Thoughts on Biblical Theology, Homosexuality and the United Methodist Church

 I am saddened by the schism of the United Methodist Church over whether to accept and ordain LGBTQ folks.  But the rift is really about more than whether the Church should include the LGBTQ community.  It is about how Christians read the Bible - and how their world view influences their understanding of Scripture.

It all started with the Apostles' Creed.  That's where we went wrong.  That's when we began to define faith as right belief, rather than right behavior.  It became more important to give one's cognitive assent to a structure of orthodox rules, rather than to live as Jesus taught us to live.  

Presbyterians (I'm one) believe that "truth is in order to goodness."  That's one of our "radical," or core beliefs. In other words, if something is true, then it should lead to goodness, and not evil.  Or, to use Jesus' words, "You will know them by their fruits."  

When we forgot that FAITH is living from a childlike trust in God and redefined faith as swearing an oath to a system of doctrines, we lost the truth, and consequently the goodness.  Our bitter fruit included the Inquisition., burning "heretics," and fighting "holy" wars.

The Church became the very Pharisees against whom Jesus railed.

Jesus prayed that we would be one, even as He is one with the Father.  But when it comes to Unity, the Christian Church has been a colossal failure.  We have been racked with division ever since the Roman church split from its Eastern Orthodox family.  Do you know who the lord of division is? Satan.

In contrast to what many of us believe the Bible teaches, here are some facts that I encourage you to verify for yourself:

• Jesus NEVER mentions homosexuality.  Some argue that he doesn't mention it because he didn't think it was up for debate.  That is an assumption that folks make from their own biases. We don't really now why Jesus avoided the subject.  But we DO know that he did not shy away from condemning sin.  He attacked the hypocrisy of the Pharisees.  He warned against the love of money. He drove the moneylenders out of the Temple. On the other hand, he spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well - a scandalous thing to do in his day.  He defended the woman caught in adultery.  He touched the leper.  He ate and drank with tax collectors and sinners.  If the Church is looking for role model for excluding the sinner, Jesus ain't it.
• Leviticus outlaws same sex relationships between men . But it NEVER says one word about same sex relationships between women.
• Men who rape other men in prison would kill you if you said they were gay. It's not about love, but about power and humiliation.  The same is true in war.  I'm sure you've read about, or heard about, Russian soldiers raping women and children in Ukraine.  The "holy" soldiers of the Islamic State did the same, to men and women (ironically, they execute their own citizens in peacetime for the same behavior).  This method of debasing their vanqished foes has been practice for five millennia, by Muslim and Christian armies alike.  THIS IS THE SIN OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH.  It was the contempt shown by the men of these towns toward the strangers within their gates that angered God enough to destroy them.
• When the Apostle Paul condemns homosexual behavior in Greco-Roman culture, in Romans 1, he is speaking specifically about the practice of older rich men hiring teenage boys for sex at men-only orgies.
• In that same passage Paul equally condemns other behaviors: "envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. ... gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; ... they disobey their parents; they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy."  If the Church is going to be morally consistent, we're going to have to exclude gossips and people who disobey their parents as well as LGBTQ folks.  Heck, there will be nobody left.
• And here's a nuance that almost everybody misses: Paul does not call homosexual behavior a sin, but a consequence of sin.  The sin in this passage is idolatry - worshiping the creature rather than the Creator.

But the problem isn't really homosexuality, but what the Church calls the Authority of Scripture. Or as evangelicals are wont to claim, whether we believe the Bible.  What does that mean, to believe the Bible?

The Bible NEVER claims to be inerrant.  In fact, the Church didn't start talking about inerrancy until the turn of the 20th Century.  The Bible claims only to be inspired, and that only one time, in Paul's second letter to Timothy.  Paul does not say that Scripture is scientifically and historically accurate and must be believed without question.  He says that scripture is "God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work (II Tim. 3:16-17, NIV)."  The purpose of Scripture is not to teach orthodoxy (right thinking), but orthopraxy (right acting).

As an aside, when Paul wrote this, "all scripture" was the Septuagint - the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. There was no New Testament. Paul probably didn't even know that what he was writing would one day be considered "God-breathed," as well.  And even more scandalous for pious Protestants, "all scripture" also included the Deuterocanonical books -- the books in the Catholic Bible that Martin Luther and John Calvin excised from the Scriptures.

Even if the Bible were inerrant, does anyone really read it literally?  As my good friend Larry Bates is fond of saying, the only true literalists have only one eye and one hand.  That is to say, one cannot lift out of the Bible the parts with which one is comfortable while ignoring the uncomfortable parts.  This makes biblical literalism untenable. 

For example:  if you are going to use the Leviticus passage prohibiting male-male sex, then you are going to have to be ok with female-female sex (it's not prohibited . . . read it for yourself).  AND you're going to have to stop eating shrimp.  And you're going to have to have your tattoos removed. And you have to stop wearing stretchy jeans, because they mix cotton with Spandex. And Bacon is definitely out.

If you're going to leverage the Sodom and Gomorrah story, then you're also going to have to be ok with having your virgin daughters gang-raped by the local hoodlums.

If you're going pull your church out of the denomination over the inclusion of LGBTQ folks, then you're also going to have to split from the gossips. And of course, you'll have to stone all the children who disobey their parents.

Finally, Jesus never commanded us to write up a list of doctrines and hold people to believing them. Jesus never said, "believe in the Trinity, and the Virgin Birth, and the Resurrection of the Dead."  

Jesus said, "Follow me."  But it's a lot easier to focus on who's in and who's out than it is to deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Jesus.

SCOTUS moves us in the right direction

 Now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade, the federal government now recognizes the sanctity of life.  At least life in the womb.  That's a good start, but there's more work to do, Christians.

Now we need to protect the sanctity of life outside the womb. And it should be easy to do, from a legal perspective, since by overturning Roe v. Wade, SCOTUS has basically established the right of the government (both federal and state) to control women's bodies, and by extrapolation, the bodies of men, as well.

So the next thing the government must do is to require every man to register his sperm in a federally supervised sperm identification program (much like the FBI collects fingerprints).  That way, when a man gets a woman pregnant (because as far as I know, only one woman in history has ever pulled it off without the assistance of a man), the government will be able quickly to trace the sperm source to the sperm donor (thank God for the human genome project!).

Since sperm will need to be registered, this will require branding a serial number on the penis of every male, including homosexual men, because, hey they might get converted (I assume conversion therapy will come back in vogue soon) and then, their penis is as dangerous as any other.

How can we afford this, you may ask? I have the perfect solution.  As every state eventually eliminates gun registration (because Constitutional Carry - the same God who gave us the right to life, also gave us the right to bear arms) a whole bureaucracy will be unemployed across the nation. So we simply convert these folks (not in the method described above) into a nationwide sperm registration program, with each man paying for a penis carrying permit to fund the cost of the bureaucracy.

Once this infrastructure is established, we will recruit the banking industry to develop an electronic sexual encounter registration system.  Every woman will carry a "square" that plugs into her smart phone, and scan the man's penis registration barcode tattoo ( I know, Leviticus teaches against tattoos . . . we'll have to hire a conservative theologian to help us out of that bind).

These sexual encounters are entered into a nationwide data bank. That way, the minute a woman finds out she's pregnant, we can go into her barcode scanning history and immediately identify the male participant in the creation of this beautiful life.

Once the sperm donor is identified, using the same banking system, the new baby (it's not longer a fetus, guys) is immediately put on the father's health insurance plan. If he does not have health insurance, the money will be automatically garnered from his paycheck to pay for health insurance on the health plan marketplace (see . . . Obamacare really is a devious right-wing plot, after all).

If the father doesn't have a job, he'll be arrested for irresponsible sperm dissemination (a new law that will need to be put on the books . . . still working on this component) and will be remanded to forced labor.  If he's white and middle class, he'll go to a halfway house and wear an ankle bracelet. If he's a person of color, well the South had a whole penal institution designed to make black men work (I wonder if that's where the word "penal" comes from?).

Oh, yes, we'll have to get SCOTUS to reverse the 14th amendment. But they've already got a jump on that. Shouldn't be too tough.

Once the baby is born, the father will have the option of marrying the woman - unless he raped her, or he is related to her by blood (of course, there will be an exemption for the latter scenario, which will become known as the "Alabama Exemption."). If he refuses to marry her (she won't have a say in the matter, of course), then 50% or $1,000 per month, whichever is greater, will be garnished from his wages for alimony and child support, until the child turns 26.

There will be, of course, men who play the system an continue disseminating their sperm irresponsibly until they have more progeny than they can afford under the above system.  For these situations, we'll need to continue our current welfare programs (SNAP, WIC, Medicaid, etc.). But to manage the growth of these programs, we'll pass another law that requires men who impregnate more than three women, or father from than six children, will be castrated.

Now we have protected the right to life of children from pre-birth through age 26. But we haven't accounted for their liberty and pursuit of happiness (or private property, as John Locke originally proposed).  To provide for these God-given rights (hey, it's in the Declaration!), we will need to create new government handout programs:  free public education through a Ph.D.; free nutritious, balanced meals; free healthcare; free transportation (Teslas, to protect the environment); free housing (40 acres, a mule and a three bedroom ranch); free birth control (again, a cost-saving measure for the government); free alcohol, tobacco and firearms (under the "pursuit of happiness" clause. Besides what good is a right to bear arms if you can't afford a gun?).

Oh, and freedom from paying taxes.

That creates a little problem: how does a government provide all the above - required because SCOTUS has ruled that everyone has a right to life) if we don't pay taxes? Not sure, but I believe the Rev. Jonathan Swift provided a plausible answer in 1729.

May 3 Lectionary Gospel: John 10:1-10

The Good Shepherd and His Sheep

10 “Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. 2 The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5 But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.” 6 Jesus used this figure of speech, but the Pharisees did not understand what he was telling them.

7 Therefore Jesus said again, “Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them. 9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.[a] They will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

                                                             ✟

Reading the Gospel of John, you encounter several instances where Jesus uses illustrations and figures of speech, and his hearers don't understand him.  This is one of those instances.  Jesus, in this case, is speaking with Pharisees:  the true shepherd enters the sheep pen by the gate.  False shepherds (thieves and bandits) jump the fence.  The Pharisees don't get it.

I feel them. I have a hard time getting Jesus in the Gospel of John.  What are you talking about, Jesus? Who are the thieves and bandits?  Who is the real shepherd?  Who are these sheep?  What does this have to do with the price of turtledoves in the marketplace?

So Jesus explains himself (ostensibly) by mixing metaphors, and, to be honest, mixing me up even more (and, I assume, the Pharisees, as well).  Now Jesus is the gate, and the sheep have to go in and out through the gate to find pleasant pastures. And then, back to the thief jumping the fence: the thief's goal is to kill (he's looking for a rack of lamb dinner).  But the Good shepherd (charged with protecting the sheep) leads his flock to abundant life (the pleasant pastures).

As is usually the case, when I read the Gospel of John, I have to let that stuff rattle around in my brain for three or four days before any marbles come rolling out.  And here's what came out today:

Jesus is the gate, and that gate is the direct path to abundant life.  This illustration is consistent with other sayings of Jesus in this Gospel:  Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.  Enter by the narrow gate.  Any other way out of the sheep pen (that is, on the shoulders of the thief, jumping over the fence) is the road to perdition.

We are tempted to follow false messiahs.  We seek salvation - no, to be more accurate, we seek escape, a numbing - from our idols.  They're not made of metal or wood and set on pedestals in pagan temples.  Our idols are gold and silver, sex and alcohol, consumerism and recognition, social status and power.  All of these false shepherds are thieves . . . they steal our souls.  The only Presence that brings life is God.  Jesus shows us the way to that abundant life . . . Jesus is the gateway to those pleasant pastures.

I'm discovering that this time of pandemic has been a rich time of self-reflection and spiritual discovery (there's not much else to do . . . I've binge-watched everything there is to see on Netflix).  The world has come screeching to a halt, and it's a gift.  It's an opportunity to step outside of the daily grind.  It's a chance to step out of the hamster wheel now that it's seized up.  And I'm realizing how much I have allowed those thieves to jump the fence and steal parts of my soul.

Working to the point of exhaustion, climbing the corporate ladder - there's one false god that was sucking the life out of my soul.  Suddenly I am finding more peace.  I've been able to cut my Zoloft tablets in half.  My stress level has dropped below the feverish rate. I am rediscovering my wife.  The aching longing to see my sons and grandson, whom I can see only on my smart phone, has heightened my appreciation and love for my children.

Most fulfilling, I am spending time in prayer and meditating on God's Word.  I am discovering first-hand that the gate really does lead to greener pastures.

Lectionary May 3: Acts 2:42-47

The marks of the first church, which one supposes should still be the marks of the church today.

There were four practices that marked this first Christian community: (1) attending to the apostles' teaching; (2) fellowship; (3) breaking bread together; and (4) prayers.  The new converts gathered at the Temple for worship, as well as individual homes for fellowship and sharing of meals.  Prayer was not just freeform prayer in small groups, but actually a service of worship, as in the synagogue.

Breaking of bread was not just having  Wednesday night supper at the church; it was, in fact, a communal meal that incorporated the celebration of the Lord's Supper.

Fellowship - the Greek word is koinonia - is more than just getting together for fun or for Bible study.  It was a very specific type of interaction, which involved caring for one another's needs. Thus, the community held everything in common, and believers sold their property and their personal goods to raise money to care for those who were economically disadvantaged.

This is one of the most controversial passages for American Christians - especially those Christians who have difficulty distinguishing between capitalism and Christianity.  But this was not a Marxist communism.  Selling of possessions was not mandatory, but was done as a faith response to God's grace in Jesus Christ, and because of love for one another.  Donations were made as needed, not on any schedule.

Christian worship in this community had two balancing elements; one without the other would throw the community's life out of  sync.  Believers gathered in the Temple (i.e. at church; in the sanctuary or worship center) AND in house churches (small groups).  We know in our own time and culture that churchgoers who only attend sanctuary worship have a much more anemic experience of corporate faith than those who also are involved in a Sunday School class, small group Bible study or shepherding group.  What you put into your community determines what you get out of it.

What does this say to us in the Time of COVID19?  If gathering together in our communal worship space and in our homes is a necessary part of being a worshipping community, how do we do that in a time of social distancing?  Thankfully, modern technology allows for a less robust experience of community than being together in person, but at least allows us to be a virtual community.  For instance, our congregation is worshipping via Facebook Live and holding Bible studies and small groups via Zoom.

Breaking bread is a little more difficult when sheltering in place!  But I have seen churches having virtual Eucharist, where each family sets the table at home with the bread and the cup and celebrate the supper as the pastor on the computer speaks the words of institution.

Now the sensitive issue:  how do we share our possessions with each other?  Let me point out that the first church was concerned with feeding its own members, and not the poor in the community at large.  But giving alms at the Temple was the method for taking care of the city's poor, and certainly, we can assume that the first Christians gave alms.

Today's church is much richer, with greater resources, than the first church.  It is logical that God would expect us to take care of more than just our own members.

At the conclusion of the passage, Luke writes that the gathering of these new believers was so attractive that it drew to itself those from outside the ecclesia (church), and the church grew day by day with new converts, wanting some of what these Jesus-followers had ("the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved").  How attractive is your church?  Do non-believers experience your community and are they inexorably drawn to you?

April 26 Lectionary Epistle Lesson: I Peter 1:17-23

The lectionary passage from I Peter, chapter 1, starts at v. 17 and goes through v. 23.  The passage itself, in context, should start at v. 13 and read through v. 25.  The passage is about committing to holiness, but we must be careful to understand what that means.  The author commands us not to return to our old ways, when we were, as Paul wrote, slaves to the elemental spirits.  We must be holy, as God is holy.

But what does it mean to be holy, in the context of life in the Spirit?  First of all, it means that we rely totally on God's grace (v. 13 - this is why it's important to read the whole passage, or we'd miss this subtle but important element).

This holiness is also powered by our faith in a risen Christ, who was from the beginning of time God's instrument for bringing salvation to creation.  This holiness also takes seriously the holiness of God, as well as the supreme price God paid, in the death of the Son, for our salvation.  So it is not enough to focus on the grace of God; we must also fear God, which I believe means a healthy reverence for God's generous love and a  commitment to respond to that grace with sanctified living.

Grace without holiness is a cheap grace.  Holiness without grace rapidly descends into pious self-righteousness.

It is also important to remember that our holiness is not the product of our own striving; instead, it is the result of our complete surrender to the grace of God.  And that holiness is expressed most fully in how we love one another, as God has loved us.

April 26 Lectionary passage from Acts

Acts 2:14a, 36-41

This passage contains the end of Peter's Pentecost sermon and the congregation's reaction.

I don't like replacing the Old Testament Lesson with a passage from the New Testament, as happens during Eastertide in this year's lectionary cycle.  I don't like lifting verses out of a longer passage, as this reading does.  I don't like a Pentecost passage being read at Eastertide.  And I don't like hellfire and damnation sermons.

I was schooled in preaching by three of the best:  Tom Long, Wade Huie and Will Ormond.  All three of them would agree on this:  a sermon should be about the Good News of the Gospel.  Preaching that manipulates its hearers with anger, guilt, anxiety and the threat of hell is not Good News preaching.

Peter would have flunked their homiletics courses.  This, the first Christian evangelistic sermon ever preached, was a "come-to-Jesus" sermon in the most literal sense.  The first verse of this reading proves as much:  "God made him Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified" (emphasis mine).  If that doesn't bring a sinner to his or her knees . . .

Remember the context:  Peter is preaching to Jews from all over the Roman Empire, as well as the hometown crew.  His tactic is to lay a guilt trip on the Jews gathered at the Temple for the crime of crucifying the One whom God has made Lord (worthy of praise and adoration) and Christ (Messiah - the Anointed One whom all Jews were awaiting).  NOTE:  none of these Jewish pilgrims actually crucified Jesus.  The Roman government carried out the execution.

Apparently, and contrary to my own professors' opinions, the technique works well.  Luke claims that 3,000 persons joined the new cult that day.

The focus of this passage is the response of those who received Peter's hellfire and brimstone sermon:  "cut to the heart," they asked, "What should we do?"  Peter answers, "Repent and be baptized." 

The converts receive baptism for the forgiveness of sins - a ritual with which pious Jews would be familiar - but with a new twist or two:  the baptism is also in the name of Jesus Christ, AND the mechanism for receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit (something the disciples only that morning had received themselves).

What, exactly are they repenting from?  Knowing the tradition of baptism for the forgiveness of sins, and looking forward to Peter's last quote in this passage ("save yourselves from this wicked generation"), it is the calling to turn away from sin and turn to God - to turn away from a lifestyle of self-serving behavior to a life of serving God.  This would not differ greatly from the baptismal call of the Essene sect, for instance, with the exception that repentance now also meant confessing loyalty to Jesus, raised from the dead, made Lord and Christ by God.

After giving Peter grief for disappointing my preaching professors with his Jonathan Edwards' "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" - style sermon, I must admit that there is a passage of Good News here, when Peter says, "for the promise is to you, and to your children, and to those who are far off."

Acts is about the expansion of the Jesus movement, which happens by the Holy Spirit blowing the walls off of religion and exploding our boundaries.  I'm sure that Peter understood himself to mean only Jews of the Diaspora when he uttered this promise, but we understand that the Holy Spirit meant EVERYONE whom the Lord calls to relationship with the Divine.

Today, we still try to erect walls around our religion.  The Church is suffering through such turmoil now when we forget our calling to love, and misconstrue our calling as one of judging right from wrong.  But that privilege belongs solely to God.  And we know that by the way Jesus lived and by what he taught ("first take the log out of your own eye . . .").  In response to our building walls, the Holy Spirit comes along and blows them down:  Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch. Peter's vision of the animals on the sheet descended from heaven.  Paul's conversion and call to preach to the Gentiles.

Who are those who are "far off" today?  Who are we leaving outside the doors of our worship spaces?  I remember when I was a kid in Tuscaloosa, I heard the story about how my church locked the doors of our sanctuary rather than allow African American college students join us in worship.  Ironically, the college those students attended was founded by the pastor of that same church, the Rev. Charles Stillman for whom the college is named.

By the time we joined First Presbyterian Church, the Holy Spirit had knocked down some walls, and the Stillman College Choir was invited annually to lead worship on Stillman Sunday.  Unfortunately, the church was still virtually lily white most other Sundays. But it was a start.

That was the 1950s and 1960s.  Who are we locking out of the church today?  Which sins are we selecting for attention and which are we overlooking?  Let me be clear: the promise and the call to repentance are inseparable.  One without the other is either cheap grace or hypocritical judgementalism.  But the journey to repentance begins inside the doors, and the doors have to be open and unlocked.

April 26 Lectionary Gospel: Luke 24:13-35

   The Road to Emmaus story is my favorite post-resurrection account.  First of all, what is Jesus doing outside of Jerusalem? Doesn't he have appearances to make in town?  And how does Jesus spend the whole afternoon and evening with these two disciples and still find time to appear to Simon Peter before these two can hoof it back to Jerusalem?

   Let's look at Cleopas and his unnamed friend.  They are conditioned by their history and culture to see what they see, as well as to overlook what they cannot see.  They are dejected and depressed because the man they considered a great prophet, and possibly even the promised Messiah, has been executed.  They could not comprehend of a different kind of Messiah than the one they've been taught to look for.  They are looking for another King David, or at least a political insurrectionist in line with the Maccabean brothers.

These two are also conditioned by their paternalistic culture to discount the women's account of the empty tomb.  Not until men of their company verify that the tomb is empty do they believe it.  And since these men did not actually see Jesus himself, they were skeptical of the claim that he was alive.  The disciples are no different. It is not until Peter recounts his interaction with Jesus that they accept the truth of Jesus' resurrection.

The two disciples, their faith thus limited, start down the road despondent and dejected.

Now, let's look at Jesus.  He has a wicked sense of humor. He approaches these two sad men, knowing full well why they are depressed.  Jesus is unrecognizable to them (why? did he make himself unrecognizable? Were the two walkers unable to recognize Jesus because they couldn't comprehend a risen Jesus? Is it just a literary technique?).  This Stranger pretends to be clueless about current events, and even eggs the two on as they relate the sad current events.  When they finish their story, the Lord responds with not a very polite retort: "You foolish and slow-witted guys.  Can't you understand the Scriptures? That the Messiah had to suffer in order to come into his glory?"

Of course these two didn't comprehend the Scriptures; because, they were conditioned to understand them otherwise.  Jesus then reveals to them the meaning of all scripture during the two-hour walk.  When the three of them reach Emmaus, Jesus pretends like he's continuing down the road.  Knowing that continuing to travel in the wilderness in the dark was very dangerous, they plead with Jesus to stay the night with them.

Jesus' last trick:  when it's time for dinner, Jesus - the guest - usurps the role of host, blesses the bread and breaks it and gives it to the two men. In that act, Jesus reveals his identity, and then disappears!  Do you see what I mean by a wicked sense of humor?

This is a rich story, which can be perceived from many different perspectives.  The application that appeals most to me is to understand the road to Emmaus as a worship experience of the Risen Christ.  The two disciples enter the journey despondent, their faith broken, their hope lost.  On the road, they hear the sermon: the Law and the Prophets interpreted and the Good News of Jesus Christ proclaimed.  The Spirit is moving in this exposition of Scripture -- "did not our hearts burn within us?"

The worshippers reach their home and gather at the table.  Where two or three are gathered, there is the Lord also, made known to the worshippers in the breaking of the bread.  Nourished with the Word preached and the Word consumed in the Eucharist, the two worshippers are restored. Their hearts warmed, their faith strengthened, their hope reborn.  And they go out to share the Good News.  They gather the courage to return to Jerusalem in the dark (remember how unsafe it is to travel at night?) to tell the others that the Lord is risen.

This passage reminds me how much we need to worship in the community of believers at all times, but certainly at this time in our history.  And yet, the worst thing we could do during a pandemic is to gather bodily together around the Table.  However, even as the Lord can appear on a dusty road in the middle of nowhere, Jesus can come to us wherever we are sheltering in place.

We can give thanks that the creators of Zoom and Facebook Live - unwitting ministers of God's grace that they might be - have given us the technology to continue to worship together, even if not in person.  And we can look forward to the day (and it will return!) when we can gather in our respective sanctuaries, mosques and synagogues.  In the meantime, whenever we break bread - around the dinner table, online, when we share our possessions (money, food, toilet paper) with those who are without - the presence of the Risen Lord will be revealed to us.