Deus Nobiscum: God With Us

On the First Sunday of Advent, I preached this sermon.  The text is here.  In it I spoke about my experience in the theatre with deus ex machina or "God from a machine" who descends from on high to fix all the problems.  I made the case that instead of that Greek tragedy kind of a god, Christianity has deus nobiscum, Emmanuel, "God with us."  On this 8th day of Christmas, this first day of a new year, this first day of a new decade, I think I could preach the same sermon.  God is not coming to magically resolve all of our issues with the wave of a magic wand (as much as I often wish that were so.)  Rather, God is here with us, in the midst of our suffering, in the midst of our joy.  God is here with us, loving us, equipping us, crying with us, and rejoicing with us each and every day.  May each and every one of us know God's presence with us and do our part in this new year to be the people God created us to be.

Unexpected: A Sermon Not Preached

Due to the nasty cold, I didn't get to preach at my appointed time on Christmas Eve.  If I had, this is what I would have said.  I'm indebted to Ann Weems for the inspiration.  

"Unexpected"

The Rev. Lauren McDonald

Christmas Eve, 2019

Unexpected

by Ann Weems

Even now we simply do not expect 

         to find a deity in a stable.

Somehow the setting is all wrong:

         the swaddling clothes too plain,

         the manger too common for the likes of a Savior,

         the straw inelegant,

         the animals, reeking and noisy,

         the whole scene too ordinary for our taste.

And the cast of characters is no better.

With the possible exception of the kings,

         who among them is fit for this night?

         the shepherds?  certainly too crude,

         the carpenter too rough,

         the girl too young.

And the baby!

Whoever expected a baby?

Whoever expected the advent of God in a helpless child?

Had the Messiah arrived in the blazing light of the glory 

of a legion of angels wielding golden swords,

the whole world could have been conquered for Christ

right then and there

and we in the church – to say nothing of the world!– 

wouldn’t have so much trouble today.

Even now we simply do not expect 

to face the world armed with love.

This poem by Ann Weems captures the unexpectedness and the scandal of the Incarnation.

Whoever expected a baby?

A savior with power and might?  Yes. 

A conquering Messiah?  Sure.

A victorious king or ruler?  You bet.

A poor helpless baby dependent on parents for everything?  Uh…

A vulnerable Messiah in a diaper?  Well…

A savior who doesn’t even save himself?  Definitely not.

No one expected him in the way that he came.  

And even knowing how he came, we still don’t expect him.

When I first read this poem earlier in Advent, it was the last line that caught me like a punch in the gut:

         Even now we simply do not expect 

to face the world armed with love.

We arm ourselves with many things in an attempt to protect ourselves and our loved ones.  And it’s understandable.  It’s a dangerous world out there.  

So we arm ourselves with guns and weapons, with alarm systems, fences, and walls, trying to keep the danger out.  

We arm ourselves with money and things, staving off the fear that there will not be enough.

We arm ourselves with hostile words, with our sense of self-righteousness.  The other side is wrong, and we are right. 

We arm ourselves with sarcasm and cynicism; no one’s going to get one over on us or see how much we care.

We arm ourselves with false smiles so that no one can see how we’re hurting.

We arm ourselves with our intellects so that no one will know how vulnerable our hearts are.  

Much as we try, the armor does not protect us, nor does it keep us safe. Not from physical harm.  Not from emotional harm.  It may give that illusion for a while, but ultimately it will fail.  

Sisters and brothers, the goal isn’t to be safe.  If it were, God would have stayed put and never come to live among us, never come to be God with us.

The way of God is the way of love.

When we are armed with love, we are not safe.  People can and will hurt us.  We will be vulnerable.  

When we are armed with love, we will go places we never expected to go, meet people we never dreamed we’d meet.  

When we are armed with love, our hearts are soft and our arms are open.  We embrace the other, we admit when we’re wrong, we accept that we are not in control.

God came as an infant.  It’s completely crazy.  Absolutely unexpected.  Can you imagine anyone less in control than a baby?

But when you look in the child’s eyes, you see the love.  

You know yourself to be loved.  You know the world to be loved.  You know God’s love.

This Christmas my prayer for each of us is that we will discard the weapons and armor that no longer serve us and that we will instead wrap ourselves in the cloak of God’s love. 

When we do, we will find ourselves singing joyfully with the angels, Glory to God in the highest heaven.  O come let us adore him.

New Year's Eves

We're in the final hours before Advent starts.  New Year's Eve for Christians!  Tomorrow is the first Sunday of Advent, the beginning of the season in which we wait and prepare for the coming of the Christ child and the 2nd coming of Christ.  Unlike New Year's Eve for the calendar year, this eve starts quietly in the dark without fireworks or champagne toasts, without parties and countdowns, without rockin' TV shows or celebrity concerts.  In this season we don't join gyms and make weight loss goals, and most of us don't make resolutions.  In this season we wait.  We journey with John in the wilderness.  We repent.  We listen with wonder to the angel's news.  We prepare.  We anticipate.  We get ready.

I actually celebrate three New Year's Eves each year.  One is on December 31, the turning of the calendar year.  The second is the eve of my birthday, my own personal New Year's Day.  And the third is the evening before the first Sunday of Advent.  It is the third that I love the most - as we walk in darkness we await the great light.  What do I need to do to be ready for its coming?  Tomorrow we will light a single candle on the Advent wreath, and the new season will begin.

Tonight I am preparing to preach tomorrow.  I'm finishing up Thanksgiving pie and listening to the purrs of my kitties as they keep me company while I type.  It's been a gloomy, dismal day outside, one that makes it easier to sit on the couch and ponder the season ahead.  The calm before the holiday storm.  My Advent wreath is ready and waiting though I have forgotten to purchase my candles.  After church tomorrow I will remedy this.

While preparing my sermon I read a quote from David Lose about tomorrow's Gospel reading, "We end up preparing for Christmas rather than for Christ and thereby more easily miss the presence of our Lord in the face of those in need..."  

My prayer for all of us is that we will not be so distracted by preparing for Christmas that we neglect to prepare for Christ.  May Christ be born in us again this new year and always.

God Rests, but God Don't Coast

At the end of my sermon a couple of Sundays ago, as I was exchanging the Peace with my colleague, Josh, he laughed and said, "God don't coast!"  I cracked up.  In my sermon I had preached about how God is always doing a new thing.  Jan frequently reminds me that people and organizations can hit a plateau after they've accomplished a big goal or celebrated an important life event.  If we don't have something on the other side, we just hit a wall.  As an example, I mentioned the installation of Bruton's new organ and how we have to be careful not to get stuck now that this huge project has been accomplished.  

"Whew! We think. Got that down. Now we can just coast for awhile.
But no, God is always doing something new, and we get to do that, too."

Josh summarized the sermon as "God don't coast!"  (And neither should we!)  If I'm not careful, I could hit a plateau or get stuck.  Having pushed myself hard as Acting Rector, I could easily just hit cruise control and stop paying much attention.  As I've been considering how to manage this transition, I've also been thinking about Sabbath.  God might not coast, but God does rest.  God created the world and then rested on the 7th day.  God instituted Sabbath and commanded us to keep it.

As I encouraged the congregation to look to what new thing God is doing at Bruton, I was also thinking about my own life.  For more than four months this year, I have served as Acting Rector of Bruton Parish while our rector has been on sabbatical.  On Monday I turn the helm back over to him and breathe a sigh of relief.  Whew!  Job well done.  I'm grateful that's over!  Now I can just coast for awhile.

If I'm not careful, I could hit a plateau or get stuck.  Having pushed myself hard as Acting Rector, I could easily just hit cruise control and stop paying much attention.  As I've been considering how to manage this transition, I've also been thinking about Sabbath.  God might not coast, but God does rest.  God created the world and then rested on the 7th day.  God instituted Sabbath and commanded us to keep it.

So the trick for me in the coming weeks is to balance the need for rest (I'm weary to the bone!) and the desire to stay awake as Advent begins and we wait once more for the coming of Christ.  I want to be alert and present to the new thing that God is doing (God IS doing something new all the time) AND I want to rest so that I will have the energy to participate.

It will be a challenge for me to hold the tension.  I'm grateful for the opportunity to do so.  

What are you doing next, God?  I'm ready to be a part of it, after I catch a nap!

Learning from the Labyrinth - There's No Right Way

Every time I lead a labyrinth walk, I always begin by saying, "There's no right way to walk the labyrinth.  There's no wrong way to walk the labyrinth.  There is only the way that you walk it today."  I say this as much to remind myself as to instruct others.  For years I didn't "get" the point of walking a labyrinth.  It was pleasant enough, but I was sure I wasn't doing it the right way. That's been true with many a spiritual practice for me.  If I don't have a powerful, tangible experience of God - and by that I mean healing occurs or a vision or an inner voice or a spiritual euphoria - then I must be doing it wrong.  Because other people have those powerful experiences and I don't.  They're right and I am wrong.  Even now, after years of walking the labyrinth and finding it to be a transforming, though often subtle practice, I still fall into the trap of thinking that if a particular walk doesn't yield definable fruit, then I haven't done it quite right.

The other day Jan Brown and I were talking about labyrinths with some other folks.  We discussed how the subtle ways of labyrinths and how they often speak through symbol and metaphor.  Everything that happens on the labyrinth can be useful.  Jan mentioned that some people can't wait to get to the center and get frustrated when the path goes near the center and then turns away.  Someone else mentioned that she didn't think she'd ever get to the center so she just gave up.  Jan asked, "And how do you see that playing out in your life?"

I've heard her ask that question many times before - I even ask that question when I'm facilitating walks.  This time, as I pondered it, I had an epiphany.  When I walk the labyrinth I'm rarely frustrated by the twisting and turning of the path. I don't worry about how long it takes to get to the center; I'm happy to be on the path. My downfall is thinking about what's supposed to be happening. Am I getting the insights I'd hoped for?  Am I listening well enough?  Did I choose the right intention or ask the right question?  Am I paying close enough attention to my breathing?  In other words, am I doing it right?  I know that when I let go and am open to the process and the walk, sometimes insights do come.  Or I'm more aware of what God is doing in creation.  Or I sink into myself more deeply and become clear on some matter simply because I'm not worrying about external factors.  I can hear my inner wisdom and sometimes I'm pretty sure I hear God.  If those things are not happening, then I'm not doing it right. Right?

How do I see that playing out in my life?  Oh, the stories I could tell.  I'm convinced that if I do everything right, then all the outcomes will be what I desire.  And when things don't turn out the way I'd hoped, then I must have done something wrong.  It can be paralyzing when trying to make decisions.  It's not like there's some clear, objective way to know how things will turn out or even if the way they turn out is the right way.  

In the past couple of weeks I've returned to a practice that I have a love/hate relationship with:  centering prayer.  As often as I've tried centering prayer and meditation, I've never been able to get it to work for me.  I'm frustrated by my clamoring thoughts and end the time feeling discouraged that I haven't found the peace that other people experience from these practices.  I've been convinced that I'm not doing it the right way, even though I know THERE IS NO RIGHT WAY.  This time, though, it's working.  I don't know how.  I don't know why.  Maybe it's finally the right time.  (But there is no right time, right? There's only now.) Maybe God has called me to it.  Maybe I'm just in a different place or I have different expectations.  What I know is that I'm showing up, consenting to God's presence in my life, returning to my sacred word when I notice my thoughts, and then going on my way when the time is up.  This time I do feel calmer in my daily life.  I do feel happier.  I'm able to laugh more at all the challenges arising around me.  I'm able to handle my stress better - just as they say will happen when we engage such practices.  

There is no right way.  There is no wrong way.  There is only the way I engage the practice today.  Tomorrow it may be different.  For today, I am grateful.

18 Years Later

I first saw the twin towers just before Christmas in the year, 2000, when I was in NYC for a couple of weeks stage managing a production of Art off-off-off Broadway at a theatre near Shea Stadium. I had tea in the Winter Garden one afternoon with a friend of mine before heading uptown with one of my college roommates for a visit.

On September 11, 2001, I was working at a temp job in Virginia Beach at some kind of computer company where I answered the phone that rarely rang.  On that day I answered more phone calls than most - wives calling their husbands to tell them the news.  I didn't have a cell phone then, so on my lunch break I ran to a pay phone in a nearby parking lot to call my friends at Virginia Stage Company to see if they were okay. They'd been evacuated because the theatre was next door to the Norfolk Federal Building.  I tried to call my parents, but I had forgotten they were on a tour for the day.  I could reach no one, so I headed back in and searched the internet for news.  I emailed everyone I could think of to see if they were okay.  I learned that my church would be holding a service that evening.

Earlier that year I had begun discerning a call to ordination, and I longed to be at the church.  Where I could pray with people, comfort people, be comforted myself.  I longed to be out of the temp job.  It never occurred to the men at the company that it might be a good day to go home.  It didn't occur to me to ask if I could leave.

That night at the prayer service at Christ and St. Luke's, we prayed Psalm 46 and the Prayer for Quiet Confidence.  "Be still and know that I am God."  To this day, I often use that phrase in contemplative prayer.

Eighteen years later, I watched the minute of silence on one of the TV morning shows, and I remembered that day again.  Hard to believe it was 18 years ago.  So much has changed.

After packing my lunch and gathering my work things, I drove to the hospital, where I climbed the stairs to the second floor - maternity ward.  Wearing clericals and carrying my battered travel prayer book with me, I entered the room where a new tiny human slept in a hospital crib beside his mother's bed.  Alexander William, born September 10, 2019.  One of the greatest joys of ministry is getting to bless babies.  For me, today, the experience of leaving the news program detailing the timeline of that terrible morning in order to hold and then bless one of earth's newest inhabitants was a microcosm of the paschal mystery:  life, death, new birth.

At 11am, I presided over the healing Eucharist at Bruton.  In my 11 years as a priest, I have never celebrated the Eucharist on September 11.  We commemorated those who died in the plane crashes and building destruction as well as the first responders who gave their lives to try to save others.  We remembered those who worked so long at Ground Zero digging out, those who ministered to the workers, those who lost their loved ones, those whose lives have been lost to cancers and other diseases that the dust and smoke carried inside their bodies.  We asked God to help us love one another, to love our enemies, and to pray for those who persecute us.  We prayed for healing.

On that day and in the days afterward, so many people asked how God could let this happen.  Where was God?  Then and now I have always thought - God didn't do this.  Human beings did this.  God was with us in it and through it, weeping as we wept, and rejoicing when the good overcame the evil.  

I wonder if God is weeping again today, remembering the destruction caused by those made in God's image.
I wonder if God is weeping over the division and hostility that are devouring our country - a country that had pulled together for a sweet moment after the tragedy.
I wonder if God is weeping that America is turning its back on the people from the Bahamas in their time of tragedy when so many Americans received welcome when we were in the midst of ours.
I wonder if God is weeping because we still can't figure out how to love one another.

"Be still and know that I am God."  We prayed these words in the service today, in Psalm 46, and in the Prayer for Quiet Confidence:
O God of peace, who has taught us that in returning and
rest we shall be saved, in quietness and confidence shall be
our strength: By the might of your Spirit lift us, we pray,
to your presence, where we may be still and know that you
are God; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Eighteen years later, I had a much better day.  I blessed a baby and celebrated the Eucharist and attended a delightful Women of Bruton meeting and offered resources to a woman with addiction and had dinner with Jan Brown.  I turned off the news and snuggled with my kitties and wept for how far we have to go and prayed that one day the good won't have to be a small light shining in the midst of darkness.    

First Half Century

On Sunday I will complete the first half century of my life.  Doesn't it sound cool?  A half century. Jan likes to say "half a hundred," and I like the alliteration of it, but half a century just sounds so solid.  I'm very excited.  It's the start of a new half century, a new decade, a new year.  50.  I don't know why I'm so excited, but I am.  I bumped into a former parishioner at the grocery store today who said she'd been weighing whether to send me a card that included the number 50.
"Of course," I said, laughing.  "I think it's cool."

My adult life has seemed to be organized in decades, and each time I enter a new one, I wonder, "What life changing thing will happen in the next ten years.?"

The 20s were my theatre years.  I finished college, interned at the Berkshire Theatre Festival and Actors' Theatre of Louisville, taught a year of high school drama, spent five summers at Interlochen, and moved to Virginia to work at Virginia Stage Company for twelve year, with summer stints in PA and RI.  I attended church, mostly as a stealth parishioner, traveled some during spells of in-between-employment, and suffered through a variety of temp jobs and substitute teaching.  I bought a house toward the end of that decade and started to grow restless.

The year I turned 30, I went to the Holy Land on a pilgrimage with my church and began exploring a call to ordination.  The rest of that decade was spent discerning my call, jumping through hoops, three years of seminary, ordination as deacon and then priest, and my first year of ministry.  When I told people in the theatre that I was going to seminary, many laughed, thinking I was pulling their leg.  "I'm serious," I would tell them.  They couldn't imagine such a dramatic shift, so many of them refugees from the religion that had hurt them or cast them out.  Everything had to change, and it did, and yet, it seemed to be the fulfillment of the longing I had felt all my life to serve God.  The first time I celebrated the Eucharist, I thought this is what I was born for.

Turning 40 was the first time a birthday was hard for me.  It signaled that I most likely wouldn't be having any biological children.  Not impossible, but not likely.  I had a lot of grieving to do for a life that I had imagined.  Even when we choose the road less traveled and it makes all the difference, and we're leading a good life, there is still grief for other roads not taken, and it's important to feel the loss so that it can move on through.  This has been a decade of inner work as well as outer work. Much healing has happened, as I've experienced my first 10 years of ordained life: Hickory Neck Church and CNU campus ministry, SpiritWorks and Bruton Parish.  Jan.  I realized in a conversation with my spiritual director that the pool of sadness which lurked deep inside me is no longer there - or no longer as large.  How grateful I am.

Sunday I begin the 50s.  I've decided that 50 will be fun.  I don't have big plans for my birthday.  It falls on a Sunday, so I will be in church - no place I'd rather be than doing what I was born to do.  Planning a nice lunch and maybe a little kayaking and a nap.  We'll see.  My retreat was a present to myself.  I think I'm going to start tap class on Wednesday.  And maybe Jan and I will go to Greece with our little bear in the coming year.  Hopefully I'll finish my book.  Perhaps I'll even get something published.
Who knows what's next?  Here am I, God.  Your servant is listening.

One of my favorite lines from Sunday in the Park with George, "A blank page or canvas. His favorite.  So many possibilities."

The next half century:  So many possibilities...