An article that I wrote entitled "Is this Pastor John?" was published in the most recent Congregations, a publication of the Alban Institute, Issue 4, 2012.  The article, available online to Alban Institute members, discusses how clergy can respond pastorally and spiritually to calls for financial assistance.  Here's the link: http://www.alban.org/conversation.aspx?id=10143.

Giving Your Heart

Sermon on Matthew 2:1-12 for January 6, Epiphany 2013 preached at St. Michael's, Raleigh, N.C.  You can listen to this sermon by clicking on this link: http://kiwi6.com/file/3vf7640cc3

We’re six days in to 2013. How are your new year’s resolutions coming? My resolution was to clean out and simplify. I got rid of over 200 emails from inbox Tuesday, donated some tapes to the Wake County Public Library for their annual book sale Wednesday, and sold back two Spanish textbooks Thursday. I heard someone say that New Year’s resolutions were your to-do list for the first week of the year. By that standard, I can check off my resolution for the year.

The Gospel poses something far more challenging than our new year’s resolutions. As we stand at the crèche of the Christ child with the Magi, the Gospel asks us what gift we will give him. Ultimately the Gospel calls us to give Jesus nothing less than our heart.

The coming from far away of the magi with gifts of gold and frankincense fulfills the prophecy we heard in Isaiah. The gifts reveal that Jesus is the light, the glory of God, who has come to illuminate the darkness. Gold of course was a precious metal fit for a king. According to tradition all the way back to the theologian Origen, who lived in the early 200s, it symbolizes Jesus’ kingship. Frankincense was used in the Jewish Temple. It was burned continually at the altar of incense. Frankincense represents the divinity of Jesus. Myrrh was a perfume primarily used in the shroud of corpses to lessen the smell of the decay. This gift foreshadowed Jesus’ death. It represents his mortality. The magi gave Jesus one other gift that is often overlooked. As important as were all of the other gifts, this gift was greater - they worshipped Jesus. In a real sense, I believe, they gave him the most precious gift one could give. They gave him their hearts.

Here at St. Michael’s we are in the middle of the It’s Your Call year. In Sunday School classes, sermons, and articles in the Chronicles, we talked this fall about discerning God’s call in and for our lives. This winter and spring we look at living our call, doing God’s work, in our church, our families, workplace, and community. As we said this fall, our call does not necessarily mean doing something different. It might mean recognizing that what we are already doing is God’s call for our lives at this point in time. Living our call, I think, is easier for us Americans than discerning our call, because we are doers. We define ourselves by what we do. The scriptures tell us though that equally important is the disposition, the orientation of our hearts.

In today’s Gospel lesson King Herod and the entire city of Jerusalem are troubled by the news of Jesus’ birth. King Herod, I imagine, would feel threatened by the birth of someone he fears might usurp his throne. The citizens of Jerusalem, as the scriptures show, are troubled for another reason. Jesus, quoting the prophet Isaiah, says in Matthew chapter 13, “[T]his people's heart has grown dull, and their ears are hard of hearing, and they have shut their eyes; so that they might not look with their eyes, and listen with their ears, and understand with their heart and turn-- and I would heal them” (Mat 13:15). In other words, the people’s hearts were far from God.

Essential to our faith, essential to living our call is the orientation of our heart. The reason is twofold. This first is that nothing less is adequate for the creator and ruler of heaven and earth. Jesus summarizes the law by saying that the first commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind. The second reason is that where we put our heart is where we will invest our time, our energies, and our resources.

St. Michael’s has many examples of people who have given their hearts to God and served faithfully in our church and our community. Nell Finch loved the Lord with all her heart and served in almost every way possible here before her death this year. Vaughn Wagoner has a great heart for God. He has gone on countless missions, and served in innumerable ways in our parish. Kevin Kerstetter gives his heart and soul to the Christ in and through the ministry of music. There are many more others here who have given their hearts to God and who live their call in ways that touch countless people.

Although in the South people often think giving your heart to Jesus means saying the sinner’s prayer, it really means, as Jesus said, to turn, or to orient our lives toward God. Now if you’re like me and feel like you did well just to make it here today, the idea of orienting your whole life toward God might seem like an impossible task. As challenging as it might seem, there are spiritual practices that can help us. One of the best is a daily examination of our conscience. Ignatius of Loyola, who in the 16th century refined and popularized this ancient practice, said it was the most important of the spiritual exercises. Today there are plenty of websites devoted to this practice. A simple version that you can practice at the end of the day is to invite God’s presence and to review your day with God. As you review it, give thanks for God’s gifts that day, admit those areas you fell short, and ask for God’s help for the next day. Overtime, this practice will make your more aware of God’s presence in your life and will transform you more into the image of Christ.

On this Epiphany, we stand with the magi at the crèche of the baby Jesus. The greatest gift that we can give is the gift of our hearts, the gift of our lives, lives lived in and through Christ.