Love and Fear

 

Church of the Redeemer                         The Rev. Nancy E. Gossling

 

            In today’s 1st letter of John, the author writes two things that caught my attention:

1. “Perfect love casts out fear, and
2. “Those who say, “I love God,” and hate their brothers or sisters are liars.”

So let’s first talk about fear. I totally get it. I am afraid of many and various things, beginning with snakes. I am afraid of losing people I love. I am afraid of not fulfilling my potential, of failing others, and of not loving myself or others the way that God loves me. I am not afraid of dying but I am afraid of having pain that makes me want to die.

I do not love perfectly. I have a lifetime of evidence to attest to that confession. Maybe if I did, I wouldn’t be so fearful. Because, you and I know, that when we are fearful we are not acting in loving ways. So I remember a classic book that was recommended to me several decades ago, entitled Hinds Feet in High Places. It is based upon the Old Testament book of Habakkuk. In it, the primary focus is on the journey of someone who is called “Little Miss Much Afraid.”

At that time in my life, my spiritual director called me “Little Miss Much Afraid.” That was me. And so as I journeyed together with the leading star in this book, I realized that the only way to move forward in my life was to take leaps of faith. I found courage to change, and take appropriate risks, even when, and especially when, I didn’t know the outcome. I had to trust God and those who loved me. One day at a time, one step at a time.

Fear is rampant these days. We are afraid of our national security in the face of escalating international conflicts. We know that boundaries are  being crossed over our national, social, and personal borders. We argue about our first amendment rights, and what is and is not acceptable in our public and private squares. We are afraid for our futures.

Protests and public discourses have dropped to new lows; and serious violations in crime and personal safety have caused many to withdraw in fear. I often wonder who wants to step forward in faith when our culture dismisses the importance of religion. Or how we do not honor the many and various ways in which people connect with God.

Which brings me to my second  point. How is it then that we can say, or the author of 1st John can say, that “those who say, ‘I love God,’ and hate their brothers or sisters are liars.” To be honest, I cannot, for the life of me, understand how anyone can hate any group of people, most especially the Jewish people at this time, or the people of Gaza, or the people of any faith or country and still say that they love God. We can disagree passionately about our politics and even religion. But hate? Amd hate that leads to violence and death?

I am aware of how the opposite of love is not hate, but rather indifference. Indeed hate is love that has despaired so greatly that it has flipped from one extreme to another. And so to be indifferent is to say that you don’t care about all that God has created, every piece and parcel of creation, every single human and living creature. And while I may not like snakes, and even some people, I can say that by the grace of God, I can love everything and everyone because God loves us first, and God loves everyone and everything. God is good, all the time; and sometimes we are not.

When I was a little girl, I loved drawing a picture of a tree growing alongside a stream of blue water. The sky was blue; the sun was bright. Apples were red and rosy. And this, for me, was the equivalent picture of the true vine. Implicit in this picture is God, who is the vine grower, and the Tree of Life, the Creator of all creation and all creatures. And yet, idyllic as the scene may appear, we all know that vines need pruning, fruits need nutrients, and some branches may even need to be cut off.

This morning we will have a baptism, and our reasons for baptism will vary. “Some are baptized as babies and do not remember it, but maybe will be grateful for it later. Some are baptized because they turned eight years old and decided that they were sick and tired of not getting to drink the grape juice at the Lord’s Supper. Some are baptized on the spur of the moment like the Ethiopian eunuch in today’s reading.

Some have never been baptized because they have never seen any reason why they should be. And Jesus was baptized because he believed that God was calling him to a different kind of life. When Jesus rose from the waters of the Jordan River, he heard a voice say: “You are my child. I love you. I’m delighted with you.”

People who are baptized are called to live a different kind of life. They tell the truth in a world that lies; they give in a world that takes; they love in a world that hates; they make peace in a world that fights; they serve in a world that wants to be served; and they pray in a world that waits to be entertained.” (Brett Younger, www.d365.org, January 9, 2016)

So today, we will baptize Grace Rebecca Wilford. And baptisms are all about love, God’s love and our love for God and others. Grace is fresh fruit, which is being added to the vine that we call the Tree of Life. Her pruning and growth will continue over the years as she, hopefully, stays connected to the true vine grower, that is to God.

Over my decades of motherhood and priesthood, I have increasingly become more and more convinced that it takes a whole community of family, friends, and faithful people to raise a child. It begins at birth, and never ends. Thanks to all of you who are part of her life and her journey today and will be in the days and years to come.

Today, we welcome Grace, as a full member of the Body of Christ, and an heir of God’s eternal kingdom. May she grow strong in her faith journey, and stay close to the vine, the true vine that is Christ. May the Spirit of God help her to bear fruit that will last.

 

Acts 8:26-40             1 John 4:7-21           John 15:1-8

 

Witnesses

 

3 Easter              Church of the Redeemer             The Rev. Nancy E. Gossling

          The Pew Research Center recently reported some statistics on atheists in America. According to them, 98% of atheists say religion is not too or not at all important in their lives and only 4% said they found life’s meaning in spirituality.” (Xian Century, p.10, April 2024) More than one-quarter of Americans now identify as atheists, agnostics, or religiously “unaffiliated,” according to a new survey by the Public Religion Research Institute.“(Derek Thompson, The Atlantic, 04/2024)  And according to a Gallup poll taken in 1982, one third of Americans, who were questioned at that time, didn’t believe in life after death. In that same year, I probably was one of them. Matter of fact, at that time I was so consumed with life that I didn’t have time to think about death, let alone life after death.

I remember Easter of 1982 quite vividly. Our daughter Megan was 1 ½ years old, and our son Brian had just been born. Life was good. Unlike this past year’s winter, it snowed considerably on that Easter eve in Walpole, and Paul’s parents had come to visit us at our home. They were delighted with the birth of their second grandchild, and what they considered to be the one who would carry on the Gossling name.

Paul’s father, lovingly called Grandfather, made a huge Easter bunny out of the snow. Like our daughter, Grandfather was a doctor, who mended not just bones, but also people’s lives. He was a man of great faith, who loved life so much that in 2001 he was incredibly angry about losing it. Too soon for all of us!

To be honest, I didn’t think much about God until our children were born. I was a Christmas and Easter kind of Christian, showing up at church for the holidays. No matter the house, there was always a holiday routine. We would dress up in our Sunday best, go to church, and then celebrate with good food, plenty of wine, and a great deal of laughter.

Fortunately, for Paul and me, having babies wasn’t hard. We decided that it was a good idea, and then it happened. Raising our children, however, was a different matter. As they say, babies don’t come with instruction manuals. It’s on-the-job training with lots of “do-overs” and “I wish I hads or I wish had-nots” mixed in. Of course, Megan and Brian will tell you that raising us was no easy matter either.

Our struggles in life come in many packages, sizes, shapes and forms, don’t they? And we all have them, no matter how young we are, how old we have become, or how happy the holidays may appear. The truth is that these challenges will test our endurance, strengthen our resilience, and cause us to wonder about life, about death, and how to make sense of it all. It is at these turning points in our lives that we may turn towards God, or given to despair and cynicism, we may turn away from anything that is not materially evident. Faith is not a matter of proof. It involves witnesses.

I love the Easter stories about the disciples hiding in that room after the crucifixion of Jesus. They are described as afraid. And wouldn’t you be? If your leader had just been condemned and killed by powerful religious and political authorities, and you were one of his disciples, wouldn’t you fear for your life as well?

And yet, it wasn’t those human powers that knocked on the door that day. It wasn’t immigration officers or government officials demanding you turn over your documents. It wasn’t your rector or a military official bringing you bad news about a relative. No, instead it was Jesus who was knocking at your door, asking you if He might come in. Looking through a spiritual peephole, you’re shocked to see someone, who you thought was dead, standing on the other side. Hey, it’s me, Jesus said to his friends.

Now supposedly, on that Sunday after his crucifixion, Jesus miraculously stepped into the room where he found his disciples cowering in fear. They had only recently denied, betrayed, and abandoned their leader. To think that Jesus might hold a few grudges against them, and harbor a little anger and resentment towards them, isn’t a far stretch for anyone’s imagination.

Emotions were running high after Jesus’ death. There was plenty of name calling, blaming, and shaming to go around and plenty of need for forgiveness. There was plenty of need to let go of some anger and resentment. There was plenty of need for peace. And I imagine there was a strong desire to “move on” and forget the whole bloody mess.

But Jesus wouldn’t let them. After only three days’ of absence, He steps right back into their lives, and meets them where they are. He shows them his scars. “Touch and see me,” He said, “and believe that I am not a ghost.” Look at my hands and feet, and you will know me, resurrected to new life. You’re not imagining me; so give me something to eat. How about some lamb and red wine? Some broiled fish and a little bread?

In a sermon by Josh Stott, a pastor of GracePointe Church in Nashville, Tennessee, he writes about the scars of Jesus, and how they tell, like our own scars, some of our stories. Scars mark those moments in our lives that shape us, identify us, and leave their traces on us physically, mentally, emotionally, and even psychically. They mark those turning points in our lives when we may think about life and death, about God, and about the choices we have made. We may want to change how we live.

Pastor Stott wrote, “Jesus’ scars tell a story. They paint a vivid picture of a human being committed to a vision of God and God’s kingdom that is just and generous, with an embrace wide enough for anyone and everyone. It is a story of a God who sees everyone as valuable, a story of refusing violence in favor of peacemaking and returning love in the face of hatred.” (Xian Century, April 2024) 

When Jesus steps into our rooms where our hearts are pounding with fear, he tells us not to worry. “Be at peace” he says to the anxious and afraid. “Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is” me. Remember what I told you when I was still with you? That all these things would happen, and now, “You are witnesses of these things.”

We use lovely metaphors to explain the resurrection. We talk about flowers pushing through softened soil or melting snow, how caterpillars become butterflies after a long and necessary struggle, and how memories of our loved ones will remain in our hearts forever. And yet, as St. Paul said in his letter to the Corinthians, “Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?  If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.”

You know how life can intrude on our best laid plans, right? How our Lenten promises to amend our lives, and to forgive others as we have been forgiven, are hard to keep for 50 days, let alone a lifetime? How, like Peter, we promise never to deny, abandon or betray those we love? But then the risen Christ appeared to Peter in that room and his fear became faith.

In today’s passage from the Acts of the Apostles, Peter reminds the Israelites of their mistakes, “I know you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers.” You killed an innocent man, but God raised him from the dead and “by faith in his name” miracles do happen.

In his fear, in his shame, and in his disbelief, Peter met the risen Jesus in that room, and his life was changed forever. So too were the disciples who met Jesus on the road to Emmaus, St. Paul on his journey to Damascus, and the disciples on the beaches of Galilee. And on that Easter morning Jesus appeared to Mary in the garden. According to our scripture stories “hundreds of people saw the risen Jesus” after his crucifixion, and lives were changed and transformed after that.            

When Grandfather made that Easter bunny 42 years ago, I did not believe in the Resurrection. I was too young, too human, and too consumed with my life. All good things, to be sure! Today, I believe in the Resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. I also believe that one day I shall sit down again with Grandfather for good food, plenty of wine, and lots of laughter. How did this happen? By the grace of God, some personal spiritual experiences, and the witness of others. Through faith, hope, and love, I came to believe.

Andrew Garnett once wrote, “When we truly grasp the meaning of the resurrection, we are motivated to change both our hearts and our lives.” (www.d365.org)  Blind see. Lame walk. The oppressed are set free, prisoners are released, and to this we are witnesses. So live joyfully, peacefully, and lovingly until Resurrection comes knocking on your door.

             Acts 3: 12-19                    Luke 24: 36b-48