August 11 — Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

Grace to you and peace…

I’m a fan of Rick Steves.           Haven’t always been —   
too cheerful.                 But he’s grown on me

Gotten a little more political, he’s very thorough and thoughtful, he’s open to lots of different kinds of people, and he’s a Lutheran from the West Coast… (I actually invited him here once!)

Now I watch his shows, podcast his radio program, I’ve bought a few of his books.  And apparently, we have the same taste in castles:  I saw it first in a coffee table book.  Burg Elz, and then found out it’s Steves’ favorite in all of Europe…

But one of my favorite things of his is his whole philosophy on light packing — whether 3 days or 3 weeks he packs the exact same thing in just a simple backpack.  I’ve watched that little how-I-pack segment about ½ dozen times...because it’s just not how I’ve packed before, especially for overseas travel.  It means, doing your research on weather and climate, wearing the same stuff over, and washing, but the goods outnumber the bads, in my experience! 

And as Rick Steves points out, no one ever comes home from a trip saying, “That was a great trip, but you know, I wish I had lugged around more.”

Packing light.  Shedding the excess.  Being nimble.  Ready to go...at a moment’s notice.  These are themes in our Gospel text today.

It’s almost like a mini-Advent theme this week:  Be on your guard.  Sell you possessions, Jesus says.  Give them away, following up on last week.  Let go of stuff, because it can drag you down.  Do you think that’s true?  Shed the excess, so that you can travel light. 

And I’m intrigued—and have been pondering this week—the connection between this idea of “traveling light” and how we treat people.   It looks like there is a correlation between traveling light and caring for and receiving care from neighbor with kindness and grace:  this “Rick Steves” cheerfulness connects to going light…

(In other words, I don’t think Rick Steves would be as cheerful a person if he travelled with tons and tons of stuff.  I actually think that Jesus is giving us a gift, rather than a daunting task, by saying, “Sell your possessions, give up your stuff.”  At first glance it sounds like this terribly unrealistic command, right?  But I believe it’s a gift that Christ gives us today.  I think of all the couples that downsize in their later years.  They always seem happier, they don’t miss all the piles and the clutter and the extra garage space.  They have everything they need (in their 1 Bedroom, 2B condo/apt.).

How do we stay light on our feet for the Gospel?  Agile in our lives and our ministries, among our families, friends and in the world?  How are we ballet dancers of the Gospel?

I love that ballet move where they run and jump with their legs split almost parallel to the earth.  And then just as quickly and gently, smiling all the while, they come back down, and it looks so soft and easy to do.  [pause]  Or a running back in football — who so gracefully hurdles the defensive line at the goal line and does that beautiful landing roll into the end zone….(they’ve gotta be smiling under that helmet).  (Or Mohammed Ali: “Fly like a….”

God creates us acrobatic too, sisters and brother in Christ! Literally that word: “up on our toes, climbing high”.  Perhaps not physically (like a ballerina or a running back) but as human beings, as baptized-blessed-and-sent children of God, we are created  to connect and relate and serve one another...acrobatically.  We are blessed to go light and cheerfully...like how Rick Steves travels.  [pause/marinate]

[Roll-with-the-punches story.  Interaction this week.  Quick to forgive.  Beat me to the punch.]

Following Jesus, remaining with the Christian community (the church), continuing along the way with Christ is acrobatics. 
It is jumping and landing, falling and rolling.  It is laughing and partnering.  It is trusting one another.  And all of that reflects our trusting in God.  How do we “ballet the Gospel”, the good news of God’s love and grace and abundance in our lives?  

Because it is easy to see work, life in general, our many and various ministries in the church and beyond the church as solo drudgery —   
Heavy footed or slumped over in the doorway (Jesus’ images from the Gospel text about the master returning), or perhaps forgetting the master’s return all together.  [pause]

But we “light-footed dancers of the Gospel”, on the other hand, live and work and care for one another and wait with energetic anticipation.

Christ moves among us, sisters and brothers, preparing for us a better country (2^nd reading from Hebrews), a feast to come, blessings that outnumber the stars; and serving us all the while, beckoning us to shed our possessions, and to join ever more the dance of ministry, the dance of Trinity, the dance of loving and serving our neighbor with joy.   Christ moves among us like a butterfly, announcing grace and peace, hope and joy.  Christ encircles us, leaps above us, dives below us and powers through us, in spite of us.  

This One-in-Three upon whom we cannot place our finger, but only put our trust, will sustain us, will forgive us, and will draw us back into the fold, back upon the road and free of our load.  Have no fear.  We are marching in the light of God (know that hymn? sing it?), and we are marching light, we are dancing light, we are singing light.  

And now, we are feasting light.  Filled to the brim and ready to move.  AMEN.