Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was lead by the Spirit in
the Wilderness where for forty days he was tempted by the devil.  
     Sociologists tell us that there are two types of status: Ascribed status and achieved
status. Prince Charles has ascribed status: Bill Gates has achieved his.
    As I reflect on my growing up years I realize that I benefited from ascribed status –
This was particularly true on Sunday mornings. My Dad would return from the Dairy
barn, pick me up, take me to the village, and buy the Sunday paper with the funny papers.
We’d pile into Mom and Dad’s big bed and read the comics. I would chew Juicy Fruit
gum, a Sunday treat.
    Then it was off to church, where the fact that I was God’s child, loved, cherished and
purposed was communicated week after week.
    Church was followed by Sunday dinner at my Grandparents’: Fried chicken, Roast
Beef, Aunts, Uncles and cousins. Touch football or, if we were entertaining my
grandfather – boring croquet; forts built in the hayloft.

      Nothing to prove, Just a day of basking in Knowing not so much who I was but whose
I was.
I never come to the scripture for the first week of Lent without a new-every-year
amazement at the synoptic gospels juxtaposition of interesting events. Event one shows a
newly minted God-hungry rabbi from Northern Galilee, knee deep in the River Jordan in
solidarity with sinners, traitors and other assorted failures and hearing the amazing words
of ascribed status: You dripping wet: hungry like the other desperados son of mine – I am
pleased with you. You are my beloved.
Suddenly the scene is shifted by the Holy Spirit. From cool waters to hot rocks, sand,
relentless sun, hunger, thirst and profound self-doubt – vivid, personalized Satanic. The
doubts and tugs towards hopelessness and despair are focused and sharpened with one
piercing little word: “IF”
Have you ever thought that there would have been NO temptation at all had Satan said,
“Since you are the Beloved Son of God” – Jesus would have rested in his ascribed status.
The devil uses the word “IF” and crisis ensues.
    Henry Nouwen describes the temptations as the desire for power, the desire for
relevance: Be spectacular: Turn stone to bread and do something for poverty – Worship
me and reveal your desire for real political power - win the election – Rely on the Bible
in a proof text way and be a stunt preaching mega evangelist with a spectacular image.
Jesus puts the Devil’s test in context. Which is what we have to do whenever we use the
Bible.
He puts the text the Devil quotes into the larger context of his having fallen in love with
the steadfast lover of Israel, whose word is never an external abstraction but an inward
reality.
One of the most tragic aspects of the post General Convention season we are in is that
scriptural texts are being hurled like stones by both sides of this debate. “Jesus ate with
sinners so those who oppose Gene Robinson’s ordination are Pharisees.” A man should
not lie with a man as with a woman so Gene Robinson is a sodomite and those who
support him are revisionists.
     The fact is that Christians on both sides of this concern are God’s cherished sons and
daughters who would be wise not to be tempted to self-authentication by Proof texting.
Our differences are not as huge as some would lead us to believe. We must not proof text
ourselves into a “rhetoric of polarization.” We need to be clear about the vast ethical
convergence we have. For instance: The issue has to do with the question – Can the
committed same gender relationships of gay Christians suffice for the “Holiness of life”
canonical requirement.
    We are not discussing:
    Adultery;
    Physical, verbal, psychological or emotional abuse;
    Rape or other non-consensual activity;
    Sexual harassment;
    Promiscuity;
    Prostitution;
    Practices that spread sexually transmitted disease;
    Pornography;
    Commercial sexual exploitation;
    Strip clubs;
    Phone sex, sex tourism or
    Pornography from the Internet
    And over the past decade our denomination has made it abundantly clear that any
sexual agenda with a person in a clergy person’s pastoral care will most frequently lead
to the canonical discipline of Deposition.
    Our misconduct training, which is done from coast to coast, helps heighten the
awareness of how vulnerable youth and children are to church based predators and such
incidents have declined in our church.
    Proof texting and the refusal to concede common ground are the devil’s tools to tempt
– not Jesus in the Wilderness – but his Body the Church into the despair that results from
not knowing our status as daughters and sons by his adoption and by his Grace.
    Our Baptism allows us to disagree until consensus comes.
    When we achieve a workable unity beyond our present issues – it will not be because
our theological sophistication defeated our perceived enemies.
    It will be because somehow something will be surrendered to the Ascribed status of
those who are naked, vulnerable, buried and risen with Jesus in our watery baptismal
grave and rely on nothing save His mercy. His steadfast, pinned down, stretching –
Mercy.
    One of the dearest friends I ever had was a celibate priest named Joe. Joe had married
– It was a mistake – He remained celibate but was very aware of the complexities of the
human condition. He was a priest to those at the margins and had a particular ministry to
those for whom the Christian Church was a toxic place.
    He told a story I have never forgotten. At a point in his life where he was feeling
unloved and unlovable – even though many around him thought of him as the very sign
to them of Christ’s love – he was taken to lunch by his good friend Jean. Jean looked him
straight in the eye and said, “Oh, Joe, I’ve thought of all the ‘What Ifs” and I love you
anyway!”
     In this Eucharist – all of us here – old, young, white, black, Republicans and
Democrats, Evangelicals, Liberals, women, men, lay, ordained, gay, straight – are
nothing but a bunch of desperados with no hope but the dripping water of our Baptism
and a voice of encouragement that calls us Beloved Daughters and Sons.
    We will, with angels and archangels cry out our Holy Holy Holy and we will adore
Him who stands in the river – who lets us touch Him even while we are unclean – Who
calls us out of our tree – or from our tax table – or from our sixth husband or 1st lover
(depending on how you count the Samaritan woman’s past.) He knows us well – this one
we cry out our holy to, and in this Eucharist
    Gifts of God for the People of God or as the Orthodox say so radically – Holy Gifts for
the Holy.
    God in Christ Jesus in this Eucharist dares – deigns – to worship (Worth) us with His
very Self – His Offered Self – His poured out Self – And as we taste and touch, as sense
fails us, and Faith responds, it is a Powerful moment and we know not only has Jesus
thought of all the “What Ifs” – He has defeated them – Bound their power on the cross –
and we know – each and everyone – that we are loved anyway.
    And now to Him who ascribes status and mercy to us as His – be ascribed as is most
justly due all might, majesty, dominion and splendor now and forever.
    Amen