Full to the Brim: Even the Stones Cry Out (Luke 19:28-40)

Welcome/Call to Worship

Good morning! I’m Pastor Ashley Dargai To those here in the sanctuary and those joining us online: we are so glad you’re here! 

This morning, we will sing songs of worship, pray together, hear from scripture and one another, as we move toward the pinnacle of our service: the table of our Lord, where we will take the bread and drink the cup in remembrance of our most Gracious Host, Jesus. The purpose of our time together each Sunday is to bring our hearts closer to the heart of God, so I invite you to participate in as much or as little in our prepared liturgy as your spirit is willing. 

We welcome all sounds and smells from the youngest to the oldest among us. The Kids Corner is in the back for anyone who needs to move around and play to worship God this morning. We know that the energy and spirit of children can be different than adults and we consider that reality a gift.

There are visitor cards in the pew in front of you—if you arrived during the pandemic or later, of if you have moved and have not updated your info with the church, please fill it out and drop it in the offering plate when it goes by later in worship. 

A couple of announcements before we begin: 

We invite you to Sunday School at 10 AM every week. There’s classes that meet in the Seekers room and the Fellowship Hall. There is also a children and youth class that meets in the parlor.

After service, we will have our Easter egg hunt! You’ll exit these back doors and go to the grass to the left.

This Thursday is our Maundy Thursday event—we’ll host a food drive for our Little Free Pantry in the courtyard, DMM will grill hot dogs, and the ukuleles will lead us in a singalong. And this year, First UMC Azle will join us. Food will be served at 6:30 in the courtyard. 

And then we’ll join with First UMC of Azle down the road for Good Friday at 7 pm in their sanctuary. 

Next week, we will have a special Easter sunrise service in the Narthex at 6:30 AM and then our 11 AM service here in the sanctuary. You are also invited to purchase Easter lilies for the sanctuary. There is an order form in your bulletin.

Our first mailing for the Drive for Compassion golf tournament will be April 18 at 9 am in the Fellowship Hall. If you’d like to help with the mailing, join us that morning!

Tomorrow morning is Eugene Wadsworth’s memorial service at 10 AM here at ACC with a reception to follow.

To keep up with all the life we live together here at Azle Christian Church, make sure you follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Subscribe to our weekly e-blast and monthly newsletter on our website. 

We continue our worship series this morning: Full to the Brim: An Expansive Lent. This morning, we enter Jerusalem with Jesus in celebration.

For our next song, after we pray, we will participate in the parade of the palms. We invite everyone who is willing to exit on the sides and move to the back to pick up a palm. We’ll wave the palm as we move up the center aisle and then place it at the alter with the help of a deacon. You will return to your seats through the side.

Let’s pray to turn our hearts toward God for this hour.

Spirit of truth, open to us the scriptures, speaking your holy word through song, through the bread and cup, and through offering ourselves, and meet us here today in the living Christ. Amen.

Litany of Faith

One: Give thanks to the LORD, who is good, whose mercy endures forever.

All: Let Israel now proclaim, “The mercy of the LORD endures forever.”

One: Open for me the gates of righteousness; I will enter them; I will offer thanks to the LORD.

All: “This is the gate of the LORD; those who are righteous may enter.

One: I will give thanks to you, for you answered me and have become my salvation.

All: The same stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

(From Psalm 118)

Pastoral Prayer

The Lord be with you.

This morning we will engage our bodies in prayer as well as our hearts. We will start in a posture, and I will let you know when to change posture. As always, please engage as much or as little as your spirit is willing. 

We will begin with the ASL sign for applause to signify celebration.

Join me in prayer.

Holy God,

Sometimes life feels like a parade rushing by  us

As we stand on the sidelines and try not to miss it. 

There are hundreds of things that catch our eye, 

But the thing we fear missing the most is you. 

We confess that we more than the endless litany of to-do lists and errands, meal prep and alarm clocks, deadlines and due dates. 

We want more than certainty that drowns out curiosity. 

We want more than fear that leads to silos and violence.

Now church, move your hands into a traditional posture of prayer.

We want a life that moves in a steady cadence of alleluias, a life hemmed in by hope, a life fragranced by good news and mercy and laughter.

So when we feel lost in the noise and the relentless demand for our attention, may Your Spirit clear the air around us. When we are afflicted with compassion fatigue and stress and self-doubt and exhaustion, show us the way to the life you long for us. 

May we listen closely to the rhythms of the earth, how the trees sway, how the flowers bloom, how the waves lap, how the stones cry out, and may we know that we have not missed You. You are right here. 

God, we are here. We are trying to pay attention. 

Now church, for our final posture, I invite you to move your hands to your heart in a posture of devotion.

Gratefully, we ask all of this in the name of our brother and redeemer Jesus, who taught us to pray…

Our Father, who art in heaven

Hallowed be Thy name

Thy Kingdom come

Thy will be done

On earth as it is in heaven

Give us this day our daily bread

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors

And lead us not into temptation

But deliver us from evil

For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever. 

Amen.

Sermon

Luke 19:28-40

28 After he had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem.

29 When he had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, 30 saying, “Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31 If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it.’” 32 So those who were sent departed and found it as he had told them. 33 As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?” 34 They said, “The Lord needs it.” 

35 Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it. 36 As he rode along, people kept spreading their cloaks on the road. 37 As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen, 38 saying,

“Blessed is the king

    who comes in the name of the Lord!

Peace in heaven,

    and glory in the highest heaven!”

39 Some of the religious leaders in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.” 40 He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”

This is the word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

Can I tell you a secret? I believe in ghosts. 

And I’m not trying to make a preacher joke and be like, “The Holy Ghost!” 

No, I actually believe in supernatural activity. The kind that makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck, goosebumps prickle your arms, your lungs to unconsciously hold your breath.

And I share this not because I want to make you all believers, too. Believe what you want to believe about how life lingers. All are welcome at this spooky table. But I think this secret is relevant to today’s text. 

Maybe I should back up a little bit. 

I have been auditing a class at Brite Divinity School this spring called Soul Care in the Midst of Climate Crisis. We’re talking about how to care for souls—ours and our parishioners’—in the midst of a rapidly changing environment and all that comes with it—natural disasters, extreme weather, rising death tolls, and the accompanying anxiety and dread. It’s been fun! 

And I think what I’m about to say will not be surprising to those of you who garden and farm. But there has been a lot of discussion about the earth speaking to us. And not really so much in a woo woo way, but that nature is always in conversation with us. The accelerating extinctions of animal and bug species due to deforestation, warming weather, and flooding, the overworked soil unable to produce one more crop, the increasingly extreme storms, concerning volcanic activity—this is all the earth crying out, “Hosanna!” 

And what I mean is that the word “hosanna” means “save us.” It’s what the people cried out in the procession into Jerusalem, though it’s not included in Luke’s account, the one we read today. It was a moment filled with possibility. The thought of what might be exhilarated all who followed Jesus. Might this be the one who would deliver them from the Romans? Might this be the Messiah who would usher in the blessing of the age to come and the return of all the children of God who had been scattered abroad?

You see, every year during Passover—the Jewish festival that swelled Jerusalem’s population from its usual 50,000 to 200,000—the Roman governor of Judea would ride up to Jerusalem from his beach house in the west. He would come in all of his imperial majesty to remind the Jewish pilgrims that Rome demanded their complete loyalty, obedience, and submission. The Jewish people could commemorate their ancient victory against Egypt and slavery if they wanted to. But if they tried any funny business, any real resistance, they would be obliterated without a second thought.

And that particular Passover week, there were two processions. From the west came Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, draped in the gaudy glory of imperial power: horses, chariots, and gleaming armor. He moved in with the Roman army at the beginning of Passover week to make sure nothing got out of hand. 

And from the east came another procession, the one we mimicked today, a commoner’s procession: Jesus in an ordinary robe riding on a young donkey

The people cried out: hosanna, save us! 

But while it was a moment filled with possibility, the atmosphere charged with the memory of deliverance, it was a very fragile possibility. Their last hope was riding on a borrowed donkey. 

If ever there were a day on the liturgical calendar that represented the dissonance in our faith—the disappointed expectations—it’s Palm Sunday. More than any other holy day, this festive, ominous, and complicated day of palm fronds and hosannas warn us of the paradox at the heart of our faith: God on a donkey. Dying to live. A suffering king. Good Friday. 

And at the end of our reading this morning, talking rocks. 

You see, the people wanted a military king. They wanted might and power. They wanted someone to show Rome who’s boss. They sang, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!” No more of this Pax Romana that seeks to squelch any rise of discontent. No, what they were all crying out for is a Pax Hosanna. 

And the religious leaders, God love ‘em, knew how dangerous this parade was. This is the very thing that Pilate had come to make sure didn’t happen. And they told Jesus to get his people to cut it out. But Jesus said, “If they were silent, the rocks would cry out.”

Which brings me back to ghosts. 

Where was I? Oh yes, the earth speaking to us. 

Okay, I have a tiny science lesson for you this morning. For those of us humans who hear with our ears, there is a threshold of sound we can hear. It is measured by hertz, which measures the frequency of sound, the number of vibrations per second. And that typical threshold is 20 hertz. Anything below that, we cannot hear with our ears. 

But that doesn’t mean that sound is not occurring below 20 hertz or that we cannot register it—it simply means that we must listen in a different way.

The sound below 20 hertz is called infrasound. This kind of sound can sometimes be felt in our body. We can feel its reverberations in our literal, beating heart. 

Think about the vibrations you have felt if you’ve been near a wind turbine or subwoofer or an explosion. There’s a reverberation in your body that is a registering of infrasound—a sound you’re not picking up with your ear. 

Animals use infrasound to communicate. Whales, elephants, hippopotamuses. The purr of a tiger. 

But do you know what else uses this infrasonic sound, this sound that is below 20 hertz and cannot be heard by the human ear but perhaps felt? The earth. Avalanches. Volcanic eruptions. Earthquakes. Icebergs. The earth makes sounds right before a natural event. 

The stones are literally crying out. 

Of course, Jesus didn’t know this. He was likely not referring to infrasound. He’s more of a metaphor guy.

But the increase of infrasonic sounds is the earth literally crying out in response to climate change. And what we’ve discussed in my class is how do we respond to the cry of creation? How do we join our cries as created creatures of God with non-human creation? Are we all singing the same hosanna together? 

We can guess what the Judean people meant when they cried hosanna, save us! They wanted a Messiah who could beat Rome and reestablish Judean sovereignty in some form. 

But here’s the thing. A cry for one military might to supplant another is still suffering under the delusion of empire. We know we’re supposed to love the God-on-a-dokey who overturns all our expectations of what divinity should look and act like. In theory, we do love this God. But in practice, we’re often just like the first people who waved palm fronds and laid their coats on the street. We train our eyes on the horizon and hold out hope for a real king. 

But what are the stones crying out for? What kind of hope do they hold? 

It’s hard to ask that question and even harder to answer it. The prognosis of the climate is not great. It’s devastating, actually. This is the general assessment of scientists around the world. 

And the rocks crying out, especially at the beginning of the holiest week with the hardest days ahead, have got me asking very very reluctantly, how many deaths lie waiting around the corner? How many sorrows, disappointments, farewells, and jagged endings must we face before resurrection comes home to stay? 

It’s hard to imagine and impossible to bear it. 

But perhaps the literal groan of creation can remind us that if anything in this Christian story is true, then it’s this: Jesus will not leave us alone. There is no death we will die, small or big, literal or figurative, that Jesus will not hold in his crucified arms. 

Which brings me back to ghosts, finally. 

This infrasound has been studied at length by acoustic scientists. And one study conducted in England found that infrasound can invoke feelings of both awe and anxiety. Because it’s a sound that cannot be consciously perceived, it can make people feel like there is a presence, like something vaguely spooky is happening. 

Now who’s to say something spooky is not happening? Certainly not me. 

But I wonder if rocks crying out help invoke the unsettling of this day. The feeling that something is in the air, as if it were charged with electricity. 

I wonder if the rocks might be saying, “Hosanna, save us” as a way to invite us into the paradox of our faith over and over again. God on a donkey. Dying to live. A suffering king. A Good Friday. 

Save us from our delusions. Save us from our petty devotions. Save us from our self-destruction. Save us, save us, save us. 

And Jesus says, “I will. By continuing to move toward the cross. Come with me. Life will linger no matter what death does to it. Just watch.” Hosanna. Amen. 

Stewardship Moment

There are many ways to support and resource the ministries of Azle Christian Church: Venmo, giving online, or the offering plate. I also invite you to bring nonperishable items for our Little Free Pantry. The collection shelves for the pantry are in the Fellowship Hall right outside the kitchen. 

The deacons are going to hand these plates over during our final song, starting at the front row and they just to need make their way to the back where a deacon will collect them. You can drop your offering, an “I gave online card,” or an information card.

Invitation 

If you’d like to become a member of this faith community, or if you’d like to become a disciple of Jesus, please talk with me after service or sometime this week.

Benediction:

Please rise in body or spirit for our benediction, the final song, and the Doxology.

May we trust that even when we are silent,

Even when we are scared,

Even when we miss the moment,

Even when we choose to speak and say the wrong thing—

We belong to God.

There is nothing said or unsaid, done or undone that can undo that, so may we rest in this good news:

We are forgiven. We are known.

We belong to God, this day and every day. 

Amen.

Full to the Brim: Brazen Acts of Beauty (John 12:1-8)

Welcome/Call to Worship

Good morning! I’m Pastor Ashley Dargai To those here in the sanctuary and those joining us online: we are so glad you’re here! 

This morning, we will sing songs of worship, pray together, hear from scripture and one another, as we move toward the pinnacle of our service: the table of our Lord, where we will take the bread and drink the cup in remembrance of our most Gracious Host, Jesus. The purpose of our time together each Sunday is to bring our hearts closer to the heart of God, so I invite you to participate in as much or as little in our prepared liturgy as your spirit is willing. 

We welcome all sounds and smells from the youngest to the oldest among us. The Kids Corner is in the back for anyone who needs to move around and play to worship God this morning. We know that the energy and spirit of children can be different than adults and we consider that reality a gift.

There are visitor cards in the pew in front of you—if you arrived during the pandemic or later, of if you have moved and have not updated your info with the church, please fill it out and drop it in the offering plate when it goes by later in worship. 

A couple of announcements before we begin: 

We invite you to Sunday School at 10 AM every week. There’s classes that meet in the Seekers room and the Fellowship Hall. There is also a children and youth class that meets in the parlor.

Next week begins Holy Week. Next Sunday is Palm Sunday. Kids are invited to come at 10 AM to the sanctuary to learn a song for service. Everyone will be involved with bringing the palms in. And after service, we will have our annual Easter egg hunt! We’re looking for volunteers to bring packed eggs for the hunt. 

Our Maundy Thursday event will be like last year’s—we’ll host a food drive for our Little Free Pantry, DMM will grill hot dogs, and the ukuleles will lead us in a singalong. And this year, First UMC Azle will join us. Food will be served at 6:30 in the courtyard. 

And then we’ll join with First UMC of Azle down the road for Good Friday. 

Two weeks from today, April 17, we’ll have our Easter sunrise service in the Narthex as well as our 11 AM service here in the sanctuary. Be sure to check your insert, your eblast, and our socials for details.

Today immediately following service, we will have a Congregational Meeting. It will be a brief meeting in-person and on Zoom for those at home.

To keep up with all the life we live together here at Azle Christian Church, make sure you follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Subscribe to our weekly e-blast and monthly newsletter on our website. 

We continue our worship series this morning: Full to the Brim: An Expansive Lent. This morning, we take a significant step toward the cross as we eat dinner with Jesus right outside Jerusalem.

Let’s pray to turn our hearts toward God for this hour.

Spirit of truth, open to us the scriptures, speaking your holy word through song, through the bread and cup, and through offering ourselves, and meet us here today in the living Christ. Amen.

Litany of Faith

One: Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old. 

All: I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

One: I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.

All: The wild animals will honor me, the jackals and the ostriches; 

One: For I give water in the wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my chosen people, 

All: The people I formed for myself so that they might declare my praise.

(Isaiah 43:18-21)

Pastoral Prayer

The Lord be with you.

Because it is the first Sunday of the month, we will end our prayer by singing the Lord’s Prayer, #310 in your hymnal. 

Join me in prayer.

Holy God,

There are times when we are at a loss for words. We don’t know what to pray. Even the simplest prayers of help, thanks, and wow, seem both too much and too little. 

So help us to remember that sometimes, our mere waking up in the morning is a prayer. 

Sometimes the songs we have stuck in our head, rumbling around on repeat, are a prayer.

The way we talk to children, the way we care for our animals, the way we water our gardens, are all prayer. 

Even the way we take out our phone to get a picture of the sunset or of the people we love—that is prayer. 

And other times, prayer is a moment like this—heads bowed, eyes closed, hearts quiet for just a moment. 

In all of it, we trust that you hear us. 

In this trust, may we find courage here today—

Courage to follow your call, courage to live into our faith.

May we find hope here—

Hope for a better world, hope that refuses to let us go.

May we find truth here—

Truth that lives in sacred community, truth that lives in ancient stories.

May we find all that we seek,

And in our seeking, may we know You more.

Gratefully, we ask it in the name of our brother and redeemer Jesus, who taught us to pray…

(Sing Lord’s Prayer)

Sermon

John 12:1-8

Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. 2 There they gave a dinner for him. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those at the table with him. 3 Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. 4 But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was about to betray him), said, 5 “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” 6 (He said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief; he kept the common purse and used to steal what was put into it.) 7 Jesus said, “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. 8 You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”

This is the word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

I invite you to close your eyes and take a deep breath. 

And consider this question: what does love smell like? 

Does it smell like your mom’s famous sugar cookies? Does it smell like a mixture of tobacco and aftershave, the smell you associate with your grandfather’s embrace? Or maybe it smells like fresh crayons—the kind your second grade teacher passed out to you on the first day of school—her smile an emblem of safety in an otherwise precarious life. Maybe it’s the smell of lotion that you lovingly put on your beloved’s arms and legs in their final days, an anointing all its own. Or perhaps it’s the grubby smell of your dog’s head, always nuzzling up close to your face when you’re sad.

Does it smell like an impending thunderstorm—the air musky and charged with energy? Or does it smell like freshly mowed lawns? Or maybe the unmistakable smell of fish as you back your boat into the lake at dawn. Or maybe it’s the red poppy-scented candle you only burn when you’re praying for someone, its light clean scent like a bell that calls you to attention every time it wafts your direction. 

You can open your eyes.

I don’t know what pure nard smells like, but there are perfume scents that transport me to a moment of love and belonging. I don’t know how a pound of costly perfume spilled out would fill a room, but there are aromas that can fill my lungs so deeply that they unlock memories long hidden away. 

We enter into the most sensuous and visceral time of the year today. Since Ash Wednesday, we have been slowly making our way with Jesus toward Jerusalem, our foreheads marked with the reminder of our mortality and our feet just outside the city gates. 

Of course all of Lent is an embodied journey. We are dealing with the human Jesus. The first Sunday of Lent forced us to reckon with hunger and fatigue as we encountered Jesus in the desert. We then imagined Jesus as a mother hen, aching to gather her little chicks under her wing. And then we felt dirt under our fingernails as we argued about what to do with a fruitless fig tree, ultimately deciding to wait and see. And last week, we felt the embrace of the man with two sons and heard the music pulsing out of the house in celebration.

But today, things get particularly fleshy. This story of a dinnertime interruption is hands to feet, hair to skin, soaked fingers to soaked toes. This morning, our holy sacraments are skin, salt, sweat, and tears. The instruments of worship are perfumed feet and unbound hair. This is not a story of abstract piety of the mind, the kind of religion that demands stoicism and unflappability. No, this is a deeply embodied faith, a deeply emotional faith. We are incarnation people, after all.

This story appears in all the gospels, but John places it here—right before the entry into Jerusalem. Jesus and his friends have gathered at the house of Lazarus, Mary, and Martha. It is likely a momentous night—perhaps the first dinner they’ve shared since Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. What a tender meal this is. The barbecue where your loved one comes home from the hospital. The potluck after the final surgery. The first dinner with friends after being apart for so long. 

And while that miracle stirred up belief among his followers, it also riled up the local authorities. Ironically, the resuscitation of Lazarus triggered deadly opposition—raising people from the dead is the kind of thing that can get you killed. In a stunning turn of events—a pattern we will see played out over and over again not just in scripture, but also in our Christian life—is that life necessarily involves death. They are not polarized forces, repelled by one another, but rather, they are dance partners—ever interlocked in a passionate embrace.

So both joy and dread hang heavy over the night. Jesus has set his face like a flint toward his fate in Jerusalem. He doesn’t know exactly what awaits him there, but he gets the gist of it. And the disciples likely feel the electricity in the air, too.

And as they break bread and fill their cups to the brim, in comes Mary not with more hummus, but with a jar of perfume, the jar of perfume. She gets on her knees and pours it out on Jesus’ feet, the entire pound, and washes his feet with her unbound hair. The room fills with the fragrance of death, a fragrance that was likely still lingering from when the sisters had anointed their brother’s body for burial. 

Judas, likely the most practical one in the room, is mortified and for lots of good reasons. First of all, we are eating dinner, ma’am. This is not the time. The time for foot washing was when everyone arrived, and that was the servant’s job. 

Second, are you out of your mind? What if the neighbors look in the window? Jesus is already drawing too much negative attention—we don’t not want people thinking this is some kind of death cult. 

And finally, Jesus is not dead, okay?? He’s very much alive and we’d like to keep it that way! Why are you anointing him with the spices of burial? This thing is just getting started—what are you doing? You must be out of your mind.

Now, according to John, Judas’s concern for the funds for the poor is not as altruistic as he would have us believe. But this concern that if we were just going to waste this bottle of perfume, we might as well have sold it to help the poor is not that misguided. He’s got a great point. He has been paying attention to Jesus’ teachings. 

This story raises a lot of thorny issues. Like Jesus quoting Deuteronomy to Judas: “The poor will always be with you.” The rest of that scripture says, “Therefore I command you to be openhanded.” Jesus assures Judas that his inclination is right—we must always be openhanded to the poor. The call to care for the poor never ceases. 

And yet, Jesus also says the hard thing: Mary has kept this anointing perfume for his burial. She sees what the disciples either miss or refuse to see: that even as they are preparing for his triumphant entry into Jerusalem, he is also preparing for his death. It’s inevitable, we know. But I wonder about the impact this statement had at dinner that night. The weight of the evening hanging thick. 

I wonder if in dinners that would follow Jesus’ death, if the disciples would think back to this one. I wonder if their muscles would tense, their hearts would race, their stomachs turn, with their bodies holding a painful memory, the most painful. I wonder if their stress cortisol levels shot through the roof, trying to shoot so high to heaven in an attempt to rewrite history. I wonder if the smell of perfume made them paralyzed. 

This fleshy, visceral time in the church year, though painful and awkward, especially in our Western etiquettes of touch and personal space, is a gift. It reminds us that we are not mere souls in a body. We are bodies. Our bodies are us. Our entire experience of the Divine is through our bodies. Through our senses, our brain chemistry, the lobes of our brain dedicated to memory and emotion and instinct. We smell love and feel safety through our bodies. 

And what we have learned through psychology and neuroscience, particularly related to trauma, in the past few decades is that our bodies remember things in a way our minds don’t. It operates outside of logical and rational thinking. It’s why when we hear a loud sound, we may realize it’s just a truck but our heart and our endocrine system that makes us sweat and emit stress hormones takes a little longer to settle. 

It’s why war veterans grapple with PTSD—their whole bodies responding to stimuli, real or imagined, as if they were still in the war zone. 

It’s why black Americans have higher rates of heart disease and cancer—because of the daily stress of living with systemic racism. 

I wonder if Judas’s response that night was body memory. Perhaps he had had encounters with the Roman police or the religious leaders frightened by the oppressive government that made him shake at the sight of Mary’s offering. 

But…our bodies do not only hold trauma. They also hold wisdom—a wisdom that stands outside of our rational minds and ardent piety. 

Consider your body’s response when you take a walk outside or simply sit on a boat or in a garden. How your heart rate slows. How you feel more peaceful. I wonder what your body might be telling you in those moments.

And there is also the way things like illness, ailments, and birth can reveal wisdom in ways that cannot be learned in Sunday School or in book studies. 

Consider Paul’s thorn in his flesh! This bodily experience taught him something about grace that none of his rabbinical studies could.

Our bodies are sending messages all the time if we would only pay attention.

Our culture has often been suspicious of the wisdom bodies have to offer, considering it the whim of women and the disabled and people of color. But the table we gather around each week is the table of a broken body and poured out blood. Our savior came from the womb of a lowly woman. It was women who would be carrying spices to care for his body that would discover and spread the news of his resurrection. 

And it is a woman who anoints Jesus in this story, and anoints him specifically for a death he has not yet endured. What can we learn from this embodied moment? What is the sensuous wisdom of this event? A wisdom that transcends the most practical and logical arguments of the day?

Mary pours out this perfume, essentially wastes it. It’s as if the message that registers in the nostrils of those there is this: Do you not understand? I am offering to God and that means it is going to cease to be useful for the rest of us. This gift I offer Christ is now Christ’s. It will not save him. It will not go to our benevolence fund or pay our water bill. But it is beautiful and it is poured out now. 

What we will see over the next two weeks is that our life is a pouring out. It’s a gift given to God. Our primary function in life is not to be useful or productive or efficient, though those are not inherently bad things to be. 

Our primary role in life is to be a fragrant reminder of Christ’s all-consuming, literally life-giving love. A love that is not afraid of death. A love that is not embarrassed. A love that is for you and is as real as the flesh on your bones and the blood pumping through your veins. 

It is a love that does not fully register on a cognitive level, but in our bellies, in the flush of our cheeks, in the taste of potluck dinners and the embrace of a beloved. And it’s a love that abides unto death. 

It’s a love that kisses broken bodies, sick bodies, oozing bodies. It’s a love that wipes the forehead of the paranoid minds, the despairing minds, the forgetting minds. 

It’s a love that speaks to our hunger deep in our bodies, cradles us like babies under her wings, is not afraid to get in the manure and muck of our lives to help us live, and it’s a love that is always scanning the horizon for us, waiting to cloak us in mercy.

The Gospel of Jesus changes all of our senses. 

May we receive this love with all our heart, soul, body and mind. Amen. 

Stewardship Moment

There are many ways to support and resource the ministries of Azle Christian Church: Venmo, giving online, or the offering plate. I also invite you to bring nonperishable items for our Little Free Pantry. The collection shelves for the pantry are in the Fellowship Hall right outside the kitchen. 

The deacons are going to hand these plates over during our final song, starting at the front row and they just to need make their way to the back where a deacon will collect them. You can drop your offering, an “I gave online card,” or an information card.

Invitation 

If you’d like to become a member of this faith community, or if you’d like to become a disciple of Jesus, please talk with me after service or sometime this week.

Benediction:

Please rise in body or spirit for our benediction, the final song, and the Doxology.

Our benediction this morning comes from St. Teresa of Avila: 

“Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which Christ looks with compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which Christ walks to do good. Yours are the hands through which Christ blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now on earth but yours.” Amen.

Full to the Brim: Prodigal Grace (Luke 15:1-3; 11-32)

Welcome/Call to Worship

Good morning! I’m Pastor Ashley Dargai To those here in the sanctuary and those joining us online: we are so glad you’re here! 

This morning, we will sing songs of worship, pray together, hear from scripture and one another, as we move toward the pinnacle of our service: the table of our Lord, where we will take the bread and drink the cup in remembrance of our most Gracious Host, Jesus. The purpose of our time together each Sunday is to bring our hearts closer to the heart of God, so I invite you to participate in as much or as little in our prepared liturgy as your spirit is willing. 

We welcome all sounds and smells from the youngest to the oldest among us. For our young ones, there is a coloring page and crayons for children to participate in worship as well as a designated area with toys in the back for families of little ones who need to move around and play to worship God. We believe that every age offers a unique perspective of the image of God, and we know that the energy and spirit of children can be different than adults and we consider that reality a gift.

There are visitor cards in the pew in front of you—if you arrived during the pandemic or later, of if you have moved and have not updated your info with the church, please fill it out and drop it in the offering plate when it goes by later in worship. 

A couple of announcements before we begin: 

Tonight is Bible and Beer. We will gather at John and Sondra Williams’ house at 5 pm. You bring a snack to share, the Piercys will supply home-brewed beer, and we’ll study a scripture text together as we watch the sun set. 

We invite you to Sunday School at 10 AM every week. There’s classes that meet in the Seekers room and the Fellowship Hall. There is also a children and youth class that meets in the parlor.

If you can believe it, Holy Week is not that far away. Palm Sunday is April 10—just two weeks away. Our Maundy Thursday event will be like last year’s—we’ll host a food drive for our Little Free Pantry, DMM will fire up the grill, and the ukuleles will lead us in a singalong. We’ll join with First UMC of Azle down the road for Good Friday. And then we’ll have our Easter sunrise service as well as our 11 AM service on April 17. Be sure to check your insert, your eblast, and our socials for details.

Next Sunday, April 3, we will have a Congregational Meeting immediately following service to confirm officers for 2022. It will be a brief meeting in-person and on Zoom for those at home.

To keep up with all the life we live together here at Azle Christian Church, make sure you follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Subscribe to our weekly e-blast and monthly newsletter on our website.

We continue our worship series this morning: Full to the Brim: An Expansive Lent. This morning, we revisit the familiar story of the prodigal son with fresh eyes.

Let’s pray to turn our hearts toward God for this hour.

Spirit of truth, open to us the scriptures, speaking your holy word through song, through the bread and cup, and through offering ourselves, and meet us here today in the living Christ. Amen.

Litany of Faith

One: Seek the Lord while the Lord may still be found. Call upon the Lord while God is near!

All: Let the corrupt abandon their ways, the evil their thoughts. 

One: Let them return to the Lord, so they might receive mercy.

All: Because God is generous with mercy. 

One: For my thoughts are not your thoughts, and my ways are not your ways, says the Lord.

All: As high as the heavens are above the earth, so high are God’s ways above our ways and God’s thoughts above our thoughts.

(Isaiah 55:6-9)

Pastoral Prayer

The Lord be with you.

Join me in prayer.

God of open doors,

We often long to come home to you,

To love,

And to ourselves,

But we aren’t always sure how to get there.

We know that we need you,

But the road back to you is heavy with distractions.

So if we can dare to be so forward, we pray—

Reach into the noise of our hearts and minds and make yourself known.

Quiet everything but your word for us today.

Come as thunder or come as a still, small voice;

We don’t care which, we just pray that you will come near to us.

Oh, God. The prodigal son isn’t given a name, but we know his name. It sounds like ours. And we know his story. For who among us hasn’t burned a bridge? Who among us hasn’t forgotten that we belong to each other? Who among us has not ached for home? 

Help us to trust that you are a God who waits in the driveway for us, who scans the horizon for us.

Help us to know that you are a God who leaves the porch light on and throws a feast when we are found.

Help us to believe in a God who doesn’t stop looking for us when we get lost.

And in response to this profound grace, may we hold tighter to each other. May we remember that humans are not meant to go through life alone. May we look for ways to welcome each other in with excessive, extravagant, over-the-top grace. 

Gratefully, we ask it in the name of our brother and redeemer Jesus, who taught to pray…

Our Father, who art in heaven

Hallowed be Thy name

Thy Kingdom come

Thy will be done

On earth as it is in heaven

Give us this day our daily bread

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors

And lead us not into temptation

But deliver us from evil

For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever. 

Amen.

Sermon

Luke 15:1-3, 11-32 (CEB)

All the tax collectors and sinners were gathering around Jesus to listen to him. 2 The religious leaders and legal experts were grumbling, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

3 Jesus told them this parable:

11 Jesus said, “A certain man had two sons. 12 The younger son said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the inheritance.’ Then the father divided his estate between them. 13 Soon afterward, the younger son gathered everything together and took a trip to a land far away. There, he wasted his wealth through extravagant living.

14 “When he had used up his resources, a severe food shortage arose in that country and he began to be in need. 15 He hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. 16 He longed to eat his fill from what the pigs ate, but no one gave him anything. 17 When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have more than enough food, but I’m starving to death! 18 I will get up and go to my father, and say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. 19 I no longer deserve to be called your son. Take me on as one of your hired hands.” ’ 20 So he got up and went to his father.

“While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with compassion. His father ran to him, hugged him, and kissed him. 21 Then his son said, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son.’ 22 But the father said to his servants, ‘Quickly, bring out the best robe and put it on him! Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet! 23 Fetch the fattened calf and slaughter it. We must celebrate with feasting 24 because this son of mine was dead and has come back to life! He was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate.

25 “Now his older son was in the field. Coming in from the field, he approached the house and heard music and dancing. 26 He called one of the servants and asked what was going on. 27 The servant replied, ‘Your brother has arrived, and your father has slaughtered the fattened calf because he received his son back safe and sound.’ 28 Then the older son was furious and didn’t want to enter in, but his father came out and begged him. 29 He answered his father, ‘Look, I’ve served you all these years, and I never disobeyed your instruction. Yet you’ve never given me as much as a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours returned, after gobbling up your estate on prostitutes, you slaughtered the fattened calf for him.’ 31 Then his father said, ‘Son, you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. 32 But we had to celebrate and be glad because this brother of yours was dead and is alive. He was lost and is found.’”

This is the word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

There are a few questions in Scripture that cut right to the heart. 

“Am I my brother’s keeper?”

“Who is my neighbor?” 

“Why have you forsaken me?”

And there’s a lesser known one that comes from the parable of the laborers in the vineyard. The story goes that a landowner goes out to hire workers in the morning and agrees to pay them a day’s wages. Then he goes out at lunchtime to get more workers and agrees to pay them a day’s wages. And then he goes out at the end of the day and hires a few more workers and agrees to pay them a full day’s wages. When pay time comes, the landowner pays each worker a full day’s wages, even those who worked only an hour. Understandably, the ones who had been working since morning thought this was unfair. They had worked much longer than the others. The landowner reminds them of their agreement and then he asks this question: “Are you envious because I’m generous?”

I think about this question a lot. Are you envious because I’m generous?

We all know the parable of the prodigal son. It’s one of the most well-known Bible stories—so much so that people who have never set foot in church know it because it’s part of our cultural lexicon. A prodigal son is another term for a wayward child. The elder brother is the jealous sibling. There’s an expectation that if someone is labeled a prodigal son that they will one day return home. 

It’s hard to see a parable with new eyes when it’s this well-known because we feel so certain that we know what it’s about. And maybe we have good cause to feel certain. It does feel straightforward compared to some other parables Jesus tells. 

For the sake of consistency, let’s recap the story. 

A man had two sons. We’ve heard this trope before. 

The younger son asks for his inheritance and his father gives it to him.

He leaves home and squanders it with “extravagant living.” It is not explicit that it’s sinful living—that’s just an assumption we make. We are safer to assume it’s foolish living. 

Eventually, he runs out of money and is eating the pig feed and decides to return home to be a servant because he knows that his father’s servants eat and sleep better than he does right now.

He heads home but while he is still far off, his father sees him and runs to embrace him. He gives his son a ring, a robe, a fattened calf, and throws him an epic party. 

This son was dead but now he is alive! He was lost but now he is found!

Well, the older son comes in from the field, not having been notified that his brother has returned or that a party is happening. 

He asks a servant what is happening and when he finds out, he sulks outside.

His father goes to him and the older son lays out the facts: he stayed home, did what he was supposed to, and he’s never been celebrated like this. He accuses his brother of squandering his dad’s money on prostitutes and being celebrated for it.

His father assures him of his love: all that is mine is yours, he says. And then he leaves the ball in the older brother’s court: your brother was dead and now he is alive. He was lost and now he is found. We have to celebrate.

The typical interpretation of this parable is that the younger son is repentant and comes home to forgiveness and the older son is just being grumpy. 

But here’s the thing: there is not really evidence that the younger son is repentant. When he is destitute and eating pig feed, he hatches a plan to return to his father and grovel so that he can gain lodging and food. And he mostly does this, despite the display of love he receives upon his return. We have better evidence that the younger son returns home because he’s hungry, not because he’s remorseful. 

And the elder son makes some good points. His brother returns from his escapades not as a ruined and repentant sinner, but rather as a self-serving con man, essentially the same scoundrel he was when he left.

So this is not really a story about repentance or even sibling relationships. It’s about a man who had two sons. It’s about this father. 

The line, “while he was still a long way off” is telling because it implies that the father has been continually on the lookout for him. It means he had a habit of scanning the horizon, hoping to see the shape of his son enter his view again. 

And despite the lack of repentance and brotherly love, this story becomes one about grace filled to the brim. The younger son doesn’t even get to give his rehearsed speech because his father engulfs him in a hug and clothes him with the finest things, one of them being a cloak of abundant grace and mercy. 

And as the older son comes home from the fields to find that he has not been alerted that his brother is home or that there is a party going on, he broods outside, replaying all the times he’s been wronged in his head so intensely that he is ready to pounce on his father when he steps outside. But the man who had two sons gives him a cloak of abundant grace and mercy, too. 

And he says, “Everything I have is yours.” Which is to say that the father is cloaked in grace and mercy, too, for he gets his sons back when it was unclear that he would ever have his family back together again. 

In my notes in the margin for this section of the sermon, I’ve just written “mercy mercy mercy, everyone gets mercy.”

Now, don’t get me wrong, speaking as an older sibling, I can say confidently that the older son was right—he had every reason to believe in his vindication. But in the presence of mercy, being the rightest doesn’t matter.

The gospel is for sinners, not former sinners. God doesn’t love us because we’ve picked ourselves up by our bootstraps in the swine field. That’s the opposite of the gospel. God loves us even if—even if we’re con artists coming home, or we’re wayward lambs, or we’ve lost our way, even if we’re disgruntled siblings unable to say, “brother” yet.

So if we resist the traditional reading of repentance and forgiveness, and we come up even more to the surface of this well-worn story, we might find a simple way of living in the abundant mercy of God. A grammar of mercy, if you will.

By living into the grammar of mercy, we might recognize that the one we lost may be right in our household. We might resolve to do whatever it takes to find the lost and then celebrate with others, both so we can share the joy and so that others will help prevent the recovered from ever getting lost again. 

We might decide not to wait until we receive an apology because we may never get one. We might not wait until we can muster the ability to forgive because we may never find it. 

Instead, we may just go and have lunch. We may celebrate and invite others to join us. And we may resolve to take advantage of resurrection when we can find it—because it is unlikely to happen twice. 

Are you envious because I’m generous? Maybe. But that doesn’t have to prevent me from receiving the generosity of the mercy and grace of God, too. Maybe in the celebrating, in the sharing of bread and wine, I might find myself laughing with ease again, I might be happy that my brother is home, that I’m home, that my kids are home, and I might let grace and mercy fill in the gaps.

Amen.

Stewardship Moment

There are many ways to support and resource the ministries of Azle Christian Church: Venmo, giving online, or the offering plate. I also invite you to bring nonperishable items for our Little Free Pantry. The collection shelves for the pantry are in the Fellowship Hall right outside the kitchen. 

The deacons are going to hand these plates over during our final song, starting at the front row and they just to need make their way to the back where a deacon will collect them. You can drop your offering, an “I gave online card,” or an information card.

Invitation 

If you’d like to become a member of this faith community, or if you’d like to become a disciple of Jesus, please talk with me after service or sometime this week.

Benediction:

Please rise in body or spirit for our benediction, the final song, and the Doxology.

May we trust that God’s reach is endless, God’s mercy unstoppable, God’s grace lavish.

May we remember that God’s love is constant, God’s wisdom vast, and God’s hope stubborn.

And may we proclaim that God’s presence is here—with us, among us, moving through us. 

Amen.

Full to the Brim: You Are Worthy (Luke 13:1-9)

Welcome/Call to Worship

Good morning! I’m Pastor Ashley Dargai To those here in the sanctuary and those joining us online: we are so glad you’re here! 

This morning, we will sing songs of worship, pray together, hear from scripture and one another, as we move toward the pinnacle of our service: the table of our Lord, where we will take the bread and drink the cup in remembrance of our most Gracious Host, Jesus. The purpose of our time together each Sunday is to bring our hearts closer to the heart of God, so I invite you to participate in as much or as little in our prepared liturgy as your spirit is willing. 

We welcome all sounds and smells from the youngest to the oldest among us. For our young ones, there is a coloring page and crayons for children to participate in worship as well as a designated area with toys in the back for families of little ones who need to move around and play to worship God. We believe that every age offers a unique perspective of the image of God, and we know that the energy and spirit of children can be different than adults and we consider that reality a gift.

There are visitor cards in the pew in front of you—if you arrived during the pandemic or later, of if you have moved and have not updated your info with the church, please fill it out and drop it in the offering plate when it goes by later in worship. 

A couple of announcements before we begin: 

This Saturday is our next Food Hub. You can sign up to volunteer on the link provided on Facebook and in your eblast.

Next Sunday afternoon, we will have another Bible and Beer. We will gather at John and Sondra Williams’ house at 5 pm. You bring a snack to share, the Piercys will supply home-brewed beer, and we’ll study a scripture text together as we watch the sun set. 

We invite you to Sunday School at 10 AM every week. There’s classes that meet in the Seekers room and the Fellowship Hall. There is also a children and youth class that meets in the parlor.

Our nursery is open and available from 9 AM until the end of service for any little ones.

To keep up with all the life we live together here at Azle Christian Church, make sure you follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Subscribe to our weekly e-blast and monthly newsletter on our website. 

And now an announcement from our Pandemic Response Committee:

As a church community, we have a particular responsibility to the 'least of these,' which in the case of the pandemic, are those most vulnerable to severe disease and death. We have exercised caution in order to provide a safer environment for all to worship God and enjoy fellowship with one another. We understand that at times, our risk mitigation has been slower to lift than other groups, but we have moved slowly out of an abundance of care for those most at risk within our community. We will maintain this commitment by continuing to monitor relevant COVID-19 data in our area in order to provide guidance for safe communal gathering.

Beginning Sunday, March 27, masks will be optional* at ACC. Employees caring for children too young to be vaccinated will still be required to wear masks. Masks will also still be required in the church office area.

The Pandemic Response Committee continues to encourage masks while indoors, welcomes you to wear a mask, and asks you to maintain social distancing with those who choose to wear masks.

We also continue to encourage respect and consideration of others who may be high risk/especially vulnerable and want to maintain social distancing.

We will continue to closely monitor pandemic data and will update guidance accordingly.  We will consider re-instituting the requirement for masks if the Tarrant county COVID hospital bed occupancy rate, found on the Tarrant County public health website, exceeds 200, evaluated in the context of other relevant metrics.

We continue to strongly recommend full vaccination and boosting.

We continue our worship series this morning: Full to the Brim: An Expansive Lent. This morning, we ask Jesus some hard questions.

Let’s pray to turn our hearts toward God for this hour.

Spirit of truth, open to us the scriptures, speaking your holy word through song, through the bread and cup, and through offering ourselves, and meet us here today in the living Christ. Amen.

Litany

One: All of you who are thirsty, come to the water! Whoever has no money, come, buy food and eat! 

All: Without money, at no cost, buy wine and milk!

One: Why spend money for what isn’t food, and your earnings for what doesn’t satisfy?

All: Listen carefully to me and eat what is good; enjoy the richest of feasts.

One: Listen and come to me; listen, and you will live.

All: I will make an everlasting covenant with you, my faithful loyalty to David.

(Isaiah 55:1-3)

Pastoral Prayer

The Lord be with you.

Join me in prayer. 

Holy God,

So often, we treat our self-worth like something that can be bought at a store; 

but you know this even better than we do. 

Instead of trusting that we are made good,

Instead of trusting that we are loved exactly as we are,

We stockpile our value in earthly thing—

In trophies and awards, in likes and follows, in wealth and power.

Forgive us for creating our own measuring stick.

Heal our open wounds and tell our hearts that we won’t be forgotten if we slow down.

We won’t be forgotten if we rest. 

God of fig trees and foxes,

Of today and tomorrow,

We ask that you scoop us up.

Pick us up like a great gust of wind.

Startle us awake like a first love.

Light a fire in us like tomorrow depends on today.

Do all of this to get our attention and then turn us toward you.

We are a scattered people, God.

The world is moving faster than we can keep up.

So we pray—scoop us up.

Catch our eye.

Open our ears.

Capture our attention.

We are here. We long to be close to you. 

Gratefully, we ask it in the name of our brother and redeemer Jesus, who taught to pray…

Our Father, who art in heaven

Hallowed be Thy name

Thy Kingdom come

Thy will be done

On earth as it is in heaven

Give us this day our daily bread

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors

And lead us not into temptation

But deliver us from evil

For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever. 

Amen.

Sermon

Luke 13:1-9

At that very time there were some present who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. 2 He asked them, “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? 3 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. 4 Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them—do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? 5 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”

6 Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. 7 So he said to the gardener, ‘See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?’ 8 He replied, ‘Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”

This is the word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

Today, we’re going to begin with a test. Don’t worry—you needn’t have studied for this test. It’s a personality test, so all you have to do is answer honestly. 

I am assuming that we have all engaged in a personality typing system at some point. For example, raise your hand if you’re an extrovert. Now raise your hand if you’re an introvert. Raise your hand if you’re Type A. Now Type B. 

Raise your hand if you’ve taken the following tests either in a formal manner or on a quiz online:

Myers-Briggs

Strengths Finder

Taylor Johnson

Enneagram

Career Aptitude

Love Language

Are you street smart or book smart? Do you have a high traditional IQ or a high emotional IQ? What’s your astrological sign? Any fellow Aquariuses out there? I don’t know anything about astrology. 

There are lots of ways for us to self-identify. And many of these tests help us step back from our inner world and see ourselves with clarity. They might help us navigate relationships or careers a little better. Or maybe they box us in or are used as excuse for bad behavior. You might think personality tests are a bunch of baloney. 

Well, if that’s the case, get the bread and mayo out because we’re about to have a bologna sandwich because here comes your next personality test.

I’m going to describe three personality types for you. Take note of which one sounds most like you. 

Type 1: 

You are goal-oriented. You thrive on seeing results. People see you as someone who gets things done, who can handle responsibility well, and has a clear eye for business. While you do exhibit some creative or whimsical behavior from time to time, you are generally a serious person who values efficiency and productivity. 

Type 2: 

You are a visionary. You can see things that others can’t. People see you as a hard worker with a soft edge. While some think you pour energy into things that don’t matter, your work is grounded in wisdom and patience. You value organic and sustainable growth above all and hold space for ambiguity. 

Type 3:

You often feel out of place. You are not focused on productivity but rather being true to yourself. While you pride yourself on being different, you feed off others’ energy and are inspired by those who invest in you and your work. People tend to see you as unpredictable but having a lot of potential.  You value authenticity and moving at your own pace despite outside pressures. 

If you most identified with Type 1, congratulations, you are the landowner in this story! If you most identified with Type 2, you are the gardener! And if you most identified with Type 3, you are the fig tree!

We’ll get back to what all this means in a minute, but first, we need to contend with the first half of this story. 

The text begins with some headline horrors. First, they report to Jesus that Pilate had his soldiers kill some Galilean worshippers as they offered sacrifice at the temple. While this cruel incident is not corroborated with any other historical text, what is known is that Pilate had a reputation for doing similar horrific things. So this report that the people give to Jesus is not out of the realm of possibility. 

And Jesus responds with a story of his own: a tower at the Pool of Siloam, which lay on the outskirts of Jerusalem, had fallen and killed 18 innocent people. While Pilate’s violence was an act of religious and political violence, the tower falling was a tragedy of fate. 

Why are these things happening? This is the question the text presents. Why did God let this happen? We don’t have to continue reading to know that Jesus doesn’t address these questions because we still ask them today. 

In typical Jesus fashion, he answers a big existential question with a story.

A landowner had a fig tree in his vineyard that hadn’t produced fruit in 3 years. He decides to cut it down and stop wasting soil. But then the gardener speaks up and says to give it a year. Let him dig around and put some manure in. If it still doesn’t produce any fruit, then sure, we can cut it down. The end.

If you remember, parables are not straightforward stories. They’re meant to be chewed on, to roll around in our hands, to step inside of. We walk around and around trying to find the trap door. One of the ways we do this is by asking questions.

For one thing, why is there a fig tree in a vineyard? That’s not where fig trees go. Perhaps it was planted to provide some shade or to diversify the soil, but if that were that case, then no one should care that it wasn’t producing figs. 

And why isn’t the tree producing figs? Is it the landowner’s fault for planting a fig tree in a vineyard? Is it the gardener’s fault for not tending to it the way he should? Is it the fig tree’s fault? Depending on your personality type from earlier, you may be making a case in your head for why it isn’t your type’s fault. 

But remember Jesus is telling this story in response to two tragedies: the murder of the worshipers and the tower collapse. These tragedies have people asking why they happened. 

And it’s not that Jesus doesn’t like questions. It’s just that instead of giving them an answer to their questions, he is trying to help them ask a better question.

Maybe a better question is what shall we do with this unproductive fig tree? What shall we do with the fact that we have a tree but no figs? That we have a tree in the middle of a vineyard?

You know, you don’t find a lot of fig trees in vineyards in scripture. But there is one place that’s quite lovely: the prophet Micah envisions the day of the Lord, and he writes that on that day, “Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid.” 

That sounds really nice.

I wonder what made the landowner plant that fig tree. His gardener may have planted it sure, but he approved it, right? Was he imagining making wine with hints of fig? Or do you think he was thinking about Micah? I can’t say, but maybe. 

In any case, do you think he was having a moment of divine imagination? Do you think his heart was opening to God’s vision for the world? And what changed? It’s been at least three years, and still no figs. Waiting around for the relief of a moment of sitting under your own vine and fig tree and none shall make you afraid was probably disheartening. Perhaps you, too, know a little about waiting for something that never seems to come.

I wonder what has broken his heart so much that he is ready to cut down a tree and use the soil for something else. Has he given up on this God dream? 

And what about the gardener? “Dig around and put manure on it”—that plan seems both helpful and also inelegant. The gardener is ready to try for a little longer. He seems to have some faith in the tree or his own ability to coax some fruit from it. Or maybe he’s become attached to the tree. Maybe he sits underneath it looking out at the vineyards wishing for his own vine and fig tree where none shall make him afraid. 

And what about this fig tree? Why he is languishing? Has he contracted a disease? Is he getting enough water? Does his soil have the nutrients he needs? What is the purpose of a tree anyway? Is it only to produce? It makes me think of that children’s book, The Giving Tree, where the tree gives and gives until there’s nothing left.

We don’t know if this tree ever did produce any fruit after that year. The story ends before that. What do you wish happened? That it did produce fruit in the end? Or maybe that it didn’t and the landowner and gardener had a change of heart? Or that it didn’t produce fruit, the tree was chopped down and something else flourished in its place? 

Maybe what we wish happened tells us a little bit about ourselves. It might allow us to step back from our inner world and see more clearly. 

Why do terrible things happen? This is the question that prompts this story. 

And what we see in this story is that at one time, this landowner had a vision for something impractical and beautiful. And he doesn’t want to waste anything. 

And this gardener is a tender, one who tends to things. He sees something the landowner can’t at the moment. 

And this fig tree. Well, if I were to take this personality test, I would be the fig tree. What is my worth if I can’t produce? Why am I here? Could I have a little more care and patience? 

And perhaps this moment when all three actors converge is the answer we’re looking for. 

The end that the reign of God is looking toward is not one focused on endless production and consumption. It is one of slow, careful, steady work. The kind that abides and loves and pays attention. 

The slow work is not for the outcome, but for the sake of care itself. Care is an end to itself. This work is for us to see something as beautiful as one’s own vine and fig tree where none shall them afraid as a worthy way to spend our lives. Where all can live in care and security. 

The slow work is for the tending, of digging around and getting dirt under our fingernails as we wait and pray. It’s for taking the manure, to put it less delicately, taking the crap in our lives, and letting it be repurposed for life and acts of hope. 

The slow work is letting ourselves be tended to. Of moving at a pace that is soul- and body-honoring, of providing shade and finding our worth in the fact that God has called us good and worthy as we are. We do not have to produce to earn care. We do not have to strive to be worthy. We do not have to achieve to be loved. 

Which is a roundabout way to say that after all this time, we don’t know why bad things happen. But we are here together, dreaming about the reign of God, helping take care of one another. That is what we can do when bad things happen. And that might be the best answer we will get.

Amen.

Stewardship Moment

There are many ways to support and resource the ministries of Azle Christian Church: Venmo, giving online, or the offering plate. I also invite you to bring nonperishable items for our Little Free Pantry. The collection shelves for the pantry are in the Fellowship Hall right outside the kitchen. 

The deacons are going to hand these plates over during our final song, starting at the front row and they just to need make their way to the back where a deacon will collect them. You can drop your offering, an “I gave online card,” or an information card.

Invitation 

If you’d like to become a member of this faith community, or if you’d like to become a disciple of Jesus, please talk with me after service or sometime this week.

Benediction:

Please rise in body or spirit for our benediction, the final song, and the Doxology.

May we trust that the God of the cosmos is at work here,

That God is fertilizing the soil, 

That God is planting roots,

That God is growing fruit yet to be tasted.

And until that promised day, when the fig tree stands tall and swords are beaten into plowshares,

Even when our work does not bear fruit,

Even when the soil grows dry and cracked,

When all seems hopeless here on earth,

May we trust that the God of the cosmos is still at work here.

Amen. 

Full to the Brim: Under God's Wing (Luke 13:31-35)

Welcome/Call to Worship

Good morning! I’m Pastor Ashley Dargai To those here in the sanctuary and those joining us online: we are so glad you’re here! 

This morning, we will sing songs of worship, pray together, hear from scripture and one another, as we move toward the pinnacle of our service: the table of our Lord, where we will take the bread and drink the cup in remembrance of our most Gracious Host, Jesus. The purpose of our time together each Sunday is to bring our hearts closer to the heart of God, so I invite you to participate in as much or as little in our prepared liturgy as your spirit is willing. 

We welcome all sounds and smells from the youngest to the oldest among us. For our young ones, there is a coloring page and crayons for children to participate in worship as well as a designated area with toys in the back for families of little ones who need to move around and play to worship God. We believe that every age offers a unique perspective of the image of God, and we know that the energy and spirit of children can be different than adults and we consider that reality a gift.

There are visitor cards in the pew in front of you—if you arrived during the pandemic or later, of if you have moved and have not updated your info with the church, please fill it out and drop it in the offering plate when it goes by later in worship. 

A couple of announcements before we begin: 

We invite you to Sunday School at 10 AM every week. There’s classes that meet in the Seekers room and the Fellowship Hall. There is also a children and youth class that meets in the parlor.

Our nursery is open and available from 9 AM until the end of service for any little ones.

Our next Food Hub is coming up on Saturday, March 26! You can sign up to help by clicking the link on Facebook or in your blast. 

Two weeks from today, we will have another Bible and Beer night. We will gather at John and Sondra Williams’ house at 5 pm. You bring a snack to share, the Piercys will supply home-brewed beer, and we’ll study a scripture text together as we watch the sun set. 

To keep up with all the life we live together here at Azle Christian Church, make sure you follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Subscribe to our weekly e-blast and monthly newsletter on our website. 

We continue our worship series this morning: Full to the Brim: An Expansive Lent. You may have noticed some artwork on our walls—there are two pieces of art that coincide with each week of Lent. You will also see these pieces in your Lent devotional that was part of your Lent kit. This morning, we heed a warning about what is to come with Jesus.

Let’s pray to turn our hearts toward God for this hour.

Spirit of truth, open to us the scriptures, speaking your holy word through song, through the bread and cup, and through offering ourselves, and meet us here today in the living Christ. Amen.

Litany of Faith

One: The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom then shall I fear? 

All: The LORD is the strength of my life; of whom then shall I be afraid?

One: Though an army should encamp against me, yet will I put my trust in the LORD. 

All: One thing have I asked of the LORD; one thing I seek;

One: That I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life; to behold the fair beauty of the LORD, to seek God in the temple.

All: You have been my helper; cast me not away; do not forsake me, O God of my salvation.

(From Psalm 27)

Pastoral Prayer

The Lord be with you.

Join me in prayer.

Holy God,

This life of ours is full to the brim. 

Our days are overflowing with emails and to-do lists, 

schedules and notifications,

Assignments and deadlines.

We wake up feeling behind,

We go to sleep worrying about tomorrow,

And we know—there has to be more than this.

So we pray:

Bend down and show us the way.

Leave breadcrumbs in the street.

Point us toward awe and wonder.

Guide us to intimacy and trust.

Gift us with laughter that will make us cry

And hope that will make us feel alive.

We want a new kind of fullness.

Show us the way.

We are listening for your cues.

For you are our light. 

You surrounds us like a warm, familiar blanket,

Layered in grace. Whom shall we fear?

You are our sturdy foundation 

And the roof over our head.

We will not be afraid.

When the world is at its worst—

When grief clings to our bones,

When fear eats at our confidence,

When loneliness moves into our house—

You set the table,

Turn on the lights,

And invite us to dance. 

So we ask you, O Lord, 

We seek and we pray—

Let us live in your house

All of our days. 

Gratefully, we ask it in the name of our brother and redeemer Jesus, who taught us to pray

Our Father, who art in heaven

Hallowed be Thy name

Thy Kingdom come

Thy will be done

On earth as it is in heaven

Give us this day our daily bread

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors

And lead us not into temptation

But deliver us from evil

For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever. 

Amen.

Children’s Moment

In today’s story, Jesus compares himself to a mother hen. He says he wishes he could gather all of his people, all of his little chicks, under his wing like a mother hen does for her babies. 

So today, we’re going to think about this metaphor for Christ. Every week we pray the Lord’s Prayer, which begins, “Our Father.” And the Bible often refers to God as Father, especially when Jesus talks about God. 

But did you know that the Bible also talks about God as mother? There are quite a few scriptures in the Old Testament that talk about God as a mother bird. And when God describes what God is like, God uses the word, hesed, which literally means “womb-love.” God loves us with a “womb-love”—like a person who carries a baby in their womb! 

There are lots of great ways to think about God—Father, Mother, Monarch, Shepherd, Sun—every image gives us a different way of thinking about God, who we get to spend our lives getting to know.

So today, I thought we would read a new book called Mother God, which explores the way scripture talks about God as a mother. 

(Read Mother God)

Let’s pray: God, thank you for giving us so many different ways of thinking about you. You are both a mystery and also as close as the family we live with. In Christ’s name we pray, amen. 

Sermon

Luke 13:31-35

31 At that very hour some Pharisees came and said to him, “Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.” 32 He said to them, “Go and tell that fox for me, ‘Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work. 33 Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.’ 34 Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! 35 See, your house is left to you. And I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.’”

This is the word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

In our Wholehearted Faith Sunday School class last week, we talked about people who made us feel loved in our childhood. It’s probably not surprising to you that the majority of people mentioned grandmothers. I can think of quite a few grandmothers in this congregation, in this room, who cluck about their grandchicks even if they live far away. 

The name Mary Pendery, Chris Piercy’s grandmother and a late matriarch of Azle Christian Church, may elicit in some of you clear memories of working alongside her. Others of you may know her by name and stories alone. And others still, will hear this name today for the first time, not realizing how her love and legacy still reach today to all who enter these doors. Such is the best of what a grandmother can be.

My mother-in-law, a stalwart Hungarian woman who has endured so much hardship in her life, greets my daughter each morning with doting utterances in a language I don’t understand, wrapping her in a warmth that I pray Annie carries for the rest of her life. 

Both of my grandmothers died this past year after contracting COVID. I know I’m lucky to have had them for 31 years of my life, and I knew intellectually they would not live forever, but there was a childlike sense deep in my heart that perhaps they would. Such is the best of what a grandmother can be.

My paternal grandmother had been in poor health for a long time, and her time edged closer and closer until the tell-tale process of active death set-in. We said farewell over months, then days, then hours. 

My maternal grandmother left us much more quickly. We all rushed to say our goodbyes in disbelief, still struggling today to comprehend her absence. 

I am still my grandmothers’ grandchild, even though they have died. Just like so many of you are still the grandchildren of your grandparents, even as some of you are grandparents and great-grandparents yourself. 

I know not every family member in our life gets to live as long as we wish they would, or be as loving or kind as we wish they were, or be present in the ways we need them to be. Sometimes family members are the ones who hurt us in the cruelest of ways. The familial hurt inflicted, we have learned, is often not a one-time occurrence but rather a generational pattern, holding  families in a fierce grip for a long time. We don’t all get memories that wrap us in warmth for the rest of our lives.

So with this truth in my hands, I cup it between them in a posture of prayer, giving thanks for the grandmothers I know here, the mothering and the grandmothering and auntie presences I encounter here every week. We give thanks for those for whom their cup overflows with love for they spill over as they bump into us. We are splashed, sprinkled, baptized, if you will, by the cups brimming with care and compassion, filled by decades of communal love and faithfulness. 

For those whose parents gave them what they needed, for those who parent in a way that buoys your children in love and hope, your cups are spilling over, and for that we give thanks. The mess of what your cups cannot contain is a salve for so many, so please keep bumping into all of us. 

For such is the best of what a grandmother can be. For such is the best of what church can be. 

In our text today, we are out of the desert and facing Jerusalem. Jesus is warned by some religious leaders that Herod is planning to kill him, and this is not mere hyperbole. Herod is from a family where murder is a casual pastime. His father Herod the Great had murdered three of his sons, one of his wives and one of his mothers-in-law along with former friends and servants, and according to Matthew’s Gospel, he tried to kill Jesus before he was out of the cradle. Herod is one whose family was held in the death grip of trauma and harm. 

And though Jesus takes this seriously, he still intends to travel to Jerusalem. He must be on his way, he says. He will go to Jerusalem not to escape death, but in order to die there. 

Today, he is performing cures and casting out demons, and tomorrow he will do the same. And then he will go to Jerusalem, knowing what awaits him there.

But he does not go with a warrior’s resolve. Instead, he goes with a weeping mother’s heart. 

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”

Luke’s gospel invites us to think of Jesus as a mother hen whose chicks don’t want her. Though she stands with her wings wide open, offering belonging and shelter, her children refuse to come to her. 

Jesus knows what is waiting in Jerusalem—he knows the pulsing violent undercurrent, the paranoid power structures, the misguided desire for a revolution. And if the city of Jerusalem were filled with hardy souls, this would all not be so dangerous. But unfortunately, the city is filled with little chicks and at least one fox. Without a mother hen, some of the chicks have taken to following the fox around. Others are exposed to the elements and the dangers that lurk close by. 

If you have ever loved someone you could not protect, then you understand the depth of Jesus’ lament. All you can do is open your arms. You cannot make anyone walk into them. 

And this is the most vulnerable posture in the world, isn’t it? Wings spread, chest exposed. The Gospel of Luke seems to say that this is the posture of fierce love. 

The fact that Jesus uses this image—a hen, who cannot fly, who cannot deliver a fatal wound with her beak, who can only sit on her eggs and cluck around her chicks, is noteworthy. The options for a life become very clear in this little comment by Jesus: you can live your life by licking your chops or you can die protecting your chicks. And if the fox wants the chicks, he will have to kill the hen first. 

And he will. He sneaks up on her one night while her babies are sleeping. And when her cry wakens them, they scatter. She dies the next day, where everyone can see the image of her fierce love: wings spread, chest exposed. No chicks beneath her feathers. 

“How often have I desired to gather you…but you were not willing.” It’s a haunting refrain of love. A love so full that is spills over even as it bumps into violence and fear. Even as it bumps into death. 

For such is the best of what love can be. 

I spent a lot of summer and sick days with my grandmothers. Some of my earliest memories are in their living rooms, in their kitchens, slurping potato soup and rummaging through cabinets. 

They had a lot of experience cleaning up the messes of their rambunctious grandchildren. They would pull out a rag or a tear off a paper towel, and soak up spilled lemonade, giving us a scolding while also trying not to grin.

And I wonder about this act. Of soaking up what has been spilled, either by careless accident or because the cups are so full. We are all being poured out anyway—such is the best of what life can be. Poured out, with not one drop left. 

And I wonder if a grandmother love, a mother hen love, an auntie love is like a paper towel that soaks us up.

It’s a love that is known not through scholarly articles or theological treatises, but through dusting hands off on an apron, and cleaning spaghetti of a toddler’s face, and cradling a sick child. 

It’s a kind of love that spreads her wings and exposes her chest, ready to die to protect her chicks. 

If we have not learned how to love like that, and I would wager it’s frightening to many of us, perhaps we would let ourselves be loved like that. Perhaps we would be willing to be absorbed by all the paper towels in the hands of the love bending to clean us up. 

Perhaps we could let ourselves be gathered by the mother hen Christ, through the wrinkled hands and leathery feet of Christ’s body. Perhaps we could nestle into the warmth of all the chicks nestled in together, realizing that we don’t have to be out there alone or follow a fox around. We could be loved here. 

Because Lent doesn’t just tell the story of what was. It also tells the story of what could be. Of such of the best of what could be, of what is becoming even now. Amen.

Stewardship Moment

There are many ways to support and resource the ministries of Azle Christian Church: Venmo, giving online, or the offering plate. I also invite you to bring nonperishable items for our Little Free Pantry. The collection shelves for the pantry are in the Fellowship Hall right outside the kitchen. 

The deacons are going to hand these plates over during our final song, starting at the front row and they just to need make their way to the back where a deacon will collect them. You can drop your offering, an “I gave online card,” or an information card.

Invitation 

If you’d like to become a member of this faith community, or if you’d like to become a disciple of Jesus, please talk with me after service or sometime this week.

Benediction:

Please rise in body or spirit for our benediction, the final song, and the Doxology.

As you leave this place,

May you be awestruck by the beauty of this world.

May you laugh, and may it be contagious.

May you overflow with love for those around you.

May you be effusive with hope and quick to point out joy.

And in all of your living, and breathing, and being,

May you find yourself full with God’s Holy Spirit,

And may it change your life.

In the name of the Lover, the Beloved, and Love itself—

Amen.