How is God calling you to be a healer, even one as reluctant as I was in the D.C. church? Write at least ten needs for healing you see in the world around you, nearby and far away, local and global. Pray each morning for those needs. Ask God how you can be an instrument of God’s healing power. Ask God by praying not only with your lips but with your life.

-Jay Sidebotham

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Jay Sidebotham

Contact: Rev. Jay Sidebotham jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement www.renewalworks.org

Consider this great resource for personal spiritual growth during this pandemic (when many of us find ourselves sheltering in place).

RenewalWorks For Me is a personal guide for the spiritual journey, providing coaching to help individuals grow. It begins with a brief online survey which assesses where you are in your spiritual life. We call it the Spiritual Life Inventory.

Once your responses have been processed, we’ll email a helpful explanation of our findings, along with some tips for improving your spiritual journey. You’ll also be given a chance to sign up for an eight-week series of emails that will offer some suggestions, coaching for how you can grow spiritually, and ways you can go deeper in love of God and neighbor.  Learn more at renewalworks.org

 

Monday Matters (April 20, 2020)

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There’s a wideness in God’s mercy, like the wideness of the sea;
There’s a kindness in His justice, which is more than liberty.

There is no place where earth’s sorrows are more felt than up in Heaven;
There is no place where earth’s failings have such kindly judgment given.

There is welcome for the sinner, and more graces for the good;
There is mercy with the Savior; There is healing in His blood.

For the love of God is broader than the measure of our mind;
And the heart of the Eternal is most wonderfully kind.

If our love were but more simple, we should take Him at His word;
And our lives would be thanksgiving for the goodness of our Lord.

Souls of men! why will ye scatter like a crowd of frightened sheep?
Foolish hearts! why will ye wander from a love so true and deep?

But we make His love too narrow by false limits of our own;
And we magnify His strictness with a zeal He will not own.

Was there ever kinder shepherd half so gentle, half so sweet,
As the Savior who would have us come and gather at His feet?

 

-Excerpts from poem (and hymn text) by Frederick William Faber (1814-1863)

Lord have mercy

We often pray: Lord, have mercy. I’ve often thought we don’t have to ask God to have mercy. That’s part of the deal. That’s in the character of the Holy One. We just need to see it, to recognize it, to remember it.

Last Friday, in Morning Prayer, we read Psalm 136, which covers the history of just about everything in the Hebrew Scriptures. Each verse (there are 26 of them) lists something God has done, and then calls for the response: God’s mercy endures forever.

At the end of that morning service, there’s the General Thanksgiving (p. 101 in the Book of Common Prayer) which asks that we be given an awareness of God’s mercies. That phrase always stops me. Spiritually speaking I can tend to be more clueless, more forgetful, more indifferent than aware. So maybe the spiritual challenge for this week is awareness, a particular challenge in times when there seems to be more judgment than mercy.

There are synonyms for awareness.  We can speak of mindfulness. We can speak of intentionality. The eucharistic prayer refers to a technical Greek liturgical term: anamnesis. Literally, not amnesia. Not forgetting.

So what do you think it means to grow in awareness of God’s mercies? Perhaps it begins with an attitude of gratitude, giving thanks in all things, even in this crazy and difficult season. This is where awareness as intentionality, perhaps even stubborn willfulness, may matter. What one, five, ten, fifty things can you be thankful for today? Note as you try this spiritual exercise if it shifts anything for you?

Maybe awareness of mercies means putting ourselves in the place of someone in greater need than we are. Now more than ever, we live in our bubbles. Yet the fragility of life, the vulnerability of those in need of medical care or food or funds or companionship screams at us. Maybe that awareness can manifest not only in our lips but in our lives, with creative acts of kindness as we remain sequestered. What might you do to show mercy, as God is merciful?

Maybe awareness of mercies calls us to look at that part of ourselves that honestly is not sure we need mercy, thank you very much. It’s that part that bristles at confession or Lenten discipline of repentance, that part that wants to let God know how lucky God is to have us on the team. Check out the parable Jesus told about a Pharisee and tax collector at prayer (Luke 18:9-14). The Pharisee (perhaps ancient version of an Episcopal priest) gives thanks that he’s not like that loser sitting in the back pew. The tax collector simply asks for mercy. Guess which one Jesus said went away justified, set in right relationship to God?

We are reading the Gospel of Matthew at our church this Easter season, as part of the Good Book Club (Go to www.goodbookclub.org for more info). This week’s reading includes the Beatitudes (Matthew 5), which begin by saying: Blessed are the poor in spirit. I am helped by another translation that renders the verse: Blessed are those who know their need of God. That knowledge, that intention, that awareness seems to be critical to a life of blessing.

And if there is any silver lining to this strange season, perhaps it will be a recognition of our own need of help from a source greater than ourselves, our dependence on others, our dependence on the Holy One. Maybe idolatrous illusions of independence and self-sufficiency can subside for the sake of beloved community, where we care for each other, rather than attack each other or blame each other as together we experience that God’s mercy endures forever. Maybe we can live our lives animated by mercy and grace, not judgment or fear, acting on the belief that in the end, love wins.

-Jay Sidebotham

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Jay Sidebotham

Contact: Rev. Jay Sidebotham jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement www.renewalworks.org

Consider this great resource for personal spiritual growth during this pandemic (when many of us find ourselves sheltering in place).

RenewalWorks For Me is a personal guide for the spiritual journey, providing coaching to help individuals grow. It begins with a brief online survey which assesses where you are in your spiritual life. We call it the Spiritual Life Inventory.

Once your responses have been processed, we’ll email a helpful explanation of our findings, along with some tips for improving your spiritual journey. You’ll also be given a chance to sign up for an eight-week series of emails that will offer some suggestions, coaching for how you can grow spiritually, and ways you can go deeper in love of God and neighbor.  Learn more at renewalworks.org

 

Monday Matters (April 13, 2020)

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Remember Jesus of Nazareth, staggering on broken feet out of the tomb toward the Resurrection, bearing on his body the proud insignia of the defeat which is victory, the magnificent defeat of the human soul at the hands of God.

-Frederick Buechner

Christ is risen!

We give thanks for the gift of Easter that runs beyond our expectations,
beyond our categories of reason, even more, beyond the sinking sense of our own lives.

We know about the powers of death, powers that persist among us,
powers that drive us from you, and from our neighbour, and from our best selves.

We know about the powers of fear and greed and anxiety, and brutality and certitude, powers before which we are helpless. And then you – you at dawn, unquenched, you in the darkness, you on Saturday, you who breaks the world to joy.

Yours is the kingdom…not the kingdom of death,
Yours is the power…not the power of death,
Yours is the glory…not the glory of death.
Yours…You…and we give thanks for the newness beyond our achieving.

Amen.

-Walter Brueggemann, Awed to Heaven Rooted in Earth 

The Lord is risen indeed

Stating the obvious, this has been an Easter like no other. Yet for those who might be interested in authentic observance, perhaps some kind of reenactment of the first Easter as described in the gospels, maybe this year we are closer to that first Easter than we might imagine. The gospels have no record of great crowds in churches, arriving at worship early to assure a seat, glorious choral music, flowered crosses, pithy, passionate, life-changing sermons, resplendent Easter dinners, perfected fashion statements, spectacular haberdashery, let alone chocolate, bunnies or egg hunts.

What actually took place on that first Easter?

Social distancing.

Disciples cower in a room behind locked doors, afraid they might be next. A few women go early to the tomb before the crowd is out on the street. While there are hints of the beginnings of celebration and rejoicing, the predominant emotional responses include fear, doubt, confusion. Even when the risen Jesus is in their midst, disciples don’t quite get it.

Those emotional responses sum up a lot of the way that we go through life. Maybe this year, we feel a bit more like those first century disciples than like participants in some Fifth Avenue Easter parade, with all the frills upon it. And while I can’t wait for this virus to go away, it may bring with it a gift of recognizing what Easter is really about. By God’s grace, there may be some learning.

For while we need celebration and festivity and joy, and while the news that Jesus is alive is the best news our church has to offer, we all navigate life, especially these days, with fear, doubt, confusion. And that’s precisely where Jesus meets us. In our own woundedness, our vulnerability, our fear, all palpable in this crisis, Jesus comes showing us his wounds as well. He could have come in demonstration of political power or religious vindication or liturgical pageantry or a reprise of triumphant entry into Jerusalem. That was not his way.

Instead, in private encounter, he speaks Mary’s name and she recognizes him, as he begins to mend her breaking, grieving heart. He breaks bread with two Emmaus-bound disciples and they see him in that simple meal, when their deep disappointment had clouded vision. He doesn’t berate Thomas for skepticism but shows a simple pathway to belief, inviting him to worship. He forgives Peter’s three-time denial giving Peter a chance for a three time-expression of love. All that happens on that first Easter.

Which brings us to the ways we observe Easter. You may have noticed that clergy often get cranky with people who show up at church just for Christmas and Easter. I confess that it used to bug me. I’d find all kinds of passive-aggressive ways to make the point. (I’m quite good at that, by the way.)

But there is a point to be made. Christmas is not really understood unless you see it in the context of a corner of an oppressive empire where a refugee family finds no place to stay and a monarch wants to kill all the male children. In that context, joy to the world is pretty powerful. Love wins.

Similarly, the joy of Easter is not fully understood if it hasn’t involved the way of the cross, the observance of Good Friday, walking that path of challenge and suffering that comes to each of us, particularly acute right now for many. Again, love wins. It may well be too early to open up the economy, but I think Easter comes at the right time.

Because that’s where Jesus shows up. Right in the middle of our mess, showing by his wounds that he knows what woundedness is all about. Easter is where Jesus stands up, which is what resurrection means: to stand again. (He’s a stand up kind of guy.) And because he did that, our faith tells us that we can stand up too, and we can give others a hand to help them stand up too.

Put that all together and it presents a very good reason that we can now finally say “Alleluia” even from a distance.

-Jay Sidebotham

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Jay Sidebotham

Contact: Rev. Jay Sidebotham jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement www.renewalworks.org

RenewalWorks For Me is a personal guide for the spiritual journey, providing coaching to help individuals grow. It begins with a brief online survey which assesses where you are in your spiritual life. We call it the Spiritual Life Inventory.

Once your responses have been processed, we’ll email a helpful explanation of our findings, along with some tips for improving your spiritual journey. You’ll also be given a chance to sign up for an eight-week series of emails that will offer some suggestions, coaching for how you can grow spiritually, and ways you can go deeper in love of God and neighbor.  Learn more at renewalworks.org

 

Monday Matters (April 6, 2020)

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The Collect for Monday in Holy Week:

Almighty God, whose dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Collect for Tuesday in Holy Week:

O God, by the passion of your blessed Son you made an instrument of shameful death to be for us the means of life: Grant us so to glory in the cross of Christ, that we may gladly suffer shame and loss for the sake of your Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.

The Collect for Wednesday in Holy Week:

Lord God, whose blessed Son our Savior gave his body to be whipped and his face to be spit upon: Give us grace to accept joyfully the sufferings of the present time, confident of the glory that shall be revealed; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. 

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Jay Sidebotham, Church Pension Group

At sundry times and in diverse manners, members of congregations where I’ve served have pointed out my growth opportunities. Some have done so with considerable energy. I have in recollection a guy who wanted to know what I was thinking in scheduling Holy Week and Easter in the middle of the local school’s Spring vacation. Hadn’t I even checked the calendar?

The fact is, it never occurred to me in 30 years of ministry that anything might interrupt our most holy week. We observe it when calendar tells us. It’s non-negotiable. Maybe it’s a failure of imagination, but I had no idea what could be so important to change that. I’ve always been committed to keeping the church up and running come what may. (Maybe it’s a point of pride, even hubris.) I’ve walked to church in several feet of snow. I’ve held services in the dark when power outages knocked out electricity. I’ve overcome roads closed by downed wires and even led worship without my morning Starbucks. 9/11 did not stop us from having services. So it feels odd (to say the least) to enter this Holy Week from a social distance, church locked, services online.

A friend commented about this season: This is the lentiest Lent I’ve ever lented. If Lent is a season about giving things up, we’ve knocked that one out of the park (Sorry if that’s a painful metaphor for grieving baseball fans). The current multi-faceted crisis calls for us to give up a lot. It will undoubtedly teach us many things. Like Lent, compared to times in the wilderness, it is a season of both challenge and formation. We will come out different on the other side.

So what might we learn? As we come to the end of Lent, think about what it means that the season calls us to self-examination. As we strip away much of normalcy, daily trips to classrooms and workplaces, casual interaction with friends, dinners at restaurants, gatherings in churches, we may gain insight into what really matters to us, where our priorities lie. We may find out what we really miss. We may find out what we didn’t need after all. As we contend with anxiety and fear, as we face needs for physical and emotional healing, as we pray for brave souls on the front lines of this war, we may gain insight into where we place our trust. We may grow in compassion for those who contend with deprivation 24/7, 365 days out of the year. Take some time this week to reflect on lessons for you and your community.

And as we come to the beginning of Holy Week, we can wrap our minds around the ways we will observe it. I’m pretty sure that however we do that, it will be different than in years past. It may be observed in isolation. It may be observed online. If on some level, we are not feeling the challenge and the pain of what our world is going through, then I suspect we’re probably not paying attention. So even at a distance, we turn to the liturgies of our church, the prayers and stories from scripture to be our guide as they have guided others through the wilderness in the past.

The collect for this Monday in Holy Week (included above, along with others) invites us travel the way of the cross. That cross is different for each one of us. Can we travel that way? The collect for Tuesday invites us to see a way of life in an instrument of death, the cross. Can we embrace that vision? The collect for Wednesday invites us to endure suffering for the glory that will come. Can we keep our eyes on that prize? Let these prayers shape our believing as we walk through this Holy Week, one like we’ve never experienced before.

A friend had to break the news to her grandchildren that she would not be traveling to be with them for Easter, and that they might not be able to celebrate Easter at church. The young granddaughter responded: “Well I guess Jesus is just gonna stay dead this year.” So let me say to this young faithful friend, and remind myself, that while we might not be together on Easter (just like the first disciples who were practicing social distancing behind locked doors), Jesus does not stay dead. We will experience his loving, liberating liveliness in new and unexpected ways, thanks be to God.

-Jay Sidebotham

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Jay Sidebotham

Contact: Rev. Jay Sidebotham jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement www.renewalworks.org

RenewalWorks For Me is a personal guide for the spiritual journey, providing coaching to help individuals grow. It begins with a brief online survey which assesses where you are in your spiritual life. We call it the Spiritual Life Inventory.

Once your responses have been processed, we’ll email a helpful explanation of our findings, along with some tips for improving your spiritual journey. You’ll also be given a chance to sign up for an eight-week series of emails that will offer some suggestions, coaching for how you can grow spiritually, and ways you can go deeper in love of God and neighbor.  Learn more at renewalworks.org