Sermon for March 18 - Addictions

Scripture for this sermon: Ephesians 2:1-10

I remember once going on a day trip to Niagara Falls with my friend Bryce from back in Guelph.  We wandered around for a short while, but it wasn’t long before we found ourselves standing outside the casino.  We looked at each other, checked our wallets and decided to head in.  I only had about forty dollars, I’d never been to a casino before, so I figured it would be ok to lose all my money, and walk out saying I’d done it once in my life.  Forty bucks isn’t too expensive for what I thought would be a few hours of entertainment.

We wandered around, wound up at the roulette table.  And within a few spins of the wheel, we were up.  It was great.  We had it all figured out.  Undoubtedly we would be walking out of there with at least a couple of hundred dollars each.  I didn’t understand how people could lose money, when it was so easy.  Each time we won, it was quite a rush of excitement.  What we didn’t notice was that, those rushes of excitement were further apart than they needed to be for us to keep our winnings.  And soon, I’d say after about only half an hour at the table, we were both broke.

I remember as we walked away thinking to myself: “Boy, I know what I did wrong, and if I just go take out a bit of money, I can get back what I lost.”  Fortunately, I have a good friend in Bryce and he said we should leave even as warning bells were starting to go off in my head.  I can see why they say that the worst thing that can happen to you the first time you go to a casino, is to win.  That thrill is easy to chase.

I never became a compulsive gambler.  But addictions do take a hold of us all in different ways.  For some they may be associated with substances.  Alcohol, narcotics, pharmaceuticals, cigarettes, caffeine, just to name a few.  Some may be associated with behaviors, gambling, sex, pornography, adrenaline inducing activities, eating, even working.  All of these can become addictions.  Though some of these addiction might be socially acceptable, or even socially praised, for the most part we view these as unacceptable.  And any addiction cannot be considered healthy.

Often people with addictions are looked at as a sort of leper.  They are people who are judged for making poor decisions, for not having any self control, for being lazy.  This is why I think addiction is another example of a taboo issue that is never openly discussed.  Instead it is whispered and gossiped about, which truthfully, I think is even more damaging than helpful.

I’m not going to lecture today on the evils of addiction.  We’ve all heard that countless times, we’ve witnessed it, we’ve seen enough after school specials.  I’m not going to tell you how to get rid of an addiction.  I’m not trained in that, though if anyone is interested, I have contact information for groups, and you can feel free to ask me about it in private for yourself or for someone you may know.  All I want to do today is to break the silence.  I want to talk about it in such a way that we are not as afraid to talk about it with one another.

So what is an addiction?

Invite responses

Simplistically put, an addiction affects the reward part of our brain.  So for example, some substances can cause our brains to release dopamine, one of the chemicals responsible for us feeling good.  The more a substance is used, the more our brains become dependant upon them to release dopamine.  Our brain circuits get damaged as we continually fill our system with addictive substances, requiring more and more of them in order for us to feel good about anything.

Behavioral addictions, like gambling addictions or sexual addictions, similarily affect our brain’s reward system.  The rush of winning a big pot, for example, causes us to feel good.  Our brains release dopamine.  Eventually, our brains become re-wired to associate good feelings with gambling.

With chemicals or behaviors we can become obsessed, we can become compulsive.  Longing for that good feeling, longing for the reward system in our brains to be activated, we seek out those same stimulants to do it.  It gets to the point where it is no longer even a choice, our brains have become re-wired, and this is the dependence.  Sometimes this can happen after one or two experiences, sometimes it might take longer, years even.  This is effected by all sorts of factors.  Certain substances or behaviors are more or less addictive.  Our own genetic predisposition to addiction is also a factor.  Environmental and social factors also influence this.

The cycle gets worse when our compulsive behavior, seeking that high, seeking that good feeling, leads us to do things that make us actually feel worse.  An alcohol binge that goes wrong, losing a lot of money at the casino, feeling ashamed of a sexual encounter.  We want to feel better after them, so tragically we return to our addiction.  Addicts often know that what they are doing is having an awful affect on their lives. 

There isn’t reason to it.  There isn’t logic to it.  Don’t try to find it. The natural human desire for pleasure, or to end pain, believe me, holds a greater sway over any of us than logic does.  Many people who are under the sway of an addiction will express a desire to change.  Guilt becomes a factor, and not necessarily a positive one. Someone trying to quit drinking may feel guilty if they fail.  The logic becomes, “I feel awful about drinking.  Let me have a drink to feel better.”

Once the brain has re-wired itself, it is no longer a matter of choice, no longer a matter of will power or strength.  And often, people do not realize the negative effect certain influences can have on their lives until this re-wiring has occurred.  The cycle of addiction is truly one of powerlessness.  And it is heart breaking.  Heartbreaking because of how helpless the addict is, and heartbreaking because of all those who are influenced by it.  Addiction leads to great wounds in life, and not just to the lives of the addicts.  Addiction can greatly wound families, friends, and communities.

I’ve been reading the Big Blue Book.  This is the book put out by Alcoholics Anonymous.  It is a good thing to read.  I’d recommend it to anyone.  It is full of stories about alcoholics, about their lives under the influence of alcoholism.  This powerlessness is shown again and again. People who know what they are doing is hurting them, is hurting those they care about, but who cannot stop.

I think our scripture reading for today responds to that powerlessness.  Verses 8 and 9, “For by grace have you been save through faith, and this is not of your own doing; it is the gift of God – not the result of works, so that no one may boast.” 

Here the author seems to be speaking directly to our society’s view that people just need to get over their addiction.  People just need to develop more will-power, people just need to be stronger.  The author seems to be saying, no amount of strength in you, no amount work done by you, is going to move you into holy relationship with God, with ourselves, with the people around us.  Moving into a state of grace is not accomplished by us. 

And of course we don’t like that in our world.  We live in a pious protestant society.  Live and act proper, and you’ll get what is yours.  Anyone who is having a rough go of it, deserves it, and anyone who is successful deserves it too.  The reason I am not an addict is because I am a better person.  The reason I am successful is because I am better.  I have done all the right stuff, and someone else has done the wrong stuff.  It is their fault, they got where they are. 

Of course we think this way.  It is logical.  It helps us maintain a semblance of control, it helps us see some sort of order to the world around us.  If I were not entirely in control of my own fate, that would be a terrifying prospect.  And since I am entirely in control of my fate, everyone else must be as well.  This is the American Dream.  The idea that everyone is in control of their own destiny, and everyone gets what they deserve. 

Unfortunately, this is counter to the passage that we just read today from Ephesians.  The author is very clear that we are not in control.  That the works we do in this world have no influence on God whatsoever.  No one is more loved by God because of the work they do.  No one is loved less by God because of what they do.  We are not in control of grace.  All we can do is surrender to the love that is freely offered to all, regardless of who they are or what they have done.

And when we think about addictions, when we think about the powerlessness that comes against such a disease, what a wonderful message of hope this is.

I was re-reading the 12 steps a few days ago at drama practice and I almost started crying at their beauty.  It is no wonder that Richard Rohr called the 12 steps, the greatest addition to spirituality that has come out of North America. 

Read the steps

The steps all carry this message of profound grace and surrender of control.  Perhaps this is why 12 step programs have an above average rate of success in helping people get over addictions.  They admit to that same biblical truth that we are not entirely in control of our own salvation.  That control is in the hands of a power greater than ourselves.  As Christians we believe this power to be the one who loves us, who cradles us, who cares for us, and who longs for the best for each and every one of us.  Maybe this is why many of the recovered addicts I have met and spoken with seem to have a deep understanding grace.

Perhaps the 12 steps can teach all of us a lesson, not just those of us who have struggled with addiction, but all of us who have made mistakes.  All of us who long for relationship with God, with one another.  Perhaps the 12 steps can remind us, that none of us have control over our salvation.  These are not about making us better, instead they are about re-creating relationships.  I would encourage everyone to take a look at these steps, and see how they can transform all of our lives.

Sermon for January 22, 2012 - Following

The Scripture reading for this sermon is Mark 1:14-20

Why are we Christian?  Why do we come to church once a week on Sunday mornings?  Do we come because we just like it?  Do we come because we’ve always come?  Do we come because it is a good place to socialize?  Why are we here?

Following last night’s events I went back to my office and typed a lot.  I didn’t know what to do with my sermon.  So I would write, then cut, then paste, then erase, then write some more, then lie down on the floor, then pace, then write some more.  Rarely have I felt so openly helpless, so ill-equipped in my ministry than I did as I sat staring at a computer screen last night.  Where was my faith in the midst of all this?

At a time like this, the rubber meets the road.  So why are we here?

In our Gospel reading for today we read a truly ridiculous story.  Possibly one of the most outlandish stories in all of the bible.  And it isn’t about a healing.  It isn’t about someone walking on water.  It isn’t about God siding with one army over another.  It isn’t even about the glories of creation or re-creation.  And yet it is one of the most miraculous stories I have read.

It’s about Jesus saying to a few people, “Hey, come and follow me.”  And do you know what?  They do.  Immediately.  Without thought.  They drop their very livelihoods, they leave their families, their possessions, and they follow.  In all honesty, there are no stories in all of scripture that I find half so terrifying as this one.

Think about it.  This is scary.  How many of us, myself included, would walk away from our jobs, would leave our possessions, would abandon our families if Jesus asked us to?  Don’t worry, I don’t think Jesus is asking us to.  But, what did these four disciples encounter? To be honest, though it scares me, I marvel at it as well.  What did they experience in Christ?  What was it that just made them drop everything?  Immediately?

Maybe the question is not, “Why are we Christian?”, maybe the question is more basic than that entirely, “What does it mean to be Christian?”  “What does it mean to cast down our nets and follow Christ?”

It is so easy to drop frivolous words around this story.  Words like, “Oh they found Christ.”  But what do we even mean by that?  “Oh, they accepted Jesus.”  Really?  So what does that mean?

These days words like that imply that we have some sort of choice in the matter.  Some sort of agency in accepting Christ.  We have turned it into a rational head game.  Do this, that, and the other thing and you will be a follower of Jesus.  Believe this, that, and the other thing and you accept Christ.  (Act it out)…  Oh, ok.  Now I guess I’m a Christian.

But look at these four disciples.  They had absolutely no control over what they were doing.  The bible is very clear that they immediately followed Jesus.  They didn’t stop to think about whether or not they should, whether it was a good idea or a bad idea.  They didn’t pause and consider the ramifications of their actions.  They just went. 

So what was it that swept them up?  What took their control away?

My own answer is simple.  They experienced God, they experienced the divine, they experienced holiness, whatever you want to call it when they met Jesus.  Richard Rohr writes that “Anyone who has any authentic inner experience knows God is only beauty, mercy and total embrace.”  To be wrapped up in total embrace, how could they not be swept away?  Once you’ve felt that, once you’ve known that, is there any choice?

More and more I’m coming to the realization that everything about our faith comes down to grace.  That’s all there is, that is all that matters.  Grace! Grace! Grace!  The idea that God’s love comes first.  That all things are created out of love and dwell within that love.  That God’s love is freely and adoringly given.  That there is absolutely nothing we can do to earn that love.  No hoop to jump through, no ritual to perform, no set of beliefs to have.  Alternatively there is absolutely nothing we can do to lose that love, no sin so great, no belief so outlandish.

As Christians we see that Grace embodied in the self giving love of Jesus.  No wonder these disciples dropped everything.  They encountered and knew divine love, and it blew them away.  They were absolutely taken by it!  Because this is so foreign to us, we try to take control of it.  We have created systems that tell us what we need to do in the world or believe about Jesus in order to receive it.  But we can’t control it.  God’s love comes first.

 “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  This is Paul, and I think it is the Gospel, it is Grace, in the most eloquent language I’ve ever read.  NOTHING can separate us from the love of God.

I think it is important for all of us to know that.

But here’s the question, how many of us know that for ourselves?  It is, in many ways, relatively easy to think it about other.  But, when we’re well and truly honest with ourselves, how many of us think, “My value comes from God’s love for me.  And God’s love is enough.”

That is the basis of all things.  That is where the rubber meets the road.  If we don’t have that, if our value comes from somewhere, something, or someone beyond ourselves, it is that somewhere, something, or someone that we will follow.  If the fishermen saw their value as being the work that they did, they would have never left their boats.  If the fishermen saw their value as what they possessed, they would never have dropped their nets.  If the fishermen saw their own value as being their families, they would never have gone.  The bible is not saying any of these are bad.  The bible is simply saying, our value does not come from them.

This is the most basic element of our faith.  Our value comes simply from God’s love.  Our role as Christians is to long to experience that for ourselves and for the world around us.  That is the basis upon which all things must grow.  I wish I could say what needs to be done to experience that.  But I can’t.  That’s not the way it works.  However, if anyone wants to know that, if anyone longs for that.  Talk to me.   I would love to explore with you, as I explore for myself.  Because God’s love is present, it resides deep within and around us.  We’re invited to know it and to share it.

Sermon for December 18, 2011 - Ramifications

The Scripture Passage for this week was Luke 1:26-38

Has anyone seen the movie Saved?  It’s a great movie, and it does a good job of pointing out some of the inherent hypocrisies of Christianity.  The story is of a young girl who goes to a Christian High School, and she discovers her boyfriend is gay.  She doesn’t know what to do, and she worries for his immortal soul.  She soon comes to the conclusion that sex before marriage is less of a sin than being gay, so she decides to have sex with her boyfriend, with the hopes that it will make him straight.  That’s the first 10 minutes.  Well, she ends up getting pregnant, and the movie goes on from there.

The persecution, the condemnation, and the judgment that she faces at school from her peers, and from the school’s principal are a key theme in the movie.  But held against that, is the love, the compassion, the Grace she receives from all the other outcasts in the school.  From the only Jewish kid at the Christian school, from the brother of the seemingly perfect Christian girl, who is a self professed agnostic, but readily points out all the hypocrisy of the school, from the principal’s son, and from her gay now ex-boyfriend.

What does it mean to be the Body of Christ in the world, and who embodies Christ more in this movie?

Last week, we spoke about the Magnificat, about Mary’s song of Joy to God.  It was a joy that swelled within her, as she experienced and encountered the wonder of God’s Grace.  We spoke about how important and yet how difficult it is to truly understand and accept that Grace which is freely offered to everyone.  We spoke about how wonderful an idea it is, that our value is not dependant upon what the world around us says about us, but is based only on the faith that we, as in all of creation, are the Beloved of God.  Our value does not come from anything we do, or anything the world says about us, it is simply a matter of faith that we have value.

That love of self is important.  It should not be confused with selfishness and egocentricity.  But rather it is a marveling at our own createdness, a respect and admiration for God’s handiwork in our very nature, and a honoring of that handiwork by devoting our lives to figuring out who we truly are.

But you may recall, I ended with some words; they might be hopefilled, they might be ominous, they might be a bit of both.  I said, “There are ramifications of such a notion.”  Since we’re continuing with Mary in our scripture readings for this week, I’d like to continue with our discussion of Grace as well, and what those ramifications are.

Today we’re going to talk about that love of the other.  I’m cautious about separating love of self and love of other.  I don’t think we can love the other as deeply as we do when we love ourselves, and I don’t think we can love ourselves as deeply as we do when we love the other.  But for the sake of practicality, today we’re talking about the love of the other. 

Once again, we need Mary’s help in this understanding of the ramifications of Grace, and how that Grace calls us to love the world.  Mary brings that love out in all of us.  She draws it forth from us, and helps us to see how possible it is.  And she does it all under the radar.

A teenage girl, pregnant out of wedlock, mystery father, from a poor village in the backside of a rebellious country in the dusty corner of the Roman Empire.  And remember from last week, by proper Law, so great was her sin that she could by all rights be stoned to death.

And we love her.  We love this social deviant, this outcast, we love this young girl who according to society did something so horrible as to deserve death in her time of history.  Gabriel is right, she is the most favored.  Not only favored by God, but favored by the world, by two thousand years of history.

And that we do hold her up is a sign of how possible grace is.  Love is possible, and not just for those we like, or agree with, or think are morally upright.  Love is possible, and fully embodied, when we realize what Grace says.  That everyone, that all of creation, has value, simply because of the love of God.

This Sunday is the fourth and final Sunday of Advent.  It is the Sunday of Love.  And what better way to celebrate love than to see how broad, and how far reaching it can be.  Yes, loving family is good.  Yes, loving friends is good.  Yes, loving our community is good.  Yes, loving ourselves is good. 

But who are the “social deviants”, who are those outsiders that we stone every day, not literally but metaphorically?  Or even literally!  How many gay kids get beaten up every day as we sit back silently?  Often it is Christians who do it!  “Send them to a special camp to get fixed.  Because it says in the bible that it is wrong.”  Yeah, well, it said in Mary’s sacred text that she should be executed, and how well would that have worked out for us?

We were able to move beyond social convention when we first held up Mary as beloved in God’s eyes and in our own eyes.  What other social conventions can we move past today?  Who else in the world needs to be held up as beloved? 

What about addicts?  What about the homeless?  And not just saying “yeah, the mentally ill ones should be helped”, but what about the ones who got there because of poor decisions?  What about our First Nations sisters and brothers?  What about prostitutes?  What about the billions of poor in the world?  What about the earth?  The earth is groaning under the weight of humanity, do we need to hold up the earth as a beloved creation of God’s, rather than as an impediment to our wealth?  Who or what are all those aspects of creation that we stone everyday, stone with our economic systems, stone with our politics, stone with our words, that deserve to be loved?

One week from now we will be celebrating Christmas.  We will be celebrating how God’s love became embodied in the world, in Jesus.  And let’s ask ourselves how that love became embodied.  Did it come into the popular crowd? Did it come in the hallways of power?  Did it come with all those perfect people who followed all the rules, and condemned anyone who didn’t?  Did it come to people who had made all the right decisions?  Did it even get a room at an inn?  Or did it come into the world in a stable, with the animals, stinking of crap, born to a woman who by all rights could have been condemned, worshipped by poor shepherds and foreigners, living, sleeping, and eating with sinners, with prostitutes, with outcasts, with people who had made mistakes in their lives, with deviants, with people no one else wanted to touch, with those who the rest of the world thought they were better than?  Did it come breaking all the rules and conventions itself?

And when you answer that, answer this, what does it mean to love?  Where is God’s love in the world?  Yes, there are ramifications of accepting God’s Grace.  Thanks be to God, Amen.

Sermon for December 11, 2011 - Mary's Revolution

Scripture Reading for this week: Luke 1:39-56

Every year in December I have a list of movies that I try to watch before Christmas.  Since it is entirely unacceptable to watch a Christmas movie in May, I think I feel I need to get it all in now, because it will be another year before I have the opportunity again.  My list contains movies like A Christmas Story, with Ralphie longing for an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-hundred Shot Range Model Air Rifle with a compass in the stock and this thing which tells time.  Scrooged and Elf are both on the list somewhere, along with a few others.

But the movie I most associate with the season is National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.  I have watched it every year since I was a little kid.  This wonderful movie is about a man who wants his Christmas holidays with his family to be absolutely perfect.  And as I reflected on this sermon, one scene came to mind.  Chevy Chase as Clark Griswald has spent all day with his son putting lights up on the house.  When all the work is done, he calls everyone, wife, kids, parents and in-laws out for the plugging in ceremony.  A drumroll, a loud singing of “Joy to the World!” and then… Nothing.  This moment I think defines the movie.  Clark, imagining something perfect, longing to offer and to feel that sense of Christmas joy, is sadly disappointed.

This Sunday is the Sunday of Joy.  And as I prepared for today’s service I really struggled trying to figure out what joy is and where it comes from.  Is it really about getting the right present, having the perfect meal, spending time with family and loved ones?  I think those are all wonderful things, and we should not belittle them.  But if we don’t have those, are we resigned to be joyless?  Like Clark Griswald, so often we associate our joy with the world around us, some ideal vision of how things should be.  “The only way I can be happy is if….”  Our sense of worth becomes dictated by the world.  And then we fill in the blank.

In our Gospel reading for today, we read about Mary’s encounter with her cousin Elizabeth, and more than that, we hear her wonderful and joyous song, the Magnificat.  To be honest with you, as I re-read it this week, initially, it made me a little bit mad.  “He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.  He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.”  I read that.  Then I read it again.  And I thought to myself, “Really? Has God done that?“ I mean maybe occasionally, but it doesn’t take long to find hungry people in the world, it doesn’t take long to look upon the faces of the lowly.

But as I reflected on this reading, I began to get a glimmer of the joy that Mary is sharing in her song.  “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant, so from now on all generations will call me blessed.”  Think about who is singing these words: a country girl, who could have been stoned by Deuteronomic law.  She wasn’t just nothing in the world, she was less than nothing.  A social deviant, a misfit, an outcast.  And yet she is singing.  She is singing about how blessed she is.  She has a powerful song of joy because she has tapped into a source of joy that is beyond the world around her.  

At its heart, the joy that resonates throughout this song, is the joy that comes with a profound and embedded acceptance of grace.  This song embodies that essential component of Christianity, Grace.  Mary has done absolutely nothing to be called blessed by all generations.  Nothing.  From the perspective of the world, she is worthless, a hell-raiser who would best serve society by being stoned to death.

But she’s experienced something.  She gets it, and it lives within her.  “I might not be worth anything to anybody else.  I might deserve to be killed in the eyes of everyone I meet.  I might have no value to the world around me.  But I am worthy.  I am worthy of dignity, of compassion, of care, I have an intrinsic value simply because God says so.  Simply because God has given me the gift of having value to the world.”

That is Christ.  That is Grace.  Mary doesn’t just carry Jesus in her womb.  She carries Christ within her heart, and that is the joy she is singing of.  The joy of someone who knows there is nothing she can do to earn God’s love, because it is there, first and foremost before we do anything,  And it is that love which makes her worthy of all the value in the world.

And we fight this!  We fight this tooth and nail because it is so counter to everything that the world wants us to believe.  Kids bullying someone in the school yard because they are different; Economic systems that say some people are of more worth than others; Social systems that say anyone who does not fit into our definition of normal (by race, or gender, or sexual orientation) is of less value; Media saying you have to look a certain way in order to be considered beautiful; Religious institutions that say you need to do this or believe certain proper dogmas in order to be considered one of the saved; these are some of the weapons we use against grace.  And they are powerful.

We fight the idea of grace, because we cannot fathom it.  Because we cannot control it.  Because it doesn’t make sense.  And we have gotten very good at fighting it.  So good that the fight even begins to invade our very selves.  We begin to question our own worth, our own value. 

I have spent a tremendous amount of time considering whether or not to go to school next year.  One of the reasons I have decided to put it off was because I looked at my own motivations.  Ministry is not the most respected position anymore, and I realized a part of me longed for that “Dr.” in front of my name so that I would be seen as more valuable by the world.

We cannot comprehend that each and every person in this room is worth no more, and no less than anyone else in the world, and yet we are all worth a tremendous amount, simply by the virtue of God’s love.  That is grace.

Now be aware.  When you let this idea wash over you.  When you contemplate the ramifications of such a notion.  When you realize the world we live in and the tremendous systems that push against the very idea of Grace.  When you understand that we do not come anywhere close to loving the way God loves, because we truly cannot comprehend how it is possible.  When you do this, you begin to see cracks in the system, you begin to see gracelessness everywhere, and you will not be the same.  You will long for the Reign of Christ, and you will live a life that tries to embody it.

The Magnificat of Mary are words of a revolution.  The powerful are brought down, and the lowly are raised up.  The coming of Christ turns the world upside down.  The rich lose what they think they have, and the hungry are filled.  A life filled with the acceptance of Grace will break through the shackles of despair, of condemnation, of judgment, and will begin to sing with that worthless young girl who we call blessed. 

Everything in creation is of intrinsic value.  That is Grace, that is love, that is joy.

Sermon for October 9, 2011 - Something From Nothing

Scripture Passage for this Sermon: Luke 17:11-19

Read Something From Nothing by Phoebe Gilman

You can’t get something from nothing.  These are the words, the little boy in the book we just read, was told.  You can’t get something from nothing.  It seems logical.  Matter cannot be created right?  You can’t have an effect without a cause right?  In general, people get what they deserve right?  But the story doesn’t end there does it?  The little boy does indeed get something from nothing.  He gets a story.

You can’t get something for nothing.  Jesus, called to the lepers, he invited them to lean in just a little bit.  They had been told many times over, “You can’t get something for nothing.”  They were unclean, cursed with an illness that separated them from the world around them.  They could not offer anything to the world, and so they would get nothing in return.  They were nothing, and people treated them that way. 

They leaned in towards Jesus.  Then he invited them to lean in a little bit more, and at this time, all the disciples and the whole crowd was starting to lean further and further away, because, come on, its lepers, and no one wanted to be anywhere near them.  So Jesus began to whisper, he said, “All these people will tell you, you can’t get something from nothing, but you know what?  You CAN!  And somewhere, deep down inside each of you, you believe it, you know it.  You wouldn’t have called out to me if you didn’t.  You CAN get something for nothing.”

The lepers were in shock! Could it be?  Was it possible?  They ran to the priests who confirmed that they did indeed get something for nothing.  They had been cleansed, they had been healed.  And they didn’t have to make promises about what they would do, they didn’t have to be wonderfully good people, they just had to believe that they might get something from nothing.

They had nothing!  They had absolutely nothing.  They were unclean.  They were diseased.  They were on the outside looking in.  They had no access to society.  They had no access to the temple.  They had no access to anything.  They couldn’t offer anything to the world around them.  They had nothing.  And yet they trusted that even though they had nothing, they could get something.  And they were right.  A scandalous thought in the first century CE, and still a scandalous thought today.

This is not a story about miraculous healings.  This is a story about grace.  This is a story about getting something from nothing.  These lepers were not healed, they did not encounter God because they were deserving.  All the rules and regulation, all the laws of the day, in fact, insured that they would NOT have access to God. 

And yet… Sure enough.  They woke up one morning as lepers, as outsiders, as marginalized members of society, as excluded, as unclean.   And they went to bed with the ability to fully participate in the community.  From nothing, they suddenly had something.

This is what grace is.  It is the idea that we can get something from nothing. This is the faith that Jesus compliments at the end of the story.  The faith in God’s grace; a grace that is boundless and that is freely given.  A grace that is something from nothing.  We just get it.  We just get God’s grace.

In our world, we have created a deceptive reality.  Because we ourselves so often struggle with the idea of getting something from nothing (or worse yet – giving something without reason); subsequently, our image of God is one that often demands sacrifice, demands saintly perfection, demands correct doctrinal belief.  God will love us if we believe this… God will love us if we do that…  That’s counter to the Gospel.  Jesus heals first, before anything else happens.  God’s love always, always, always, comes first.  That is grace.

But the story does not end there.  One of the ten lepers comes back.  And he’s all healed, all clean, possibly skipping like the ex-leper from The Life of Brian. And this leper, responds to that grace which all of them had received.  He says, “thank you.”

And though Jesus is saddened that the others have not come back, he is delighted with this one man.  Jesus sees in him the model of his disciples, the model of who Luke thought Christians should be.  We are all recipients of God’s grace.  We are all bound up in God’s love, created and cherished.  To be Christian is not to be loved any more than anyone else.  All ten lepers were healed.  To be a Christian is to respond to that grace with gratitude.  To be Christian is to respond to that grace with humility.  Remember, grace touches everyone, we’re not better than anyone, we are just called to be grateful for it.  To live in response to that love God gives to the whole world.  We are called to live lives within that grace.

The question I’m going to leave you with is, and this Thanksgiving Sunday, is how do we show our gratitude to the God that loves everyone and everything?  How do we live lives that say “thank you”?  How do we fully live lives that embody that grace we are freely given?