Father Snort

A mother gave her daughter a soothing bath when she came home from school angry, frustrated, shouting, and in tears. Now that was a loving response. She saw her daughter hurting. Past the tears, anger, and probable shouting and disrespect, this mother saw her daughter in desperate need of some soothing, some love, and some being cared for. Past some possible misdeeds, this mother saw a cry of hurt and brokenness, a loving response. This particular loving response, however, is not some a new law. We’re not just going to start drawing baths for each other anytime someone is upset, rude, or disrespectful. For one thing, not all of us are going to have fresh baked cookies and bath bombs on hand, every time we see someone stressed out and in need of some soothing, and for another thing there are a whole lot of us for whom the bubble Frank Sinatra cookie bath would not be a pleasant, soothing treat. The bath was given because this mother saw a cry of hurt and brokenness, a loving response, not a la

What do we give to God? Everything. I don’t mean that we should give God everything or we aught to give God everything. I mean, whether intended or not, we give God everything. The kindnesses we give to the people we know and love, and the kindnesses we give to the people we hardly know are given to God. Similarly, the hurt, contempt, and indifference we give to the people we know and love are given to God, and the hurt, contempt, and indifference we give to the people we hardly know are given to God. Our votes even are given to God, and I daresay most of us are doing are darnedest to vote in a way that honors God’s kingdom, even when we vote differently from each other. So, don’t let anyone tell you that vote goes against God’s kingdom or God’s way just because you vote differently than they do. Do contemplate seriously how your vote does or does not follow the ways of God’s kingdom; realize also that by “God’s Kingdom,” I don’t

This story is not about an either/or, in-group/out-group, one side over another conflict in which we get to declare “Jesus good" and “chief priest and elders bad.” Both sides in this conflict brought some to follow more closely the will of God. The deeper music was not whose religious practices were best. The deeper music was the seeking of God, the seeking of justice, peace, and love that pervaded both religious practices. The deeper music of justice, peace, and love is made by all of us together, every voice important: yours, mine, those we love, those we struggle to love. The deeper music is God’s presence, God’s way, and God’s will of justice, peace, and love which runs through all of us, every person a part of each others’ song.

As much vengeance as there is in the world, that is how much we are to forgive. In doing so, we unburden ourselves. The cloak of anger and resentment loosens its grip, until we can eventually let that heavy cloak fall to the ground and be clothed instead with the cloak of light, the cloak forgiveness, healing, and love.

Who do we say Jesus is? Is Jesus the one who makes us perfect so that we can be around other perfect people? Nah. That’s not who Jesus is, and that’s not what the church is. The church is the broken, the beaten, the blessed, and the damned, people who need healing, gathering together for strength and support. The church is people who are imperfectly following Jesus and receiving his love and grace, to be healed and blessed in order to bless others.

Let the weeds grow along with the wheat, Jesus said, so that we don’t all get damaged by pulling the weeds out. Imagine if everyone who wanted to pull the weeds out of society or out of the church was able to do so. There wouldn’t be any wheat left. Everyone would be pulled up and cast out because everyone is a weed in someone’s eyes. So, Jesus said to let them grow together, and leave the weeding to God at the end of the age. We’re God’s garden after all, and rather than leave the weeding to us who are tossed about by our emotions and our brokenness, we leave the weeding to God who is not only loving, but who is love itself. I can trust love to do the weeding. There are parts in me that need to be weeded out. There are parts in all of us that need weeding. There are certainly parts of society that need weeding, so we leave the weeding to God who is love, and we follow in the way of Love, focusing on loving and blessing, rather than constantly fighting against other

The Rev. Brad Sullivan Emmanuel Episcopal Church June 7, 2020 Trinity Sunday, A Genesis 1:1 - 2:4a 2 Corinthians 13:11-13 Matthew 28:16-20 Some of you have heard before a story I told of a former youth, now a young woman, who told me that all I do is talk for a living. She was joking around, at least kind of joking, and during times like this past week, I kind of feel like that is all I do, is talk for a living. When I see people being killed; see the violence in our streets; see hundreds of years of racism, of overt and covert oppression, and of mistrust throughout our society because of it, I want to do more than just talk. I want to make some kind of lasting change and difference in the lives of people directly affected by the racism, violence, and mistrust, and I want to make that change quickly and right now, but I can’t. Not alone, not immediately. So, being that I can’t make some enormous, immediate change for the good, I figure I will go ahead and spend a few minutes talking, and

We’re united, one in God, one in Jesus, one in love. We are all one in our need to be set free from burdens that oppress us, and we are all one in finding salvation, finding freedom from those burdens through Jesus, casting our burdens upon him and turning our wills and our lives over to him. No other issue or belief is greater than that. The freedom that Jesus gives, freedom from whatever binds us? No other belief or issue should cause us to be divided into camps or factions, not when we all get to be ministers of Jesus’ freedom from bondage. We’re a diverse bunch of folks, with all sorts of political beliefs and backgrounds, cultures, and ideologies, and that’s just within Emmanuel. Worldwide, we’re an extremely varied group of people, but we’re not baptized into any of those political beliefs, backgrounds, cultures, or ideologies. We’re baptized into Jesus, into the freedom from bondage that he gives, and we are all ministers of that freedom, all mi

Brad Sullivan Proper 14, Year C August 11, 2019 Emmanuel, Houston Luke 12:32-40 Dance With the Demons “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” We live with quite a lot of fear, don’t we? Fears of all kinds and varieties. Economic insecurity, health issues. Fear of loss. We have fears of violence, fears of natural disasters destroying what we have. We have fears of the other political party gaining power (whichever political party that is for each of us). We also have fears of not being good enough, worthy enough. Fears that someone might find out the truth about us. We have fears of what the world will be like for our children and grandchildren. These fears keep us striving against each other, trying to overcome each other, trying to make sure that if the world is not going to be ok, at least those I love and I will be ok. In the midst of these fears, Jesus says, 

Brad Sullivan The Epiphany, Year C January 6, 2019 Emmanuel, Houston Isaiah 60:1-6 Matthew 2:1-12 Flawed Dreams and Unexpected Love Happy Epiphany y’all. Christmas ended yesterday, and the joy of Christmas now continues on in the Epiphany, the revelation of Jesus, of the God-baby to the nations through the Magi, and if I’m being honest, I feel the joy of Christmas continued on into Epiphany, and at the same time, I’m having a hard time feeling the joy right now. Over the first five to six days of Christmas, I really got to feel the joy of Christmas and let everything else fade into the background. I was at Camp Allen with my family on a clergy family retreat the weekend after Christmas, and other clergy were concerned about Emmanuel after Andy’s death, and they kept asking me, “How are you?”, not just to say “hi” but actually wondering how I was, with the knowing expression in their voices, expecting a sa

Brad Sullivan 3 Advent, Year C December 16, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Isaiah 40:1-11 Luke 1:26-38 “I Love You.” “I know.” There’s a scene in the movie, “The Empire Strikes Back” in which one of the heroes, Han Solo, is about to be taken away by the villainous, evil Empire, and just before he’s taken away, one of the other heroes, Princess Leia, says, “I love you.” Han replies, “I know.” They’d had this on again off again, flirtatious angry relationship, never fully admitting how they felt for each other. Then, as everything is going downhill fast, Princess Leia makes sure Han knows how she feels about him, and Han replies with the perfect answer. Rather than the expected, “I love you too,” Han sees how much Leia wants him to know that she loves him, and so he replies, “I know.” In that, “I know” is of course heard, “I love

Brad Sullivan 1 Advent, Year C December 2, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Jeremiah 33:14-16 Psalm 25:1-9 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13 Luke 21:25-36 Prisoners of Hope “Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly.” Happy Advent everyone. Here at the beginning of the church year, we have Jesus talking about what almost sounds like a doomsday scenario. Be on guard, guys, because it’s gonna get bad, then it’s gonna get worse, then the Son of Man is going to come, and you’ll really have to watch out. That’s not what’s going on here. “That day,” Jesus said. “Be on guard…[lest] that day catch you unexpectedly.” They day he was referring to was the day of the son of man, an allusion to Daniel chapter 7. The son of man, or one like a son of man, or a regular dude, (depe

Brad Sullivan Proper 28, Year B November 18, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Mark 13:1-8 …Then Were We Like Those Who Dream… “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.” (Psalm 126:1-2) That’ Psalm 126 verses 1-2, and whether in those words or in other words, that idea is a recurring theme through the history of Israel. “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.” God restores Israel. God restores his people. God restores creation and covenant. Before God restored the fortune of Zion, well obviously Zion’s fortunes weren’t doing so well. Babylonian captivity and the near total destruction of the nation of Israel. The capturing of the Ark of the Covenant by the Philistines, Go

Brad Sullivan Proper 25, Year B October 28, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Mark 10:46-52 Isaiah 2:2-4 Out of Anger, Hatred, and Killing, “Let There Be Light” “In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep…Then God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.” (Genesis 1:1-3) Bartimaeus, a man who was blind called to Jesus to have mercy on him, and when Jesus asked what he wanted, he said, “My teacher, let me see again.” Jesus said, “Go; your faith has made you well,” and immediately Bartimaeus could see. Where there had been a formless void and darkness for Bartimaeus, Jesus spoke, and there was light. It is no stretch to draw a connection between the light at the beginning of creation and the restoration of sight for Bartimaeus, because there was so

Brad Sullivan Proper 21, Year B September 30, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Numbers 11:4-6,10-16,24-29 Psalm 19:7-14 James 5:13-20 Mark 9:38-50 …And All the Water Was At Ease Between the woods the afternoon Is fallen in a golden swoon. The sun looks down from quiet skies To where a quiet water lies; And silent trees stoop down to trees. And there I saw a white swan make Another white swan in the lake; And, breast to breast, both motionless, They waited for the wind's caress, And all the water was at ease. - The Mirror, A.A. Milne That poem is The Mirror by A.A. Milne, one of my favorites. My mom used to read the Complete Poems of Winnie the Pooh to my brother and me as kids growing up, and I have been reading those poems to our kids as they grow up. I love the peace and beauty of this poem where there are these two swans seemingly similar and yet as different as they can be, different

Brad Sullivan Proper 19, Year B September 16, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Isaiah 50:4-9a Psalm 116:1-8 James 3:1-12 Mark 8:27-38 To Sustain the Weary With a Word Years ago, when I was youth minister and assistant priest, one of the youth in the church said to me, apropos of absolutely nothing, “You shouldn’t even be paid. All you do is talk for a living.” She said it with a smile…I think she was joking. We laughed. There is a lot of talking in my job, and one thing I pointed out was, “hey, I gotta eat.” Hopefully what I’m really doing through all this talking, is sustaining the weary with a word. That’s what God had Isaiah do in his years of prophesying to Judah: sustain the weary with a word. Judah had not yet been taken into captivity by Babylon, and Isaiah prophesied both warnings of coming captivity and promises of restoration. Throughout Isaiah’s messages of warning and

Brad Sullivan Proper 16, Year B August 26, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Joshua 24:1-2a,14-18 Ephesians 6:10-20 John 6:56-69 Choose Whom You Will Serve Eat “Choose whom you will serve,” Joshua said to the Israelites. Will you serve God, or will you serve some foreign false god or idol? Joshua had taken over leadership of Israel from Moses just before they entered the promised land after fleeing from Egypt and spending 40 years in the desert. In today’s passage, Israel had finished settling the promised land, the territory was all divided up, so, Joshua was leading the people in renewing their covenant with God. Choose whom you will serve. In the context of our Gospel reading today, I think it might be more appropriate to say, “Choose whom you will eat.” I know; it sounds bad, but Jesus said that those who eat his flesh and drink his blood abide in him, and he abides in them. Of course, Jesus is not tal

Brad Sullivan Proper 12, Year B July 29, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Ephesians 3:14-21 John 6:1-21 Kneeling to Jesus, to Freedom, to the Man Who Wouldn’t Be King I was at a teacher’s party last week with Kristin, for the teachers at her school; spouses were invited, and we actually got to see each other, which was lovely. We were meeting at one of their houses, and the Astros game was on, so as we were talking, we’d catch glances of the game, and unfortunately, the Astros were losing to the Texas Rangers. So at one point, the host and I were watching the game for a few minutes, and he rather sheepishly admitted to me that he was, in fact, a Rangers fan, having lived in Dallas for many years, and was rather happy with the score. There was no problem, but there was a hint of a possibility of a problem. Was it ok for him to admit that he was a Rangers fan? Was I going to get upset and offended and think less of him? Did his identit

Brad Sullivan Proper 10, Year B July 15, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Mark 6:14-29 Title John the Baptist was killed because of a hastily-made promise given by a man who was overly aroused by his step daughter’s dancing. With little thought as to possible consequence, Herod spoke his promise to give her whatever she wanted. He was acting out of emotion, feeling more than thinking, and so in his lust and over excitement, he got a man killed. I’d like to say that as disciples of Jesus, we don’t fall into that trap anymore, the trap of speaking and acting out of our emotions and letting our rash words cause harm to others. I’d like to say that we don’t cause harm with our rash words, but of course we all still do. As researcher and author Brené Brown points out, we like to think of ourselves as thinking people who also have emotions, but really, we are emotional people who also think sometimes. We are often driven by our

Brad Sullivan Proper 5, Year B June 10, 2018 Emmanuel, Houston Genesis 3:8-15 Psalm 130 2 Corinthians 4:13 - 5:1 Mark 3:20-35 At the Time of the Evening Breeze… At the time of the evening breeze, God was walking through the Garden, and the man and the woman were afraid of God’s judgment, so they immediately started demonizing the other. Rather than just take responsibility for their own actions, they each blame someone else. Eve blames the serpent. Adam basically blames God. “You gave me the woman, and she gave me the fruit, so really, it’s kinda your fault.” We’re still pretty good at blaming the other at the time of the evening breeze when God walks through our lives. What if we’re not good enough? What if God is upset about something I’m doing or something they’re doin…“Demon!” “Burn the witch!” We shout. “Ooh, something new or different