"Powerful and Empowering" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday September 27, 2026 – 18^th Sunday after Pentecost
Scripture:  Matthew 21:23-32

Most of you know that I’ve gone back to school this year – don’t worry, it is a programme that is designed to be done while we continue to work full-time! – and I’ve started my next course which I’ll be taking online between now and December.  The course is called “Theology and Power” with a subtitle that talks about Political Theology, so I wasn’t surprised back at the beginning of the week when I read the story from the gospel of Matthew that we just heard, the thing that jumped out at me was the question from the chief priests and elders in the temple:  “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?”  Because authority is really about power.  When you have authority, you have power; and when you have power, you have the ability to make things happen.

It’s a really interesting dynamic at play here, when you look at this story through the lens of power.  The people who are asking Jesus this question – the chief priests and elders in the temple in Jerusalem – are in a position where they have more authority than anyone else around.  They are the ones who get to decide what is OK and what isn’t for all of the Jewish people whether they live in Jerusalem or not.  They have the power to control the actions of all of the people as the people try to live their lives as faithfully as possible.  They also had the authority to determine who they would share their power with, who they would give power to.

But they don’t have ultimate authority, because the land, at that time, was part of the Roman Empire, and the emperor in Rome had the final say.  The emperor had set up a puppet king, in the person of Herod, and there was also a governor appointed to rule the land on behalf of the emperor – that would be Pontius Pilate.  And those chief priests and temple authorities – they knew that if they did anything to go against Rome, they wouldn’t just lose their authority, they would also lose their lives.

So in terms of power and authority, these chief priests and temple elders were walking a fine line of having and not having power.

And along comes Jesus.   They ask him, by what authority are you doing these things?  These things would refer to preaching to crowds of thousands of people, healing people who had been cast out from their communities, flipping over the tables of the currency exchangers in the temple, maybe they’d even heard about Jesus walking on water and calming the storm.

Here is someone who seems to have even more authority than the chief priests and temple leaders; someone with more power than them.  I imagine that they were worried at this point in time.  “What if Rome hears about this?  What will happen to us if we haven’t been able to get everyone to toe the line?”  Or maybe even, “do we have less power in the world now, because this itinerant preacher from the backwater of Galilee has more?”

And so they confront Jesus and ask him:  “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?”

I’ll also add a note here to say that this is going to be the dynamic for most of our readings between now and the end of November when we move into the season of Advent.  In the timeline of the gospel of Matthew, we are now in the last week of Jesus’s life.  This story comes almost right after Jesus entered Jerusalem in the parade that we remember every year on Palm Sunday.  Tensions are high.  The streets of Jerusalem are crowded, as is the temple, as people have come from around the known world to celebrate the festival of Passover.  Over the next couple of months, we’re going to be reading stories that are situated between Palm Sunday and Maundy Thursday, and the tension of this setting spills into the stories that we will be reading.  Authorities are questioning Jesus; and Jesus tells some very pointed, provocative parables in response.

Getting back to that question of authority – we know what the answer is.  Jesus’s authority comes from God.  It is implied that his questioners also know the answer to their question, but they are reluctant to say so.  If they admit the truth, they will be admitting that they have less authority and power than they would like to have; but if they lie and say that his authority comes from humans, the crowds are likely to react in a negative way.

The ironic thing is, that their power comes from God as well.  If we understand God to be the Creator and Source of All, then God is the source of all power.  One of those challenging theological questions is, if God is good, and if God is powerful, then why do so many awful things happen in the world.  One way that you can answer this question is that it is because God chooses to share Their power.  God doesn’t hoard power, micromanaging everything that happens on earth, but God empowers us, even though we are merely human.  That whole thing about free will and all.

So the chief priests and temple leaders only have authority and power because God shared it with them.  We might go one step further and say that the emperor off in Rome, only had power because God gave him power; and even though the emperor might think that Herod and Pilate had power because he, the emperor, chose to give them power, God is ultimately the source of all power and authority.

Which brings us to you and to me.  We’re not Jesus.  We’re not the Roman emperor.  We’re not even the chief priests and temple authorities.  We’re just us.  What gives us any authority at all to talk about God, and to act on behalf of God in the world?

I know that this is a question that I have wrestled with – for 13 years now since I began discerning a call to ministry; for 15 years since I began the Licenced Lay Worship Leader course; for 21 years since I was first invited to preach.  That day, 21 years ago, when I was first invited to preach, my immediate reaction was to blurt out “No!  I don’t have any training or authority to preach or teach about God!”  And a little bit of that sense still remains.  When I or anyone else steps into the pulpit, we are handling holy things, things of God, and what right do any of us, as mere mortals, have to speak of or handle the holy?

But then I remember that all of us do have that authority because we are beloved children of God.  God empowers all of Their children to speak of God and of God’s love.  God empowers us to share in the bread and wine of communion and the waters of baptism because we are all God’s beloved children.  God loves you, and God wants to you feel empowered to share this love with the world.

And if we try to pretend that we don’t have this authority… well, later in November we are going to be reading the parable of the Talents, and when one of the slaves hid his talent in a hole in the ground and refused to make use of it… let me just say that things didn’t end too well for him.

But we do have authority, and we need to decide how we are going to use our power.  And the answer, at least for me, comes down to love.  God empowers us to love the world and God wants us to share the message of that amazing love with the world.  You’ve probably heard me say it before, but let me say it again:  God loves you more deeply than you could ever know or even imagine; and God is equipping and empowering you to love the world!  Thanks be to God.

 

 "Empowerment Sculpture - Lincoln, UK"
Used with Permission

"God Isn't Fair" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday September 20, 2026 – 17^th Sunday After Pentecost
Scripture Readings:  Jonah 3:10-4:11, Matthew 20:1-16

I have two sisters, which means that growing up, I developed a very strong sense of fairness.  One of my favourite stories to tell is that my mother would occasionally bring home cinnamon buns as a treat for us to share.  Whoever divided the cinnamon buns got the last pick of her share, so you’d better believe me that you were very careful to make it fair if you were the one dividing them up.  Rulers were usually involved!  Each of us would get precisely and mathematically one third.

And so reading the story that Jesus told today through the lens of fairness, I’m quick to join the chorus of the workers who had been working out in the sun all day:  “That’s not fair!”  And I can almost hear the voice of my father in the voice of Jesus or the voice of the landowner in the parable, “Well, life’s not fair.”

If you, like me, have a keen sense of fairness, then this parable of Jesus probably rubs you the wrong way.  Surely the workers who worked out in the heat of the day for a full 12-hour shift should receive 12 times the salary as the workers who only came along and worked for the last hour, as the sun was almost setting.

And when I realize that I’m reading the parable this way, I realize how deeply a capitalist mindset has me entrapped.  Maybe it is capitalism, and not fairness, that says that hard work is rewarded, and the workers who were willing to work 12 hours should, of course, be ahead in life, compared with the workers who only worked a single hour.  And the owner of the land who hired the workers – why he must have worked extra hard to be in the position that he’s in now.

But that capitalist mindset misses so much of the nuance, and I wonder if maybe that is what Jesus is trying to point out to us.  I rather suspect that the landowner didn’t work extra hard in order to be able to afford so much land, and in order to be able to pay so many people to work for him.  I rather suspect that he inherited the land from his father, who inherited the land from his father, who inherited the land from his father, and so on.

And what about the question of why some workers still hadn’t been hired at 5pm while others had been working since sunrise?  Capitalism might tell us that they must be lazy, they must have still been sleeping while the go-getters were already out in the marketplace looking for work.  But what if those 5pm hires had been overlooked earlier in the day because they have a disability?  Or what if they had been overlooked because they were immigrants?  Or what if they had been overlooked because they were queer, because they were trans, because their family led an untraditional lifestyle?

The thing about the salary that was negotiated – a denarius – is that it is enough to live on – enough to buy your daily bread – but it isn’t enough to be able to save any for a rainy day.  Those workers who weren’t hired at sunrise, they were probably starting to worry about what was going to happen if they didn’t work that day.  And when they were hired part-way through the day, they probably assumed that they were going to receive a partial salary and were trying to figure out how they were going to make the budget work – maybe pay the rent to keep a roof over their family’s head, but the children were going to have to go to be hungry again tonight.

But doesn’t every human being deserve the dignity of a roof overhead and food in their belly?  The landowner recognizes this, and pays every worker, whether they had worked a full day or only the last hour, enough to keep the wolves at bay for another day.  And to me, this is a deeper level of fairness.  This is a fairness that says “not what you have earned, but what you need.”

Now it could be, as Jesus told this parable, that he was making a commentary on the economic practices of his time and place… and maybe our time and place too, where so many people don’t have enough to get from one day to the next.  And that is probably part of Jesus's message.  But the thing about parables is that they are never just simple stories.  And when Jesus tells parables, he is usually trying to teach us something about God, and about God’s kingdom.

One good rule of thumb for interpreting Jesus’s parables is that you can usually look for the person in the story who has the most power, and with that person, Jesus is trying to depict God.  And in this parable, the person with the power is the landowner.  And Jesus is trying to paint us a picture of a God who is not fair, but who is generous far beyond fairness.  We don’t need to work to earn God’s love, we don’t have to earn God’s grace – it is given to us freely as we need it.

I think that this connection is made even more clear in the story from Jonah, and I love how cleverly the lectionary pairs these two stories together.  This happens after the famous part of Jonah’s story.  Most people associate Jonah with the whale, but you might remember that Jonah ended up in the belly of the whale because he was running away from God, because God had told him that he was to go to the city of Nineveh and tell the people to change their hearts and lives and turn back to God.  And Jonah was so convinced of the utter depravity of the people of Nineveh that he was afraid to go there, so he ran away.  After escaping the whale, he realized that he was going to have to go there after all, and he reluctantly carried God’s message to the people of Nineveh.  And to his surprise, the people listened and turned back to God.  And to his even greater surprise, God forgave the people of Nineveh for their evil ways.  And today, we get the end of Jonah’s story, where he essentially throws a temper tantrum over God’s generosity, God’s grace, and God’s love.

The thing about God’s grace is that if we accept that God loves everybody, that everybody also includes people that we might, in our heart of hearts, wish were outside of God’s grace.  We’re not going to name names here, but I rather suspect that most of us carry a couple of names in our heart about whom we think:  “Surely God can’t forgive that person.”  But God’s love is for everyone.

If we approach the parable that Jesus tells from the perspective of the workers hired in the morning, we might start to think that God loves us especially, 12 times as much as those people over there.  But if we approach the parable from the perspective of the workers who were only hired at the very end of the day, our response is more likely one of awe at a God who could be so generous and gracious as to love us too.

For God loves you – as I often say, God loves you more deeply than you could ever know or even imagine.

(At Westfield United Church, at this point in the sermon I went off-script and added the following.)

Some of you may have seen the post I made in our Westfield United Facebook group this week, telling you about a church in Hamilton that voted last Sunday to become Affirming, and the post that they made went viral in all the wrong ways.  They have received literally thousands of hateful comments.  And in my post, I invited you to go and share some love and encouragement with them, and I know that some of you did.

I also left them two comments – one under my own account, and one as Two Rivers Pastoral Charge.  And this morning as I was waiting for the ferry – it was a very long wait this morning – I opened up Facebook on my phone and saw that my Two Rivers Pastoral Charge comment had received some replies.  I had written:  “Congratulations on taking this step! God's love is limitless, unconditional, and for EVERYONE!” followed by a row of rainbow hearts; and someone literally commented underneath:  “God’s love is 100% conditional.”

What?!?!  That’s not the God that I know.  That’s not what Jesus is telling us in this parable.  God’s love and God’s grace does not depend on anything that we do or don’t do.  We don’t need to earn God’s love.

(Back to the regularly scheduled sermon.)

To quote author Phillip Yancy, “Grace means that nothing could ever make God love you more; and grace means that nothing could ever make God love you less.”

You don’t need to work 12 hours out in the blazing sun to earn God’s love.  God already loves you!  You are God’s precious child… and so is everyone else.   Thanks be to God!

 

Image:  The Late-Arriving Workers (JESUS MAFA)
Used with permission.

"Dream Dreams that are Bigger" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday September 13, 2026 – Church Picnic
Scripture Reading:  John 14:12-16, 25-31
Dr. Seuss Connection:  Oh! The Places You’ll Go!

This year, we are having a Seussian Summer – each week during the Story for All Ages, we will be reading a different Dr. Seuss book, then pairing it with scripture to see what wisdom we might find within its pages.

 

The book, Oh! The Places You’ll Go! is often given as a gift to graduating students – especially to students who are graduating from high school or from university as they prepare for their next major step in life.  It is a book that offers both deep encouragement – you’ll get there, I know that you will! – as well as a dose of reality – it isn’t going to be easy, every step of the way.

It is a great book to read at the transition points in life – transitioning from high school to college or university, or transitioning from higher education to proper grown-up life.

And this point in time, our September church picnic, is a bit of a mini-transition point in the life of our church.  The summer is always a more relaxed pace around the church, a bit of a sabbath time for many of our groups and committees.  But September is when we tend to jump back in with both feet, jumping back into the business of being the church.  Even though the new year won’t begin on the calendar until January, and even though the new year won’t begin in the church calendar until Advent, the beginning of September always feels like a new year, a fresh start, a new beginning.  So this is a transition point for us as the church, as well as for all of the students and new graduates out there.

And I think that much of the wisdom of this book holds true for us too.  Oh!  The places we could go, as the church!  Oh!  The things that we could do as the church!  We are only limited by our ability to imagine, our ability to dream, our ability to say “yes” to wherever the Holy Spirit is leading us.

What might us back from this?  Maybe sometimes it is fear – fear of something new, or fear of the work that it might take us to get there. Dr. Seuss points out to us that the path isn’t always easy.

Maybe sometimes it is nostalgia for the way that things were.  But the thing about the past is that it has passed.  We can’t go back to the way that things were, but if we get trapped in cycles of longing to recreate the past, then we’ll never get to experience the beautiful future.

And I thought that Dr. Seuss had another very insightful moment in the book, when our character gets stuck in the waiting room – waiting for something to happen, waiting for someone else to do something, waiting for… anything.  But if we, as the church, are only ever waiting for something to happen, rather than reaching out and grasping our future with both hands, then nothing will ever happen.

But I deeply believe, with every fibre of our being, that God isn’t done with us yet, that God has a future for us, and that this future is going to be new and beautiful and exciting.  Oh! The places we’ll go as we dance with the Spirit.

For the Holy Spirit is our dance partner all the way!  We aren’t on this journey alone.  The scripture passage that Rose read for us today comes from the very end of Jesus’s life – we’re in Maundy Thursday at this point, and after Jesus finishes talking to his disciples, they are going to go out to the garden and Jesus is going to be arrested.

But even on his last night alive, Jesus promises his disciples that he isn’t going to leave them alone.  They are going to have an Advocate, a helper, the Holy Spirit.  And through the Holy Spirit, the church is going to be able to do far more than Jesus, just one person, could do in his short life.

Dear Church, you can do this!
I know that it’s true!
The Spirit is with you
in all that you do!
Dream dreams that are bigger
than ever before;
Imagine a future,
and then dream some more!
Oh! the places you’ll go!
Oh! the things you will do!
The Spirit is with you,
She makes all things new!
Let’s dance with the Spirit;
our future – embrace;
leap in with all gladness;
our fears – let’s erase.
Dear Church – you can do this!
It’s plain, and it’s clear!
God’s love, it will guide us,
for God’s always near.

"We Speak for (And Care For) the Trees" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday September 6, 2026 – Feast of Creation
Scripture Readings:  Psalm 104:10-25 and Revelation 21:1-5
Dr. Seuss Connection:  The Lorax

This year, we are having a Seussian Summer – each week during the Story for All Ages, we will be reading a different Dr. Seuss book, then paring it with scripture to see what wisdom we might find within its pages.

 

This summer, there have been some weeks when I have acknowledged that the Dr. Seuss book we were reading was new to me – that it hadn’t been part of my childhood repertoire.  But that’s not the case with The Lorax.  This book was very much a part of my growing up.

In fact, this book was one of the major influences in my youngest sister choosing to become an environmental engineer – she now spends her professional life speaking for the trees, and for the animals, and for the birds, as she coordinates the clean-ups that are required when corporations make a mess.

When I messaged her earlier this week to confirm that my memory was correct, and that The Lorax had been one of her major influences, she replied with a quote that has followed her through the decades:

“UNLESS someone like you
cares a whole awful lot,
nothing is going to get better.
It’s not.”

In planning out the summer, I chose to read The Lorax today, on the first Sunday in September, because earlier this year the Consultation on the Common Text, the international and ecumenical body that is in charge of the lectionary readings that we follow through most of the year, they named the Sunday on or following September 1 as the Feast of Creation, sometimes called the Festival of Creation in Christ.

This didn’t happen overnight.  The Feast of Creation is a day that has been recognized by the Eastern Orthodox church since the 8^th Century, and the Orthodox leaders have been advocating for other churches and denominations to recognize the day since 1989.  The first Sunday in September, 2026, comes at the end of decades of advocacy.

When we celebrate creation, we are worshipping the God who created everything that we can see and everything we cannot see.  We celebrate the ways that creation can reveal the image of the Creator.  The diversity of the Truffula trees and Bar-ba-loots and Swomee-Swans, and Humming Fish reveal to us a Creator who is endlessly creative and imaginative, and who celebrates diversity.  The immensity of mountains reveals a Creator who is bigger than we can imagine.  The fury of a thunderstorm or a good nor’easter reveals a Creator who is more powerful than we sometimes like to think about.  The hardness of rocks reveals strength; the busyness of an ant colony reveals continual activity; the flow of the river reveals cleansing; the abundance of trees and plants reveals a living God, who lives again after every winter.

There is so much that creation can reveal to us about the Creator of All, and yet the message of the bible and the message of the Lorax doesn’t end there.  Both the bible and the Lorax call all of us to tend to creation and care for creation.  If we lose the riotous diversity of Creation, then our image of the Creator will lessen.

But more than that, if we harm creation, then we are harming our relationship with the Creator.  If we say that we can cut down all the trees and build a factory to make Thneeds (because why else were the trees placed there if not to make Thneeds) then what are we saying about the Creator of those trees?

It is a difficult conundrum to be in, because we know that we are not able to tread the earth so lightly so as not to cause any harm at all to other parts of creation.  We are trapped in systems that exploit creation for human benefit, and we can see how the earth is groaning under the pressure.  We humans – and I’m speaking about humans on a global scale – we urgently need to find our place within the interconnected community of creation, and find a way to be in true community with the rest of creation.  Because I honestly don’t know how much longer our planet will tolerate the current stress.

But we aren’t left without hope.  There is always hope.  Both the Lorax and the bible offer us hope.

We heard part of Psalm 104 this morning – a psalm that celebrates the goodness of God’s creation and the goodness of God the Creator of All.  But we also read from almost the very end of the bible, from the end of the book of Revelation.  And God promises to renew the earth and the heavens.  Even when we humans mess up so badly that it seems beyond repair, nothing is beyond God’s ability to restore.  The resurrection of Jesus at Easter is just a foreshadowing of the resurrection that is part of God’s very nature.

And The Lorax also holds the promise of resurrection.  Even when all of the trees are gone and the animals and birds and fish have abandoned the place, and the landscape looks more like a wasteland than anything else, there is still hope.  A Truffula seed remains, and with people willing to tend and care for it, a Truffula forest can return, and provide a home for all of the creatures.

For God is Creator
         Creator of all!
God’s heart will be broken
         to hear a tree fall.
But we are God’s people,
         who care for the earth,
we will tend and keep it
         and nurture re-birth.
For we can be people
         who care a whole lot,
and things WILL get better,
         it’s NOT a long shot!
God’s Spirit will guide us,
         and show us the way,
to be God’s good stewards.
All this, we do pray.
Amen.

"You Are God's Beloved Child" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday August 30, 2026
Scripture:  Psalm 33:13-22 and Matthew10:26-31
Dr. Seuss Connection:  Horton Hears a Who

This year, we are having a Seussian Summer - each week during the Story for All Ages, we will be reading a different Dr. Seuss book, then pairing it with scripture to see what wisdom we might find within its pages.

When I was a student at the Atlantic School of Theology, one of my favourite classes I took was called “Jesus in Text and Image.”  It was a course on Christology – a course that examined the life and work of Jesus Christ – but we approached it through art and literature.  We read novels, we watched movies, we looked at paintings, we read poetry, and each time we would ask the question, “what can we learn about the person and work of Jesus? What is this artist or creator trying to tell us?”

As we watched movies, they could be divided into two different categories – on one hand, there were the “Jesus films,” which were movies depicting either all or part of the life of Jesus; and the second category were films that included a Christ figure.  These would be films that weren’t explicitly about Jesus, but instead they were films where a character took on some of the characteristics of Christ.  (And then there was one remarkable movie that managed to be both – it is both a Jesus film and a film with a Christ figure.)

When I was first planning out this summer, my original plan for the week in which we would read Horton Hears a Who was that we could compare ourselves to Horton, who is on a mission to save the world.  Or save a world.  I was going to talk about how we, who have a fair bit of privilege on a global scale, are called to care for the more vulnerable, the more disadvantaged.  For a person’s a person, no matter how small.

Or maybe we could look at young Jo-Jo, the slacker.  His was the smallest voice, but it took his voice to make a difference in the outcome.

But then as I was charting out the summer, I realized that Horton and his Whos were going to be making an appearance just two weeks after we read the story about Yertle, the Turtle King, and the ordinary turtle Mack who overthrew the emperor with a burp.  And I worried that the two sermons would be too similar and you might get bored with the same message twice!

But when I thought more about Horton, I started to wonder if, perhaps, we aren’t the elephant, and hopefully we aren’t the kangaroo or the monkeys causing chaos and destruction for the sake of chaos and destruction.  But what if we are the Whos instead?

What if we are the Whos, living our ordinary lives on this speck of dust that we call home, a planet that is both beautiful and terrible, a world where we know both love and suffering?  And what if Horton, the elephant, is the deity in the story, the divine figure who does everything that he can to protect and care for the Whos.  Someone who endures and suffers for their sake.  A Christ Figure, if I think back to those movies that we watched in class – not a literal re-enactment of the life of Jesus in the form of an elephant; but rather someone who takes on some of the characteristics of Christ, giving of themself for the sake of others and for the sake of the world.

I think of the perspective of those Whos.  From my ordinary human perspective, when I’m close to an elephant they seem huge.  To a creature whose entire world is the size of a speck of dust balanced on the edge of a clover, something the size of an elephant would be unfathomably huge.  I don’t know how a Who would ever be able to wrap their mind around an elephant.  But the elephant hears the cry of the Who; and the Whos trust in this being that they can’t comprehend.  The Whos couldn’t see Horton searching for the clover, but the Whos trust that Horton is caring for them and searching them out.

Our ordinary human brains can’t comprehend God, but God hears our cries, and God is with us even when it feels like we are being tossed in a storm.  God will seek us out, even if it requires searching through millions of clovers, for God will never abandon nor forsake you.  God knows and loves every last part of you, right down to every hair on your head.

I don’t think that we have to do an either/or interpretation – either we are called to be like Horton saving the world, or we are the Whos, fully dependent on a God we can’t comprehend.  I think that we can do a both/and reading.  In some ways, we are called to be like Horton.  Together, we are the Body of Christ, called to be the hands and feet of Christ in the world, protecting the vulnerable and creating a space where the voiceless can be heard.  But we are also the Whos; we are also God’s beloved children.  You are God’s beloved child.

For God sees us, and knows us, and loves us.
As the psalm writer said:

Our souls wait for the Lord,
    who is our strength and our shield.
Our hearts are glad in God
    because we trust in the holy name.
God’s steadfast love is upon us,
    as we hope in the Lord.

Thanks be to God.
Amen.

"A Voice the Size of a Mustard Seed" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday August 16, 2026
Scripture:  Jeremiah 1:4-10 and Matthew 13:31-33, 44-46
Dr. Seuss Connection:  Yertle the Turtle

 

This year, we are having a Seussian Summer - each week during the Story for All Ages, we will be reading a different Dr. Seuss book, then pairing it with scripture to see what wisdom we might find within its pages.

 

Reading Yertle the Turtle, it is interesting to ponder who Dr. Seuss was thinking of when he created the character of Yertle.  Yertle was king of the pond, and everything was peaceful and everyone was happy.  Until they weren’t.  Or more specifically, until Yertle wasn’t.  He was dissatisfied, and wanted to be the king over more than just the pond.  So he climbed on the backs of other turtles, and proclaimed himself to be king of all he could see.  But it still wasn’t enough, he was still dissatisfied, so he commanded more turtles to make his throne even higher; and once he could see further, he became king over even more land.  But it still wasn’t enough for old Yertle, so he commanded even more turtles to make him a still taller throne so that he could increase his kingdom’s reach.

So does Yertle remind you of anyone, past or present?  Someone with a lust for more power and more land, more control over others?

Dr. Seuss didn’t make a secret about who he was thinking of when he created the character of Yertle – in the early 1950s when he was writing this story, Dr. Seuss said that he was thinking about Hitler, and how Hitler had taken over countries in Europe in the preceding decades in his lust for more power.

But I rather suspect that Hitler may not have been the first name to pop into your head when I asked you who Yertle reminded you of.  Because the pattern of Yertle is a pattern that has been repeated throughout history, for as long as we have been keeping track of history.  It is a pattern that we could see in all of the ancient empires – the Assyrian Empire, the Babylonian Empire, the Persian Empire, the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire… folks who have been coming to bible study may recognize these names, as we traced ancient history though the stories of the Old Testament.  In more modern times, we’ve seen the British Empire and the American Empire.

Empires in every moment of history gain power by taking land and resources from others and absorbing them in to the Empire.  You have what I want, therefore I am going to take it and proclaim myself to be the ruler over it… and over you.  This is how empires work.

Yertle sees a cow, a mule, a house, a bush, and a cat, and claims that they are his and he now rules over them and the land on which they stand.

This is maybe even a pattern we see at work in the world today.

But the interesting thing about Dr. Seuss’s story is that even though Yertle is the titular character of the book, I don’t think that he’s the hero of the story.  To me, the hero of the story is young Mack, the turtle who overthrows the emperor with a burp.

A plain little turtle named Mack, who is suffering under the oppression of Yertle, and who has had enough, politely asks Yertle for a break.  Yertle insults him, and when the suffering increases, the voice of Mack becomes a bit louder, letting Yertle know about the suffering of the rest of the turtles. When Yertle continues to ignore their suffering and orders it to increase all the further, Mack burps.  No eloquent words.  No speeches proclaiming the suffering. No polite petitions for it to end.  A simple burp.  And the throne collapses, the empire collapses, and the reign of Yertle the Emperor Turtle has come to an end.

One small voice.  That’s all that it took.  A voice as tiny as a mustard seed.  And an emperor fell.

Jesus told us a couple of parables about the power of something small – he told us that a tiny mustard seed could do good in the world, could grow into a tree that would give shelter to vulnerable birds.  We would never throw away a tiny seed because it seems too small to do anything.

And what about yeast?  With just a quarter teaspoon of yeast, a great big loaf of bread will rise.  Something small can feed a hungry family.

Our ability to do good in the world doesn’t depend on our size, or on the reach of our voice.  It just depends on our willingness to speak up.  And even more than that, just imagine what might be possible when we join our voices together!  I wonder if the story might have unfolded differently if all of the 9 original turtles that made up Yertle’s throne had spoken up, and refused to let the other turtles climb up them to increase the height of the throne?  Well, there might not have been a story if that had happened!

Jesus encourages his followers to be like a mustard seed, to be like yeast in the world.  We don’t have to be the biggest and flashiest, but we can still work change in the world.

I don’t know if you have been following the Tim Hortons – Harry Potter collaboration that is happening right now?  Beginning last Wednesday and continuing until September 6, Tim Hortons has some Harry Potter themed items on their menu.  Now there is nothing wrong with the books or with the people who love the books, but the author of these books is using her money to fund anti-transgender movements and legislation.  And in order to offer Harry Potter branded items on their menu, Tim Hortons had to pay the author of Harry Potter licensing fees.  Which means that Tim Hortons is directly funding transphobia and anti-trans legislation.

I wrote them a letter expressing my dismay when the campaign was first announced, asking that they turn back from this decision, and asking that they take an equivalent amount to what they paid the author of Harry Potter and donate that amount to organizations that support trans people.  And when the campaign launched this week, I sent a second letter, again expressing my dismay and telling them that I will be avoiding their stores for the duration of the campaign.

Will my letters change Tim Hortons mind?  No.  Will my one-person boycott make a difference?  No.  But my initial letter was one of more than 5000 letters that were sent using the template provided by Affirming Connections.  And letters are still being sent in the second round of letter-writing.

It still may not make a difference, but maybe it will.  Some of you are likely old enough to remember the impact that boycotts had in ending Apartheid in South Africa in the 80s and early 90s.  Maybe our collective voice will be heard by Empire, and the world will shift just a little bit towards justice and love.

A couple of weeks ago, we read the story about King Herod, and the fear that the birth of a baby instilled in him.  There’s a great line in one of the hymns we sing at Epiphany when we read the story of the magi and Herod:  “Will you join the hope, alight in the young girl’s eyes, of the mighty put to flight by a baby’s cries?”

The birth of an infant caused a king to tremble with fear; and we, the church, are the body of Christ in the world, called to use our voices, like the turtle Mack, to bring about peace and justice.

When United Church Moderator, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Kimberly Heath, was installed last summer, she compared the United Church to a dandelion.  Not the flashiest of flowers, but tenacious.  A thorn in the side of gardeners.

And so may we, as the body of Christ, be dandelions in the side of empire – tenacious, maybe irritating, but like Mack the turtle, like a mustard seed, like yeast, stubbornly insisting on turning the world towards goodness and love.

And may it be so.  Amen.

"August Saturday" (not a sermon!)

It has been a while since we have had a writing prompt at the Grand Bay Writers' Group (ie we begin with the same prompt but each write something different). At today's gathering, we did choose a prompt then spent 35 minutes writing. The prompt was: “Someone with one thing left to do before summer ends.” Here is the story I wrote.

 

The best part about summer Saturdays is waking up without an alarm.  The sun diffusing through the curtains makes the world feel awake by the time your eyes are open.  A whole day open to an infinite number of possibilities – where to go, what to do, who to see.

When she woke up that particular Saturday, the sun was barely above the horizon and she had to sit up in bed in order to make out its shape through the curtains.  That is a sure sign that the end of August is approaching – the sun is starting to sleep in a little bit later each morning and go to bed a bit earlier each evening.  Not enough that she needs to turn on an outside light, but last night she noticed that she was closing the curtains a good half hour earlier than she had a month ago.

Sitting there in bed, she started to think about the day ahead, started imagining what she might do with the hours that stretched in front of her.  A trip to the library was definitely in order, as she had finished the books she had borrowed a couple of weeks ago.  Maybe a stop at Caffeine-8, her favourite indie coffee shop, for one of their iced coffees.  Would she sit there to drink her coffee and dip into one of her new library books?  To be determined.

The farmer’s market was also beckoning her – this was peak season for all of the local produce, and she knew that the stalls would be overflowing with corn on the cob and tomatoes and peppers and cucumbers and beans.  In the middle of winter, she knew that she would regret any summer Saturdays that she had missed the market – in this northern clime, the short season was a time to be savoured and not wasted.

And would this be the day?  She had been putting it off all summer, but the days were counting down and she knew that there were a few weeks left before it was too late.  She had promised herself that she would go before the end of August, but that promise had been made back when the summer weeks had seemed to stretch out without an end in sight.

She didn’t know why she had been putting it off – it was such a simple thing to do.  Fill in the paperwork.  Put it in an envelope.  Drive to the office.  Drop the envelope into a box.  It would hardly take any time to do at all, and yet somehow the weeks had slipped by and the papers were still sitting there on her kitchen table.

She thought to herself, “If I were a shrink, I would probably be psychoanalyzing myself, telling myself why I am such a lazy bum, why I have been putting it off.  Maybe there is some deep-seated childhood trauma that is keeping me from taking the next step.  Maybe I have unresolved parental issues.”  This thought elicited a laugh out loud from her.

“Or maybe,” she thought, “I could see a psychic who can tell me why.  Maybe the constellations aren’t quite aligned, and I am waiting for their position to shift before I do this.”

With another laugh, she threw off the blanket and got out of bed to make her first cup of coffee for the day and a slice of toast with peanut butter.

Despite its late rising, the sun still carried warmth as it rose higher in the sky.  Her first stop was the library – the old books were returned, and a couple of new ones picked up – a new-to-her Nora Roberts standalone and the latest Inspector Gamache novel – perfect summertime reads.  She stopped at Caffeine-8 and picked up her ice coffee and chose to sit on their patio and read the first couple of chapters of Gamache, the familiar setting of Three Pines welcoming her home.

Coffee finished, the market was next.  As she surveyed the vegetable selection, she decided to pick up a couple dozen cobs of corn to blanch and freeze – they would be a nice treat in a few months when the winter winds were howling, a taste of the summer sunshine.

Preparing the corn for the freezer would take up most of the afternoon, so maybe today wouldn’t be the day after all.  Anyway, what made today special enough to be the day when she would start the next chapter of her life?  It was just an ordinary summer Saturday.  Surely a new beginning deserved a fanfare of trumpets and a heavenly chorus, or fireworks at the very minimum.

She got home, put the library books on the kitchen table, the tomatoes on the counter, the beans in the fridge, and took the corn outside to shuck where it didn’t matter if the silk got everywhere.

She thought about that paperwork as she shucked the corn, as she plunged it in to the stock pot of boiling water, as she pulled it out and dropped it into the ice water that filled her sink, as she sliced the kernels off the cob, as she spread the kernels on cookie sheets, and placed them in her freezer.  The papers were there on the table behind her, staring at her as she worked, seeming to mock her.

Two dozen cobs of corn-off-the-cob in the freezer, and it was still only three in the afternoon.  Still time to do it today.  Though the lure of Inspector Gamache and the world of Three Pines felt strong.  Surely she could read just a couple more chapters first.  The paperwork would still be there tomorrow.

She went back into the kitchen, and walked over to the kitchen table.

 

 Image Credit:  Sharon Drummond on flickr
Used with permission.