Mid-Week Message - January 21

May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be always with you!

It was a year ago today that Bishop Mariann Budde, Episcopal Bishop of Washington, preached a prophetic sermon the day after the US inauguration. It isn't very often that a sermon makes the international news! (If you missed that sermon, or want to re-visit it, you can watch it by clicking here.)

After that sermon and all of the buzz that it created, Bishop Budde started sending out a newsletter that I have subscribed to. It only sends out once or twice a month, but always contains much food for thought.  Her January newsletter came out yesterday, and the focus was on Martin Luther King Day which our neighbours in the US marked on Monday of this week.  She reflects on King as not only an activist, but also as a preacher with a deep and committed faith.

Towards the end, she quotes from Martin Luther King Jr's sermon that he gave on the night before his assassination in Memphis Tennessee, where he had gone to march with striking sanitation workers.  King is preaching on the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37), and he said:  "The first question the Levite and the priest asked when they saw the wounded man was ‘If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?’ The Good Samaritan reversed the question. ‘If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?’... That is the question before you tonight. Not, ‘If I stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to me?’ But ‘If I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?’ That’s the question.”

Last night, at our Asking the Big Questions gathering, these are the sorts of questions we were wrestling with. The Big Question was, "How much am I willing to risk to do what is right?" and at one point, I had a couple of video clips of things going on in the world right now, and I asked the group, would you be willing to take this risk? (The options included "Yes, absolutely," "Never," and "Depends on the Circumstances.") March in a protest?  Place your body between the "powers of this world" and the most vulnerable?  Take up arms? (As always, it is in the conversation that follows the initial answer where the value lies.)

If I don't stop to help my most vulnerable neighbours, what will happen to them?

These are heavy questions to wrestle with; but these are heavy times we are living through right now.

At our gathering, I showed a clip of a speech given recently by the Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire, Rob Hirschfeld, at a vigil following the shooting death of Renee Good by an ICE agent.  In it, he says that he has told the priests in his diocese to get their affairs in order and make sure that they have a will written, because the time may be coming when they will be asked to place their bodies between the powers of this world and the most vulnerable.

But he ends this clip by reminding his listeners that we put our faith in the God of life, in the God of resurrection, in the God of a love that is stronger than death itself.

And that, I think, is what gives me courage to keep plodding through these heavy times. I trust in a God whose love is greater that fear, greater than hatred, greater than even death. And because that is where I put my trust, I can trust that these current times (and any future times if the heaviness becomes heavier) are not the end of the story.  Thanks be to God!

(If you want to watch the 1-minute clip of Bishop Hirschfeld's speech, you can click here; if you want to watch the full 9-minute version that gives the context for the clip, you can click here. If you have time, I highly recommend the longer version!)

Moving on to announcements for this week:

• Worship on Sunday will be at 9:15 at Summerville and 11:15 at Westfield and on Facebook Live.  We will be reading Isaiah 9:1-4 and Matthew 4:12-23, and will be continuing our Epiphany theme of light. It will also be a communion service at both churches!

• Reader and Greeter Lists - thank you to Elaine as well as to those of you in each congregation who compile the names, and to all of you who serve as readers and greeters! The January - June schedule is now available at the back of each church (Summerville - it will be there this Sunday!). If you are a reader and/or greeter, please pick up a copy so that you know when your turn is coming up and you aren't surprised when Elaine emails you a few days before with a reminder!

• Annual Meetings - another thank you to Elaine who is hard at work compiling all of the reports that you submitted into our Annual Report. The plan is that we will have the reports printed and available at Long Reach and Westfield on February 1, and at Summerville by February 8 (with an electronic copy distributed in that time period as well). Once you have had a chance to look through the report, our annual meetings will be:

  Long Reach - Sunday February 15 at 9:00am

  Westfield - Sunday February 15 at 11:15am

  Summerville - Sunday February 22 at 9:00am

  Two Rivers Pastoral Charge - Wednesday February 25 at 7:30pm at Westfield United Church.

• Westfield Choir Concert Date Change - if you were at the Christmas Concert last month, you heard that the date for our March concert has been pushed back a week, from March 19 to March 26, still at 7pm. (On a related note:  Fans of the famous actor Bertis Sutton can take note that you will have a chance to cheer him on in the Saint John Theatre Company's performance of "The Play that Goes Wrong" between March 18 and 21!) The choir has started rehearsing for this concert and it is going to be another good one as we are singing our favourite anthems, "The Best of the Best," this time around!
  

Thank You Corner - this week's "thank you" goes out to our snow clearers at all three of our churches. I'm not going to name names here, but thank you to all of you who help keep our church buildings accessible through the winter months. Your efforts have been much appreciated this winter!

For a closing thought this week, I have two links to share with you - things that have sparked joy in me this week.  The first is titled "Beatitudes Remixed" - I have had this printed out and taped to the wall in my office at the church right beside my desk, and it has caught my eye a couple of times this week. You can read it by clicking here.

And the second is another of the short videos that I shared at yesterday's Big Questions gathering. When I first saw it on Monday, it made me tear up, and last night a couple of people mentioned that they had a lump in their throat or a prickle in their eye watching.  It is of a "singing protest" in Minneapolis this past weekend.  "Hold on. Hold on. My dear ones, here comes the dawn." You can watch (and listen) by clicking here.

Blessings to you and yours, today and always!

Kate.

Rev. Kate Jones

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

(506) 757-2201 (office)

(506) 343-1307 (mobile)

www.tworiverspastoralcharge.com

Pronouns:  she/her/hers

"Teacher, what is the greatest commandment in the law?"

Jesus replied, "You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your being, and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: "You must love your neighbour as you love yourself."

(Matthew 22:36-39)