Sunday, March 22, 2026

Ezekiel 37: 1-14 - Sunday, March 22, 2026 - Lent V

The dream-like vision that the prophet Ezekiel had, of being in a field of dry bones that he and God partnered together to bring back to life, occurred about seventy years before the reading I preached on at our “Annual Meeting Sunday” from the 8^th chapter of Nehemiah. In that reading, people had returned from exile in Babylon to Jerusalem, and rejoiced at hearing the scriptures read aloud beside the rebuilt Temple. By contrast, in the reading we heard today from Ezekiel, the exiles from Jerusalem and Judah had just arrived in Babylon and the future looked bleak. Few expected to see their homeland ever again. Amidst the gloom, the Spirit of the Lord presented Ezekiel with a vision, in a field of dry bones. Not animal bones, but dry, human bones, as if a military regiment had got lost in the desert while doing a training exercise, and had met a grim end.

God asks Ezekiel a question – “can these bones live?” – and Ezekiel basically turns the question back to God, “well, can they?” The late Canadian religious scholar Peter Craigie, in his wonderful commentary on Ezekiel, described what came next: “God addressed Ezekiel and told him, in effect, to preach to the bones. As an experienced prophet, Ezekiel must have felt many times in the past that he was preaching to the dead, but never so dramatically as on this occasion; and when he began to declare God’s word, the results were equally startling. He preached to the bones, declaring that God would restore them to life, and even as he spoke, his sermon was accompanied by a cacophony of clanking as the dead bones began to come together. Then, before the prophet’s eyes, the reconstructed skeletons were fitted with sinew and muscles and clothed with skin. They now looked marvellous, their skeletal appearance removed, but still they were dead. Again, the prophet was commanded to speak; addressing the four winds, he invited the spirit (RSV ‘breath’) of God to enter the reconstituted bodies and give them life. As he spoke, life was imparted: a great host of living persons stood up in the valley where formerly only corpses had been.”

It is natural for us to draw the connection between this vision of this Jewish prophet, and a Christian belief in resurrection – in this case, a resurrection of an entire nation and its hope. Once more turning to Peter Craigie, we read that “this prophecy provides an extraordinary insight into the life-giving capacity of God. (repeat) To a people whose life seemed to be over, a declaration of new life was made. To those whose existence had become a form of living death, new horizons of hope were revealed…. The message of hope to those in exile may become a message of hope to all: that the Spirit of God imparts fulness of life to all creatures.”

I invite you to receive that on whatever level you need to hear it today. If your faith is flagging and you need a fresh infusion of belief in the God of resurrection, the God of Jesus Christ who shares in our life and death and prepares for us a life beyond death, let that be yours. If you are weighed down by the anger and division that is so prevalent in the world today, and the challenges faced by this beautiful planet as economic concerns overrule ecological ones, open yourself to God’s own Spirit breath, to renew your life and, hopefully, have impact on this broader scope. And if you wonder, what might this highly unusual reading about a valley of dried-out bones has to do with us, well, listen on.

At our recent Annual Meetings, each of our congregations did some preliminary looking ahead at what might come next in our gathered life, as a family of faith tasked with sharing God’s love with one another and with our neighbours. You may have already guessed that the people of Osoyoos United Church and Oliver United Church are not the only United Church folks wondering about the future.

In recent years, the United Church of Canada has been well-aware that the numerical trends, both membership and finances, are mostly disheartening when we imagine the future. Facing that fact is important, but that’s not where we pitch our tent, for we believe in the God of resurrection, the God of justice and reconciliation, the God who told Ezekiel to bring those dry bones back to life for they had more life to live. Spurred on by that trust in God, and a curiosity about where God would find hope for us, our national General Council in 2025 prayerfully considered the question, “who will we be ten years from now, in 2035?” There are ministries in our denomination that are showing signs of new life, so we are curious: what is working for them that can inform what all of us might do together? And since we know from decades of experience that a faith that makes sense intellectually but fails to turn into meaningful action is not inspirational to younger generations, how do we articulate our call and purpose in ways that attract interest and propel us forward?

You have seen this logo (on screen), which gives visual expression to the United Church’s new call and purpose, to be a Church of deep spirituality, bold discipleship, and daring justice. I would add to that a fourth element, something like “authentic kindness”, for wounded people of all ages in our community need safe, kind gathering places with people who are thoughtful, non-judgmental, patient, truly welcoming. Naming this new call and purpose was an important first step in figuring out who we, as the United Church of Canada, will be going forward.

The next step, was to envision what a living, breathing Church will look like in 2035: if you will, what the valley of dry bones, the valley of Church decline looks like when the spirit of life refreshes it. And here is the basic description, written as a present-tense statement in 2035: “in The United Church of Canada, inspired, resilient, and diverse contextual communities of disciples seek to continue the story of Jesus by embodying Christ’s presence in the world. The church is present and deeply connected coast-to-coast-to-coast in rural and urban settings, and in ecumenical and global relationships. Guided by hope-filled, adaptive and effective ministry leaders, the denomination is increasingly multigenerational, multiracial, and intercultural”.  

That’s a densely-packed statement, and impossible to cover in one sermon – so today I’m going to lift three phrases out of it.

· Who will we be as a denomination as we move toward 2035? We will be contextual communities of disciples – that is, congregations that pay attention to the communities around them. That, in essence, is one of the three questions Shannon put in front of us at the start of our Interim time, “who is my neighbour?” - and I think you have done well at keeping that question before you for the past eighteen months. And in fact, over the years you have done a lot of good work looking at future vision, which relates to this call to love our neighbours.

· What are we going to do as we move toward 2035? We will continue the story of Jesus by embodying Christ’s presence in the world. For many years, United Church congregations and their leaders – and I fully count myself into this number - have been baffled as to how to connect with younger generations we barely know. Well, something we have heard consistently from young adults who DO end up in Church, is how moved they are by the brave, inclusive, loving person of Jesus and by individuals and congregations who let his unconditional love change them – congregations transformed by inclusive, socially aware love. Embodied, authentic love, the love of Christ that breathes us to life, is still the key answer in a world that enjoys hatred.

· And what will we look like as we move toward 2035? We will be increasingly multigenerational, multiracial, and intercultural. (And, of particular interest to Oliver as we foster a relationship with our Anglican neighbours, “ecumenical” is in there, too). What many Churches are finding, especially those in a growth phase, is that people who have come from other parts of the world are blown away by the message of love and inclusion of Jesus Christ expressed boldly and blatantly in the United Church of Canada. Churches, rural and urban, that connect with new Canadians, open an important door to people who want to be with us. Then, of course, it’s up to the whole congregation to actually mean it – to be a people of deep spirituality, bold discipleship and daring justice, in the name of the risen, eternally loving, completely non-judgmental Christ.

I could go on and on about this, but what I hope you are hearing in all this, is that the work that you have been about locally for some time now, of imagining what this congregation might look like in years to come, maps onto this bigger, longer view of our denomination rather well. It’s not identical, but the road forward identified locally is not all that different from the road forward identified nationally.

And there is one more thing. As a key aspect of the Toward 2035 initiative, our Moderator, the Right Rev. Dr. Kimberley Heath, is calling the Church to prayer. Not a top-down, “fix all this, won’t you, God” kind of prayer, but a prayer that includes a lot of listening: listening for God, listening to one another, listening for the surprising whispers of the holy spirit, listening for what Peter Craigie called the “cacophony of clanking” as the dry bones start to come to life.

So that’s how I’d like to end this message: in prayer. First, we will remain seated and prayerfully sing together, “God prepare me to be a sanctuary” – {More Voices #18} --- and then I will lead us in words of prayer suggested by our General Council and Moderator…

“Gracious and loving God, you called into being This United Church of Canada, One expression of Jesus’ Beloved community, here in the particularities of our place and our time.

For the past 100 years You have guided and sustained and called us back when we have erred.

Now, as we look back We also look forward, Daring to believe That even among us, even in this very place, you are doing a new thing. We long to perceive it

Like a way through a wilderness for the sake of our neighbours, for the sake of this world of beautiful and broken things, yearning to be made whole, yearning to be made new, may we perceive and live into it. Amen.”

Let us continue in prayer, in silence or aloud:

We bring to mind, O God, the nations of the world in their most recent and perilous struggles…

Our neighbours here in the south Okanagan, as we see vines and orchards being prepared for a new growing season…

Those known to us, and those known to you, O God, who are needing love to feel real again…

And prayers for ourselves, for health, for guidance, for hope…

And now, as a child turns to her mother in hope and trust, we turn to you, O God, as we say together The Lord’s Prayer… Amen.

References cited:

Craigie, Peter C. The Daily Study Bible Series: Ezekiel. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1983, pp. 259-261

The United Church of Canada, “A Listening Prayer”, accessed at https://united-church.ca/toward2035#downloads

The United Church of Canada, “Toward 2035”, https://united-church.ca/news/toward-2035-invites-communities-faith-hope-filled-bolder-future

Sunday, March 8, 2026

Nehemiah 8: 1-10 - Annual Meeting Sunday, March 8 and 15, 2026

It’s an understatement to say that the book of Nehemiah is a rather low-profile book of the Bible. And yet, the scripture we heard this morning – the only portion of Nehemiah that finds its way into our three year Sunday lectionary – is a reading that inspired one of the best sermons I’ve ever heard. The sermon was delivered way back in seminary days by a fellow student at VST, Ted Roworth, who some of you will remember from 2004-2005 when he preached in Osoyoos. Ted’s sermon began with his face beaming, breathlessly proclaiming, “you should have been there!” and then he described first-hand what it was like to be part of the crowd when all the people gathered in the square to hear Ezra read the Hebrew scriptures.

While the book of Nehemiah is named for a Hebrew prophet, it’s more like journalism than prophecies. You see, Nehemiah is written in the style of a first-hand account of someone who is experiencing history being written before his very eyes. The story he tells is so important in times like ours, for he has seen the rise and fall of Empires, the hardships of the immigrant underclass, and the durability of religious life when times are tough.

Around 600 BCE, the Babylonians were THE powerful nation of the middle east but, as is always the case for powerful nations, even now, they were not content with what they had. One of their expansionist targets was the land and people of Judah. Starting with the most skilled workers, the Jewish people were forced to leave their homeland, exiled to Babylon. It seems that there was a surprising amount of personal and religious freedom for the Jews in Babylon, but they kept their faith alive on a household by household basis; so far as we know, gathered religious instruction or public worship services were not allowed. But while we might regard the Babylonians as benevolent tyrants, overlords are still overlords and exile was still exile for the people of Judah, and I do not want to downplay that. To live in exile is heartbreaking, as we have learned from the Indigenous peoples of our land who were forcibly removed from their parents to go to Residential School. In Babylon, the Jews never stopped yearning for a return to their beloved Jerusalem, and the rock-strewn hills of its surrounding countryside.

In the year 538 BCE, the Persians overthrew the Babylonians, and the people of Judah were released to return to their homeland. But when I say homeland, in reality it was a home they knew only from the tales of their elders. Forcibly kept away from Judah for over sixty years, generations had born and died, so virtually none of the people who were “returning home” had ever actually seen it. They had inherited their parents’ and grandparents’ longing to return to Judah and Jerusalem, but they were, in the words of John Denver, “coming home to a place they’d never been before”. And to top it off, when they returned to the holy city of Jerusalem, they found the temple in ruins.

We pause for a moment to size this up. Exiled: forcibly kept away for sixty years, and when they returned to this storied homeland they’d never seen, it had been trashed, and other people were living there. Exhausted yet determined, the people put twenty years into rebuilding the Temple so they could properly worship the God of their forebears.

So here we are, at the scene described by the 8^th chapter of Nehemiah. The Temple was rebuilt, and the men, women and children were ready for the grand opening. It was time to hear the word of God read aloud for the first time in a long time. The crowd was too large to be inside, so they gathered in a public square just outside the new and glorious temple, and as the scribe and priest named Ezra started to read, the emotions were deep and varied: we’re told that people were bowing and weeping and shouting amens, moved to the core by the Spirit. We can only imagine the energy in that place. The joy, the sorrow, the trauma, the fatigue all rolled together in one great big emotional, energetic mass. And for many it was bittersweet: their parents and grandparents did not live to see this day, but they trusted that their children and grandchildren would live good lives here.

Gathered in that public square, I wonder how God’s Holy Word would have sounded to them. The people spoke Aramaic, but the scripture scrolls were all written in Hebrew. Ezra, knowing that this was the case, provided translators beside him on the stage, but I suspect that even without knowing the words, the people would have heard and felt the rise and fall of their mother tongue, a language of love spoken and sung by their people from the days of old. The sacred words of the old language, now spoken in real time; the old temple, destroyed, the new temple rebuilt, and as they stood there, the future of their faith was being written before them.

Many of us can identify, in a metaphorical sense at least, with living in exile. In our families, there may be brokenness that feels like exile. Sometimes changes in health, or the death of a loved one, can be like exile. I feel exiled from our American neighbours, as we are kept off-balance and offended by their leaders. And in many nations, the civility that was counted on for decades has been replaced by a divisive nastiness that splits our world into us and them, which feels like a global exile from our best selves.

And then there’s Church. When I was growing up, I could not imagine – and did not imagine – the decline of the mainline Christian Church in Canada. When I compare what I expected with how it unfolded, it feels a bit like exile. We remember Church buildings and Sunday Schools completely full, youth from Church and community involved in CGIT and Hi-C, the women of the Church serving through the WA and WMS and, later, the UCW, the men of the Church actively involved in Church governance and, in some places, AOTS. We now know, from the stats of Rev. David Ewart, that Canadian Church attendance peaked around 1964 or 1965 and gradually diminished from then on, but in the midst of it, it didn’t feel like something declining; this United Church of ours was integral to the “fabric of Canadian society,” as central as... uh-oh… Eaton’s, and The Bay. At times there is a hollowness within me that aches for what was.

But exile, in the Biblical record, was eventually followed by restoration, and the unfolding of new life, as is God’s pattern, Christ’s pattern, of resurrection to life anew. The exile was long but it did not last forever. In the 8^th chapter of Nehemiah, the troubles in Babylonia were becoming more and more distant. Now in Jerusalem, in the courtyard of the newly opened Temple, the people were allowed to gather, and listen, and be moved by the almighty God as they became accustomed to hearing Hebrew once more. It wasn’t perfect, but there was hope; when Ezra spoke the old words in this new place their spirits soared to the heavens.

In the Annual Meeting today, we look back a little way, as we review the year 2025, and we give thanks for everything and everyone in that recent history that contributed to the life and work of this congregation. We are thankful for the Councils and the Committees and the Transition Team and the JET, for the efforts of all our staff, and we thank everyone for their financial contributions and the other ways you support this place. Remembering that 2025 was the year in which we marked the 100^th Anniversary of the United Church of Canada, we also look much further back with gratitude to our forebears in the faith, in this congregation and in the Churches we grew up in, and we recall with fondness the faithful who kept things alive in the lean years.

And… and… as we look backward with gratitude, we look forward with expectancy, knowing that the Holy Spirit is, as always, leading us into new futures. No, it’s not as dramatic as hearing Ezra read from long-neglected sacred scrolls, but I hope that you feel that new things are possible here, that God will continue to place opportunities before this community of faith. In our eighteen months together, you have discerned your sense of identity, thought about the neighbours you are called to serve, and opened yourselves to what God is calling you to be and do. You have expressed a desire to continue to be a people of welcome and light and unconditional love, and for your Church home (whether that’s here or St. Edward’s) to be a place where there is always room for more at the table. Not in the same old ways, but with open ears and open eyes and open hearts, paying attention to the actual needs of your actual neighbours in a way that fits in 2026. We are informed by who we were ten years ago, and twenty years ago, and forty years ago, and eighty years ago, but the work is today, and tomorrow, moving toward a new horizon. God is NOT done with you yet, not by a long shot. You have identified that, and are called and empowered to lean into it.

And so we pay attention to the world, and our hearts go out to people who live in all manner of exile. In acts of love and words of solidarity, we commit ourselves once more, to be a people of love, shaped in the image of Christ. We hold gratitude for the fidelity of those who went before us; we give thanks for the present and for these companions on the journey; and we seek new ways of being. May we be ready for whatever will come next. Thanks be to God! Amen.

For further reading:

Denver, John. https://johndenver.com/tracks/rocky-mountain-high-5/

Holmes, David. “Together We Worship” video sermon, January 4, 2026.