SPEAKER_03: Blessed be God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_03: And blessed be God's family.
SPEAKER_03: Now we prayer.
SPEAKER_03: Amen.
SPEAKER_03: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_03: Almighty God, to you, all desires.
unknown: And from you.
unknown: Bless the hearts.
SPEAKER_03: By the inspiration of your Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_03: And we perfectly love you and perfectly magnify your name through Christ of the Lord.
SPEAKER_05: Amen.
SPEAKER_03: Let us pray.
SPEAKER_03: O God, the strength of all who put their trust in you.
SPEAKER_03: Mercifully accept our prayers, and because in our weakness we can do nothing good without you, give us the help of your grace, that in keeping your commandments we may please you both in will and deed, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one God forever and ever.
SPEAKER_03: Amen.
SPEAKER_03: As you're being seated, I'd like to invite children forward who are interested in the children's sermon.
SPEAKER_03: All right, one of our stories today is about how you welcome people into your home.
SPEAKER_03: So when you have somebody coming to your home and you want to show them welcome, what should you do or not do?
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
SPEAKER_03: Well, don't act like you're not there, because that's not a great welcome, right?
SPEAKER_03: If somebody comes to the door and you just don't answer it, that wouldn't be great.
SPEAKER_03: And if they're in the home and you're like having a meal and you don't serve them or talk to them, like that wouldn't be great.
SPEAKER_03: How do we show welcome?
SPEAKER_03: I think there's gonna be a lot of discussions at homes today.
SPEAKER_03: What do you say, Jonathan?
SPEAKER_03: You can say hello, so you can acknowledge that you're there, that'd be sweet.
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so you you if you wanted to show somebody welcome, would you consider what they'd like to eat or just what you'd like?
SPEAKER_03: You could probably do both, right?
SPEAKER_03: But it's nice to show that I've thought about what you'd like, right?
SPEAKER_03: How what could you do?
SPEAKER_03: Like have you ever been welcome to too much?
SPEAKER_03: Have you ever been somewhere and somebody gave you a present for coming?
SPEAKER_03: I don't know if you have.
SPEAKER_03: Would that just be strange?
SPEAKER_03: You ever had to be people with people you didn't want to be with?
SPEAKER_03: So what are you supposed to do in that situation?
SPEAKER_02: Jonathan, what are you supposed to do?
SPEAKER_02: You got it, you got it tickled.
SPEAKER_02: You're gonna say what we're not supposed to do, maybe.
SPEAKER_02: Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I mean, so today there's a story about this, and I want you to hear it.
SPEAKER_03: There's a story where a lady does something that's a little bit wild, the show welcome, she starts washing Jesus' feet and she pours perfume on him.
SPEAKER_03: Now you might be thinking, he must have been really dirty if she needed to do that.
SPEAKER_03: Or maybe you're thinking, I wouldn't want somebody washing my feet when I went to their home for dinner or perfuming me.
SPEAKER_03: But this is a story you're gonna hear about radical welcome.
SPEAKER_03: And to be honest, I don't think I want somebody to welcome me radically.
SPEAKER_03: So maybe think a little bit today about who you could show radical welcome to, what kind of welcome you would really like to have, and what kind you wouldn't like to have.
SPEAKER_03: And even better, what happens when somebody gets welcome that you don't even think should be there?
SPEAKER_03: You ever had that happen?
SPEAKER_03: Somebody's there that shouldn't be there, and how they're supposed to get treated.
SPEAKER_03: Hey, we all still think about those things because they happen over and over, and today you're gonna hear a story about that.
SPEAKER_03: And you can see if you like my my thoughts on it or not, or you can do the covering pages.
SPEAKER_03: Thanks for coming up.
SPEAKER_00: Now the judge of all flesh spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the women and men of Israel and say to them, If the wife of any man goes astray and betrays him with a betrayal, and a man if and a man lies with her, yielding an emission of seed, yet is hidden from the eyes of her husband, and she conceals it, and she has rendered herself unacceptable, and there is no witness against her, and she was not forced.
SPEAKER_00: And if a spirit of jealousy comes upon him and he is jealous on account of his wife, and she has rendered herself unacceptable, or if the spirit of jealousy comes on him and he is jealous on his wife and she has not rendered herself unacceptable, then the man shall bring his wife to the priest, and she shall bring the offering for her one tenth of an ephah of barley flour, about two quarts, and he shall not pour oil on it, and he shall not put frankincense on it, for it is an offering of jealousy, an offering of remembrance for remembering iniquity.
SPEAKER_00: Then the priest shall bring her near and set her before the judge of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: The priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel, and from the dust that is on the floor of the tabernacle, the priest shall take and put water into it.
SPEAKER_00: Then the priest shall make the woman stand before the dread God, unbind the hair of the woman, and place upon her hands the offering of remembrance.
SPEAKER_00: It is an offering of jealousy.
SPEAKER_00: And in the hand of the priest shall be the curse begetting waters of bitterness.
SPEAKER_00: Then the priest shall make her swear, saying, If no man has lain with you, and if you have not turned aside to that which is unacceptable, fall under or subject to your husband, be uninjured from the curse begetting waters of bitterness.
SPEAKER_00: But if you have turned aside, fall under or subject to your husband, if you have rendered yourself unacceptable, and a man has lain with you who is not your husband, now the priest makes the woman swear the imprecation, the oath of cursing, and says to the woman, May the all-seeing God make you an imprecation and an execration or a ritual cursing and the curse itself among your people when the fountain of justice makes your uterus collapse and your womb swell.
SPEAKER_00: Now may the curse-begetting waters of bitterness go into your inners and make your womb swell, your uterus collapse.
SPEAKER_00: And the woman says, Amen, Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Then the priests shall write these curses on a scroll and dissolve them in the waters of bitterness.
SPEAKER_00: He shall make the woman drink the curse-begetting waters of bitterness, and the curse-begetting water shall enter her, creating bitterness.
SPEAKER_00: When he has made her drink the waters, then if she has rendered herself unacceptable and has betrayed her husband with an act of betrayal, the curse-begetting waters shall enter her and cause bitterness, and her womb shall swell and her beer is collapse, and the woman shall become an imprecation among her people.
SPEAKER_00: But if the woman has not rendered herself unacceptable and is pure, then she shall be uninjured and be able to be sown with seed.
SPEAKER_00: The word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Please read with me responsibly by the half verse.
SPEAKER_00: Sheltering one, my God, in you I take refuge.
SPEAKER_00: Else, like a lion, they will rip me, body and soul apart.
SPEAKER_05: They will spare and no one will deliver.
SPEAKER_00: Righteous one, my God, if I have done this, if I have repaid my ally with harm, then let the enemy pursue me and overtake me.
SPEAKER_05: And travel my mind to the ground, and lay my glory in the dust.
SPEAKER_00: Rise up, thundering God, in your anger.
SPEAKER_00: Raise up in opposition to the wrath of my enemies.
SPEAKER_00: Let the congregation of the peoples be gathered around you.
SPEAKER_00: The righteous God judges the peoples.
SPEAKER_00: Judge me, righteous one, according to my righteousness, and according to my iniquity.
SPEAKER_00: Look, he is pregnant with iniquity.
SPEAKER_05: And he can see troublemaking and heard the loss.
SPEAKER_05: And it fell into the whole.
SPEAKER_01: But because of sexual immorality, each man should have his own woman, and each woman her own man.
SPEAKER_01: For the wife, the husband should do his duty, and likewise the wife for her husband.
SPEAKER_01: For the wife does not have authority over her own body, rather, the husband does.
SPEAKER_01: Likewise, the husband does not have authority over his own body, yet the wife does.
SPEAKER_01: Do not ever defraud each other except by agreement for a time to devote yourselves to prayer and then to come together again so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.
SPEAKER_01: This I say is a concession, not a command.
SPEAKER_01: I wish that all were as I myself am.
SPEAKER_01: But each has their own gift from God indeed, one to one and another to another.
SPEAKER_01: To the unmarried and the widows, I say that it is good for them to remain so.
SPEAKER_01: But if they are not showing self-control, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn.
SPEAKER_01: To the married I give this command.
SPEAKER_01: Not I, but the most high.
SPEAKER_01: A woman should not separate from her man.
SPEAKER_01: Though if she does separate, let her remain unmarried, or else be reconciled to her man.
SPEAKER_01: Also, a man should not divorce his woman.
SPEAKER_01: To the rest I say, I am not the most high, that if a believer has a woman who is an unbeliever, and she agrees to live with him, he should not divorce her.
SPEAKER_01: And if a woman has a man who is an unbeliever, and he agrees to live with her, she should not divorce him.
SPEAKER_01: For the unbelieving man is made holy through his woman, and the unbelieving woman is made holy through her man.
SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, your children would be unclean.
SPEAKER_01: Yet now they are holy.
SPEAKER_01: Now if the unbeliever leaves, let them leave.
SPEAKER_01: Sister or brother is not bound in such circumstances.
SPEAKER_01: It is to peace that God has called you.
SPEAKER_01: For woman, how do you know whether you will save your man?
SPEAKER_01: And how do you know, man, whether you will save your woman?
SPEAKER_01: However, let each walk through life as the Holy One has designated, and as God has called them.
SPEAKER_01: This is what I instruct all the churches.
SPEAKER_01: The word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_03: Glory to you, Lord God.
SPEAKER_03: Now one of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and Jesus went into the Pharisee's house and was seated.
SPEAKER_03: And suddenly a woman who was in the city, known as a sinner, having learned Jesus was eating in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster jar of perfumed ointment.
SPEAKER_03: She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began with her tears to Bathed his feet, and with the hairs of her head dried them.
SPEAKER_03: And she kissed his feet and anointed them with ointment.
SPEAKER_03: And when the Pharisee who had invited Jesus saw it, he said to himself, If this man was ever a prophet, he would know who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him.
SPEAKER_03: But she is a sinner.
SPEAKER_03: Then Jesus replied to his thoughts and said to the host, Simon, I have something to say to you.
SPEAKER_03: Teacher, Simon replied, Speak.
SPEAKER_03: Two debtors had a certain money two debtors had a certain money lender.
SPEAKER_03: One owed 500 denarii, more than a year's earning, and the other 50, almost two months' earning.
SPEAKER_03: When they could not pay the money, the moneylender canceled both debts.
SPEAKER_03: Now, which of them will love their creditor more?
SPEAKER_03: Simon replied and said, Well, I suppose the one for whom the moneylender forgave a greater debt.
SPEAKER_03: And Jesus said to him, Well, you've judged rightly.
SPEAKER_03: Then turning toward the woman, Jesus said to Simon, Do you see this woman?
SPEAKER_03: I entered your house.
SPEAKER_03: Water for my feet you gave not.
SPEAKER_03: But she with her tears has spit my feet, and with her hair dried them.
SPEAKER_03: No kiss of peace did you give me, but from where I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet.
SPEAKER_03: Oil for my head you did not prepare, but with perfumed ointment she has anointed my feet.
SPEAKER_03: That is why I say to you, forgiven are her sins, which work any, thus she loves deeply.
SPEAKER_03: But the one to whom little is forgiven loves little.
SPEAKER_03: And Jesus said to her, Your sins are forgiven.
SPEAKER_03: Then those who were reclining at the table with him began to say among themselves, Who is this who even forgives sins?
SPEAKER_03: And Jesus said to the woman, Your faith has saved you.
SPEAKER_03: Go in peace.
SPEAKER_03: The gospel of the Lord.
SPEAKER_03: And it is always a strange thing after we read one of those to say the word of the Lord, thanks be to God.
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I can't help but chuckle, because uh those are weird readings.
SPEAKER_03: And um, I don't know how many of you, by show of hands, have read well the numbers reading it's because Episcopalians don't read the Bible, that's why.
SPEAKER_03: Uh sir, I read that as a Baptist, but not in a wana, and here's why.
SPEAKER_03: That's not what we call an edifying reading.
SPEAKER_03: So if you've never heard that reading before, that's because it doesn't show up in the revised common lectionary.
SPEAKER_03: Reminder, that's the lectionary we typically use that takes us through most of the biblical content on a three-year basis.
SPEAKER_03: Uh the compilers of the lectionary didn't like readings like that because they thought they'd be confusing.
SPEAKER_03: So instead, they left it in what's called the daily office because the founders of the Episcopal Church assumed you'd be reading the Bible every two years, cover to cover.
SPEAKER_03: That's their assumption.
SPEAKER_03: And you would have read this during the Daily Office.
SPEAKER_03: Um, we're not using the revised lectionary, we're using the women's lectionary for the whole church, which is really designed to highlight stories of women in the Bible.
SPEAKER_03: And so we get these.
SPEAKER_03: And look, let me just say a few remarks about this, because it's weird.
SPEAKER_03: And if you're concerned that your wife has committed adultery, I will not give you a magic potion in church to do this.
SPEAKER_03: I don't, we don't do that anymore.
SPEAKER_03: I hope that is a relief instead of a disappointment.
SPEAKER_03: Um I also want to say sometimes people have this knee-jerk reaction and they say, Well, that's just that old testament.
SPEAKER_03: Good thing we got the new testament.
SPEAKER_03: You read that one Corinthians reading, it's pretty weird, too.
SPEAKER_03: I I think it's pretty weird.
SPEAKER_03: So, look, I could easily make this a uh an exposition on structural misogyny.
SPEAKER_03: I don't even need to do that.
SPEAKER_03: I mean, just a quick couple of words on that, right?
SPEAKER_03: What if a woman's jealous of her husband?
SPEAKER_03: What does she get to do?
SPEAKER_03: Nothing.
SPEAKER_03: Did you hear that?
SPEAKER_03: What happens if you falsely accuse your wife?
SPEAKER_03: Nothing.
SPEAKER_03: Except she just lost her dignity publicly.
SPEAKER_03: Do you hear the structural misogyny in that?
SPEAKER_03: I hope you do.
SPEAKER_03: If a man drank this magic potion, what would shrivel and collapse?
SPEAKER_03: I don't know.
SPEAKER_03: I don't, I mean, I'm not even trying to be silly.
SPEAKER_03: It's in the Bible, friends.
SPEAKER_03: We just read it.
SPEAKER_03: I'm not making it up.
SPEAKER_03: And part of what I wonder is, is the potion toxic and it's a miracle you don't get the toxicity, or is it benign and it's a miracle you do?
SPEAKER_03: If you're not wrestling with that, I don't think you heard the reading.
SPEAKER_03: I want to suggest that the reason it's in this week is not because of the misogyny that's there.
SPEAKER_03: I think it's in this week because the question is, how do we treat people we consider to be worse sinners than we are?
SPEAKER_03: Well, you go to the priest and have them drink a potion and proof will be happy.
SPEAKER_03: I don't have potions, so that's not going to work.
SPEAKER_03: Um why did I say it that way?
SPEAKER_03: Because in the story that we get later, there's a woman who's known as a sinner.
SPEAKER_03: Doesn't say she was one.
SPEAKER_03: Did you catch that?
SPEAKER_03: She was known as one, which means she had a reputation.
SPEAKER_03: Why?
SPEAKER_03: Maybe she wore lipstick, which must have meant she was a loose woman.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe her skirt was too short, which must have meant she was baiting men.
SPEAKER_03: By the way, that is like false.
SPEAKER_03: I hope you know that.
SPEAKER_03: That's what men make up.
SPEAKER_03: For whatever reason, she's known as a sinner.
SPEAKER_03: And she does this act of hospitality that I think would just be really hard to accept.
SPEAKER_03: I mean, who let her into the party?
SPEAKER_03: I don't know.
SPEAKER_03: Why did Simon let her in the home?
SPEAKER_03: I don't know.
SPEAKER_03: It's possible.
SPEAKER_03: It's possible she was Simon's wife.
SPEAKER_03: And he was jealous of her.
SPEAKER_03: I sure don't think I'd want one of you, if you had me to your home for dinner, to start crying on my feet and drying it with your hair.
SPEAKER_03: That's a welcome so radical as to be hyperbolic, right?
SPEAKER_03: Jesus tells, I think, the key to all the readings today.
SPEAKER_03: He says this thing that just sounds so logical.
SPEAKER_03: Pretend you've got two debtors, and one of them owes you 500 days worth of wages, and the other owes you 50, and you forgive them both.
SPEAKER_03: Who will be more grateful?
SPEAKER_03: Well, who will be more grateful?
SPEAKER_03: You can answer.
SPEAKER_03: The 500 is that necessarily the case?
SPEAKER_03: Boy, that sure is how we think, though, isn't it?
SPEAKER_03: I mean, the truth is, what if you owe 500 days of wages but you also make 500 days worth of wages every day?
SPEAKER_03: And what if you owe 50 days of wages, but you make one-fifth of a daily wage per day?
SPEAKER_03: Who will be more grateful?
SPEAKER_03: Actually, not even knowing how much you owe, it doesn't even matter.
SPEAKER_03: The truth is, right, who will be more grateful?
SPEAKER_03: The person with the grateful heart.
SPEAKER_03: And if you don't hear anything else to say, I will tell you that most experts on this tell me that the biggest challenge to joy and gratitude is comparison.
SPEAKER_03: The biggest challenge to joy and gratitude is comparison.
SPEAKER_03: At the end of the day, shouldn't they both be grateful because now they don't owe stuff?
SPEAKER_03: Now, I like Simon, and I think this is our kind of secular logic.
SPEAKER_03: I'm not going to call it wisdom, says that the guy with the 500 should be more grateful.
SPEAKER_03: And you'll notice that Simon is the one hosting Jesus, and yet he expresses no joy or welcome to have Jesus in his home.
SPEAKER_03: Because the truth is he didn't need Jesus that much.
SPEAKER_03: Like most church folk.
SPEAKER_02: We're mostly pretty good, right?
SPEAKER_02: I'm mostly pretty good.
SPEAKER_03: I didn't like party with the Rolling Stones.
SPEAKER_03: Uh, you know, I didn't like dye my hair blue, I never took to dancing, you know, like pretty good stuff, right?
SPEAKER_03: And if you're like me and if you're like Simon, you might find yourself thinking that you indeed are pretty good.
SPEAKER_03: Which means there's not necessarily a lot of gratitude or welcome for grace.
SPEAKER_03: Because you only need it a little bit.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: You just need it a little.
SPEAKER_03: I mean, some people need it a lot more than we do, right?
SPEAKER_03: I think the story is actually saying that that's dead wrong.
SPEAKER_03: I don't think Jesus is affirming that Simon is right.
SPEAKER_03: I think he's saying that is the criterion with which we live in competition with one another for who's good enough for God.
SPEAKER_03: I love doing that because I can always find somebody worse than me.
SPEAKER_03: Always.
SPEAKER_03: I mean, Charlie Mann said, there you go, right?
SPEAKER_03: Better than that guy, so I'm not at the bottom, right?
SPEAKER_03: Do you find yourself doing that?
SPEAKER_03: Here's another question.
SPEAKER_03: You ever did something wrong and you knew it was wrong, but when you got confronted with it, you found someone who did more wrong than you?
SPEAKER_03: Like, let me just make this up.
SPEAKER_03: You got pulled over by an officer for speeding and you said, but that other car was going faster?
SPEAKER_03: Anyone ever thought that anyway?
SPEAKER_03: And I wonder, actually, if this isn't inviting us to consider where gratitude comes from?
SPEAKER_03: Does gratitude come from this idea that I owe less than you do, so you should be more grateful?
SPEAKER_03: Does gratitude come from this idea that, hey, we're on this uh pyramid to heaven and we just need to beat the people behind us?
SPEAKER_03: Or does gratitude come from this idea that God gives us all remission of our trespasses, and that whatever we owe, it's something.
SPEAKER_03: This is gonna sound like a little side trail, but this week I was on this panel, I don't know why, other than I was on it last year, and I think they were desperate for people.
SPEAKER_03: So I was on this panel down in Galveston on UN Interfaith Harmony Day, and I was supposed to speak for 10 minutes on what forgiveness is in the Christian tradition, not like at St.
SPEAKER_03: Thomas or in my own head, but it's supposed to represent the Christian tradition.
SPEAKER_03: What's forgiveness and how does that relate to peace?
SPEAKER_03: And I had 10 minutes.
SPEAKER_03: And as you know, I can't do anything in under 15 to 18 minutes.
SPEAKER_03: So I had my timer and I got it off.
SPEAKER_03: But it occurred to me, having been the first person to present, that it doesn't really make sense to talk about forgiveness unless we talk about why it is we might need forgiveness in the Christian tradition.
SPEAKER_03: And there is a word that gets bandied about a lot that we've um, to be honest, really extorted from what it meant biblically.
SPEAKER_03: So I'm just gonna give you the same stump speech that I give you semi-annually, and that is the word sin.
SPEAKER_03: So we have, depending on what church you grew up in, you might think that sin is disobeying God, or that sin is a moral blight on your white garmented soul that looks like a stain, or that sin is like punching your one-way ticket to hell.
SPEAKER_03: But biblically, sin means three things.
SPEAKER_03: In the Hebrew Bible, it means first an archery term in which I aimed for the bullseye and I didn't quite get what I was shooting for.
SPEAKER_03: I missed the mark.
SPEAKER_03: You ever had something go not the way you planned?
SPEAKER_03: That's sin.
SPEAKER_03: Well, geez, Mike, that could be a lot of things.
SPEAKER_03: Yep, sure could.
SPEAKER_03: The other word for sin in Hebrew means carrying a heavy weight.
SPEAKER_03: Have you ever carried a weight having done nothing wrong?
SPEAKER_03: Like been worried about your children's future or their schooling.
SPEAKER_03: If you've had children, I suspect you've sinned because you carried a heavy weight.
SPEAKER_03: I'm not being playful, I'm telling you how it reads in the scriptures.
SPEAKER_03: If you've never heard it before, I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_03: The third word for sin is the Greek word hamarsha, and it means your tragic flaw.
SPEAKER_03: I don't know if you know anything about Carl Jung, but we all have gifts and graces through which we illuminate the world, but sometimes those same sources of light cast dark shadows.
SPEAKER_03: You ever been too creative?
SPEAKER_02: You ever been too in control of your schedule?
SPEAKER_03: As your spouse or parent, then I think you know what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_03: Jeez, Mike, it sounds like you're talking about regular everyday stuff.
SPEAKER_03: Yep, that's what sin is.
SPEAKER_03: What we like to do, I just what I like to do is make it really big stuff.
SPEAKER_03: Like, yeah, I know I said a thing I shouldn't have said, but that guy's a murderer.
SPEAKER_03: So, I mean, what I do is, like, I guess it's bad, but it's not like that.
SPEAKER_03: And in so doing, I strip my common humanity from my brother or sister, and I refuse to welcome Jesus with gratitude and elong.
SPEAKER_03: And I wonder if Jesus isn't questioning that whole bit.
SPEAKER_03: What does this woman, what sins does this woman need forgiven?
SPEAKER_03: Well, I can tell you a burden she's definitely carrying is people think she's a nasty woman.
SPEAKER_03: That's a heavy burden to carry.
SPEAKER_03: It's an even heavier burden than just being a woman, not to overdo this, right?
SPEAKER_03: But uh most women that I've talked to sort of say being a woman is like having an app running in the background that sucks your energy because of things like structural misogyny.
SPEAKER_03: That's sin, that's a burden.
SPEAKER_03: You don't deserve it, but you bear it.
SPEAKER_03: I know I'm redefining sin.
SPEAKER_03: I'm just doing it biblically.
SPEAKER_03: So, what does she need forgiveness from?
SPEAKER_03: Carrying a burden around.
SPEAKER_03: What mark did she miss?
SPEAKER_03: I have no idea.
SPEAKER_03: What's her tragic flaw?
SPEAKER_03: Well, maybe it is that she'll grow gr she'll show gratitude even to the point of making people feel uncomfortable.
SPEAKER_03: That doesn't sound like murder, does it?
SPEAKER_03: Or sacrilege or desecration.
SPEAKER_03: It sounds like life.
SPEAKER_03: And who has authority to forgive her her sins?
SPEAKER_03: Well, Jesus does, but guess what?
SPEAKER_03: You do too.
SPEAKER_03: You can say, My friend, I see you are bearing that burden.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe I could help you lift it, or even better, what if we could figure out a way for you to just put it down?
SPEAKER_03: Friend, I see that you've missed the mark.
SPEAKER_03: That is, things did not come out like you thought they might.
SPEAKER_03: Like you hoped.
SPEAKER_03: So, what could we do?
SPEAKER_03: But we could practice with intention.
SPEAKER_03: Let's not give up, let's just keep practicing.
SPEAKER_03: And let's put on some accountability guard rules.
SPEAKER_03: Because if you've ever been to, say, an archery range or you've been to a rifle range, you don't shoot wherever you want.
SPEAKER_03: The targets are there, and your people stand back, right?
SPEAKER_03: There's safety involved.
SPEAKER_03: So maybe we help make it safe to try and to fail and to try again.
SPEAKER_03: As Charlie Bolden told me, his goal at NASA was that you fail quickly and that you fail smartly.
SPEAKER_03: Because failure is not to be avoided, it's to be learned from.
SPEAKER_03: So if we don't learn from our mistakes, friends, we will keep making them.
SPEAKER_03: And many of you know, like I do, I usually learn nothing from my successes.
SPEAKER_03: I really only learn from my failures.
SPEAKER_03: Why are we afraid to fail in showing love?
SPEAKER_03: Why are we afraid?
SPEAKER_03: Because God might be mad at us?
SPEAKER_03: And how do we handle our tragic flaw?
SPEAKER_03: Well, we just need accountability and we need support, right?
SPEAKER_03: Hey, I see you're doing that thing you do when you get wound up.
SPEAKER_03: Just take a deep breath.
SPEAKER_03: You've set together a great dinner plan.
SPEAKER_03: Now it's really important for you to be at the table and enjoy it yourself.
SPEAKER_03: So how can I support you doing that?
SPEAKER_03: That sounds like community care.
SPEAKER_03: It also sounds like the gospel of Jesus Christ, because that's what happens in the story.
SPEAKER_03: I don't know where you are in the story, but to be honest, I'm probably Simon most of the time.
SPEAKER_03: How could you let that sinful person touch you, Jesus?
SPEAKER_03: Only more competent, clean, good-acting, theologically sophisticated folks like me should have access to the Lord.
SPEAKER_03: And I hope that you hear that that attitude and orientation and way of behaving is a heavy burden to bear.
SPEAKER_03: I hope you hear that that attitude and orientation and way of judging my neighbor with about two sentences of information on them.
SPEAKER_03: Boy, I will miss the mark most of the time.
SPEAKER_03: I hope you will hear that Mike, who is an INTJ, and the J stands for judgment.
SPEAKER_03: I am really talented at judging, is a light to the world, and it's a tragic flaw.
SPEAKER_03: So now you know my sins.
SPEAKER_03: They're in front of you.
SPEAKER_03: I'm suspicious they're in you as well.
SPEAKER_03: So the question is, when God says your sins are forgiven, do we say they didn't earn it, I didn't need it, or do we say you mean I can lay that down?
SPEAKER_03: I do mean you can lay that down.
SPEAKER_03: I do mean that.
SPEAKER_03: We're coming up on Lent.
SPEAKER_03: Look, it's just two weeks away.
SPEAKER_03: And the whole theme of Lent is what are you gonna lay down so that you can enjoy the life God's given you more?
SPEAKER_03: If you're thinking you're gonna lay down chocolate so that you can prove God how much you love God by being miserable for 49 days, I just would encourage you to lay something else down.
SPEAKER_03: Like, lay something down that's hurting you, like that's a habit or a thought pattern that is not helping you, and you know it.
SPEAKER_03: And you get to do it like in church, so you get like double credit.
SPEAKER_03: It's going to increase your life, and you're doing it as a sacrifice to God.
SPEAKER_03: And maybe, oh, maybe one of the things we just really have to lay down in some topsy turvy times, at least I feel like topsy-turvy times, is taking people's God, giving dignity away because they don't do what we think they should do.
SPEAKER_03: Because that's really the first thing that happens in the story.
SPEAKER_03: She's not even a woman, she's a sinner.
SPEAKER_03: I know that sounds controversial, but look, if you're a student of the Constitution, you understand we believed in that when we made this country because we said everybody gets a trial by jury from their peers, even if I caught them in the act.
SPEAKER_03: Everybody's worth a trial.
SPEAKER_03: Even when they're wrong.
SPEAKER_03: Forgiveness doesn't mean I give up on an accountability.
SPEAKER_03: What it means is I'm committed to dignity no matter what.
SPEAKER_03: Simon's not committed to dignity.
SPEAKER_03: I'm not sure I am either.
SPEAKER_03: Which is why we'll hear this story again in three years.
SPEAKER_03: In three more years.