Episode 6: I Love Jesus.

Episode Description: In this episode, the Most Rev. Michael Curry (The Episcopal Church), the Rev. Canon Marcus Halley (The Eiscpal Church in Connecticut), and the Rev. Kerlin Richter (Saint David of Wales Episcopal Church, Portland, Oregon) will dive into the Why, How and What of proclaiming ourselves the Episcopal Branch of the Jesus Movement in authentic and loving ways.

Transcripts in order of appearance.

*** The Most Rev. Michael Curry:

There's a story in the New Testament. After Jesus has been executed, he's been killed and then he rises from the dead on that first Easter morning. And some time later he...there's several times when he appears to his followers, but some time later he appears to his followers on the beach by the Sea of Galilee or the Sea of Tiberias. And they have breakfast and they realize he's risen and there's real sorts of conversation about that. And then he pulls Peter aside and he says, "Simon bar Yonah, do you love me more than these?" And Peter said, "Well, yeah, Lord, you know I love you." And he says, "Well feed my sheep or tend my sheep." And, and he says it again, "Simon, son of John, do you love me?"

And Peter said, "Well, yeah. Yeah, I do." You can hear him almost thinking, “why you keep asking me this question?” And he does it a third time. And you can almost imagine the intensity building up. "Simon, do you love me?" And Peter says, "Yes, Lord, you're the Lord. You know everything. You know I love you."

And then Jesus says, "When you were young, you used to go where you wanted to go and do what you wanted to do. But when you grow old, another will take you by the hand and lead you where you do not want to go." And the writer, John, it's in John's Gospel, inserts, Jesus said this to say how Peter would sacrifice his life for this cause of this Jesus. And then he goes back to Jesus, talking to Simon and he says, "Now, you love me. Follow me."

That's not a story I would expect after the Resurrection. And yet that's the story, I think, that's in the Gospel. You often wonder why did the Gospel writer tell that story? He could have told other ones, but why did he tell that one? I have a feeling that that story, that event, that encounter between Jesus and Peter was giving us a key to following Jesus for real, to actually living his teachings. We're not going to do it perfectly. We're going to mess it up. But the living what he taught us, to actually live out his example and to live in the power of his risen life and energy, his spirit, his reality, that it's not a matter of mechanical obedience. You know what I mean? It's not a matter of me, just if I keep trying harder, I'll get it.

It's a matter of if I love him so much, I'm willing to entrust my life into his hands. And the more Michael is able to do that... And I don't get it right all the time. But the more I'm able to do that because I really do love this guy, he'll take me by the hand and lead me where I may not want to go. But together we'll get there.

That this Jesus really is about love as the most liberating reality in life. Think about it for a second. When you love somebody, you give yourself to them. I mean, you really do. You give yourself to them. That's part of what it's about. Love is overcoming self and giving to another. I mean, that's really what is happening. Human love is about that. So that to love God is to give myself to God.

In fact, I remember reading a book some years ago about believing. It was by Karen Armstrong, the historian, and she was talking about her struggle to believe. And she said that she wrestles with doubt and all sorts of stuff. She has a PhD. This is a world-class historian and a former nun, so she knows religion and religious faith. And she said she finally came to some peace with that when she realized that the Latin root word for believe, that it's related to the word [foreign language 00:04:55], which comes from the root which means heart, to give your heart to.

To believe, in its Latin origin, the root words to believe is I give my heart to God. It's not about intellectual ascent. It's not about having everything answered. It's not about not even doubting and getting mad with God. I mean, read the Psalms. They get mad with God all the time. It's like a constant... Actually, you get mad with somebody you love. You play games with people you don't care about, but you actually have an emotional... a real relationship with somebody you love. I'm just convinced that... And I don't do it all the time. I don't get it right all the time. But see, love is... Love can handle that. Love can handle that. I mean, I love my wife, but I don't get it right all the time. That don't mean I don't love.

You see what I mean? But I hang in there with her. You know what I mean? That's what Jesus... "Peter, do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me?" Because that love is your connection. That love is my connection to you, and we will see each other through, in the long run.

I've got to tell you, a couple years ago... No, it was longer than that. It was in 2008. I actually remember. It was 2008. I went to the Lambeth Conference of bishops. And so this is when all the bishops in the Anglican community come together. So there are like 800 bishops there. And so we were all together, and part of the morning was spent... You'd have a worship service and then we have a speaker, and then we'd go into small groups. But you have a speaker.

And I remember this one day we had a speaker, and I don't remember who it was. He was either from England or the States, but I can't remember now off the top of my head. And he was talking about evangelism, and he was actually talking about why it matters. And he said, "Well, it doesn't matter because we're trying to make more people for our church pew to fill our pews." And he said, "That's not what it's about. That's just about recruitment." And he said, "It doesn't really matter because we want to pay the bills. Again, that's development and recruitment, which is nice, but that's not what evangelism is about."

He said, "It matters because the more people who are in love with Jesus, really in love with him, what he taught us, how he lived, those are people who are going to change the world for the good."

And when he said that, that resonated with me because I really... I know that to be the case. I've seen it in my life. I've seen the people who have actually changed our world for good have been people who've done it out of a love, and very often, many of those have done it out of a love for Jesus and what he taught us and how he showed us to live. And that makes all the difference. So it's, "Michael, do you love me?" "Yes, of course I love you. I mean, I'm praying from The Book of Common Prayer and it says that I have to say that. So yes, of course." "Now, Michael, I didn't ask you does the prayer book love me. Do you love me?"

"Yes, I do. Will you quit asking me that question? I want to have an intellectual consideration of you. I don't want to have to get your..."

"Michael, do you love me?"

"Lord, you're the Lord. You already know the answer to the question. Why are you asking me the question you already know the answer to?"

The same reason a parent ask a child a question that they already know the answer to because they're going to force the child to accept the truth of the real answer.

"Do you love me? Because if you do, you give me your life a little bit each day, and when you do that, your life will never be in vain."

The old song says it this way, "If I can help somebody along the way, if I can treat another as a Christian ought, if I can love the way the master taught, then my living will not be in vain." They sang that song at Martin Luther King's funeral.

“Michael, Jerusalem--whoever's listening--do you love me?”

*** The Rev. Canon Marcus Halley:

A few years ago, my senior warden and his husband invited me over for dinner with a few of their friends. I was excited to go because they had a lovely home and were wonderfully hospitable hosts. The kinds of people you just simply love to be around. In retrospect, I was also spiritually exhausted. I had not really been attending to my spiritual life and had fallen into one of the most insidious traps of ministry, substituting working for Jesus with being in love with him. Now, I think a whole lot of folks can testify that you can work for folks that you don't love or even like.

The dinner party itself was fabulous. I vividly remember eating miniature sweet potato pies out of individual cast iron skillets. And I remember it because I am a baker, an amateur one, but a baker nonetheless, and you don't forget when you've eaten something that tastes far better than anything you could have made yourself.

For most of the dinner, although everyone in the room knew that I was an Episcopal priest, I had managed to avoid any of the awkward dinner conversations that tend to result whenever the priest shows up. Towards the end, however, someone asked me a direct question, "Father, do you think the world needs the church?"

Now, remember, I was tired. All the meetings and the tasks and the projects outside of the context of a vibrant relationship with the Lord, Jesus are taxing to say the least. My response is something I will never forget. "No," I said. "I don't think the world needs the church. I think there are other ways of being a good person."

Now, those words turned into ash while they were still in my mouth. I didn't even believe them when I said them, but overwhelmed by fatigue and shame, they tumbled right out of my mouth.

Now, let me set the record straight. The world needs the church only in as much as the world needs Jesus. The world doesn't need the institution. The world needs the movement that bears the name of the son of God. The church was not brought into being simply to make us better people, new and improved versions of ourselves. The church came into being to make us into the body of Christ, the hands, the heart, the eyes, the ears, the feet of a loving, life-giving, liberating savior. Now, for many, this whole concept of love, life and liberation are theoretical ideas that we can toss around and handle from a distance. But I have lived a life where these words are practical and real. Jesus, for me, is not simply a good idea. He is not simply a wonderful moral teacher. Jesus is the life of God for this dying world. And I know it because I've experienced the power of his presence and of his love in my own life.

Now, many years prior to that dinner party, I found myself in a space of spiritual and emotional anguish. I had grown tired of the folks who bear the name of Jesus hurting and exploiting people in his name. At the same time, I felt this draw. I felt drawn to the church. I was like Peter when Jesus asks him and his friends if they would leave him. “Where else can I go? You have the words of eternal life”. That said, I was ready to go. I found myself sitting in my car in front of an Episcopal parish and having an honest conversation with God. "God, I'm going to give this one more try. And if you aren't here, then I'm going to walk away from all of this for good."

I got out of my car and I walked into St. Martin's Parish in Charlotte, North Carolina. And before I knew it, I was on my knees at the altar rail weeping uncontrollably. As the hymn puts it, “surely the presence of the Lord is in this place. I can feel his mighty power and his grace. I can hear the brush of angels wings. I see glory on each face. Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place.”

Now, I don't know what I thought I would experience. And to be honest, the fullness of what I did experience is yet unclear. What I do know is that in that moment, when the priest pressed that piece of bread into my palms, and when I drank from that cup, I experienced a kind of Jesus I had always hungered and yearned for, but had never known.

In that moment, like our brave sister Mary Magdalen on that first Easter Sunday morning, I knew that I had seen the Lord because he called me by name and saw me in a way that was simultaneously terrifying and affirming. In that one moment, I knew that I needed Jesus because I could no longer live my life responding from places of hurt and pain. I needed Jesus because I wanted to learn how to respond from an overwhelming and overflowing well of love. Now, I get it. It's easy to be ashamed of Jesus. The world that the gospels lay out in front of us is fantastical and wonderful. The path that he calls us to walk is inconvenient and impractical. And some of those who bear his name make it very difficult to carry it with any pride whatsoever.

That said, to be a Christian, to be baptized into the radical life, the saving death, and the renewing resurrection of Jesus Christ is to be invited to partake in yet another dinner party, where we are the guests of he who is Love. He who is joy. He who is hope. He who is resilience. He who is healing. He who is transformation. He who is forgiveness. He who is, as my elders would say, my all and all. We have been invited, but it's up to us to respond.

Now, as a parish priest leading a missional congregation in one of the least religious states in the United States, I have to get really clear about what difference Jesus makes.

If community is all we have to offer as the church, folks can find that elsewhere. If religious advice and spirituality is all we have, folks can find that in spades on Instagram. If good works and charity is all we have, there are community organizations in each one of our contexts doing wonderful, direct service and advocacy work among issues of poverty and justice, and they're doing it far better than we can. Each one of these is important, but if it's all that we have then the world doesn't need Jesus.

What then does Jesus offer that should warrant our attention? Our affinity, our service, our affection, our allegiance, or our love? The love Jesus offers us a Way of being in the world that is truly transformative. He dethrones oppression without resorting to violence. His way undoes self-centeredness without resorting to shame. His Way offers us self-worth by reframing honor and service. His way invites us to try on and learn the ways of love by bringing us into close relationships with others who aren't like us, and then bringing us back again and again and again. When our presiding Bishop says that the Way of Jesus, his Way of Love can set us all free, he is not lying. The freedom that Jesus offers us is a true freedom. One where we are liberated from the cycles of violence, destruction, hatred, and revenge, not by taking us out of them, but by working through them to bring about a transformed relational, new reality, I've seen it with my own life how good Jesus can take what feels worthless and valueless in me and turn it into something wonderful and glorious.

Now, since that dinner party all those years ago, I have learned that if I want to be able to boldly proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, I have to stick close to him. I have to pray. I have to read scripture. I have to meditate and contemplate the goodness of the Lord.

I have to recognize that before I can believe the world needs Jesus, I have to act like I do. I need to behave like I believe that Jesus is the very air that I breathe. I need to respond to the love of Jesus like I believe he is a rock in a weary land, a shelter in the time of storm, peace in the midnight hour and the balm in Gilead.

In the gospel of John, Jesus tells a crowd that he is the bread of life. There's something about Jesus that we need to live.

How can I behave like I believe that? It means that I spend time with Jesus, that I set aside quality time, not simply the time I have left, but that I set aside quality time to simply enjoy the presence of Christ. It means that when I'm anxious or afraid, that I turn to Jesus rather than turn away from him. It means that when I have more than I need, I do with the extra what Jesus would have me do, that I shared with those who have less.

It means that when Jesus teaches me a more excellent way of being in the world, that I choose to keep practicing that way until it becomes second nature. It means that I live in such a way that my life overflows with the life, the values and the love of Jesus Christ. It means that when I inevitably turn away from Jesus and find myself exhausted and tired and weary and worn down, that I accept his invitation to turn back to him. When we live like we need Jesus, I believe that we will experience a spiritual fulfilling that will overflow into every area of our lives. The gospel of John says that, ” out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water,” that living water flows out of us and touches everything that we're in contact with, our relationships, our community, our justice and advocacy work.

Where we live like we need Jesus like we love Jesus, that love pours out of us. It's the kind of love that can teach us how to love our enemies, how to respond with kindness, how to speak truth with boldness, how to hold on to hope, how to live gently and compassionately in this violent world.

Now, imagine a world filled with communities of folks who really love Jesus. Now, I'm not talking about the Jesus of white supremacy, the Jesus of racism and bigotry, the Jesus of sexism and homophobia, the Jesus of power and wealth and exploitation. No, I'm talking about the revolutionary, the humble son of the living God, the one who gave his life for us and invites us to follow him on the path that leads to abundant life. Imagine a world filled with communities of those kinds of folks.

That's the kind of church the world needs. The world needs a church filled with people who live like they need Jesus.

***

The Rev. Kerlin Richter:

Hi, I am Kerlin Richter. I'm the Rector of Saint David of Wales Episcopal Church in Portland, Oregon. My talk today is about the What of loving Jesus.

You have heard all about the Why's and How's, the deeper theological reasons behind it, sharing the love of Jesus. And they've asked me to share with you what that might look like in the world as we move through it. And so I just want to start with the utter importance, which I feel like you probably already know, but the utter importance of being grounded in our own relationship with Jesus. We cannot share the things that we do not have and the things that we do not already know deeply to be true. So whatever that relationship with Jesus is in your own life, be sure to nurture it and care for it, through reading gospel stories of Jesus, through prayer, sensory imagery, picturing Jesus showing up in the world with you, and picture yourself showing up in Jesus's world with him.

Engage other creative ways. People who have written novels, imagining Jesus. I personally love the Christopher Moore book, Lamb. Imagine Jesus as a part of your daily life, not just as a distant figure, but the living, breathing person of him. If you do not know who Jesus is for you, it becomes very difficult to share that love and that person with other people.

There is a wonderful word popularized by Helen Fielding in her book, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason of “mention-itis”, which is a tendency toward repeatedly, or habitually mentioning someone, or something that you are infatuated with, regardless of its relevance to the topic of conversation. I think this is a great method of evangelism and living out our love of Jesus in the world. And again, it goes back to this idea of having a real relationship with Jesus. When you are newly dating someone, it is so much at the very forefront of your thought that in every conversation you just want to bring up this person who is so special to you.

If Jesus is this person in your life, then all sorts of things will remind you of him. Be careful, obviously not to mention him so much, particularly around unchurched friends, that people start rolling their eyes and trying to avoid you. But when something happens that reminds you of your beloved Jesus, bring it up. “This is like that time when Jesus was talking to the Pharisees...this is sort of like that time where Jesus was so exhausted by the crowds of people that he too needed to get away, and that is how I am feeling today.” Just mention him.

Have him be so much a part of your intimate and everyday life that of course he comes up. And you do not need to defend him, or explain him. Jesus does not need your help being the beautiful son of God, the incarnate body of love in this world. Sometimes he says weird and awkward things and that's okay. That's who he is, and it's part of what we love about him. He does not always make sense, and he does not clearly answer the questions that people ask of him.

Remember that you are talking about a real person and he is awesome. When talking with people about Jesus, do not forget to be curious about them. Remember that most people love to talk about themselves. And Jesus was always curious about the people that he met. He was open and saw them. We should go and do likewise and be curious about the people that we encounter.

But even as we try to model so much of our lives on Jesus, please remember that we are not him. We are not Jesus. We are one of the beautiful and broken people that Jesus loves.

Whenever we are doing things out in the world, even in the name of love, whenever we feed people, or help people, we need to always do it from a place of equality and not superiority. We will never ever bring the love of God to a place where God has not already been moving and acting and loving.

Speaking of doing things in public, there are all sorts of things that we can do to bring these ideas of Jesus out into the world. Street fairs and festivals offer fantastic opportunities. There has been a time, a couple of different street fairs, where we have made huge life-size cutouts, or pictures of Jesus that we have brought with us and have had a “Selfies with Jesus” station.

People, even if they do not like Christianity, often already like Jesus and are happy to go somewhere and get their photo taken with him. They will laugh and smile. Especially if you have little prompts--a mustache on a stick. People already are attracted to, and like this Jesus, and we as Christians get the privilege of carrying him with us into the world.

We can also offer spaces of public prayer, whether it is a wall or a chalkboard. If it is just little, blank pieces of paper where we invite people to make a note of the holy and broken places in their lives. We can make little blank prayer cards and have a mailbox of letters to Jesus. You could even pre-print them out, so they would say, "Dear Jesus, thank you for blank. Please, blank. Love, blank." So that people can fill out what they are grateful for and what they long for. It helps open up a dialogue with Jesus. When I was first married, one of our best wedding presents was a big package of Curious George, thank you notes that were written sort of like that. Dear, Blank. Thank you for the blank. I really like it. Love, Blank. They were the most fun thank you notes we got a chance to write.

Allow people to have fun and engage with Jesus. Do not ever set up a stumbling block or an obstacle to that conversation, rather be a facilitator and a welcomer.

Likewise, when we see something out in the world that feels really contradictory to our understanding of this beloved Son of God, our beloved incarnate Love walking the earth, speak up.

There are billboards in Portland that say in white letters on a black background, "Jesus is the only way to God." And then there's like a phone number or something about 1-800 truth, something. I was with a friend at one point who does not go to church, and we were walking along and we saw this billboard and they didn't mention it at all. So I said, "Wow. It seems like these people really spent a lot of money to seem Jesus sound more like a bouncer at an exclusive club than the one who welcomed absolutely everyone. That's not really how I experience him. Like some kind of tough guy saying, ‘You've got to get through me if you want to get to God.’"

And my friend laughed, then we moved on and kept talking. But I think oftentimes we, in our silence or discomfort, allow a public narrative of a God who seems angry and unwelcoming and exclusive to take center stage. And without a voice to the contrary, without another story, how will people know that that's not what we believe too?

The other piece of this, and this goes back to the street fair Jesus and other places of public representation, is be sure to have non-white images of Jesus in your church and in your home. And when you see representations of that blonde Jesus, point out how it is humorous. Point out how we all pretty much know that if Jesus had been a blue-eyed, blonde guy, hanging out in first century Palestine, people would have noticed it. And there would have been a lot of scripture references, not so much to his compassion and his love, but how much he would have looked nothing like anyone else around him. Jesus was clearly not a white guy, and so much damage has been done in this world from people who have not examined that truth.

Also, the other piece I think that is important, is it is good to have certainty and clarity about the things that you do have certainty and clarity about, but also be transparent and vulnerable about what you do not know.

People who have all the answers rarely get asked good questions. It is okay to share that there are things about the Bible that confuse you. To share that there are pieces of Jesus that you wrestle with. When he talks to the Syrophoenician woman in that way and calls her a dog, it is problematic.

When it is that place where you're not quite sure what to do with a scripture, don't run and hide from it. I don't think that unchurched people often enough get to see how Christians in our daily lives really don't know all the answers. How we struggle and look for clarity ourselves.

I do not love Jesus because he makes perfect sense to me and never surprises me. I do not love God because I understand God and God never surprises me. I have a faith that has plenty of room for doubt and wrestling and confusion.

My own cognitive perfection is never the measure of my faith. It is okay to say, "Wow, yeah, the Bible is kind of crazy sometimes, and I don't understand everything in there. But what I do understand is this God of Love. That this whole world was spoken into being by Love itself, and then that Love showed up in a person and that person was Jesus. And he spent his life healing and feeding into teaching and touching those. He met and not even death held him back from that love. That's the God I understand. And gosh, yeah, it's bigger than I can possibly grasp. And that's good news." If your church is doing something interesting. If your church is doing something a little weird or out of the norm, it is good to mention it to your friends.

If you guys are reading a book that is really pushing your understanding of God, mention it. Say, "Wow, my church is reading these books right now that are dealing with racism and the way that the church has been complicit in it. It is really, really pushing me." “ It is part of a conversation of the Black Lives Matter movement.” “ It is part of what is relevant in the world as we live in it, and part of how we wrestle with this world that we live in as Christians, is probably lived through in our faith communities. And it is good for folks who are not part of church to know that we wrestle with this stuff too.”

At Saint David's this past advent, we did an entire series on sex and faith. We called it Crazy, Sexy Advent. And we had a sex worker and a non-binary leather daddy and a polyamorous Christian come on and share with our congregation how their intersection of sex and faith has worked in their lives.

They were vulnerable and courageous, and it was powerful. One of my favorite pieces was when the woman who was a sex worker was talking, she said at one point, "I think the real reason that Jesus hung out with prostitutes was because we are just so nice to people." It was an amazing statement, and so rarely how I think people see Jesus and his relationship with prostitutes. And so I have shared that story with other friends, and it generates curiosity and wonder of, "What is this church that is not afraid to listen to sex workers, not as people that we reach out to and help, not as some lesser, needy population, but as real, full people, who have a lot to tell us.

I have had people be very curious that we had polyamorous and kinky Christians talking to our congregation, not as people that we need to help, but as people that we are blessed to learn from. People who are already in our pews and who are already us.

The unfortunate truth of the way that our world is right now, and the way that Christianity has been perceived, that the burden is on us to open the doors and make the path wide into the church. It is up to us to let people know that the God that we worship loves them, that the God that we worship delights in them, and that they are beautiful, and holy, and wonderfully made. And again, we must always know that we too are beloved. That we are beautifully made and that God delights in us. And if we know that deep in our hearts, if we experience the truth of God's love for us, and the delight of Jesus in our daily lives, then sharing that love with the people around us is just sort of the same thing as sharing about your new boyfriend, your new puppy, the exciting and beautiful thing that you have found when the love of Jesus fills up your heart. Then it is fun and joyful and natural to share that with the world.

Peace and blessings.