Sermons

The Rev. Joseph Farnes

All Saints, Boise

Easter 6C

          From the reading from Acts: “During the night Paul had a vision: there stood a man of Macedonia pleading with him and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” When he had seen the vision, we immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia, being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them.”

          During this Easter season, we read from the book of Acts and the Gospels about how the Gospel spreads like wildfire. On Easter Day, it’s Mary Magdalene alone taking back the message, “I have seen the risen Lord!” The next week the circle keeps expanding: the rest of the apostles, groups of disciples in Jerusalem, and more. Then we see how a persecutor of the church, Saul, has a vision and changes his ways and becomes Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles. That’s how powerful the Gospel message is! And it keeps going outward.

          For many centuries after, there was a triumphalism in this message. “See? We’re right! We’re popular! We’re the ones with the truth!” Then with the Roman Empire making Christianity the official religion, where the Empire was, so too was Christianity. The mix of military and Christianity would persist throughout the ages – through the Crusades, through the explorers who took the Gospel along with swords and guns as they colonized and divvied up wide swaths of the world, stealing the land, resources, and rights away from the inhabitants who were first there.

          We now recognize how much that mix of power and the Gospel undermined the proclamation of the Gospel. The good and holy name of Jesus was defamed when colonizing forces denied the humanity and dignity of others – since the Gospel proclaims that God loved the world so much that Jesus Christ took on our human nature that we might be joined with God forever, then anything that denies that human dignity is a denial of the love of Jesus for all people.

          And so we changed our way of thinking. We no longer sing “Onward Christian soldiers” like we’re parading for war to convert others. We call people to the banquet of the Eucharist, we call people to the work of the Kingdom of God, we call people to the way of the love of Jesus Christ. It is an invitation, not a military campaign nor an advertising campaign.

          We forget, though, how much people really do want to hear the Gospel, the Gospel as it really is. There are people longing to hear this Good News. They call out like the Macedonian in Paul’s dream that we read in Acts: “Come to us, and help us.” People want the Gospel. They know, deep down, it means something holy, something transformative and loving.

          People want to hear the Good News of God’s love. The world around us feels so unloving so often. People argue with strangers on the internet, and people are strangers to their neighbors and communities. People don’t know what kind of greeting they’ll get if they go to a neighbor’s door – will it be a frosty reception through a security camera, or worse? People chatter on neighborhood apps about what they see peering out their front windows – is it a threat, or just a child or teen being a nuisance by existing? So how do we proclaim God’s love when humans seem so focused on closing off from one another?

          People want to hear the Good News of Jesus. People have long heard the “turn or burn” message that some people insisted the Gospel was – either turn and accept Jesus the way we accept Jesus, or you’re going to go to hell forever at the hands of a loving God. A monstrous message if I’ve ever heard one. “Love me or I’ll send you to hell” is hardly an invitation to love – and anyone who has read the Old Testament knows how much God keeps trying again and again to heal those who have rejected his love, and anyone who has read the New Testament knows how Jesus seeks out the wayward and the lost to lead them to the way we’re meant to be: to love God, and to love our neighbor.

People deserve to hear that the Gospel means new life now, and new life forever. They deserve to hear that the Gospel means loving God now and loving our neighbor as ourselves. The Gospel means caring for those in need and having a tender heart brimming and burning with God’s love – to let our hearts become like God’s heart. And God is loving, God is just, God is merciful.

If you read the Bible and listen to it, you’ll hear that message. If you read the early church fathers and mothers, you’ll hear that message. Christian theologians and mystics have proclaimed that very Gospel. This isn’t some new-fangled idea of the Gospel. It’s the root.

          Since this is what the Gospel is, then why don’t we share it?  We have all sorts of barriers we set up in ourselves for sharing it. What is it that holds you back from sharing Jesus and the Gospel with others? What is it that holds you back from talking about matters of the spirit with others?

          People hunger for deeper spiritual life. People hunger for community to talk about holy things, to grow in love and wisdom, to learn more about themselves and to be transformed by God. What is it that holds us back from sharing the Good News of all the good we find in Jesus?

          The people around us in Boise and the Treasure Valley want to hear this Good News. They want to hear the Gospel. We think that people know about the Episcopal Church and just aren’t interested – I got a note from a neighbor here on the Bench who was in awe of the Presiding Bishop’s stance on immigration, grateful for a moral voice when human lives are treated so callously. I’ve heard from folks grateful for Bishop Budde from Washington DC asking for mercy for immigrants and LGBT folks – Mercy is a core virtue of God, so mercy is a core virtue for us Christians! People want to hear Christians speaking the Gospel. People want to see Christians living the Gospel. People want to know that there are Christians who really do believe what Jesus taught and did, and who try their hardest to live it out and who admit when they stumble and who get back up and try again.           The world wants to hear the Gospel – and the world wants Christians on fire with God’s love. Will we proclaim the Gospel, and will we let the Gospel ignite our hearts with God’s love?

Fifth Sunday of Easter

Christina Cernansky

I speak to you in the name of Source, Word, God, and mother of us all. 

It was a cold, wintry night, and the mother of a teenage son was worried because he hadn’t checked in a while. She called his cell phone and the dorm room TA. Hours turned into days, and then the phone rang. It was the county jail letting her know that her son had gone on a spree, leaving a path of destruction. The police officer read out a long list of misdemeanors and felonies to her.  

Months passed, and this mother tried to get answers, tried talking to her son, but he had no rights because he was considered a violent felon who was awaiting a court date. He had not calmed down from whatever might be happening, and the days passed. She was embarrassed to tell anyone at her place of work, her church….her son was in jail for doing things that she had no idea he was capable of doing. 

And then, on a spring day, the phone rang.  Her son had finally seen a psychiatrist and was diagnosed with schizophrenia. She had no idea what that was or what was happening. He was placed on medication, became lucid, and was deemed safe to come out of solitary confinement. This mother was able to speak with her son for the first time in months.  He had no idea what had happened.  He remembered leaving school, and that was the last memory. 

Why am I talking to you today about this family?  Because these families are our neighbors. In today’s Gospel, we hear the infamous “New Commandments speech. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, we know what this is all about, right? Love God, love our neighbor.  We get it already….or do we?  For the sake of this sermon, I aggregated and mixed up some of the storylines of the families I have worked with, but I know many more that I could share.  

May is mental health awareness month, and I wanted to share stories that have been near and dear to my heart. The story is one of hundreds of stories that impact our community.  How can we, as All Saints, love our neighbors?  

A couple of weeks ago, I had the honor of hearing Bishop Rowe speak to a group of Lutheran and Episcopal Chaplains. He said that we don’t need to make our tent bigger; we need to ensure the tent’s center is marginalized, as Jesus taught us. The marginalized were at the center of Jesus’ ministry. Think about that, the most marginalized of society, those on the edge of society, those on the fringe.  Jesus taught us to center ourselves, our love, on those on the outskirts of society.  How does that translate to the mental health needs of the community? 

Mental health is near and dear to my heart. August will be my tenth anniversary of living in Idaho.  When I arrived, I was struggling with my own mental health. My best friend had died by suicide a year prior, and I was searching for my meaning in life. It was then, within my first two months living in Idaho, that I was introduced to an organization called NAMI as well as the Episcopal Church. Follow me here on a journey.   NAMI stands for National Alliance for Mental Illness. They provide support, education, and advocate for the mental health needs of those with a diagnosis and their loved ones who support them.  

Along with my volunteering with NAMI, I started attending St. Thomas’ in Sun Valley, their priest at the time, like Fr. Joseph, had clinical training in mental health. Combined with the Holy Spirit, I started rebuilding my relationship with God, Learning about mental wellness, and my calling to ministry.  God willing, I live in the sunlight of the spirit, not in the darkness of stigma, and   I am now over 9 years sober. 

My friend’s story and the families of NAMI’s stories are not unique. One in five adults and one in four children will be faced with a mental health diagnosis. Complete transparency: I sit on the board of NAMI Idaho. We have a saying: whether you like it or not, or want to admit it or not, you will be faced with a mental health challenge in your lifetime.

One common lament that I hear from families is that they feel so alone & isolated; there is a stigma associated with these incidents, with these diagnosis.  A casserole is delivered when your loved one is in the hospital or getting treatment for a medical ailment.  They don’t receive the same treatment if their loved one is in a mental health hold or in jail. I’m not downplaying our neighbors who go through the trials and tribulations of cancer diagnosis, treatments, complicated surgeries, or broken bones.  We are asked to show up for our neighbors and we are really good at reaching out during those times, but again…to reiterate Bishop Rowe’s point, how are we focusing on the most marginalized? 

How can we love those neighbors who might need support? What does loving your neighbor mean when someone is dripping with melancholy, as they described Abraham Lincoln, or a so-called bipolar episode of Winston Churchill?  We know some of the Saints also struggled with mental health and that didn’t block their faith.  

Again, how can we show our love and compassion to someone in a mental health crisis, such as what we saw with Britney Spears? 

How do we show up when we want to make small talk about public incidents, or when we forget to pray for those struggling during a mental health crisis? How can we support those who are on the fringe, on the edges of society? 

All Saints has been deep in this work for over 20 years with the Friendship Clinic. It has also opened its doors to NAMI Idaho and now rents space and hosts support groups. There are brochures in the common area that encourage you to read up on the free services they provide to the community. And you have opened your doors to 12-step recovery groups. That’s huge, amazing. Think of the ripple effect of those ministries in the Treasure Valley! 

I am going to kindly ask us to explore a little deeper.  We are reminded that we are made in the image of God. We are asked to love our neighbors because we are all God’s children. Jesus set us free because he laid down his life for us to follow and lead in his way of love.  He liberated us to set our focus on our ministry to those most marginalized. We need not fear, as this is what we are asked to do as Christians: step into that tent, raise it up, and shine our light so bright that others living in the shadows of despair will be able to “see”  the way of love.  How can we show radical hospitality, allow space for a wave of love over the most vulnerable, not just for Mental Health Awareness month, but every day, as Jesus commanded us to do at that last supper? 

The Rev. Joseph Farnes

All Saints, Boise

Easter 4C

          Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me.” 

          In a day and age when we hear many, many voices, it might feel harder to discern that voice. Even within the church, the voice of Jesus has been hard to hear at times – but I give thanks that the Episcopal tradition has put the Bible, and especially the Gospels, at the heart of our liturgy so that at least we would hear that.

          In the history of Christianity, so often the voice of Jesus has gone unheard. In some centuries, blood was spilled and fires lit up the sky to try to purge the wrong kind of believers. In some centuries, blood was spilled and arms and legs were put in shackles to try to prove that the church and its European lords were the only force of civilization. In some centuries, no blood was spilled directly, but spiritual blood was spilled as the church became a bloodless social club for the “right” kind of people, and they belonged to a club that promised a beautiful salvation with a minimum of effort.

          Throughout the centuries, the voice of Jesus has called us – and those who responded we have called “saints”. They heard, they listened, they followed. And if we weren’t listening to the voice of Jesus, at least we might hear the voice of Jesus filtered through the voices of the saints and the voice of Jesus demonstrated in their lives.

          And, if we are without a saint whose life and witness make it abundantly clear they are following Jesus, we turn to our leaders, lay and clergy, to help us to listen for the voice of Jesus. Through their teaching, sermons, leadership, and compassion, we hope to hear the voice of Jesus speaking through them, even if it is soft and subtle.

          But still we are faced with so many voices around us. In every age, and especially in this one, it is easy to listen to the voice we want to hear, the voice that confirms what we want to think, the voice we want to be the voice of Jesus.

          We want the voice that aligns with our political views to be the voice of Jesus.

          We want the voice that aligns with our liturgical preferences to be the voice of Jesus.

          We want the voice that aligns with our socio-economic status to be the voice of Jesus.

          This reality has made it even harder to be a preacher, pastor, and priest for me and other clergy colleagues. As the rhetoric shifts, some words become buzzwords and landmines. Love, mercy, and empathy suddenly have a connotation beyond their Biblical meaning, and the pressure is on. To be a pastor is an impossible task – how are we to be the “all things to all people” that some expect, with contradictory expectations? And to be a preacher – how do we preach the Gospel when what people assume the Gospel means may not align with what is preached?

          Is the Gospel a self-help message about living a good life? Is the Gospel a comfortable message about an eternal life filled with family and fluffy clouds? Is the Gospel about building a “family values” society and hearkening to “good old days”? Or is the Gospel far more than that? And what if the Gospel as the Bible and tradition tell us is more demanding than what we want to give?

          In years past, I’ve always been mindful of trying to focus on the logic of the Gospel in how I preach. Instead of telling people which side of an issue they should be on like politically-focused pastors, I want to look at issues and concerns Biblically, to think through how our Scriptures, our tradition, and our thinking brains can sort through complexities. Any issue is far more complicated than our politics will ever make it out to be, and a Christian is not called to commit themselves to a party; we are called to follow Christ, to hear his voice. We have to discern, we have to ruminate, we have to contemplate our way into hearing his voice better. It’s deeply spiritual work to write a sermon, and it’s deeply spiritual work to listen to a sermon and to discern what it might mean beyond, “Oooh, I like that!” and “Hm.”

          Some pastors love the opportunity to preach in a way that tells people what to vote, what to do. Some shepherds walk into the pulpit with confidence that there is no difference between their voice and the voice of Jesus. Some shepherds have no qualms about guilting and shaming and raging in their sermons and writings.

          And from the other direction, some folks would enjoy sermons that focused on our rightness versus others’ wrongness. Some would want an uplifting sermon that tells us that we’re on the correct side by speaking from the pulpit what we already think. Some would want to just be told what to do and what to think.

          But the goal of a sermon is not to take the difficulties of the Bible and the challenges of being a Christian and make them easy; the goal of a sermon is to open up the Bible, to look around the world and to open our hearts to hear the voice of Jesus. That is hard. And it’s even harder when everything that is said also gets filtered through layers of assumptions and experiences. We pick who we trust, if they fit into our worldview.

Let’s see those layers at work. Already in the last few days with the election of a new pope, commentators have been poring over every single thing he’s written to try to predict what kind of pope he will be. Is he a leftist, woke, Marxist pope (yes, there are some commentators already calling him that), is he a centrist, is he secretly a conservative because he’s an American Catholic who served as a missionary?

          You tell me what kind of pope you think this is:

“The Church has a responsibility towards creation and she must assert this responsibility in the public sphere. In so doing, she must defend not only earth, water and air as gifts of creation that belong to everyone. She must above all protect mankind from self-destruction. There is need for what might be called a human ecology, correctly understood. The deterioration of nature is in fact closely connected to the culture that shapes human coexistence: when “human ecology” is respected within society, environmental ecology also benefits. Just as human virtues are interrelated, such that the weakening of one places others at risk, so the ecological system is based on respect for a plan that affects both the health of society and its good relationship with nature.” (Caritas in Veritate)

So themes of environmentalism, human relationships, a working “human ecology” where the parts of the world work together for mutual flourishing. I can tell you that the rest of the document I’m quoting from also supports labor unions and criticizes modern corporations for prioritizing only shareholder value and not the needs of communities and workers. So what kind of pope would write that? 

A trick question! It wasn’t the new pope, Leo XIV, that wrote it. And you might think because the environmentalism that it was Pope Francis. No, it was the “conservative” Benedict XVI that wrote it. Surprise! But our world wants to split up things into nice, neat ideological brackets. And those ideological brackets mark who we trust and who we do not trust, and that trust is an easy thing to lose.

          When we Christians try to follow the voice of Jesus, we should go deeper in our discernment. Jesus did not come to bring us pithy slogans and easy answers; Jesus’ favorite method of teaching was the parable, a short story that calls us to pray and contemplate many layers. Jesus gave us the Beatitudes, the Sermon on the Mount, the Summary of the Law, and then he gave us the fullness of his life, death, and resurrection. Discerning the voice of Jesus takes us back to the Gospel stories, takes us to the work of community, and it takes us to our own lives, the world around us to ask where Jesus calls us.

          In the week ahead, notice what Jesus is saying to you. Do you hear his voice? What does it sound like, what does it feel like to hear the voice of your good shepherd? Listen to the voice of Jesus, wherever he speaks. But always be listening for Jesus’ voice. Amen.

Fr. David Wettstein

All Saints Church

Acts 9.1-6, Psalm 30, John 21.1-19

Places You Would Not Choose

The journey with God is never, never a straight line. When reading the stories of saints and folks like you and me, no one wakes up one morning and says I am going to live a saintly life until the day I die. There are myriads of missteps, bad decisions and outright sin, mixed with all that makes us who we are and desire to be; that leads us to God. Some of the path with God we choose and gets baptized along the way. Some comes to us out of grace filled longing, the spirit breathing with-in us. And some out of loss. It is generally loss that has the deepest lessons, drawing us to God.

Two of the most well-known people of our Christian faith are Paul and Peter, part of whose stories were read this morning. These two stories have a common thread of humility, surrender, acceptance to what has come and will come in life.

The recounting of Paul’s story is told to give us the basic story of Paul’s conversion, his coming to know God in Christ. For the most part Paul is known as a missionary church planter, whose fire and boldness win souls and creates enemies. Often overlooked is the initial encounter with God, he was struck blind “led by the hand, and brought to Damascus.” In my own estimation this is probably how God could get through to Paul – giving him some humility.

If we have not been struck down and made blind, some of us can tell stories of humility and being led by the hand in coming to know God more fully like Paul. We may have had a new call in our life but we had to wait until the time had dropped the scales from our eyes. We did not choose this way of conversion, there is nothing heroic, from our own strength and faith, but God worked through what was at hand in our lives to reveal in us more of the divine image planted in us at birth.

This part of the spiritual life is called kenosis, emptying out of all our “stuff” – assumed strength, position, virtues, whatever – RC Fr. Thomas Keating calls this the “false self.” This false self has a need for power and control which prevents God from working through us. Every once in a while we have our Damascus Road experience, conversion through kenosis, emptying out, making room for God.

Read John 21.18-19

• 153 fish (v.11); according to Jerome, the Greek zoologists said there were 153 kinds of fish – using this number is pointing to the universality of Christ’s call.

If you don’t have the Damascus Road conversion in your life an alternative to such sudden and dramatic change is life itself. Sometimes the simple living of year after year converts us and changes us, and changes us again.

Peter is given by Christ some vision into the future, as they finished breakfast. The bold and cowardly disciple is restored from his denial of Jesus before the crucifixion with the three-fold questioning of feeding and tending sheep (see John 18.25-27). There is your life’s work, day in and day out. Chop the wood and carry water.

When you are old Peter, you won’t have any say and control, you will have to let go of yourself. You won’t be able to dress yourself. Yet in this empty, seemingly weak position “he (Peter)would glorify God.”

Again the lesson comes around, to receive things as they are and let them teach us. Out mistakes, are what Richard Rohr calls falling upward. We grow sometimes by no other way. We fear grief and loss as a diminishment of who we are, we may loose our security and esteem with those we love and want respect from. In our losses we follow Christ to the cross, he who seemed to have lost everything but gave us freedom over all powerful death. That is the power that does not diminish others, take, or oppress but sets others free.

• Crucifix or a plain cross
• Legend of Peter’s death in Rome as a witness to Christ

At the beginning, at the end and places in between we are called. Not to be successful, powerful, rich or famous. Rather time makes us students, prophets and beggars for God’s spirit in our lives.

“Hear O Lord, and have mercy upon me, O Lord be my helper.” Psalm 30.11 This life with God is not a straight line, if it were, I could package this all up and sell for a few hundred bucks and we could be done with it. To follow, to let go of our glittering image of ourselves, and open our eyes to what is before us and our minds and hearts to God in part this is a call to a holy life.

The Rev. Joseph Farnes

All Saints, Boise

Easter 2, Year C

          Alleluia, Christ is risen!

          On this second Sunday of Easter, Day 8 of the Easter season, we always read this story of the disciples’ encounter with the Risen Christ and poor Thomas. Every year. Every single year.

          For the longest time, the preaching focus has been on how we, who have not seen the Risen Christ, may come to belief. Thomas the “Doubter” was a stand-in for us. We need to have faith, we need to trust in the resurrection. Makes sense. Sometimes we need that nudge. We want to intellectualize what is ultimately a work of the soul. We want 100% certainty what cannot be definitively and perfectly proved.

          Then there came a shift. Wisely we perceived that the over-emphasis on “Doubting Thomas” then downplayed the important role of asking questions. Especially for us Episcopalians, we like questions. We’re brought together to a common table even if we are not 100% of the same mind. Thomas asks questions that any of us would ask. He is our stand-in – he is a faithful disciple who uses his brain and his senses to pursue the truth in Jesus Christ.

          And in other years, there was another thing that we noticed: that Thomas wasn’t present when Jesus made his presence known the first time to the disciples. Thomas was away from home, out of the office. We don’t know why – was he doing the shopping, was he visiting home? But he just wasn’t there. How lonely that would feel, to come back and be told that Jesus had returned when you were not there. It would feel isolating. No wonder Thomas would doubt – why would Jesus leave him out like this? Must have been some other explanation. But Jesus returns, and brings Thomas back into the fold. We, too, might feel left out, but Jesus will bring us back in and re-build the beloved community gathered in his name.

          And we keep coming back to this text. What more can we wring out of this text?

          First, that’s not quite the right way to think about it. The texts of the Bible are not damp sponges soaked in spiritual knowledge that we just have to wring out to get what we need from them. Or perhaps a different metaphor: the Bible is not an orange that we’re going to squeeze the juice out of and then discard. We see what happens when people think that they’ve squeezed all the knowledge out of the Bible.

          Each time we read the books of the Bible it’s a living encounter. None of us are the exact same person we were a year ago – so we’re different people reading the same text. The world around us is a different place – so we have a different context as we read the same text. Each of us is bringing new knowledge, new concerns, new worries and thoughts to the same text. We read it with new eyes and a new heart and a new spirit …  so we keep reading the Bible.

          Let’s think of our context: there has been such chaos and upheaval politically so far this year. There is fear about people losing their jobs for no reason other than somebody decided that all the important functions of the federal government needed to be slashed and burned with all the confidence of a 1980’s movie corporate villain.

          There is widespread fear about our constitutional order, about the independence of the judiciary and the separation of powers, about wide-sweeping actions targeting immigrants and dissenters and people exercising their human and civil rights.

          Fear is all around. And, so too, were these early disciples afraid. They had locked themselves away out of fear of the authorities. They locked the door. They huddled. They stared at the door out of fear of hearing footsteps and a knock.

          Fear is a powerful emotion. It is not just in the heart. Fear runs through our bodies and brains. Fear can pull our brain and body into fight-or-flight-or-freeze. Fear brings more parts of our nervous system online. Fear isn’t an abstract concept; fear shows up in our flesh.

          So where are you these days? Are you afraid about things going on in the world? Are you afraid for your work, or your family? Where do you feel this fear in your body? What do you do – do you read the news all the time, hoping for safety in awareness? Do you find yourself stuck in your brain, thinking all sorts of “What ifs”? Do you feel powerless, angry?

          When we feel fear, we want connection – hence why the disciples were huddled together. We want safety in numbers. So what a blessing, then, as a church community when we can share our blessings and also our fears. When we are fearful, or overwhelmed, we gather with others. We’re a social species. Safety in numbers, we’re not by ourselves. Our mirror neurons in our brain turn the dial up or down on our nervous system based on what we see in others. So if someone in the group can be that non-anxious, non-fearful presence of peace, maybe the fear dial will turn down from panic.

          But as we see in our Gospel story, the disciples get the peace of Christ in that first week, that day when Thomas was not in the house. The following week, where are they? They’re still in the house.

          The Bible translation today is a little misleading – it sounds like one week the doors were locked and the next they were just shut; nope, it’s the same word in Greek, κεκλεισμένων. The doors were locked the first week, and the doors were locked the second. The disciples were still afraid, even those disciples who had received the gift of Jesus’s peace and the gift of the Spirit.

           Fear is powerful. Fear is a tight knot that takes time to be untied and undone. It takes patience and gentleness, it takes deep spirit and courage. It’s not a switch that can just be flipped off. For us as Christians, it’s not a matter of “believe harder” or “have stronger faith” – it’s ongoing gathering in prayer, it’s continual prayer, it’s sharing in the sacraments and sharing the peace of the Holy Spirit.

          We’re in a time of great fear and uncertainty. We might feel that fear deep inside our hearts and minds and bodies. We know that there are many out in the world who are also afraid, and alone. We gather to share our fear, to share the gift of God’s peace in the midst of fear. It takes doing it again and again. We let God untie the knot of fear that keeps us bound so that we may be heralds of the resurrection and agents of God’s love.

          See how the Holy Spirit helped us today in reading a Gospel passage that gets read every year on this second Sunday of Easter. The story is familiar, and God still speaks to us through this story. God speaks to our fear and worry, God speaks to our need for community, God pours out the gift of the Spirit upon us who gather in the name of the risen Christ in strange and uncertain times.  We are gathered together to love one another, to support one another, and to love God who supports us all our days. Amen.