Easter Vigil
March 22, 2008
Rev. Jennie M. Anderson

Lord, make us stewards of ourselves, that we may be servants of others, Take my words and speak through them, take our minds and think through them, take our hearts and set them on fire, for Jesus' sake. Amen.

Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.

Why do you weigh out your money for something that is not (bread) nourishment, and the fruit of your labor for that which does not satisfy? Just listen to me and eat something good, so that your soul may feast on (fat) rich food.

It is through our weakness, darkness and even our death that we come together and form a community in Christ.

So what is this all about? Sometimes we come to a big party just to help celebrate and it's not so important to understand what the celebration is all about (ever crashed a wedding or slipped into a concert?). But tonight, we need to know as much as we can about this celebration. Christ is risen. He's not here and at the same time, he will never leave us. It's not really clear what that's all about "really." In Christ's time, as we'll read about in the gospel in a few moments, and even and especially in the time of the Israelites' exile into Babylon, they knew very well what death looked like. It was a stillness, a place where there is no life left in that body. Sometimes a profound sleep can resemble death but after three days?..., there is no mistaking death. It is not pretty but it is required that we care for our dead. It has something to do with our life that we care for our dead. We can understand what it is to live a life with out God, when we know death up close and personal. To be weak, to be unable to contribute very much to the community, to make a big mistake, what is that feeling about? To be so weak takes great courage! In her poem about that very thing, courage, Anne Sexton wrote:

"Courage"
By Anne Sexton

It is in the small things we see it.
The child's first step,
as awesome as an earthquake.
The first time you rode a bike,
wallowing up the sidewalk.
The first spanking when your heart
went on a journey all alone.
When they called you crybaby
or poor or fatty or crazy
and made you into an alien,
you drank their acid
and concealed it.

Later,
if you faced the death of bombs and bullets
you did not do it with a banner,
you did it with only a hat to
cover your heart.
You did not fondle the weakness inside you
though it was there.
Your courage was a small coal
that you kept swallowing.
If your buddy saved you
and died himself in so doing,
then his courage was not courage,
it was love; love as simple as shaving soap.

Later,
if you have endured a great despair,
then you did it alone,
getting a transfusion from the fire,
picking the scabs off your heart,
then wringing it out like a sock.
Next, my kinsman, you powdered your sorrow,
you gave it a back rub
and then you covered it with a blanket
and after it had slept a while
it woke to the wings of the roses
and was transformed.

Later,
when you face old age and its natural conclusion
your courage will still be shown in the little ways,
each spring will be a sword you'll sharpen,
those you love will live in a fever of love,
and you'll bargain with the calendar
and at the last moment
when death opens the back door
you'll put on your carpet slippers
and stride out.

Why do you weigh out your money for something that is not (bread) nourishment, and the fruit of your labor for that which does not satisfy? Just listen to me and eat something good, so that your soul may feast on (fat) rich food.

Well, when we go through something dreadful, don't we really know and appreciate those who have remained with us in our time of dismay and loneliness? I make mistakes all the time. I'm really rather good at making mistakes. I was meeting with the chaplaincy group, five 18 to 19 year old college students from Framingham State College, and a group of homeless veterans in Brooklyn, NY this past Tuesday. We were listening to the veterans tell us about how hard it is to be homeless and how hopeless it is to be addicted, homeless and alone. Yet when I wanted to emphasize how difficult it can be working with the actively addicted, I said something about how unworthy, worthless, not fit for, contemptible and shameful those people were! Well, that's not what I meant at all but that's what came out of my mouth. You might imagine how that was taken! Well, it was not taken very well at all. I finally had a moment in amongst the objections and general hubbub that my comments caused, filled with grace, when I could hear what I said and then work hard to say what I really meant. That it's the crazy and often dangerous behaviors that make it so difficult, not the people, but the active addiction! It's not always easy to separate people from their behaviors but that's what we must do sometimes. And yet in this case, the damage was done, the mistake was made and the words couldn't be vanished. Yet, after working so hard to make amends for my mistake, there developed a quality of closeness between us that may not have been there had I not made the blunder in the first place. By making an honest mistake and being vulnerable to these homeless veterans, they gave me an opportunity to be loved and forgiven by them.

Why do you weigh out your money for something that is not (bread) nourishment, and the fruit of your labor for that which does not satisfy? Just listen to me and eat something good, so that your soul may feast on (fat) rich food.

So, in our culture, we are seldom rewarded for our iniquities, our shortcomings. Instead we are celebrated by our wealth, our charisma, our attractiveness, our positions of power and even simply our work (we are in New England after all). These are what our culture celebrates. It's no wonder that the prophets like Isaiah were all but ignored. How can they compete with the power of our culture? Well, I say we must hear Isaiah even today.

In the daily meditations sent out by the Henry Nouwen Society on Tuesday, that very day of my latest big mistake, the words of the meditation were:

Coming together in poverty: There are many forms of poverty: economic poverty, physical poverty, emotional poverty, mental poverty, and spiritual poverty. As long as we relate to each other's wealth, health, stability, intelligence, and soul strength, we cannot develop true community. Community is not a talent show in which we dazzle the world with our combined gifts. Community is the place where our poverty is acknowledged and accepted, not as something we have to learn to cope with as best as we can but as true source of new life.

Living community in whatever form - family, parish, twelve-step program, or intentional community - challenges us to come together at the place of our poverty, believing that there we can reveal our richness.

There are many groups and organizations that come together around wealth and prestige. This isn't always a bad thing and yet I find where true community is formed, is where our poverty is. I have been so blessed to participate in many of these communities. In my family and their environs, I have helped my brother and his kids celebrate their skill at the swimming pool at the Essex County club; I have helped my father to die. I have helped my younger brother and his kids while he has gone in and out of treatment facilities for over 25 years; I have helped my son to face incarceration. I have helped my mother to settle into the "watch the yachts try and fit through the eye of the needle" Naples, FL area for her retirement; I have helped the farm-workers in that same Collier County fight for fair wages (a penny more per pound of tomatoes picked!). I have taught third grade at the well-to-do (by the standards of Honduras) bilingual, Episcopal School in Tela, Honduras, and I have worked with poor communities even by their standards in the mountains of that same country.

Why do you weigh out your money for something that is not (bread) nourishment, and the fruit of your labor for that which does not satisfy? Just listen to me and eat something good, so that your soul may feast on (fat) rich food.

This business of our wealth, power and importance is not a simple one. We are called to be a community. How we share in our wealth and in our iniquities is how we share our love for one another. How we listen to each other and hear the pains and joys of our connections is how we eat what is good. How we come together and laugh and cry over the life and death of our members is how we delight ourselves in rich food or fat. How we reach out to our friends in our times of crisis, isolation, loneliness and inadequacy; our grand celebrations, festivals our gleeful and joyous moments, these reflect our community in Christ and our community here at the Church of St Andrews. I am grateful to be welcomed into such a generous community as this. I look forward to so many good meals and joyous moments with this wonderful community.

Why do you weigh out your money for something that is not (bread) nourishment, and the fruit of your labor for that which does not satisfy? Just listen to me and eat something good, so that your soul may feast on (fat) rich food.

Amen.