"little children, let us love..."

Anna Blaedel
3 May 2009
First UMC, Osage
Psalm 23
1 John 3:16-24

Hear these Easter words, written by Rev. Odette Lockwood-Stewart:

"Whether the world is ready or not,
Whether the church is ready or not,
Whether you and I are ready or not,
Christ is risen.

Resurrection means that truth will not stay buried,
That justice cannot be kept down,
That love shall not be destroyed by death.
Christ is risen.

Resurrection is a frightening thing.
But the amazing good news of Easter is that even fear and terror can lead to new life."

Ready or not, Christ is risen. Ready or not, we are called to live as Easter people, Resurrected and Resurrecting. Let us pray…

Alice Waters passed by a run down school in Berkeley every day on her way home from work. Broken windows, graffiti, peeling paint, a meager blacktop playground, and old crumbling concrete left the school looking so neglected, Alice wondered if it was abandoned. It wasn’t. Nearly 1,000 middle-school children were enrolled there, grades 6,7, and 8. She saw a school, falling apart. And with it, the lives and futures of hundreds of children. Because Alice is a chef, and the owner of one of the Bay Area’s most delicious restaurants, where others saw an empty, abandoned lot in the schoolyard, Alice saw a place to grow lettuce or fennel or tomatoes or blackberries.

She started talking with the overwhelmed principal and overworked teachers. They planned a community garden that no one really thought would be possible to create and sustain. People doubted whether middle schoolers would ever do the work of pulling weeds, or be willing to eat kale. But they were so desperate for something different, they couldn’t help but give it a try. They started a community garden, and committed to serving their own food in the cafeteria. Science teachers used the garden to teach things like photosynthesis. History teachers used the various grains to trace the histories of different people and cultures throughout the world and throughout history. Chemistry teachers charted the chemical reactions at play in raising dough and baking bread and cultivating compost.

Over time, their understanding of these “at risk” kids began to deepen. One girl’s mother told Alice this girl had a pair of special shoes just for gardening, and that she loved her garden days so much she always set out those shoes the night before, to remember them. Alice had to hide her astonishment, because that girl never let on at school that she liked the garden one bit.

Another boy refused to participate, no matter how many people tried to encourage him. He simply sat and watched the others. At the end of the session, at a gathering for parents, the boy’s mother walked up and said, “Thank you so much for being so nice to my son. The garden has completely changed him!” Surprised, but wanting to be polite the teacher asked, “How do you mean?” “Well,” she said, “my son used to come home and play video games and watch TV all night. Now he comes home and talks and talks about the garden and everything happening there. He talked to the family and our friends and neighbors, and has started writing stories about gardens and plants.”

Another time, two girls were given the parts for a new wheelbarrow. They were handed a wrench and a screwdriver, and left alone to assemble it. They did a fine job, and the teacher thought nothing more about it until the end of the year, when the two girls said this was the highlight of their year. They said nobody had ever trusted them to do something like that before.

Then came the day that the cook let students make pancakes from scratch. As each class came into the kitchen, they found nothing on the tables except the recipe, written out. Dividing into groups, they had to do everything: find ingredients, measure the right amounts, mix the batter, turn on the stove. One of the teachers found this frightening and said to the cook, “I’m so worried they won’t be able to do this. It’ll make them feel badly about themselves.”

And it’s true: there were runny pancakes, and pancakes that would’ve make great Frisbees, and others that could have been hockey pucks, and others that were delicious, but they were all still pancakes, and you would’ve thought those kids had climbed Mount Everest, they were so proud. The doubting teacher had to leave the room to wipe tears from her eyes. From a neglected, overgrown paved lot, Alice and the teachers and students created an edible schoolyard. The power of resurrection and rebirth, unleashed and unloosed. “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

Majora Carter returned to the South Bronx neighborhood where she grew up, and hardly recognized what she saw. Severe pollution from power plants and production factories was destroying the community, and the people living there. The childhood asthmas rates were soaring. Cancer rates were alarmingly high. She learned the Mayor had plans to build a waste transfer station in the neighborhood. Garbage and waste from wealthy, white neighborhoods would be bussed to poor, black areas. Politicians counted on people feeling so hopeless and powerless they wouldn’t find the courage or strength to organize and resist.

The situation was spiraling from bad to worse. Because air quality was so bad, kids weren’t playing outside. Because kids weren’t playing outside, rates of childhood obesity and diabetes were on the rise. Majora Carter began organizing people from the neighborhood. She helped connect issues of poverty, racism, pollution, and poor heath. She witnessed to the hopelessness and powerlessness people felt. She founded a green jobs training program. Folks on the fringe—single moms, ex-convicts, people in recovery from addiction—began restoring wetlands, cleaning contaminated land, installing green roofs, and planning community gardens. Together, they blocked the plan to turn their neighborhood into a waste dump. People began feeling their sacred worth, and power. Crime rates dropped. Majora saw people smiling again, and sitting out on their porches. The power of resurrection and rebirth, unleashed and unloosed. “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

Tom Henderson was a sixth-generation famer in South Carolina, who heard God’s call to ordained ministry within The United Methodist Church. As a pastor, he found that too few pastors and people in the pews were thinking theologically about the command to be good, sustainable stewards of God’s earth. He started educating other pastors about issues of sustainability, and food. He began serving as the Sustainable and Urban Agriculture Consultant to the General Board of Global Ministries. He challenged local churches to start community gardens.

Tom wrote, “Community gardening is being used in imaginative and effective ways to address many of today’s societal ills. It is especially effective in combating hunger, and building community. It also brings such side benefits as stress relief, better health and nutrition, a closer physical and spiritual connection with God’s creation, and a deeper commitment to responsible stewardship of God’s earth.” The power of resurrection and rebirth, unleashed and unloosed. “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

Casey Payne knows that just making it through the day, day after day, can be a challenge. As a young man learning to live with his black body and his Bipolar brain in a world where racism and stigma and misunderstanding around mental illness abound, he knows what it means to feel isolated. Alone. In need of support and community.

After three mental breakdowns and terrible experiences with doctors who didn’t try to understand him, Casey found hope in Taiwan. The doctor there taught Casey about healthy living, and respected him for who and how he was. Casey found himself on a spiritual journey to build healthy, supportive relationships. Now, he writes about being bipolar, and helps other people learn how to live healthy, full lives. Casey is planning an intentional community in the big house where he lives—inviting other young, black men who need extra support to experience a sense of community and belonging, a safe place in the midst of transition, the company of people who get it, and who care. The power of resurrection and rebirth, unleashed and unloosed. “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

Francine Jones was eating lunch at a McDonalds in the middle of Manhattan. Within a few short days in New York City, Francine was shocked by the number of people she saw living on the streets, searching for food in dumpsters and trash cans. So many of God’s least of these, living on the edge without homes, hot meals, or people who care. Francine found she was full before she finished her chicken McNuggets and fries, and recognized that before this trip she would have thrown away this extra food without thinking twice. But she had seen hungry faces. And through the window, she saw a woman shaking her cup of change, asking for food. And she saw her abundance in a new way. And saw the injustice of having too much, when others had too little. And felt the call of faith to respond.

So Francine stepped outside, shared her food, and built connection with a stranger. God’s ambassador from Osage, responding from the heart through an act both small and significant. The power of resurrection and rebirth, unleashed and unloosed. “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

"Whether the world is ready or not,
Whether the church is ready or not,
Whether you and I are ready or not,
Christ is risen.

Resurrection means that truth will not stay buried,
That justice cannot be kept down,
That love shall not be destroyed by death.
Christ is risen."

May it be so. Amen, and amen.