Category: Sermons

Sermon Delivered at Church of the Good Shepherd
Fort Lee, New Jersey
Sunday, February 13, 2022, at 8:00 & 10 a.m.
By the Rev. Stephen C. Galleher

Friendship and Living in the Light

“Blessed are those who trust in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. They shall be like a tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream” (Jeremiah 17:7-8)

A fellow clergyman and I were talking about the delivery of sermons, and he felt strongly that each meditation should begin on a positive note. I swallowed hard and shaded my eyes because you who know me know I often start with a mini-rant about something in the scripture reading that annoys me. This is indeed perhaps a bad habit. I say “perhaps,” because I am assuming you, too, may be startled or put off by some of the stronger passages about hell or about God’s severe judgment on the wicked. I just do not sit well with a God who promises to be more severe in his punishment of me than my own father would have ever been.

          We’re talking about love here, and about light. Because it’s always about the light. The light that shines on us all; the love which bathes us in its glory, minute my minute from birth to death. Even on the cloudiest days, like these gloomy days of mid-winter, the sun, we know, is behind the clouds. “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God almighty; heaven and earth are full of thy glory!” Not one corner of our lives is removed, outside this permeating light and love.

But then we have the opening lines of the Old Testament reading. I know, Jeremiah is one of the major prophets. He is on fire with the justice and judgments of God. But, answer me this, would you like to sit next to him on a long airplane flight? How about being thrown with him as your dance partner at a formal dinner party? Jeremiah starts the passage we read a few minutes ago with these lines:

          “Cursed are those who trust in mere mortals…. They shall be like a shrub in the desert…. They shall live in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land.”

          Do you see what I mean? This is a man with a very low estimation of human nature. One wonders if he has been hanging with much of any support group. For, according to my lights, I not only have trusted in what he calls “mere mortals,” but I continue to do so…and, what’s more, I want and enjoy doing so. I trust in dozens of people every day. Of course, there are some scoundrels among us, in fact, some plainly evil people. And, of course, all people—family, friends, associates—come and go in my life. Some stay for decades; other for only a season. I can depend on them and I can be disappointed in them. Trust can be broken, sometimes in shocking and consequential ways. I enjoy my dependence on people, but I also know the pitfalls of co-dependence, depending too heavily on people, to the detriment of my own independence and sometimes integrity. I know that people pleasing seldom truly pleases with myself or the person I am pretending to be so kind to.

A friend was recalling in outline that wonderful book by the British author and theologian C.S. Lewis called The Four Loves. In it, Lewis outlines love as eros (romantic love), affection (called storge), philia (friendship), and agape (unconditional love). This friend said that the first three of these loves can lead to our understanding of this last and greatest love, the love of God. Now that’s a fairly straightforward analysis, but I think it misses the point. The point isn’t that love is the crowning love, the love of God, it is that agape (unconditional love) permeates and infuses and is expressed in all of the others as well. The love of God is not something else. It is the love of a mother for her child, the affection of the child for its pet dog, the camaraderie of a group of friends in the local tavern. Love can be divided only through the prism of our lived life circumstances. Some of our worldly loves are warped, twisted, not healthy, but they all come from and are embedded in the one and only love—namely, the love of God.

          And to prove this, or at least to illustrate this from my own life. I was reflecting with a couple of clergy I meet with most weekday mornings on Zoom on the value of our friendship. We were wondering how we learn about and come to experience God’s love if not through our earthly, worldly, day-to-day friendships. I know in my life, and I ask you to reflect on your life, just where have you experienced the love of God? I think of my childhood, my school days, my adult career, my social life, and now, my retirement years and I wonder—just where were those special moments that will never escape memory. Maya Angelou said it well with her famous quote, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Is there any greater gift than this. One of my favorite lines in from Winnie the Pooh, when Pooh said, “It’s more fun to talk with a friend who doesn’t use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like “What about lunch?”

I, like you, have known many, many people throughout my life. Some we took little or no notice of. Just like many, many people in our lives have taken little or no notice of us. That’s the way life seems to unfold. If we all felt the same way towards everyone else, think what a weird world we would live in. It just wouldn’t work, would it?

          But in my reflection on those people I have known, indeed, my memories are surely of things we have had in common, experiences shared, and times enjoyed; but the memories are basically the love that has been communicated. And that love has taught me about God. The best lessons about God have come from other people and the love they have shown me. Sure, no friend is perfect. Ideally, I do not expect them to be, as I do not expect them to think anything like that of me. In fact, under the best circumstances, we can laugh at each other’s foibles and joke about our silly humanity.

          Strange, how some of the strongest memories I have of the wisdom I have received come from what might be thought of as unexpected places. I was conducting a confirmation class years ago when I asked the class what it was they liked most about their friends. And one of the pimple-faced young seventh graders said, “A friend is someone who makes you feel good about yourself.”

          Simple, right? Beautiful, right? And tell me how this trait of a good friend differs in any way from what we learn about the life and ministry of Jesus. Jesus took the time to just be with everyone he encountered. And he even seemed to spend more time with the least fortunate, those who were the least admired, the outcasts even. Because he knew that they felt very poorly of themselves. His presence boosted them, ennobled them, blessed them…just where they were. The sinner, the leper, the prostitute. No reproach, no condemnation, just presence and love. The friendship of God knows no boundaries, lives with no exceptions.

          So I ask each of us to reflect on those friends, sometimes close friends, sometime perhaps only passing acquaintances, who have left you feeling better about things—about yourself, your world, your everything. And I ask you how you could possibly separate that feeling from the love of God that surrounds us, the light which shines on us every moment of our short but dazzling lives?

What I Can Do for You by Kelly Murphy Moreton

I cannot give you possessions. I can promise you passion. I cannot guarantee you security. I can make you smile. I cannot open doors of opportunity for you. I can expand your imagination. I cannot dissolve your concerns. I can strengthen your spirit. I cannot change the world in which we live, But I can encompass you in love.

Amen.

Sermon Delivered at Church of the Good Shepherd
Fort Lee, New Jersey
Sunday, February 6, 2022, at 8:00 & 10 a.m.
By the Rev. Stephen C. Galleher

Abundant Life & Being Good Enough

“[God,] give us…abundant life.” (Collect Epiphany V)

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” (Isaiah 6:3)

“For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain.” (I Corinthians 15:9)

“But when Simon Peter saw [such a large number of fish], he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” (Luke 5:8)

Today’s themes are about the disheartening fact that we human beings are ingrates and have trouble appreciating a good thing because of our oneriness and ingratitude. Yes, that’s right. All of the lessons are about slapping down a beautiful thing when it is staring us in the face. Just how long do we stay on the sunny side of the street?

Our collect asks God to give us abundant life. Abundant life: what a great phrase for the unlimited, illimitable spectacles called our lives. Consider just the smallest favors you have been given and then consider that your lives have been enriched, surrounded, overflowing with bounty, even in the midst of the trials and challenges you have faced.

          In the call of Isaiah, we have a full-blown opera set with the fledgling prophet seeing God sitting on a throne with a long, flowing robe filling the temple. Angels hovered over God, each with six wings, covering their faces and feet. They flew with the remaining two. And they were singing one of the most spectacular outbursts of joy in all written literature:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory.”

          Cecil B. DeMille could not have choreographed such a scene. It is almost beyond our imagination. In fact, only our imagination can describe the scene as the writer of Isaiah does. Remember that I suggested that we substitute the word “beauty” for the word “glory”? The whole world is full of the grace and beauty of God.

          But this young whippersnapper Isaiah. He just feels sorry for himself in the face of such a vision and says, “Woe is me! I am lost and I am a man of unclean lips.”

          Paul is more sophisticated. He admits to his earlier terrible persecution of Chistians. But he has come to see his earlier defiance as a vehicle for his conversion to the graceof God. “By the grace of God, I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain.”

          And then there is poor Peter, who is a bridge to us modern people. The guys in the boats were complaining to Jesus, who had gotten into one of them, that they had gotten no fish. But Jesus told them to put the nets down into the water. Shortly thereafter they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break, and the boats were beginning to sink for all the fish! Peter, instead of rejoicing at the gift of the catch, falls at Jesus’s feet and says, “Leave me, Jesus, for I am a sinful man.” Sure. Here is the theme of our meditation! Ingratitude and not feeling good enough.

          Before we scold Peter, perhaps we too fall victim to self-pity and never feeling quite adequate for the glory that surrounds us, the light that continually falls on us.

          It is truly amazing. Someone chided me recently for not accepting a compliment graciously. This could very well be a posture of false modesty and of feeling really not worthy of receiving the compliment offered. Could be. For sure enough, there are a thousand and one ways we underestimate our own glory, we strip the gold from the people that we truly are.

          Have you ever heard that wild song by the talented musician named Beck? It is called “I’m a loser, baby. Why don’t you kill me?”

          We seem to sit—or, better, wallow—in our imperfections and concentrate on what we think we don’t have.

• I’m not good-looking enough.
• I’m not healthy enough.
• I don’t have enough money.
• I don’t have many friends.
• I want more hair.

I had been living in New Jersey a few years when I received a letter in the mail informing me that the storage facility in which I had two units full of old letters, slides, diplomas, camping equipment, etc., had burned to the ground and that everything was lost. It’s amazing how brief my grief was, for, after all, what could be done? It was gone and that was that.

And I have just moved and gotten the lesson again that I own more than I need. A friend said the other day, “Being happy with what you have is the only way to do it.” Being happy with what we have is, indeed, the only way to do it!

But, no, I am a child and I give myself messages that do not focus on the glory of what is around me. As St. Teresa of Avila wrote, “The farther away light is from one’s touch, the more one naturally speaks of the need for something else.” But the irony of this, of course, is that light is never absent from one’s touch. All we need do is reach out and touch it!

          We are very clever strategists. We create powerpoints in our heads with conclusive evidence that we are not good enough.

 “God doesn’t care about me.” And let’s be honest, isn’t there a side of us that kind of enjoys these negative emotions? A lot more happens in our heads that happens outside our own homes.

          So we don’t think that God cares for you? I heard of a patient in a therapist’s office who was bewailing his sad lot in life. “What a failure I am,” he lamented.

          The therapist replied, “But I love you and God loves you.”

          “But I just can’t forgive myself for the things I have done.”

          Just then the therapist stood up, pounded the desk and yelled, “Who do you think you are? Smarter and more knowledgeable than God?”

          There is a time for therapists to pound on their desk, and this therapist struck the right note and should pound whenever you or I catch ourselves feeling sorry for ourselves.

          But we can continue to dwell in the land of darkness if we want to. And we can continue to feel cut off from the sunlight of the spirit. I can tell you I love you till I’m blue in the face, but that just isn’t a message strong enough to pull us out of funks.

          God does not demand, or even expect, perfection. The life of Jesus should show us definitively that God blesses imperfection. In fact, a poet proclaims, “Light baptizes life wherever it falls.” And that light falls right here on you and on me! It’s always about the light.

          So I’m going to take us all to theological seminary this morning and give you a degree in thirty seconds. This will save you a lot of money, and you can get your degree and become a fully accredited priest in under a minute—at least, if you want to!  Just don’t tell our bishop!

          So, welcome class. The first question you must master is this:

1. Where is God?

Yes, the answer is EVERYWHERE.

And the second and final question is:

• Why? Why is God everywhere?

Answer: Because he likes us!

So, I now award you your divinity degree.

“Holy, holy, holy, Lord God almighty. Heaven and earth are full of your glory!”

Amen.

Sermon Delivered at Church of the Good Shepherd
Fort Lee, New Jersey
Sunday, January 30, 2022, at 8:00 & 10 a.m.
By the Rev. Stephen C. Galleher

The Greatest of These

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you. I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”
(Jeremiah 1:4)

“I have been sustained by you ever since I was born; from my mother’s womb you have been my strength.” (Psalm 71:6)

“Love never dies.” (I Corinthians 1:13)

          The readings appointed to be read in our churches are on a three-year cycle, so here we are this morning with one of the supreme passages in all of the New Testament, in fact, in all of world literature—a hymn, a theological statement on the subject of love, one that resonates down the ages and touches us closely in our everyday lives. It is often read at weddings, but it should be posted on our refrigerators and, indeed, embedded in our hearts—not just read in church once every three years!

          For love is a tough subject, isn’t it? You know, love plays a role in all of the major world religions—from the sutras of Hinduism, to the summary of the law in Judaism to the love lyrics of the Islamic poet Rumi. Rumi typically writes, “All the universe is born of love—but where did this love come from? Love your soul in God’s love, I swear there is no other way.” But nowhere is love as central as it is in Christianity.

          God says to Jeremiah as he calls him to be his prophet, that he knew him as he was being formed in the womb. He was rendered holy even before he was born. And the same is so with us, according to the psalmist: ““I have been sustained by you ever since I was born; from my mother’s womb you have been my strength.” If love stretches even to the placenta of our births, surely this confirms and strengthens the message that God is love, loves us, from the first and until the last.

          But I said, as you remember, that love is a tough subject. Why? Because not only can it be a challenge to believe that God is love, but the commandment to love as God loves seems far beyond our feeble means.

          To call God love can be quite shocking, since many of us have inherited an idea of God as a judge or potentate or stern Father or indifferent unmoved mover or cause of Fate. It is a radical paradigm shift to transform these forbidding and abstract images into a God of gentleness, compassion, understanding and intimate love.

          Even more challenging is the belief that we are worthy of such unconditional love. Because we think that what we really, really know about ourselves discounts us, rules us out of the party of love-making that God invites us to. I was thinking of the terrible culture wars that seem to be infecting (yes, infecting, like Coronavirus itself) our public life. We read about people creating havoc on airplanes from refusing to wear masks, of plots to overthrow our presidential election, of corruption so pervasive that our heads spin. And of talk of war, of this juvenile obsession with territorial aggression. Can you believe that we are actually making possible the destruction of the earth over squabbling over Ukraine? I wonder what Andrei thinks of such insanity? Bad enough that we have this tin-pot dictator Vladimir Putin, who can’t resist bearing his bare chest to photographers, pining for a return to the boundaries of the Soviet Union; perhaps as bad, if not worse, that the United States wants to threaten this aggression with deadly weapons that will make all parties lose and lose fatally. When is the world, and that includes us, going to stand up and demand an end to war? It can be done. We just have to do it.

          I consider myself a millimeter from being a full-blown pacifist. But I know that there is aggression and animal nature within me. The mob that stormed this Capitol last January were ravenous traitors, all right; but I, too, could be lured into joining a lynch mob. Under certain circumstances, my rage could be aroused to the point where I, too, could do something heinous and illegal and deadly.

          Everyone wants to be loved and loves to be loved; but few of us are willing to do the loving. Being loved results in returning it. It is not only a natural consequence of being loved, it is our obligation, our happy obligation to love others as we have been loved.

          One way to turn around our pinched attitudes, our reluctance to love under the numerous circumstances when we withhold it, is to consider all those times and places, and all those people who have loved us. I think we will be amazed, in fact, to consider just how much love has come our way. We are children of grace, every single one of us. And this love is not just confined to us human beings.

          I recently read the story of a wounded dog, a Doberman named Khan, who after just four days into a new and adopted family with a 17-month-old baby saved that baby’s life by suddenly picking it up by its diaper and tossing it across the yard. At first the bystanders thought the dog was attacking the baby—until they realized the dog took sick very suddenly. Rushing it to the veterinarian they learned he had been bitten by one of the most venomous snakes in the world—the Mulga snake of Australia—and Khan was near death for days as the vets struggled to save its life. Instead of killing the baby, the dog had saved its life, had intervened when he saw the snake approaching the tiny child, and put its own life on the line. As it turned out, the dog lived. And the child too. Love among the animals. This too is love; this too is God present.

          I close with a reading of our Epistle, this time the Message Bible translation:

The Way of Love

13 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.

² If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.

^3-7 If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.

^8-10 Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

¹¹ When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.

¹² We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

¹³ But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.

Sermon Delivered at Church of the Good Shepherd
Fort Lee, New Jersey
Sunday, January 23, 2022, at 8:00 & 10 a.m.
By the Rev. Stephen C. Galleher

Stop, Look and Listen!

“Give us grace to answer the call and proclaim to everyone the Good News.”
(Collect for Third Epiphany)

“Then all the people listened—they were all ears—to the book of the law.”
(Nehemiah 8:3)

“The heavens declare the glory of God, *
and the firmament shows his handiwork.

2 One day tells its tale to another, *
and one night imparts knowledge to another.

3 Although they have no words or language, *
and their voices are not heard.” (Psalm 19:1-3)

“And [Jesus] rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the assistant, and sat down. Every eye in the place was on him.” (Luke 4:21)

It’s truly remarkable how the themes of Epiphany weave themselves together so wonderfully. We have spoken about the light, the light of Epiphany that shines on us, from us, outwardly through us for all the world to see. The light that shone over the cradle in Bethlehem is the same light that lightens Jews and Gentiles and every single soul on the planet Earth. That’s what light is, what light does. It does not discriminate. It’s always about the light. Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.

And this light is something that is revealed. Like the answer to a riddle, the solution to a puzzle. It is what has been there in plain sight, but perhaps unnoticed, un-turned on, for as long as we can remember. Except we seldom noticed.

Let’s look a few moments at noticing. What are the requirements for noticing something, for really noticing, not just out of one corner of our eye, not just for the briefest, most superficial attention?

I suggest that the requirement for an epiphany, for enlightenment is to STOP, LOOK, and LISTEN.

These are the themes of the scriptural passages I cite this morning, and they seem to be the ingredients of insights that move our lives from indifference to excitement, from sluggishness to exhilaration.

Our collect this morning asks God to “give us grace to answer the call and proclaim to everyone the Good News.” Sounds attractive enough, but how can we answer the call or proclaim anything until we stop and pay attention to what that call is, until we have a clue as to what to proclaim!

What do you think God calls us to do? Have we thought about this? My guess is that many of us haven’t even a clue—which, when we think about it, is kind of pathetic. Am I being too callous? I wonder, because I do not exempt myself from this challenge. What are we called to proclaim? Can we put it in a simple sentence that will call other people’s attention?

Remember as kids when our teacher would tap us on the shoulder as she or he would walk up and down the aisles of the classroom> “Sit up straight! Pay attention! What’s the answer to this question!” We may have been too busy doodling with our blunt pencils, passing notes to our buddy next to us, or counting the minutes to the end of class. So we may not have been paying attention. So unless we were paying attention, we cannot have answered any call or proclaimed much of anything. Sad. Someone must have missed this good news which we could have passed on.

We may not be children today, but, if you’re like me, you are easily distracted. Either by multitasking, trying to do too many things at one time, or by getting diverted to do too many things, either serially or at one time. Our heads can whirl and we can miss out on a lot that’s going on around us.

This reminds me of the suicide bomb instructor when he was giving a lecture to new recruits. “All right, lads, pay attention, because I’m only gonna show you this once!”

The Old Testament lesson talks about a group of people who indeed did listen to what was read to them. One translation puts it in the vernacular: “They were all ears.” That’s a heap of listening—all ears! Love it.

The psalm speaks of stopping to look and listen as well. It talks about a marvelous thing. It reads:

“The heavens declare the glory of God, *
and the firmament shows his handiwork.

One day tells its tale to another, *
and one night imparts knowledge to another.

Although they have no words or language, *
and their voices are not heard.”

What is said in this passage is that what is seen and what is heard is too beautiful, too marvelous for words; this light, this enlightenment goes beyond words. It can only be experienced. These voices are not heard by our ears, as they were by the Jews in the Old Testament reading. These things were experienced, felt: the heavens declare this glory as one day tells its tale to another. So beautiful, so fragile, so glorious that we are in the realm of the sublime.

          How can this be experienced unless we Stop, Look, and Listen. Do you know the beautiful Christmas song, “Do you hear what I hear?”

          Sometimes it takes the sound of silence, as it did for the psalmist this morning. Sometimes it takes a seismic event in our personal lives, like a slap in the face, to wake us to certain realities we have been avoiding. Other times, it may be a quiet piece of chamber music, an off-the-cuff statement made by a friend, or a poem heard as if for the first time.

          Perhaps nature sometimes hears what we do not hear. After all, nature seems stopped all right: and it seems to be looking and listening.

          This poem is entitled “I See You More Clearly Now:

One hundred and sixteen souls,
counted with care.
My inspiration
on a quiet afternoon
to get to know those who live
around me.
 
Mostly oaks, some spindly
and just beginning,
others like grandfathers
with wide open arms.
A towering pine that was a
miniature Christmas tree
twenty-five years ago.
The sycamore planted
before our daughter was born.
An elm, that shades
where we sit on the patio.
Mulberries lining the driveway,
their leaves dessert for the deer.  
And a small eucalyptus grove,
where trees are tall enough
for the hawks to nest.
 
To each I say, I see you.
I honor your presence,
and gritty patience
with battering winds,
sunbaked earth,
birds that squawk and titter
from your branches.
Being the guardians
that you are, I can believe
you love all of this.
Beautiful, sacred trees,
I see you more clearly now.

Isn’t that marvelous? Hearing this writer stop and notice all those trees inspires us to stop, look and listen.

Then a similar poem by Robert Frost. You probably know it. It is called “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening.”

Whose woods these are I think I know.   

His house is in the village though;   

He will not see me stopping here   

To watch his woods fill up with snow.   

My little horse must think it queer   

To stop without a farmhouse near   

Between the woods and frozen lake   

The darkest evening of the year.   

He gives his harness bells a shake   

To ask if there is some mistake.   

The only other sound’s the sweep   

Of easy wind and downy flake.   

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,   

But I have promises to keep,   

And miles to go before I sleep,   

And miles to go before I sleep.

          Having those who stop and look to serve as examples helps us enter that deep awareness wherein, perhaps, we touch on everything, it is like looking into the source of light itself. Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.

          Amen.

Sermon Delivered at Church of the Good Shepherd
Fort Lee, New Jersey
Sunday, January 16, 2022, at 8:00 & 10 a.m.
By the Rev. Stephen C. Galleher

It’s Always About the Light IV

“Jesus Christ is the light of the world.”
(Collect for Second Epiphany)

“You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of God.”
(Isaiah 62:3)

“How priceless is your love, O God!…You give them drink from the river of your delights.” (Psalm 36:8)

“Jesus [turned the water into wine], the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory.”
(John 2:11)

Here we are once again at home, meeting and worshiping together via Zoom. I bet you’re as tired as I am of this seemingly endless COVID pandemic and want to be shoulder to shoulder with your friends and fellow parishioners. But it is very dangerous out there, and safety should be our motto until things ease up. In the meantime, greetings and let’s make the best of this less than ideal situation.

Epiphany, as we have seen, is about light. It’s always about the light. The light that was coming into the world. The light that came into the world through the remarkable and dazzling light of one named Jesus, and the light that shines in our hearts as we see how transforming this light really is—a light that is reflected from God, that wells up from within and radiates out into the world around us. Let our light so shine. Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.

Epiphany means an uncovering, a revelation, a manifestation of something that we may not have seen, that may have eluded us. It’s not that something was not there and is suddenly there. It may have been there all along, but we just neglected noticing. Of course, if we don’t notice something, it’s as good as not being there. How many times have we said, do we say, “Oh, wow, I never noticed that before”?

Like when we look in a mirror [photo #1]. Or like when water becomes wine [photo #2].

We are told, or we have heard, that we are created in God’s image. Now, that’s a lovely phrase, but do we believe it? Do we really, really believe that we reflect, that we emanate the light of God? Remember, it is always about the light. It can be challenge, especially as Father Time gets the better of us, when we look in a mirror. Some of us have never been pleased when we brush our teeth in the morning and get a glance at the face staring back at us [photo #3]. One smart aleck wrote that when he sees really attractive people, he laughs because he knows if we lived in the Aztec culture, they’d be sacrificed to the gods for their beauty. It may seem a strange way of coping with not being really attractive… but it works for him.

What a shame really. Most of us aren’t Sophia Loren [photo #4] or Marilyn Monroe or Brad Pitt or Bradley Cooper [photo #5]. And if we get really, really serious, I think most of us want to remain exactly as we were created. The light we are given is sufficient for us. In fact, this image of God in us is not confined to the human race. Caterpillars have it [photo #6]; crocodiles have it; chimpanzees have it. And, can you believe: ostriches, elephants, platypuses, kangaroos. What in heaven’s name? This place right here is more bizarre than the bar scene in “Star Wars” [photo #7]. In fact, the mountains, the oceans, the forest, all manifest this light, this image of God [photo #8]. Coming to understand this is to step into heaven itself. It is to see that water is wine, already [photo #9]. Jesus just calls this to our attention. The miracle at the wedding in Cana supposedly reveals the glory of Christ. “Glory” is a wonderful word with many surprising meanings. One of these meanings is “beauty,” Next time you hear the term “glory,” substitute the word “beauty” for it, and see how it can help us see something in a new light. Like an epiphany. The beautiful chorus from Handel’s Messiah sings, “And the glory of, glory of the Lord, shall be re-vealed!” That is epiphany. The curtain lifts, the penny drops, the eyes see, as if for the first time, the unimaginable bright light that shines from and in and around everything we see. Light, light, light. It’s always about the light.

And perhaps, just perhaps we underestimate our own glory, our own beauty, because the God we worship is too small. This God is not an old crabby guy with no sense of humor. God every minute is bursting out of the little tin boxes we try to put him in, through God’s wonderful creations. When  I was musing about light the other Sunday and wondering if light traveled in a straight line or could go around corners, I was informed that the light we see around corners is reflected and that colors are that reflected light. That’s what colors are: reflected light! Isn’t that great? We are the colors of God, reflecting what comes directly at us as pure white. And white light contains all the colors unrefracted and unreflected, and we cannot see those colors until they are reflected in you and me and the trees and mountains.

I close with a favorite poem of mine, one that I had to memorize when I was in the fifth grade, when doing such things was a lot easier than it would be now. It is called “Rhodora” by Ralph Waldo Emerson [photo #10].

On being asked, whence is the flower.

In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes,
I found the fresh Rhodora in the woods,
Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook,
To please the desert and the sluggish brook.
The purple petals fallen in the pool
Made the black water with their beauty gay;
Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool,
And court the flower that cheapens his array.
Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why
This charm is wasted on the earth and sky,
Tell them, dear, that, if eyes were made for seeing,
Then beauty is its own excuse for Being;
Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose!
I never thought to ask; I never knew;
But in my simple ignorance suppose
The self-same power that brought me there, brought you.

It’s always about the light. Before I could not see what was right before me. Now I see.

Amen.

By The Rev. Deacon Virginia Jenkins-Whatley

And the Word became flesh and lived among us” (From
John 1:1-18; First Sunday after Christmas)
Bishop Hughes recommends that since things
are so hectic we can take a break and we do
not have to write sermons each week. She
suggested using prepared sermons to present
available for priest on the diocese website.
Today’s sermon and last Sundays sermon are
from their website with some revisions….

How was your Christmas? People will be
asking each other that question for weeks
to come. While I understand what is being
asked. I also hear an underlying assumption
that Christmas is over. It is the same
assumption that underlies the birthday
wishes to Jesus. “Happy birthday Jesus”
suggests that Christmas is the celebration of
a past event, an anniversary. It is the reason

why in at least a few homes the tree has
already been taken down, the decorations
are being packed away for another year,
and the leftovers thrown out.

I raise these three points not as a criticism
or judgment but to show that we are event
driven people. We tend to live our lives
from one event to the next. If you don’t
think so, take a look at your calendar. It is a
schedule of events.I look for holidays for
days off from work. CVS, Walgreens, Target,
Walmart already have Valentine’s Day,
Easter and St Patrick items for sale. If we
have nothing scheduled on any given day, it
is as if there is nothing for us to experience
or learn that day.How different is St. John’s

understanding of Christmas, life, and
humanity.

In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was
God. He was in the beginning with God. All
things came into being through him, and
without him not one thing came into being.
What has come into being in him was life,
and the life was the light of all people.

This, for St. John, is the Christmas story and
it is set in the context of creation, “In the
beginning.” Creation is not an event of the
past but the ongoing life of God with his
people. St. John echoes and continues the
Genesis story of creation, “In the beginning
God said, ‘Let there be…’ and there was….”

Land, sky, vegetation, living creatures from
the water, birds of the air, living creatures
from the earth, and humankind made in the
image and likeness of God.

Christmas is God continuing to give life to
his people. “And the Word became flesh
and lived among us.” Christmas, says St.
Gregory of Nyssa, is the “festival of re-
creation.” It is God giving God’s own life to
his people. It is as if God said, “I want
humanity to see my face. I want them to
hear my voice. I want them to touch me. I
want them to smell my sweat. I want them
to eat my body. I want to live their life. I
want them to live my life.” “And the word
became flesh and lived among us.” This is

God in the flesh, the divine human, holy
humanity.

This festival of re-creation is God’s
celebration of humanity. It is God
entrusting God’s self to human beings, to
you and to me. It is God’s reaffirmation of
humanity’s goodness. It is the sharing and
exchanging of life between God and you
and me. That’s why the early church could
say that God became human so that
humanity might become God. The Son of
God became the son of man so that the
sons of men might become sons of God.

That is really nice… Imagine what that
means for us. It means we are holy and
intended to be holy, not as an achievement

on our own but as a gift of God. This is the
gift of Christmas. We have been given the
power to become children of God. This
happens not by blood, or the will of the
flesh, or the will of people, but by God.
“And the Word became flesh and lived
among us.”

God sees humanity as the opportunity and
the means to reveal himself. Yet far too
often we use our humanity as an excuse. If
something goes wrong we are the first to
say “what do you expect I’m only human,”
we declare, as if we are somehow deficient.
We fail to see, to believe, to understand
that in the Word becoming flesh and living
among us we are God’s first sacrament.
Human beings are the tangible, outward,

and visible signs and carriers of God’s
inward and spiritual presence.

Have you ever thought of yourself as a
sacrament? Have you ever looked at
someone across the street and said, “Hey,
look! There is the sacramental image of
God?” Why not? Why do we not see that in
ourselves and each other? After all, “The
Word became flesh and lived among us.”

In the Jewish tradition rabbis tell a story
that each person has a procession of angels
going before them and crying out, “Make
way for the image of God.” Imagine how
different our lives and world would be if we
lived with this as our reality and the truth
that guided our lives.

Everywhere we go the angels go with us
announcing the coming of the image of God
and reminding us of who we are. That is the
truth of Christmas for us. It is also the
Christmas truth for the person living next
door, for those we love, for those we fear,
for those who are like us and those who are
different, for the stranger, and for our
enemies. “And the Word became flesh and
lived among us.”

The implications are profound. It changes
how we see our selves and one another, the
way we live, our actions, and our words. It
means that Christmas cannot be limited to
an event. Christmas is a life to be lived, a
way of being. It means that Christmas is

more properly understood as a verb rather
than a noun. So maybe we should stop
asking, “How was your Christmas?” Instead
we should be asking, “How are you
‘Christmassing?’” Are you recognizing the
Word become flesh in your own life? Are
you recognizing the Word become flesh in
the lives of others? Do you see the
procession of angels and hear their voices?
“And the Word became flesh and lived
among us.” The Word became flesh and has
never ceased living among us. The Word
became flesh and will never cease living
among us. So make way. Wherever you go.
Whatever you are doing. Whoever you are
with. Make way for the image of God.
Christmas your way through life.
Amen..

Sermon Delivered at Church of the Good Shepherd
Fort Lee, New Jersey
Sunday, December 24, 2021, at 7:00 p.m.
By the Rev. Stephen C. Galleher

It’s Always About the Light

 “O God, you have caused this holy night to shine with the brightness of the true Light: Grant that we, who have known the mystery of that Light on earth, may also enjoy him perfectly in heaven.”
(Collect for Christmas Eve)

“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness—on them light has shine.” (Isaiah 9:2)

“For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all.” (Titus 2:11)

“And the glory of the Lord shone around them” (Luke 2:9)

 [Play song of the blackbird]

Blackbird singing in the dead of night.
Take these broken wings and learn to fly.

All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise.

It’s always about the light.

The COVID-19 pandemic still rages, in part because of the random and irritating course of nature, in part because of our social reluctance to work in solidarity to end it. We miss proximity to one another. Enough is enough, we complain; yet Coved and Delta and Omicron rage on. Our world climates worsen in terrifyingly unpredictable ways, creating anxiety about our future on this planet. Our political divides are so deep that we back away from civil discussion and hiss and lob curses at one another.

Light indeed? World affairs, human affairs seem so fouled up that we are apt to lapse into pessimism and despair and wonder if the Christmas proclamation is just so much tinsel town and unfulfilled promises.

But the Christmas message—whether proclaimed loudly by a chorus from Handel’s “Messiah” or quietly as the verse from “O Little Town of Bethlehem” has it—continues to sound. Light will prevail. Happiness will spring forth. Love will triumph. It’s always about the light.

  Blackbird fly, blackbird fly
  Into the light of the of the dark black night. (John Lennon and Paul McCartney)

            Advent has been preparing us by asking us to watch and to pay attention to our world and our lives closely and patiently enough to see that there are tons of good in it. Not to despair. To keep looking to see all the people reaching out, smiling, touching one another. So, now, on this most solemn night, we welcome the one who will make all the difference, who will proclaim what we have suspected all along, that life is good, that human beings are good, and grace and love prevail.

          So all the jingles and doggerel of the season are worth it. When I see tacky decorations in storefront windows or on my neighbors’ lawns, I rejoice. Better tacky that dreary, better cheer than gloom.

When calm is the night and the stars shine bright,

The sleigh glides smooth and cheerily;

And mirth and jest abound,

While all is still around,

Save the horses trampling sound,

And the horse-bells tinkling merrily.

But when the drifting snow in the traveler’s face shall blow,
And hail is driving drearily,
And the wind is shrill and loud,
Then no sleigh shall stir abroad,
Nor along the beaten road
Shall the horse-bells tinkle merrily.

But to-night the skies are clear, and we have not to fear
That the time should linger wearily;
For good-humor has a charm
Even winter to disarm,
And our cloaks shall wrap us warm,
And the bells shall tinkle merrily.

          It’s always and everywhere and completely and forever about the light! Light: not just the magical, mysterious thing that illuminates us all, but the new perspective, the new vistas, the new understanding that light gives when it is turned on. Poof, out of darkness and incomprehension—and then light, insight, clarity, and amazement.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to be free

This is what Christmas does. It turns on the light. It helps us see, perhaps as we have never seen before. Our old, sometimes dreary world takes on a color and a sparkle unseen by our cynical eyes but staring us square in the face by our open hearts.

          I repeat a story first heard at a Christmas Eve service some years ago:

One Christmas Day, a woman, her husband, and their year-old son had driven a long way before they found an open diner by the side of the road. It was quiet and almost empty, and they were waiting gratefully for their food when the little boy began waving from his high chair and calling, “Hi there!” to someone behind them. To the mother’s surprise, it was a wreck of a man, unshaven and unwashed, obviously a homeless drunk. Now he was waving back at her little boy and calling, “Hi there, baby, hi there, big boy . . . I see ya, buster.”

The woman and her husband looked at each other, and the other customers in the diner were throwing disapproving glances their way.

And the old guy went on, even after their food came. “Do you know patty-cake? Attaboy . . . Do you know peekaboo? Hey, look, he knows peekaboo.”

The mother tried turning the high chair around, but the boy shrieked and twisted to face his new buddy. Finally, giving up on their meal, her husband got up to pay the

bill, and the mother took the baby in her arms, praying that she could quickly get past the old drunk, who was seated by the door. But as they approached, her son reached out with both arms—his pick-me-up signal—and propelled himself into the man’s open arms.

But now the mother could see tears in the man’s eyes as her son laid his head on his shoulder. He gently held and rocked the boy, and then he looked straight into her eyes.

“You take care of this baby,” he said firmly. And as he slowly handed him back, “God bless you, ma’am. You’ve given me my Christmas gift.”

She must have mumbled something in return, but as she rushed to the car, tears streaming down her face, she could only think, “My God, my God, forgive me.”    

          Let us not this season ask God to forgive us for the love we withhold, but to be grateful to God for the love we can give. For there is an awful lot of it to be given.

Let us pray:

I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

By The Rev. Deacon Virginia Jenkins-Whatley

In the name of the Father,Son and Holy Spirit
A Visitation” (Sermon on Luke 1:39-45)
Our gospel today tells the story of the meeting of
the two moms –the visitation of Mary to Elizabeth.
Elizabeth was the older woman; Mary, the younger.
Elizabeth was in her sixth month; Mary’s pregnancy
had just started. And we’ll get to why neither one
should have been pregnant in a moment. But it was
at this time that Mary goes to visit her older relative
Elizabeth, traveling from her home in Nazareth.

“The Visitation” is the term that is commonly used
when referring to this meeting of these two most
uncommon mothers, Mary and Elizabeth. There is
even a day in the church year set aside for
observing the Visitation. This year it was listed in
the Lectionary on May 31.
But the key to this story is that it is not just a
meeting of the two moms. It is also the first
meeting of the two baby boys they are carrying
inside of them. In particular, it is the baby boy that
Mary is carrying that will make this–both for the
people involved in this story and for us as well–that
will make this “A Blessed Visitation.”

Now there is a back story to each of these
pregnancies. Elizabeth was an older woman, well
beyond her childbearing years. And what’s more,
she had never been able to have children. This was
a great disappointment to Elizabeth and her
husband Zechariah. Zechariah was a priest who
served in the temple in Jerusalem. One day he was
there, in the Holy Place, ministering at the altar of
incense, when all of a sudden an angel appeared. It
was the angel Gabriel, who told Zechariah that he
and his wife Elizabeth were finally going to be able
to have a child. It will be a boy, and they are to
name him John. And the angel said that God would
have a special calling on John’s life: that John would
be filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s
womb; that he would be a great prophet like Elijah;
and that John would go before the Lord to prepare
his way. This sounds like Gabriel is saying John will
be the last great prophet immediately before the
coming of the Messiah–which indeed he was. So
after hearing this news, Zechariah goes home,

Elizabeth becomes pregnant, and she is six months
along with baby John when Mary comes for a visit.
The angel Gabriel made another surprise
announcement, this time telling Mary that she also
would be expecting a child she didn’t expect. What
made this pregnancy unusual was that Mary was
not married. Yes, there was a time when that sort of
thing was considered unusual. But what takes it
from the unusual to the unique was that Mary
became pregnant while remaining a virgin. That just
does not happen. And this is the only time it ever
would happen. But it was fitting that it should
happen in this way, for the child Mary would bear
would be totally unique.

The angel Gabriel said many wonderful things about
this boy to be born. He told Mary: “And behold, you
will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you
shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be
called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God
will give to him the throne of his father David, and
he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of
his kingdom there will be no end.” And then Gabriel

added: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the
power of the Most High will overshadow you;
therefore the child to be born will be called
holy–the Son of God.” Conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the virgin Mary. True God and true man, in
the one person of Christ. This baby Jesus will be the
Son of God come in the flesh. He will be the great
Messiah prophesied so long ago.

Gabriel also told Mary: “And behold, your relative
Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son,
and this is the sixth month with her who was called
barren.” And that is how Mary comes to visit
Elizabeth. They’ve both got these miracle
pregnancies in common.

And so this is where we pick up the story today.
Mary goes to the home of Zechariah and Elizabeth,
she enters the house, and she greets Elizabeth. And
when she does, the sound of her greeting is picked
up by baby John, in the womb, and he does a joyful
little leap! Remember, the angel had said that John

would be filled with the Spirit even in his mother’s
womb. And so when Mary greets Elizabeth, the
Spirit causes John to recognize that Jesus was there,
too.
So John leaps, and Elizabeth too is filled with the
Holy Spirit and starts to get excited. She tells Mary:
“Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the
fruit of your womb!” Mary, you have been given a
great honor, to bear the Savior of the world. I mean,
I am honored to bear the forerunner of the Lord,
but you get to give birth to the Lord himself! What a
wonderful blessing!
Elizabeth continues: “And why is this granted to me
that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”
She realizes that she is not worthy of such a
visitation. And at the same time, she realizes that
her Lord is coming to her, bringing great blessing.
Such humble faith is truly the work of the Holy
Spirit.

Do we have the humility and the faith of an
Elizabeth? Yes, I believe we do. We recognize that

we are not worthy to have God grace us with his
presence. We know we are sinners–we confessed
that earlier in the service. We don’t deserve to have
our Lord come to us with his blessing. It is purely by
his grace and his mercy that he does.
As with Elizabeth, the Holy Spirit has worked in our
hearts, through the gospel, so that we trust in Jesus
as our Lord and Savior. We know that the little child
came as our brother, in the flesh, so that he could
do the only job that would save us. He came to do
the Father’s will, to keep God’s law perfectly on our
behalf. Christ came to offer the one perfect sacrifice
that atones for all our sins, to suffer and die a
sinner’s death on the cross, taking the punishment
that the law requires and that we deserve. He came
to be our peace and our life, shown when he rose
victorious over sin and death, granting us blessing
and joy in their place.
Yes, when Jesus enters the house, we get all of
these blessings with him. This is enough to make
someone leap for joy, as Elizabeth tells Mary: “For
behold, when the sound of your greeting came to
my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.”

Then Elizabeth has one more word for Mary: “And
blessed is she who believed that there would be a
fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the
Lord.” Faith–that is what we’re seeing here. The
faith that Elizabeth had to know was that this was
no ordinary child Mary was bringing into the world –
-it was the Lord himself. And the faith of Mary in
which she believed the great things the angel had
told her about the son she would bear.

Dear friends, the meeting of the moms is a meeting
of two great women of faith. Both Mary and
Elizabeth stand out as wonderful examples for us.
They believe the Lord’s words, and they receive his
gifts. The Holy Spirit will work such a Mary-and-
Elizabeth faith in us, too.

You see, there’s a whole bunch of miracles that we
see in our text today. The miraculous pregnancies of
both Elizabeth and Mary . The way that they both
believed and rejoiced in the good news of their Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ–that too is a miracle. Any

time anyone is given the gift of faith and joy in the
Lord–that is a miracle of God. It is the work of the
Holy Spirit, working through the Word, working in
our hearts, creating a saving faith and a blessed joy.
And the great thing is, you and I have the same
good news and the same Holy Spirit at work in our
hearts today.
Today we have heard the story of the visitation of
Mary to Elizabeth. It was a meeting of the moms,
yes. But don’t forget those boys! They meet, too,
Jesus and John do. And wherever Mary’s baby boy
goes, he brings blessing with him. Even in the
womb, he brought blessing and joy to the home of
Elizabeth and Zechariah. And Jesus brings blessing
and joy into our homes, too. When we gather with
our family for Christmas–when the Christ of
Christmas is the reason for our merriment–Jesus
brings the joy with him. When we gather here with
our church family, here in God’s house, Christ is
surely present to bless us with his gifts. Christ is
here, visiting us with his grace and favor. And that
makes this a most blessed visitation.

Wishing you all many blessings this Christmas
..AMEN

 December 5, 2020
By The Deacon Rev. Virginia Jenkins Whatley
Luke 3 1-6

 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene,   during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the desert.

 John went throughout the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,   as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah: A voice of one crying out in the desert: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.

 Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill shall be made low. The winding roads shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth,  and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”

The gospel reading above mentions very important people (VIP) yet it is to a man in the wilderness that the Word of God was revealed. A great lesson to be learned here. John the Baptist lived in the desert seeking only the presence of God while the great men of his time lived in their palaces seeking the adulation of people.

 The desert is a desolate place away from the bustle and hustle of city life where the voice of God is drown out by noises from every direction. John the Baptist could not have chosen a better place to prepare him for his ministry. Indeed, modern life is not only hectic but noisy and full of distractions. That is why it is always best to go for a walk in a desolate place, perhaps in a forest, where we can focus all our attention on God alone. If it is not possible, we can just shut the door of our room (Matthew 6:6), switch off the television and stuck away our mobile phone in a drawer so we can concentrate on listening to the voice of God. The point is we need complete silence because common sense dictates that it is in quietness that we hear God’s voice.

 John proclaimed a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Repentance is a condition for salvation. God loves us as to send His only begotten Son to deliver us from death and eternal damnation yet we need to accept first that we are sinners, then repent and change our ways.

 The cry of John the Baptist was and still is to prepare a way for the Lord and to make straight His path. When a special visitor comes to our residence, we will make sure that everything is in order. We will spend a day or even a week to clean, maybe repaint and fix everything to show the very best impression and to give our visitor a comfortable stay in our house. Don’t we do that to Jesus our savior? The season of advent is the best time to do it. Let us fix our life, clean our mind and heart, and put on the garment of faith, hope, and love to welcome Him.