Aha! Embracing the God Moments: Together 

I Corinthians 12:1-11 

April 24, 2016 

Mark S. Bollwinkel 

            It is true in professional sports as well as in amateur sports.

It’s not the teams with the best players that win championships but the players with the best teams that do. Josh Donaldson and Bryce Harper won Major League Baseball’s “MVP” awards last year.  Carey Price won the Hart Trophy as the National Hockey League’s “Most Valuable Player award last year.  In 2015 Cam Newton was the
MVP of the National Football League.  Although outstanding individual athletes not one of their teams would end up winning a championship. 

“The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don't play together, the club won't be worth a [dime].”  Babe Ruth

It’s true of our nation as well.  If you’re frustrated with government consider this: After the 2010 Census, ten states lost seats in congress due in part to the high number of folk refusing to turn in their census forms (AP 4/28/10).   In 2012 US voter turnout was 53.6%, unusually high in a country where most often less than half of registered voters elect our representatives.  In voter turnout, the USA lands 31st among the 34 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, most of whose members are highly developed, and democratic states” (pewresearch.org). 

It’s been said “We get the government we deserve” (Joseph de Maistre, 1753-1821).  If over half of us take our citizenship for granted, what kind of government can we expect?

When people work together for a common good it makes a better sports team, it makes us a better nation and it makes us better people.  That is also true of the church.   Church life is much more than our individual experience on a Sunday morning. 

During the Easter Season we are inspired to consider the God moments in our lives beyond what we do on Sundays.   God’s resurrection spirit can be found in our lives Monday thru Saturday, in all sorts of places; a park, a gas station, a kitchen, even at work when we pay attention.   When we work and live together as a community the church it is one of the places we find God.

            Status, role, title, the money we make are all indicators of self-esteem in our culture.   We judge each other by those qualifiers.   We rate our success and status in society by them. 

I have only been a “Senior Pastor”.  In six of my seven assignments since ordination in 1976, I have been the Presiding Elder or pastor-in-charge.  I came out of seminary at the age of 27 and was assigned as the Principal of a seminary in South East Asia.   I have only ever been “on top of the pyramid” as they say in business.   

Now in one of those churches, a very small church, St. Paul’s UMC in Reno, Nevada, I was the “Senior Pastor”…and the custodian and the church secretary and in charge of snow removal and lighting the pilot light of the boiler in the winter.  But I was the “Senior Pastor”!  When I sat on two city commissions during my stay in Reno, right there on the name plate on the city desk I was identified as “Mark Bollwinkel, Senior Pastor”!   Title and status is an important thing.  Let’s be honest.    

But a Senior Pastor, the President of a corporation or the captain on a ship in the Navy will tell you that every person in the organization is a part of their success if they enjoy it.  That certainly has been my experience in churches.  Regardless of title, role and status everyone in any organization contributes to its success.  Every role from bottom to the top in our social ladders plays an extremely important part in the success or failure in any organization. 

You may not be aware, but I love baseball.  It is has been a passion in my life and a passion in my family since I was young.  Growing up in Indiana, it was the game we played, sun rise to sun set.  Especially in the summers when there wasn’t anything else to do.  We played baseball.  We played baseball without uniforms, without adults keeping score or going to a pizza parlor after each game.   We had our friends and we played.  Now being a heavy and slow kid, I was always chosen to be the catcher.  I could hit.  I could throw.  But I couldn’t run the bases ‘if you threaten my mother’s life’!  I could not do it.  So I always ended up being the catcher.  Now some will tell you that the catcher, usually batting at the end of the batting order, is not as important as the pitcher or the star hitter playing at centerfield.  But without the catcher where would baseball be?   In fact I would argue that the catcher is an equal to the quarterback on a football team.   Very little good can happen in baseball without the catcher. 

The point being, on a team everyone has a role, everyone has a place.  Regardless of the status we place on any one position everyone is going to have to function if there is going to be success on a team.    That’s even true in the church.  For the Apostle Paul in our scripture lesson today, he is trying to remind everyone in the church that in spite of differences in status, role and title we are all a part of the body of Christ.

Corinth, Greece in the first century was a bustling, cosmopolitan sea port.  It was a melting pot of nationalities, classes and religions; picture San Francisco in its “Barbary Coast” days.   The apostle Paul writes his first letter to the church in Corinth to encourage the young Christians to get along with each other.   Church leaders had written Paul about a number of issues that were dividing the church in conflict. Paul writes back with advice and admonitions about sexuality, the use of wine at Holy Communion and how they are all supposed to worship together without fighting.   We shouldn’t be surprised that from the very beginning the church has had to deal with conflicts within.  Ours is a very human institution.  Since Easter afternoon we have brought human pride and weakness to mix with our noble efforts to “love God and neighbor”.

In our text this morning Paul teaches that despite their differences the Corinthians need to acknowledge and respect them not judge each other by them.  Everyone has a role in the body of Christ even when their gifts are different.   No one should hold themselves spirituality superior over and against another because their gifts are different.

The heart of Paul’s teaching about conflict in I Corinthians is his “still more excellent way”:

…love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful, arrogant or rude.  Love does not insist on its own way, it is not irritable or resentful; it doesn’t rejoice in wrong doing but rejoices in the truth…love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends…the greatest is love.”( I Corinthians 13) 

This much beloved chapter, often cited in weddings ceremonies, was actually written to suggest how church members are supposed to get along with each other even when they disagree.

Here at Church of the Wayfarer we envision our purpose as “Reaching Up, Reaching In and Reaching Out”, a modern way of affirming Jesus’ greatest commandment “…to love God with heart, soul, mind and strength…and to love our neighbors as ourselves…” (Matthew 22:34-40).    We cannot succeed in faith or in life all on our own.  We need each other to fulfill the promise of our mission.  We need to share our strengths and our weaknesses.  We need to share our dreams and our failures.  We find God in our lives together, even when we disagree, even when we are at odds with each other, if we keep the commandment to love one another as our focus and commitment.  And when love reigns in our community nothing can stop us.

Mia Hamm is not only the greatest American female soccer player, she may be one of the best of all time regardless of gender:

“I am a member of a team, and I rely on the team, I defer to it and sacrifice for it, because the team, not the individual, is the ultimate champion.”  Mia Hamm

            Isn’t that true of our families…or workplaces…at school…or for our nation as well?  It’s certainly true of our churches.

            To illustrate the point simply consider the faith community’s response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005.  Someday the story will be written how long after governmental services left, the churches of this nation offered hundreds of thousands of volunteer hours, tens of thousands of volunteers and millions of dollars to assist our brothers and sisters in the Gulf Coast rebuild their lives.

            Are you aware that the United Methodist Church has joined with the United Nations and the Gates Foundation to eradicate malaria in the tropical world?  The World Health Organization reports a dramatic decline in malaria deaths in Africa due to increase use of insecticide netting, new medications and public health education.  Thousands of lives are being saved in part due to United Methodist efforts to end this disease.

            Since 1975 the United States has resettled over three million refugees into our nation, most from Southeast Asia and Russia (www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/orr/about/history).  Protestant, Roman Catholic, Jewish, Orthodox and Muslim voluntary agencies oversee the resettlement process of support and assimilation for these folks fleeing oppression and war. 

            Why?  Why do the faith communities again and again strive to serve the least and the lost?  Because if some of us are suffering we are all suffering (I Corinthians 12:26)!

            We are all in this together.   That’s especially true of the church. We are not always going to agree.   We are not always going to like each other.   But when we put the larger goals ahead of our own we can accomplish amazing things…and we find together that God is with us.

            Amen.

Aha!  Discovering the God Moments in Ourselves 

Isaiah 6:1-8 

April 10, 2016 

Mark S. Bollwinkel

Isaiah, son of Amoz, proclaimed his message of faith in the One God to royalty and the powerful during a disastrous period in the life of Israel (742-701 BCE, chapters 1-39).  The Northern Kingdom would be destroyed by the armies of Assyria.  The Southern Kingdom (Judah), with its capital in Jerusalem would become a vassal state.  Isaiah preached around the same period of Amos, Hosea and Micah.  He shared their common theme attacking social injustice not just as a moral failure but indicative of our relationship with God. (“Introduction”, The New Oxford Annotated Bible, NRSV, 1991, p. 866)

In our text this morning we hear of Isaiah’s call to prophecy by God as it occurred in the Temple of Jerusalem.  Scholars suggest that Isaiah had to have been a priest there since only the authorized could have access to “the throne of God” within the Holy of Holies of the sanctuary.  Isaiah protests the call saying, “I am lost…a man of unclean lips living among a people of unclean lips…”  God sends a heavenly creature to purify Isaiah and then asks, “Whom shall I send?” to which Isaiah replies, “Here I am, send me!”

In the midst of calamity and injustice, this Isaiah will proclaim such visions of Israel’s future as in these beloved words: 

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light;

those who lived in a land of deep darkness on them light has shined.

For all the boots of the tramping warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire. For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. (9:2-5)

Not all of us are called to be prophets of God.  Many of us are reluctant believers.   Intellectually we struggle with the tenants of the faith.  We are mystified by the way others use religion to hurt and control.    For all too many of us “whose got the time?!” to pay attention to “godly” matters when our highest expectation is to just get through the day.  Our hectic, multi-tasking life style throws serious obstacles in our way to cultivate the mindfulness of the holy all around us.

This is the Easter season.  Christ has risen.  Are we paying attention to his spirit all around us?

When our son Daniel was in third grade, we went to a teacher evaluation at the beginning of the year.  The teacher expressed her concerns that Daniel was showing signs of burnout.  At the third grade!   He wasn’t playing at recess.  He was compulsively working on his homework.  Everything had to be perfect.  His tests had to be turned in first.  He just wasn’t showing any signs of joy while at school.   One of the things that was concerning us was that he wasn’t eating his lunch.    We know that Daniel takes after Bonnie’s side of the family; extremely intelligent, very bright, ambitious and driven. For a Bollwinkel to stop eating raises major concerns! 

So along with talking with a school counselor we took him to our family pediatrician.  The doctor gave him a complete once over, a full check up and some great advice.  He said, “Dan, if you are going to have the energy to succeed in school you have to eat your lunch.  You’ve got to take the time to take a break and enjoy lunch time.”   He went on to explain this metaphor to my third grader, “Daniel, it’s like putting gas in a gas tank.  If there isn’t any gas in the tank then the car isn’t going to get any where.  That is the same for our bodies.”  For Daniel, he got the point.

 The metaphor is true for us all as well.   We all know that the more we invest ourselves, whatever the endeavor, the more we will get out of it.  That’s true for our marriages, work, school and recreation.  The more we give the more we get in return.

Well, isn’t that true for our spiritual life as well? 

Yet somehow most of us think of our spirituality as some kind of organic, natural experience that we find in the midst of our busy, multi-tasking days.  We need to take the time to fill our spiritual tanks as well.

Along with filling up the gas tank when I go to the station, I love to wash my windows.  Not because they will stay clean for very long.  But because it just feels so good to look out that clean front or back window and see clearly the way before me or the way behind me.

You’ve heard me say it before; if we are not feeling close to God guess who moved?  It’s time for us to open our eyes and be aware of God all around us!

Church of the Wayfarer is committed to “Reaching Up, Reaching In and Reaching Out”   We believe such words are simply a modern version of Jesus’ greatest commandment to love God with heart, soul, mind and strength and to love our neighbors as we love ourselves (Matthew 22:34-40).    There are many of us who struggle with the call to faith, we want to be better people and make a difference in the world, we want to grow closer to God but don’t know how?    What does “Reaching Up, Reaching In and Reaching Out” look like?

John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement, had plenty of moments of doubt and struggles.  He knew that living assured of God’s presence and purpose didn’t just happen for most.   He taught the early Methodists that by the practice of the “Means of Grace” we would find God in our lives.   He broke them up into two categories:

Works of Piety, such as:

Prayer

Fasting

Searching the Scriptures

Healthy Living

Attending to the sacraments of Holy Communion and Baptism

Christian Conferencing (or "community")

Works of Mercy, such as:

Doing Good

Visiting the Sick

Visiting the Imprisoned

Feeding & Clothing those in need

Earning, Saving, & Giving all one can

Service focused toward communal/societal needs--

Seeking of Justice; Opposition to Slavery

 These things ‘fill up the tank’ when it runs dry.  These things open our eyes to the God all around us a ready source of “aha moments”.   Practicing the Means of Grace can change our lives.

At one of the lowest points of his own life, John Wesley sought out the wisdom of a fellow Christian, Peter Boehler a Moravian Brethren.  They talked and prayed together, sharing their deepest hurts and hopes:

Immediately it stuck into my mind, "Leave off preaching. How can you preach to others, who have not faith yourself?" I asked Boehler, whether he thought I should leave it off or not. He answered "By no means." I asked, "But what can I preach?" He said, "Preach faith till you have it; and then, because you have it, you will preach faith." (John Wesley, Journal, 4 Mar 1738)

John Wesley and his brother Charles would begin a movement that would change the Protestant world forever.

If we are down, doubtful or exhausted, do something for somebody else…take a moment to begin and end your day with a prayer, even a moment of holy silence…reach out to the community of those you trust and love and open up…and you will see God.  At the gas station, at the grocery store, at work or at home, God is with us.   All we need do is pay attention when given the opportunity of grace.  That’s true for preachers as well. 

Thirty some years ago in Reno, Nevada I was getting our station wagon ready for a long awaited, well deserved family camping vacation.  I am no mechanic but I figured I could save us some money by changing the oil in my own garage.   Some gorilla must have put the oil filter on during the previous change because no matter what I did I could not get it to budge.  I tried every tool in my box to no avail.  I ran over to the auto parts shop and bought a special tool just for such occasions.  It did not work.  Bonnie was about to come home from work.   I was supposed to have the car all loaded up and ready to go on our long awaited, well deserved family camping vacation.  

Time was running out. 

In desperation I figured that if I drove a large screw driver through the body of the filter itself, I could then torque it off the thread of the base to which it was fused.  So I drove the screwdriver through the filter and the body of the filter tore as I tried to turn it.  I succeeded in getting oil all over the engine and floor of the garage but failed to get it off.   Now I couldn’t even drive the car.

I was overwhelmed with frustration and shame.  Bonnie was going to blow her stack.  I was a failure as a man.  I felt as if I was about to break down and cry.   I didn’t know what to do. 

Just then my nine year old son Dan came into the garage and asked me what was going on.  I briefly explained the mess and my frustration, to which he replied, “Well, Dad, have you prayed about it?”

I was dumbfounded.  I hadn’t prayed about it at all.   I had been using God’s name quite vocally but I wouldn’t call it prayer.  That such a suggestion would come from my nine year old son stopped me cold.  After Dan left indeed I did pray for help.  As I did it came to me to call the mechanic who occasionally worked on the car.  I got off my knees, called my friend and he patiently explained how one can tap a stuck oil filter off an engine block with a hammer and chisel over against the rim of the filter in the opposite direction of the thread.  I thanked him, went out to the car and had it off in 30 seconds.

Sitting in a hospital as one’s beloved is in pain, waiting for solutions to the crisis is a perfect and essential time to call on God’s loving grace and presence.  We all know the aphorism to be true, “There are no atheists in foxholes.” Even strangers to faith turn to God when there’s a crisis and they don’t know where else to turn.

I was amazed this week by the overwhelming number of positive affirmations and words of encouragement for Bonnie as she went through her hospital stay.   A number of our friends and family are agnostic or atheist and yet they had no hesitancy to say “We are praying for you!” which will make for interesting conversations at Thanksgiving!

Yet if God is God, then God is ever present and all-knowing in each and every moment, good or bad.   And as we learn from Jesus, if we cultivate the awareness that sense of spiritual connection can be with us anytime and anywhere. That is an essential message of Easter.  Not even death can separate us from the love of God.

If we don’t feel close to God, guess who moved?  If we are down, doubtful or exhausted, do something good for somebody else…take a moment to begin and end your day with a prayer, even a moment of holy silence…reach out to the community of those you trust and love and open up…and you will see God.  At the gas station, at the grocery store, at work or at home, God is with us.   All we need do is pay attention when given the opportunity of grace. 

Amen.

Aha! Embracing the God Moments: Family

 John 2:1-11

 April 17, 2016

 Mark S. Bollwinkel

                                                                                   

Dorothy Canfield Fisher once wrote, “A mother is not a person to lean on, but a person to make leaning unnecessary.”

            If that is the case then Mary did a great job with Jesus.

            No sooner was he twelve years old than he ran away while on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in order to stay in the Temple.  Unable to comprehend his parent’s concern or their demands to return home, he says, “But this is my father’s house” (Luke 2:48).

            (Do any of you know any young people who have a smart answer for everything?)

            In some ways it appears that Jesus and Mary struggled with each other during the course of his adult life.   Scholars suggest that Mary is widowed soon after Jesus begins his ministry as she moves in with her other children (Mark 6:3, Luke 8:19-21).  The fact that Jesus doesn’t take her into his household, a duty expected of an oldest son, may relate to their inability to understand each other.   Soon after Joseph’s death, Jesus’ siblings and his mother Mary come to see him in Galilee and Jesus dismisses them: 

While he was still speaking to the crowds, his mother and his brothers were standing outside, wanting to speak to him. ⁴⁷Someone told him, ‘Look, your mother and your brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.’^{* 48}But to the one who had told him this, Jesus^* replied, ‘Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?’ ⁴⁹And pointing to his disciples, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers! ⁵⁰For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother’ (Matthew 12:46-50, Mark 3:31-35, Luke 8:19-21).

             The tension that the gospel writers faced in presenting Jesus as both human and divine becomes evident in how they portray his relationship with his earthly mother, even when it comes to food.

Food and families seem to go together.   When families gather for the special holidays like Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas it’s all about the food.   For a birthday and an anniversary, the food is central.  There are special dishes made by your mother or a special dish made by your grandfather; these can be a great source of memories.  They are a source of love!  When a family member or friend makes your favorite cookies or prepares your favorite meal, its one of the ways they express their love and concern for you. 

That was certainly true in the family in which I grew up.  About the only time in the course of a day that we would all be together; me, my brother, two sisters and my mom, after dad got back home from work, would all have dinner together.   My mom was an indifferent cook.  She wasn’t excited about the domestic arts as a young woman.  She mastered about a dozen dishes that she did real well, very basic, simple things.  One advantage of such a system was that you could tell the day of the week by what she served for dinner.  On Thursday we would have Spam and yams, my dad’s favorite from his military service in the Pacific during WWII.  On Sunday afternoons we would always have pork roast, browned potatoes and sauerkraut.  It became like a sacrament; pork roast, browned potatoes and sauerkraut, my dad’s favorite meal.  I lived in that household for seventeen years.  And whenever I have pork roast, browned potatoes and sauerkraut I always think of those special Sundays when we’d get together, share the stories of the week, laugh together.

Food in my family was “love”.   It’s true for a lot of families.  The opposite is also true.   Food can be a bone of contention.  Food can become an agent of shame, for young people struggling with their weight as their parents are nagging about what they are eating or not eating.  Food choices can become battle grounds.  My aunt Ruth and my mom had a huge battle once over zucchini.  My brother and I refused to eat that strange green vegetable one time while visiting my aunt and uncle’s home in Lafayette, California. 

To make a long story short, it led to a big family harangue between my mom and my aunt.  They didn’t talk to each other for years!    Thanks be to God they found their way back to each other and enjoyed many years as good friends.   But zucchini ended up splitting them apart!  Food can be a blessing.  It can be a curse.  It really depends on what we do with it.  In our gospel lesson today, we learn that Jesus and his mother have a bone of contention about food and what to do with it at a wedding.

The miracle of Jesus turning water into wine is found only in the gospel of John.  In first century Palestine, wedding festivities usually lasted a week.  Those invited …especially if they were family…were expected to bring provisions such as food or drink to be shared by all.  The quality and quantity of the food or drink shared would then become a matter of pride and social status within the clan.   Such food hospitality may be Mary’s concern as she asks Jesus to do something when the wine runs out for the wedding.  His response to her request, “What concern is that to you and to me…woman”…is not necessary disrespectful although for 21^st century ears it can certainly seem like Jesus is perturbed by his mother. 

Regardless of the impression that the son and mother misunderstand each other there isn’t any argument.  Jesus obeys his mother’s request.  He instructs the servants to fill six stone jars with water and turns them into the best wine of the party (scholars suggest it could have been 15 to 25 gallons each jar!).

Food hospitality may have been Mary’s concern but Jesus’ concern was that such a display of his divinity was premature; he says, “My hour has not yet come” referring to his eventual death and resurrection (4:21, 7:30).  The miracle of changing water into wine at the wedding of Cana  is “the first of the signs” (also see 4:54, 2:23, 20:30) in the gospel of John revealing Jesus’ “glory” (:11) or the presence of God in Jesus’ life (Ex 16:10, 24:15-18, 29:43-46, 40:34-38, I Kings 8:10-11, Ps 26:8, 63:2, Ezek 11:22-23, 44:4). 

Whether as a sign of filial love and respect in sharing the costs of a wedding or a metaphysical sign of God’s glory indwelling in the Christ, the wine in our gospel lesson reminds us that the importance of food and drink in our families is all in how we use it.   It can be an extravagant gift for a special occasion.  It can be a means of nurturing love.  Or, as an example, as many of us know all-too-well, the mis-use of alcoholic beverages in our families can be the basis of terrible suffering and pain.

Confronting the Pharisees’ hypocrisy about Torah dietary laws, Jesus says, “It is not what we take into our mouths or our bodies that defiles us but what comes out of our mouths and bodies that make us unclean…” (Matthew 15:10-11, 17-20).  Alcohol is not an inherent evil in and of itself.  Rather it is how we use it that makes it a good or a bad.

Alcoholism is an illness.   Alcoholism is not a moral failure.  It is a disease.  Alcoholics are dependent not because they are bad people or lack will power. It affects all races, incomes levels, genders and nationalities.   It is an illness that affects not only its victim but the entire social system in which they relate.

 

For most people who drink, alcohol is a pleasant accompaniment to social activities. Moderate alcohol use, up to two drinks per day, is not harmful for most adults. Nonetheless… nearly 14 million Americans - one in every thirteen adults -abuse alcohol or are alcoholic. Several million more adults engage in risky drinking that could lead to alcohol problems. In addition, 53 percent of men and women in the United States report that one or more of their close relatives have a drinking problem.  (medicinenet.com)

One of the most insidious symptoms of this disease is the stigma it engenders that promotes deceit and falsehood.   If a person deals honestly with the disease the resources for recovery are enormous.   But the layers of dishonesty addicts wrap around themselves make the journey of recovery something begun most often as a last resort for survival.  The lying and deceptions used to maintain one’s dependency can ruin a life and those most important to that life.

As a pastor, when someone comes to me asking if they are an alcoholic I simply respond, “Can you tell the truth about your drinking?   Not to me.  Can you tell the truth about your drinking to yourself?”   The inability to be honest is one of the most devastating aspects of the disease and one of the prime indicators of its severity.   The family of the alcoholic is so often invested in the lie it is as if walking around an elephant in the living room that everyone pretends is not there.  

Many of us just don’t know what to say.   Blaming, shaming, threats and bribes are useless.  Al Anon, the twelve step support program for the families of alcoholics and those who love them teaches that the best thing we can do for our loved one is to be “safe, strong and free” ourselves.  About the only thing to be said to one with an addiction is, “Do you want help?”

[If you aren’t aware, we have an AA meeting here on church campus every Tuesday night at 7:00 p.m. and if you want to learn more about relating to your loved one with alcohol issues I strongly recommend that you attend one of the many Al Alon meetings in our area, you can find out their locations and meeting times on line.]

            One of the things I love about our Bible lesson today is that Mary is so honest with Jesus; “Jesus they have no wine….The servants will do whatever you ask them to do…”  Regardless of his theological concerns Jesus performs the miracle none-the-less.

In spite of apparent difficulties between Jesus and this mother during his three years of ministry, she traveled with the disciples and she was there at the cross.  Only a deep, parental love could have made Mary stand near a son who was being crucified as an enemy of the state.  Most of his disciples weren’t there.  Jesus’ brothers weren’t there.  But Mary stood by him in the last hours. 

Just as he dies, looking down from the cross, he asks the disciple John to care for his mother after he is gone.  At the end of Jesus’ life, all that mattered between them was the love between a son and his mother (John 19:25-27).

            If you know or you’ve known a parent’s love, give thanks to God not just today but everyday.   If you didn’t but found such love and acceptance in other healthy relationships, give thanks to God too, for such relationships are just as much our family as those who brought us into the world.    Parental care and nurture, biological or not, is one of the places where God is at work in the world, a place full of Easter resurrection “aha!” moments of divine incarnation. 

And may our prayer be that the food and drink we share in such community is a celebration reminding us of the miracle of love, overflowing and abundant.

Amen.