Joseph and the Election

Joseph of Arimathaea and the Election

“He was a good and righteous man… and had not agreed to their plan and action. He came from the Jewish town of Arimathaea and he was waiting expectantly for the kingdom of God.” Luke 23:50-56

Matthew D Garrett

As we read this, all of us will know most of the results of this midterm election. Our prayers should be with those who win the election, for those who lose, and for those who voted for both of them.

For some reason I am hoping to remember Joseph of Arimathaea after this election. “He was a good and righteous man… and had not agreed to their plan and action. He came from the Jewish town of Arimathaea and he was waiting expectantly for the kingdom of God.” That’s us!! I think we all are waiting expectantly for the kingdom of God and are hoping to find some part of it in all the people we voted for. We have much in common with Joseph of Arimathaea.

“He did not agree to their plan and action.” But what did he do about it? Did he speak up for Jesus? There is no record that anyone testified on Jesus’ behalf at his mock trial. We have sometimes been like Joseph of Arimathaea. At times we see injustice and wrongdoings in the lives of others and ourselves, but we do not speak up against them. We fear what might happen to us. We fear the consequences of speaking out. We fear what we do or say might be offensive and hurt someone, or heaven forbid, we would become unpopular. We fear that our voice will not make a difference.

But then a transformation occurs in Joseph, what we might call, a moment of clarity. Joseph personally goes to Pilate. What bravery. He asks for Jesus’ body, personally and compassionately takes the nails out of Jesus’ hands and feet, washes off the blood from his head, his hands his feet, his side, his back, wraps the body in a linen cloth and lays Jesus presumably in his own tomb.

Are we Joseph of Arimathaea? Is there a point where we can no longer live our lives only concerned about our own well-being, concerned about the issues that only affect us? We no longer pretend to go along with the old crowd inside and outside of ourselves. We look to our inner core values and speak our truth and act on it. This certainly happens for people in recovery from addictions as well as for spiritual friends seeking a deeper connection to God.

This also may be how we experienced voting yesterday. No matter the results of the election, we voted and let our voice be heard. We took a stand. For many of us, like Joseph, it was only a beginning.

Think about it. We who are gathered today through the internet know what it is like to be Joseph of Arimathea.

I believe there is a Joseph of Arimathaea inside each of us, finally making a stand, changing the way we have been relating to ourselves, to God, and to the world, speaking out with love and compassion, becoming concerned for the plight of others.

Remember the quiet, compassionate, loving courage of Joseph of Arimathea that is in each of us, the courage to change, the courage to bring healing to ourselves and others, and now the courage to bring compassionate healing to our country especially in the days ahead.

Joseph provided the tomb for resurrection to take place. That is now our job. We have learned about resurrection and compassion through spiritual friends and in the thin places where we worship. We are called now to be that same vessel for compassion and resurrection outside in the world today where compassion is so desperately needed in our divided world, perhaps even more now than before the election.

Let us be that place for healing and resurrection.

Joanna joannaseibert.com

Election Day

Election Day

“For an Election

Almighty God, to whom we must account for all our powers

and privileges: Guide the people of the United States in the election of a president and other officials and representatives;

that, by faithful administration and wise laws, the rights of

all may be protected and our nation be enabled to fulfill your

purposes; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” Book of Common Prayer, p. 822.

It is hard not to think about the election today. I remember all those who are running for office, some I know personally. I have looked through a small window to see what a great sacrifice it has been for some of them. It has been a sacrifice for their family, for their bodies, for their minds, for their hearts, and for their spirits.

How difficult it must be for candidates to stay with their core values through the whole experience. How hard it must be to stay truthful. We see this at every turn. We hear people saying things they did and will do after the election which we know did not happen and that they will never allow to happen.

That is a great price to pay to win, to lose your integrity. More than any other people, politicians may be susceptible to bribes coming in the form of people with deep pockets who offer money so that they will support their programs or businesses. Winning becomes so expensive or so important that all other values go to the wayside. May this be a lesson for all of us in our own lives as we are tempted to compromise in order to reach a goal.

Our Daughters of the King will be praying in St. Mark’s chapel all day while the polls are open for those running for office today, all of them. They all so need our prayers. We give thanks for their courage to stand up and try to make a difference in this world, often at great sacrifice.

We pray for all of us that we will be able to accept the results of the election and continue to pray for those who did not win and those who did.

We also must pray that all who are elected to office will be able to keep their core values and become the people they say they are and the people God created them to be.

While we are at it, let us pray the same prayer for ourselves.

Joanna. Joannaseibert.com

Heaven

Heaven

There’s something real about the communication between this world and the world to come, a kind of communion between saints and souls and sinners that spans the gulf of time. It is not just we who are praying, but we are being prayed for by a great cloud of heroic wit­nesses, some of whom, I believe, are attracted to us, who have our name and have our number and who remember us. It’s a wonderful thing to be remembered. I think we are. Br. Curtis Almquist, Society of Saint John the Evangelist, ssje.org, Brother Give us a Word

I have been rereading Heaven, a book edited by Roger Ferlo, where twenty-five well known spiritual writers write about some of their ideas about heaven. I bought it over ten years ago when I was preaching at more funerals and spending more and more time with people who were grieving. Heaven is almost always a question about which all will eventually ask.

Barbara Crafton writes that perhaps we will be with our loved ones in heaven and suddenly realize that they never left us. Nora Gallagher talks about a difficult parent who was dying and how they eventually find love and peace shortly before she dies. She begins to see her mother’s life from a different perspective. She finally reaches a place where she does not describe her mother as someone who “tortured” her, but that her mother led a “tortured life.”

Alan Jones describes heaven being already all around us. Heaven is a “code” word for the presence of God in our midst. Michael Battle discusses how we are to practice how to show love the way God does in preparation for heaven. “We are to practice heaven.” Barbara Brown Taylor writes that her sense of the communion of saints is so strong that she has never felt alone.

Kathleen Staudt writes about times at prayers when she imagines being in the presence of all those, living and dead, who have been spiritual mentors and friends to her. Maggie Ross writes that heaven appears to her when she is not looking for heaven.

Benjamin Morse humorously writes that pets will be in heaven but they will not chew “on the upholstery.”

Of course, none of us knows what heaven is like, but our promise is that God will be with us throughout all eternity. We know we have a God of love. We have that promise that God and love will always be with us.

Joanna joannaseibert.com