March 1, 2026 First Congregational Church UCC, Brimfield MA
Psalm 121 1 I lift up my eyes to the hills— from where will my help come?
2 My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.
4 He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
6 The sun shall not strike you by day nor the moon by night.
7 The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.
8 The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in
from this time on and forevermore.
John 3:1-17 — Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. 2 He came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with that person.” 3 Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”,* 4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” 5 Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. 6 What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ 8 The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” 9 Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” 10 Jesus answered him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?
11 “Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen, yet you do not receive our testimony. 12 If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? 13 No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.,* 14 And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.,*
16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
17 “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him.
“I would like to invite you to a very practical and frequently unappreciated form of abstinence: that of refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor.” — Pope Leo XIV
A couple of weeks ago, I was having a conversation with someone about the Super Bowl, and kinda out of nowhere, they said, “well I’m NOT watching that terrible Bad Bunny; I’m watching the good half-time show…”
It was more than a little hard to know how to respond – if only because I generally find the half-time shows to be terminally boring… since then, I’ve found myself thinking about that exchange, working out why I found it puzzling. It was Pope Leo’s call for a Lenten discipline that helped me understand and led to today’s meditation.
With that intro, I want to turn our eyes to this morning’s readings. First, Psalm 121 reminds us that it is God who leads us, guides us, is our unfailing source of support. God is the center from which all else comes. And our second lesson reminds us that God loves the whole world, so that everyone who believes may enjoy a life that’s led by God.
So, think about this…. We, not just you and me, not just all of us in this room or with us on Zoom, but every human being in the world, are all welcome in God’s eyes. That’s our starting point with everyone.
That means our first line, our first action with anyone is always going to reflect that they are known by and loved by God, just as we are.
One of my interims was in a downtown church in a city with a significant unhoused population. Our doors were open on Sunday, and it wasn’t uncommon for someone to drop in on Sunday, often with their dog. We had a choice, each time. Were we going to welcome this person, who hadn’t taken a bath, who was accompanied by a perhaps untrained animal…. Or were we going to stop them at the door?
What did God want of us?
That church welcomed every person who walked in the door. I don’t want to sugar-coat it; from time to time someone took offence. I once received a note from someone who said they’d never attend again if we continued to be that place where people were welcome until or unless they caused a problem. She left; we kept welcoming.
That’s a dramatic scenario. For most of us, welcome is more about little things, like holding doors for people with strollers. But it’s also about starting our conversations with what’s good, rather than starting with anger or hate.
It’s a hard thing to do, especially when you don’t actually like the person you’re thinking of. It’s ever so much easier to remember why you don’t like them, or what they’ve said or done that you don’t like, that’s made you angry. Remember then, that no matter how good your reasons for hatred or anger, God has made us a world where everyone can be loved. Maybe you are thinking of someone who’s turned away from that good world, but even that doesn’t exactly justify our hatred, our anger.
Life’s been a little challenging down my way for the past week, what with three feet of snow arriving in just a few hours last Monday. And one of the biggest challenges, as you can imagine, is what to do with all that snow. The first few days, our DPW crews worked round-the-clock, to get at least one lane open on every street in East Providence. There are 813 streets in East Providence, most have been plowed at least once, and they’re now working to widen every street so we can return to parking cars on the street.
And it’s not been happening fast enough for some people. Some people are really angry. “It’s been cleaned up in (fill in city’s name), why are you sleeping on the job here?” Never mind that the other city got 10 inches of snow. Or the nasty one I saw, “bet the mayor’s street got plowed”…. Implying that no one else has had their street cleared… The anger and mean comments from just a small group of residents really ate away at the folks who were working so hard.
It’s been a real-life reminder of how anger can destroy love and hard work. I don’t mean that the city plows are stopped, but we’ve begun to see blowback from their spouses saying “back off, they’re working as hard as they can,” and it’s clear that the folks who are angry because their street’s not cleared from curb to curb, are beginning to anger the people who are working so hard to help all of us. Impatience, ignorance, entitlement, all lead to anger, and anger that’s not justified.
Over and over and over, what we see when we really look at things is that, when our default response to everything is anger, everything falls apart.
It’s not easy… if only because there are times when anger is the right, maybe even the only effective, response. But I’m not talking about our anger about corruption, or anger about sexual predators going free, or even anger at seeing our country go to war illegally.
I’m talking about our everyday relationships with one another. I’m talking about those times when our leaders, the leaders of this church, have folks come up to them, already furious about something before they every share their concern. I’m talking about angry people making nasty remarks to the young mother ahead of them in the grocery line, or acting like Bad Bunny was the literal incarnation of the devil. I’m talking about the kind of anger that builds walls, scares people, destroys community.
It’s not easy to let go of anger; Pope Leo as much as admitted that when he suggested that for a Lenten discipline we abstain from words that offend, words that hurt our neighbors. But, even the effort is worth the effort. Even the effort to look for the good changes us, maybe changes our relationships with one another, certainly changes our world.
This Lent, God calls us to be kind. To show love. To turn away from reflexive anger, to turn towards our neighbors, to build community.
It is our call to live out God’s truth – God has made this to be a world built on love, and it is our call to make that happen.
Amen.
©2026, Virginia H. Child
To Believe is to Care. . . To Care is to Do 