Epiphany 5

Blessed be God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Let's pray together.

Almighty God, to you all hearts are open, all desires known, and from you no secrets are hid.

Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love you and worthily magnify your holy name through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

The Lord be with you.

Let us pray.

Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sin, and give us the liberty of that abundant life which you've made known to us in your Son, our Savior Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Amen.

Have you not heard?

Has it not been told you from the beginning?

Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?

It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers.

Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them like a tent to live in?

Who brings princes to naught and makes the rulers of the earth as nothing?

Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown.

Scarcely has their steam stem taken root in the earth.

And when he blows upon them and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stubble.

To whom then will you compare me?

Or who is my equal, says the Holy One.

Lift up your eyes on high and see who created these?

He who brings out their host and numbers them, calling them all by name, because he is great in strength, mighty in power, not one is missing.

Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel?

My way is hidden from the Lord, and my right is disregarded by my God.

Have you not known?

Have you not heard?

The Lord is everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth, and he does not faint or grow weary.

His understanding is unsearchable.

He gives power to the faint and strengthens the powerless.

Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted.

But those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength.

They shall mount up with wings like eagle eagles, and they shall run and not be weary.

They shall walk and not faint.

Hear what the Spirit is saying to God's people.

How good it is to sing praises to our God.

The Lord rebuilds Jerusalem and gathers the exiled.

Sorry.

The Lord heals the brokenhearted.

The Lord counts the number of the stars.

Great is our Lord and mighty in power.

The Lord lifts up the lowly.

Sing to the Lord with thanksgiving.

God covers the heavens with clouds.

God makes grass to grow upon the mountains.

God provides food for flocks and herds.

The Lord is not impressed by the might of a horse.

But the Lord has pleasure in the God fearing.

For an obligation is laid on me.

And woe to me if I do not proclaim the gospel.

For if I do this of my own will, I have a reward.

But if not of my own will, I am entrusted with a commission.

What then is my reward?

Just this, that in my proclamation I may make the gospel free of charge so as not to make full use of my rights in the gospel.

For though I am free with respect to all, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I might win more of them.

To the Jews, I became a Jew in order to win Jews.

To those under the law, I became as one under the law, though I myself am not under the law, so that I might win those under the law.

To those outside the law, I became as one outside the law, though I am not free from God's law, but am under Christ's law, so that I might win those outside the law.

To the weak, I became weak, so that I might win the weak.

I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some.

I do it for the sake of the gospel, so that I might share in its blessings.

Hear what the Spirit is saying to God's people.

Glory to you, Lord Christ.

When Jesus and his disciples left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John.

Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once.

He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up, and then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.

That evening at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons, that is, unclean spirits, and the whole city was gathered around the door.

And Jesus cured many who were sick with various diseases and cast out many unclean spirits, and he would not permit the spirits to speak, because they knew him.

In the morning, while it was still very dark, Jesus got up and went to a desert deserted place, and there he prayed.

And Simon and his companions hunted for him.

When they found him, they said to him, Everyone is searching for you.

Jesus answered, Well, let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also, for that is what I came to do.

And Jesus went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out unclean spirits.

Please be seated.

The disciples get him wrong over and over and over again.

The Pharisees and the scribes, the teachers, the religious experts, the good people, they never figure out who Jesus is.

It's only the people who are considered to be possessed with unclean spirits.

Which could mean they were physically sick.

But more often than not, it means they had some social stigma attached to them, either by their past, by the way their body looked, or by the way they didn't meet social norms.

Those are the ones who know who Jesus is in Mark.

And every time they say, We know who you are, Jesus tells them to be quiet.

You notice that?

It's almost like he wants to keep his identity a secret.

In fact, scholars of the book of Mark talk about the gospel secret in Mark.

And perhaps I think what they're trying to suggest is that they would deeply like for us to have our own encounter with Jesus instead of relying on somebody else's.

I want to tell you that this passage from 1 Corinthians, in which Paul writes, I became all things to all people so that I might win some, it probably has more baggage for me religiously than I realize.

I preached a really meandering sermon at 8 o'clock and went nowhere.

And I realized where I wanted to go.

It is to this, this idea that Paul, I think, is trying to get out.

It is so profoundly difficult.

I have this particular personality.

I'm learning more about it through tools like the Enneagram, in which I am hardwired to be very concerned with pleasing other people.

And this passage, frankly, has been a coffin nail in my life since I was a teenager, because it taught me to be terrified about pleasing other people for the sake of God.

It wasn't just that I wanted that so I could be personally accepted.

I had the weight of doing that in God's name.

We can take Paul as saying that, and I think we're taking it wrong, because what Paul is trying to say ultimately, he begins the passage with the whole point is that the gospel is meant to be free.

So I want to talk about freedom for a second.

Maybe you've read this book by Barbara King Sulver called The Poison Wood Bible.

The Poison Wood Bible is frankly about a misguided missionary who goes to Africa to convert Africans to becoming culturally English, and then he can make them Christian like he is.

So he has no honor or respect for African cultural customs.

He goes to make them believe exactly like he does.

And the book is full of, frankly, his rather laughable failures, which really amount to fundamental disrespect.

He's trying to give them the same chains he's suffered from culturally and religiously the rest of his life and put God's weight behind that.

That is not free of charge.

Free of charge means that there is good news.

God loves you exactly like you are, and you don't have to become like I am in order for God to love you anymore.

In fact, if you do that, you might enjoy God's love even less than you already do.

Free of charge means, free of charge.

And I want to suggest to you, well, this is a really great thing about being in an Episcopal church, is a lot of y'all didn't grow up with the religious baggage I grew up with.

But let me tell you kind of a dumb story, if you don't mind, and then I'm gonna tell you an ironic hero story, and then I'm gonna get back to the gospel.

So here's a dumb story, maybe, and it rolls right into the ironic hero story.

One of the most significantly faithful people in my life was my previous rector, who was my mentoring rector.

His gift to the world, he was a fine preacher.

He was a good administrator.

His gift to the world was he was comfortable in his own skin.

This is going to sound like a really dumb story when I tell you this.

One of my model faith moments of the man is that we were together celebrating the retirement of three clergy members in our little teeny tiny diocese, all in one setting.

So the clergy were all gathered, there was a buffet line, people had gathered, they had some food, the bishop got up to pray.

Everybody stood still, they backed up.

And that's when my mentoring rector went right through the food line.

And I said to him, Um, the bishop was praying, and he said, he's just a person.

Besides, I'm hungry.

And that might sound really rude to you, but my the gift the man gave me was that he was free.

He was free, and that's who he was.

Now you may say, well, he was free to be a jerk.

I didn't think so.

There's a difference between being free to be who we are and saying, I'm free to be cruel.

And really what happened is he broke some decorum.

And it didn't seem to bother him at all.

I wish I could live my life like that.

I mean that.

Instead of getting caught up in, man, I wish I hadn't done that because that bothered somebody else.

Oh, I'm not even doing what I meant to do.

Case in point, we're living in a pandemic right now, and it's really hard to know which health practices are the best ones.

You know, it is.

The mask we think is really great.

And then there's the face shield, which is not as good as the mask.

And people have all kinds of expectations about what we're supposed to do when and how long, right?

And I know I'm not gonna please everybody.

And then there's a difference, right, between willing to be inconvenienced so that somebody else can have one less thing to worry about.

There's a difference between being inconvenienced for the sake of something that's life-giving, and then there's this other kind of trapping, which is being critically judged for somebody that you are.

This kind of thing, oh, you didn't go to an episcopal seminary.

Maybe you'll end up okay.

Can't do anything with that, right?

This other kind is the one, okay, you know what?

It's inconvenient to wear a mask.

I'm happy to do it.

Happy to do it because I can, you know?

I don't know if the face shield helps at this distance, but I know it doesn't hurt.

The difference between these two things seems to be what Paul is talking about.

So here's my dumb story.

I was a substitute teacher at a at a nationally ranked Episcopal School in La Jolla.

I'd come there from being a regular teacher at a not nationally ranked school.

At that previous school, I wasn't allowed to wear my earrings because we weren't supposed to do that.

It was not part of our dress code.

So when I switched jobs, I just didn't put them back in.

To be honest, it actually requires like a pair of inverse pliers that I don't own to put them back in.

The parish I was working at, right out of there, was a Navy parish.

And you know, in the Navy, sailors don't wear earrings, especially if they're going to be officers.

I had this interesting freedom.

There were seven admirals at the parish of 200 active members.

There were seven of them, and one of them had four stars.

And I met him at 30 years old as Bud, and I called him Bud, even though the 75-year-old people who went to church with him called him Admiral Edmi.

Now that guy had retired 20 years ago, and I'm really convinced that he appreciated me calling him by his first name instead of a position I'd never served under him with.

But I do remember this really bizarre event in my life in which I had some chronic pain, and I was starting to get to the point where I was doing non-traditional medicine.

So um, so somebody in the parish gave me ear acupuncture.

It basically looked like those little piercing studs, if you've ever been to Claire's, like a little ball with a little needle, and she put like 13 of them in my ear all around because I just was having chronic pain and had it for two or three years.

So I had all of these little balls in my ear.

You're just supposed to leave them in till they fall out, which could last a couple of weeks.

Didn't make any difference in my pain level.

And I decided, you know what, if I'm gonna wear these, I'm just gonna put my earrings back in.

And I remember going to church with people who had loved me, who I had earned their respect by calling in their first names.

I saw me with my earrings for the first time, and they said, I remember one of my friends said this to me.

Even though he was 50 years older than I was.

I'm so disappointed in you.

That was not what my Enneagram personality needed to hear.

It was tough.

I could do something about it, you know, I could just pull him right back out.

But that wasn't the gift my mentoring rector taught me to be.

My mentoring rector taught me to be imperfectly myself.

The happy resolution to that story was that a couple of weeks later, my friend apologized.

He said I was way offline.

And in that sense, I'm glad we stuck together long enough for him to realize and for me to realize that what I put in my ears is no threat to him, nor should it be a threat to me.

In this business that I'm talking about, the difference between wearing a mask and wearing earrings, one has to do with other people and one doesn't, this is the razor's edge that Paul is inviting us to consider.

If you have to pull your earrings out to become a Christian, that isn't free.

It's not free of charge.

If you've got to convert your entire way of living, because you might set a bad example for somebody else that you don't even know.

I'm not convinced that's free of charge living.

I grew up in a church where it might be okay to drink alcohol, but you shouldn't do it because you might send this the wrong signal.

I'm not convinced that's free of charge.

The difference between charge is who decides whether you have to pay or not.

If other people decide you have to pay, it isn't free.

If you decide to give it up, that's different.

Paul, I think, is really inviting us to consider this and to consider whether or not, quite honestly, we're going to live fully present in our own skin, or we're going to live in fear of how people look at our skin.

There are things on my skin, whether I should have done them or not, that will never come off.

I could spend the rest of my priestly ministry worrying what somebody else will think about it, but life is too short for that, don't you think so?

Paul is inviting us to consider how we are going to live with the choices we've already made.

What I did not do well at eight o'clock is say that.

And it's the essence.

Of the gospel.

And again, there's a difference between being free to be who we are and appreciate the freedoms that other people have.

And I did use the word appreciate intentionally.

And there's a difference between being free to be a jerk, which I don't think Paul is sanctioning.

There is a difference between the two.

And we often come out on the wrong side of which one's which.

You know why most what most people think about Christianity in the United States?

They think number one, it's judgmental, and number two, that it's homophobic, and number three, that it's hypocritical.

Because we get these wrong.

Over and over and over again, we get these things wrong.

So I was talking to somebody after eight o'clock, and you know, I get the difference between saying, you know what?

My neighbor is free to be who they are in God, and God is delighted with them.

And I have people in my family that God loves just like they are who were abusive to me, and that's not okay.

And after eight o'clock, the conversation went like this.

What do I do with those people?

How do I forgive those people?

And here's what I think forgiveness looks like.

I think forgiveness looks like this thing I'm striving to do that I haven't fully lived into, which is to say no matter what they did to me, no matter whether I made a reckless decision that honestly I knew better than to do, and I've still got, either way, I'm grateful enough for who I am that I wouldn't change any of it.

And I think that's what forgiveness looks like.

And I think that's what Paul is talking about.

Where the gospel truly becomes free.

And free-ing.

Whether you raid the buffet during the bishop's prayer, or you choose to put metal in your ear, or you choose to say, you know what?

Coworker, father, brother, what you did wasn't wrong, and it wasn't right, and nonetheless, I am who I am because of it, and I choose to love myself like God loves me.

And it's important to hear this now.

We don't live in a holy Lent by giving up something we enjoy so that we can prove to God how much we love God by being miserable.

Lent becomes holy when we start to live freely into who we are.

Mistakes, posture, degrees, whatever it is, when we start to become free in ourselves, when we dare to enjoy God ourselves as God loves us, then we're free to actually enjoy other people.

So maybe you don't need to give up chocolate this year.

By the way, if giving up chocolate is going to make you cranky, please don't give it up.

There is no gift to the world in that.

You know, really.

Maybe the thing to do, and I've already threatened, I'm going to talk about this more than once, is to consider the rite of reconciliation.

So you can say, not just, hey, I told a lie when I was six, so that you can say, I've been worried way too long about whether I wear my earrings or not.

And you can come and we can get that straight before God, and you can leave and not worry about that anymore.

Maybe you can say, gosh, I keep thinking if I'd been thinner when I was 15, I would have been happier.

Gosh, what a waste of 25 plus years that thought is.

Holy Land is about giving that thought up.

What's interesting is that only the unclean spirits know Jesus.

Only the things that are not normalized.

The people who don't act like they're supposed to act, they're the ones who realize who he is.

Because finally they're free to be who they are.

When Jesus drives out an evil spirit or an unclean spirit, it doesn't always mean there was something wrong with the person.

More often than not, it means that the person was not treated like a person.

And what Jesus drives out is communities mistreating each other.

I mean, think about what good news the world needs, right?

The good news the world needs is that if you're black, you don't get looked at on a double take when you're walking through this neighborhood.

That's some good news.

World needs that.

Gosh, we need that.

Good news is that if you're a woman and you're successful, people don't say you've done pretty well for a woman.

Let's not pretend like we don't need that news.

Good news is when we hire somebody to clean our house and we don't say, well, they've been pretty good, they haven't stolen anything.

I mean, come on, what's wrong with us?

This is what Paul is asking us to consider.

How do we live into freedom?

And who pays for it?

And do we require to be people for people to be twice the children of hell we are, to quote Jesus, in order to come to church or be holy people, or are we willing to give that up so we can actually be free to be who God's made us to be?

It's a little early for Lent, but I invite you to consider in advance how we can live into some holiness in Lent.

How it is that we can come to do what God dares to do, which is love the person God made us to be.

How it is that we can start to say, you know what, I make some major mistakes, and I'm really grateful for who I am.

That might be the holiest Lent we could live.

And I want to suggest look how this goes.

Jesus does this miracle, the disciples want him to stay, and he says, You don't own me.

I'm gonna live into my skin.

And I think if we could live into our own skin, we'd have some good news the world is desperate for.

And if we don't get it done this Lent, don't worry, there's next year.

But it's what it is that we're aiming for that Jesus invites us to consider.

Please join me as we pray our faith in the words of the Nicene Creed.

We believe in one God.

In peace, let us pray to the Lord, saying, Lord, have compassion, for the holy church of God, that it may be filled with truth and love and be found without fault at the day of your coming.

We pray to you, O Lord, for all the holy people of God, for all bishops and other ministers, for Andy, Hector, Jeff, and Kay, our bishops, in the diocesan cycle of prayer, St.

James Lagrange, St.

James Taylor, and St.

Joan of Arc, Pflugerville, for Michael, our presiding bishop, for Mike, Jim, Craig, Bill, and Lillian, the priests in our community, we pray to you, O Lord.

For all who fear God and believe in you, Lord Christ, that our divisions may cease and that all may be one as you and the Father are one, we pray to you, O Lord.

For the mission of the church, that in faithful witness it may preach the gospel to the ends of the earth.

We pray to you, O Lord.

For the peace of the world, that a spirit of respect and forbearance may grow among nations and peoples, we pray to you, O Lord.

For those in positions of public trust, especially Joe, our president, and Greg, our governor, that they may serve justice and promote the dignity and freedom of every person, we pray to you, O Lord.

For the poor, the persecuted, the sick, and all who suffer, for refugees, prisoners, and all who are in danger, that they may be relieved and protected, we pray to you, O Lord.

For this congregation, that we may be delivered from hardness of heart and show forth your glory in all that we do.

We pray to you, O Lord.

For our enemies and those who wish us harm, and for all whom we have injured or offended, for ourselves, for the forgiveness of our sins, and for the grace of the Holy Spirit to amend our lives.

We pray to you, O Lord.

For all who have commended themselves to our prayers, for our families, friends, and neighbors, especially Chris, Sean, Susie, Joe, Mark, Janice, Rudy, and those who the congregation wishes to name at this time, silently or loud.

We pray to you, O Lord.

For all who have died in the communion of your church, especially Don, Rudy, Joe, and those whose faith is known to you alone, that with all the saints they may have rest in that place where there is no pain or grief, but life eternal.

We pray to you, O Lord.

Rejoicing in the fellowship of all the saints, let us commend ourselves and one another and all our life to Christ, our God.

To you, O Lord, our God.

For yours is the majesty, O Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory now and forever.

Now forgive me.

We've already prayed for the forgiveness of our sins, so we're not going to do it again.

We're going to trust that God, got it the first time.

So, the peace of the Lord be always with you.

Good morning, and thank you for worshiping with us at St.

Thomas.

Uh, just a few announcements I'd like to call to your attention.

The first is that yesterday was our monthly mobile food distribution, and it was another really great week.

It actually was fantastic.

Uh, if you've not done this before, just to know the good work that's being done here on our campus.

So, yesterday, 497 persons were fed with$18,000 worth of food.

And one of the things that's really amazing about this distribution is that people from the community come to volunteer.

Like they don't come to church here, they hear we're doing this, and they'd like to be a part of the good news.

And it's just so wonderful that you all have that spirit and uphold this ministry and really believe in our value that we can do more together.

Meanwhile, yesterday, Cub Scout Pack 1965 collected, it's called Scouting for Food.

It always happens Super Bowl weekend, and they brought in a record like more than a thousand pounds of food to stock one of our neighborhood food pantries.

So it was a huge food yesterday, uh food day yesterday for Clear Lake through St.

Thomas.

Again, thank you for the ministry that you're doing and supporting here.

Um, I just it's not too early for me to mention this that uh Lynch, as you know, begins on Ash Wednesday, which is Wednesday the 17th, and there's three opportunities for worship that day.

The first is at 6 45 a.m.

That'll be a service here.

You'll find the sign-ups and the link.

It'll have Eucharist Imposition of Ashes.

Um the next opportunity is Ashes to Go in our little driveway here right off San Sebastian, you know, this moon-shaped driveway right out here between 11:30 and 1.30.

I'll be out there with Ashes and also uh healing prayer and some reserve communion as well.

Um and then we'll have the 6 p.m.

service in here as well with some with some music.

All right, so I think so.

6 p.m.

on Ash Wednesday.

So those are the three opportunities.

Um and again, it's it's not too early to really think about ways in which you could engage in a practice or discipline, even if it means just saying no to something, that would be life-giving to you and the rest of the world.

So, in advance, we're thinking about how can we live into a holy and life-giving Lent.

Um, as Christ first loved us and gave himself for us, an offering and sacrifice to God.

Oh God, me guide me because I want to be good.

Oh no.

Oh night Oh, angels watching over me, yes, angels watching over me.

All things come of you, O Lord, and of your own have we given you.

This is a table not of the church, but of God.

It is ready for those who seek relationship with God.

Succumb and make this journey.

You who have much faith and you who have little, you who have been here often, and you who have not been in a long time or ever before.

You who have tried to follow and you who have lost your way, come and make this journey not because I invite you.

God invites.

It is God's desire that we gather here.

The Lord be with you.

Lift up your hearts.

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.

It is right and a good and joyful thing, always and everywhere, to give thanks to you, Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth, because in Jesus Christ our Lord, you've received us as your daughters and sons, made us citizens of your kingdom, and given us the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth.

Therefore, we praise you, joining our voices with angels and with archangels and with all the company of heaven who forever say this hymn to proclaim the glory of your name.

Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory.

Hosanna in the highest.

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest.

Holy and gracious Father, in your infinite love, you made us from yourself.

And when we've fallen into sin and become subject to evil and death, you in your mercy sent Jesus Christ, your only and eternal Son, to share our human nature, to live and die as one of us, to reconcile us to you, the God and Father of all.

He stretched out his arms upon the cross and offered himself, in obedience to your will, a perfect sacrifice for the whole world.

On the night he was handed over to suffering and death, our Lord Jesus Christ took bread.

And when he given thanks to you, he broke it and gave it to his disciples and said, Take, eat.

This is my body which is given for you.

Do this for the remembrance of me.

After supper, Jesus took the cup of wine, and when he given thanks, he gave it to them and said, Drink this, all of you.

This is my blood of the new covenant which is shed for you and for all, for the forgiveness of sins.

Whenever you drink it, do this for the remembrance of me.

Therefore, we proclaim the mystery of faith.

Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.

We celebrate the memorial of our redemption, O Father, in this sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving.

Recalling his death, resurrection, and ascension, we offer to you these gifts.

Sanctify them by your Holy Spirit to be for your people, the body and blood of your Son, the holy food and drink of noon and ending life in Him.

Sanctify us also, that we may faithfully receive this holy sacrament and serve you in unity, constancy, and peace.

And at the last day bring us with all your saints into the joy of your eternal kingdom.

All this we ask through your Son, Jesus Christ, by him and with him and in him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all honor and glory is yours, Almighty Father, now and forever.

Amen.

And now, as our Savior Christ has taught us, we are bold to pray.

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever.

Amen.

Be known to us in the Of the bread.

We who are many are one body, for we all share in the one bread.

These are the gifts of God, and we are the people of God.

I invite you to receive either bread or a blessing by coming to the aisle immediately to your right.

Come down forward, socially distanced, and returning to your seat on the far side.

Sometimes I feel discouraged and think my works in vain but revise my soul.

If you cannot preach like hold, you can tell the love of Jesus and say God for killing God.

Before all creation, we acknowledge the mystery of this simple meal.

Let it remind us of our common humanity and our commitment to love one another and all of creation.

Through it may we be strengthened to service.

In it may we find peace.

Amen.

May God guide you into a deeper knowledge and love of yourself so that you can meet and love others where they are.

And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit be among you this day and remain with you always.

Amen.