May 10th, 2024

BELOVED BRANCH,

Thursday, May 9 is Ascension Day.  The day we celebrate or fail to celebrate Jesus’ ascension into heaven.  In Jerusalem, Ascension Day is not forgotten.  In fact we went to see the holy site where Jesus’ foot print was left in stone.  The last place his foot is thought to have touched the ground before returning to his Father.  And of course there is a chapel built around it and large grounds for the gathering of many Christians who come together to celebrate.

As you ponder the branch, vine and vinedresser relationship we have with God, include this portion of Rev. Dr. Char Rachuy Cox reflection on Ascension Day.

Every includes
this least celebrated,
most forgotten feast day
       (thank you for those words,

       Barbara Brown Taylor)
That always comes
40 days after
the great exit from the tomb
and 10 days before
the holy winds
and tongue-loosing fire
that made the Word that became flesh
become words once again.

This odd juxtaposition
of the Great and Holy Week
       and the lifting up
       of the raised-up One
opened up the mystery
of the Ascension
for me
in ways that have felt akin
to the tomb bursting open anew.

Here is where my Holy Week-Ascension-ponderings have led.

First,
It is the Enfleshed Word that ascends.
That may seem obvious,
but bear with me.
The Word –
enfleshed in the earthly stuff
of blood and bones,
Risen –
still wounded and scarred –
that same, yet made-new-yet-same body
is
who and what that ascends.
The stuff of earth becomes
a part of not just heaven,
but of the Divine.
It is the Ascension,
therefore,
not the Resurrection,
that completes
the Incarnation.
The Word becomes flesh
and the enfleshed-One –
takes the stuff of earth,
our own flesh,
into the unity that is the Trinity.
That has to say
something
about the goodness
of BODIES.

For me –
mind blown.

Second, and for this,

   I have the artist Albrecht Durer
   to thank.
In his depiction of the Ascension,
most eyes are looking upward
at the disappearing Christ,
yet one figure
is clearly looking
at the ground that had been under

Jesus’ feet –
where it is marked
by the footprints of Jesus.
The Enfleshed Word has left –
AND his footprints are left behind –
Footprints, it seems
that are not
simply scars in the sand
to dissipate on the winds
of that holy hilltop,
but FOOTPRINTS
that we
who are called to be witnesses,
we who are now the Body of Christ on earth -    
           not metaphorically,
           but literally –
          as in, we really are Christ’s body,
          Enfleshing Jesus  -

        Enfleshing
        Love Divine
        In the world today –
we are called to continue to make
the footprints –
         and dare I say
         hand prints
         and heart prints
of Christ on earth.
Begging the question,
of course,
what kind of footprints
        and hand prints
        and heart prints

are we leaving?
Are we –
Are you –
imprinting the world
With DIVINE LOVE?

Mind blown again.

And finally,
Luke tells us
that Jesus led them out –
Out of the city,
Out of their comfort zones
Out beyond
where they were
what they knew
what they understood
what they imagined
what they comprehended.
Out.
Ascension is,
therefore,
about movement –
not just up
– but OUT!
Out –
for those
who first lived this story
and for us.
How are we –
How are you –
Called OUT?

Mind blown one more time.

BODIES
FOOTPRINTS
OUT

There is so much good news in
all of this
that I cannot quite
comprehend
how I missed it
or ignored it
all these years,
probably assuming
that Ascension
is unnecessary,
or inconvenient
or that, like those earlier followers
gaping after the place
where Jesus used to be,
there is nothing to see here.

How wrong I was!
And how captivated
I now am –
by this least celebrated,
most forgotten feast day
that I never used to think about
and now
cannot seem to stop thinking about –
and wondering
and imagining
ways that
the Ascension
can come to life,
not only as a feast day,
but as we seek to
faithfully
be the Body of Christ –
in,
and through,
and with our own bodies –
leaving footprints of Divine Love
Out –
Out beyond where we are
what we know
what we understand
what we imagine
And what we comprehend
so that our lives
as Resurrection people
become lived out
as Ascension people.

More to add to the mix, Ascension people.  Enjoy your time abiding with Jesus.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

May 2nd, 2024

BELOVED BRANCHES,

There is an expression that has been around for a long time, perhaps you have heard it or even used the phrase.  “It’s to die for.”  Usually this is pulled out when we want to describe something of decadence, richness, and luxury.  It is to die for because deep down we know that if we have too much of whatever it is, it will lead to death as was the case for the little lion cub, Simba in The Lion King.   Simba asks his Uncle Scar whether he will like the surprise uncle is getting him. Uncle Scar replies, “It’s to die for!” 

The opposite, “It’s to live for!” does not roll off the tongue with the same enthusiasm or drive as “It’s to die for!”  It fails to carry the risk of stepping close to death yet surviving.  Could this be the reason we have so much more ritual around the season of Lent compared to the season of Easter?  In the season of Lent we take the “It’s to die for!” approach with Jesus moving toward the suffering and death on the cross and we give up things and we add more worship and offerings.  The season of Easter challenges us to move through death and trust what it is we have to live for.  But our feasting and celebratory rituals of Easter do not carry the same gusto or joy.

We’ve got our work cut out for us. I try to change up the treat tray for children’s sermons.  We will have our cantate on The Day of Pentecost, May 19 and as well as a guest preacher.  More information will come next week.  We have so much to live for how can we fail to celebrate and be full of joy? Anybody want a “Sunkist” orange soda to remind you of how we have been “sonkisted”?  I experienced such delight with our intergenerational time of learning and fellowship with our Generosity Project hosted by our Stewardship Committee. And this week we will celebrate with Mary Wanek as she retires from serving

children and looks forward to new life in retirement.  I continue to wear the white stole and chasuble from Jerusalem.  I slip it on right before Holy Communion and I feel all dressed up for the special occasion of the simple feast of bread and wine that Jesus has given to us.  What do you do to enter into this season of great joy and delight?

Our refrain to the empty tomb is what we have to live for.  Our refrain to the cross dressed in white linens is what we have to live for.  Our refrain of repentance and forgiveness is what we have to live for.  God the good gardener tends to us, and we have something very precious to live for.

In this Easter season, John’s gospel invites us into the metaphor of the last of the seven of Jesus’ “I AM” statements and the only one we are given a part in.  God is the vinedresser. Jesus is the vine, and we are the branch.  This picture is an astonishingly intertwined and intimate relationship.  This is what is to die for and to live for.  I hope you will play around with this metaphor to nurture you in this celebratory season of Easter as we bear witness to both what it is to die for and what it is to live for as Jesus paves the way forward for us.  We live for Jesus and without Jesus we can do nothing and with Jesus the potential and possibilities are endless. 

We are here today, these many centuries later because of the strength of the vine and branch and the care of the vinedresser.  We branches are connected to the true vine and as we continue into John 15, Jesus further defines the relationship between the vine and the branch.  It is not a servant relationship but a friendship with great love coursing through veins of this relationship.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

April 25th, 2024

GREETINGS TO GOD’S IMAGE BEARERS,

In John’s gospel there are 7 times Jesus uses “I Am” statements.    

Here are the “I am” statements and with a frame of reference for context:

After the feeding of the 5000, Jesus says, “I am the bread of life” (6:35);

After the woman is not condemned for adultery, Jesus says, “I am the light of the world (8:12);

After the blind man is healed, Jesus says, “I am the door (10:7), and “I am the good shepherd.” (10:11, 14);

Before Jesus calls Lazarus out of the tomb, he says, “I am the resurrection and the life (11:25);

And while Jesus bids his disciples farewell, preparing them for the days ahead, he says, “I am

the way the truth and the life (14:6) and I am the true vine” (15:1). 

It is only in this last “I am” statement where Jesus also says, “you are the branches”.  In all the others the relationship is assumed or we are invited into.

We are the ones who eat the life sustaining bread and we are given life.

We are the ones who flourish in Jesus' light.

We are the ones who pass through the threshold of the door in abundant life.

We are the sheep who follow the good shepherd.

We are the ones raised to life again and anew because Jesus is the resurrection and the life.

We are the ones who follow Jesus' way, truth and life, a way leading through suffering, death, resurrection and ascension.

But in this I am statement, Jesus tells us clearly that we are branches.  We are the branches connected to Jesus, the vine.  This is plural.  Not I am the branch.  We are the branch.  The “you” throughout this text is all plural.   I am not a branch but we are the branch and we are intimately connected to Jesus the vine.  This is how Jesus thinks of his disciples.  This is how Jesus comforts and prepares his disciples.  This is the risen Christ and Christ’s relationship with us.  This is how connected Jesus is to us and if that’s not enough, God is the good gardener that tends to the vines and branches.  God is the master gardener who knows what he is doing and knows how to take care of us.  God knows what will bring us life and what will help us to grow tending to our relationship with Jesus as we abide all together.

Hold this intimate image before yourselves as you read John 15:1-8 trusting Jesus and trusting God so that we can hear these words of grace as we also hear the words of pruning, bearing fruit and branches being thrown into the fire.  Words heard as law.  We trust that God has a hold on us and that hold brings us through all the pruning, helping us bear fruit and God is glorified. 

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

April 19th, 2023

BELOVED PEOPLE OF GOD,

I think I’ve been “Sunkist” in response to sharing my eclipse story as I found a 6 pack of Orange Sunkist soda on my chair in the sanctuary.  At first, I thought it was for the acolyte, but it remained and I’m still not sure who it is from and what the intention is of the mysterious appearing of the six pack of pop.  It is a mystery, a mystery that I will understand to be a clever treat from the people of puns.  It took some planting of seeds from Gretchen Vigil who told me the one about a son who asks his father to explain the solar eclipse and the father replied, “No sun.”  And my mind was opened not necessarily to understand scripture but rather to wonder at the mystery gift giver and think that my eclipse experience was “sunkisted”.  I will take it as a delightful breath of the playful spirit among us until someone confesses or solves the mystery.

How are you seeing the delightful breath of the Holy Spirit play in your neck of the woods?  Are you smelling the signs of Spring in the blooming flowers and trees?  Hopefully you don’t have allergies and if you do, hopefully the play of the Holy Spirit draws your attention in another direction to see the signs of resurrection abound.  Or the sneezing and watery eyes are a fierce reminder of the power of the Holy Spirit to wrestle in our lives and keep us up all night. 

We want the gentle playful breath of the Spirit, the sunkisted one rather than the wild, mysterious and out of control one.  The Holy Spirit that Jesus breathes into the disciples helps them to reach out and see more, to see life beyond death, to see life anew.  We see the turmoil of fear and joy; of disbelief and belief as Jesus invites the disciples into the new reality of resurrection.  It is hard to trust Jesus and God’s way for us and creation.  God, our painstaking planner who sticks with us, trying all sorts of maneuvers to nurture in us a living relationship beyond anything we know.  God who uses puns and playfulness also uses wilderness and death to get our attention, hoping we will take another look and see more of what God is up to in our lives. 

And yet God is more than we can imagine or possibly know and understand or as one of our Advent hymns puts it in reference to God’s gentle grace, unexpected and mysterious.  The unexpected and mysterious appearance of a six pack of orange Sunkist on my chair brings a smile and another reflection on the sun, moon and earth aligning and getting to be a part of the experience of God’s magnificent and marvelous masterpiece always unfolding in our lives.  What a great treasure we have in God’s love lived out with us.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

April 12th, 2024

BELOVED PEOPLE OF GOD,

It was my husband’s birthday on Monday, April 8 and so about a month ago, I wondered if he wanted to go on a road trip to see the total eclipse of the sun for his birthday and soon plans were underway.  We left Sunday afternoon, stayed just south of St. Louis and drove on Monday to Cape Girardeau, Missouri.

The earth, the moon, and the sun all in alignment for a brief moment in time and what was familiar, and routine changed dramatically.  Watching with special glasses allowed us to see what we couldn’t see on our own, as the moon moved between us and the sun.  We would swap back and forth between gazing up and looking around as the earth, moon and sun moved and light changed to that weird kind of translucent green before a storm.

But when the moon was right in front of the sun, we could look at the sun and see the corona.  We saw the sun in a new and very different way and it changed our familiar surroundings and our bearings; the temperature dropped, the sounds of crickets replaced the chirping birds, the blues of the horizon all the same no matter what direction we looked, dawn and dusk appearing simultaneously and two planets made their appearance as well. 

There was that moment of awe at the power and magnificence of our sun and moon and planet united in this way and spilling over into our  environment. God’s creativity in motion on a huge scale. And I got to see it but more than just see, I got to experience it. It was amazing and weird and strange. It was a holy moment.

Of course I am at a loss for words and pictures don’t do it justice but trying to capture what cannot be captured is a worthwhile endeavor no matter how clumsily I do it.  It is what we, people of faith, try to do all the time when we share our faith in what God is up to among us.  We keep at it struggling to find the words, the metaphors, the pictures to give shape to God’s mysterious presence and activity.

Experiencing the eclipse helps me understand Peter’s address to the people in Acts 3 when he says, “why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we had made him walk?” And Jesus’ consistent words of peace to his disciples as he shows himself risen from the dead.  “Have you anything here to eat?”  Jesus asks.  Calling them into something they recognize like eating so that they can see and experience more of Jesus as they wrestle with their disbelief and belief, trying to trust the joy of the moment and the presence of Jesus. 

They are our witnesses that have spoken to us over the years.  They are like the special eyewear that protects our eyes while allowing us to see what we can’t see on our own.  And we are witnesses to each other as we move with each other, and God’s word and the Holy Spirit works with and among us to help us see Jesus.  We are witnesses of these things – God’s creativity in motion among us.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack