No one lives outside the walls of this sacred place... The holy water my soul’s brow needs is unity. Love opened my eyes and I was cleansed by the purity of each soul, for the Infinite has no walls.
           - St Francis of Assisi 
            (1182-1226) (Adapted)

Reading: Or, to put it another way, you are God’s house. Using the gift God gave me as a good architect, I designed blueprints; Apollos is putting up the walls. Let each carpenter who comes on the job take care to build on the foundation! Remember, there is only one foundation, the one already laid: Jesus Christ. You realize, don’t you, that you are the temple of God, and God himself is present in you? No one will get by with vandalizing God’s temple, you can be sure of that. God’s temple is sacred—and you, remember, are the temple. 
               - 1 Corinthians 3.9-11, 16-17 (The Message)  

Reflection: On Sunday our faith community will consecrate its newly renovated worship space by… tearing down the walls! Shocked? At first blush you have every right to be. It’s been so long in the coming, this renovation, and we have invested so much time, heart, soul, and resources in its completion. Why should we tear down the walls after all that? The short answer, from my perspective, is that we have to tear down the walls to be the faith community God envisions for us… we have to tear down the walls to consecrate this space to its unique purpose: welcoming the neighbor, whoever she or he may be; offering a safe place to grow personally and spiritually; becoming – as we Disciples say – a movement for wholeness in a fragmented world; and celebrating with all who come within ear shot the mystery of God’s presence in, with, through, and for us.

We have to tear down any and all walls that close us in, tie us down, or in any way impede our going into the world to be love, compassion, and justice. We have to tear down any and all walls that bind our spirits: envy, bigotry, pride, or fear. We have to tear down any and all walls that prohibit us from recognizing the one truth that should guide us into God’s future, so eloquently expressed by St. Francis, “The Infinite has no walls.” I am so ready! I invite you to join in the festivities… oh, and bring that neighbor, because she or he is welcome here. Who knows, it might even feel like home.

The moment’s depth is greater than that of the future. And from the fields of the past, what can you harvest again? The soul does not understand the word seasons. The petals on the sun can only be touched now.
                                           - Rabia (c. 717-801)    

Reading: But for right now, friends, I’m completely frustrated by your unspiritual dealings with each other and with God. You’re acting like infants in relation to Christ, capable of nothing much more than nursing at the breast. Well, then, I’ll nurse you since you don’t seem capable of anything more. As long as you grab for what makes you feel good or makes you look important, are you really much different than a babe at the breast, content only when everything’s going your way? When one of you says, “I’m on Paul’s side,” and another says, “I’m for Apollos,” aren’t you being totally infantile? Who do you think Paul is, anyway? Or Apollos, for that matter? Servants, both of us—servants who waited on you as you gradually learned to entrust your lives to our mutual Master. We each carried out our servant assignment. I planted the seed, Apollos watered the plants, but God made you grow. It’s not the one who plants or the one who waters who is at the center of this process but God, who makes things grow. Planting and watering are menial servant jobs at minimum wages. What makes them worth doing is the God we are serving. You happen to be God’s field in which we are working.
                                   - 1 Corinthians 3.1-9 (The Message)

Reflection: God’s field – from the unplowed soil in which seed is sown to the bountiful crops awaiting harvest – is a familiar biblical symbol for the Reign of God. It is, indeed, a rich and fertile symbol, but it would be a mistake to attribute to God’s Reign all the characteristics of agriculture in the everyday world of the farmer, ancient or modern. Every farmer depends on the regularity of the seasons, from the cool, fresh days of seedtime; the warmth of the sun and adequate rain; to the mature days at season’s end when the crops mature. For every thing there is a season, Ecclesiastes asserts with confidence, and the farmer depends on such regularity.

In God’s Reign, however, there is real, impenetrable mystery in the transition from seedtime to harvest. Jesus makes this clear in his parable of seed & harvest found at Mark 4.26b -29. The farmer sows and, at the appropriate time, the farmer harvests, but in between the fields grow secretly, mysteriously. The farmer neither tends nor watches over the fields. He neither weeds nor fertilizes. The crops’ growth to maturity is dependent upon God and God alone, and always arrives as a surprise.

Paul understood this mysterious aspect of God’s Reign; it is evident in the humility with which he speaks of his role working in God’s field. It’s not the one who plants or waters who is at the center of the process. Rather, it is God who makes things grow. He compares his role (as translated in the Message) as a menial servant job at minimum wage. Recognize this mystery, he exhorts the Corinthians, and live in humility, and your eyes will see clearly the vision of ministry God offers.

This message of humility before the mystery of God’s Reign should not be overlooked as we at OPCC attempt to discern God’s vision for our future ministry. We can neither create this vision nor bring it to fruition. While our role is and will continue to be significant because God always chooses to work with and through God’s people, this role is also humble. We can only stand awe-struck before the mystery of God’s Reign that grows secretly and mysteriously. Even in periods when no progress is visible and things seem to be at a standstill, we can know that the Reign of God is growing, maturing. Joachim Jeremias expresses this aspect well when he says, “The fruit is the result of the seed, and the end is implicit in the beginning. The infinitely great is already active in the infinitely small.” Let us begin in humble faith, knowing that the end is present and active in our efforts. 

We would like to heed God’s words, but we only half hear them. The big drama between us makes too much noise for us to understand each other. Only in our doing can we grasp you. Only with our hands can we illumine you.

                                                - Rainer Maria Rilke (adapted)




“Let me tell you why you are here. You’re here to be salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth. If you lose your saltiness, how will people taste godliness? You’ve lost your usefulness and will end up in the garbage. “Here’s another way to put it: You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket, do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand—shine! Keep open house; be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven. “Don’t suppose for a minute that I have come to demolish the Scriptures—either God’s Law or the Prophets. I’m not here to demolish but to complete. I am going to put it all together, pull it all together in a vast panorama. God’s Law is more real and lasting than the stars in the sky and the ground at your feet. Long after stars burn out and earth wears out, God’s Law will be alive and working. “Trivialize even the smallest item in God’s Law and you will only have trivialized yourself. But take it seriously, show the way for others, and you will find honor in the kingdom. Unless you do far better than the Pharisees in the matters of right living, you won’t know the first thing about entering the kingdom.
                - Matthew 5.13-20 (The Message)



The passage cited above is perhaps better known (at least more broadly known) than any other from the Sermon on the Mount; at least the first part about light, that is. Most people know it, however, from the song it inspired. You know the one I mean, This Little Light of Mine. We’ve all sung it at one time or another: in children’s Sunday School, at summer camp, or in Vacation Bible School. It’s a harmless little ditty, lighthearted and casual; and it tends to bring back pleasant memories from our childhood that soothe and comfort us.

But, I must tell you; this perplexes me, because this simple, unpretentious song is inspired by one of the most challenging passages imaginable. Yet we seem to avoid its challenge by inserting our preferred interpretation of what it means to let your light shine. Whenever we sing it, we assume we know what light shine means. I remember, for example, growing up among fundamentalist-tending folk in the Deep South who interpreted the song for me as a child. “Be a good boy and do everything your momma asks you to do,” they said; and, “always, always avoid those Catholics,” whom they saw as the archenemy of all good Christians (read conservative, Protestant Christians).

As an older teen, I had advanced to a more sophisticated evangelical perspective; and the meaning of light shine was still assumed in a rather rigid sense that, surprisingly (or not) reflected the beliefs and biases of the group in which I found myself. To let your light shine meant to make sure you were different (read superior), from all those pagans who didn’t go to church. And it meant offering them the true beliefs that would transform them into faithful Christians. “Believe like we do,” they insisted, “And you will claim your ticket to heaven.”

As an adult - and a long-time student of faith, spirituality, and the Christian Biblical Tradition (among others) - I have found these interpretations lacking. They are good at spreading a rigid morality, and even a sense of superiority that any right-believing Christian can ostensibly claim. But they say little to nothing about living in community with God and other folk; nothing about walking a pilgrim pathway in the very real presence of God. So I decided to do something novel - and I invite you to do the same – I decided to turn directly to the Biblical Tradition and ask what Matthew’s Jesus has to say about light shine; and to seek other voices – like Isaiah 58.1-9a  - that provide context and content as well.

Long story short (so as not to steal my own thunder from Sunday’s sermon), both Matthew and Isaiah sketch a faith that acts; a faith that humbly looks beyond religious orthodoxy and learning about God as the primary sense of what it means to be a Christian, and recommends actually doing something to address the needs of others. Rilke (in the worship heading above) expresses this sense well in noting that we only grasp God, we only illumine God’s meaning for life, with our doing… reaching out with compassionate hands and hearts to address human misery. So, perhaps we should change the expression let your light shine to let your life shine. What do you think?