Lent 4A

I started this year's season of Lent on Ash Wednesday in my sermon 

talking about the wisdom in a cup of tea, 

or rather, the wisdom in an empty cup of tea. 

Since Ash Wednesday, 

when I had a cold, until today, 

I pretty much have had a cup of tea everyday. 

Throat Coat, ginger tea, peppermint tea, I'm an herbal tea girl, I cannot have caffeine.

My cold has gotten better, but there is something comforting in having a cup of coffee or tea. 

And right now, we all need a little extra comfort in our lives.

For some reason, 

I always seem to have a different favorite mug for a season and use it everyday for that season, and then move on to another mug. 

This spring is this lime green one I picked up for free at a thrift store. 

Do you have a mug or cup of something with you this morning? 

Is it empty? Full? Somewhere in between?

If I were to imagine my mug's life it would look like this: 

one of being filled and emptied, 

being put in new and different places, 

carried around, 

being a bit used, and occasionally knocked over. 

But all the while being loved, simply for what it is.

For some of us, 

everything has most recently been dumped unceremoniously out of our daily cups.

Our normal activities, our normal work situations, our normal hangouts with friends and family.

Even though it doesn't usually happen for everyone all at the same time or in the same way, 

as a wider community, across the whole nation, 

we are truly having an experience of Lent. 

Being emptied. 

Being hungry for things we didn't realize we needed.

We have been given an experience

an experience we probably all didn't think or feel like we needed,

but God always has a way of working through our experiences,

especially when we open our eyes to what God is doing in our lives.

The story we hear this morning from the Gospel of John

is definitely one of an EXPERIENCE for the blind man.

The blind man has an experience, a personal revelation, 

which changes his relationship with everyone, 

including himself, his parents, his community, and God. 

He is given sight by Jesus, in a very personal way. 

He has spent his entire life not being able to see

and then Jesus changes his whole life in one experience.

He gives him the gift of sight,

not only in his eyes,

but the ability to see Jesus for who he really is.

Naturally, this whole experience is questionable to the authorities,

as most things Jesus does are.

They haul the formerly blind man into the Pharisee's court. 

When he is questioned by the Jewish authorities about his experience, he stands alone. 

His parents cannot answer, his community cannot answer. 

All he has is his own experience to fall back on. 

In this way, 

The formerly blind man has a second experience,

one of sharing his story 

and sharing his witness to Jesus.

Though untrue, we Episcopalians supposedly sit 

on the three legged stool from Richard Hooker of scripture, tradition, and reason. 

Which does not actually come out of his book, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity,

but which came under attack after years of being the modus operandi 

during the first American Revival movement 

and the breaking off of the Methodist and other holiness church groups. 

One of many reasons we split apart at that time

was that they thought that a fourth leg should be added to the stool: experience. 

They argued that scripture, tradition, reason were all ways in which we know God 

and can share God, 

but while we are not writing more scripture, 

God's revelation of Godself in the world had not stopped, 

we still have personal and community revelation and experiences of God 

which expand and inform our understanding of and relationship with God. 

We do experience our relationship with God 

in ways that change our understandings of ourselves, others, and God.

In our current situation of social distancing, 

many feel at a loss without their communities. 

We feel keenly the separation and distance 

of not being able to gather or share our experiences personally. 

However, now is the time for us to have those personal experiences, 

to reflect on how our experiences of God have shaped our lives 

and how they have changed our relationships. 

Even though we may stand alone in this moment, we are not alone. 

Even though we may feel that our cups are empty,

Jesus is filling us up.

Jesus has been revealed to us 

and now is our time to acknowledge and stand in our hearts, bodies, and minds 

to know how God is interacting with us.

God works through the community in many ways. 

But in all the community discernment, we also need personal discernment. 

We need the ability to feel, in our heads, hearts, and bodies, 

the truth of our experience, 

so we know we are acting in authenticity, 

not simply following along with other people's experience.

What is this time of personal discernment telling you? 

Is there are part of your life you have been doing for a while that perhaps needs to change? 

Is the experience of slowing down or staying home opening your eyes to something different in your life?

Lent is always a difficult time

and this year, 2020 seems to have amplified all the world's difficulties twenty times over.

For many of us, it might be too soon to be able to say what we are learning from this experience,

it may be too early to put our experience in context in our lives,

but it is an authentic experience 

which needs to be reflected on. 

It needs its own cup of tea, or several,

time to sit down, pray, and reflect

to listen to God in our personal experiences

and when the time comes for things to start up again,

to go forward with God intentionally.

Amen.