The Cross and New Life

A Sermon preached by
the Rev. Peter De Franco
at
St. Peter’s Episcopal Church
August 31, 2008

Last week, we heard the story of Peter identifying Jesus as the Messiah. Jesus thought that God gave Peter a unique insight into Jesus and his mission. Jesus was so impressed with Peter’s understanding that he called Peter the Rock on which Jesus would build his church. Peter must have thought himself very special.
I have some Spanish friends and they gave me a word to describe Peter: Especial. It means someone who thinks of himself as better than others, as velvet compared to cotton, a Don Perignon champagne to Boon Wine, a Lamborghini rather than a banged up Impala. People who feel themselves to be Especial usually have a bit of an inflated ego. And that was Peter.
After all, Jesus singled him out from all the apostles and let him know that he saw things that they did not understand. Since Peter recognized that Jesus was unique, Peter must have felt that he needed to protect Jesus. He must have felt, as any friend would feel, that he had to protect Jesus from harm, shelter him from danger, shield him from disaster. We all would feel the same. None of us would want any disaster to fall on our best friend. If Peter was anything to Jesus, Peter was his dear friend.
Just after Jesus called Peter the rock on which Jesus would build the church, Jesus then goes on to tell the disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. Peter hears those words and goes into protective mode. Just imagine Peter as a huge Israeli shepherd; Peter would not allow anyone to touch his Jesus. Suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests, being killed, and that nonsense about rising on the third day – Peter would have none of that for his Jesus. We all would have felt the same. We all would have tried to protect Jesus. All of us except for Jesus.
Just as quickly as Jesus inflated Peter’s balloon, so Jesus did not fail to pop that balloon. “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” Satan – that is what Jesus called Peter. The Rock becomes the demon. The most important becomes the least important. Apostle Especial becomes first class devil.
If the rest of the disciples do not understand what Jesus is saying, Jesus spells it out for them in no uncertain terms: If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 25For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.
Those are very hard words. But let’s just look at the week that has passed. I am sure you read the newspaper articles about two young boys, athletes both, who died tragically while preparing for the football season. On Thursday, we received the tragic news that Fred Richter, a beloved parishioner of many years, died suddenly and his funeral was on Friday. Another member of the parish buried her aunt. Another member of the church underwent major surgery. We could go through a litany of woes that we are all carrying, problems with children, spouses, finances, work and health. Just because it is summer does not mean that problems take a vacation.
As we gather on this the last Sunday of the summer, we find that Jesus is talking to us about a cross. Perhaps this is God’s offer at making sense of the crosses that come our way. To be a follower of Jesus involves us in a process of death and resurrection.
Now I don’t want you to imagine that I am endorsing a Christianity that is all about suffering. Let’s thanks God that Jesus suffered once for us all and we do not have to repeat that cycle of suffering. I think its bad theology to imagine that we have a God who delights in disrupting our lives with anguish, pain and suffering. God does not send pain into our lives to crush us, to punish us, to get back for those offenses we committed at one time or another.
But Jesus knows that suffering is part of all our lives. When Jesus invites us to take up our crosses, Jesus is asking us to enter into the life process where we let go and surrender the old patterns of life that new forms of life might begin.
There is a tendency in all of us, when we listen to these passages about death and resurrection, that we stop at the death part and don’t move on to the life part. We get stuck. Jesus is addressing that pattern of getting stuck.
In today’s Gospel, Peter got stuck. When Jesus told the disciples about the process of death leading to life, Peter could only hear the death part and not engage the life part. For that reason, Jesus calls Peter Satan since the Rock was caught and could not imagine how life could come from death. But God could imagine that process. God could think of a way to get beyond death and make the way of the cross a way of life and peace.
I invite you this day to find those places in your heart where you are suffering, where you feel the pain of the cross, and ask yourself what you need to surrender of your old life to allow space for new life. I invite you to look into your soul, to find those places where you feel the weight of the cross, and ask yourself what you need to surrender in order for resurrection to happen. For in this holy process of life and death, we are not in it alone. God is the one who is drawing new life out of the old. God is inviting you to leave behind the old patterns and enter into the new life God is preparing for you. God is the one who is inviting us to leave behind the womb of our old lives to enter into the new birth of a life we cannot imagine.

Let us pray.
Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.

Hunger for Heaven

A Sermon Preached by the Rev’d Peter De Franco at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church on August 3, 2008

Nothing about the history of Sara Miles would have brought her to the place where she is today. An avowed atheist who was raised by atheist parents, A radical reporter on the staff of the left wing publication, Mother Jones. A journalist who covered the 1980’s war in Nicaragua. A sometimes cook in New York restaurants. A Mother of one. A wife of another woman. She is the last person you would have expected to walk into a church. But stranger things have happened.
When Sara Miles walked in St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church in San Francisco, little did she anticipate it would be the day of her conversion? Why did she do it? This is what she said: “I was curious. You know, I'm a reporter, and it's a big, beautiful, wooden-shingled building. And it has this gorgeous mosaic icon outside and a sign that says, "All That Is Prays to You." You walk inside and you are struck by this huge mural of dancing saints, only the saints are people like Malcolm X and Cesar Chavez. It's very surprising.”
Sara Miles walked into St. Gregory of Nyssa Church and heard the invitation to receive communion: “Jesus welcomes everyone to his table and so we offer everyone, without exception, the bread and wine, which are Christ’s body and blood.” Deacons and priests came into a congregation standing around a circular altar giving to all a piece of bread broken from a loaf. They passed around chalices with wine. Sara describes her experience in these words: “A woman put a piece of fresh bread in my hand and gave me a goblet of some rather nasty, sweet wine. And I ate the bread and was completely thunderstruck by what I felt happening to me. So I stood there crying, completely unsure of what was happening to me. I thought I’ve got to get out of the church as quickly as I could before some strange, creepy Christian would try to chat with me. And I came back the next week because I was hungry, and kept coming back and kept coming back to take that bread.’
Completely Thunderstruck by what was happening. Now how many of us are thunderstruck when we receive communion?
Here is another way she describes communion: "It was pretty good bread, a nice whole-wheat bread. The other was that God was alive and in my mouth. It was bread, and it was God."
But that was only the beginning. She came back, week after week, drawn to satisfy a hunger that she had long known but could never find the food to fill her. Sara knew that the invitation to receive the body and blood of Christ echoed the radical welcome Jesus gave to all whom he invited to share his table.
We heard that invitation which Jesus extended to 5,000 men. I wonder why Matthew did not include the women and children. To all of them, to girls and boys, women and men, anyone who could eat food, Jesus and the apostles spread out, like those priests and deacons spreading out through the church, giving to one and all a lunch of bread and fish. It was a bountiful meal. There was so much food that they put together doggie bags, twelve baskets of leftover food.
Let’s recall that the gospels speak in symbolic language and when they talk about 12 baskets of extra food, they mean food to feed the 12 tribes of Israel, all of God’s people have enough to bring home. Sara knew something of that generosity of Jesus. She knew that hunger not only touches the heart, as it touched her. Hunger cripples the body.
San Francisco is close to the bountiful fields of northern California. People in the city began to organize food pantries where the bounty of the fields would be sold to food pantries. Sara had the bright idea of starting up a pantry.
St. Gregory’s church does not have a parish hall. The church is a double room. One room has chairs that are set up to face one another. The other room has only one piece of furniture in it: an altar. Sara asked to set up the food pantry in the church, with tables surrounding the altar. Food would be brought in every Friday morning. Volunteers would set out the food on tables surrounding the altar. Melons, fruit, tomatoes, lettuce, rice, beans, boxes of cereal, pasta. People would come with their bags and slowly enter into the church. Candles would be burning in front of icons. Flowers decorate the church. Five tons of food would be handed out to 450 people. They do that every Friday.
The Food Pantry at St. Gregory’s Church was only the start. When you do God’s work, God sees that the work will spread. Money started to come into her pantry and she gave the money to other places to start pantries. Only one church joined her effort. But parents in schools, people in the projects, volunteers started to come from all different places to find food. It all sounds a lot like us.
I invite you this day to come to this table that Jesus sets for us, come with your hunger, come with your heart desiring to be filled. Perhaps this day you too can say with Sara: God was alive and in my mouth. It was bread, and it was God."

Cultivating A Garden of Weeds

A Sermon Preached by the
Rev’d Peter De Franco at
St. Peter’s Episcopal Church,
July 27, 2008

Just think about what will happen today at St. Peter’s Church. We celebrate the baptism of our youngest member and the birthday of one of our oldest members.
So you would imagine that with the parable of the mustard seed, I would preach a sermon where I would compare Ava to the mustard seed and Rosemary to the mustard tree. We would all think that the sermon would encourage Ava’s parents and family to help her grow into the tree, that they would water her soul with love and instruction and discipline and all the things that good parents do for their children. Sort of like the thinks that Rosemary’s parents did for her so that one day Ava will sit in this church and celebrate her 90th birthday and someone will read this same gospel and compare her to the mustard seed that has grown into the mustard tree. Wouldn’t that be a perfect sermon? No, not by a long shot. That sermon would be too predictable.
Whenever we hear Jesus speaking in a parable, we should train our ears to discover the unpredictable. So let me tell you a story.
Someone, way back went in the history of St. Peter’s church, thought that it would be nice to plant morning glories around the church. They thought that morning glories would look really nice where they could do what they did best: climb. So they found the things on which the morning glories could climb: the railings up the steps of the parish hall and the pole in the front of the church. I am sure that the first year the morning glories were planted they were beautiful. Lovely blue flowers opening up to the sun, and every week more and more flowers began to grow on the vine. Every week, the vine must have taken over the railings so that it became impossible to use the railings going up to the Parish Hall.
Every week the vine must have grown up the sign at the front of the church till it covered the sign with a waterfall of blue morning glories cascading down the sign. Were the morning glories a thing of beauty or a weed?
When I first came to St. Peter’s Church, three years ago, there were huge bushes that flanked the entrance to the parish hall. Growing on the crooked branches of those overgrown bushes were morning glories. As they grew closer to the railings, people would pull out the morning glories. I cannot remember a single morning glory flower. No flowers mean no seeds. But, even this year, you can see morning glories sprouting on either side of the parish hall and Fr. Ed pulls them out so they don’t take over the new gardens. And next year, I am sure that we shall continue to find those morning glories continuing to sprout in places where they have not been seen in years.
Morning Glories are invasive. Once you plant them you will have them forever. For those of us who are gardeners, morning glories are like bamboo, or mint, or dandelions, they have a habit of taking over the garden.
In Jesus’ world, mustard was like dandelions, morning glories, bamboo or mint. You would have to be out of your mind to plant it in your garden. Unless you wanted your entire garden to be taken over by the weed. Does that make any sense?
Now every parable of Jesus has something in it that does not make any sense. There is always something in a parable that baffles the one who hears it. A smart shepherd would not risk the lives of 99 sheep for the sake of one lamb. A thrifty housewife would not spend a hundred dollars on a party when she found her silver dollar. A smart gardener would not plant a weed that would take over the garden. Who would plant dandelions? Who would plant morning glories?
Perhaps a God who knows about dandelion wine. Perhaps a God who loves the blue of morning glories. Perhaps a God who knows that mustard can heal and season and prevent disease. Perhaps a God who invites us to look into those places in our lives where we do not expect or even want God, in the dark crevices, in the ordinariness of our days, in the disorders of our minds and hearts, all the places we neglect.
Perhaps, if we anticipate God coming to us in those places we neglect, as we would neglect a weed, we will find God lightening the darkness, cheering our ordinariness, restoring us to peace. It is the crazy seed of God. It is God’s unconditional love. Available to us this day in the sign of water poured, bread broken and a shared cup.
It is the crazy seed of God’s love, that spreads through the world as much as dandelions, when, on a windy spring day the breeze lifts the seeds and spreads them through all the gardens. Not many of us deal with mustard seeds, but many of us know about dandelions, and morning glories, and mint and bamboo.
Today God plants a seed in the soul of Ava. It’s the seed that God plants in each of our hearts when we are baptized – that wild and crazy seed that God plants in mustard plants, dandelions and morning glories. It is God’s unconditional love. That we are loved by God, no matter what we do or say or become.
If you ever watch very young children, and those of us who are parents might remember this happening to us, young children do not seen dandelions as weeds. Children love to go to the lawn and pick a bouquet of dandelions because of their ready made beauty. They see them as a heaven sent gift of God planted in the lawn as a ready gift to pick and bring to mom or dad. Children have that eye to see the beauty of ordinary things. I think they have that eye because they see like the God from whom they have come.
Let us pray this day that we might be overrun with weeds, with dandelions and mustard and mint and bamboo. Let us pray that Ava’s soul will be overgrown with that weed of God’s Love. Let us pray that Rosemary’s heart will continue to be overrun with that same pesty weed. And let us all go out and gather the dandelions and give and receive bouquets of God’s love.

No Condemnation

A Sermon Preached by the the Rev’d Peter De Franco at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church,
Clifton, New Jersey
July 13, 2008

Over the last six weeks, we have been reading sections from the letter to the Romans. The first week came as the most positive of all those readings and it has been a steady downward spin as we listened to Paul describe the increasingly dire situation in the world. Last week we heard one of the most difficult passages in Paul, not because we cannot understand what Paul says but because his words are as a mirror to our souls caught in the dilemma of wanted to do God’s good works but also drawn away from God’s good works. Each of us is painfully aware of that tension between what we would want to do that is good, holy and blessed and what we actually find ourselves doing which is less than our idealized plans. Paul speaks of an energy in us that spirals downward, not unlike the flush of the toilet that spins the water and the refuse in a circle and down the pipes and into the sewer. Last week, we ended the reading on a terribly depressing note with the question: What A wretch I am. Who will rescue me from this body doomed to death? Not the best news in the world.
But today, we come to a turning point in the letter to the Romans. Today the water is not being flushed down the toilet. Today the water is dancing like a fountain, spraying upward in joy and delight, as we hear described for us the effect of living in the Spirit. Today’s reading begins with those phenomenal ords: “There is no condemnation for you.” Just imagine that: No Condemnation for you!
I shall speak for myself, but I am not a sterling saint. There are some of us here who have been living the Christian life with devoted energy for a long time and they approach that sterling shine, but for the rest of us sinners, I cannot imagine greater words of joy: There is no condemnation for you.”
Just imagine the person who for their entire lives was told that they could not meet the standards that their parents set for them as children, who for their entire lives lived as underachievers since they could never hope to reach that impossible standard: There is no condemnation for you.
Just imagine that person living with family members who constantly live on a downward spiral so no matter what they do, they cannot reverse that negative energy: There is no condemnation for you.
Just imagine that person who knew that they were lesbian, gay, or bisexual and were told that they would be condemned to hell realizing that God does not create to condemn, that there is no condemnation for you.
Just imagine whatever your circumstance in life, whatever situation drains you of energy, whatever circumstance hampers you from feeling the fullness of life and joy, there is no condemnation for you.
In Christ Jesus. That is the hitch. Condemnation has been lifted because of a relationship. A relationship with Christ Jesus. That relationship begins with our Baptism. Something mystical happens to each of us at Baptism. Something of a miracle. We become part of Jesus. That dipping in water, those words spoken over us, effect a miracle in our souls. We become one with Christ. So when God looks at us, God sees us as part of God’s own Child, Jesus.
If we search deep in our hearts, not just on the surface, but in the very depths of our souls, we will discover an energy deeper than our own spirit, in the depths of our hearts, God’s Spirit is welling up, like a fountain of water, springing up to water our souls and lead them to discover new ways of acting, new ways of seeing, new ways of relating.
I would like to tell you a story about a couple of girls who experienced this strength to follow Christ. The story is told by a woman, a shy woman, who stepped out in the public to become a community organizer. When she was asked why she took this step she told this story: “When I was a young girl in North Caroline, my sister and I began to attend the local Roman Catholic Church. In those days, blacks sat in the back pews. Now I was a very large young girl, rather heavy, and so was my sister. When we went to that church, I saw no reason why my sister and I should sit in the back. So one Sunday we went right up and sat in the first pew. The pastors and ushers were upset. The pastor came over before Mass and asked me if we would please sit in the back, like all the other blacks. I was scared as I could be, but I just couldn’t see where God would care where we sat, so I said no. Finally, the ushers came and carried me and my sister to the back. Carried us right down the aisle of the church. On the next Sunday, my sister and I sat in the front pew again, and the priest came and the ushers came and they hauled us off again, huffing and puffing. On the third Sunday, the same thing happened.
By this time, we were pretty well known. The black girls who got carried away to the back of the church every Sunday.
“My family, my mother particularly, was frightened at what we were doing, but she said we were doing the right thing. On the fourth Sunday, the priests and ushers didn’t do a thin. The Mass started, the choir sang, we took our seats, and from then on we sat where we wanted in that church and in any Roman Catholic church we ever attended.” (Roots for Radicals by Edward Chambers)
God’s Spirit lived in those two girls. God’s Spirit gave them the courage to do the right thing.
Each of us also faces unique challenges, those places where we need to find the grace to move into greater freedom. If you wonder how to find such freedom, just listen to what Paul says: Set your mind on the things of the spirit and you will find life and peace.(See Romans 8: 6)
Those two girls found that peace. They experience that life. You too can move into that life and peace. You too can experience that freedom.

Peter & Paul, A study in Contrasts

A sermon preached by
the Rev’d Peter De Franco at
St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Clifton, NJ
on June 29, 2008,
Feast of Saints Peter & Paul.

Famous pairs find their way into every area of human life.
Just think of a few you might know: George and Martha Washington, Abbot and Costello, Venus and Serena Williams, Johnny Carson and Ed McMahon, Sonny and Cher, Chip and Dale. In Christian tradition, Peter and Paul endure as a matched pair of saints, as two sides of a coin, as matching book ends in your library. Peter and Paul are as different as salt and pepper yet closely linked as those two spices are bound together on every table at which you sit. Let’s think of the two for a minute and let’s start with Peter.
Of the two of them, only Peter saw the Lord Jesus in his fleshly existence. From the Gospels, we know Peter as an impetuous, hot headed, loud mouthed leader of the apostles. He is hardly the person whom I think would qualify as the CEO of a major company. Don’t you wonder what Jesus saw in Peter?
Jesus saw in Peter a strong leader. Jesus changed his name from Cephas to Peter, the Rock. Jesus wanted Peter to serve as a stone in the temple Jesus was building, the temple of which we are all a part. Perhaps it was Peter’s big heart that so loved Jesus that Peter left behind his family, his expensive fishing enterprise, his prominent place in his society to follow Jesus for that year of intense preaching, healing and even confrontations that lead Peter with Jesus through the backwoods of Galilee to that fateful week in Jerusalem when Peter would deny the Lord he loved and then see that Jesus transformed from the crucified one to the Risen Lord. After the Spirit descends on Peter and the other disciples on the day of Pentecost, the Spirit transforms those fearful men into bold evangelists, proclaiming the word of Jesus’ Resurrection to their fellow Jews and at the Spirit’s urging to include the Gentiles among the people of God. I cannot imagine Peter, a devout Jew from Galilee, ever thinking that he would be the one who would ever eat with Gentiles. Just imagine whomever it was that your parents told you not to associate with, the kids who always got in trouble, the girl who was a little loose with herself, the boy who would find himself on the other side of the fence, just imagine finding out that those very people were devout believers and that you would join them in a supper at church. Strange things that God has in store for us.
Then there is Paul. The Acts of the Apostles first calls him Saul, a Pharisee, a ancient version of the Congregational style of Christians whom some of you know as going to church at least twice on Sundays and rigidly observing the Sabbath.
They are the Christians of the no: No cards, no dancing, no alcohol, no work on the Sabbath, perhaps even no fun. Hardly Episcopalians! Saul was like them. The No Saul had in his head was No Christians and he started by helping to stone Stephen to death and then leading a band of self appointed self righteous bounty hunters to search out, jail and execute those Christians.
Such would have been his lot in life, and a life which later generations would have forgotten, except for that voice from the heavens and that blinding vision that called out to him: Saul, Saul why do you persecute me? Strange words when you think about it. Saul was not persecuting Jesus, he was persecuting the Christians.
Yet from those words, Paul would understand that all Christians are linked together with Jesus in a mystical bond that makes us but one body with Christ.
Saul would become Paul, the one who persecuted the Church changed into its premier apostle, going through the what is now Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, Greece and ending up in Rome where his preaching of the Gospel lead to his death. Those words from Second Timothy reflect what must have been Paul’s sentiments in the Roman jail when he knew that his execution would be immanent: I am already being poured out like a libation and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Saul, turned into Paul, another hot head, another zealot, another one who, like Peter, Jesus turned around and made into a herald of the Gospel. Strange things that God has in store for us.
What does it all mean for us? Are Peter and Paul only a quaint pair of saints we polish off once a year and use their day to do what we do best: have a party? I would suggest that Peter and Paul come to us as a pair to remind us of what is remarkably similar in the lives of these very dissimilar saints: that God has strange, unexpected tasks in store for us. Strange and unexpected tasks – for those of you who love adventure, you are thrilling at such possibilities. Strange and unexpected tasks – for those of you who hate change, you are appalled that God would so upset your apple cart with such a world shattering proposal. Perhaps you would prefer the words of today’s collect, you know standing firm on the one foundation of Jesus Christ and not venturing into the unknown fields where the lost sheep are scattered.
Peter and Paul fulfilled those words of the prophet Ezekiel; they were shepherds who sought the lost, brought back the strayed, bound up the injured and strengthened the weak. They did it all because of love, love for Jesus who called them, love for Jesus who loved them.
As you share in the same Eucharistic feast that fed Peter and Paul, I invite you to draw strength from this table not to stand on the one foundation, but to go into the world. Find those who are on the edge and invite them to the table that nourishes you. Find those who are wounded and invite them to share in the cup that heals you. Find those who are lost and lead them to the home you have found.
For then Peter and Paul are not two dusty saints from the past. They are living models for you and I to imitate. For we, like Peter and Paul, hear those last words from today’s Gospel, words beckoning, not Peter and Paul but you and me, those two words leaping off the page into your ear, into your heart, those two inviting words of Jesus: Follow Me!

Finding our Home in God

A Sermon preached
on April 13, 2008 by the Reverend Peter De Franco,
Interim Rector of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Clifton, New Jersey

My mother attended school in the days when class would begin with a reading from the Bible. That bible was always the King James Version. Even though she was a Roman Catholic, she would occasionally go with her girlfriends to attend their church services. I don’t think that her priests would approve stepping into the pasture of another church, but with that wisdom that believers have she knew that God is one and we all worship that one God.
Through the bible readings and her Sunday afternoon trips to the protestant church, she learned the 23rd Psalm. I think it is her favorite prayer. I think of her whenever we come to this fourth Sunday of Easter which is called Good Shepherd Sunday and we usually pray Psalm 23.

I am sure that while many of you read the words of that psalm from our Book of Common Prayer in your head and perhaps even on your lips formed the words of the King James Version.
The Lord is my shepherd; *
I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; *
he leadeth me beside the still waters.
He restoreth my soul; *
he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his
Name’s sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil; *
for thou art with me;
thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of
mine enemies; *
thou anointest my head with oil;
my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days
of my life, *
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

We all love this psalm. I think one of the reasons we love this psalm so much is the accumulation of images from this psalm brings our hearts great comfort.

Many of the psalms present God as a Warrior who battles for the people, as a King who rules over them with Justice, as a Judge who brings a fair ruling to the people. A recent commentator on the bible called these the psalms of Homeland Security. Secure the borders, summon the army, bring the villians to court.

Psalm 23 takes an alternate approach. In this Psalm, God comes as a shepherd. If you hear this psalm with the ear of your heart, you will find yourself surrounded by feelings of great comfort: Not being in want, finding sufficient food and drink, protected against enemies, enjoying a rich banquet where perfumed oils scent the hall, and your cup is never empty. Those feelings of security come together in the final sentence: And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

If you had to find a word of comfort to summarize all those feelings, I think that word would be home. Even if our childhood memories of home left something to be desired, there is a longing in our hearts to find and to build a perfect home. There is something deep inside us that yearns for that place of abundance, of warmth, of protection, of assurance. If we were to put a name on that home of our heart’s longing, we would call that home God.
In God’s home we are free of want. Let’s remember that this psalm was written by a person who lived in ancient Israel. In a country where the pastures were green only two months of the year, God leads us to perpetually green pastures. In a land where flowing waters could sweep away the sheep, our shepherd brings us to still waters so we can both drink from the waters and even cross them in safety.

Like every good prayer, this psalm enlists not only our trust in God, we are invited to place our trust in God especially in the midst of the most difficult crises of our lives. No crisis can be more difficult for us than death. The thought of our own death or the death of those near and dear to us strikes terror into our hearts. Our souls are crushed whenever we have to endure the death of a member of our family, our parish, our neighborhood or our city. Yet whenever I walk with someone through that valley of the shadow of death, I always say Psalm 23.

I think of my mother who spent the night alone on the day my father died. I wonder what comfort my mother drew from psalm 23 in the night she first heard of my father’s death and mourned the loss of her husband. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I fear no evil. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.
I fear no evil, even in the face of the greatest evil. For the rod which Jesus, our good shepherd carries, is none other than his cross. The cross on which he walked through the valley of the shadow of death. That cross gives us comfort for on that cross Jesus has destroyed both death and fear. He has first gone into that dark and deadly valley and come through with the light of resurrection, of new life, of life in that place where the pastures are always green, where the waters are still, where food is abundant, where faith displaces fear, where want is replaced by plenty.

God creates for us a new home. That home is God. A home where we know that the final victory is on the side of life, even if we walk in the valley of the shadow of death. A home where we can be assured of a meal, a banquet in the sight of those whom we fear. A home we enter through the door who is Jesus. Through that door, all can enter. Through that door, all can find a safe haven. Through that door, all can experience the home their hearts desire.

So listen this day, listen carefully to your heart, and in the depths of your heart, if you listen carefully enough, you will hear the voice of our good shepherd calling us into the sheepfold, calling us home.

Moko and the Whales

An Easter Sermon for Children
Preached by the Reverend Peter De Franco at
St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Clifton, New Jersey
Easter 2008

On the other side of the world on an island country named New Zealand, a park ranger was patrolling the beach. He would check this beach every day since it was the time of year when whales would sometimes get confused and beach themselves on the sand. The whales would just swim into the shallow water until they swam out of the water and were laying on the sand. This bright sunny morning, the park ranger turned on the beach and he saw the sight he was terrified of seeing: A mother pygmy sperm whale and her baby were stranded on the beach. It was an emergency.

Pygmy sperm whale are not the largest whales. The mother was about 10 feet and the baby was 7 feet. But they were in serious danger. The people had to get the whales back into the water. There was no time to lose. The park ranger called for help and other park rangers and other people came to the beach. They all worked very hard to move the whales. After an hour and a half, both the people and the whales were totally exhausted. Four times they got the whales back into the water. But the whales stranded themselves on a sand bar off the beach. Unless the ranger could get the whales back into the deep water, he would have to kill the whales to spare them from a slow and agonizing death.

Then suddenly, Moko appeared. Moko is a bottlenosed dolphin who would swim along that part of the beach. Many people knew Moko since Moko likes to play with people in the water. Mako is a dolphin most of us would love to meet. When Moko saw the stranded whales, Moko knew that the whales were in trouble. Moko started to talk to them. Dolphins have their own language and Moko was speaking it to the pygmy sperm whales. Strangely, the two whales started to talk to Moko.
Moko swam up the whales and when the human pushed the whales out into the sea, Moko directed them to swim past the sand bar and into the deep water. The park ranger and the other people saw Moko direct the mother whale and her child into the safety in the deep ocean waters.

Today we saw another story about someone calling out someone’s name. Mary was in the garden and she was totally sad. I wonder why she was sad? (Children: She was sad because Jesus had died.) Suddenly Jesus came to her. But she did not recognize. That is something that we can learn about Jesus after he was raised from the dead. You just don’t know when he will appear to you. She thought that Jesus was the gardener. But then he called out her name: Mary. And something in her heart stirred. She knew the voice of her Jesus.
Jesus calls us too. Not in a voice that we can hear with our ears. But in a still silent voice in our hearts. Jesus lets you know that he loves you. No matter what happens to us, no matter the things that we do, or the things that we see, we can know one thing for sure: Jesus loves me. Jesus ALWAYS loves us. Can you say that with me: Jesus Loves Me. I cannot hear you. Jesus Loves Me. One more time. Jesus Loves Me.

Today, you will renew the promises you made when you were baptized. You will tell Jesus that you will be his hands, his feet and his heart in the world. You will promise that you will pray, that you will help other people, that you will treat everyone fairly and with love. We will then sprinkle you with water to remind you of the water that we poured on you when you were baptized. When you feel that water, know that it is a sign that Jesus loves you. When you taste the host and drink from the chalice, know that it is a sign of what? Jesus loves me.
God bless you with a blessed Easter!