Younger saints here –> “Pup and bear”
Younger saint’s reflection
After listening to Pup and Bear, what do you notice? Who is not your mother, but still cuddles you and keeps you safe? You may not be a mother, but can you still love and protect another too? Please pray with me: Mothering God, thank you for giving us all the gift of being mothers to one another, just like you are to us. Amen.
Listen/watch sermon here –> https://youtu.be/OaoczZwNjqs
ANNOUNCEMENTS
– Keep tuning in here.
– Keep checking the private page for prayers and sending them along.
– Keep safe and healthy!
As we continue the selfless practice of Sheltering in Place, as we witness new losses and new gains, as we continue to adjust to living differently – our souls may be restless, forlorn, confused, over excited, or numb. This service is one of a series designed to tend the pandemic-stressed soul. It is based on one by Rev. Kathryn M. Schreiber.
Call to Worship
Julian of Norwich, 15th century English mystic, healer and saint wrote:
“Jesus is our true mother,
The protector of the love which knows no end.
We have our being from Jesus,
where the foundation of motherhood begins.
God revealed that in all things,
as truly as God is our father,
so truly is God our mother.”
“God is the power and the goodness of fatherhood;
God is the wisdom and loving kindness of motherhood.
God is the one who makes us to love,
And the endless fulfilling of our true desires.
God desired Christ to be our mother, our brother, and our Savior,
for God knows us now and loved us before time began.”(jn)
May we gather in the presence of Jesus Christ, our true mother. Amen.
Let’s Name Our New Reality
If you are with others in person or via devices please share what is on your minds and in your hearts. If you are alone, speak out loud to God.
How has it been for you and your loved ones this week?
Who did you most enjoy spending time with?
What deeply comforted your spirit?
What continues to be challenging?
Be honest. Name your truth no matter what it is. God is listening.
Let us Pray:
Like a very good mother,
God, you always welcomes us home.
No matter where we have been, or not been;
No matter what we have done, or not done;
No matter what we achieved, or did not achieve;
We are your beloved children.
God, you always rejoice upon our return.
We lean into the warm, spiritual arms of you, God:
received, forgiven, embraced, and blessed.
On this Mother’s Day we give thanks for the women
who have given birth to our bodies
And who have mothered us
Who have grandmothered us.
We give thanks for the women who changed our diapers
Who wiped our noses
Who gave us shoulders to cry on.
We give thanks for all the women of the Hebrew Bible, and the Gospels, Acts, and Letters and more.
We give thanks for our church mothers.
We pray for all mothers, of all walks, of all kinds.
We ask your blessing upon them, be they here on earth or in heaven.
We pray for all mothers – especially those for whom this pandemic is especially challenging.
We pray especially for those mothers separated from their children;
For mothers grieving;
For mothers awaiting to be mothers.
We pray for mothers working on the frontlines;
mothers who have lost jobs;
mothers who are tending children and parents.
We pray especially for our own mothers. We say their names now aloud or in our hearts:
God, our true mother and true father, all praise be to you for the wonders, challenge, and glory of being motherly. Amen.
Today, let me share from the Gospel of John, 14:1-14
Praise to God for these wise teachings. Amen.
SERMON
Don’t let your hearts be troubled.
Sure Jesus. Great advice. How can I not be troubled when we’re under a Stay Safe Order… which is a Stay at Home order… that is a Shelter in Place order?
How can I not be troubled that this means companies are to open, but are not required to provide any sort of protection to their employees or customers? Oh, sure, they’re encouraged. But it is up to US to enforce it.
And enforcing it has been leading to… people being spat on, and shot, and killed.
Don’t let your hearts be troubled.
Be at peace with murdering someone for trying to follow the law? Trying to care about public health? Be at peace with companies content to sacrifice human lives for profit…
Or rather, a government okay with people dying in order to gild coffers? Coffins for coffers.
This makes my heart troubled.
It makes my heart troubled that opened businesses means no longer qualifying for unemployment. So many people are now choosing between returning to work where they may be shot if they try to stay healthy or enforce the rules; or staying home with no income and falling into homelessness.
It makes my heart troubled that the people sick with COVID-19 are dis-proportionally minorities and the poor. People who were called essential, but not given hazard pay, and not able to work from home. People dying for minimum wage.
My heart is troubled.
I’m troubled knowing of all the parents who dare don’t go home from their first responder jobs, hospital jobs, and nursing home jobs because they dare don’t get their spouse and children sick. I’m troubled reading about orphans who lost first one, then the other, parent in the same week.
I’m troubled how fear is manifesting in our souls.
My own included. I’m missing my mom on mother’s day. I’m missing my grandmothers on mother’s day. I’m missing my second daughter.
I’m troubled, Jesus.
Believe in God, you say, and also in you. I do! But golly, help me with my unbelief. Help me with my lack of trust. Help me with my troubled soul.
Jesus spoke these words to his very troubled disciples at the last supper. When he’s told them he will be killed. When he’s told them how they will betray him. When he’s started the new commandment to love one another, as he loved, and sealed this new way of living with his blood.
I can’t think he was saying literally you may not be troubled. He was troubled! Twice we’re told Jesus is deeply troubled and one of them is over the death of Lazarus.
No… I think it is more like when our mothers rocked us and whispered, Don’t cry.
This is reassurance. Comfort. Shh… shh… don’t be troubled. Believe. Take heart. I am leaving. I am dying. But it is not the end. Shh… take comfort, be brave… I go to prepare a place where we will never be separated again.
A house big enough to house us all.
A home where we are not separated by COVID-19; nor border control; nor prison. A home where we are not even separated by death. A home with enough room for everyone.
Jesus reassures us we already know how to get to this home. We know it. We cannot unknow it. We already have the keys to the home. We’re already welcomed in.
He is the way there. Jesus is the path home. Jesus is the trail that leads us into the heart of God where we are reunited with our mothers, our daughters, our brothers, our sisters, our fathers, all our family and friends who share love with us. Reunited, and reconciled. Forgiveness given and forgiveness received. Because in God, with God, all things are possible.
I think Jesus is also telling us not to let the troubles rule our souls. When we live out of fear we don’t live abundantly. We live fearfully. Restricted. Narrow. Defensive. Quick to anger and quick to take offense.
Fear causes people to refuse to mask. Masking admits the virus is real. Admits people are dying. Admits we are fragile, mortal, vessels who live shorter than a blink of God’s eye.
Fear causes people to hoard. Hoard not just toilet paper and Lysol, but hoard wealth. Demand people back out to jobs and demand a growing, profitable economy. Fear of going without. Fear of not having enough. Fear of scarcity.
When I’m troubled by scarcity I close my pocket book and my heart. I don’t want to share. I want more than I need right now because I’m scared of how much I’ll need In the future, and it won’t be there.
Fear of scarcity makes us horde emotions too.
We need a lot of emotional energy right now just for our daily lives. We’re scared. We’re angry. We’re lonely. We’re unsure what the future holds. That means there’s very little emotional energy left over to do things we want to do – read, and art, and talk with people, and pray.
When someone asks more of us – more emotional energy – asks us to add one more thing to our plate – we freak out. We’re overloaded! No, I cannot do more! I cannot!
I cannot shed another tear!
I cannot hear one more bad piece of news!
I cannot comply with your request to mask.
I’m scared. I’m out of spoons. I’m out of emotional energy. I’m out of the ability to act.
Troubled souls.
Jesus is reassuring us of abundant life. Of peaceful souls. The future is a home reunited, reconciled, and redeemed. We do not need to fear. There will be heartache, and death, and pain, and sin, but in the end, as in the words of Julian of Norwich who we read earlier, “All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”
In her vision, she speaks with Jesus. She recounted the vision,
“In my folly, before this time I often wondered why, by the great foreseeing wisdom of God, the onset of sin was not prevented: for then, I thought, all should have been well. This impulse [of thought] was much to be avoided, but nevertheless I mourned and sorrowed because of it, without reason and discretion.
“But Jesus, who in this vision informed me of all that is needed by me, answered with these words and said: ‘It was necessary that there should be sin; but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.’
“These words were said most tenderly, showing no manner of blame to me nor to any who shall be saved.”
In our reading, Jesus tells his disciples all shall be well. In Julian’s vision, Jesus tells this mother all shall be well. Today Jesus tells us – all shall be well. And all shall be well. And all manner of things shall be well.
Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God. Believe also in me.
There is enough space in God for all people.
You already know how to get to this place of abundance.
You already know how to live out of the grace, the bounty, God gives.
You can do even greater miracles than you can even imagine because of the abundance available to you.
Love in Jesus’ name. Love in God’s name. Love – and miracles happen.
Love – and live out of abundant live. Live out of extravagant love. Live out of the wealth of God and the fear we have fades like morning dew.
No, things are not alright. Love anyways.
No, I’m not without troubles. I will love anyways.
No, there’s much that keeps me up at night. Much that makes me scared. Much that makes me want to hide and hoard and cry out for my mommy.
But I will love and determinedly live the Way of Christ.
I will love God. I will love my brothers and sisters, love one another, and even love my enemies and strangers. And I will love myself.
Because that is the commandment I live under: Love one another as I have loved you. (John 13:34)
And the love sets this troubled heart at peace. The love is stronger than the fear. The love is stronger than the death. The love is stronger than the isolation and loneliness. “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” (1 Corn. 13:13.)
Don’t let your hearts be troubled. As in, yes, there’s trouble in my soul, but I will choose to have a loving heart anyways.
For love overcomes all. For God is love.
Blessed mother’s day.
Amen.
Pastor Whitney Bruno Sermons 