This Sunday, on the eve of Independence Day, we are holding a vigil for America at both services.
In the locked room where the disciples hid after Jesus’ crucifixion, when Jesus appeared to them and showed them the marks of the nails in his body, they were holding a vigil. In the Book of Acts, (Saint) Peter was arrested and thrown into jail. When an angel of the Lord released him, he went back to the house where he was staying. Even though it was late at night, the followers were up praying for him in a vigil. A first century world traveler who kept a detailed diary stayed briefly in Jerusalem during the Passover. He was impressed by a particular activity on the part of one group of people. They stood on a hillside just outside of the city walls. They prayed, walked in circles and then would stoop under a heavy wood beam. Historians later determined this traveler had witnessed a group of Christians holding a vigil at the site where Jesus was crucified. It was on the Friday before Passover which we call “Good.” A vigil is a time of quiet, of reflection, of reading Scripture and prayer. It can be held privately, or as we have seen in Florida, it can involve thousands of people. The typical format is an opening prayer – usually stating why everyone is gathered – then a reading of Scripture, silence, prayer, silence, Scripture, silence, prayer, etc… A vigil can last 30 minutes, many hours, or even years, in some instances. The Christian belief is that vigils change things. First and foremost, vigils change the heart of the participant. They bring peace and comfort. Secondly, vigils can change the world. When people gather for a vigil, God hears the prayers and through faith responds. I participated in a vigil in 2009. The governor’s recession-era budget included major cuts in health care to the most vulnerable in California. Through the Interfaith Network, clerics from all different religious traditions gathered at a medical clinic in Vista. The leaders would offer a reading of Scripture, a prayer, and then a short homily. During each homily, the speaker would introduce a different group that would lose vital heath care resources. The groups that stood out most for me were three home contractors whose business had dried up for lack of funding. The hundred people there prayed for the Governor to change his budget and save that clinic and hundreds of others like it around the state. The end result, the clinics remained open, nothing short of a miracle. I have friends and parishioners who self-identify along all points of the political spectrum. Nevertheless, there are a few things we all agree on – freedom isn’t free, we live in a great Republic, and our country needs prayer. Everyone I talk to is troubled by violence in America. We are all concerned about the state of the Union that we are handing on to our children. And we’re going to do something about it. This Sunday, we are going to hear God’s word, bow our heads in prayer, and place our country in God’s steady and supportive hands. May God’s peace be with us and may God grant peace to America. -Fr. Marshall How big is God? I think we believers all agree that God is huge, bigger than big, huger than huge. But, most of us have probably not spent much time thinking about how small God is which is what is on my mind this week.
In our family prayers on Tuesday, Ethan thanked God for mitochondria and photosynthesis. It was no surprise to me because he is enrolled in biology and speech at College for Kids at Southwestern. The biology professor impressed upon them the importance of cell development and energy. If it’s been a while since you’ve been in a biology class, here’s a quick refresher. Mitochondria act like miniature batteries that provide energy to the cell. They take energy locked in food and, in what I can only describe as a miracle, combine oxygen and food and turn it into power. For example, your brain cells require energy to read this sentence. If you are sitting while reading this, your muscles require energy to maintain your upright position. Both your brain and muscles receive chemical energy from mitochondria. Without them, we’d be energy-less like the proverbial bump on a log. I like to eat and I like to breathe. At a mini-cellular level, eating and breathing would be useless except for mitochondria. Speaking of eating, photosynthesis is very important for those of us who enjoy food. It’s a process whereby plants trap light energy and convert it into sugar called glucose. On Saturday, I enjoyed a good sweet ear of corn. Without photosynthesis, none of that would have been possible, especially the “sweet” part. During a normal day, we don’t see photosynthesis or our mitochondria at work. If you are like me, you take it for granted. Of course plants need sunlight and convert it to sugar which feeds me and the animals I like to eat. I have the brain power to read, pray, run and think but it wasn’t until Ethan’s thanks to God for these things that I found myself appreciating them. We often thank God for big things and pray to God to do big things. When was the last time you thanked God for the small things, like cell reproduction and photosynthesis? Perhaps this week you will find yourself thanking God for the building blocks of life and thank our Creator that we are included in that life. But I would be entirely remiss were I not to return to Ethan and his prayer which started this entire line of thought. And so, I close with these words from the pen of Father Eugene Hemrick of the Catholic News Service: “Seeing through the eyes of a child means keeping alive a childlike fascination and allowing it to captivate and draw us into the mind of another. We must apply it when we wonder what Christ desired when he said, “Unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Mt 18:3).” -Fr. Marshall Fr. Tolley and I had the privilege to be at Sallye Graves’ bedside hours before she passed into glory. We were blessed to offer last rites to this long-time Christian and faithful Saint John’s member. In addition to singing in the choir at Saint John’s, Sallye performed with radio and television personality Fred Waring, trained with Jack Metz, and sang with the San Diego Orchestra. Yet, on her last day, I took her hand and told her that she was about to join the best choir, the one she’s been preparing for her whole life, the choir that sings praises to God in heaven.
The Bible mentions a heavenly choir in Isaiah, chapter 6. The prophet saw and heard the choir singing, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” In Revelation, John saw a vast multitude from every nation, tribe and language crying out in a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” The angels, elders and four living creatures sang, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.” (Rev 7) Through faith in the Bible, we believe there is a choir in heaven. I, however, have a little more information about this than you might expect which did not come from seminary. I had a dream-like experience when I was in my junior year of high school. I say dream-like because unlike most dreams that fade way, this event was just as vivid as my memories of visiting Yellowstone. In that junior year, I was in a symphonic band that was competing for perfect scores at the yearly state contest. Our center piece was Marche Slave by Tchaikovsky. Our director was pushing us to be perfect. I was the student-assistant director and lead chair so I felt some of the pressure. Privately, he told me, “There is no perfect performance. We have sixty students in this band. There will be mistakes. We just have to strive for our best.” The week prior, I had this dream. I was in an extraordinary orchestra. We were in gorgeous black and white outfits. The brass of my trombone shined like pearl. Our “audience” was a stunning array of white and gold light that had substance – not like a beautiful sunset – but more like life itself. This full orchestra had a giant choir behind it. The music we played I had never heard before. It was perfect. Every note, every singer, every instrument was on pitch and on time. There was no director; neither was there music. We listened to one another and simply played from our hearts. I told my director (who is a Christian) the following day of my dream. He said I had been blessed to see the orchestra of heaven. Later that week we played the best we could. Because of our initial high scores, we ended up playing our final piece, Marche Slave, at the end. Most of the other high school bands were in attendance – partially because of the timing, partially because we were playing a difficult and well-known piece. We weren’t perfect but we certainly played our best. We were rewarded with the top score. I believe that Sallye is now a part of the giant choir of my dream, singing praise to God who is love, light and life. There is a perfect performance awaiting us. And through God’s grace, when we arrive, you’ll know someone in the choir. -Fr. Marshall Now that summer is upon us, we’re looking at what to do about our television viewing habits. I know some families that enforce a no-TV-summer. I am impressed by those folks but that’s not us. Nevertheless, I’d like to give up cable.
I am tired of paying for channels I have no interest in watching. There are many options for us so-called “cable cutters.” My favorite option is to buy a rather expensive box that picks up over the air (free) broadcast channels from the major networks. It has a 1 terabyte hard drive to record as much as my heart desires and there is no monthly subscription fee. The downside is that I won’t be able to watch my favorite cooking shows. But if I am willing to pay for cable channels, there are internet based viewing options that stream right into that fancy and expensive box. It appears the TV viewing world is heading toward an a la carte system. Viewers like me want to pay only for what we watch. For instance, I’d like to watch ESPN but I have no desire to watch any of the plethora of ESPN-related channels. I’d like to watch the Food Network but don’t want to be yoked into paying for MTV and Bravo just to get the one network I want. I have friends that love the Golf channel and Bloomberg News but never would watch the Food Network or AMC. They too are frustrated at the pay-for-all cable setup. That system is a little bit like going to the movies to watch one particular film but having to pay to watch all the other movies, too. Or, it is like buying a ticket to watch the Padres but also for admission to the other ballparks in California. Our world seems to becoming more compartmentalized, specialized, customized and focused on catering to our own perceived needs and wants. One example of this is how I used to watch cartoons – they were available on Saturday morning, period. Today, my children can watch cartoons on a variety of devices (TV, tablet, phone, computer) whenever they want. In our compartmentalized and customized world, I wonder how this affects our spiritual lives. How relevant is church when we want something our way? The Church says, “Jesus is the way, the truth and the life,” yet our culture says, “Have it your way.” We believe in a personal savior which is to say that Jesus knows us personally. When we pray, it usually is a very personal, tailored prayer for ourselves and our unique concerns. Likewise, when we read the Bible, it is absorbed into ourselves in a very personal way. How many of us are moved personally when we hear the opening words of Psalm 23, “The Lord is my shepherd.” At the same time, we have corporate worship on Sundays. Our services are not tailored or customized for our independent, individualized needs or concerns. We don’t even have a say in the liturgical color of the day (green, by the way, this Sunday). Yet, it is through our corporate worship, through reciting ancient prayers and reading of God’s word, that we get a sense of a God who knows us personally. And, although God may want to have an a la carte approach to us as individuals, God loves all of us. No exceptions. The bread that Jesus raised up, broke, and said “Take, eat,” wasn’t just for a few particular people Jesus liked or had a preference for, it was for everyone – Judas included. Likewise, the death and resurrection of Jesus wasn’t just for a particular elect or secret group. His resurrection opened the way for all who believe. -Fr. Marshall This Monday, Saint John’s will graduate another class of 8th graders. Graduation is always a bittersweet time for those of us involved in our wonderful school. Consider this: half of the class has been at Saint John’s for ten years. Three-quarters have been at Saint John’s for at least five years. For many students, Saint John’s is their second home and their primary spiritual home. For some, Saint John’s has been the most stable thing in their life. There will be no other experience like this in their academic lives. They went through very important life transitions including, to be blunt, puberty. So there are two sides to graduation, the bitter and the sweet. The bitter is those graduates will never have a community like this; and neither will Saint John’s ever have a community just like them again.
The sweet side of graduation is that they are ready to go. We can’t hold them here any longer. God is calling them out and the world needs them. As the students take their graduation walk on Monday and depart from Saint John’s, I am confident of many things. First and foremost, I am confident about the education they received. We educate the whole child: mind, body and spirit. They have been soaked in the Anglican moral tradition, which at its core holds Christ as exemplar for how we are to conduct ourselves with God and one another. From that core notion of Christ-as-exemplar we show the virtues of patience, forgiveness, humility and most of all, love. They know they are loved by God through Christ, forgiven by God through Christ, and called to serve others through Christ. This moral theology and tradition reverberated through all their studies even in subjects like art, PE, and science where we might not expect to see those values. Christ as exemplar is the standard we hold up to them in their daily conduct with one another on campus and off campus; we even teach about Christ in their online activity. I am confident our graduates are going to change the world for the better. We have shaped a holy people for the sake of the world and, frankly, the world needs them. Another thing I am confident of is that they are being commissioned as apostles from Saint John’s. They’ve been disciples, which at the root means “students.” They are now ambassadors, as those who are sent into the world. Ambassador shares its root with “apostle." They were students, but now are the sent-ones. This process is not unique to our school. It repeats itself each and every Sunday. On Sunday morning, we come to Saint John’s as students to learn, be fed, and worship God. The lessons, sermon and prayers lead us to follow Christ as exemplar. Then, with the final words, “Thanks be to God!” we become the sent-ones to bring Christ to the world. We are the same as those eighth graders who will be graduated in a few days, holy people for the sake of the world. There are many Sundays where I have a bittersweet moment. I stand at the open gate in the early afternoon and miss the congregation and the worship experience we just had. I wonder where everyone went. The sweet part is the knowledge that the world will be changed by what we learned and experienced through Christ our exemplar. Likewise, on Monday late afternoon I’ll stand at the gate and think about our new apostles and experience a bittersweet moment. I will miss them but also have the sweet hope that they continue living Christ-as-exemplar and that as a result, the world will be changed. -Fr. Marshall |