Foolish Victories

1 Corinthians 1:18-31; Matthew 5:1-12

I love a good upset victory.

Love it when the team or contestant that’s obviously the underdog, the one who shouldn’t even be in the contest in the first place, pulls off a surprise victory, and no one’s ready for it.

 

And that’s what Paul’s got for us today.

Here’s the dominant team, team Wisdom, who win spiritual insight, and righteousness with the divine, by logic, philosophy, and reasoned debate. They face no serious opposition in the Greco-Roman world; everybody else in the game plays by Team Wisdom’s own house rules.

Until Paul introduces us to Team Foolishness.

 

Foolishness fails every reasoned debate, stammering over half-formed descriptions of transformed hearts in the face of Wisdom’s clean, logical proofs. 

Foolishness puts the very weakest possible players on the field, a team of obvious losers, the ones the rest of the world laughs at or ignores. 

Foolishness celebrates defeats – proclaims that crucifixion – the defeat that basically erases the person – is actually the shining example of the triumph of God.

 

You have to laugh at Team Foolishness even thinking about taking on Team Wisdom.

 

Wisdom, after all, works hard, hires the best coaches, strives for success. 

Doesn’t depend on fuzzy spiritual values but teaches us to get life right so we can earn our own love, freedom, happiness, security and access to heaven without having to depend on unknown, unmeasureable mercy and gifts from God.  

Team Wisdom counts how many people are in the pews and how solid our budget is, and how respected or famous our preacher is, to measure our “wins” as a church, and tells us that’s the only way the game is played. 

No use for foolishness there!

 

But Paul looks at his friends in Corinth (and maybe at his friends in New Jersey, two thousand years later) and tells us that whether we notice it or not, Team Foolishness actually wipes the floor with Team Wisdom when God enters the world.

 

Because when the wisdom of the world (the proponents of Not Rocking The Boat) nailed Jesus to the cross and romped off the field, God’s foolishness took over, reaching into every human failure, every place we’re broken inside, every deeply-buried hope and holy yearning we’ve given up for lost, every one of the mistakes you or I might be too embarrassed to remember, every single loss, taking those painful little deaths into the tomb with Jesus, and bringing them back to us full of the potential for abundant life and generous love.

Team Foolishness takes our secret burdens of shame, our unspoken fears that no one loves me, loves you, for ourselves, on to the cross where the fears suffocate and burdens expire.
And then Foolishness bursts out of the tomb with the absolute certainty that God’s love cannot be blocked or broken by even the worst we can think of ourselves or others.

Team Foolishness invites you and me to romp onto the field ourselves, to drop every certainty that we don’t know what we’re doing or how to win the game, and just revel in the victory we did nothing to win, but that God is absolutely determined to give us.

 

I’ve struggled with that a bit this month. 

I’m stepping away for the next two months to do something I honestly don’t know how to do. To take sabbatical – a time of actually stopping work, of saying “no” to being busy, “no” to being recognized for my accomplishments. 

A time to try to do, actually, nothing.

I’m…still not quite sure I’m ready for that. It seems, well, a little irresponsible. Maybe even foolish.

 

I know this is something I need to do, but it’s contrary enough to my training and habits – to the wisdom that’s supported me so far in my life – that I haven’t been sure how to look forward to this time for rest and renewal.

And when some of you have asked me if I’m excited about sabbatical, and my travels, I’ve sometimes shared with you instead my anxious efforts to be sure everything is in place here, that every bit of knowledge, capacity, and strength I can manage is transferred to other people so that nothing goes wrong. 

That effort and care is the right thing to do. The wise thing. I want nothing more than for Trinity to be so well cared for and successful while I’m away that you barely miss me. 

 

But where the wise thing fails is where it’s been blinding me to the holy thing – the sheer exuberant joy of God’s invitation to do something unproductive. God’s invitation to rest. To trust Jesus and you with one another. 

Blinding me to the opportunity to embrace the possibility that something failing to work the way it “should” while I’m away is a wide-open door for God’s creative, loving power to do something I never dreamed of.
Blinding me to the opportunity to share your delight in my potential adventures.

There’s a whole absurd, wonderful, foolish, loving joy that’s been hovering right around me, and I was missing it.

 

Paul would be furious with me.

 

For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is greater than human strength. God doesn’t choose the prudent, successful, confident, respected, and competent to save our souls, or our community, or to make God’s love visible in the world. 
We heard Jesus say something about that today. About God’s blessing, the spotlight of God’s love, falling on the apparent failures: the imprudent losers, the meek and powerless, the hapless optimists and those too burdened by grief to “be strong”. 

That’s who God chooses, Jesus tells us. Paul tells us.

Wisdom – the basic common-sense consensus of the world – drops us when we fail, scolds us when we don’t quite measure up to the standard of success.
God’s foolishness picks us up, hoists us on God’s shoulders, and celebrates the victory of unconditional love over prudence, logic, and common sense.

 

We’ll talk about this more at the annual meeting, but your Vestry, Wardens, and I know that we’re going to be navigating a year at Trinity that calls for all the wisdom that we’ve got. Calls for a solid effort to determine a responsible, realistic plan for how we worship and work together as a strong community when it looks like we could fail, with fewer of us together on a given Sunday morning, a shift in our congregation away from the usual measures of success like overflowing Sunday School classrooms and a cash-rich budget.

 

At a time like this, it not only seems rampantly foolish for me to go away on sabbatical;

it seems especially foolish to ask you all to join me in resting, in seeking renewal, when we are looking at a budget shift that demands our attention, our work, our pulling together and sorting things out – not just from a few of us, but from many if not all of us.

 

But that’s what God’s foolishness is for – for renewing our hearts in rest, trust, renewal, play, so that God’s love is victorious in steering the present and future of Trinity.
So that we don’t get twisted up in the foolish “wisdom” of doing it all ourselves rather than keeping our eyes peeled for God bringing absurd generosity and love from unexpected places [while we do what’s right in front of us].

 

God’s foolishness invites us to rest, trust, renew ourselves, and pray even while we are fully committed to the work before us, so that we don’t wear ourselves out past the point where we can rejoice in God.

 

If this doesn’t feel easy for you – as, I admit, it doesn’t feel easy for me – I want to invite you to try something next month as a spiritual exercise in foolishness. On February 12, before you tune in to watch the Eagles take on the AFC, find and watch the Puppy Bowl or the Kitten Bowl.

Ignore the commentators, whose job it is to invent some kind of rationale for what you’re seeing, and just watch the silliness. Watch what happens when the rule-filled, effort-oriented, success-striving field is turned over to foolishness. To the possibilities of uninhibited joy, play, rest, and delight.

 

And see what happens when you carry that experience with you to Trinity the next week. To work or school on Monday. To the demands of your daily household life.

See what happens when you carry that experience to your reading of scripture and your personal prayer.

See what happens when you look around the world for God’s foolish, uninhibited joy and play and rest and delight and love in your neighbors, in yourself.

 

I love a good upset victory.

I bet you’ll find one.

Room

Luke 2:1-20

At the church that sponsored me for ordination, the traditional Christmas pageant featured a cranky innkeeper whose role was to slam shut doors and windows when Joseph and Mary came looking for a place to stay in Bethlehem, and to shout, several times, “No room!”

 

I flash back to that several times a year, when I’m feeling crowded in an elevator or building, when my schedule is too full for one more thing, I just can’t take one more bit of news, or one more person than I can handle needs my attention.

Inside of me there’s a ten-year-old slamming a prop door or window, shouting “No room!”

 

I don’t know if you’ve felt something like that recently, but this year it’s just seemed to me like there’s so many more things to pay attention to, so much to do to get ready for Christmas, and my schedule, my brain, my life are too full.

There’s just no room!

 

Of course, after the door slams, the pageant story goes right on, and the cranky innkeeper is persuaded to become a helpful innkeeper, who leads Mary and Joseph and their donkey to the stable and tries to make them comfortable.

And then, Luke tells us, Mary gave birth to Jesus “and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn”.

 

No room.

But God makes room.

In an animal’s feed tray, when necessary.

 

Luke front loads his story of Jesus’ birth with the crowded politics of the day – emperors and governors who have no room for any new leaders; a census that’s crowding every town and people’s schedules and lives. 

It’s a central feature of our Christmas story that there’s no room.

And that in the midst of all this, God makes room.

Makes room to be one of us, to be with us.

 

 

Every time I sit down at home to write a sermon, just when I’ve gotten launched and focused, my hands and laptop are abruptly or gradually re-arranged. In a minute, or sometimes five, there is an entire 12-pound cat in the space between the keyboard and my hands.

 

This is an ergonomically terrible way to write a sermon.

Laptops are not designed to have room for a cat.

I’ve pointed this out over and over, physically moved the cat, suggested that another place or time would be better for the cuddling and napping the cat is insisting on right now. Over and over I tell him there’s just no room right there, right now.

 

Every time – every time – the cat ignores this, and just…makes room.

Makes room for himself where there is no room.

 

It’s not just sermons. This particular cat absolutely, positively, WILL make room for himself in my personal space, no matter how critical the load I’m juggling or the document I’m typing, no matter how late I am running. 

This cat insists that no matter what I am doing, this is the time and the place to be close to me, pin me down with affection, or “help”.

It defies physics, sometimes. Sometimes it makes an utter mess of my schedule. 

But this cat makes room, no matter how little room there is.

 

And when he does, in spite of myself, I feel calmer. 

I feel a sense of peace sometimes. Of belonging sometimes. 

A sense of irritation often, but oddly mixed with a sense of generosity – as if everything else in my life has a little more room and flex to share now that the cat has made physical room where there was no room.

 

In spite of myself, I feel loved.

 

And I suspect something like that is going on in that manger, in that crowded hill town of Bethlehem, in the crowded business and politics of two thousand years ago, as Jesus makes room.

As God quietly, persistently, re-arranges a space and time where there’s no room for divine presence, and no room for a baby, to fit perfectly around both a newborn infant and the whole infinite power and presence of God.

 

Peace on earth, and goodwill, the angels announce in the fields outside of Bethlehem.

And perhaps, in spite of the crowds and the government business that leaves no room for wonder or anything else, there is a sense of peace, a softly-weighted calm, a little more sense of spacious generosity – of goodwill – sneaking into the bodies and hearts of the people of Bethlehem as Jesus makes room.

Perhaps, that night, this night, all the people feel – in spite of ourselves – more love.

More loving and more beloved, filled up with tender affection and that melting of our hearts that comes with the deep, personal trust of a sleeping infant.

 

Because Jesus made room.

 

Made room once upon a particular time, twenty centuries ago.

And over and over ever since, 

Christmas after Christmas,

ordinary day after ordinary day.

Makes room, in our own crowded, busy, messy world here and now.

 

Sometimes it happens like it did in those Christmas pageants I’ve enjoyed, where God touches the heart of an innkeeper – of one person – who finds compassion and generosity making room in their own heart, and who then makes room in the world for God.

 

I watch this happen a lot this time of year, when I see people like many of you, going to a crowded mall – or squeezing online shopping into your crowded calendar – in order to find the perfect Christmas gift for a child who otherwise wouldn’t have anything.  

Many times over any year, I watch one of my friends or colleagues listening to a story of heartbreak or need from a stranger, or from someone none of us really like, and offering sympathy or help.

And your compassion and generosity make room in my heart to feel God’s compassion and generosity toward you, and me – and then I discover unexpected room in my heart and schedule for compassion and generosity toward others.

 

Other times it happens like it must have been happening all around crowded Bethlehem long ago, as people scrunch up in a crowded house or at a crowded table to invite a traveler in.

Sometimes, God does this with friends or family who absolutely insist on dragging you to a party or event (or church service) you really did not have time for. And joy or love or wonder or peace make room in your calendar and your spirit in spite of everything.

 

Where there’s no room, 

when there’s no room,

Jesus makes room.

 

And that’s probably the best news I’ve heard all year.

Because so often I just don’t have room. Even when I really want to.

 

There are so many other things crowding our time and attention. 

Responsibilities at work and at home.

Public crisises of war, and politics, and a precarious climate, and inflation, and still Covid.

Private challenges in our work (or classes), our health, relationships, grocery budgets.

And of course Christmas: the baking and events and presents and packages and rehearsals and decorating and dinner….

 

So often it’s so easy to get distracted from God’s presence in our world. So often, for many of us, it can feel like there’s just no room to squeeze in the things that Jesus asks from us: prayer or worship or silence or service. No time for the time God wants to spend with me.

 

It’s such a relief, a gift, to be reminded that in spite of all of that, in the middle of all that, Jesus still makes room.

To be one of us.

To be with us.

With you, with me.

 

Rearranging our space and time with insistent affection, and presence, and love.

Squeezing the gentle weight of peace into our hearts, 

the spaciousness of generosity and compassion into our spirits,

the whole infinite power and presence of God into the world in the tiny space of a newborn child,

until we cannot escape the knowledge in every part of our hearts, bodies, calendars, or souls, that we are deeply and insistently loved.

 

Tonight, tomorrow, all day and all year, wherever we have no room for God, or for ourselves,

Jesus makes room.

Room for love.

Room for everything.

Jesus Sends Us Stories

Matthew 11:2-11

What are you waiting for?

What are you looking for as a sign that God’s promises are all being fulfilled?

What are you waiting for, before you drop everything else to throw yourself into the glory of God? What’s missing, that would allow you to go in 110% on following Jesus? 

 

Myself, I tend to be cautious about going all in on something – or believing it’s all ready – if there’s not a clear plan.
I spent years waiting for a step-by-step (or even clear first step) plan for following this weird idea that maybe I should be a priest. 

I’m still waiting for following Jesus to get clearer than all this constant nebulous discernment about what spiritual path I’m on, and whether to give this money to the food bank or the disabled veterans.

 

Maybe some of us are waiting for a break in all the responsibilities you’ve got to take care of: family, work, getting dinner on the table and the bills paid and the holiday organized. If that were cleared away… ?

And Jesus has always been there, God seems patient – the sense of urgency is missing.

 

Maybe you’d like some kind of proof, even just a little bit, that Jesus is personally interested in you, before you go all in. (I mean, there are all these stories in the gospels about Jesus getting in one individual’s face to say “follow me”, doing a spectacular miracle for one particular other person – why not me?) 

Or something that proves that God is making the world a better place, not just watching from some far detached place in the sky, before you’re convinced this is the moment of decision?

 

I don’t know exactly what you are waiting for. Honestly, I may not be sure what exactly I’m waiting for.

But many of us are waiting for something to change, to happen, before we commit our whole selves, whole hearts and lives, waking and sleeping, to following Jesus in all ways, proclaiming God’s kingdom already come.

 

Many of us, consciously or otherwise, may also be evaluating the options besides Jesus – in case there’s something else we should be waiting for. Checking out the possibilities that work or exercise or the right friends or the right hobby might offer fulfillment or healing or wholeness. Looking for our sense of purpose from sharing the right moral views with friends and family and the people we vote for.  

 

Many of us are, at one time or another, considering whether we couldn’t do better than Jesus for solving the needs and heartaches of our lives. 

 

Even the most religiously passionate of us are often waiting for some change, or sign, or choice, or something, before we commit completely and permanently to Jesus, dropping every other priority in our lives. 

 

Even John.

 

John who already spent most of his life getting us all ready for the real power of God to show up among us. John who already met Jesus while he was out baptizing, and knew then that he was the real thing, the real power of God.  Even John is waiting for something else.

And he’s not afraid to ask Jesus directly about it.

 

Look, are you the Messiah? The one we’ve really all been waiting for? 

Or not?
Is there someone, something, better coming along?

 

John’s waiting for an answer.

A direct answer, before he feels confident committing what’s left of his life to this particular person being The One he’s already spent his life preparing for.

 

And Jesus sends him stories.

Sends him people who’ve seen healings, who’ve seen lives restored, seen and heard oppressed people respond with joy to what Jesus has to say, to just talk about their experience.

 

It’s not like John never heard those stories about Jesus before, probably. 

So far, though, those stories haven’t been enough. They weren’t what John was looking for.

 

Maybe John was waiting for Jesus to overthrow either the foreign government, or the religious elite. Maybe John was looking for fire and brimstone – an epic moral confrontation between ultimate good and human evil.

Or maybe he was looking for a personal touch, a clear plan, a different urgency, or the relief of all his other responsibilities so that he could finally follow Jesus as The One whose coming he’d been waiting for. 

 

What he gets is the stories. Stories about what his friends have witnessed in physical healing and heart healing as Jesus moves around the countryside.

 

None of these stories are about what John was preaching and predicting; none are about John getting released from prison.

They are just are stories about renewal, insight, hope, and love, actually seen and heard by the tellers, as Jesus walks through the world.

We don’t know if this time it’s enough for John.

If it was the yes his heart needed.

Matthew never tells us.

 

But I think it might have been, after all.

It might even be enough for me.

 

When I’m getting wishful and wistful about God fulfilling promises, sometimes I get tempted to treat attendance at church as a sign of whether God is really coming. (I know better, but there’s that tempting feeling when the pews are full…)

And then it’s cold here. Or you’re busy on Sundays. And we’re out of the habit of being packed together in these pews. And I wonder if this is really what we’ve been waiting and working for – since Covid, since all our lives, really. Wonder if God’s really all that interested.

 

And then someone tells me a story about how good it was, how powerfully healing, to get to just talk to one other person casually at coffee hour again.

Another person tells me a story about how important the livestream service has been to them, still. That the church is present, that they have been to church, they are part of us, when they cannot physically get here on Sunday morning. 

 

And my heart says “yes.” 

Yes. 

This is what we are waiting and working for.

This is the kingdom of God coming among us – in the ways I wasn’t especially looking for. 

 

God’s purpose, God’s plan, are being fulfilled.

Just not the way I thought I was waiting for.

 

When I’m looking for what I am expecting God to do, 

I might be missing what God is actually up to.

 

When I look for what I want God to do – for things that make me more comfortable, or just more confident; when I look for Jesus to be making it easier for me to drop everything else – I might be missing the things that God wants to do to make all of us more trusting and generous, might be missing what Jesus wants to do to empower all of us to follow him, love him, be loved by him.

 

Then when I listen to the stories – stories about other people, healing and renewal that happens one trickle at a time – when I listen to the stories Jesus sends me, I might just be seeing God’s whole kingdom coming, all of it, in a place and time that doesn’t feel like enough, but is everything. 

And then my heart answers John’s question. 

My heart says, yes.

 

What stories is Jesus sending you? 

What story of healing, insight, joy, or love – happening on a small scale, to someone else – have you heard lately?

What if that is the invitation, or the proof, that you’ve been waiting for?

 

What story of renewal, generosity, or hope far away have you heard?
What if that story is the relief, or the urgency, or the opportunity that you’ve personally been waiting for? Not the way you thought it would look, not at all.

But actually what you need, somehow, to say yes to God’s coming into the world, into your heart, your life.  

 

And what story could you tell?
What little moment of insight or hope, healing or renewal, love or joy, glory and generosity have you seen that might be the story Jesus is sending to someone else? To someone waiting to know if God, if Jesus, really is what they’ve been waiting for. 

 

We all wonder, once or often, if this is it. 

If this is real. If this is God. If God is enough for what we’re waiting for.

 

And Jesus sends us stories.

 

Sends us not an answer, but stories of what God is up to.

And then waits, listens, to see if our hearts say, “Yes!”