SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the First Love Church Podcast.
SPEAKER_00: This is a collection of Sunday teachings inspired by the revised Common Lectionary and recorded weekly in Ocala, Florida.
SPEAKER_00: I'm grateful to be with you in this season of Pentecost.
SPEAKER_00: I love that Pentecost is a season, not a one-time deal.
SPEAKER_00: It is for us an invitation into the practice of attuning ourselves to the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Thomas had mentioned something, I don't know if you passed by, but I just want to remind you about the Spirit and the invitation that we have to not only live in the Spirit, but to allow the Spirit into every area of our life.
SPEAKER_00: We read that portion in 1 John where it says, God is love.
SPEAKER_00: And if we live like Jesus lived in this world, well, that seems like a big ask, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: To live like Jesus lived.
SPEAKER_00: It does if you're asked to do that by yourself, but if you live in the same way that Jesus did, empowered by God's own spirit, you are not asked to do anything alone.
SPEAKER_00: And so this invitation into the Spirit, into learning how to hear the Holy Spirit, the Spirit that is in you, the scripture tells us that the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you.
SPEAKER_00: That very same spirit that was greater than death lives in you.
SPEAKER_00: And so if we have this great spirit living in us, our intention needs to be then how do I learn how to listen to the spirit who will lead me into all truth?
SPEAKER_00: The spirit who will be the comforter, the spirit who will be the guide, the Holy Spirit will be with you at all times.
SPEAKER_00: That's what Jesus said.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to his followers, hey, it's going to be better that I leave you.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm sure the consensus was absolutely not.
SPEAKER_00: You have us wrong.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, It's better that I leave you because my Father is going to send you a comforter, the spirit that will not only abide near you, but will be in you.
SPEAKER_00: You will have a comforter.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, have you ever needed comfort?
SPEAKER_00: I have on the daily.
SPEAKER_00: And the scripture tells us that we have a comforter that abides with us, that there is nothing that you will ever go through that you will have to go through alone.
SPEAKER_00: That God's own spirit is with us.
SPEAKER_00: Even now, the spirit of God is with us this morning, bringing us illumination, the spirit of truth, changing the way that we feel about ourselves, about the world around us, and letting us see the way that God sees.
SPEAKER_00: This is some of the work of the Holy Spirit in the world today.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's an honor.
SPEAKER_00: It is a joy to talk to you about the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Because if I could give you anything, anything, anything, it would be an attunement to the Spirit, and then you'd have everything you need because you would be connected to the source of all life.
SPEAKER_00: The source of everything.
SPEAKER_00: This is what we're coming back to, our connection to the source.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is our connection to the Spirit, and the Spirit is our connection to the source.
SPEAKER_00: And the source lives in us, God in us.
SPEAKER_00: This is so much hope this morning.
SPEAKER_00: And this is so much goodness.
SPEAKER_00: And we go to the scripture today, and I've already asked the Holy Spirit that the Spirit would illuminate our eyes.
SPEAKER_00: Let us see things that maybe we haven't seen before.
SPEAKER_00: Let us understand things.
SPEAKER_00: And I remind you that over and over again in the scriptures, the spirit is all loosey-goosey.
SPEAKER_00: And she's kind of wild.
SPEAKER_00: And yes, you heard me say she, and that might be a little odd for you.
SPEAKER_00: And Thomas had mentioned it this morning.
SPEAKER_00: In the New Testament church, written in Greek, when the believers there referred to the Holy Spirit, they called her Sophia.
SPEAKER_00: And they'd be like, That's the work of Sophia.
SPEAKER_00: That is the work of the feminine spirit of God.
SPEAKER_00: That is the work of the nurturer.
SPEAKER_00: That is the work of the includer.
SPEAKER_00: That is the work of God's spirit that brooded over the waters and creation came forth.
SPEAKER_00: In the book of Proverbs, it talks about wisdom and it uses in this feminine form.
SPEAKER_00: And it says that follow her.
SPEAKER_00: She will bring you to life.
SPEAKER_00: And this spirit that was within us is part of God.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, in Genesis story, it says that God made them male and female.
SPEAKER_00: God made them in God's own image.
SPEAKER_00: And there is a feminine image of God, and it is the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit who draws us, the Holy Spirit who comforts us, the Holy Spirit who walks with us.
SPEAKER_00: And so, while in no way does it, you know, in any way change that God, and we can use the masculine terms, but we recognize that the spirit also is a feminine move of God.
SPEAKER_00: And there is an invitation into the spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I think it's important for us to think differently about how we have always heard something.
SPEAKER_00: Because if you hear it the same way, one of the things our brain does for us, and it's a real gift, is tune us out.
SPEAKER_00: And so sometimes you'll be like, oh, I heard that story before.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I know that one, especially if you've been around this morning.
SPEAKER_00: And so I thank you for being here, even if you've heard these stories before.
SPEAKER_00: The intention of us gathering is that we would learn to walk like Jesus did in the world.
SPEAKER_00: This verse in 1 John said, that's the whole point, that we would learn to be like Jesus in the world.
SPEAKER_00: And so I want us to go to the text this morning.
SPEAKER_00: And it's in this portion of Matthew, and we're meeting up with Jesus, and he's frustrated.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you have ever experienced frustration, but let me tell you what it's like.
SPEAKER_00: You can feel it in here, in the inside of you.
SPEAKER_00: You can feel the frustration mounting.
SPEAKER_00: And you have been communicating something and it's not landing.
SPEAKER_00: People are not hearing.
SPEAKER_00: And we meet Jesus at a time of frustration.
SPEAKER_00: He has been talking to not only his disciples, but to the crowds of people.
SPEAKER_00: And at this point, we meet him at a place of frustration.
SPEAKER_00: He's like, what can I even compare this generation to?
SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't even know how to tell you what you people are like.
SPEAKER_00: It's always a great idea to get feedback from Jesus on what you're like.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you have a plan on how you want to be, and then somebody else says, but that's not how I experience you.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is telling us how he experiences him, how he experiences us.
SPEAKER_00: To what can I compare this generation?
SPEAKER_00: Hear the frustration.
SPEAKER_00: It's like children playing a game.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, first of all, that's never who you want to be in the story that Jesus is telling.
SPEAKER_00: Children that are playing a game.
SPEAKER_00: Because this is real life, beloved.
SPEAKER_00: This is not dress rehearsal.
SPEAKER_00: This is your life.
SPEAKER_00: Live it to the full.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said, I came so that you would enjoy your life.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've heard that preached enough in church, but it's true.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus came and said, I'm here to give you life and have it to the fullest.
SPEAKER_00: That you would eat your bread and that you would enjoy it.
SPEAKER_00: That you would drink your cup and that it would bring you quenched of your thirst.
SPEAKER_00: That you would be with friends and their own spirit would bring you joy.
SPEAKER_00: This is the kind of life that Jesus is offering us.
SPEAKER_00: And he's saying, To what can I compare you?
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, like children playing a game in the public square.
SPEAKER_00: They complain to their friends also, you never want to be on the side of the complainers.
SPEAKER_00: And there's just never in this particular text, you just never want to be on their side.
SPEAKER_00: And he's saying, This is what it's like, complaining.
SPEAKER_00: We played wedding songs and you didn't dance.
SPEAKER_00: So there's a group of people, they want to play wedding.
SPEAKER_00: They're a bunch of kids and they want to play wedding.
SPEAKER_00: And so they got the little piper and they played the wedding, but the other team was like, no, I don't wanna.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, So then we're gonna play funeral.
SPEAKER_00: And so we played funeral swarms, and but you wouldn't mourn with those.
SPEAKER_00: You just didn't want to participate.
SPEAKER_00: We gave you the wedding, we gave you the funeral, you just didn't want to.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, That's what you people are like.
SPEAKER_00: Now, before we say that's what they're like, ask yourself, is that what I'm like?
SPEAKER_00: Where am I in this story?
SPEAKER_00: Am I the one other people are saying, Come on, let's do this.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, No, I don't like that song.
SPEAKER_00: No, I don't want to play.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus then says, now he starts making it though.
SPEAKER_00: So he took it from the analogy and he's reminding them, John, he was talking about John the Baptist who came.
SPEAKER_00: According to Jesus, there was never a better man who ever lived.
SPEAKER_00: So we sent John, this better man, no, there was no one better, this incredible man, to teach people about God's coming, to prepare the way for Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, John didn't spend his time eating or drinking.
SPEAKER_00: We know this because he was in the wilderness.
SPEAKER_00: He was eating bugs and eating some honey, I think, on the way home, and he dressed super weird.
SPEAKER_00: But you know what the people said?
SPEAKER_00: He's possessed by a demon.
SPEAKER_00: And then the Son of Man, Jesus is talking about himself, on the other hand, feasts and drinks, and you say he's a glutton and a drunkard and a friend of tax collectors and other sinners.
SPEAKER_00: But wisdom is shown to be right by its results.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is asking us and telling these people, listen, you didn't listen to John, you disqualified him, and you don't listen to me, you've disqualified me.
SPEAKER_00: You're asking for God to show up and to show for you, and you're not listening to God in any of the ways God speaks.
SPEAKER_00: And so I ask you this morning, in what ways is God showing up for you and you are not listening?
SPEAKER_00: You are deciding I'm not going to participate in that.
SPEAKER_00: This more love, this generosity of spirit, this generous orthodoxy?
SPEAKER_00: Now I remind you that the Holy Spirit, who had to work with Peter, or chose to work with Peter, I would like to amend that, chose to work with Peter, had to tell Peter three times.
SPEAKER_00: So sometimes it takes a minute for us to register what the Spirit is actually doing.
SPEAKER_00: But wisdom is shown to be right by its results.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, what are the results of the choices that you are making?
SPEAKER_00: What are the results of the thoughts that you are thinking?
SPEAKER_00: Do you only see the negative?
SPEAKER_00: Are you only looking for the hatred?
SPEAKER_00: Are you only looking for the division?
SPEAKER_00: Or are you looking for something else?
SPEAKER_00: Our brains that have been given to us by God are amazing.
SPEAKER_00: And our brains are prediction machines.
SPEAKER_00: They will tell us this is what's going to happen.
SPEAKER_00: And then we find the bias in it.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is offering us another way.
SPEAKER_00: Look for the results of wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: Look for the results and say, Is this hatred doing us good?
SPEAKER_00: Do we have more of God's kingdom because we believe hateful things?
SPEAKER_00: Or is there another way?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus goes on to say in some of those verses, and you can read them, He has done these incredible miracles, and the people still haven't responded to the miracles.
SPEAKER_00: Now you and I sit back and we read these, and we're like, no, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: If I saw 5,000 people fed, I would believe.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, people are fed all around us all the time and we don't believe.
SPEAKER_00: If I saw someone raised from the dead, I would believe.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, the dead are raised to life all the time.
SPEAKER_00: People who have believed one way now believe another, that's dead to life.
SPEAKER_00: People who were in addiction choose sobriety, that's dead to life.
SPEAKER_00: There is miracles, there are miracles all around us.
SPEAKER_00: There is the power, the wisdom that shows us there is another way.
SPEAKER_00: The Son of Man, on the other hand, feasts and drink, and you say he's a glutton and a drunkard.
SPEAKER_00: I wonder if we would say anything about the Christ that was opposite of what Jesus actually was.
SPEAKER_00: I wonder if we would label his generosity toward others and go, yeah, we gotta rein that in.
SPEAKER_00: That's not for everyone.
SPEAKER_00: You can't be having dinner with just everyone.
SPEAKER_00: There are rules in this place.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus came to show us something different.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus goes on to say, and the verses are in between there, and he talks about it would be better.
SPEAKER_00: Those people would have believed more than you do.
SPEAKER_00: At this time, Jesus prayed.
SPEAKER_00: This prayer.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for hiding these things from those who think themselves wise and clever.
SPEAKER_00: If there is something you don't understand, beloved, maybe it's because you think yourself wise and clever.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there is something hidden from you because you choose to not think a certain way.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Father, for revealing them to the childlike.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, Father, it pleased you to do it this way.
SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus says, My Father has entrusted everything to me.
SPEAKER_00: My father has entrusted everything to me.
SPEAKER_00: I remind you that in the past couple weeks, we've even been looking at the scriptures that said that God made Jesus the judge of the world.
SPEAKER_00: And everything that Jesus does is to bring us to restoration.
SPEAKER_00: The judgment of Jesus is to bring us back home to our Father.
SPEAKER_00: And then says, No one truly knows the Son except for the Father, and no one truly knows the Father except the Son.
SPEAKER_00: And to those the Son chooses to reveal him.
SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus said, Jesus says all of these things.
SPEAKER_00: And then I think there was a look on the people's face.
SPEAKER_00: Because then he says, Okay, come to me.
SPEAKER_00: All of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.
SPEAKER_00: This would have an impact that may be different now because during the time that Jesus was talking to this, that a big part of the crowd would have been people who were raised in a Jewish tradition.
SPEAKER_00: And in the Jewish faith, they would say over and over again, the rabbis would remind them, who are you yoked to?
SPEAKER_00: A Jewish person was supposed to be yoked to the Torah or to the teachings of God.
SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't an agricultural term, although that's where it came from originally, this idea of you could get a lot of things accomplished if you had yoked two oxen together.
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of strength there.
SPEAKER_00: And so the implication was if you yoke yourself or if you get yourself into agreement with this kind of wisdom or with this way, so much can be accomplished.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, Come to me, yoke yourself to me.
SPEAKER_00: This is different.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to give you rest.
SPEAKER_00: Take my yoke upon you.
SPEAKER_00: Let me teach you.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, that is a question that the Spirit asks us all this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Who is your teacher?
SPEAKER_00: For most of us, we would say it's experience.
SPEAKER_00: But I want to tell you that experience needs to be trumped by the words of Jesus, by love, the invitation into something else.
SPEAKER_00: Let me teach you because I am humble and I am gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, rest.
SPEAKER_00: When was the last time that you really felt rest, like deep rest?
SPEAKER_00: And when you got up from that rest, you felt energized.
SPEAKER_00: That's what Jesus is offering.
SPEAKER_00: Let me change the way that you think so that you don't have this anxiety-ridden life, this life that is fueled by anxiousness, by fear, by hatred.
SPEAKER_00: There is another way of living and it's living in rest.
SPEAKER_00: It's living deeply rooted in our belovedness.
SPEAKER_00: It is connected to source, connected to the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: And so the invitation for all of us is let Jesus teach you how to live.
SPEAKER_00: We pause here for a moment to thank you for joining us today.
SPEAKER_00: If you're finding this episode meaningful, would you take a moment to share it with a friend?
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SPEAKER_00: If you would like to support the ongoing work of First Love Church and the continued work of our podcast, visit us online at firstlovechurch.org, reminding you to like, follow, and subscribe.
SPEAKER_00: When I read the stories in the gospel, Jesus was invited to a lot of parties.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've ever had a party and had an invitation list, but you want to invite the people who are fun to your party.
SPEAKER_00: I do not believe that Jesus was a big downer in any kind of situation.
SPEAKER_00: He was invited to all the parties.
SPEAKER_00: He was invited to so many parties that people were like, well, he can't be God.
SPEAKER_00: He can't be the Son of God, because even the people who party differently than we do want him at their parties too.
SPEAKER_00: And the invitation for all of us is to follow the way of Jesus into understanding our own humanity, living fully human, embracing that, allowing the Spirit to teach us how to live differently.
SPEAKER_00: In the message translation of these same verses, it says, Are you tired?
SPEAKER_00: Are you worn out?
SPEAKER_00: Are you burnt out on religion?
SPEAKER_00: And come to me and let me show you how to live.
SPEAKER_00: Let me show you how to live freely and lightly, how to access unforced rhythms of grace.
SPEAKER_00: Let me show you my way.
SPEAKER_00: And so the invitation for all of us is to actually take a pause and ask the Holy Spirit, will you show me a way to really live?
SPEAKER_00: What if everything that you saw inspired you?
SPEAKER_00: What if we could live in a state of awe?
SPEAKER_00: For good friends, for good food, for the air that we breathe, for grass, for the bugs that crawl in the grass, for beloved, every night stars come out.
SPEAKER_00: Every night the stars come out.
SPEAKER_00: Every night the planets have a parade.
SPEAKER_00: This is such an incredible life.
SPEAKER_00: I hope that you hear the words of Jesus saying, learn to just be.
SPEAKER_00: Now I want to tell you that Mary didn't try really hard for all the things that happened to her.
SPEAKER_00: She just simply consented.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, we give our yes.
SPEAKER_00: It's the same way that we come to new life in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I will let the life of Jesus be the life for me.
SPEAKER_00: And this invitation, take my yoke upon me, upon you, let me teach you.
SPEAKER_00: So an invitation for all of us is will I allow the Spirit to teach me?
SPEAKER_00: Or will I be one of those people that Jesus was talking about at the beginning of this text, who is part of this generation who says, uh-uh, I'm just gonna be hard-headed.
SPEAKER_00: That's who I'm gonna be.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna sing when you have happy songs.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna be sad and cry when you have sad songs.
SPEAKER_00: I am just gonna be hard-headed.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is like, come on, there's real life here.
SPEAKER_00: Come on, there's good food, beloved.
SPEAKER_00: Come on, there's good friends.
SPEAKER_00: You don't even know all the people you're gonna meet yet.
SPEAKER_00: You're not even, you don't even know all the people that you will love yet.
SPEAKER_00: You don't even know all the beauty that you will see yet.
SPEAKER_00: This is an invitation for us by the Spirit to be awake in our own life.
SPEAKER_00: How sad it is that many of us just live our life on autopilot.
SPEAKER_00: We get up and do the work someone's told us to do, and and then we come home exhausted and we are frustrated, and then we go to sleep and we get up and we do, and we miss out on joy.
SPEAKER_00: We miss out on the life that Jesus has come.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, Come, yoke yourself to me.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, don't yoke yourself to the law, yoke yourself to me, and I'm gonna show you something different.
SPEAKER_00: When we see the Holy Spirit that's come, and the reason that we're reminded of this during the season of Pentecost is the Spirit asks us to open ourselves up to bigger things, to more, and asks us to give up the things that keep us in tight places, in places of anxiety, in places of fear, in places of other.
SPEAKER_00: The invitation of the spirit is to more.
SPEAKER_00: The invitation of the spirit is to expansion, that wisdom would lead us into something so much more.
SPEAKER_00: And this is the hope of Christ that we would truly live.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, you are made in the image of God, but you are made on Purpose.
SPEAKER_00: You are here intentionally so that God can live through you, so that God can enjoy the world around you through you, through your experiences.
SPEAKER_00: This is an invitation into living.
SPEAKER_00: And if you don't feel like that's your invitation, ask the spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Spirit, show me this.
SPEAKER_00: There is um, there was a man by the name of Brother Lawrence Monk, and there's many, many um stories that you can find out about him.
SPEAKER_00: Incredible.
SPEAKER_00: He met God um by standing in front of a tree and began to really look at a tree.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever done that?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, really looked at the tree, spent some time in quiet and really looked at the tree.
SPEAKER_00: Try it, it might be remarkable.
SPEAKER_00: But he spent time really looking at the tree, and God revealed God's self to him.
SPEAKER_00: So he went to the monastery and he began to serve the Lord because he felt like that was how he would best serve the Lord by giving his entire life to God.
SPEAKER_00: And people began to notice about him that there were supernatural miracles that would happen.
SPEAKER_00: People would be healed, people could understand things they didn't understand before.
SPEAKER_00: Things were different with this guy.
SPEAKER_00: And they began to, according to all the letters that are written, they began to like take time off their work.
SPEAKER_00: They began to tell other people.
SPEAKER_00: They all began to come and follow and say, What is Brother Lawrence doing?
SPEAKER_00: We want to know why God is present so much in his life.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, This is, and again, he didn't wasn't a teacher.
SPEAKER_00: He would just invite people to come into the kitchen with him because that's where he worked.
SPEAKER_00: And he would peel potatoes.
SPEAKER_00: And in the peeling of the potatoes, he said, I am practicing the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: I see God in the people that are going to eat this potato and their lives are going to be nourished.
SPEAKER_00: I see God in the farmer who planted this potato and he practiced the present moment.
SPEAKER_00: He practiced engaging with the spirit right there.
SPEAKER_00: And what happened to the people around them, they would have miracles.
SPEAKER_00: Not because he laid hands on them, not because he spoke over them.
SPEAKER_00: He himself was so attuned to the spirit that even practicing peeling potatoes, I don't know if you peel potatoes, my grandmother did it when I was uh young.
SPEAKER_00: She peeled potatoes all the time with a paring knife.
SPEAKER_00: And she'd bring the paring knife toward her, which is against all the rules, beloved.
SPEAKER_00: You peel away from you, you cut away from you.
SPEAKER_00: She would take in her hand and she would talk and not even look and be peeling.
SPEAKER_00: It was astonishing to me as a small child.
SPEAKER_00: And she could peel those potatoes so quickly.
SPEAKER_00: I know that my grandmother was not practicing the presence there because her mind was other places, but she would take that knife in her hand and take that potato.
SPEAKER_00: And in the practice, and I just mean that's not a very glamorous job peeling potatoes.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what unglamorous job you have, maybe wiping counters or dusting some dusting something.
SPEAKER_00: That is very unglamorous.
SPEAKER_00: But or vacuuming.
SPEAKER_00: No, I think you can do more praying in the vacuuming, and there is some, there is something back, but there's other things that feel like the invitation is in that uh invite the presence, invite the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: How can this be a point of joy?
SPEAKER_00: How can this be a point of me really understanding?
SPEAKER_00: How can I pray for the people who will use this?
SPEAKER_00: And this can then be a place of gratitude for us.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said this.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, I know that you're tired of how things are going.
SPEAKER_00: Come and let me show you the unforced rhythms of grace.
SPEAKER_00: Let me show you how to connect to the Holy Spirit because you will find rest for your souls.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if your soul needs rest.
SPEAKER_00: In the Psalms, David said, I cry and I weep all the time because my tears are making a pillow for my soul.
SPEAKER_00: Our souls need rest, beloved.
SPEAKER_00: We live in a world where frantic pace is absolutely given reward.
SPEAKER_00: And God is saying, Slow down, enjoy, attune yourself to the spirit, you will find rest for your souls.
SPEAKER_00: For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden that I give you is light.
SPEAKER_00: In the message translation, Jesus says in these same verses, I won't put anything ill-fitting on you.
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever worn something that doesn't fit?
SPEAKER_00: That's an irritation, beloved.
SPEAKER_00: A shoe that doesn't fit, it almost can stop you from moving.
SPEAKER_00: A button that doesn't fit, something that's itchy, a scratchy tag, good Lord.
SPEAKER_00: That can stop your thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: Like there are things that we're looking at ill-fitting, but not only things like that that are irritants, but things that tell you to be small when you are a child of God.
SPEAKER_00: Things that tell you to dim your light when you have the light of Christ in you.
SPEAKER_00: Things that tell you to be silent when the Spirit is saying, sing your song, sing the way that you want to be.
SPEAKER_00: My yoke is easy to bear, and the burden that I give you is light.
SPEAKER_00: This season of Pentecost gives us time to practice together saying yes, offering yes, bringing ourselves into the presence.
SPEAKER_00: One of the ways that we do that is through holy communion.
SPEAKER_00: But another way we do that is sitting in practice, attuning ourselves to the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm offering a blessing over you this morning.
SPEAKER_00: I ask that you would take a moment and follow your breath in.
SPEAKER_00: Pay attention to your own exile.
SPEAKER_00: And then bring yourself back home to all the places that you've scattered yourself during the day.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe part of you is already making a list for the grocery store.
SPEAKER_00: Bring yourself back to the present moment.
SPEAKER_00: Right now.
SPEAKER_00: The ground underneath your feet, in the presence of people who love you, in the presence of God who loves you, in the presence of Jesus, who even at this moment now is smiling upon you.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved ones, just as the women gathered, just as Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of Jesus, the apostles, and the faithful companions of Christ waited together with open hearts for the coming of the Holy Spirit, so it is that we gather here today, not because any of us have arrived, but because we are becoming.
SPEAKER_00: That same spirit who whispered to Philip, go and draw near, and led him to the Ethiopian eunuch, crossing every boundary that tradition had built.
SPEAKER_00: That same spirit who interrupted Peter's certainty again and again and again until he could finally hear, do not call unclean what I have called clean.
SPEAKER_00: The same spirit who fell with extravagant generosity upon the Gentiles, revealing the heart of God has always been wider than our fears.
SPEAKER_00: May that spirit find us.
SPEAKER_00: May that spirit interrupt us.
SPEAKER_00: May that spirit expand us.
SPEAKER_00: And when we are tempted to close the circle, may that spirit draw it wider.
SPEAKER_00: When fear tells us there is not enough room, may love prepare a larger table.
SPEAKER_00: When despair settles heavily upon us, may the breath of God fill our lungs again with hope.
SPEAKER_00: When chaos swirls around us, may the Holy Spirit breathe peace into our bodies until our nervous systems remember that we belong to the one who is love.
SPEAKER_00: May our eyes become attentive to the quiet promptings of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: May our ears recognize the voice that always leads toward compassion.
SPEAKER_00: May our hands become quicker to acts of mercy, and may our feet carry us where love is needed most.
SPEAKER_00: May our hearts remain soft enough to be changed, and may we never mistake the comfort of certainty with the movement of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Because the Holy Spirit is still speaking, the Spirit is still surprising, still calling us beyond fear, still reminding us that we are God's beloved children, still inviting us to become a people whose lives proclaim that love is stronger than exclusion, that mercy is greater than judgment, and that belonging is God's first language.
SPEAKER_00: May the Holy Spirit who hovered over the waters of creation, who breathed through the prophets, who raised Jesus from the dead, who filled the church at Pentecost continue now to breathe through us.
SPEAKER_00: Until every act of love becomes a living sermon, until every table becomes a place of belonging.
SPEAKER_00: Until every person knows themselves held within the limitless embrace of divine love.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, may it be so.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever you have need of, meet the Spirit here this morning.
SPEAKER_00: This table prepared for all of us, this invitation into embodied storytelling, into acts of obedience.
SPEAKER_00: This is us yoking ourselves with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus said every time you gather together, do this in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_00: We hope you've enjoyed this week's sermon.
SPEAKER_00: If you would like more information about us, visit us online at firstlovechurch.org.