I remember hearing a story once, of the difference between heaven and hell.  A man was given a vision of hell.  A group of emaciated people were seated around a huge banquet table, full of wonderful foods.  Instead of hands, they had long arms with spoons attached where their hands should be.  But the spoons were too long, and no one could get them into their mouths.  So even though the table was full of nourishing foods, the people were starving to death, not able to feed themselves.  Then the man was given a vision of heaven.  It was the same room, the same table, and the same feast.  However, all the people were fat and happy and joyfully enjoying the food, even though they also had long spoons.  The man asked why these people were so happy.  “Because’, God said, “these people have learned to feed each other.”

When I think of us feeding each other, I generally think of very, very poor people.  People who are living on the street, in shelters, and those who need the food pantry to get by.  People who truly don’t have enough to eat.  The single mother who goes without a meal to make sure her kids can sleep without their tummies growling.  And these people are needing help, and we all know that.  It makes me feel good to donate to the food pantry.  We can donate money, canned food, and extra produce, and we know that we are feeding people.  And that is a very good thing.

But what about the people who are living on the edge of poverty?  One missed paycheck would mean them losing their home, apartment, or car.  They live paycheck to paycheck.  They are very careful with the money they have left after the bills are paid.  They make too much to qualify for any type of assistance.  One car repair, one breakdown, one unexpected hospital bill could send them over the edge.

What about the widow who’s husband passed away, and with only one social security check, she can no longer afford her groceries and prescriptions at the same time, the light bill and utilities.  She cancels her cable, cuts back on everything she can, but she still can’t quite make ends meet.  Now her AC goes out in the heat of the summer.  Or her furnace quits in the winter, what will she do?

I know families who are very fortunate to have grandparents nearby, who can help them out with daycare, and running children to events.  But there are some families who don’t have this luxury.  If their child gets sick at school, they must leave work.  If their child becomes very sick, and they have used up their personal leave and sick days, how will they pay their bills?  What if that child is diagnosed with a chronic illness, or migraines, or cancer? How will they manage?  In a world of Go Fund Me accounts and charity dinners, there are still families who suffer these financial burdens without help.  The families who don’t have a community of support suffer.  That’s why community is so important.

Our community is so wonderful, and we are all so fortunate to have each other.  I am always willing to take care of someone’s pets when they are gone, and I know that I can count on help from them when I go on vacation.  That is a direct benefit: I help you and you help me.  You mow my lawn when I’m gone, and I’ll mow yours.  My neighbor Paul always takes care of my chickens.  He lets them out in the morning after I’ve gone to work, and I give him eggs.  Plus the chickens eat some of the bugs from their yard as well as mine.

But sometimes, we are called to help those who aren’t going to help us in return.  My kids are adults, so I’m not going to need someone to watch kids.  But I’m willing to watch other people’s kids if they are running late.  They can come in the store after they get off the school bus for 15 or 20 minutes, or however long.  And while I’m not planning on opening an after school daycare, I don’t mind doing it once in awhile, if the parents call and ask first.

I want to tell you a story of a wonderful young woman who is helping so many people.

(This story is from the CBS News website.)

At a nursing home in northwest, Arkansas, CBS News found a gem named Ruby.  11-year-old Ruby Chitsey likes to go to work with her mom, Amanda.

Amanda is a nurse who travels to several nursing homes in the area. It was on one of those visits, that Ruby started going up to residents with her notepad, asking “if you could have any three things, what would they be?” Ruby says she was mostly just curious what they’d say.

“I was very surprised. I thought people would say money, houses, a Lamborghini,” she said.

But instead, here’s what she got: Electric razor, new shoes, Vienna sausage, for some reason a lot of people asked for Vienna sausage and other really basic items.  Some of the other items on her list included basic clothing items, cheese, avocados, oranges and watermelon, and a chocolate pie.

“Like, that’s all they wanted. And I really decided that I needed to do something,” Ruby said.

So she started a charity called, Three Wishes for Ruby’s Residents. Now, while her mom is caring for patients, Ruby goes room-to-room, jots down wishes and then sets out to grant those wishes.

Ruby has a GoFundMe to cover costs, but again, no one is asking for a sports car here. Her expenses are minimal, especially compared to the rewards.

“It really lifts you, it really does,” she said.

On one day, she came back with a wheelchair full of sausages and other grocery items. But make no mistake, this isn’t about food. Whether she knows it or not, Ruby is satisfying some much more basic human needs here,  to be remembered, to be cherished, especially by a child, that is what our seniors are truly hungry for. That is what Ruby brings every time she sets foot in a nursing home.

Now, it’s not just her. Since this story first aired on CBS, Ruby has helped start chapters of her charity in other states. She speaks to advocates for the aging. Of course, she is still very much hands on, proving no one needs a Lamborghini when they’ve got home delivery of all the happy they can handle.

Maybe we should all take Ruby’s work as an example.  Are there elderly neighbors you could help? Is there a struggling family near you? Perhaps you could be the one to grant their wishes.  Perhaps sharing your extra produce, a night of babysitting, or a hand helping them repair a lawn mower or car would make all the difference in the world.  Maybe a battery jump-start in the morning when they are running late, or a meal delivered when they are working late would make their day.  Or maybe a new pair of shoes or a sweater for a nursing home resident would be a blessing.  You don’t have to spend a lot of money to help someone.  Sometimes, giving our time and expertise is the most valuable gift we can give.

And as Jesus tells us, we reap what we sow.  And we all sow love.

One day a teacher asked her students to list the names of the other students in the room on two sheets of paper, leaving a space between each name.

Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write it down.

It took the remainder of the class period to finish their assignment, and as the students left the room, each one handed in the papers.

That Saturday, the teacher wrote down the name of each student on a separate sheet of paper, and listed what everyone else had said about that individual.

On Monday she gave each student his or her list. Before long, the entire class was smiling. ‘Really?’ she heard whispered. ‘I never knew that I meant anything to anyone!’ and, ‘I didn’t know others liked me so much,’ were most of the comments.

No one ever mentioned those papers in class again. She never knew if they discussed them after class or with their parents, but it didn’t matter. The exercise had accomplished its purpose. The students were happy with themselves and one another. That group of students moved on.
Several years later, one of the students was killed in
Vietnam and his teacher attended the funeral of that special student. She had never seen a serviceman in a military coffin before. He looked so handsome, so mature.

The church was packed with his friends. One by one those who loved him took a last walk by the coffin. The teacher was the last one to bless the coffin.

As she stood there, one of the soldiers who acted as pallbearer came up to her. ‘Were you Mark’s math teacher?’ he asked. She nodded: ‘yes.’ Then he said: ‘Mark talked about you a lot.’

After the funeral, most of Mark’s former classmates went together to a luncheon. Mark’s mother and father were there, obviously waiting to speak with his teacher.

‘We want to show you something,’ his father said, taking a wallet out of his pocket ‘They found this on Mark when he was killed. We thought you might recognize it.’

Opening the billfold, he carefully removed two worn pieces of notebook paper that had obviously been taped, folded and refolded many times. The teacher knew without looking that the papers were the ones on which she had listed all the good things each of Mark’s classmates had said about him.

‘Thank you so much for doing that,’ Mark’s mother said. ‘As you can see, Mark treasured it.’

All of Mark’s former classmates started to gather around. Charlie smiled rather sheepishly and said, ‘I still have my list. It’s in the top drawer of my desk at home.’

Chuck’s wife said, ‘Chuck asked me to put his in our wedding album.’

‘I have mine too,’ Marilyn said. ‘It’s in my diary’

Then Vicki, another classmate, reached into her pocketbook, took out her wallet and showed her worn and frazzled list to the group. ‘I carry this with me at all times,’ Vicki said and without batting an eyelash, she continued: ‘I think we all saved our lists’

That’s when the teacher finally sat down and cried. She cried for Mark and for all his friends who would never see him again.

The density of people in society is so thick that we forget that life will end one day. And we don’t know when that one day will be.

So please, tell the people you love and care for, that they are special and important. Tell them, before it is too late.  (This story was shared by Jim Hubbard.)

Those lists are amazing.  Who wouldn’t want to have a constant reminder of all the good things about us?  Anytime you felt sad, or down, you could take out that list and get picked right back up again, reading all the great things people think about you.

But what if your teacher never did this, and now you’re done with school?  How will we get a list of our own?  Its turns out that you did get a list.  Do you want to hear what someone wrote about you?

In Isaiah 43:4-5 it says:  Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life. Fear not, for I am with you; I will bring your offspring from the east, and from the west I will gather you.

‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” –Jeremiah 29:11

Isaiah 41:10  “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”

Zephaniah 3:17 The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.

“See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” –1 John 3:1a

These are only a few of the things that God inspired to be written about you, about all of us and to all of us, in the Bible.  Carry it in your purse, in your wallet, keep a copy in your nightstand.  Anytime you are feeling down, pick it up and read it.  Read all about the promises that God gives us as his children, read about the good news of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross and what that means for us all.

And then, when your spirits are lifted and your heart is full of joy, remember thank God for those words.  Our Psalm today tells us that the best way to give God our grateful praise is to shout it out!  Worship with gladness!  Enter his gates with thanksgiving and praise!  Praise His holy name!

I’ve watched videos of Southern churches, with everyone dancing in the aisles and shouting “Hallelujah!!” with their arms raised above their heads.  And maybe that’s a little bit overboard for our church, but perhaps we can make a bit more noise.  I mean, Joel (our pastor) is not here so it’s just going to be up to us.  Maybe shouting “Hallelujah!” in your own house even feels a little strange, but go home and try it.  No? No takers?  So what if you instead found that CD of hymns or gospel music you have, and listened to that the next time you take a drive in the car? Play it on your stereo or blast it to your iTunes.  There are so many great songs about God and His love for us.  One of my favorite memories is that of my Grandpa belting out “How Great Thy Art”, and it was joyful.  He always sang loudly, especially for such a conservation man.  But we, the grandkids, always knew that he loved us very much.  We also knew that God loved us very much because Grandpa told us all the time about how great God’s love for us is.  And its wonderful to know how much people love us.  So if there are people in your life that you love: kids, grandkids, nieces, nephews, neighbors, friends;  tell them.  Tell them how much they mean to you.  It’s such a blessing to know that you are important to someone, that you matter in someone else’s life, that you are appreciated.  But don’t forget that those around you would also love to know that they matter to you.

Pray with me:

Thank you for your amazing power and work in our lives, thank you for your goodness and for your blessings over us. Thank you that you are able to bring hope through even the toughest of times, strengthening us for your purposes. Thank you for your great love and care. Thank you for your mercy and grace. Thank you that you are always with us and will never leave us. Thank you for your incredible sacrifice so that we might have freedom and life. Forgive us for when we don’t thank you enough, for who you are, for all that you do, for all that you’ve given. Help us to set our eyes and our hearts on you afresh. Renew our spirits, fill us with your peace and joy. We love you and we need you, this day and every day. We give you praise and thanks, for You alone are worthy!

Anytime I read the obituary of a younger person who has suddenly passed away, it makes me sad; sad for their families, sad for their friends.  But sometimes it also puts our lives into perspective.  Because, lets face it, we’re all going to die someday.  Are we prepared for that day?  I know that our hearts are prepared to meet Jesus, our souls long to be reunited with God.  But what are the things that each of needs to do before we go?

If you learned that you had one year to live, what would you do differently?  Would you travel?  Where would you go?  What’s that one place you really want to see? For me, I want to see the giant Redwoods and giant Sequoia trees in California.  There are many other places I’d like to go, but seeing and touching those trees are high on my bucket list.  Just imagine the stories they could tell!  Redwoods can live for 2000 years, and sequoias can live for 3000 years! How amazing is that!  The oldest sequoia known is 3500 years old.  Wow!  But the oldest known tree in the world is a Bristlecone pine located in the White Mountains of California, and it is over 5000 years old! (There are older clonal colonies of trees, some believed to be 80,000 years old, but that’s a tree story for another day.)

Who are the people that you would want to spend more time with if you knew your time was limited?  Are you a lucky one whose family is nearby and you see them on a regular basis?  What friends have slipped out of your life, and you wish to reconnect with?  School friends that you haven’t seen for years?  Maybe friends from the military that you served with, and you wish you knew how to get ahold of them.  Would you try harder to find them?  Do you have family a long way away that you want to go see”someday”?

Are there relationships in your life that need to be mended?  Are there apologies that you need to make?  Is there someone that you need to forgive to cleanse your heart of anger and resentment?

We have all lost family and friends, and we all know what grief feels like.  My paternal grandfather died when I was 6 years old.  I have a few specific memories of him, but not many.  I do have a shelf that he made, he was a carpenter and farmer, that my dad’s cousin gave me.  He had made it for her when she was a girl, and she felt I should have it.  It was a very kind gesture, and I cherish it.  But do my kids know who made it?  And what significance it carries?  Probably not.  It would probably get sold at a rummage sale, or maybe even tossed in the trash.  What keepsakes do you have that should be labeled or explained to the next generation?

Do you have boxes of unlabeled photographs?  I inherited my grandmother’s box, as well as several albums.  Some of the pictures were labeled, some not, and some had been labeled on the back and then glued into the album!  Who the heck are these people??  I gave the box to my dad in hopes that he would label them, but he passed away before they were finished.  Its taken me years, and visits from a couple of my dad’s cousins to get them figured out.  And yes, there are still some that I don’t know, but for the most part, those pictures have names.  And I was able to send some of them to the people in the pictures!  Now, that was fun!  But do my kids know who these people are? Nope.

I know that in my life, I tend to get caught up in the day to day workings of life.  I have my job, my hobbies, my responsibilities and obligations, and the unending list of chores that need to be done in my daily life.  My brain has its own worries and ideas that need attention.  I have errands to run, and meetings to attend.  I think that pretty much summarizes everyone’s normal days.  But maybe, we all need to learn to just pause. Stop the running.  Breathe.  Take time every day to do something you like.  Take the time to talk to those you love.  Tell them how much you love them.  Listen to them.  Ask about their lives.

I loved listening to the stories my grandparents told of their childhoods.  I loved hearing about the mischief they caused, and what they did for fun.  My maternal grandfather told the best stories about tipping over outhouses where he grew up in Iowa, and playing baseball, April Fools pranks and Halloween shenanigans.  My paternal grandmother awed me with stories of riding horseback through the prairie near Bowman, shooting rattlesnakes.  She and her brother would cut the rattles off the tails to see who got the most.  I heard stories of the Great Depression, stories of hardship and pain, and stories of love and laughter.  I wish I had those stories written down.  Even though they may seem trivial to some, they are a part of  my heritage, my family’s history.  Its like “Little House on the Prairie”, but instead of Ma and Pa, its about grandma and grandpa, and great grandma and great grandpa, some of whom I was born too late to meet.

What stories do you have for your family?  Have you ever thought of writing them down?  Or recording yourself telling the stories?  I know more and more people are doing this nowadays, and its such a great treasure for those who get to listen to those stories. And don’t forget to include the stories that your grandparents told you!  How much fun it was to hear about how great great grandpa and grandma came across the ocean, gave birth to great grandpa on the ship, and kept him hidden until the ship was in the harbor, making him a natural born citizen!  Those crazy Norwegians!

We all hope we have many years ahead to do all the things we want to do.  But there are things we shouldn’t put off, no matter our age.  Tell those people that you love them.  Write down your stories. Forgive those who’ve hurt you and don’t dwell on negative experiences.  Live life for happiness and don’t let the daily grind get you down.  Eat the cake, drink the wine, use your good dishes, and plan that trip.

prayer:

Loving God, thank you for the time that you’ve given us here on this earth.  Help us to use our gifts and resources wisely, to help others, and to glorify you.  Bless us with the knowledge of your love and forgiveness, and help us love and forgive those in our lives as well.  Help us see the goodness in life and beauty all around us, that was created by you.  Help us to see the extraordinary in our everyday ordinary lives.  In your name we pray, Amen.

The First Council of Nicaea was convened by the Roman emperor Constantine the Great upon the recommendations of a synod led by the bishop Hosius of Corduba in the Spring of 325.  In the summer of 325, the bishops of all provinces were summoned to Nicaea, Constantine had invited all 1,800 bishops of the Christian church within the Roman Empire, but a smaller and unknown number attended.  The emperor was present as an overseer and presider, but did not cast any official vote. They debated and fought, and finally produced the Nicene Creed, which we all know today.  To maintain this Creed, the four Gospels that were chosen for the Bible needed to have no rivals.  So all the other sacred writings that hadn’t been chosen became a threat, they believed.  In 367, Bishop Athanasius of Alexandria ordered that the monks destroy all the the writings that hadn’t been chosen.

Luckily for us, those rebel monks decided to preserve these holy writings by burying them in urns in the desert, and hiding them deep in caves in clay jars.  I’m sure you’ve all heard of the Dead Sea Scrolls, over 900 different texts, many of which had not been seen for nearly 2000 years.  It was an amazing discovery that has taken much too long to translate.  These scrolls were not found all at the same time, but over the course of many years, in many different locations in the area of the Dead Sea, beginning in 1947 when the first jars of scrolls were found.

The Nag Hammadi Library, a collection of thirteen ancient codices, or stitched together pages, containing over fifty texts, was discovered in upper Egypt in 1945.  These discoveries have been a wealth of knowledge, and have shown us how different the early branches of Christianity were from what we know now.

But one of the most amazing finds was in 1896 in an antiquities market in Cairo.  A German scholar bought a text written in Coptic, the Egyptian language still used today by Egyptian Christians.  Scholars refer to it as the Berlin Codex, and it is the Gospel of Mary Magdalene.  In time, two more ancient copies of the Gospel of Mary were found, these written in Greek.  Harvard Divinity professor Dr. Karen King explains in her translation of Mary’s gospel, “Because it is unusual for several copies from such early dates to have survived, the attestation of the Gospel of Mary as an early Christian work is unusually strong.”  Basically, this was a very popular book for three copies of it to have survived.

In the book, “Mary Magdalene Revealed”, Meggan Watterson tells of her research and study of the Gospel of Mary over the past 20 years.  There were several other gospels found in the past century as well, and when read together, they tell us a story of Mary, a Disciple of Jesus, whom Jesus loved more than the other disciples.  Even kissing her on the mouth, according to Levi. Peter was a hothead, angry that Mary is the companion of Jesus, and that Jesus has given her special knowledge.  Peter doesn’t like the fact that a woman has been placed above him.

But there have been other men who did not want women in the same category as the apostles.  One of these was Pope Gregory from the 6th Century.  By the time he was done proclaiming his Homily 33 sermon, Mary was a whore, a prostitute, and since she had seven demons expelled from her, he said this proved her sinfulness.

But the Gospel of Mary actually mentions seven powers; darkness, craving, ignorance, craving for death, enslavement to the physical body, the false peace of the flesh, and the compulsion of rage.  These are very similar to the seven deadly Christian sins; pride, greed, envy, gluttony, lust, sloth, and anger.  Perhaps these are actually the seven demons she was able to overcome with the help of Jesus.  And since Jesus had accepted her as a disciple, then who were they to say otherwise? The role of women in that period of time was not one of equality.  Women were seen as property.  Jesus showed them a new way of thinking, that men and women were created to be equals.  That women deserved the same education and acceptance as men.  Jesus showed us in many ways that he judged humans as human, not greater or worse for their gender.  Unfortunately, many pages of Mary’s gospel is missing.  We may never know the rest of the teachings of Christ that Mary had been taught.  Or perhaps, they are still copies of this gospel waiting to be discovered in clay jars in the desert.

Some people try to discredit these other gospels, but not every student learns the same things from a teacher.  Every gospel is the story of that person’s experience with Jesus.  Its their own interpretation of what happened and what was taught.  Just as in any classroom, the experiences of each student are different.  Some students really grasp a new concept, while others need to take the class twice to learn the new material.  And as we read in Luke 9, there were a few disciples that didn’t get it.  They argued over which of them was the greatest while Jesus was headed to his crucifixion.  They just didn’t understand what was going on.

I personally would love to read the entire gospel of Mary, along with the full versions of the other gospels as well. I find it fascinating to read these new experiences from the other people who knew Jesus.   One of the things from Mary’s gospel that really caught my attention is that Jesus told her that there is no sin other than what we as humans create.  I have really thought about that.  Its true, it makes sense.  We humans are the ones causing all the problems, and Mary says we need to look inside ourselves to find our higher power to stop sinning. We need to stop injuring the earth and all the beauty and perfection that God has created.  God sent Jesus to save us, save us from our sins.  So as we continue to learn from these ancient gospels,  I pray that humanity finds a way to stop sinning; to love each other, and to love ourselves as well.  Jesus told Mary that each of us has the Divine inside us.  I pray that we work to find and reveal that Divineness and use it to better the world.  Amen.

*Please be aware that this is my copy to read, and perhaps there are some more parts which should have been cited specifically.