Stewardship: The Divine Economy: Make our Life the Vision of Thee

Summer is coming to an end. I have just returned from some time off. I fished, worked on some genealogy, listened, read, and listened some more. I also enjoyed listening to a lot of music while I was relaxing. As I prepared for this talk on stewardship I was reminded of a hymn that is somewhat like a summer prayer. The song is by Rascal Flatts and it is called, “Backwards.”

You get your house back

You get your dog back

You get your best friend Jack back

You get your truck back

You get your hair back

You get your first and second wives back

Your front porch swing

your pretty little thing

Your bling bling bling and a diamond ring

Your get your farm and the barn and the boat and the Harley

That old black cat named Charlie

You get your mind back

And your nerves back

Your achy breaky heart back

You get your pride back

You get your life back

You get your first real love back

ohh big screen TV, DVD and a washing machine

You get the pond and the lawn and the rake and the mower

You go back when life was slower

It sounds a little crazy, a little scattered and absurd

But that's what you get

When you play a country song backwards

The economic culture that we live in is economy based upon the loosing of things and the gaining of things; the selling and the purchasing of things.

Sometimes, our church economy is based upon the increase or the decrease of things as well: people, pledges, and plate.

So I thought we should begin at the beginning. We must begin with a sense of the “Divine Economy.”

The poet, author, and Dean of York beginning in 1941, Eric Milner-White, wrote a poem called Thy God, Thy Glory. Here is the last stanza:

O God, most glorious,

Make our life the vision of thee

To the praise of thy glory;

that we all as a mirror may reflect it,

and be transformed into the same image

from glory to glory,

world without end.



Excerpt from: Thy God, Thy Glory


Eric Milner-White, 1884-1963

So we begin as our ancient texts tell us, in the beginning was the Word and the word was with God. (John 1.1)

God looks upon God, and in this looking has a perfect image of God’s self, the perfect and beautiful idea of God’s self. God looks and sees God perfectly, wholly, and corporately. And, in this looking in this perfect beholding of God’s self God is both Father and Son. There is God and there is God’s perfect self the Son.

Our human language cannot incorporate or speak adequately of the eternal, whole, and incorruptible nature of God and God’s self; so we say in our Creed, “God is Father, almighty,” and we also say, “God is Lord, Christ, only Son of God, eternally begotten,” and we say: “God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one being with the Father.”

God looks upon God and perfectly sees God’s self.

In seeing God, God perfectly loves God’s self. God perfectly is bound to God the son. So perfect, so unblemished is God’s love for God’s self that it, too, is actualized and repeats the perfect and beautiful and manifest glory which is God…This perfect love is that than which no greater can be thought.

Once again our human language fails to capture the movement and work of God or the perfection of God who we proclaim as love, so we say in our Creed that we believe in God who is “Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son.” And, we recognize this God of three and three in one as eternally present in community one to another.

So perfect is God’s love for God, the Father for the Son, that God’s beauty and perfection and glory overflows, spilling out in the action of creation. God is creator of heaven and earth, God creates through God’s self (the son), through him all things were made. And the creative power and force is itself the very spirit of God, the hands of God at work in the world about us, the Holy Spirit. So it is that all things come to be and are given shape and form. Out of nothing they were created, but for the pleasure of God they were created and God saw all of God’s creation and the reflection of God’s image in its watery forms and green canopies, and creatures and saw that it was “good.”

All of creation is formed out of the divine imagination reflecting to God the glory of God’s self eternally united in a Holy Community we call the Trinity.

This is our sacred Truth.

This community of mutual affection and perfected friendship and undivided unity by its very nature, its very being creates all that we see, all that we have, all that we are for the pleasure and enjoyment and reflection that it provides. It’s as if to say, God creates out of the love for the Son and offers it to God saying, you are my son, see the love I have for you and I give to you in this creation which I hold in the palm of my hand, and offer to you. See in this creation formed out of nothing and given life by me the reflection of our beauty.

This is what we are made for. This is the purpose of all creation. We are made, formed, and given the breath of life for the purpose of glorifying God.

This is what we are made for…this is the divine economy.

We are created out of nothing as a gift to the Son from God the Father so that we might as a whole creation, not just human beings, not just one individual, not just the human self – the whole of humanity in conjunction with all of creation, reflect the dignity of God.

The glory of God is the ultimate purpose of creation.

Our story of beginnings, our heritage of community tells us of our all-to-human and all-to-imperfect attempts to do this work, to make this our ultimate concern. In fact, not only is God’s glory not our ultimate concern or our primary undertaking, it is the opposite of our human willfulness. Through all of history we have perpetrated the primary work of self-glorification, self-preservation, and self-manifestation making us the Gods of creation. This is the lie we live.

So tragic, so pervasive, so broken is this understanding of creation that we – on our own – outside of community only see imperfectly the shape of the world intended by God. So it is God who comes into the world, to possess the world which is a gift, to participate, to undo the powers of this world, by reorienting, refocusing, and drawing our eyes to the greater work of God. They asked Jesus, “Why did you come into this world?” He answers us clearly, “To glorify God.” This is his answer and he is our teacher in the life of holiness – in the divine economy.

Jesus’ death on the cross purchases, redeems for us the freedom from the bonds of self-service that we may follow him along the way, imitating our teacher, and undertaking the glorification of God. We are given by the cross freedom from sin which is nothing less than freedom from avarice, the insatiable desire of a God like self-preservation above all else – the root of all sinful desires and actions.

God not only enters and claims creation as God’s own, but also redeems it, providing a missional map to the work of creation, and breathing, loosing on all creation the ever present Holy Spirit, God with us, to strengthen us for the work of glorifying and magnifying God. The lens is polished that we may see more clearly, with the help of the Holy Spirit, our work and the work of community.

The Holy Spirit, the empowering agent of Godly life, transforms and binds individual sinners into virtuous community. This is the family of God, the community called the Church, with the primary working outwardly, on a daily basis, the inner life of the Holy Trinity. The mission of true virtue, co-creating with God, the community of God, the reign of God, the kingdom of God, on earth and in this moment.

We are as the family of God, the temple of the Holy Spirit, enlarging and actualizing God’s Holy vision in creation.

If these themes of “glorification of God” and “building virtuous community” are our work, what then? (And it is most certainly the orthodox view of creation and redemption rooted deeply in our Anglican theology and tradition.) If this glorification of God is our ultimate created purpose as community and our penultimate work is the perfecting of human relationships one to another in undivided unity – the building of the virtuous community at work in the world -- then stewardship is at the center of our life and our ministry. In fact, we might say, our life and our ministry is stewardship.

Virtuous life, a life lived to benefit God, is a life of stewardship the essential ingredient in the divine economy.

We are created for stewardship of the eternal.

We cannot look upon creation, our use or abuse of it, without the knowledge of its ultimate purpose and our fallen desire to manage it for our own benefit rather than for God’s glory.

We cannot look upon our communities, our towns our cities, without acknowledging the brokenness of human interrelations, and the collateral casualties of economy of wealth, power, and authority which benefit human aggrandizement and not the divine economy.

We cannot look upon our families, our mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, and children and not acknowledge how we live out our relationships into horizontal alignment along competing self-indulging sibling relationships. The cost of this economy is broken families, record divorces, bankruptcy, astronomical debt, and abuse. God rather intends the family of God to be one of caring and support with roles ordered out of virtuous care for the “other” in our midst.

We cannot look upon our church without recognizing the result of ego driven communities, with mob mentalities, conflicted loyalties, political maneuvering, and argument measured in electronic sound bytes, followers, and power rather than in discerned corporate stewardship of the divine economy.

When we stop, when we pause, when we take a moment to recalibrate and measure our journey along the way – we see clearly that our priorities may indeed be out of sync.

Our ultimate concern may not be God’s. Our primary interest may not be what has been intended all along.

All of this is to say that what we intend to do when we say we are engaged in stewardship is of the most radical transformative work before the church.

Christian stewardship, which is Anglican and uniquely Episcopalian, recognizes the radical work of creature-li-ness: to glorify God and co-create a virtuous community in mission.

And, when we speak of being stewards we are speaking of a radical faith in God who is Trinity, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who is at work in the world as creator, redeemer, and prophetic missioner. We are saying that “we believe in God,” a particular kind of God -- a God who has brought into being creation for the purpose of his glory and his beauty.

We are saying that we care about the earth and its health in reflecting God’s glory.

We are saying we care about our farms, and communities, and towns, and cities and neighbors and how we are relating and care taking of the land, resources, and our relationships.

We are saying that we believe and so we act in our lives, private and public, for the good and in a way revealing and reflecting the goodness of the one who gives us form and breath.

We are saying we believe and as a community we give in accordance with our thanksgivings. We give not 10%, because we know God has given us all that we have, all that we are, our friends, our family, our neighbors, our gifts for ministry, our vocations, our work, our lives, our very lives God has given. We give out of the abundance of what we receive – God in Jesus yes, but moreover, out of the glorious generosity of beauty which is God’s creation all around us. We give, we make a difference, we restore, we co-create, and we design.

As Christian stewards, we understand that we are artists who are intimately engaged in the beautiful things, the beatitudes, in the blessings of neighbors and creatures and creation.

To be a Christian steward at work within the economy of God is a most life changing, and mission altering notion. To glorify God as our primary witness and concern in our lives, with one another, in our relationships, and in our affiliation to God and God’s community is life’s work of stewardship.  So we pray:

O God, most glorious,

Make our life the vision of thee

To the praise of thy glory;

that we all as a mirror may reflect it,

and be transformed into the same image

from glory to glory,

world without end. Amen.

Stewardship: The Divine Economy

Stewardship Conference
Episcopal Diocese of Texas 2010
by the Rt. Rev. C. Andrew Doyle

Following my weekly thoughts on the Gospel?

Every week I am publishing thoughts on the upcoming Gospel lesson. Find those thoughts, and resources for running your own bible study on the Gospel here:  http://www.hitchhikersguidetoluke.blogspot.com/

Sermon Preached at Prayer Service for Immigration Reform

In the first book of the Bible called Genesis God speaks to Abraham and says, “Leave your country, your family, and your relatives and go to the land that I will show you. I will bless you and make your descendants into a great nation.”
God calls people to leave where they are and go and make new community.

God called Abraham and Sarah.

God called Moses.

God called Joshua.

God called the judges.

God called the kings.

God called the exiles.

For Christians God sent Jesus and called the apostles and Paul and the first followers whose names are recorded in the books of the New Testament.

God calls.

God beckons.

God makes new community.

My family came from England and from Ireland. One almost drowned along the way, others made the journey with ease. All faced life threatening and life giving challenges in a new world. All of them faced a nation that promised new life regardless of the cost of arriving or the cost of staying on these shores.

They came with hope for a future and for something better for their life. Many believed that God had in store for them better things.

Perhaps your parents came too or you came. You and I have arrived here today because the mother of exiles, these United States, promises: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."

We are, as the author Jon Meacham has writen, a nation that believes in God and believes in providence; the working out of God’s plan.

We know that God invites, God beckons, God calls out to his people and says: “Go to the land that I will show you.” We know this because we have experienced it ourselves.

God has called us, beckoned us into community.

God is constantly renewing the face of the earth. God is constantly doing his work through the efforts of his holy people. People called to work together, hand in hand, beyond the divisions of homeland and language, for the betterment of creation.

God intends us to be built into a virtuous society, a society who works for the benefit of all of God’s people and not ourselves alone.

When the followers of God have journeyed out into the deserts of life they have called upon God, do not forget us. And, I say God does not forget.

God does not forget his tired, his poor.

God does not forget his huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

God does not forget the fearful or the anxious.

God does not forget the fallen.

And, God does not forget the imprisoned.

God does not forget. God does not turn his eyes away. God remembers his people and their journey. God does not forget, God remembers you and he remembers me.

And when God looks down upon us and sees us in our lives calling out for him. God answers. And, there are many ways in which God answers. One of the ways in which God answers his faithful people calling out to him for rescue and to be saved is to send others.

Did not God send Moses to his people in Egypt? Did not God send Isaiah to comfort his people in Babylon? Do you and I not remember the names of those who God has sent to us to call us by name, to offer us the hand of God, and to lift us out of the dirt and ashes of our broken lives? You and I remember their names.

Those saints of God are generations of immigrants who have gone before us and were not content for their own success. When others arrived they remembered their experience and choose not to act out of fear but to help our immigrant fathers and mothers find their way in a strange land. They did this, these saints of God, because they heard the words of Isaiah calling: help the oppressed.

They heard the words of God speaking to their hearts saying: you were once a stranger in a strange strange land. You remember and you are called by God, this is what our immigrant fathers and mothers heard, you are called to help people into society with dignity, and respect. You are to help them become part of your national family…for they are part of my family -- the family of God.

Immigrants have always built up this nation and benefited us as a nation and as people of faith, by bringing their willingness to hard work, their entrepreneurial spirit, their diverse cultures, and their ethnic foods. Our culture is an immigrant culture.

It is true that immigrants are being demonized today because people are afraid of changing demographics, economic anxiety, border violence, because the system is broken.

These fears are not new fears. They are the same fears that greeted the Irish when they arrived. These are the same fears that greeted the Asians as they arrived. Today these fears greet the immigrant Hispanics, the new Africans, the islanders, and those from the Middle East.

God has never asked us to act out of our fear. God has always called us to act on behalf of the newcomer and the stranger. We know what we must do. We must on God’s behalf see one another as immigrant brother and sister – as family.

We are advocating and praying for reform because we are God’s family.

We are simply advocating for family unity.

We are advocating for reform that allows documentation of immigrants and their families with a path to citizenship.

We are advocating for affordable process.

We are advocating for an environment where people are safe in their community no matter what their legal status is; and that they have the ability to work with our civic authorities to provide for healthy communities.

We are advocating that policies should respect human rights by beginning with humanitarian values. We are advocating that we respect the dignity of all persons.

We are simply saying that we have a moral obligation to provide refuge and to welcome the stranger.

You and I have a responsibility to remember that we were once strangers in a strange land and that we are called by God to care for those now sent into our care.

We must do this because we understand that they represent God. The immigrant and the immigration issues we face today are our greatest challenge as a nation. How we answer the questions posed and the advocacy required will show what we are truly made of.

At the end of the day we can have great slogans, great beliefs, and even be one of the most powerful and greatest nations in the world.

If we do not help people find freedom and liberty…and we do not do this with kindness, and hospitality and love then we may loose the heart of our nation. Indeed, we will have lost the heart of all of our faiths combined.

It is God that calls us into a diverse community, a family of God. It is upon God’s mercy and providence that we depend. And, it is upon God’s call to help the stranger that we discover our journey into God’s kingdom.

God spoke to Abram and said, “Leave your country, your family, and your relatives and go to the land that I will show you. I will bless you and make your descendants into a great nation.”


by The Rt. Rev. C. Andrew Doyle, Preached at Immigration Reform Prayer Service, Catholic Charismatic Center, Houston, Texas

Hear the sermon preached in Spanish, with the last 1/4 in English  here:  http://www.adoyle.libsyn.com/

News following the Immigration Service:
http://www.39online.com/news/local/kiah-religious-leaders-immigration-reform-story,0,3910843.story

http://www.click2houston.com/video/23811580/index.html

http://www.khou.com/home/Interfaith-prayer-service-focuses-on-immigration-reform-95739914.html

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/special/immigration/7039827.html

Pide a Dios a su pueblo: Ir a la tierra que yo te voy a mostrar. (Génesis 12:1-7)

En el primer libro de la Biblia llamado Génesis, Dios habla a Abraham y le dice: "Deja tu tierra, tu familia y tus parientes para ir a la tierra que yo te voy a mostrar. Con tus descendientes voy a formar una gran nación; voy a bendecirte y hacerte famoso y serás una bendición para otros. "

Dios llama a la gente a salir de donde están y que vayan y hagan una nueva comunidad.

Dios llamó a Abraham y Sara.

Dios llamó a Moisés.

Dios llamó a Josué.

Dios llamó a los jueces.

Dios llamó a los reyes.

Dios llamó a los exiliados.

Para los cristianos Dios envió a Jesús y llamó a los apóstoles y Pablo y los primeros seguidores, cuyos nombres se registran en los libros del Nuevo Testamento.

Dios llama.

Dios nos llama con señas.

Dios hace nueva comunidad.

Mi familia vino de Inglaterra y de Irlanda. Uno casi se ahogó en el camino, los demás hicieron el viaje con facilidad. Todos enfrentaron amenazas y desafíos en la vida que da un nuevo mundo. Todos ellos enfrentaron una nación que prometía una nueva vida sin importar el precio de como llegaron y los gastos de permanecer en estas tierras.

Llegaron con la esperanza de un futuro y por algo mejor para su vida. Muchos creían que Dios tenía reservado para ellos cosas mejores.

Tal vez los padres de ustedes llegaron o usted mismo llegó. Ustedes y yo hemos llegado hasta aquí porque la Madre de los exiliados, los Estados Unidos, promete: "Dame tus cansados, tus pobres, tus grupos confundidos que ansían un libre respirar."

Somos, como el autor Jon Meacham, que tiene la creencia de que una nación que cree en Dios y cree en la providencia, esta trabajando en el plan de Dios.

Sabemos que Dios invita, Dios nos envía señales, Dios llama a su pueblo y dice: "Ve a la tierra que te voy a mostrar." Lo sabemos porque lo hemos experimentado nosotros mismos.

Dios nos ha llamado, nos envía señales en la comunidad.

Dios está constantemente renovando la faz de la tierra. Dios está constantemente haciendo su trabajo a través de los esfuerzos de su pueblo santo. Personas llamadas a trabajar juntos, mano a mano, más allá de las divisiones de la nacionalidad y el idioma, para el mejoramiento de la creación.

Dios tiene la intención de que seamos incorporado en una sociedad virtuosa, una sociedad que trabaja para el beneficio de todo el pueblo de Dios y no solo para nosotros mismos.

Cuando los seguidores de Dios han viajado a través de los desiertos de la vida y han clamado a Dios, no te olvides de nosotros. Yo les dijo, Dios no olvida.

Dios se no olvida su cansancio os sus pobres.

Dios no se olvida de las multitudes que ansían respirar libertad.

Dios no olvida de los que tienen miedo, o sus ansiedades.

Dios no se olvida de los caídos.

Y, Dios no se olvida de los cautivos.

Dios no se olvida. Dios no voltea la mirada al otro lado. Dios recuerda a su pueblo y de sus viajes. Dios no se olvida, Dios se acuerda de ustedes y se acuerda de mí.

Y cuando Dios nos contempla y nos ve en nuestras vidas gritando por él. Dios contesta. Y, hay muchas formas en que Dios contesta. Una de las formas en que Dios responde a su pueblo fiel que clama ser rescatado y salvado es enviando a otros.

¿Acaso Dios no envío a Moisés a su pueblo en Egipto? ¿Acaso Dios no envío a Isaías a consolar a su pueblo en Babilonia? ¿A caso ustedes y yo no recordamos los nombres de aquellos que Dios ha enviado a nosotros para que nos llamen a cada uno por nuestro nombre, que nos han ofrecido la mano de Dios, y que nos han levantado de la tierra y cenizas de nuestras vidas rotas? Ustedes y yo recordamos sus nombres.

Esos santos de Dios son generaciones de inmigrantes que nos han precedido y que optaron por ayudar, no por temor, sino que ayudaron a nuestros padres y madres inmigrantes a encontrar su camino en una tierra extraña. Ellos hicieron esto, porque estos santos de Dios, habían oído las palabras del llamado de Isaías: ayuda a los oprimidos.

Escucharon las palabras de Dios hablar en sus corazones diciendo: una vez fuiste un extranjero en tierra extraña. Recuerda que eres llamado por Dios, esto es lo que nuestros padres y madres inmigrantes oyeron, ustedes están llamados a ayudar a las personas a formar la sociedad con dignidad y respeto. Ustedes están para ayudarles a formar parte de esta nación ... porque ellos son parte de mi familia - la familia de Dios.

Los inmigrantes hoy en día y siempre han construido esta nación y nos han beneficiado como nación y como comunidad de fe, trayendo su voluntad de trabajar duro, el espíritu emprendedor, sus diversas culturas y sus comidas típicas. Nuestra cultura es una cultura inmigrante.

Es cierto que hoy los inmigrantes están siendo comparados con el demonio porque la gente tiene miedo de los cambios demográficos, de la ansiedad económica, de la violencia en la frontera, porque el sistema de inmigración está roto.

Estos temores no son nuevos temores. Son los mismos temores que recibieron a los irlandeses cuando llegaron. Estos son los mismos temores que saludó a los asiáticos cuando llegaron. Hoy en día estos temores saludan a los inmigrantes hispanos, los nuevos africanos, los isleños, y los del Oriente Medio.

Dios nunca nos ha pedido que actuemos por nuestro miedo. Dios siempre nos ha llamado para actuar en nombre del recién llegado y el extranjero. Sabemos lo que debemos hacer. Debemos de parte de Dios vernos unos a otros como hermanos y hermanas inmigrantes - como la familia.

Estamos defendiendo y orando por una reforma porque somos la familia de Dios.

Simplemente estamos abogando por la unidad familiar.

Estamos abogando por una reforma que permita la documentación de los inmigrantes y sus familias en un camino a la ciudadanía.

Estamos abogando por un proceso económico accesible.

Estamos abogando por un ambiente donde las personas estén a salvo en su comunidad sin importar su estatus legal, y que tengan la capacidad de trabajar con nuestras autoridades civiles para establecer comunidades saludables.

Estamos abogando por que esas leyes deben respetar los derechos humanos.

Estamos abogando por los valores humanitarios.

Estamos abogando por que se respete la dignidad de todas las personas.

Simplemente estamos diciendo que tenemos una obligación moral de brindar refugio y dar la bienvenida al extranjero.

Usted y yo tenemos una responsabilidad de recordar que una vez fuimos extranjeros en una tierra extraña y que estamos llamados por Dios para atender a las personas que se envían ahora a nuestro cuidado.

Tenemos que hacer esto porque entendemos que ellos representan a Dios. Los inmigrantes y los problemas de inmigración que nos enfrentamos hoy son nuestro mayor reto como nación. Cómo respondamos a las preguntas formuladas y la defensa necesaria se mostrará de lo que realmente estamos hechos.

Al final del día podremos tener grandes lemas y consignas, grandes creencias, e incluso ser una de las naciones más poderosa y más grande del mundo.

Si no ayudamos a la gente a encontrar la libertad ... y no hacemos esto con la amabilidad y la hospitalidad y el amor, entonces habremos perdido el corazón de nuestra nación. De hecho, habremos perdido el corazón de todas nuestras creencias combinadas.

Es Dios quien nos llama a una comunidad diversa, una familia de Dios. Es la misericordia de Dios y la providencia de lo que dependemos. Y en el llamado de Dios ayudando al extranjero descubrimos nuestro viaje en el reino de Dios.

Dios habló a Abraham y le dijo, "Deja tu tierra, tu familia y tus parientes para ir a la tierra que yo te voy a mostrar. Con tus descendientes voy a formar una gran nación; voy a bendecirte y hacerte famosos y serás una bendición para otros. "

Un Sermon que predico en el Servicio de Oración por Inmigración

The Archbishop of Canterbury's Pentecost Letter & Responses

The Archbishop of Canterbury's Pentecost Letter to the Anglican Communion has energized many responses in The Episcopal Church and throughout the Anglican Communion. Linked are the Presiding Bishop's response and my response.

A Column for the Living Church
 
I wrote the following guest column for the Living Church at their invitation. It is a more condensed version than the response included above. I have also included it in the Out of the Ordinary.