1 Kings 19:9-15 "The Sound of Silence"

         Elijah was the most talked about, decorated, powerful Hebrew prophet known in his day.  He hailed from the Northern Kingdom of Israel and was a chief advisor to King Ahab, both in court and on the battlefield.  In addition, it was said that Elijah was a miracle worker.  

         Highlighted in his resume was the time he had ended a most serious drought by causing the skies to darken and heavy rains to fall.  He also once created an endless food supply for a destitute widow and her starving son in Zarephath. 

         That particular miracle was reminiscent of Strega Nona and her magic pasta pot because, in this case, bread dough kept forming daily and effortlessly in a small bowl on the windowsill of the widow’s kitchen.  And if those miracles were not enough, it was also said that Yahweh/God had worked through Elijah to resurrect the dead. 

         So what was this most talked about, decorated, and powerful prophet of God doing quivering with fear in a cave on the summit of Mt. Sinai when we meet him in this story we just read?  Well, in short, Queen Jezebel, wife of Ahab the King of Israel, had scared the dickens out of her husband’s primary consultant and confidant. 

         You see, back in those days, not everyone paid homage to Yahweh, the God of Israel – even those living in Israel and Judah.  Many continued to worship Baal and looked first to this god when food was in short supply and life was just plain difficult. 

         Jezebel was one of those people who held Baal in such high esteem and perhaps even fanned the flames of discord between these two deities.  Whatever her desires might have been, it all came to a head one day when Ahab and Elijah decided to settle the disagreement once and for all.  And so a divine competition was organized: Elijah against 450 prophets of Baal.

         Two altars were hastily built at dawn’s early light, sacrificial fires set but not lit, and bulls for sacrifice retained.  The prophets from Baal went first, imploring their deity to light the sacrificial altar fire.  The author of 1 Kings tells us that all 450 of them prayed louder and louder until mid-day.  Then they resorted to ranting and raving and even some ritualistic cutting of themselves well into the afternoon. 

         However, nothing happened.  Their fire remained unlit, and it probably did not help much that Elijah teased and goaded them: “Call a little louder—he is a god, after all.

Maybe he’s off meditating somewhere or other, or maybe he’s gotten involved in a project, or maybe he’s on vacation. You don’t suppose he’s overslept, do you, and needs to be waked up?” 

         Wallowing in their own humiliation, the 450 prophets of Baal finally gave up – much to the chagrin of Queen Jezebel.  Elijah then prayed to his God/Yahweh, and, in no time flat, Elijah’s fire burned, the bull roasted, and the sacrifice was made. 

         Woo!  Wee!  Elijah was feeling his oats at that point.  And so, to celebrate God/Yahweh’s victory, Elijah ordered all 450 fake prophets of Baal to be killed – and they were.  No wonder Queen Jezebel was furious with Elijah, who naively supposed that she and her husband would become immediate converts to the one true God. 

         Instead, Jezebel declared angrily to Elijah. “The gods will get you for this and I’ll get even with you! By this time tomorrow you’ll be as dead as any one of those prophets.”  Elijah, for his part, was smart enough to know that when a woman like Jezebel gets her back up, you best take her threat seriously.

     And so our prophet fled for his life, traveling by foot through the desert to Beersheba in Judah.  He stopped there when fatigue and fear and hunger had overwhelmed him and simply asked God to end it all – and then promptly fell asleep under a straggly desert broom tree. 

         Elijah dreamt, and, in his dream, God came in the form of an angel and touched him.  The angel told him to get up and eat and keep going.  When Elijah awakened, he found a loaf of bread and a jug of water.  With food and drink to sustain him now, he hiked forty additional days and nights until he reached the holy mountain Sinai (or Horeb) where he crawled into a cave and again fell asleep – and there we find him this morning….. 

         ….Awakened by God with a question that developed into a brief conversation.  Here is how Episcopal priest Stuart Higginbotham imagined it:

         God: "What are you doing here, Elijah?  Why are you holed up in this cave?"

         Elijah: "Well, I'm pretty upset right now." 

         God:  "Well, whatever for?"

         Elijah:  "Well, I've been working so hard as a prophet, you see?  And, as for the other Israelites, they aren't trying at all.  They have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword.  I alone am left, and now they are seeking my life to take it away too!" 

         And what does God tell him?  "Oh, I am so sorry; yes, I know that you have been such a wonderful prophet?"  No.  God says to him, "Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by."

         Elijah doesn't get some sympathetic statement from God; instead, he gets a call to get out of the cave and see for himself what God is all about and what God might say to him. And that's when Earth Wind and Fire show up – not the band but the elemental forces.”

         Elijah, of course, is expecting that whatever God has to show him or say to him will be found in the furious roar of the wind as it split the hills and shattered the rocks around him, or the earthquake that followed, or the pyrotechnics of the fire – and so he cowered in the darkest recesses of the cave.  He must have been surprised at the emptiness that followed those dramatic illustrations of the sheer force of nature. 

         However, our prophet must have been even more surprised at the silence that followed.  It was the kind of silence that was so deep and heavy it was all-encompassing.  It was almost like a sound itself: The sound of silence as Simon and Garfunkel once termed it.  It was the kind of silence that drew Elijah to the mouth of the cave, his face covered with his mantle – perhaps knowing deep inside that he would now confront his God.

         You know, too often we stopped reading this passage right here – with Elijah at the mouth of the cave.  Too often, we presume, because of some of the Biblical translations that we read, that God spoke to Elijah in that stillness, in some small whisper of a voice. 

         However, God did not speak to Elijah in those hush, hush quiet moments.  If you were to read the original Hebrew, you would find that God spoke to the runaway prophet after the silence.  And then God asked the same question to Elijah that he had asked Elijah hours earlier as he sat despondently in the cave.  “Elijah, what are you doing here?” And then God went on to direct the runaway prophet to buck up and go back, back into his world, for there was still work for him to do.

         God did not speak in the silence, but it took the time in silence for Elijah to be able to listen enough to hear what God was telling him.  That is the essence of our Lenten worship series, you know – right there.  How can we possibly hear what God might be trying to tell us – as individuals or as a church family – in the cacophony of our busy lives?

         In this digital age, we are bombarded by sound and imagery day in and day out.  If we are not following the President’s constant tweets, we are watching cable news’ replay after replay of another school shooting.  Or we are checking out the latest adventures of Facebook friends on our newsfeed or following a thread of comments on who knows what inane or controversial topic. 

         Neither we nor our children seem able to live without cell phones.  Our TVs, radios, computers, and tablets beckon us unceasingly.  Siri tells us how to get to wherever we need to go, and Alexa reminds us to feed the dog and go to the grocery store. 

         There is no silence in our lives, unless we intentionally make it so.  And how can we possibly hear what God is saying to us without the silence needed to simply listen? 

I believe that the silence Elijah needed to hear God speak can come to us today in a variety of forms – from actual silence to the gentle rhythm of Simon and Garfunkel to the haunting sound of an oboe.  

         No matter who you are and no matter how busy your life might be, you need a cave equivalent.  You need to experience the sound of silence just like Elijah did.  You need a place to listen to God. 

         Maybe, for you, it will be here in church in the times of silence that we will intentionally create during worship these next few weeks. And perhaps you can take some of those ideas and try them at home because you need to find silence in your daily life and not just on Sunday. 

         Maybe it will be a park bench, a labyrinth, or an intentional walk in the dark.  Maybe it will be a comfortable chair in front of the woodstove, the buzzing of bees as you work your hives, or a hike in the woods with the dogs. However, if you are like me, at least at first, you will need to be intentional and even plan-full about creating those times of silence.

        We all need to discover that place where we can listen to the sound of silence.  And so I challenge you this Lenten season to find your cave equivalent, your place of silence where you can hear God speaking to you, where you can hear God telling you, like God told Elijah:  “Go back.  Go back into the world.  There is still work for you to do in this crazy, cynical, broken world we live in.”  We all need the sound of silence, and I pray that you will find your place to hear it.

        

John 21:1-19 "Two Charcoal Fires"

         During a visit long ago to a mental asylum, a visitor asked the Director how he determined whether or not a person should be institutionalized.

         “Well,” said the Director, ”we fill up a bathtub; then we offer a teaspoon, a teacup, and a bucket to the person and ask him or her to empty the bathtub.”

         “Oh, I understand,” said the visitor. “A normal person would use the bucket because it is bigger than the spoon or the teacup.”

         “No,” said the Director, “A normal person would pull the plug.  Now, tell me, do you want a bed by the door or near the window?'

         Normalcy is a relative term – which is probably a good thing depending on how you solved the problem of the bathtub. Now, I am not one to declare someone normal or not, nor am I one to psychoanalyze motives or behaviors.  However, that does not mean that I am not interested in trying to figure out why people do the things they do. 

         I call that focused “people watching,” and I find the disciple Peter a fascinating person to watch – probably because, when all is said and done, he is so like us – with his faults and failures, his nagging guilt, his bold and brash promises coupled with so little follow through, his wishing he had done things differently, and his hope – however small – that somehow, someday, he would be forgiven and restored.

         By the time we meet Peter here in the last chapter of the Gospel of John, he is a man caught between two charcoal fires.  The first fire, of course, had burned brightly against the cold outside the palace house of the High Priest of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem.  The High Priest was Caiaphas, and he was overseeing the mock proceedings that found Jesus on trial for his life. 

         It was there in the courtyard that Peter stared intently into the glowing embers of that first charcoal fire, warming his chilled hands, not making eye contact on those three distinct occasions when he denied even knowing who Jesus was or that he – Peter - had any role in the Rabbi’s ministry and mission.  It was then (Remember?) that the rooster broke into the whispered Q&A and crowed three times to punctuate in triplicate Peter’s abysmal failure to love when loving was not easy.  Then Peter ran away.

         At that very moment, the guilt, the depression, the confusion, the fear, the constant drumming in his own head – “loser, loser, loser” – gripped Peter and covered him like a thick blanket and would not let go.  Like all good human beings, of course, Peter immediately began to rationalize his disloyal behavior at that first charcoal fire.  The story he told himself and maybe even began to believe was that the whole situation was unfortunate, but Jesus was dead and buried, and so it was time to shed the past and move on. 

         Then, of course, came Easter – and the empty tomb. A niggling anxiety awakened in Peter because he could not help but wonder what would happen…if.  What if he were to be so unlucky as to run into Jesus?  Would Jesus would hold him accountable for his – what? Lack of loyalty? Lack of friendship? Lack of love? 

         Maybe Peter thought he was safe when he saw the Risen Christ first with a group of followers - in an Upper Room in Jerusalem. Jesus slipped through the locked door, more ghost-like than human perhaps.  Then later they all watched as Thomas insisted upon inspecting Jesus’ nail marks and spear wound.  Why - Jesus had barely looked at him (Peter) and certainly did not single him out.  Logically, one should be able to assume that he was in the clear.

         But try as he might to purge himself, the dark emotions continued to haunt Peter.  And when life becomes confusing and fearful like that, we often try to go back to the way things used to be.  And that is exactly what Peter did. 

         He went home, back to what he knew, back to his own safe harbor.  He and six of the other disciples rented a trawler and went fishing in the familiar Sea of Galilee in the waters they knew like the backs of their hands. 

         I wonder though:  Was Peter really intent on fishing for fish – or was he still fishing for answers?  What have I done?  How will I go on?  Where is the meaning in all of this?

        The seven of them fished all night and caught nothing – neither fish nor answers.  And so they headed to shore.  It was that dream-like time – half way between night and day, the mist and fog playing in the trees silhouetted in the background, and the water slapping gently on the shoreline.

         On the beach, they could see the embers of a charcoal fire burning, and a fellow standing tall, looking somewhat tree-like himself.  He called out to the seven across the water: “ “Did ya catch anything?”  “No,” they shouted back.  The fellow answered in return: “Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” 

         And lo and behold, they did – maybe not answers just yet, but certainly fish, 153 of them to be exact (And I wonder who was counting?).  It was only then that one of the disciples recognized the voice and the man and grabbed Peter’s arm.  “It is the Lord,” he gasped. 

         And Peter – as impetuous and spontaneous as ever – leapt out of the boat and slogged his way to the beach, losing one sandal in the muddy sediment, his robe heavy with water, holding him back.  The other six were more circumspect and moored the rented boat before they came ashore hauling the net with them. 

         By that time, the charcoal fire – the second fire – burned brightly.  Jesus deftly fileted a few of the fish, grilled them like a pro, looked at none of the disciples in particular, and simply said, “Come and have breakfast.”  Imagine:  The last supper has become the first breakfast!  And the fish served on gently toasted sesame seed buns tasted better than they ever had before. 

         When the meal was over, Peter found himself staring into this second charcoal fire, perhaps once again warming himself - he in his wet clothes in the chill of the morning.  And it all came roaring back to him – the cold air in the courtyard, the simultaneous heated discussion inside the High Priest’s palace, the three questions, the three denials, the crowing rooster that still haunted Peter’s days.  And the emotions too:  It was like it had happened just yesterday – the fear, the failure, the guilt, loser, loser, loser. 

         However, this time, Peter looked up from the glowing charcoal and made eye contact.  This time he did not run away.  And the saddest eyes in the world stared into eyes filled with such great love.  Perhaps Peter knew that this was the moment.  After the fish were grilled, his moment of grilling would come.  So much had happened between the two charcoal fires. 

         Yet, the bridge between them hung, once again, on three questions – though it surely was an awkward conversation.  After all, this was the first time Peter and Jesus had spoken – just the two of them - since before the first charcoal fire.  And since then, this time, this moment – perhaps always known to be inevitable - had been eating away at Peter.  Maybe Peter had already imagined it many times over – what he would say to Jesus, what Jesus would say to him.  But never in a million years had he expected this.

         “Simon, son of John (That was Peter by his old name), do you love me more than these?” Jesus queried.  Ouch!  As Episcopal priest Rick Morley speculates, “I bet the crowd hushed at this point. Everyone knew Peter had this coming to him. And, everyone loves to see a good fight.”

         “Yes, Master, you know I love you,” Peter responded tentatively.

         Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.”

             He then asked a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?”  How awkward is this?

         “Yes, Master, you know I love you.”

         Jesus said, “Shepherd my sheep.”

            Then he said it a third time: “Simon, son of John, do you love me?”

         Peter was upset that he asked for the third time, “Do you love me?” so he answered, “Master, you know everything there is to know. You’ve got to know that I love you.”

         Jesus said, “Feed my sheep.” And then one last time he implored Peter and the other six, and down through the ages his voice echoes to us as well, “Follow me.”

         We follow Jesus not because it is the superior way, or even the only way, or because we are somehow better than everyone else.  We follow Jesus because, for us – gathered here in his church – for us, living our lives in his name gives those lives a meaning greater than ourselves, a meaning they do not have otherwise. 

         And that meaning is grounded in love, in compassion that manifests itself in service and outreach.  Jesus does not call us to do what we do in order to get a first class ticket to heaven.  Our call is not about the hereafter – that will take care of itself. 

         It is about the here and now.  It is about this life and this world that is in such disrepair.  Jesus calls us to do what we do because he knows that we have it within us to change the world for the better and to make a difference in people’s lives.  And, if we choose to do so in his name, he calls us to do it in that community we call the church.

         The church is not a perfect place – and we certainly are not a bunch of perfect people.  We lose our way.  We become caught up in ourselves and in our own needs.  We look inward instead of outward where authentic ministry should be leading us. We convince ourselves that all there is to this discipleship business is having breakfast with Jesus surrounded by like-minded people who look and think and act just like us. 

         You know, reputable Biblical scholars believe that this last chapter of the Gospel of John was really an addendum, an epilogue.  It was added later by someone who realized that there were some loose ends to tie up – mainly having to do with Peter, but also having to do with sending the disciples – and us – out into the world to minister in Christ’s name. 

         And so we have this delightfully vivid tale of a simple breakfast on the beach, a meal that turns first into Peter’s restoration – his own personal resurrection of sorts - and then into a commissioning – a sending forth to follow in the footsteps of the Risen Christ. 

         Religious author Thomas Troeger writes of this ending to the Gospel:  “The epilogue awakens memories of the darkness—the darkness of our hunger, the darkness of our failure to recognize Christ, the darkness of our denial—but at the same time it reminds us that none of this darkness has overcome the light. For the risen Christ still calls, still feeds, still empowers even doubters and deniers for the ministry.”

         If Peter can be rehabilitated, then so can we.  If Peter is called to stand up for and care for the sheep of the world – the unfortunate ones, the marginalized ones, the Dreamers, the war-torn refugees, the ones who haunt the soup kitchens and food pantries – then so are we. 

         No matter where we have been on our journey so far, no matter how far off track we have gone, no matter how many times we have found ourselves in the courtyard with Peter, God gives us a second chance – just like Jesus gave to Peter.  God gives opportunities to try again at those three questions:  Do you love me?  Do you love me?  Do you love me? 

         As Methodist pastor Alyce MacKenzie so poignantly reminds us, Jesus “knows where we live. He stands on the shores of our lives. He stands at our front doors. And when we answer his knock, he has (one final question for us): "Do you love me?" and, if so, "What are you going to do about it?"  Two charcoal fires – and so much happens in between.

 

 

        

          

        

        

Mark 4:35-41 "The Perfect Storm"

         There was a Native American chief on a remote reservation in South Dakota whose tribe asked him if it was going to be a cold winter. He did not want everyone to know he had not the slightest idea how to predict the weather, so he snuck away and called the National Weather Service.

         The forecaster told him, “We are fairly certain that it is going to be a cold winter.” So the chief went back to his Council and confidently told the others to collect a lot of firewood in preparation for a cold winter.

         A few weeks later, the chief called the National Weather Service and asked the forecaster again about the upcoming winter months. This time the forecaster said, “We are more certain now that it is going to be a very cold winter.” So the chief told the tribe to collect even more firewood.

         A few weeks later, as the first snowflakes of the season began to fly, the chief called the forecaster one more time and asked for a final update on the winter weather. The forecaster said, “We are now more certain than ever that this will be one of the coldest winters we have ever had.”

         The chief asked, “How can you be sure?”

         The forecaster replied confidently, “The Indians are collecting firewood like crazy!”

         Weather forecasting has never been a perfect science – not today - and certainly not in first century Palestine when Jesus lived.  Keep that in mind as we join our Rabbi after a long day of preaching, teaching, and healing.  The crowd of well-wishers, caregivers, curiosity-seekers, hangers on, and hope-filled ailing men and women continued to press in upon him, and when all was said and done, he was dog tired. 

         And so Jesus suggested leaving both the shoreline and the crowd behind and embarking on a twilight cruise on the Sea of Galilee, crossing over to the other side for a picnic dinner round a driftwood campfire.  The sky was a rosy red and, after all:  “Red sky in the morning sailors take warning, red sky at night, sailors’ delight.”  And so they set out in the little dinghy with the red paint chipped off the bow.

       Now, the Sea of Galilee is a fresh water lake that sits about 600 feet below sea level making it the lowest lake in the world. It is about fourteen miles long and about seven miles wide and is shaped like a harp. It is known for its unexpected and often turbulent storms.  On a clear night, it should have taken the disciples about three hours to sail or row across the lake.   But this night, of course, turned out to be different. 

         They might have been sailing for an hour – maybe more, maybe less – when the first drops of rain began to fall intermittently as the disciples sang “Holy, Holy, Holy” and “How Great Thou Art” in two part harmony, interspersed with slightly more bawdy sailor songs.  However, the rain picked up steadily along with the wind until before long you could not hear “Amazing Grace” even when the disciples belted it out with great gusto.

         And then all-of-a-sudden, it hit them.  They were out in the middle of the forever-fickle Sea of Galilee in the teeth of an emergent gale.  Though none of them – not even the fishermen - knew anything about the laws of physics, they all sensed they were in deep trouble.

       After all, if a boat heads directly into a wave that is higher than the boat is long, the boat will almost certainly “pitchpole,” meaning that it goes end over end to its doom. Or, if a wave hits a boat broadside, and if that wave is higher than the boat is wide, the boat will flip and capsize.  If the disciples had seen the movie “A Perfect Storm”, they would have concluded that their boat, like the Andrea Gail, would eventually head into swells so high that it would similarly pitchpole and sink to the bottom of the Sea of Galilee, taking the twelve and Jesus along with it.

         The moment of that horrific realization was also the moment the crew discovered that Jesus was sleeping through the whole nasty adventure, his head resting comfortably on a pillow in the stern of the boat.  Whereas in the Gospel of Matthew, the disciples immediately go down on their knees and pray for deliverance, in Mark’s version of the story, they simply freak out in the chaos.

         They jostle Jesus with a desperate wake-up call that does not say much about either their faith or Jesus’ behavior in the face of such clear and present danger. ““Teacher, doesn’t it matter to you that we are perishing?”   "Hey, we're dying here! Don't you care?

         Jesus, for his part, awakens, and it is this land-lubber who seems unafraid in the midst of the wind and the rain.  He immediately assumes a level of authority so foreign to the disciples that all they could do was try to keep their balance in the wildly pitching boat and just stare at him. With these few choice words, Jesus put the wind in its place and commanded the sea: “Silence!” he shouted above the howling and crashing.  “Be still!”

         Surely the Gospel writer was thinking of one of the ancient psalms of Israel – Psalm 107 to be exact – when he wrote down this tale.  That is the psalm where sailors are facing a storm on the sea, and they “cried out to the LORD in their trouble.” Then the LORD made the storm ‘be still,’ “and the waves of the sea were hushed.”   And so in Mark’s version of this story, after Jesus spoke with such authority, there was a moment of the “great calm”, as the Gospel writer – and the Psalmist - term it.

         And that was also the moment when the disciples pondered the origins of Jesus’ authority. “Who then is this guy?” they asked. That was the moment when they were truly terrified, as the Gospel writer tells us.  Terrified rather than relieved?  Terrified rather than in awe?  Yes, terrified!  Why?  Simply because that was the moment when they realized that their lives were never going to be the same.

         You know, there are endless ways to reflect on this text.  Preachers do have a tendency, however, to look to allegory and give special meaning to the boat along with everything else in the passage.  You have probably heard most – if not all - of such sermons. The bottom line in each of them is that there is far more going on in this story than simply being out with Jesus on a stormy evening.  The boat, the sea:  They all mean something.

         Lutheran pastor Karoline Lewis attacks this allegory approach.  Some of the questions this kind of interpretation raises, she writes, are “What boats are you in at this point in your life? What are the storms that are tossing your life around?

         None of this is necessarily bad (she notes). It’s just that the boat becomes a metaphor for all kinds of things rather than simply what it is -- a traveling vessel. A means by which to get from one place to another. Maybe the boat is simply a boat. Maybe the point is that Jesus is just trying to get us to the other side.”

        And if the boat in the narrative is just a boat and if Jesus is really just trying to get us from one side to the other, then maybe one way to look at this story is that it is about change.  After all, when you come right down to it, most of us would rather just stay put, not step out deeper into the waters of faith, but settle comfortably into where we are right now – in a place, in a job, in a marriage, in a vocation.

         If we are not reveling in our passion, if we are not happy with ourselves - or content with our lot - we have decided – either consciously or unconsciously – that it is probably better to remain in our safe harbors and certainly better not to rock the boat. That seems to be human nature: Go along to get along rather than risking or embracing change.

         However, as Karoline Lewis goes on to suggest, “But it also seems to be the nature of faith. We can’t seem to hear Jesus’ invitation – ‘Let us go across to the other side.’

         How easy it is to stay in our comfort zones; to default to our pet theologies; to remain in what is known, even though that which is known has become unbearable. We would rather ignore the desperate need for change than make the change happen. So we sit. And we wait. For what? The right time?  For someone else to make the first move? (Lewis asks).  Maybe this is why Jesus doesn’t give the disciples any time to think about the trip – ‘On that day … ‘ We would think about it forever. ‘Thinking about it’ is always one of our best excuses,” (she concludes).

         You know, in this passage, we often focus on ourselves as individuals and how, as individuals, we are called to embrace change.  However, since Jesus does not single out a particular disciple in the teeth of the storm and all twelve of them – the whole darn family - are in the boat together, perhaps we should focus less on our own individual lives and more on our life together – as a church family.

         You see, our congregation is facing two instances this year where Jesus has already invited us to get in the boat and come to the other side.  The first instance is reflecting on the role of music in worship and employing someone to help us fulfill our goals in this area.  The second instance is broader, and it is reflecting as a church family on who God is calling us to be as the United Church of Christ in Raymond and just how we are going to live out that calling. 

         When it comes to the first instance, music here in church, I know that we are saddened by the lack of a music anchor, such as Karen was employed to be. 

However, I was excited meeting with the choir last Sunday and realizing that they were not looking on this transition time fearfully but rather saw it as an opportunity to explore different styles of music here in worship and different models for coordinating and directing our music program. 

         During this transition time, in addition to Cherie, Lori, Brenda Olsen, and Craig stepping up to play our hymns and responses, we will have at least one guest pianist and several accomplished musicians with us over the next few weeks.  Cherie will be accompanying an oboist in doing several classical pieces.  We have a guitarist scheduled to come and offer special music on several occasions.  He is very interested in exploring jazz settings for traditional hymns.  Our Adult Choir will be singing on occasion as will our Very Occasional Men’s Choir, and Scott will be playing his trumpet on Easter as he often does. 

         I have encouraged people to put together small groups and ensembles for worship – or singing solos as Lori has so beautifully this morning.  For a real change of pace, I am working out the details to bring the Slukes here.  That is the local ukulele group – who, among many other songs, do gospel music.  We may also be hearing – if only on CD – from our now grown up Youth Choir of several years ago – as well as singing along with some video presentations. 

         My hope is that all of you will approach these musical experiences with the same openness and enthusiasm as the Adult Choir has.  My hope is also that you will not cherry pick your Sundays here and make decisions on attendance based on your unwillingness to leave where you are and travel to the other side to experience a different style of church music and be part of this conversation on music and worship.

         The second instance where Jesus has invited us to contemplate change (that is, leave our safe harbors and venture out to sea) is the challenge to articulate who we are as a church and who we want to be in all the communities of which we are a part.  Call it what you want:  We will be engaging in visioning, strategic planning, mapping out a future, or whatever.  All of these sorts of conversations imply change, moving out of our comfort zone, leaving behind the way church used to be, redefining church, and journeying to places unknown. 

         However, to be successful, these conversations cannot be ones that I as your Pastor have with myself, or your Council has with itself.  Every single one of you is a stakeholder in deciding who and what this church is going to be in the future.  As plans for these conversations emerge, I hope that all of you will feel called to participate in them – to be open to getting in the boat and traveling to the other side. 

         In closing, however, because I do not want to leave you overwhelmed by what will come, let me say two things.  First, as Lutheran pastor David Lose reminds us:  “Here’s the thing:  we may fear encounters with God because we fear being changed, but ignoring these encounters will change us also. There is no choice about whether we’ll be changed, it’s what kind of change, and whether we seek God’s help that it may ultimately prove transformative. “  And so, take the time now to wonder and dream about where you sense “the presence and call of God and what changes this encounter may bring and what is frightening (and even hopeful) about what is coming.”

      And second, ponder these wise words of Episcopal priest Rick Morley:  “It can’t be said enough: God never, ever, ever promises that nothing bad will ever happen. God never promises smooth sailing and blue skies every day. If you think that God promises this, you haven’t read your Bible lately.  What God does promise is that when the world comes crashing down, God is right there with us. Jesus is there with us, in the sinking boat.

         This is an important part of the story: Jesus isn’t elsewhere. He isn’t in some cush-y palace somewhere eating olives and hummus. He is in the boat with the disciples. Sinking.  And then he calms the storm. God is with you (and God is with us in this church). And all you – and we - need is enough faith to get through to the moment when Jesus speaks, “Peace. Be still.”

         That small amount of faith, of course, is essential – but equally important is remembering that the hardest part is getting into the boat in the first place, as Karoline Lewis noted.  Before you can meet Jesus, before you can get to the other side, you just have to get in the boat.