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Saint Bartholomew's Episcopal Church
Livermore, California
4/28/2024
5 Easter
Collect: Almighty God, whom truly to know is everlasting life: Grant us so perfectly to know your Son Jesus Christ to be the way, the truth, and the life, that we may steadfastly follow his steps in the way that leads to eternal life; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
Scripture (John 15:5): [Jesus said] I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.
Reflection: This sounds pretty harsh, right? Apart from Jesus we can do nothing. But it only sounds harsh until we put it into practice. Jesus is telling us that, as his disciples, we have to do a very hard thing. We need to put away absolutely everything, even our most treasured possessions and relationships, that doesn't keep Him at the very center. Nothing in our lives can be an end unto itself, something we do apart from Christ and his life-giving Spirit. This can mean a difficult and painful stripping-down of our lives. But the rewards are staggering. Far from leaving us as hollow shells, possessing nothing and detached from the rest of the world, this process leaves us wide open to enjoy everything and everyone aright for the first time. When we live with Jesus as the one and only true Vine in our lives, we get back everything else our hearts desire as well, and in a far better form than we had ever imagined possible. We find ourselves in right relationship with everything and everyone in our sphere. The only question is do we trust Jesus enough to give up everything and allow Him to reorder our lives into something infinitely better than we could ask for or imagine?
4/21/2024
4 Easter
Collect: O God, whose Son Jesus is the good shepherd of your people: Grant that when we hear his voice we may know him who calls us each by name, and follow where he leads; who, with you and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
Scripture (John 10:11): Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep."
Reflection: Sheep are expendable. They are bought and traded on the livestock market. They are rented out to graze. We keep and care for them for a season, but ultimately they become meat or just expire of natural causes, and we don't tend to be terribly moved. But it's not so for Jesus. For him the sheep are infinitely precious. So precious in fact that his response to a perceived threat to them is, quite literally, "over my dead body!" And we are those sheep. This is the way God cares for us, both in this life and leading even more fully into the next. We often may not feel or understand it, but God's answer to anything that threatens to truly harm us is "over my dead body!" Let us rest in the blessed assurance of this wonderful promise.
4/14/2024
3 Easter
Collect: O God, whose blessed Son made himself known to his disciples in the breaking of bread: Open the eyes of our faith, that we may behold him in all his redeeming work; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Scripture (1 John 3:2-3): What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.
Reflection: The heart of our Christian faith is death and resurrection. Today's verses from 1 John tell us something about this wonderful mystery. When we die and rise again, we rise again in purity. Another word is perhaps simplicity. We are at long last living in and breathing the naked truth-nothing more, and nothing less. And this is our daily calling. Even in the here and now where the work will always be incomplete, each day we we are called to let the complex web of lies in us die and let rise in its place something that is true, simple, and pure. Do we dare to ask of ourselves where we are saying what isn't true, omitting what needs to be said, exaggerating, or understating? Do we dare to let these patterns die and be replaced by a life of fearlessly speaking the whole truth in love to one another? Do we dare to taste the wild and glorious freedom this provides? This is the way of death and resurrection. This is the way of Jesus.
4/7/2024
2 Easter
Collect: Almighty and everlasting God, who in the Paschal mystery established the new covenant of reconciliation: Grant that all who have been reborn into the fellowship of Christ's Body may show forth in their lives what they profess by their faith; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
Scripture (John 20:30-31): Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name
Reflection: St. John the Evangelist summarizes the entire point of committing his Gospel to paper in this week's reading. He recounts healings, miracles, exorcisms, signs, Jesus' Passion, and his glorious Resurrection, all for one simple purpose. He hopes that in reading this account we will come to believe, and that in believing we will get to live life with a capital L, both in this world and the next. And this raises a simple question: are we following John's example? All of us experience the Lord's presence in and around us in unique ways. When we experience the miracles and wonders that Christ performs in our lives do we keep it to ourselves, or do we dare to shout it from the housetops? Yes, if we choose the latter course we risk ridicule or worse, but if we don't, how will anyone else ever come to believe in the Good News and find their lives transformed for the better from the inside out? Let us dare to do what John did-share unashamedly the signs and wonders we have witnessed and experiencedso that others might come to believe and in believing find an infinitely abundant life.
3/31/2024
Easter
Collect: Almighty God, who through your only-begotten Son Jesus Christ overcame death and opened to us the gate of everlasting life: Grant that we, who celebrate with joy the day of the Lord's resurrection, may be raised from the death of sin by your life-giving Spirit; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Scripture (John 20:11-18): But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’ When she had said this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? For whom are you looking?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni!’ (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, ‘Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” ’ Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, ‘I have seen the Lord’; and she told them that he had said these things to her.
Reflection: This conversation between Jesus and Mary Magdalene is arguably the most pivotal one in the entirety of human history, but one would hardly guess it. It is, by all appearances, so small and insignificant. One bereaved woman lingers by a tomb and suddenly sees her beloved friend and teacher, whom she believed dead, alive and well. After this she goes and tells his other friends what happened. Compared to the forces of evil, this seems like nothing. This is no accident. Evil always looks like it has the upper hand. The forces that seek to corrupt and destroy are almost always seemingly bigger, flashier, and louder than the power of God. But make no mistake; it's all smoke and mirrors. The seemingly indestructible empire that sought to kill Jesus and stamp out any hint of resistance has been gone for over 1500 years, and like it every apparently spectacular show of human power has met a similar fate. But the message of the Resurrection lives on. God's power lives on. It may appear tiny, weak, and insignificant, but it has one trait that everything else lacks: it is eternal and indestructible. And in that we can put our full faith and trust. No matter how things look, God wins. Life wins. Love wins. Happy Easter!
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