I was pleased to have an opportunity to provide a gospel reflection and deacon's witness talk at the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany in Leeds, Alabama this Sunday. I have many connections and friends to and through the parish. Below is the final draft of the my offering for this Sunday.

The Last Sunday after Epiphany 2007
at Epiphany in Leeds, Alabama
Exodus 34:29-35 | Psalm 99 | 2 Corinthians 3:12-4:2 | Luke 9:28-36, [37-43a]

Beloved sisters and brothers, let us look to the Lord.
May only God’s word be spoken,
May God’s word be heard.
In the name of Jesus, I pray.
Amen.

My sisters and brothers in Christ, allow me to say right now: It is good for us to be here in this holy place! I have been blessed to be with you at various times over the years, for some very happy occasions and for some tinged with the sadness of loss, but always in celebration, thanksgiving, and joy for the gift of God’s boundless grace. This parish of Epiphany has always seemed to me to be a place of tenacious hope, and for that I give thanks.

So, as we come to the end of the Epiphany season and start to look toward the beginning of Lent three days from now on Ash Wednesday, we find ourselves this morning in the midst of the scene of the Transfiguration.

I’ve read, that the Apache people of Arizona when they see the powerful lightning displays and hear the thunder echo from the canyons of the Superstition Mountains say, “That is the home of the thunder Gods.” The Kikuyu people of Kenya when they look at the majesty of Mount Kenya, alternately hidden and revealed by the clouds, say, “Ngai (god) lives there.” When the Hebrew people see Moses come down from Mount Sinai, his face shining with such a brilliance that he has to cover it to protect their eyes, say, “The Lord reveals himself there.” And when Peter and James and John come down from the mountain, after witnessing Jesus’ transfiguration and the appearance of Moses and Elijah, say, “God does spectacular things there!”

Mountains hold the mystery of the ages, the rock solid strength of the divine, the beauty of fellowship with God. They seem to have long held that kind of power for human beings, and I am no exception. I know that I’ve had the experience of going somewhere or doing something that lifts my soul to such a new height, that I’ve said, “I’ve had a mountaintop experience!” The psalmist even tells us to worship at God’s holy mountain. Mountains call us to worship God; who is Creator, Sustainer, and Redeemer of all that is.

Of course, my problem has always been that I want to stay on the mountaintop. There have been times when I’ve felt God’s presence so strongly that, like the disciples, all I want to do is to build a little house and stay there, soaking up all that divinity for myself. But, unfortunately, that’s not the way it works. As God told Abraham, “I am blessing you so that you will be a blessing,” and God has the same message for each one of us. Just think about what Moses had on his hands when he comes down from Sinai – a grumbling, mumbling people to be lead in desert wanderings. When Jesus and the disciples come down from the mountain; a great crowd of people meets them, wanting all kinds of blessings, including the healing of a child with a demon.

When the people of Kenya come down from their mountain there are more than one million children infected or affected by HIV/AIDS, seven hundred deaths per day from the disease, and massive poverty caused by fifty percent unemployment. It has been said that the people of Africa don’t struggle for quality of life. They struggle for survival, to keep themselves and their families alive for another day.

When we come down from our mountaintops, we also encounter the reality of the urgent needs of the people around us that are to be met. I found encouragement for myself, when the psalmist describes this experience as looking at God and responding with praise; because God loves justice, and establishes fairness and righteousness. Paul (in his second letter to the Corinthians) says that when we have seen the Lord’s glory on the mountaintop, we who are created in God’s image are truly transformed into that image. That is when we become people who not only seek righteousness for ourselves, but also strive for fairness and justice for all of God’s people.

One of the ways that we seek to strive for justice and meet the needs of those around us, here in the Diocese of Alabama, is through the network of Jubilee Ministries. Jubilee Ministry as it exists today was created by action of General Convention in 1982 and now encompasses over 700 different ministries throughout the Episcopal Church as well as 13 foreign countries.

My role in this ministry is as Diocesan Jubilee Officer, to provide support and encouragement for folks doing, or interested in doing, Jubilee Ministry in this diocese. But what does it mean to “do” Jubilee Ministry? Well, the mission of Jubilee Ministry is to make a direct and dynamic link between our theology and our ethics – in other words– it is where we connect the Talk of Our Faith and the Walk of Our Faith. As Christians we do this by:

• First, calling the church to live out its prophetic role of empowering local people to “Do Justice, Love Mercy, and Walk Humbly With Their God.” (Micah 6:8)
• and Secondly, by responding to the Gospel Imperative to “Feed the Hungry, Give Drink to the Thirsty, Welcome the Stranger, Clothe the Naked, Care for the Sick, and Visit the Imprisoned” (Matthew 25:35)

Perhaps, at its core, Jubilee Ministry is intended to help the church, and each one of us, focus attention on a specific question: How are we responding to the call of Jesus Christ who was born, who died, and who rose again two millennia ago?

Of course, the idea of Jubilee is established in the book of Leviticus: “You shall hallow the fiftieth year and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants” – although there is no evidence that it actually took place then. But it can and is taking place now, in the church and in this diocese, this time is a “season of unfoldment in which God’s blessing, compassion, and justice are unleashed, not from some remote heaven but from within the human heart.”

What better description of the Christian journey can there be? Being stretched and cracked open by God’s own joy and desire for our full flourishing leads us to acknowledge that it is not only ourselves who need to flourish: we, as the body of Christ in the world, are called to be agents of healing for the entire earth.

The concept of Jubilee has its roots in the idea of Sabbath – a time of “re-creation, reordering, and release.” Former presiding bishop Frank Griswold once said that, “ in Jubilee, all creation is to be liberated for the sake of finding proper balance and relationship in union with God and one another. God's liberation unfolds as we cease to hold one another hostage through unyielding bias, prejudice, judgment, suspicion, fears, and forgiveness. ... Jubilee is fundamental to our life as a resurrection community.” Indeed, indeed…

So, how does Jubilee Ministry work? Why does it continue to flourish 25 years after the resolution establishing it at General Convention, and why has it now grown to be a vital part of the ministry of more than 1 in 10 parishes in the Episcopal Church?
Jubilee Ministry begins with an Episcopal congregation, an ecumenical cluster with Episcopal presence, or an agency with connections to the Episcopal Church being involved in ministry programs among, and with, poor and oppressed people wherever they are located. That’s the point of beginning.

A Jubilee Center then includes at least one or more of the following:

• Advocacy – on behalf of others – by being the voice of those who have not yet dared to believe that their voice can literally change society and social structures.
• Empowering volunteers and staff, as well as the population being served – for the good of others and our own life in community. By working together with others – by breathing in sync with the Spirit of God and of each other to bring about a new way of being in which we truly do live out our baptismal vows of respecting the dignity of every human being.
• Evangelism – in our action, in our prayers, in a pastoral presence, in inviting others to share in our worship.

Jubilee Centers also covenant to actively participate in:

• Reflecting theologically upon learnings in ministry,
• Demonstrating the operation of programs as models to others, and to
• Act as a resource center for other Jubilee Ministry Centers.

The kinds of ministries offered at Jubilee Centers include: camps, clothes, food, community services, children’s programs, youth programs, emergency services, health, HIV/AIDS, housing, shelters, immigration, jail or prison, homeless, substance abuse, credit unions – any ministry program among and with poor and oppressed people.

In the Diocese of Alabama, Jubilee Ministry Centers take the form of, and I’ll briefly describe just some of the ministries at each: Grace Episcopal Church in Woodlawn with 55th Place Thrift Store, Grace-by-Day, Community Kitchens; St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church in Athens providing a multi-cultural preschool with bilingual teachers and a drop-in pantry; The Jubilee Community Center in Montgomery providing after school programs, an entrepreneurial class, direct health services, job training, and vacation bible school; Christ Episcopal Church in Fairfield with CityWorks which is an interfaith Community Development Corporation providing affordable housing, in addition to, a literacy program, thrift store, prison ministry, and emergency services; and the newest member of Jubilee Ministry in the Diocese of Alabama, Good Samaritan Health Clinic in Cullman providing free primary health care serving low-income, uninsured, and under-insured residents of Cullman County. In the 4 years since opening its doors, the clinic has delivered $4.6 million in services to more than 7800 persons in the community. Also of note, services are being provided on budget's that last year totaled $200,000 and a total of in-kind contributions of $325,000. This year the clinic anticipates around 4,000 patient visits and will potentially provide approximately $4 million in services to our patients. They currently have three medical clinics per week and could use one more, two dental clinics per month, one eye disease and one hearing clinic per month. We also have twice monthly diabetes and nutrition classes and provide diabetic monitors, test strips, lancets and insulin syringes to our patients.

Perhaps you’re wanting to discern your place in this vineyard. I found a great resource in this important little book "What Can One Person Do?" In it, two accomplished economists, Sabina Alkire and Edmund Newell, who also happen to be Anglican clergy, have outlined seven simple steps that we people of faith can take to heal a broken world. They are (1) pray for the healing of the world, (2) be informed by study of the realities of global poverty, (3) give 7/10ths of 1% of our own incomes for international development, (4) connect on a personal level with those who are poor and marginalized, (5) get active in events addressing global poverty, (6) become vocal about these concerns, and (7) get political and advocate for the poor in our governmental processes. If you want to know more about how you can become engaged with this work, then getting a copy of this book can be a good place to start, and, of course, you can also talk to me or Mother Lynette or Deacon Clyde.

My Sisters and Brothers in Christ, like Moses and Jesus and the Kenyans, we go to the mountaintop to strengthen and renew ourselves, and to affirm our place in God’s heart. Then we, too, come back to the valley, to level ground, where there are people who are struggling for life, and where we are called to carry on God’s purpose. In this process, we will not only discover shalom, God’s Sabbath Peace¸ within our spirits, but we will also become bearers of that shalom to the earth and all her inhabitants in response to Jesus’ call to us: “You are gifted with my grace; you are the light of the world. Now go forth in my name, proclaim jubilee, and above all, surprise me.”