Christmas 1, John's Christmas Pageant, John 1:1-18, Saint Mark's Episcopal Church, Little Rock

Christmas 1 December 31, 2023, John’s Christmas Pageant, John 1:1-18, Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church, Little Rock

 Growing up in Tidewater Virginia, the custom was decorating homes at Christmas with a single, lighted, electric candle in each window. The Virginia tradition goes back to colonial times when candles were necessary to light pathways to homes on dark winter nights./ From an early age, I also loved Christmas pageants. I think it is in our family’s DNA, for when our grandchildren were young, the oldest would write a Christmas pageant where all participated, delightfully costumed. I have pictures if any are interested.//

Christmas pageants are icons of God’s love. No matter how the children act, whether they remember their lines, pick up cues, or drop props,/ we are delighted, grateful, and full of compassion and encouragement to see the wonder and light in their eyes.1 I still feel the electricity in the air in this place from Christmas Eve one week ago at the packed children’s pageant. Stop for a second./ Can you feel something different around you? //

Today, we hear John’s Christmas story. It, too, is all about love, but is markedly different from Luke or Matthew. No angels, sheep, shepherds, wise men. Not even Mary or Joseph. A Christmas pageant based on John’s story has a single child holding a lone candle in front of a dark curtain, saying one line, “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and the darkness did not overcome it.” That child then leads the congregation out to the hymn, I want to walk as a child as a light. The dismissal secretly concludes with, “Go in the name of Christ… to an early Christmas Eve dinner.”//

More often, we hear John’s Christmas story when children go off script in traditional pageants. My favorite is when Mary and Joseph approach the innkeeper, asking for a room. The sensitive teenager playing the innkeeper’s wife opens the door and spies the pregnant Mary, obviously in early labor pains. She throws down her script/ and shouts, “Of course,/ come on in. We have lots of room for everyone,/ especially for pregnant mothers.”/ The astonished director is forced abruptly to end the pageant and invites a surprised Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus, and the compassionate innkeeper to lead haloed angels with magic wands, sheep, stuffed animals, bath-robed shepherds, drummers, and jeweled gifts along with the congregation out into the winter night singing Love Came Down at Christmas. Again,/ to an early Christmas Eve dinner.

Frederick Buechner describes another pageant at an Episcopal church.2 The manger is in front of the chancel steps. Mary wears a blue mantle, and Joseph has a cotton beard. The wise men are there with a handful of shepherds; the Christ child lies deep in the straw in the manger. The rector reads the nativity story as carols are sung at the appropriate places. All goes like clockwork until the arrival of the angels of the heavenly host, children of the congregation robed in white,/ scattered throughout the nave with their parents.

They all gather around the manger and say, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill among men.” But, there are so many angels crowding and jockeying for position/ that one of the smallest nine-year-old angels ends so far on the fringes that/ not even by craning her neck and standing on tiptoe can she see the Christ child. She has been waiting all Advent to see baby Jesus. “Glory to God in the highest,” the angels sing on cue. Then/ in the momentary pause that follows,/ the small girl electrifies the entire church by crying out in a voice shrill with irritation, frustration, and enormous sadness at having her view blocked, “Show me Jesus! Where is Jesus? I can’t see Jesus. Show him to me!”

Much pageant is still to come, but Buechner’s friend says one of the best things she ever did was ending everything precisely there. “Show me Jesus!” the child cries out again, and while the congregation sits in stunned silence, the rector intuitively pronounces the benediction. The crowd processes out of the church, singing, Hark! The Herald Angels Sing with those unforgettable words ringing in their ears. “Show me Jesus!”//

We also gather today because we, like that tiny angel, have heard John’s Christmas story of how lives have changed for over twenty centuries by the light in the darkness that now “lives among us.” We are like the Greeks later in John, who approach Phillip, saying, “We would like to see Jesus.” We long to come closer to see that light from the “word that became flesh,” but the mess in our lives and the world seems to block us from that view./

In another town, a third pageant begins.3 The second and third graders are animals making unusually realistic creature sounds. The new pageant director fails to realize the preparation time to dress/ and fix the hair/ of the heavenly host, who are thirty-two angels between ages two and four. It is a rough night in Bethlehem. Mary is sick, and the bucket near the manger is for her. Joseph may be a “righteous man, unwilling to expose Mary to public disgrace,” but he is thirteen/ and decides not to enjoy this pageant. When the mooing, barking, meowing, and baaing animals arrive behind the shepherds, all hope of heavenly peace vanishes. The animals take over the whole chancel and elevate “lowing”2 to a new cacophonous art form. The angels miss their cue and arrive long after the wise men, after the congregation sings Angels We Have Heard on High,/ and after the teenaged narrator says four times, “and suddenly there was with the angels a multitude of the heavenly host.” /But when the angels finally arrive, they look good: their halos and hair are perfect./

Right before everyone sings, Joy to the world! the narrator fights to center stage for his last line. He walks over an abundance of sheep, cows, dogs, cats, and one mouse. The angels’ parents ignore the narrator, making up for lost picture-taking time, entirely disregarding the no-flash photography request.

Mary reaches for the bucket, and Joseph has rolled his eyes so many times that they are about to fall out of his head. Our star narrator has to shout over the barnyard noise,/ and never gets the parents’ attention. /Exasperated, he throws down his folder,/ stretches out his arms,/ and yells, “Christ was born for this??”4 The exhausted pageant director cries out, “It is an exclamation point, not a question mark!”/ //

BUT, INDEED, Christ was born for this, IN ALL OUR MESS… “The word did become flesh, and lives among us.”/

Some days, the birth of Christ does feel like a question mark. Underneath the surface of our lives that look so good on the outside live hidden, secret, hemorrhaging, fractured relationships. We long to see Jesus’ love, peace, and light in our darkness. That scared inner child in each of us cries out,/ “Show me Jesus!”.//////

The child holding a single candle in John’s Christmas pageant says, “Here is the light we have been waiting for,/ the very presence of God living among us,/ inside us,/ beside us,/ and at this table.” That light of Christ miraculously enters our wounds and our messy world. The light heals us daily through neighbors,/ friends/ and this community gathered today/ if only we open our eyes and hearts to see this light already in each other, ourselves, and at this table.

God sees all of us as participants in this messy Christmas pageant we live in daily, and God dearly loves each of us, just as we love the children in last week’s pageant. God loves us no matter how well we remember our lines, sing our solos, or keep from knocking down the scenery. 

In our rich and messy pageant of life, we are called to remember and keep looking for that light from that single candle/ held by a child in John’s Christmas pageant/ proclaiming that the light can always overcome our darkness. Keep looking for that light, open to all of us,/ here at this table, in ourselves, our neighbor, our children, and the stranger. Hold John’s Christmas story in your heart, where we learn that “the word became flesh”/ and now dwells among our messiness.… “Christ was born for this!”

1 Br. Curtis Almquist, Society of Saint John the Evangelist

2 Frederick Buechner, Secrets in the Dark A Life in Sermons, (Harper Sanfrancisco 2006) p. 268.

3David Davis, “A Kingdom we can Taste,” Sermons for the Church Year. pp. 25-30.

4“Good Christian Friends,” The Hymnal 1982.107.

Joanna Seibert   joannaseibert.com

Feast Day of Saint Nicholas

Feast of St. Nicholas

St. Mark’s 12-step Eucharist, December 6, 2023

If you have been at this 12-step Eucharist in December, you have heard a homily about St. Nikolas. I apologize, because you are going to hear about him again. I am powerless over St. Nikolas. He has become a significant figure in my life. It is possible that in December, I replace my addiction to alcohol with an addiction to St. Nikolas. 

Little is known about Nicholas, bishop of Myra, who lived in Asia Minor around 342. He was probably at the Council of Nicaea in 325. He is the patron of seafarers, sailors, and especially children. As a bearer of gifts to children, his name was brought to America by the Dutch colonists in New York, where he soon became known as Santa Claus.

The feast day of St. Nicholas, today, December 6th, was celebrated in our family as a major holiday. We began with a big family meal together. My husband dressed up as Bishop Nicholas with a beard, a miter, a crozier, and a long red stole, and came to visit our grandchildren after dinner. He spoke Greek to the children and the adults. Speaking Greek is my husband’s favorite pastime, and of course, you know that Nikolas is Greek. Our grandchildren then went into the bedrooms and left their shoes outside the doors, and Bishop Nicholas placed chocolate coins and presents in their shoes. If you want to see our pictures of this family event, they are stunning.//

Why am I sharing with you our family story? Yearly, I remember how I sat and watched this pageant and was filled with so much gratitude, for my sobriety date is close to the feast day of St. Nicholas. Each year, I remember that if someone had not led me to recovery, I would not be alive tonight. I would not have witnessed this wonderful blessing of seeing my children and grandchildren giggle with glee as they tried to respond to a beautiful older man with a fake beard speaking Greek to them/ and secretly giving them candy in their shoes. For me, it is a yearly reminder to keep working the 12 steps, so I can be around to remember and treasure the next feast day of St. Nicholas./

This is a suggestion. Look at the calendar of saints. Find one close to your sobriety date or an important event in your life. Learn about that saint. Observe that saint’s day in your home, in your life. You might consider that saint as your patron saint.

This is simply one more way to remember how our sobriety has transformed our lives. Spend that saint’s day giving thanks for those before us,/ who loved us before we were born,/ developing a program before we were born to save our lives. This love only comes from the love of the God of our understanding. My hope is that we will all pay this love forward, giving back God’s love to a world so desperately needing it.

A secret./ St. Nikolas may make an appearance Sunday night at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Little Rock, at the Christingle Service at 5 pm on December 17.

Joanna joannaseibert.com

Wicked Tenants 22A Mathew 21:33-46 Saint Mark's Episcopal Church, Little Rock, October 8, 2023, 5 p. m.

Wicked Tenants 22A Mathew 21:33-46  Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church, Little Rock, October 8,  2023 5 o’clock

Jesus’ parable of the wicked tenant farmers is more like an allegory, with its meaning barely hidden. It is a good story from the viewpoint of the landowner. But let’s listen to another version. A wealthy farmer from Texas buys an abandoned apple orchard in Searcy, Arkansas. He prunes the trees, fertilizes them, and fixes the sales stand with a new hand-painted sign on Highway 67. He leases the place to a local family for less than market value, with the understanding they will return ten percent of the apples. With no business experience and high hopes of owning their place someday, the tenants agree and seal the deal with a handshake. The wealthy landowner gets into his black Hummer and drives back to Texas.

The tenants love the place like it is their own. They tend the trees from dawn to long after dark. They use organic pesticides. They haul water by hand during the summer drought, and when the first frost is predicted before the apples are ripe, they build small fires throughout the orchard and stoke them all night.

Come October, the air smells of applesauce. The trees are so heavy with fruit that they look like Victorian ladies wearing too much jewelry. A Little Rock cousin designs a web page advertising their homegrown Arkansas beauties. The harvest must be done quickly, so they work in shifts, some half-sleeping while others pick. Seventy-two hours later, mountains of apples rise from the wooden bins in the sales shed: Golden Delicious, Winesap, Arkansas Black, and most especially, Fuji.

Exhausted, the tenants admire the fruits of their labor when they hear gravel crunching under tires behind them, and turn to see an eighteen-wheeler with Texas plates backing into the shed. Two big men with bulging biceps start loading apples into the truck. When one of the tenants attempts to negotiate the ten percent business, the big guys pick him up and set him out of the way.

So, one of the tenants cranks up the Bobcat, while the others get out pitchforks and pruning hooks, and soon, they have persuaded the landowner’s men to return to Texas empty-handed.///

You know the tenants are wrong. It is not THEIR orchard. They have made a deal. The vineyard owner deserves his share of the produce, but the story does not sit right. Maybe because no one likes absentee landlords. Perhaps we have relatives who were sharecroppers, and we know how hard that life is: making someone else’s profit.

This is not the American way. From the beginning, this country has fueled the dreams of disenfranchised people from all over the world who have come looking for their own small piece of paradise.

This is the American way: owning our own home on our own land. Most of us believe in ownership, autonomy, and self-reliance. We do not like following someone else’s agenda.

Barbara Brown Taylor tells us if we believe Jesus’ parable,/ the American values are not the kingdom’s values. Ownership of the vineyard is NOT the issue. It is NOT for sale and NEVER will be. The owner is not looking for BUYERS; he is looking for tenants, RENTERS, who will give him his share of the produce at harvest time, which means the real issue is stewardship, a word that puts us on the defensive because it challenges our sense of ownership.

We worked hard for what we have. We have deeds, titles, and fence lines to prove it. We have registered land plots, mortgage payment books, and tax bills with our names on them. Getting these things was difficult, and keeping them requires financial courage. But according to this evening’s parable, we are simply deluding ourselves.

Our ancestors became divine tenants so long ago that we forgot the circumstances. Somewhere, someone misplaces the tenant’s agreement and writes up a deed instead.

The landowner is surprisingly easy to handle. When he sends messengers to remind the tenants of their agreement, it only takes a little burst of violence, and those still alive run away empty-handed. The owner could send the police or recruit his own army. He could return violence for violence, but he does not. He keeps sending messengers, pleading with the tenants to come to their senses and honor their agreement.

Finally, when there are rows of unmarked graves of messengers outside the vineyard walls, the owner sends his son, unaccompanied, unarmed, to teach the tenants things they have forgotten. He reminds us that ownership is a game we are playing, that we are guests on the earth, not rulers.

 This is good news! Being guests relieves us of responsibilities we are not equipped to handle,/ like numbering the hairs of our head/ or speaking out of a whirlwind to command the eagles to mount up and make their nests on high/ or to bring rain on land where no one lives,/ or knowing when the mountain goats give birth.

 As guests, we have free access to far more than we could ever earn. Instead of a vineyard full of one-acre tracts divided by barbed wire, we have acres and acres at our disposal, not to own but to use and enjoy through the owner’s generosity. All he asks is that we care for it, “this fragile earth, our island home,” and that we give back to God a portion of what we produce,/ not because God needs it,/ for he always turns around and gives it away,// not because God needs it,/ but because we need it. We need to give so we remember who we are: grateful guests. We are to take our lives like wrapped and ribboned gifts to return the favor by giving ourselves away to others.

The tenants kill the son, but he does not stay dead,/ and to this day, he walks the vineyard, reminding us that we are God’s guests, welcome on this earth as long as we remember whose it is/ and how it is to be used. We can love it as our own. We can even will pieces of it to our children, naming them our successors in the stewardship of the vineyard. //

We are God’s sharecroppers. We tend to the earth and its riches on someone else’s behalf. We are expected to represent God’s interests, being as generous with each other as God is with us. We are not owners. /This is not the American way, but it is the kingdom way, A NEW THING,// and I will tell you something:// the harvest will take your breath away.

Barbara Brown Taylor, “God’s Sharecroppers,” Gospel Medicine, pp. 96-100.

Mary W. Anderson, “Reflections on the Lectionary,” Christian Century, September 23, 2008.

12-Step Eucharist 21A Yes and No Brothers Matthew 21:23-32

Yes and No brothers Matthew 21:23-32 Proper 21A

12-step Eucharist St. Mark’s October 4, 2023

Today’s parable hits home. Jesus talks about the times we say we are going to do something, change our minds, and do not do it. Anyone in 12-step recovery can identify with this situation. We have an awareness of our addiction, whether it is, drugs, alcohol, tobacco, shopping, gambling, work, or relationships. Each morning we wake up and say “This is a new day. We will stop using or drinking or smoking. We are going to seek help from a recovery group or counselor. We will never use or drink or smoke again.” Usually by early or late afternoon, we have forgotten this promise and are back to our old ways. This is the brother in today’s story who says “yes” in the morning, but by late afternoon does not change.

It is so easy to get our thoughts mixed up with actions. Each of us is aware of at least ten people who deeply love their families, but for various reasons spend very little time with them. We passionately believe in protecting the environment, but we do not practice recycling and drive cars that get less than ten miles to the gallon.

I remember the year I decided to simplify my life. I have a whole bookcase full of books I read about making my life simpler, taking care of the environment, and returning to Walden Pond. At the end of the year, I had only made one change in my life. I stopped using paper towels… and that only lasted for a year. It is a peculiar thing, this vacuum between what we think and what we actually do. We say we are going to work in the vineyard, but instead of harvesting the grapes, we spend our time rearranging the stones along the path.

Whether we say yes or no to the changes God calls us to make in our lives is apparently less important to God than what we actually do. The important thing is what our lives say, and this is as easy to figure out as the story of the Yes and No brothers. Jesus asks us to look into the mirror. What is moving? Our mouths… or our hands and our feet?

Barbara Brown Taylor, “The Yes and No Brothers,” Home By Another Way, pp. 187-191.  

19A Forgiveness Matthew 18:21-35, Saint Mark's Episcopal Church, Little Rock, September 17, 2023 5 o'clock

19A Forgiveness Matthew 18:21-35, September 17, 2023, 5 o’clock, Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church, Little Rock

 Nelson Mandela was imprisoned in South Africa’s most brutal prisons for 27 years. He was released in 1990 in response to international pressure and fear of racial civil war. His first words were about forgiveness and reconciliation. He repeatedly said, “Unless I can forgive those who imprisoned me, I am still in prison.” I am still in prison. Forgiveness is a condition of the mind and heart.

Today, Jesus talks about forgiveness and the kingdom of heaven. We begin to wonder if the kingdom is not a PLACE but a CONDITION, like forgiveness and love.

Howard Thurman writes, “The religion of Jesus says ‘..Love your enemies…’ It may be hazardous, but we must do it.”

Jesus warns us that forgiveness is not an option. Mathew’s comment of “being handed over to be tortured” is the life we lead if we cannot forgive. The people we cannot forgive, including ourselves, pile up in an ugly place in our minds and hearts that blocks us from loving God,/ each other,/ and /ourselves. We start thinking about those who have harmed us more often,/ or sometimes all the time until they become our higher power. I have a great deal of personal experience with this. I don’t want them to become what I obsess about continually. Unless we can forgive, those who have harmed us are still hurting us. This is when I often start on the difficult road of forgiveness. Mandela also said being unable to forgive is like “drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.” Resentments about the harm done to us poison our minds, hearts, and souls. We don’t have an option if we seek a life of peace and love.

Bishop Tutu and his daughter have written a book about Forgiving. The path starts with telling our story. Then, we try to name the hurt that the harm to us caused. For me, the hurt often is my pride that is hurt. Sometimes, it is physical and mental abuse. We often get stuck between telling our story and naming the hurt. We keep telling our story over and over. We stay a victim. I know you have known other people, or even yourself, who talk about harm done to them years ago. This is being stuck.

 After naming the hurt, we can start on the path to forgiveness. There are numerous rituals we can do to start forgiving. Tutu talks about carrying a stone in our dominant hand for some time. We soon realize how not forgiving impairs our basic daily living.

Richard Rohr1 teaches us basic lessons about how to forgive. It involves seeing the Christ—God in the person we are forgiving—as well as seeing God or Christ in ourselves. That makes sense. But then Rohr throws in this third condition. We must change our concept of God. God is no longer a hall monitor, handing out detention slips, checking a list, looking at our every action, and judging whether our neighbors and we behave correctly. He calls us to enlarge our concept of God to a God of love.

How do we do this?

First, we place ourselves in a community, like this one today, with others who seem to experience God’s love. Second, we observe how they know how to forgive others.

As we see the Christ in others who know love, the God of love, the Christ in us awakens—and slowly, often very slowly, we also begin to see the Christ in those who have harmed us. We may discover that personal tragedies have brought them to the place of hurting others. This awareness starts as we pray daily, sometimes hourly, for the person who has harmed us. We realize we are still carrying around a heavy load of resentment, which makes it so challenging to live and walk on our journey through life. It is like a cancer, destroying the joy in our lives a little each day. That person is still hurting us. They are becoming our higher power, our God. ///

Father Keating’s Contemplative Outreach group has several meditations that have helped me. I want to share one of them with you. But before we start, I must remind you and me that this is not a one-time thing. You do it daily, if necessary, until God changes your heart. Another reminder is that we think we are over this, and the hurt done to us raises its ugly head when we least expect it. We simply pick ourselves up and meditate again. The harm done to us is powerful. It is usually easier the second, third, or more times around. Soon, we simply get tired of carrying this heavy burden and surrender,/ and God changes us.

Another reminder: some people have harmed us that are toxic, and we must never be in a relationship with them again, but we still must forgive them.//

So here is the Forgiveness Prayer. You may sit and practice it with me in our last minutes together.

“Begin with a period of Centering Prayer.2

 Following this, spend a few moments in silence.  

Close your eyes and gently ground yourself in your body; 

scan your body with your inner eye and relax each part of your body. . .  

Rest in the area of your chest near your heart. https://www.contemplativeoutreach.org/

Breathe.

 Focus on your heart and allow your heart to open.

Imagine you are in a sacred space. Where is your most sacred space?

Gently allow the Spirit to lead you through a passageway that is filled with light, warmth, and a welcoming presence.

Breathe the light of the Spirit into your heart, inviting God, Jesus, Holy Spirit into that space to sit beside you.

Invite the Holy Spirit to bring forth a person, living or dead, whom you need to forgive.  

 Or, invite the Holy Spirit to support you as you call to mind a person that you wish to forgive.

Remain open to whoever appears in your sacred place.  

 Greet the person by name.

Share your experience of being in relationship with this person; share how you have been hurt, offended, or traumatized.

 Be specific.

 Allow yourself to share your pain with this person.

 Relax in the process and remain open.

When you feel ready, tell the person that you forgive them.

 Gently say ‘I forgive you. I forgive you. I forgive you.’

 Repeat as many times as needed until you feel ready to continue the process.

Now ask the person how you have offended, traumatized, or hurt them.

 Wait and listen.  Remain open to the process.

When you feel ready, gently say, ‘Forgive me. Forgive me. Forgive me.’

 Repeat as many times as needed until you feel complete in the process for now.

Observe your thoughts, feelings, and emotions.  Just be present with them.

 Allow the person to leave your sacred, safe place.

 Invite the person to return at a later time if needed.

Rest in the Spirit.

Take as much time in silence as you wish.

Prepare to leave your sacred place.

Move out of the sacred place . . . through the door into the passageway . . . grounded in your body.

Gently open your eyes when you feel ready.

 Close with a prayer.”

Again, this is not a one-time event but may require many encounters.

The Forgiveness Prayer is especially beneficial when the person who harmed us refuses to discuss it. The Prayer allows us to speak to that person in a safe place where we cannot be hurt again, but also to acknowledge mistakes we made as well.

We are then asked to pray daily for the person who has harmed us until we are ready to forgive. I have people who have injured me whom I have been praying for/ for some time. It is not easy, but we have no other option. As we pray daily for that person, they may never change, but my experience is God will always, always change us.

1.  Adapted from Richard Rohr’s Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media, 2008), pp. 193-194.

2.  Mary Dwyer Contemplative Outreach. https://www.contemplativeoutreach.org/

Joanna Seibert.