So what I wanted to do a little bit this morning is focus, I think, focus a little on the Gospel and the second reading, but also a little bit what I was talking a couple of weeks ago, where I spent some time talking about the processions, and it sounded like for a couple of you that was helpful. So I wanted to try to go to the second procession. So remember how many processions are there? Five, very good, five. So we have, in some ways, they’re kind of, some of them are a bit misnamed, because we don’t necessarily think of that word “precession” as connected with some of the movements that we do, but the first one is the first procession, and the second procession is the gradual, where the Gospel is brought down and read, that’s the second procession. Where is the third procession? What’s that? Yeah, the bread and wine, the gifts are brought up, and remember that the gifts are brought up, but the people who bring them up are representing all of us. Where is the fourth procession? Receiving communion. And I’d even said a couple of weeks ago that that, in a sense, is our altar call, and when I got, at the end of that, asked if that was helpful, and I got some great feedback from Portia about wanting to make it more applicable to our life, because I think at times when you hear the word “altered call,” there can be a tendency to connect that denominationally, as opposed to saying it’s an invitation to come up. And then the last one is which? What’s the last? It’s when you get out of here, right? And so, just to spend a couple of moments on that second one, which is the gradual, and to remember that the gradual then is when the Gospel is brought down and it is read in your midst. And I had proposed that I think a lot of people understand that the reason you stand for the Gospel is because it is some degree of reverence. It’s like when someone great would come into your midst, you would stand in their presence. Also the fact that it could be the fact that the word, the incarnate word, is coming into our midst, and that is why it is that we stand. But I had suggested to you that that’s not the purpose. That wasn’t… Those can be… Those can be valuable and important and great wonderful illustrations of respect and of the word coming into our midst. But do you remember what that was all about? That everybody stood, the word of God was proclaimed, and all of those who were inquirers or searchers or catechumens, who were in the process of entering into the Christian faith at the end of the Gospel, because everyone was standing, they had to leave. They had to leave, they went out the door, and the door was locked. Do you remember that? And the question was asked, so what do they do, do they just hang outside the door? Is that what they do? No, they have an assignment. Do you remember the assignment? The assignment was that before the Son goes down, they were to witness to at least one person in word or deed that Jesus Christ is Lord. That’s the purpose. And I’m not trying to take away from the whole sense of the Lord coming into our midst, or the standing for reverence. But some feedback that I had gotten regarding looking at the gradual and explaining what was going on in the early church as that was being done, is they weren’t offended, but it was just like, I don’t understand why those who were in the process of becoming have to leave. Why can’t they stay and sit and hear the word, but instead they have to leave? But remember, they’re still going through instruction outside of that moment of the liturgy. Are you with me? So they’re going through instruction. It’s like when Cyprian, in the second century, established that kind of discipleship, that he began to realize that there were things that needed to be dealt with. And so it was like this two-year process. And I’m not saying that there’s a value of extending the process for someone becoming Christian, because there’s examples in the New Testament, in the Acts of the Apostles, that people were baptized immediately. Were those unique circumstances? Is that normal Christianity? Maybe both of those are true. But do you see any value of someone being discipled? Is there part of that process of being discipled? And so the early church looked at that and said, this is how we disciple, and to say that they will be instructed otherwise, but they cannot participate in hearing the word and receiving the Eucharist until they go through it and are fully received. And if that is bothersome to any of you, remember that there’s a value of not reading our 21st century, let’s call it bias, back into the historical church. To be able to, before we do that too quickly, to take a step back and go, that was their world. And so may I suggest, be respectful of that, that that was their world. And so the whole idea of needing to go out and to manifest the presence of the Lord that was operating in their life, even though they were not yet fully received, but they had already begun to surrender to Him. Right? They had already begun to give their lives to Him. And so they had this task, this commitment to do, to go out and to do that, to share the gospel. So obviously when that wonderful time would come when they would be received, they would be received typically at the Easter Vigil, and they would become part of the community, able to fully participate. You with me? And then I had suggested when we look at that second processional and we go to the fifth one, the recessional, where those who have been able to be there the whole time, right, who have been part of, you know, the first part of the liturgy, been able to hear the word proclaimed, been able to come and receive the Eucharist, when they recess, what are they supposed to do? What’s their task? To what? You should move up here to the front. Isn’t their task the same thing? They are taking within them, they who are the temple of the Lord, they came into the temple, but they are the temple to go out and to witness, to manifest the presence that they are infused, that they are woven into in Christ. Does that make sense? So, you know, when I have some people come up and we do this prophetic time, and then ask if there is anyone out here who might have a word for someone, I know I am talking to the choir and I know that so many of you have been exposed to this for centuries. But I want you to grasp the importance of why we do that. And I am not trying to pit one thing against the other here, but let me tell you something about preachers. And let me tell you something about preaching. So, I was ordained a deacon in 84 and a priest in 85, and like many people who have been involved in ministry, I was in ministry 10 years prior to being ordained. So, we are looking at 50 some years of being in ministry. I have heard thousands, thousands of sermons, thousands of them. And there is not very many of them I can remember, including my own. And I am not trying to pit one against the other, I am not doing that. But I will tell you this, there are times, and I know today was one of those, but I am not saying that because that happened today. But there are times that there has been a prophetic word given that has impacted me for unbelievably a long, long time. I think I had shared, there was a guy by the name of Dick Mills who gave me a prophetic word in scriptures. I still go to those all the time. It has so impacted my life. St. Theresa of Avola used to say, “When the Lord speaks to you, write it down.” Write it down. And keep going back to it and remember it. Cherish it. Cherish it. Because that may be something that there will come times to where you need to go back and say, “The Lord spoke then, may I not forget.” It is the same way of cherishing when the word is proclaimed in our midst, right? The reason it is proclaimed in our midst as opposed to you reading it is because that word is coming alive in our midst. It is the whole scene from Jesus in the synagogue at Nazareth when he has handed that parchment from Isaiah and he opens it and he reads and he says, “Today this is fulfilled in your hearing, that you are hearing that word of God, that each week somehow, some way that God all put together.” For who? Us. For us. And to be able to cherish that and to hear that. And so when you go back to taking this time for some of the prophetic or words of knowledge and to see this ebb and flow and this kind of movement and that whole process of the gradual. And you see some of that coming forth and so people hopefully can be blessed in hearing or giving. And then in the whole process of the proclamation of the word and the whole process of what it is that I’m doing now, all of that can be of value, right? So there’s going to be a young lady at this 3SI conference. Her name is Jane House. And at the last 3SI, during the Eucharist time, the bishop had a word of knowledge and he said, “There’s someone by the name of Jen or Jennifer and she has an issue with her thyroid.” Okay? Now there may have been more to it than that but that was basically the essence. So at any rate, the service goes on, it breaks and people go out for lunch. Anyway, she went out with some friends and they are at this restaurant and the waitress comes up and someone asked her what her name was and she said, “Jen.” And so Jane is sitting there and she’s stewing about this so she turns to her dad, Jim House, Father Jim House, and says, “Remember that word that the bishop had at the conference? I wonder if that’s her.” And I wasn’t privy to that conversation other than what I was told but apparently her dad said to her, “Well, if you’re feeling that, maybe you need to go ask.” And so she went up and verified that her name was Jen and said, “Do you have, I just need to ask this, and I may have a really bizarre question, but do you have any issue with your thyroid?” And she said, “Yeah, it was all stuff that was going on with all of that.” And so she prayed for her and I don’t know if, you know, there was no doctor’s report but apparently she had felt that there was something going on in the midst of that. That’s why we do this. That’s why we do this. So that you practice here, you practice here, and hopefully your practice is something that is so meaningful to you, such a value to you, that you take that out there. We were reminded, Stacy and I were reminded that we went to Home Depot not too long ago and we went in there and we were looking to see if we could return something. And there was an individual standing there, a young black man, and he said, “You’re the guys that prayed for me.” And we said, “Oh!” And I’m going, “I don’t remember.” “I don’t remember.” And he said, “Yeah, about a year ago you were in and we were just talking and you asked kind of how things were going and I told you all that well and you prayed for me.” And I said, “Well, how’s things going?” And he said, “Unbelievable what’s happened.” Unbelievable the things that have happened. Now, I don’t know if it was providential for me to be there at that moment so it deepened what was happening in him or if it was for me to be able to say, “Mark, you heard.” “You heard and you stepped out.” So if you think of these processions and you think of that last one, the recessional, is everywhere you are going, are you going with your own agenda or are you being sent? Are you being sent to more be aware of what’s going on and to be able to sniff out or to be aware of anything and everything that’s around you? And take it out for a spin. I know Stacy has shared with you that I used to drive her crazy because early on I had heard this statement and the statement went like this. It was an individual who had been involved in praying for a lot of people for healing and he said, “Lord, I want to see more breakthroughs.” You know what the Lord said to him? Pray for more people. Instead of thinking, “Well, I prayed for a person and nothing happened,” or, “I prayed for someone and I don’t know if something happened so I guess I don’t have that gift and I’m just going to stop.” I would just encourage you, don’t do that. Because remember, if the gospel is true and you are included, woven, infused into the life of Christ to participate in that and then in the whole process of participating in that, his story is lived through you and he manifests his presence through you, then there is no pressure on you to perform. There is no pressure on you whatsoever to perform or to worry whether or not it’s going to be a success that you can put on the handle of your pistol. “I got another one!” It is not about you. And please don’t hear that in any kind of like this, but hear that as an invitation. It’s not about you. It has nothing to do with you. It has everything to do with you or a physical conduit in that moment to be able to release that manifestation of his and let him take care of how that happens. You know, in the early church, this was an official teaching that everyone who was anointed was healed. Everyone who was anointed was healed. Now one could, you know, take a step back and go, “Well, I saw so-and-so get prayed for and they didn’t get healed.” And so this is not a mincing of words, but it was saying the thing that you don’t know is maybe the healing was spiritual. It may have been emotional. It might have been physical. It might have been relational. It might have been something was deposited in them that was going to draw them to go to confession. Who knows? But the fact of the matter is, the Lord was working in that moment and our task is to let go and to let him manifest. Does that make sense to you? So when we go back to the gradual, the idea that the gospel is brought into our midst, let’s go ahead and include that. That we’re doing it out of reverence for the Lord and the fact that he’s coming into our midst. The incarnate word is coming into our midst and all we want to do is just touch the hem of his garment. We just want to hear him or have him touch us because we want that soul to be touched or delivered or have clarity or whatever it be. And that is something that’s happening when he’s right there in our midst and we’re standing and we’re in attention to that. But then we also hear there’s that beckoning, come to me, come to me and let me give you what I have, my rest, my anointing, my presence, my power, and go out and manifest that. Isn’t it fascinating that in the gospel, Jesus will say, “It’s like children in the square. We piped you a tune and you didn’t dance. We sang you a dirge and you didn’t wail.” What do you think he’s talking about? What did he use that illustration? Might I suggest to you, it’s really important not to change the gospel, to fit our own narrative, to fit our agenda, to lower the scriptures, to fit our experience or lack of experience or to lower the scriptures to fit our theology. That doesn’t fit into my theology. That doesn’t fit into what I’ve learned denominationally and besides that my pastor taught me some things and I don’t think I’m supposed to deviate from that. So the whole notion of saying, “You know, John the Baptist came a certain way and you dismissed him because you said he’s crazy.” You don’t have to listen to him. You don’t have to listen to anything he has to say. So we’re going to turn away from everything he said because we’re finding something that we want to hear. And then Jesus says of himself, he said, “And I came hanging around with tax collectors changing between 120 and 180 gallons of water into some really good wine. And you say, “I’m a glutton and a drunkard.” And so the Lord would say, “You look at me and you dismiss me because you don’t want to hear that.” So again, let’s go back to these processions. What if these processions are so much more pivotal in our life than we ever realized? What if they are the ones who remember when I’ve talked so many times about that fundamental stance and that fundamental option? We have a stance in which we view the world that is, we might say, that is non-negotiable for us. To say, “This is what I believe. This is what I stand for. This is the hill I’m going to die on. This is me. This is my stance.” That’s my stance. And the fundamental options, remember that? The options are the choices moment by moment that you make. Some of them major, some of them middle, some of them minor. But they’re choices that you make, these options. And with each of those choices, it’s either going to support your stance or it’s going to undermine it. One the other. And so it’s beginning to look and say, “What is my stance?” So let’s just say without me feeling like you’re being browbeat. But what if I were to say that, I remember a pastor saying this one time and I thought, “Boy, that would go over like a lead balloon.” Yikes. He said, “If you walk by someone who’s sick and you don’t do anything about it, that’s a sin.” Whoa! You walk by somebody and you see that they’re sick and you do nothing about it, that’s a sin. I’m not saying that. I wouldn’t want to put that on you. Because I don’t think the Lord looks at it that way. But I think it’s recognizing it’s an invitation. Have you ever seen anyone sick in the marketplace? Have you ever seen anyone like in their face that looks like they’re troubled? Maybe once? Several months ago? I’m being silly. If you start looking around, you can see it all the time. And it’s one thing to be burdened and say, “Oh my God, this world is just so troubled. There’s so many people that are just so messed up. I can’t believe it.” You know, “Oh my God, I hope you come back quicker. Get me out of here.” One or the other. “I can’t wait for the rapture.” But what if instead you’re aware of that because the Lord wants you to see that? Because He’s inviting you to be His ambassador that the Lord is calling and saying, “Come to me.” “Come to me when you find life burdensome and take my yoke upon your shoulder and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble of heart and you will find rest for your soul.” What if that’s what they’re longing for? Doesn’t it say in Romans that there are people who are groaning for the sons of God to appear? They’re groaning, all of creation’s groaning for that. And this entire thing that we do, as I have suggested, is this perfect pattern, this perfect prayer of the Lord Jesus. It’s His gig. And that may sound like a really stupid way to say it. It’s His bailiwick. It’s His. It’s not mine. It’s not the patriarch’s. It’s not Father Don’s. It’s not any of ours. It’s His. It’s His. It’s His perfect prayer. It’s His perfect pattern that you and I are invited to fully participate in. And to recognize that we’re constantly on the move. That’s that whole sense of procession, the pilgrimage, in this life. We never sit still, whether it be physically or whether it be in our minds, our hearts, our spirit. Think about it. When have you ever sat still mentally or emotionally or spiritually? You’re constantly on the move. Constantly on the move. Constantly. Because you’re forever on pilgrimage. And what if in every image of that pilgrimage you continue to remember who you are and where you are in that. And in the midst of that, you find that you’re becoming less and less weary and more and more hopeful and trusting that He’s there in everything. And then when you see someone out in the marketplace and you look at them and going, “I am really doing some stuff and they may be far better than me, but Lord, they’re there and what have I got to lose?” That’s the learning to practice. And that’s why this stuff up here, man oh man, in some churches, is a cacophony. In other words, it is something that’s like, “I don’t like that.” But it’s part of the church. Don’t you love that in Acts of the Apostles where it says that the Holy Spirit spoke, “Set aside Paul and Barnabas for the work to which I called them to.” If you go back and look at that and look at some of those words, you know what the word in Greek says? It says, “During the Liturgy.” Do you get that? During the Liturgy, the Holy Spirit spoke. “Set aside Paul and Barnabas.” It wasn’t in some meeting off someplace. It was during the Liturgy, the Holy Spirit spoke. “Set aside Paul and Barnabas.” I’m so grateful that you are willing to allow me to chatter on, but to continue to say to you what I’m saying to me, the absolute value that our journey in this life, at least at one level, is others. St. Catherine of Siena, when she was having this dialogue with the Lord, the Lord was speaking to her and saying, “Daughter, you can give me nothing. There’s nothing you can give me I need from you. Nothing, nothing you can give me that I need from you.” So think of all the performances, all the spiritual disciplines, all of that stuff. There’s nothing you can give me I need from you. So what I want you to do, if you desire to please me, is to love your neighbor, is to be attentive to your neighbor. That’s the gift you can give to me. That’s what you can give. That’s what you can give. See, that’s why I just again want to try to reinforce it, to try to instill this whole notion of the absolute inestimable value. I mean, I have received some words like I had suggested. The bishop, one time we were in Selma during a liturgy and the bishop says, “I’ve got this word for Mark Finley. The Lord says, “You can’t mess it up. You’ve had some anxiety about messing it up and he tells you, you can’t mess it up.” Well, I was never worried about that. I mean, I’ve never had a problem with worrying or being anxious or concerned or thinking, “I’ve got this figured out. I’m a priest. I’ve got a lot of degrees. I’m good. I don’t know that word doesn’t mean anything to me.” You know how many times I’ve repeated that? Thousands. Thousands. The value of the word from the scriptures and the value of the word from where the Holy Spirit is speaking, whether it be corporately or individually, to you or through you. And again, going back to that gradual, that you’re taking on that mantle to carry that out and to know that the Lord has not forgotten you. I had a word for someone today that didn’t show up. And I think it was a really good word. But remember the very first processional, and when I say this, this is in no way… Maybe I over-qualify this stuff. But in no way is this… Because things come up. Things come up that we can’t control. And so we can’t do that. But remember the very first processional, all about that, in Dr. Tim was one of my assets that answered immediately a couple of weeks ago. The first processional begins before it begins. Where does it begin? The moment that you got up and made the decision to come. That’s where the processional begins. And even though you’re here before that group comes down, you’re participating in that even though you’re still physically sitting there. But that’s where the first processional happened. You chose to come. You chose to be here. It begins before it begins. And so in the midst of that, to be able to come and to be filled to overflowing and to recognize that, wow, in the early church there were people who were actually told to leave. And the door was locked. And they weren’t wandering around, but they had a mission to go do that. That’s so counterintuitive to us. Because we want to be so nice. We want to be so nice. We want to be so inclusive. We want to sleep like… Yeah, you’re welcome. Well, do I have to change anything in my life? No. Just come as you are. And I guess it’s okay if you stay as you are. Not good, huh? Not good. Of course, come as you are. But don’t stay there. Don’t stay there. And to come and be part of something to say, “Lord, all I know is I don’t want to stay where I’ve been.” If I’m on pilgrimage, I want you to get me to the next place that you’re drawing me to. That’s where I want to get. Is that helpful? I think that’s going to be helpful for 20 or 30 or 40 year old kids. Well, I was going to go back to that second reading, but I want to be conscious of the time. I would just say this about that. When Paul says, and he said prior to the, a few verses prior to the ones we had today, that the things I’m supposed to do I don’t do, and the things that I’m not supposed to do I do. Who is going to deliver me from this chaotic mess? Thanks be to God, Jesus Christ our Lord. And then, remember the break from chapter to chapter is something that’s contrived. That was not in the early text. There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. John 3, 16 and 17, you know John 3, 16 very well. In John 3, 17, Jesus said, “I did not come to condemn.” John chapter 8, the woman caught in adultery, “I will not condemn you.” He did not come to condemn. He came to save. So in the very midst of seeing that struggle, we continue to do what? Recognize that we are in Christ. And at that moment we lean into him and say, “Lord, you have already saved me from that mess. You have already saved me from myself. You’ve already done that. That old man is already dead and I’m tired of hanging around with a corpse.” I think it’s that word that Rick had about Skippy. I’m tired of hanging around with a corpse, so why am I paying attention to a dead person? Why not I pay attention to the one and who I am who saved me? me from that mess and says that’s not your mess I took care of that can you trust me now lean into me and let me give you the truth about how I see you and how I see that situation and you might consider letting it go because hanging on to it at least from my perspective I think the Lord might say it’s not doing you a lot of good it’s not helping you a whole lot to be dragging around a corpse why don’t you consider giving it to me and let me take and by the way I’ve already done that amen so again do you believe in the creed peace of the Lord be with you to