May 5 — Sixth Sunday of Easter

Listen to this sermon HERE.

Oh no!  Now Paul has had a vision.  (Remember last week when Peter had a vision—and everything changes?)  What an energetic and open group of people that must have been accompanying Paul, the way Acts 16 is narrated — “When he had seen the vision, we immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia, being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them.”

And so they set sail from Troas, to Samothrace, to Neapolis and from there to Philippi.  That’s their missionary journey.  How’s yours looking this week?  You know you’re all Christ’s missionaries, right?!

From where will you set sail this week, and where will your visions lead you this week/month?  How would you record your missionary journeys?  God’s calling some of us down to T.A.C.O. again this week, and then maybe over to visit a friend’s house…

“During the night, ____ had a vision: there stood a man on the corner of W. Broadway and India St., pleading with her and saying, come over to the city and help us.  And when she had seen the vision, we immediately tried to cross over into downtown, being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to the people there.  We set sail from Shepherd of the Valley’s parking lot, and took a straight course to Third Avenue Charitable Organization.  The following day we went to visit an aging friend who was lonely and from there we continued…”  Something like that?  

Sound crazy, all this talk of visions?  A little irrational?  Maybe so.  Betty Corsi told me once about a vision she had.  It was Easter Sunday 2009.  We were all arriving to church in our Easter finest, we had brass instruments that that Sunday, and everything was intended to be glorious, to blow the roof off.  That’s when I first changed the seats to be in the round as a way of surprising, shocking everyone.  That first Easter was a shock right...and there’s great symbolism in the Christian community gathering in a circle, equidistant from one another, looking at each other…

Betty, as she appeared to me after the service was unimpressed and un-phased really by any of the shock and awe of Easter fabulous-ness.  She just says to me quietly after the service, pointing over to this plot of land, “Pastor, I’ve had a vision:  Why don’t we have garden over there and grow food for hungry people?”

We set sail from a clump of dirt and weeds, took a straight course and now we have crossed over to these 12 plots where fruits and vegetables and herbs grow, 6 fruit trees, 8 families, a girl scout troupe, a preschool class, our Sunday School class, and members of our community, not even affiliated with our worship on Sunday (gasp!) all planting and growing food out there.  We set sail from a clump of dirt and weeds, and now we have a garden, a community garden...

Our reading from Revelation this morning says “the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.”  Imagine the healing of the nations.  If you could paint or draw or write a song about or act that that out—the healing of the nations—how would you do that?  For some, maybe they see the healing of the nations—in their Holy-Spirit-inspired minds’s eye—as  a community garden.  Where will our visions from God take us?    

We set sail from here...wherever “here” is for you.  

And look what happens to Paul and his companions:  In this story today, they are taken in!  They are taken care of!  The meet this woman of considerable means named Lydia.  Who offers them safety in a strange land, hospitality and welcome.  Who knew? 

We had our Synod Assembly this week.  And all the crossing over, I like to call it cross-pollinating of ideas and stories and laughter and fellowship that takes place.  And I continue to come away surprised:  Who knew?  There’s actually a bunch of us faithful Lutheran around Southern California and even in Hawaii?  Doing incredible ministry (you should see the dvd Jenny did honoring our lay leaders, caretakers of creation around our synod)!  Lydias abound even today.  When we risk the missionary journey — whether we’re traveling to downtown to help out at a soup kitchen or across the world or over to a grieving friends house —when we take the risk and make the missionary journey, sometimes we’re met by Lydias!

There are other amazing people out there, ready to welcome us in, perhaps even ready to be baptized along the waters’ edge!  [pause]

And there is trouble too.  But this is where God calls us to go.  We set sail from clumps of dirt and weeds.  That’s us, by the way.  We were reminded by our key speaker Dr. Ben Stewart that we are earth creatures, dry clumps of dirt and weeds, but God takes us, and sets us to sail by breathing life into us.  And off we go, into this life, filled with God’s spirit/breath/wind (all the same word in Hebrew (ruach).  And look where we go!  Where will God’s spirit/wind/breath blow you this week?  Maybe you’ll meet a Lydia, and maybe you won’t.  But no matter what, sisters and brothers in Christ, know that you will ultimately be taken care of.  For you are a child of God.
Hear Jesus‘ words again from the Gospel of John: “Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Peace I give to you.”  

"Rescue breaths"

We set sail, because when God gives us CPR (my presentation slide on Genesis 2), we can’t help but live with gusto, live with spirit, live with vision, live like the new Jerusalem has dropped right on top of La Mesa, of San Diego.  When God gives us CPR, when God blows into us spirit/wind/breath, we can’t help but live like the Tree of Life is growing right there in our front yards. (If you have a tree or a plant in your front yard, give thanks for it, and let it be a reminder for you of the beautiful passage from Revelation.) Right there in our own home, apartment, condo or cabin are images of the healing of the nations.  Your house, your dwelling place is a place of God’s healing!  That’s what God breathing life into you and me does for us, it turns everything around, it raises the dead, it hydrates the dry ground, it causes fruit to grow.  That’s what happens when God’s vision sets us to sail.

God, through Christ, sets you to sail this day in love and forgiveness, in peace and joy.  

So off we go!