Our kids are packing their school bags. The people of St. John have returned to their pews. The summer is slipping away, and life is speeding up again. It is time to get down to business. But what kind of business? And whose? Will our focus be human things? Or divine things?

This summer, I read a short essay by Toni Morrison, the prestigious African-American writer. She was writing about her first job. After school, she would clean a house in a neighbourhood where there were steaks in the fridge and a washing machine and a vacuum cleaner – items, as she says, that were common in this neighbourhood but absent in hers. As time went on, and as her cleaning skills improved, she was asked to do more and more chores for the same wage: to carry a bookcase, or move a piano. She knew these tasks were not something a young girl should safely do, but she was proud of the money she had to spend on herself, and even more so about the money she had to contribute to her family. Even though she was being taken advantage of, she didn’t want to get fired.  But it was her father who really defined the job for her, when she finally complained to him about the job. She describes how he put down his coffee cup and said: “Listen. You don’t live there. You live here. With your people. Go to work. Get your money. And come on home.” That is what he said, Morrison writes, but among the lessons she heard, one she tried to remember all her life, was this: You are not the work you do; you are the person you are.

But if that is how we understand work, we might wonder why at parties, or when meeting someone new, we are so often asked, or so often ourselves ask: What do you do? It’s a filler question, of course, to move the conversation, but we assume the answer - teacher, accountant, doctor, mason, engineer, etc – will reveal some truth about the person, define them in some way, so we can understand them better. If we are proud of our job, if it is prestigious or interesting, we offer it up so that we might be so defined.

And we put the same question even more pointedly to our children: What will you be when you grow up? Even when they are in grade school, we ask them to write essays about the profession or job they want to have. We ask them to pin themselves down into a work, into a place. How often do we ask them instead: What kind of person do you want to be? What is important to you? Isn’t that the real question for all us: Who will we be when we are grown up? Who are we now?

In our gospel, we find Jesus and Peter in a heated discussion. Jesus is explaining that the path they are on will lead to Jerusalem and his death, and Peter, understandably, wants a different outcome. “This can’t happen,” he says. Jesus insults him – calling him the devil – and chastises him for getting muddled up in human things and not divine. Let’s consider where Peter and Jesus part ways in the context of work. Jesus was raised to be a carpenter; he became a healer. Those are two worthy occupations that he might have done for a long life, bringing honour to himself and helping others: he would have been a contributor to society. But Jesus refused to be defined by the work he did; he was driven by the person he wanted to be, the person he was destined to be. And the more he spoke up, the more he taught, the more he used the status and talent he had to make a difference, the more trouble and danger came his way. Jesus did not walk passively to his fate; he taught and lived as though building homes and curing the sick were not acts enough to create a better society. It was who you were, the choices you made, the belief and value you held, that made the difference. Losing your life, as the gospel defines it, is about losing the things that trap us in that other mindset: where a person’s title and salary decide their worth, where we decide our own worth by those same standards. Indeed, we have a clear prescription in our second lesson, and does it ever conflict with our in-it-to-win-it world. We are told to bless those who wrong us, to take on the pain of those who suffer, to be noble, to live peaceably. To overcome evil, not with more evil, but with good.  That is a very different kind of job title.

A few weeks ago, when Hurricane Harvey was still heading to Houston, a man named John Bridgers went into action. He had been there before, organizing volunteers with boats to help people trapped by flooding in Louisiana, and he knew what was coming. They called themselves the Cajun Navy on Facebook, and a group of them loaded up their boats and began driving to Houston to be prepared. Some made it before the waters got too high. Bridgers was caught on the outskirts of the city. But he got on Facebook and began using their page, with its 50,000 followers, to organize a rescue from afar. Posts were coming in about pregnant women trapped, or a person in a wheelchair in a flooded house, or seniors unable to get out of nursing home, with their locations to help focus rescuers. When this is done, Bridgers says, they will help rebuild Houston as well. Reading a story about him, you’d naturally wonder what John Bridgers does for living. What’s his occupation? His so-called real job? The story doesn’t say. Except of course, it does. John Bridgers is someone who acts in the face of tragedy, who offers his help and expertise to those who are in need. That is a real job. The kind that defines a person. Perhaps if someone like John Bridgers were asked, “What do you do?” he would say, I try to do my best to ease suffering where I can.
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As we go forward into the busy season, may we all think about how we answer that question: What do you do? Think of how we want our children to answer it for themselves: Who – not what - will you be when you are grown up? Let us shape our answer not around human titles and ambitions, but by the divine, by the gospel, by the example of Jesus. Or as Toni Morrison puts it: “You are not the work you do. You are the person you are.”
 
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/06/05/the-work-you-do-the-person-you-are

It is Christmas Eve and the church faces two services, with some people attending both. The early service is particularly conscious of families with children. The community has decided that each year, the sermon time, is a live building of a nativity scene in conversation with children who volunteer to be characters. Over the years, children would volunteer for parts as they were called out. Individually they came forward for conversation reflecting on the birth of Jesus, and to be dressed as an innkeeper, Mary, Joseph, an angel, the star, a sheep, et cetera. Discussions included: the sights, the sounds, the smells, the character’s feelings. Scenes have included: the nativity scene in North America today and who the characters would be now; a simple scene with children bringing gifts for the baby – all the items needed to make a baby bundle for Canada Lutheran World Relief.

With an intention of learning more about our history with First Nation’s people, the theme was, ‘Twas in the Moon of Wintertime, a Canadian Christmas hymn written by Jean de Brébeuf. The children enacted the scene with “new” characters, costumes, and props: hunters came with pine bows for beds, their families came with bannock, pine tea, and leather moccasins; chiefs came with beaver and fox pelts; angels came with songs; Jesus was wrapped in faux rabbit skin; instead of sheep there were deer. When the scene was complete, the volunteers remained in situ as the congregation sang the hymn, Twas in the Moon of Wintertime.
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This same Christmas, the Christ candle was lit in the centre of the Advent wreath – an Advent wreath with coloured ribbons (red, black, white, yellow) signifying the First Nation circle of people and directions.

​“There is too much hockey, and too many musical recitals.” These words are the frustration spoken by Sunday School teachers who are expected to have the children involved in a Christmas pageant. There are few attending Sunday School on the Sundays before Christmas and picking another practice day is impossible. Add to this a group of children who are too young to read.

The solution was a family pageant in pieces. Individual families (some with children, young adults come home from university for the holidays, or older couples with a senior parent living with them) were given poems, litanies, or short dialogues to prepare and present. Some came in costume, others with sound effects, and some dressed for a concert. The program was full of the names of families; households of all kinds.

The centre piece of “the Christmas pageant” was a two piece musical interlude: a teenager on a violin played, “Angels We Have Heard on High,” while the little girls, dressed in angel halos, danced through the church with gymnastic ribbons – Crayola markers with lengths of ribbon attached via the cap- twirling in praise; the second part was a young adult pianist who played, “Little Drummer Boy,” while the boys (and many of the men - as the maker of the drum sticks passed out lots) stood and tapped out the rhythm on the backs of the pews with homemade drum sticks.
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The “Christmas pageant” was enjoyed by all as everyone took responsibility. Participation was at 100%.

​It is the Reign of Christ Sunday and in the world it feels like everything is falling apart. Within the church there is also a feeling that depression is settling in, after a number of deaths, problems on the board, issues needing to be addressed, and property items needing attention. Individual members are grieving, sick, facing addiction, financially strapped, and close to nervous breakdowns from school, raising teenagers, older-parent care giving.

How does the Reign of Christ speak to this?

This year the sermon spoke about chaos and that it was from chaos that creation came into being; that in death came resurrection. The Word was heard in the theology of Paul Tillich and his idea that God (hope) was an integral part of abstract art of the 1950s and 60s --- that in the chaos of paint on the canvas, the artist worked out their angst (society’s angst), and then in capturing the emotion, to view the work propelled one to move forward towards creating God’s kingdom in the present.

Following the service, everyone was invited to paint out the chaos they were feeling, to paint until they had painted out their angst. Tables were set up in the hall, covered in garbage bags. Pages of finger painting paper were lined up on each side of the tables. Each paper had a dollop of blue finger paint in the middle. When the paintings were done they were left to dry.
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When people arrived at church the next week for the First Sunday of Advent, the finger paintings were hung around the entire sanctuary including the chancel, a little higher than eye level when sitting down. (Blue finger paint was chosen because the works were used throughout Advent.) When one sat in the church for five minutes, the pictures actually seemed to vibrate; it was a little disconcerting. Into the chaos, and vibrating, the Word was read; the prophet’s words from Isaiah to a people in chaos. “The time is surely coming…” To sing Advent hymns of hope into chaos brought healing to the chaos in our lives.

​A sermon. A talk with the children. A Sunday school activity.
It was one of those Sundays when the pastor was giddy. The scripture was all about the kingdom of heaven; “The kingdom of heaven is like…” The pastor added her own idea. The kingdom of God is like glitter dust.

Glitter dust is like glitter, but finer. It is impossible to clean up. It sticks to everything.

The pastor on that Sunday had filled her hand with glitter dust. Part way through the sermon she threw her hand up, scattering glitter dust everywhere: the pulpit, the floor, the first row of people, part of the altar rail, the carpet under the rail. It was all over her hands.
Later, as she came down to share the peace, some received hand shakes and others hugs – their were more hands and people with glitter dust on them; others received hugs. As the peace was shared the glitter dust spread to people and pews.
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The glitter dust was to represent letting God’s love and grace flow through us, and when we do then God’s kingdom spreads. As the kingdom spreads, it sticks, because it touches people’s hearts.
It was a really long time before the church people forgot about the kingdom of God, because glitter dust – God’s kingdom, followed them everywhere.