Good News 

All humans need good news to bring hope into hearts and minds. The Greek word for good news is evangelion, and those who bring it are evangelists. The English word for good news is gospel. 

Order of Service - Script 

for Sunday  May 29, 2022: 

NIUU, Jeanie Donaldson, Pastor Fred 

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Welcome and Announcements: 

(from Tracey and Fred) 

Where do we go from here? 

  NIUU Semi-Annual Meeting

   The time has come for us to re-envision how we manage all that is NIUU. How we meet, how we organize, and we move forward. Please join us for our semi-annual meeting on June 12th at 10:30am on Zoom or in person at the Harding Center. We will not be having a Sunday Service prior to this meeting as it will require our full attention and participation. The NIUU board requests that you consider the questions: Where do we go from here? What is required of us as a UU congregation? What does it mean to you to be a member of this beloved community? How do we continue to seek truth in love and support for one another? Together we will explore these questions and share our unique perspectives. 

Come into this circle of love and compassion,

Come into this community where we can dream and

Believe in those dreams—

Welcome to North Idaho Unitarian Universalists where we accept, we support, we transform:  Ourselves, Our Community. Our world.   

Offering Information 

Charity of the Month:

Family Promise of North Idaho

"Family Promise of North Idaho is an affiliate of 

Family Promise® which was created in 1986 in response to the growing need to provide shelter, meals, and comprehensive support to families without homes. We are a nonsectarian charity and we welcome all clients who meet our eligibility and admission requirements. Our staff and board of trustees work together with our interfaith and community partners to extend support to the homeless families in North Idaho."

NIUU

P.O. Box 221

CDA ID 83816

Lighting the Chalice and Opening Words: ­­­

Forged in the Fire of Our Coming Together

By Gretchen Haley

We are all connected; stronger together; love's hands in the world; called to create justice; responsible for one another and the Earth.

What's going to happen?

Will everything be ok?

What can I do?

In these days we find ourselves, too often,

Stuck with these questions on repeat:

What's going to happen? / Will everything be ok? /What can I do?

We grasp at signs and markers, articles of news and analysis,

Facebook memes and forwarded emails

As if the new zodiac

Capable of forecasting all that life may yet bring our way

As if we could prepare

As if life had ever made any promises of making sense, or turning out the way we'd thought

As if we are not also actors in this still unfolding story

For this hour we gather

To surrender to the mystery

To release ourselves from the needing to know

The yearning to have it all already figured out

And also the burden of believing we either have all the control, or none

Here in our song and our silence

Our stories and our sharing

We make space for a new breath, a new healing, a new possibility

To take root

That is courage

forged in the fire of our coming together

and felt in the spirit that comes alive in this act of faith:

that we believe still, a new world is possible

That we are creating it, already, here, and now

Come, let us worship together.

Hymn #346: “Come, Sing a Song with Me” 

Covenant: 

Love is the spirit of this church, and service its law

This is our great covenant:

To dwell together in peace,

To seek truth in love,

And to help one another. 

Greeting each other  (Those present in person can leave our seats for this, if we wish.) 

Joys and Concerns (with lighting of candles of caring) 

Story: 

A Day At The Lawn

By Erik Walker Wikstrom

Once upon a time there was a girl named Wendy. She loved grass. What can I say? She loved grass—she loved the feel of it between her toes; she loved the smell of it when it was freshly mown; she loved its bright green color. Wendy loved grass more than just about anything.

One day her family decided to go to the beach. Wendy wasn’t too sure about it. “Come on,” said her older brother, “we can go swimming.” “And we can collect rocks and shells together,” said her mom.” “And you can bury me in the sand,” said her dad. It sounded like fun, so they all piled into the car, and off they went.

When they got to the beach it sure looked great. Like nothing Wendy had ever seen. But when she first touched the sand it was way, way, way too hot. “This isn’t cool like grass,” she said. “I wish this sand was grass,” she cried!

Now, Wendy had a good luck fairy who followed her around, and he heard her wish and decided to grant it. With a flash, all of the sand, turned into grass. Now it was her family’s turn to be “not too sure.” (Wendy, of course, was delighted.) “I guess I won’t get buried today,” said dad.” “That’s okay,” said mom. “Let’s collect some shells.”

Everyone went down to where the water lapped the edge of the grass. There were polished rocks and beautiful shells lying all about. They all set to work looking for the shiniest or the biggest or the most colorful. Everyone except Wendy. “Ouch,” she said. “Oooch.” “Eeech.” The rocks and shells hurt her feet. “I wish these rocks were soft like grass,” she thought to herself, and as soon as she did, her good luck fairy—who could hear her thoughts as well as her words—made it so. The rocks and shells turned to grass too!

The family looked at one another. “Well,” they said, “at least there’s swimming.” Everybody laid their beach towels on the grass and changed into their bathing suits. “Last one in is a rotten egg,” Wendy’s older brother cried, and he ran into the waves followed closely by Wendy’s sister, their delighted squeals trailing behind. Wendy followed tentatively. But when her toe touched the water she said, “Yuck! Too wet and cold.”

This time she didn’t even have to think it—the fairy changed the water into grass without her even having to ask for it! Everyone turned to her and said, “Wendy!” but what was she to do? But her family was very understanding—they were, after all, Unitarian Universalists—so they decided to try to make the best of it. “Let’s have lunch,” said mom and dad. So they got out their picnic basket, found a nice spot on the now wide lawn, spread out the checkered cloth, and they all set to it.

Wendy was in heaven. After all, didn’t she love grass more than just about anything? But she had to admit, she was beginning to feel a bit bored and something just didn’t feel right. After all, every where she looked there was nothing but grass. And all of the sounds of the beach—the waves, the seagulls, all of it—they’d gone too. Grass was nice, but maybe not so much when that’s all that there was.

“Well,” said her mom, “we went to the beach and we’re at a lawn. This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be.” “What do you mean?” Wendy asked.

Her dad said, “You made it all the same—the sand, the rocks, the water. Each was different, and you made them the same because their differences made you feel uncomfortable. But those differences also made them special and beautiful and without them there’s a whole lot missing. In fact, everything that makes this place what it IS, is missing. And that means that you are missing out on everything you really came here for.”

Wendy thought about this for a while. She did want to collect rocks and shells; she’d seen some really beautiful ones. And the water was cold, but her brother and sister looked like they were having a lot of fun, too. And the idea of burying her father in sand was too good to pass up. “I wish it was all back the way it was,” she thought, and the good luck fairy made her wish come true.

Wendy and her family had the best time that day. She still loves grass more than just about anything, but she’s learned to love other things too. And she’s come across some things that she doesn’t like much, and that’s okay too. But she’s never, ever wanted everything to be the same again. Because she knows that things are supposed to be different, each thing as it is, and that exploring new things makes life so much more fun!

Meditation: 

A Buddhist / Taoist Meditation: 

Being Present

By Elena Westbrook

Let every moment be a prayer.

With every sip of tea,

let your lips move in thanksgiving.

Be fully present to every stroke of the hairbrush,

every cup of milk you pour for the children.

Be present, without judgement or regret,

without plans or expectations,

or even dreams,

And every moment

becomes a prayer.

Sermon: 

I love to tell stories. 

Some of my favorite stories 

  include aspects of my own experiences. 

I haven’t gotten too many complaints 

  about my sharing personal stories, 

    so I plan to continue. 

One story that I have told before 

  is relevant to our theme for today. 

I grew up in San Antonio, Texas, 

  and as a result I am (to this day) 

    functionally bilingual 

      in English and Spanish. 

That came in very handy 

  in the first opportunity I had 

    to serve in ministry in a congregation. 

On Sunday mornings, 

  I taught a class in Spanish 

    on the Augsburg Confession. 

I was also the organist 

  for the same Missouri Synod Lutheran Church. 

The pastor was Norb Oesch, 

  who is well known to this day in the Mo. Synod 

    as a leader in church renewal. 

He had a small, hand lettered card 

  taped on his pulpit. 

It said, “Dear Norb, If you have good news, 

  stand up and speak it. 

    If you don’t, sit down and shut up.” Love, Jesus 

The fact that I still remember the little card 

  after all these years (about 50 years) 

    tells us that it’s important to me 

      in life, ministry, and preaching. 

If I call something a sermon, 

  it means that I intend to convey good news. 

If I don’t have or convey good news, 

  I may be giving a talk, a speech, or a presentation, 

    but it would not be a sermon in my view. 

Sermons are important in our times of worship 

  because we all need good news in our lives.

Good news brings hope, 

  and sometimes hope can be hard to find 

    in the world around us. 

We gather here in the hope that we can find 

  some good news to take with us. 

That’s the heart of what I’m trying to do 

  week by week in the things that I share 

    with our congregation. 

Some of the best news for our congregation 

  is that we have been able to stay 

    in community with each other 

      during the difficult times of the pandemic 

        when it has been impossible for us 

          to meet together in person. 

Even better good news will be 

  our holding together 

    in the face of the continuing challenges 

      of our times.

Our spiritual lives and principles provide us strength 

  to cope with our own circumstances,  

    the circumstances 

      of people we love and care about, 

        and the circumstances 

          of the communities around us. 

This is an approach to the Good News 

  according to us Unitarian Universalists. 

The English word for this kind of good news 

  is Gospel, and in its old English form we can see it: 

    Godspel, like the Rock Opera from the early 70's. 

From Greek, the word for people 

  who bring good news is evangelist. 

People who follow the evangelists 

  are traditionally known as evangelicals. 

Enough of the language study, 

  but I want to point out 

    one of the ironies of our time.

When we think of evangelicals, 

  good news would not likely come to mind. 

Combine the term with another word of their use, 

  and fundamentalism would be another example 

    of bad news in the subject of religion. 

Originally, fundamentalists were simply those 

  who tried to be faithful to the ideas 

    they believed were basic 

      or fundamental to their faith. 

Now they are all too often the people 

  who try to impose 

    their religious rules and beliefs on others. 

Our dearly departed Beth 

  sometimes used the words, “funny mentalist” 

    to refer to them. 

That seems all too appropriate, 

  especially in our time. 

In our society today, they seem to be ascendant. 

While their star may appear to be rising, 

  we can be sure that a strong, contrary movement 

    is also forming all around us. 

As Unitarian Universalists, 

  we proclaim a faith that can encompass 

    a wide variety of points of view, 

      in keeping with our 4th Principle.

It advocates, "A free and responsible search 

  for truth and meaning." 

Among the religious movements of our time, 

  ours brings hope of peace and progress, 

    surely some of the best good news 

      we all sorely need. 

In ways similar to our present circumstances, 

  I've often noticed that our own good news 

    may be contrasted with news that is not so good. 

Our UU faith with all the affirmation 

  of different points of view 

    can be contrasted with the ever-narrower 

      religious point of view of the so-called 

        Christian conservatives, the fundamentalists. 

From a certain point of view in history, 

  Jesus of Nazareth was condemned 

    for false teaching and turned over 

      to the Roman authorities for execution 

        by the fundamentalist Pharisees of His time. 

Not all Pharisees were fundamentalists. 

In fact, despite the Pharisees having been often 

  and severely criticized in the New Testament, 

    they were long known 

      for trying to adapt the ancient teachings 

        of their faith 

          to the needs of their contemporaries. 

Ironically, Jesus Himself was probably one of them: 

  a successful Pharasaic reformer 

    who was one of the founders 

      of Rabbinic Judaism as we know it. 

This is surely a wildly alternative view of Jesus, 

  but I believe that He brought a message of hope 

    for all people. 

It would be a controversial view among Christians, 

  especially fundamentalist Christians, 

    but not so much among Reform (Progressive) 

      and Conservative Jews in our time. 

Fundamentalist Pharisees of the 1st Century 

  and Fundamentalist Christians of the 21st C. 

    share something important in common. 

They believed - and believe - 

  that they alone have the truth. 

Those of us who want to be people of good will 

  can rightly disagree that any fundamentalists 

    have the truth all to themselves. 

The good news of our UU faith 

  is that we emphatically do not believe 

    that we alone have the truth. 

We accept the idea 

  that truth may be found 

    in a variety of religious traditions. 

We are open to learning 

  from almost anyone, 

    with the possible exception 

      of those who would claim 

        that they alone believe and teach 

          truth and goodness

            and that all others teach lies and evil. 

In contrast, we have hope and we trust 

  in the possibility of human beings 

    learning from each other, 

      especially in matters of faith, 

        and this hope and this trust 

          is exactly the good news that our world needs. 

Our freedom in matters of faith is one of the gifts 

  that we UU's bring to our world and our times. 

It's one of the reasons that I believe 

  in the importance of our particular approach 

    to religion and spirituality. 

Simply by being ourselves 

  and continuing to find 

    renewal of the mind and heart 

      we are providing an alternative path 

        into the future for our nation and world. 

Amen 

Let it be  

Blessed be! 

Congregational Response 

Extinguishing the Chalice and Closing words: 

Interfaith Benediction

By Gary Kowalski

Gathered in our varied faiths,

We give thanks for the blessings of world community

As we share our common dream:

Homes and schools where children thrive,

Neighborhoods that are safe and clean,

A city rich in colors and cultures,

An economy where no one is expendable,

A beloved community where rich and poor alike have access to the

opportunity for a dignified and productive life,

Churches, mosques, synagogues and temples 

Where our deepest hope is to be of service to a hurting world.

Enable us as we leave this place

To carry forth this prayer into the coming week,

Turning our thoughts toward charity,

Our hearts toward justice,

And our hands toward the work of peace.

Shalom and Amen.

Accountability for God 

The most difficult question for people who believe in God is, "Why?" There is no simple answer to that question. 

Order of Service - Script 

for Sunday May 15, 2022 

NIUU, Jeanie Donaldson, Pastor Fred 

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Prelude: 

Jeanie Donaldson

Welcome and Announcements: 

Come into this circle of love and compassion,

Come into this community where we can dream and

Believe in those dreams—

Welcome to North Idaho Unitarian Universalists where we accept, we support, we transform:  Ourselves, Our Community. Our world.   

Offering Information 

Charity of the Month:

Family Promise of North Idaho

"Family Promise of North Idaho is an affiliate of 

Family Promise® which was created in 1986 in response to the growing need to provide shelter, meals, and comprehensive support to families without homes. We are a nonsectarian charity and we welcome all clients who meet our eligibility and admission requirements. Our staff and board of trustees work together with our interfaith and community partners to extend support to the homeless families in North Idaho."

NIUU 

P.O. Box 221 

CDA ID 83816

Lighting the Chalice: 

We light this chalice to celebrate the inherent worth and dignity of every person;

To reaffirm the historic pledge of our open-hearted  faith to seek that justice which transcends mere legality and moves toward the resolution of true equality; And to share that love which is ultimately beyond even our cherished reason, that love which unites us.

Opening Words: 

Amid all the noise in our lives,

we take this moment to sit in silence --

to give thanks for another day;

to give thanks for all those in our lives

who have brought us warmth and love;

to give thanks for the gift of life.

We know we are on our pilgrimage here but a brief moment in time.

Let us open ourselves, here, now,

to the process of becoming more whole --

of living more fully;

of giving and forgiving more freely;

of understanding more completely

the meaning of our lives here on this earth.

Hymn #120 “Turn Back, Turn Back” 

1. Turn back, turn back, forswear thy foolish ways.

Old now is earth, and none may count its days;

yet humankind, whose head is crowned with flame,

still will not hear the inner God proclaim —

”Turn back, turn back, forswear thy foolish ways.”

2. Earth might be fair, its people glad and wise.

Age after age our tragic empires rise,

built while we dream, and in that dreaming weep:

would we but wake from out our haunted sleep,

earth might be fair, and people glad and wise.

3. Earth shall be fair, and all its people one;

nor till that hour shall God’s whole will be done.

Now, even now, once more from earth to sky,

peals forth in joy that old undaunted cry —

”Earth shall be fair, and all its people one.”

Covenant: 

Love is the spirit of this church, and service its law

This is our great covenant:

To dwell together in peace,

To seek truth in love,

And to help one another. 

Greeting each other  (Those present in person can leave our seats for this, if we wish.) 

Joys and Concerns (with lighting of candles of caring) 

Story: 

The Shattering of the Vessels

By Amy Petrie Shaw

A Free Retelling of the story from the Kabbalah. 

At the beginning of time, before anything else at all existed, Love was all there was, and it filled up everything in the whole universe.

But Love got bored and lonely. There was no one to be in love with. So one day Love decided to make a world.

First it took a deep breath. Can you take a deep breath? How deep? let me see!

Deeper! A little deeper.

Love got all squished up taking the deepest breath ever, and was sooooo squished that it squeezed out darkness.The darkness was all around: thick and shiny and black. It was beautiful but now Love couldn’t see anything! Love waved its arms and legs around, but the darkness was everywhere.

“I have to do something about this,” said Love. It thought for a minute, and tried to think of the most wonderful beautiful warm thoughts ever. Love thought harder and harder and all of a sudden Love called out “I want light!”

And pop!

All of the warm and wonderful and beautiful thoughts exploded outward in ten different directions and shaped themselves into ten big glowing glass balls. Each ball was filled with a spinning lump of pure light and warmth. Some of the spare good thoughts that couldn’t quite fit in the glass became dust and water vapor and seeds and molecules that could form animals.

And Love said, “This is amazing. I better make something for the light to shine on.” So it waved its arms and kicked its legs and all of the dust and water vapor and molecules that had been scattered around when the glass balls formed began to form into another huge ball, this one of dirt and water and plants and animals. Love called this the Earth.

The ten balls of light started toward the Earth, and if they had made it here in one piece, the entire planet would have been exactly the way Love wanted it. But the glass balls were too fragile to contain such strong, powerful wonderful good thoughts. They broke open and shattered, and all the good thoughts shattered and flew out like sparks and were scattered like sand, like seeds, like stars. Those sparks fell everywhere on the Earth in tiny bits instead of big clumps like Love intended.

“Oh NO!” said Love. “I’m too big. I’ll never be able to find all of those tiny sparks. I have to make one more thing.”

So Love waved its arm and kicked its feet one last time, and people appeared on the Earth. They didn’t know it, but they were created with one job: to find these sparks, these tiny pieces of wonderful goodness, and to bring them together again in big clumps.

“When enough clumps are there, I will recreate the big glass containers to hold them, and this time I will set them down a little more carefully,” Love said.

So all of us, from the time we are born, have a job, and that job is to help find love and more good and warm and wonderful things. If we do that we are reparing the world (Tikkun Olam). 

 

Meditation: 

HYMN TO MATTER by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin 

‘Blessed be you, harsh matter, barren soil, stubborn rock: you who yield only to violence, you who force us to work if we would eat. 

‘Blessed be you, perilous matter, violent sea, untameable passion: you who unless we fetter you will devour us.

‘Blessed be you, mighty matter, irresistible march of evolution, reality ever newborn; you who, by constantly shattering our mental categories, force us to go ever further and further in our pursuit of the truth.

‘Blessed be you, universal matter, immeasurable time, boundless ether, triple abyss of stars and atoms and generations: you who by overflowing and dissolving our narrow standards or measurement reveal to us the dimensions of God.

‘Blessed be you, impenetrable matter: you who, interposed between our minds and the world of essences, cause us to languish with the desire to pierce through the seamless veil of phenomena.

‘Blessed be you, mortal matter: you who one day will undergo the process of dissolution within us and will thereby take us forcibly into the very heart of that which exists.

‘Without you, without your onslaughts, without your uprootings of us, we should remain all our lives inert, stagnant, puerile, ignorant both of ourselves and of God. You who batter us and then dress our wounds, you who resist us and yield to us, you who wreck and build, you who shackle and liberate, the sap of our souls, the hand of God, the flesh of Christ: it is you, matter, that I bless.

‘I bless you, matter, and you I acclaim: not as the pontiffs of science or the moralizing preachers depict you, debased, disfigured — a mass of brute forces and base appetites — but as you reveal yourself to me today, in your totality and your true nature.

‘You I acclaim as the inexhaustible potentiality for existence and transformation wherein the predestined substance germinates and grows.

‘I acclaim you as the universal power which brings together and unites, through which the multitudinous monads are bound together and in which they all converge on the way of the spirit.

‘I acclaim you as the melodious fountain of water whence spring the souls of men and as the limpid crystal whereof is fashioned the new Jerusalem.

‘I acclaim you as the divine milieu, charged with creative power, as the ocean stirred by the Spirit, as the clay moulded and infused with life by the incarnate Word.

‘Sometimes, thinking they are responding to your irresistible appeal, men will hurl themselves for love of you into the exterior abyss of selfish pleasure-seeking: they are deceived by a reflection or by an echo.

‘This I now understand.

‘If we are ever to reach you, matter, we must, having first established contact with the totality of all that lives and moves here below, come little by little to feel that the individual shapes of all we have laid hold on are melting away in our hands, until finally we are at grips with the single essence of all subsistencies and all unions.

‘If we are ever to possess you, having taken you rapturously in our arms, we must then go on to sublimate you through sorrow.

‘Your realm comprises those serene heights where saints think to avoid you — but where your flesh is so transparent and so agile as to be no longer distinguishable from spirit.

‘Raise me up then, matter, to those heights, through struggle and separation and death; raise me up until, at long last, it becomes possible for me in perfect chastity to embrace the universe ''

Sermon: 

There are many questions 

  that people would like to ask God 

    or ask about God, 

      depending on what and how they believe. 

For believers, an important question 

  would probably be, "Why?" 

    as in, "Why me," 

      or, "Why is this happening to me?" 

For non-believers, the similar question would be, 

  "How can anyone believe in 

    an all powerful, good God, 

      if God allows terrible things to happen?" 

These questions are all similar 

  to the ones that the book of Job 

    attempted to deal with, 

      but the questions are both broader 

        and more complicated

          than anything we can answer from the Bible. 

They apply for people of all religious persuasions, 

  and they may be meaningful for anyone. 

The wonderful book by Rabbi Harold Kushner, 

  When Bad Things Happen to Good People, 

    gives a strong answer, calling into question 

      one of the most popular concepts about God, 

        His omnipotence, or all powerful nature. 

I mentioned the Rabbi and the book 

  in my last sermon, 

    regarding the biblical book of Job, 

      since the biblical book seeks to answer 

        at least some of the same questions 

          as Rabbi Kushner's book. 

Of course, no idea that would weaken 

  a believer's concept of God 

    would pass biblical muster. 

At the same time, 

  it's necessary to entertain the questions. 

The doctrines of omnipotence (all power) 

  and omniscience (all knowledge) 

    are held by most believers 

      in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, 

        but they are not necessarily supported 

          by the traditional scriptures of those faiths. 

Approaching the questions raised by theology 

  with a sense of humor 

    is especially important 

      if we are to think about the subject 

        of accountability for God (theodicy). 

One of my personal favorite ways 

  of applying humor to our understanding of God 

    is the movie, Oh God. 

In that movie, from 1977, 

  the part of God is played by George Burns 

    and his prophet is played by John Denver. 

Having those two at the center of the plot 

  is a perfect setup for comedy. 

Related to our subject for today 

  were several funny statements and interactions. 

God, as portrayed by George Burns, 

  admitted that He had made mistakes. 

My personal favorite was the avocado. 

God said, "I made the pits too big." 

As I see it, some of the greatest signs 

  of God's sense of humor 

    may be seen in the animal world. 

Whether in the understanding 

  of mythology or scripture, 

    the Creator of the giraffe 

      and the duck-billed platypus 

        has to have a sense of humor. 

Similarly, in all of literature, 

  my heart and mind tell me

    that one of the greatest humorists 

      in all of human history 

        was Jesus of Nazareth. 

It's sometimes called a parable, 

  but I think it's a great joke: 

    Jesus once told us all 

      not to be too worried about the speck of sawdust 

        in our neighbor's eye

          until we take the plank out of our own eye. 

Likewise, He was an expert 

  at catching His enemies in their own traps. 

One of my personal favorites 

  among the examples of His humor 

    in the New Testament 

      is the story of questioners whom He trapped 

        in more ways than one 

          because of their attempt to trap Him. 

It must have infuriated them 

  because they thought 

    they really had Him that time, 

      when they asked Him about taxes. 

"Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not?" 

He asked them to show Him the coin 

  in which the taxes were paid, 

    and then asked whose IMAGE and inscription 

      were upon it. 

Caesar's, they said. 

Their very act of carrying a coin with a graven image 

  of the emperor 

    who claimed divine nature for himself 

      was a violation of the kind of law about which 

        they were trying to trap Jesus. 

They tried to create a conundrum for Him: 

If He told them that payment of the tax was legal, 

  His revolutionary followers would desert Him. 

If He told them that the payment was not legal, 

  the Roman soldiers who were everywhere 

    would likely have arrested Him on the spot 

      for advocating disobedience of Roman law. 

Jesus gave the perfect answer. 

"Then give to Caesar what is Caesar's, 

  and give to God what is God's, 

    He told them. 

One aspect of the humor of the situation

  is something we can easily miss in our time.

Jesus created a conundrum for His enemies. 

By even carrying the coin with the image of Caesar, 

  they were shown to be hypocrites, 

    violating the very religious law 

      they demanded must be upheld. 

By paying the tax, which they must have done, 

  they showed themselves to be unfaithful 

    hypocrites twice over. 

Humor doesn't really answer 

  the issues and questions we are looking at today, 

    but at least it gives us different angles 

      from which we may look at them. 

Humor can call us to have compassion. 

Our having compassion for God 

  could be a reflection of the compassion 

    He is believed (by many) to have for us. 

After all, in one of the great moments in history 

  for the people of ancient Israel, 

    a Midrash (commentary) on the event 

      shows God's compassion 

        in a new and different light. 

Pharaoh and his armies were drowning 

  in the waters of the Reed Sea, 

    and the Children of Israel 

      were singing and dancing for joy.

God said, "Stop singing!" 

"Those are my children who are drowning there!" 

This approach to the story 

  brings a view of my own personal faith 

    when it comes to calling God to account 

      for His works and His ways. 

God is far beyond 

  our understanding and knowledge. 

Yet at the same time, 

  God is far closer to us than our next breath. 

God is intimately involved in the multiverse, 

  so much so that what happens to us 

    happens also to Him (or Her, of course). 

This view is called Process Theology, 

  and my description is an extreme 

    oversimplification of it. ‑

To speak of it as I see it, 

  God's sense of humor 

    and God's personal humility 

      are signs of His involvement 

        in the process of the evolution of all things, 

          including us. 

To use a powerful metaphor from popular culture, 

  the Force in Star Wars 

    is a reasonably good descriptor 

      of God in Process thought and theology. 

A theology that sees the presence of God 

  in the processes of evolution 

    is not a perfect answer of accountability for God, 

      but it does enable us to hold God accountable 

        and ourselves as well. 

We all make choices in what we think, say, and do. 

Our choices matter. 

One way they matter is 

  that we drag our concept of God along with us 

    to face the consequences. 

With the words of a song by Joan Osborne, 

  we hear that God may in fact be one of us 

    a part of us, incarnate (in a physical body) like us. 

The song says, 

"What if God was one of us?

... 

  Just a stranger on the bus

    Tryin' to make his way home?" 

There may be more to God 

  than what we think about Him; 

    there may be no more than that, 

      but we know for sure that He is part of us. 

So the best way to understand 

  accountability for God 

    is to understand it 

      as part of our own accountability. 

As we hold God accountable, 

  we also hold ourselves accountable 

    for what we think, say, and do. 

We can then have more effective compassion 

  for God and for ourselves, 

    and that is deeply important. 

If we fail to have compassion for anyone 

  whom we are holding accountable, 

    we are moving toward a truly bad place. 

We can transcend hypocrisy  

  in our self understanding

    by recognizing our own accountability. 

Faith is built on realities 

  that are both within and outside ourselves. 

We can believe or not 

  and yet find meaning in a faith 

    that calls on believers to question 

      and non-believers to hope. 

Amen. 

Let it be. 

Blessed be. 

Congregational Response 

Extinguishing the Chalice and Closing words: 

As we extinguish the Chalice, cherish your doubts, for doubt is the servant of truth.

Question your convictions, for beliefs too tightly held strangle the mind and its natural wisdom.

Suspect all certitudes, for the world whirls on—nothing abides.

Yet in our inner rooms full of doubt, inquiry and suspicion, let a corner be reserved for trust.

For without trust there is no space for communities to gather or for friendships to be forged.

Indeed, this is the small corner where we connect—and reconnect—with each other.

STATEMENT OF FAITH BY PASTOR FRED TOERNE 

I am a Christian. 

I have tried not to be a Christian because of the evil done by the Christian religion and by the thoughts, words, and actions of Christians. 

I can gladly let go of the Christian religion, but I cannot repudiate Jesus of Nazareth or His teachings. 

Along with other rabbis of His era, Jesus believed and taught that the Law of God is best summarized by the Two Great Commandments: 

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and 

You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 

His own good example and that of all people of good will have taught me: Love is best expressed by seeking freedom for the beloved. 

Especially in our time and with its issues, I believe we all need to let these thoughts sink in as we contemplate them.