Beloved is the name give to us by God through Jesus Christ. We see this most clearly in Jesus’ baptism, when He rises up out of the water and the Holy Spirit comes down to bless Him. It is the same power of God to raise Christ from the dead, that welcomes all into the church and claims us in Baptism.

Beloved, Baptized, Blessed. A rhythmic trinity.

Dungeon Dwellers Is. 42.1-9; Ps. 29; Acts 10.34-43; Matt 3. 13-17

Rev. Tiare L. Mathison, Pastor & Soul-Tender, January 12, 2020

BELOVED, BAPTIZED, BLESSED

When I can’t sleep at night, I lie in bed and rub a small cross pattern on my forehead with my left thumb, and repeat these words. Beloved, baptized, blessed. ‘Beloved’ is the name I am given when God first calls me into His Kingdom. My Baptism is an outward sign of an inward grace, permanent. Blessed is the sense of gratitude I carry with me, humbled that God should call a Dungeon Dweller like me. It is my simple trinity, buried in the touch of forehead skin. Like helping a newborn baby rest.

Dungeon Dwellers.

He joined us you know. The one Human Being who never fell from grace, the only one who does not need to repent, does not need to be baptized for the forgiveness of sin, steps into the water to be marked. Its amazing. This incredible act of humility. Jesus did not grasp equality with God. Rather He became a servant even unto death, that humanity might be lifted up and every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Thats how Paul says it in Philippians 2.

The first act of Jesus’ adult ministry signifies His complete identification with humanity. He gets down with the Dungeon Dwellers at the river’s edge, a gigantic baptism party. He stays down through out His ministry. He eats and drinks with sinners, He talks theology with women, He engages with foreigners and the despised gentiles, all the way to the cross, His life no more valuable than a thief. From the beginning to the end He belongs to us. As He comes up out of the roiled waters, the heavens open wide, the Dove Spirit descends and a voice rings with the rhythm of the universe, “This is my Beloved, I am deeply pleased with Him.”

Jesus’ baptism is his ordination & installation as the Christ. The Father in heaven opens up the brass doors to give a shout-out to the One He loves more than anything in the universe. I’ve often wondered if there was a tinge of sadness on an undercurrent of this voice, knowing the cross was 3 years waiting. (pause) God says, “here He is. This is it. This is all I got.” All God’s desires, hope, promises, everything in the Old Testament leads up to this razor-edge moment, offered to the world in Jesus the Christ. Liberator, Justice seeker and maker, Redeemer, Savior, Spirit-Bearer, our limited language falters. In a contained moment, the entire Trinity is present. The Father in the voice; the Spirit in the Dove and the Son dripping wet. The next time they appear together is at the end of Matthew’s gospel when the church gets baptized: Jesus says, “Go out into all the world and make disciples. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.”

The inauguration of the office of the Christ opens up a worldview never seen before. Even John the Baptist is surprised by the Spirit coming as a Dove. He’d been hoping for a fire-breathing tiger! The Spirit in Jesus offers a strong Word yet does it in gentleness. He modulates His power to come along side people and offers a model of non-violence. Peace-making is what wins the day not more tribal or ethnic war. He pursues justice as the means and the end. This Pre-Fall possibility of human life is staggering in its implications. Humanity could be different. We are not stuck in our violent, tit for tat, defensive postures, arms crossed permanently over our chests, scowls on our faces. Only the cynical among us see it this way. The baptismal waters are infused with the life-breath of this Spirit-Bearer, Jesus. The doors of heaven are wide open, never to be shut again. Access to the Father is freely given. The Spirit comes to dwell permanently. The Son promises to be with us always, even to the end of the age. Magnificent words the Father says about the Son: “This is my Beloved, I am deeply pleased with him.” But there is a larger shock in store. (pause)

At our baptism, we are adopted and named BELOVED. Just like Jesus. All the kindness and affection heard in the Father’s voice at His baptism, is now whispered in our ears as we bury the old self in the powerful waters. We rise up to new life, singing with the angels, ‘Glory’.

I am here to tell you, again, that in your baptism you have been claimed as God’s own. God says, “This is my priceless daughter Wendy, I am deeply pleased with her.” “This is my priceless son, Matt, I am deeply pleased with him.” Every single one of us gets to hear our name in the deep, rhythmic voice of the universe: This is my daughter, this is my son. I am deeply pleased. The Spirit descends into the very fabric of your life and She does not leave. You can ignore Her of course. But be reminded, You have access to the open doors of heaven to let your Father know everything you need. The Christ welcomes you home. The Trinity is looking out for you. There is only one baptism. It is not like Jesus got a private ceremony and the rest of us are stuck with the public one. No. (pause) We are adopted into Jesus’ family and claimed as one of God’s precious, unrepeatable miracles of grace. You are one in a bazillion! It brings you to tears doesn’t it? The God of the Universe delights in you. Let me say that again, over and over. Through our adoption, we can now hear the drumbeat for justice that Isaiah sings, to set us Dungeon Dwellers free. God is relentless in Her pursuit to unlock the gates of the captives, to bring the light of life where darkness is all they see. As Peter declares, there is no partiality on God’s part.

Let me ask you this: What about on your part? Do you find yourself letting some in and leaving some out?

God sent Jesus preaching peace. The Message spreads, especially after John’s Baptism of Jesus. All over the place!

Let me ask you this: Do you still preach peace in the daily of your life?

Jesus had power and used it for good.

Hmmmm, et moi, et tu?

Put to death, but God raised Jesus up.

Jesus ate and drank with us, Peter says. His witnesses.

Let me ask you this: Is He still invited to your table?

As Jesus sat at table, many tax collectors and dungeon dwellers came and were sitting with Him... When the Senior Pastors and Bible Teachers saw this, they asked the disciples, “Why does Your Teacher eat and drink with them?!” People will come from north and south and east and west to share the banquet of Abraham/Sarah/Hagar, Isaac/Rebecca, Jacob/Rachel/Leah in the kingdom of heaven. Matthew says a little later on. Dungeon Dwellers. All. Amen

The ancient story of 3 Magi, Astrologers, follow a huge star and find a baby who is named Jesus, or Emmanuel, God-with-us. All through the Hebrew Scripture, we see God revealing justice, compassion, mercy and judgment against oppressors. God’s desire is for humanity to be made whole, again. The ultimate act, born a human baby, blows all our categories of understanding. Jesus Christ moved into the neighborhood and has never left. Through the Holy Spirit, we live constantly in the presence of God. This is revelation!!!

Sermon: January 5, 2020

Maybe We Forget. Epiphany, 2020 Eph. 3.1-12; MATT. 2.1-12

Rev. Tiare L. Mathison, Soul-Tender & Pastor

Maybe we forget... We were once outsiders, without Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers to the covenant of promise, having no hope, without God in the world. This is what Gentile means. Maybe we forget, we follow stars or little gods; we cower before the mighty lifted up and exalted as empires vie for power; we pursue petty things in competition with our neighbors. We center our lives on the puny rather than the majestic. Maybe we forget the good news of the gospel of Matthew. in chapter 1 of his gospel, is the genealogy, which just by saying the word your eyes glaze over. OT lists only contain men's names right? Yet this list says something else, something really important for us. There are 4 women named as great-great-greatgrandmothers of our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ. Tamar, Ruth, Rahab and Bathesheba, whom Matthew modestly calls 'the wife of Uriah'. Each irregular in their own way. Tamar had to play the harlot to trick her father-in-law, Judah, into keeping his promises in Genesis 38. Rahab is a prostitute who assists the spies of Israel in Joshua 2. Ruth is Moabite, a foreigner, and a descendent of the incestuous Lot, who says the immortal words, “Where you go, I will go, where you lie, I will lie. Your people will be my people, your God, my God”. She speaks these words to her widowed mother-in-law, she too, a widow. Batheseba, well, we all know what her crime is--too pretty for words, David couldn't help himself. They are irregular but more importantly they are NOT Israelites, they are Gentiles. Maybe we forget. Genealogies are normally constructed to show the 'purity' of the line, no Gentile contamination here. But Matthew says, 'oh wait a minute. There is a deeper theological truth. There is something about God I want you to know. He is not a nationalist or a racist or a sexist." Even more important these 4 women are morally questionable. It is a perfect example of the gospel Matthew is going to preach over and over again, throughout the season of Epiphany, the next 8 weeks, until Ash Wednesday. God can and does overcome sin--Jesus arrives to save sinners..how does He get here? he comes through sinners. God has been in the mercy business for an awfully long time, including all of the OT, long before Christmas. Yes there is judgment, absolutely, but there is mercy too. Such mercy... Now in chapter 2, Matthew does it to us again. He takes us on a journey via Magi, again Gentiles, "despised heathens" one commentator says. Not only Gentiles but astrologers to boot. Ancient world views imagined the earth as the center of the planets with a magnetic connection to the god of each planet, who controls peoples lives, thus acts of sacrifice, even human, to assuage the god’s fire. Astronomy looks at the laws of the stars; astrology looks at the message in them. Acceptable, even honored in Greek & Roman culture, the magi are viewed with contempt by Israel. "They get their wisdom by looking at the creatures, in this case the stars, rather than the Creator. Their so-called wisdom is anathema, we have been rescued from all that. God would never invite astrologers to Jesus' birthday party. I mean really!" Israel is shaped & formed by God's word which in Ezek 21:21 says, "For the king of Babylon stands...at the head of the two ways, to use divination; he shakes the arrows, he consults the teraphim, he looks at the liver" a sarcastic description mocking a king. Matthew says, 'mmmmmm. Well that is true but...' The faithful Magi pay attention to the natural revelation of God. Let me say that again. The star rises at Jesus' birth. But the stars are not the savior. The Magi follow the star. They meet with Herod and the senior pastors & Bible teachers of the day in Jerusalem, as Dale Bruner, retired prof from Whitworth, says. They continue their journey 2 hours south, about 7 miles, to Bethlehem and there the star hovers over the savior. When they see the Christ they pay homage. They bow down. They fall to their knees and prostrate themselves on the ground. They have seen The Lord! They worship Him!!! This is Emmanuel--the with-us God, born in the flesh-- could be called 'Emmanuel-Adam' fully human/fully divine. The Magi act out one of the responses to divine revelation. Last week, with the slaughter of the Innocents, we saw Herod’s response, another kind of reaction. Absolute rejection. When there is rejection of glory, humanity gets hurt. We see this to this day. Then The Magi share their resources. Their existential reality has been changed from deeply bad, a good definition of sin, to wonderfully made in the image of God, essentially good. This is bit of a bird walk. This is the tension of existential/essential, Christians live with. We claim we are made in the image of God, a good thing. We see it most clearly in a newborn baby. But we bear the mark of original sin in our existence, a bad thing, just ask any parent. Innocent babies still have to be taught right from wrong. The saving light of Christ takes the existentially bad and begins the long, hard life-time task of drawing it into the essentially good. So in Romans, Paul writes, “salvation is nearer than when we first believed.” The Magi go home another way, on a brand new journey of life. They no longer need the star, they found the Savior. Maybe we forget... One thing to note, Dale Bruner states: quote, “...its always been a little embarrassing to theology that God’s initial means of revelation to the magicians was their idol- the stars. Yet we have to look closer: God takes the unusual both in history - the four Gentile women - and nature - the star - and uses them for His Glory.” Unquote. As our Book of Order says, “God’s Word preached rightly and the sacraments administered with understanding, there the light of Jesus Christ shines.” So tell me, Where would we hang the star today? Maybe we forget Epiphany - the manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles. “But now, in Christ, you who were once far off, have been brought near, by the blood of Christ. For He is our peace.” The dividing walls of hostilities were torn asunder as the curtain in the Holy of Holies was rent forever when Jesus died. Amidst systems of domination that pit groups of people against one another, we are called to perceive the mystery of Christ revealed! You who were far off have been brought near. You are now an enrolled member of the tribe of Glory! Your essential goodness is established as a bearer of the image of God. Your existential goodness is rooted in Christ’s resurrection. And no one can take it away. Maybe we forget. The Magi take another way home, one of Matthew the preacher’s favorite off-set words. He uses it like repentance, ‘turn around and go the other way’. It’s a radical new scaffolding of life. Not isolated to the metaphysical, encounters with the living Light of Christ remake every aspect of our lives. Existentially to be more generous, more filled with grace, less judgment, more forgiveness. To get in the ring and fight for the least and the lowly and the alien and the stranger and the unwanted and the neglected. To be wounded on behalf of others. Maybe we can remember... Amen

Beloved, the Tatoo on Your Heart

So What Is Revealed in Epiphany?