Pastor Tony's Sermon January 28, 2018

John 3: 1-21     1-28-18    Rev. Tony Clark    ACCUCC

You may have noticed that we are doing a series on the Gospel of John. John is perhaps the hardest gospel to read because he is the most literary of the gospel writers. He uses metaphorical and mystical words with multiple meanings, he plays with puns, and he has recurring themes and characters to pull you through the narrative. Jesus also sounds a bit like the Kung-Fu master teaching Grasshopper in Zen koans.

Here a few things that can help us understand John a bit more:

·     John uses water to indicate something of this worldly realm, and water is the transition element to the Spirit world.

·     The word for Spirit in Greek, which John wrote in, also meant Breath and Wind.

·     John interchanges the ideas of light and darkness, day and night, sight and blindness, and mystical understanding and literal misunderstanding.

·     the word for judgement in Greek is also the root of our word, “crisis”; Jesus does not judge, but there is a crisis of faith in being separated from the Light of God.

·     And, in this passage, we are introduced to  Nicodemus, who  returns in Chapter 7 to defend Jesus before the other Pharisees, and again in chapter 19 to help Joseph of Arimathea  bury him.

The story is simple: Nicodemus, who, as a Pharisee, was a leader of the faith, came to Jesus at night and asked him a theological question about being born again. Jesus replied that to enter the Kingdom of God, we must be born of water and the spirit. And then he went on, addressing all the Pharisees, in a preachy, lecture-y tone about knowing the truth, being raised into heaven, judgement, eternal life, and living in the light.

Jesus talks in riddles and rainbows, that, like rivers, ramble and run rampant. He talks of entering the Kingdom of God born of the water and the spirit, together, as if they are intimately linked, like in baptism--the spirit descended on Jesus when he was being baptized with water.  Yet we also could hear Jesus say that being born of water is different than being born of the spirit. Water and spirit are two different things. Water is of this earthly world; we begin life in the watery world of the womb, and when we die, water is released. Jesus was born of the water of his mother’s womb and when Jesus died, a spear was stuck in his side, and from the wound flowed water and blood. (Jn 19: 34). Jesus turned water into wine (Jn 2: 1-11), met a woman at a well to tell her he is the living water (Jn 4: 1-42), he walked on water (Jn 6: 16-21; cf Jn 21: 1-14), and he washed his disciples’ feet with water (Jn 13: 1-20).

Water is worldly, and it is a transition element to the spirit. We can see water, and when you look at it, it seems like it might be a solid mass. After all things float on it—ducks, logs, even people—and Jesus walked on it!-- yet we cannot hold it in our hands. When you try to pick it up, it flows back to the ground. Like earth, water can be held in a cup. Like wind, though, water slips through our fingers. Like earth, water can be seen. Yet like wind, we can move through water, and, like wind, water has a power and a pull all its own, where earth mostly just sits there.

John tells us that where Jesus and water meet, the Spirit is there too. Water to wine, the woman at the well learning Jesus is the Living Water, and washing the disciples’ feet to prepare them for life in the Spirit. When Jesus taught at the Temple, right before Nicodemus appears for the second time to defend Jesus, Jesus stood up and said…, “whoever is thirsty should come to me and drink. As the scripture says, ‘Whoever believes in me, streams of life will pour out from his heart.’” And then John adds this commentary, Jesus said this about the Spirit, which those who believed in him were going to receive. (Jn 7: 37-38, GNV) Water, an earthly substance, transitions us to the Spirit.

The Spirit, like our breath, like wind, is felt but not seen; it has direction but no beginning or ending place; it has power but no substance that we easily perceive. It is the Spirit hovering over creation, calming the chaos of the waters; it is the breath of God blowing life into the mud-made Adam; and it is the breath of Jesus who breathed new life into the disciples who were hiding in a locked room after his death. Jesus came and stood among them… and said, “Peace be with you,” …and then he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” (Jn 20: 19-22, GNV).

The first time Nicodemus met Jesus, Jesus preached to him about first being born of water then being born of the Spirit, which is the way normal human beings are born again. “Born again” also mean “born anew”, as well as “born from above”. We mere mortal humans are born once of the womb in a watery whoosh, and then we can be born from above—born of the blowing, billowy breath of God.  But Jesus did it the other way around. He was born first of the Spirit, before the world began; he was the Word, who was with God and who was God (Jn 1: 1). After that first spiritual birth, then much later he became human, born of the water of the womb. For God so loved the world… (Jn 3: 16).

Yet Jesus did not come to judge, but to save (Jn 3: 17). Salvation in John is not so much an erasing of immoral actions from people’s past. Salvation is so that we may live with, live in—abide, dwell—in the light that is God. Jesus does not judge, but if we live in a place of unbelief we have already been judged, not by Jesus, nor by God, but by ourselves. We have judged ourselves worthy of living only in the watery world which is as dark as a womb.

Salvation is being birthed from dwelling in the watery womb of darkness to life in the luminous, languid, luxuriant light. Life in our watery world includes the reality of Darkness—the darkness of doubt, the darkness of death, the dark that falls in the deepest night, and the darkness of depression and grief.  Mystics will tell you that darkness has its own spiritual gifts.  I can almost hear Jesus claiming that while darkness is a real place where people could dwell, darkness doesn’t have to be the final destiny. Jesus calls us to move through the desperate darkness of death toward the luminous light of life.

Jesus is the Word of God, the light of the world, who dances with darkness at dusk and calls us from night into daylight. Jesus lives in the liminal, liquid, languid land that lies at the edge where watery womb meets windy spirit. He breathes the breath of God, a blustery breeze, that is the beautiful, billowy Spirit. He is the one in whom water becomes spirt becomes light.

Nicodemus, who stands in for each of us, is to be born from the watery womb into the windy world and walk from there into the luminous, languid, light of life, where each of us sees the beautiful, bountiful truth that we are, all of us, children of God. May this be our new birthday. Amen.

City of Berkeley Named Among Nation's Most Innovative In Reducing Energy

Sponsored Article from Person of the Planet

Read the original city manager's post here!

Community energy conservation efforts make big impact

Berkeley, California (Wednesday, January 10, 2018) - Berkeleyans reduced enough energy over two years that it equaled taking 2,141 cars -driving a total of 25 million miles - off the road for a year. 

Berkeley's energy reduction - among residents, businesses, the City government and schools - were driven by regulations, incentives and programs started by the City as well as steps taken by individuals such as installing rooftop solar.

The significant decline in energy use led to Berkeley being recognized as one of the top 10 cities in a nationwide competition about creating innovative solutions for reducing energy consumption. The energy reduction is all the more notable because Berkeley's temperate climate already requires less energy than other regions. 

The Georgetown University Energy Prize recognized the City of Berkeley for a number of innovative actions, such as:

The City of Berkeley's Building Energy Saving Ordinance, which helps building owners to identify ways to save energy.

The city's conversion of its streetlights to LED bulbs reduces energy and saves the City nearly $400,000 every year.

The West Berkeley Library, which was awarded the highest LEED Platinum designation for its sustainable design and operation, produces enough excess clean energy from its rooftop solar panels to power an electric vehicle charging station installed in 2017.

Future energy-reducing projects in Berkeley include designing a clean micro-grid to generate back-up power for increased community resilience.

Despite an 18% increase in population, Berkeleyans have reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 12% since 2000. Most of the gains come from reducing building electricity and natural gas usage and the increase in renewable energy (solar and wind power) in our Bay Area electricity supply. The City has been working to give Berkeleyans more options for cleaner electricity, furthering reducing our greenhouse gas emissions - a goal that will become reality this year.

Despite our climate action progress, more needs to be done to meet our long-term goal of reducing greenhouse gases by 80 percent in 2050 compared to 2000. Some simple first steps include:

Getting out of cars to bike, walk, bus or BART

Continuing to reduce energy use in our homes and businesses

Switching to energy efficient LED light bulbs and adjusting thermostats to reduce utility bills and greenhouse gas emissions.

See the city's website for a list of energy efficiency rebate and financing programs that can help commercial, residential and multi-family properties undertake building improvement projects such that will save energy, increase comfort, and reduce utility bills.

Pastor Tony's Sermon January 14, 2018

John 2: 1-11     1-14-18     ACCUCC     Rev. Tony Clark

Listen to this week’s sermon by clicking here.

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.” His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it. When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

Since moving to California, I have learned something about wine. Because it is ubiquitous, I tell people back east that it is our unofficial State drink. I also joke that in some places, our faucets are plumbed for wine; if you turn the left handle you get red, and if you turn the right handle you get white.

I’ve learned something of the agriculture of wine; how fragile the grape is to frost or fire, how many years it takes an immature grape plant to produce grapes—3 years, as I’ve heard after the devastating fires north of here.

I’ve also learned a bit about the economy of wine. Many of the workers in the fields are undocumented immigrants, people who have few rights in our society, including aid from FEMA after the recent fires. I imagine the difficulty of the work, even if though I don’t do it myself, because I see the workers when I travel through Napa and Sonoma Valleys.

On July 4, when Darrell’s family was in town we went to Napa. This was before the fires hit, there was a casual joy in the air, and the holiday meant that the wineries were pretty sparsely toured. We stopped at Stags Leap Winery, which is known for winning a French recognition for its cabernet in 1976. There weren’t many people there, and the wine steward was in a generous mood, and he gave us a free tasting of their Cask 23. It was beautiful, smooth, rich, and with a little kick in the end. They called it an “iron fist in a velvet glove.” Thinking of enjoying a bottle of that with friends, I immediately took out my wallet and said, “I know I can’t afford a case, but I would like to buy a bottle of that.” The steward said, “It’s $245 a bottle.” I gulped, and put my credit card back in my wallet and my wallet back in my pocket, and said, “Thank you for the taste. That was the most exquisite wine I’ve ever tasted, and the taste will have to last my life time.”

The wine that Jesus made was that good. A solid 94-96 points. An Iron fist in a velvet glove-- smooth, fruity, rich, deep, and luxuriant. The finest wine, served not at the beginning of the party, but 3 days in, when most people would serve the cheap stuff, the stuff that was nearly vinegar, the stuff from the bottom shelf. Jesus, a mere guest at this wedding, made water into the best wine ever.

And that is not the point of the story.

Each of the Gospels presents an answer, not just to the question, “Who was Jesus?”, but to the question, “How did Jesus reveal God to us?” The Gospel of John has a very clear answer to that question; Jesus revealed God because Jesus was the Word of God.

I don’t know about you, but when I think of the Word of God, I think of the Bible, the book of scriptures, typeset on thousands of pages, bound in paper or cardboard or leather. I’m pretty sure that Jesus didn’t become a book of pages and pages and a leather covering.

Jesus was the Word of God, not a book, but the God’s spoken Words made manifest. The Gospel of John opens with these words, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.” The Word of God is the spoken truth at the center of the universe, at the beginning before the Big Bang. The whole of our scripture opens with the beautiful poetry that says, “In the beginning… God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.”

The Word of God is not merely a book, written, edited, canonized, and then closed for all eternity. The Word of God is spoken over and over again, and the Gospel of John says that not only is the Word of God what God speaks and becomes true, but the Word of God became manifest, incarnated in the person of Jesus.

That opening of the Gospel of John continues with these words, “What has come into being in him was life…”

The Word of God was present with God at the beginning of time, and the Word of God is life. Jesus, as the Word of God reveals to us what God keeps trying to tell us about life, and he does it by doing things. In the Book of John, Jesus does signs—what the other gospels call miracles, and these signs, and the words of interpretation around them point to what God wants to speak to us. Turning water into wine at a wedding in Cana is the first sign.

We look for meaning in the alchemy of turning water into wine, yet the meaning is not in the miracle, nor in the alchemy. The meaning is in what this act says about the actor, Jesus, and how Jesus reveals God.

Jesus turns water into wine on the request of his mother. She comes to him and asks him to not let the wedding host look embarrassed by running out of wine. Jesus’ answer, though, is that it is no concern of his, and it is not his time. His mother simply tells the steward to do what he says, and then walks away leaving it to Jesus to do something.

Jesus was not ready to reveal himself, yet there was something that Mary could see in her adult son. Always his mother, she had to encourage him to do something which would reveal him as the Word of God. So, like an alchemist turning lead into gold, Jesus turned water into wine. This first sign tells us about God, not in words, but in action.

We learn that Jesus was a miracle worker, an alchemist of some sort, yet that is not the entire meaning of this sign. The meaning is deeper, a reflection on what it means to be so completely alive in God. What has come into being in him was life. This alchemical miracle tell us about life: life is about celebrations, about being together for the important times like a wedding. Life is about hospitality, and good hospitality is bringing out the best when others would bring out the cheapest. Life is noticing the extraordinary in the ordinary. And life is about listening to your mother.

The Word of God doesn’t just proclaim, but makes manifest, that life in God is abundant. Jesus didn’t just make a few bottles of wine; he turned six jars of water, each containing approximately 20-30 gallons, into wine. That’s between 120 and 180 gallons of wine. If we assume the total was someplace around 150 gallons, something on the order of 750 modern bottles of wine, which would have taken about 1 ton of grapes had the wine been made from grapes.[1] In terms of the $245/bottle wine that I got to sample, that would be more or less $184,000 worth of wine. Certainly, weddings these days are costly, but even that is beyond what the wealthiest would budget for the wine at a wedding.

That was an amazing amount of hospitality, an abundance, an overflowing of the extraordinary in what would otherwise have been a relatively ordinary wedding. And what is even more amazing is that Jesus was not the host. He was merely a guest, along with his mother and disciples. He did it so the host would not be embarrassed, he did it because his mother asked, he did it because she knew he could and encouraged him. And he kind of went over the top.

And that is the point. The point is not the magic, the alchemy of adding carbon out of thin air to the hydrogen and oxygen to change a relatively simple chemical—water—into a more complex chemical—alcohol.

The Word of God, the living Jesus Christ, preached to us, not merely with words, but by revealing God’s point of view on this thing we call life. Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, celebrated this thing called life, and showed us that Life in God is abundant and there is extraordinary abundance in the midst of the ordinary.

God proclaimed, at the beginning of time, the words, let there be life, animals, plants, sea creatures of all kinds, an abundance of cockroaches and butterflies, whales and plankton, bacteria and people. Let there be abundance, and there was abundance. And the Word of God at a wedding in Cana proclaimed with an act celebrating life, that Life in God is abundant-- -- Life in God is abundant, abundant in joy, abundant in community, abundant in diversity, abundant in love.

Yes, Jesus was a magic man, a miracle man, full of signs and wonders. And more than that, he is the Word of God, teaching us what that means.  

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life…”

Let there be life. Let there be abundant life. May we gather here to celebrate life, and may the extraordinary signs amidst the ordinary day-to-day of life reveal the good news of God to each of us. Amen.

[1] Calculations retrieved from https://grapesandwine.cals.cornell.edu/newsletters/appellation-cornell/2011-newsletters/issue-8/conversion-factors-vineyard-bottle on 1-11-18

Some Optimism for the New Year (part 2)- Sponsored Article from Person of the Planet

This is the concluding part of a Christian Science article on new developments that will make the world a better place. We have previously presented the first four of those developments, and here are five more, all of which will bring good for the environment, to briefly again quote the beginning of the article, the improvements in this list will

“... help make the world a safer, saner, and more prosperous place for the majority of us. Fueled by advances in electronics, software, and materials science as well as by the imaginativeness of researchers and inventors, a number of new technologies promise to help curb global warming and biodiversity loss, ease commutes, and stretch the planet's natural resources to feed and house the nearly 10 billion people who are expected to be sharing it by 2050. . .from rooftop fans that pull carbon dioxide from the air to 3-D printed homes to radical concepts in transportation...

5. Slicker Cities

In October, Sidewalk Labs, a subsidiary of Alphabet, the company that owns Google, announced that it will commit $50 million to redesigning 12 acres of waterfront in Toronto as a “smart city.” Rechristened as Quayside, the neighborhood will be carpeted with sensors; road design will prioritize pedestrians, cyclists, and self-driving cars; and construction will emphasize prefabricated structures built with eco-friendly timber and plastic. If all goes well, the company will expand the project to 800 acres.

Billionaire Bill Gates is getting involved in the city-of-tomorrow movement, too. The former head of Microsoft plans to invest $80 million in a smart city on 25,000 acres on the western edge of Phoenix. Called Belmont, the community will include 80,000 homes.

“Belmont will create a forward-thinking community with a communication and infrastructure spine that embraces cutting-edge technology, designed around high-speed digital networks, data centers, new manufacturing technologies and distribution models, autonomous vehicles and autonomous logistics hubs,” says Belmont Partners, a real estate investment group that is developing the land.

Another futuristic city that will soon be getting more visibility, when the Olympics open in Pyeongchang, South Korea, in February, is the Songdo International Business District. The 1,500-acre site, built on land reclaimed from the Yellow Sea 45 miles southwest of Seoul, features energy-efficient buildings, electric vehicle charging stations, and pneumatic waste-disposal systems.

6. Printing Homes

3-D printing has been used to create everything from jet airliner components to custom-fit shoes. Many experts say the process of turning digital files into three-dimensional objects could ultimately usher in a new industrial revolution. 

One of the latest manifestations of 3-D wizardry: building houses. It’s an application that could transform construction practices that have remained unchanged for centuries. 

Using a swiveling robotic arm that extrudes concrete, a San Francisco company, Apis Cor, 3-D printed the concrete walls for a 400-square-foot house in Russia in less than 24 hours in early 2017. And researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge have built a robotic arm and a vehicle that dispenses concrete for a 50-foot-diameter, 12-foot-high dome in less than 14 hours.

The technology could greatly speed up the construction of homes and reduce the waste. Construction refuse accounts for half of all solid waste in the United States. 

7. Purer Water

If you have a water filter in your refrigerator or on your kitchen faucet, you know it comes with one major drawback: The filter often has to be replaced.

Researchers at Princeton University in New Jersey have developed a way to clean water that may get around this problem: Infuse it with gas. It works by injecting carbon dioxide into a stream of water. When CO2 is dissolved in water, it creates ions that generate a small electric field. Because most contaminants have a surface charge, the electric field can split the stream into two channels, one carrying the contaminants and one containing clean water.

The researchers say that their method is 1,000 times as efficient as conventional filtration systems. They believe it could be useful in providing more sources of potable water in the developing world because of its low cost and low maintenance requirements. The technology could also find use in filtering water at desalination plants and water treatment facilities.

8. Wonder Wafer

Graphene has been heralded as the next wonder material. A form of carbon that consists of a single layer of atoms, it is stronger than steel, harder than diamond, lighter than paper, and more conductive than copper. 

It is currently being used in everything from electronics to high-tech tennis rackets. It may one day lead to smartphones as thin as paper that can be folded up and put in your pocket.

A team of physicists at the University of Sussex in England has for the first time combined silver nanowires with graphene to create a bendable, shatterproof touch screen. Because of graphene’s high conductivity, the screens could be more responsive and use far less power. They may be crucial to creating a new generation of credit-card-size phones.

9. Curbing Global Warming with Fans [last, but not least!]

Climate change is caused mostly by human activity emitting greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Part of the solution may lie in extracting the harmful pollutants from the air – and then recycling them in useful ways.

That, at least, is what the Swiss company Climeworks is banking on. On the roof of a recycling center outside Zurich, Switzerland, 18 fans suck in the surrounding air. Chemically coated filters absorb the carbon dioxide. When they are saturated, the filters are heated to produce pure CO2, which is pumped into a nearby greenhouse where it helps vegetables grow bigger. Climeworks estimates that its fans are about 1,000 times as efficient as photosynthesis, which draws carbon out of the atmosphere and turns it into plant material.

Climeworks was the first to commercially capture CO2 from ambient air, but it is just one of many companies around the world pursuing carbon capture as a way of mitigating climate change. Carbon Engineering, backed by Bill Gates, is testing air capture at a facility in British Columbia. New York-based Global Thermostat has two pilot plants drawing CO2 from the air and power-plant flues.”

Please contact POP if you know about some more good developments in the works that will help our planet heal and thrive.

Faith is a Verb... Musings by Pastor Tony January 5, 2017

Cautiously we slide into the New Year, first dipping a toe into the cold waters of winter, testing to see how 2018 might affect us. In turning away from 2017 we leave behind memories, yet we take with us legacies of the year just past. In 2017, we finished the railing project along the outside wall of the sanctuary, providing more stability for those who walk that long walk each Sunday, we renovated the kitchen to a more modern look, and we replaced the stage curtains. In 2017, two small groups continued the work of the New Beginnings process started in 2016, creating the Person of the Planet and inaugurating a monthly speaker series on the nexus of justice and environmentalism.  As well, three long-term Council members, Ruth Robinson, Elena Caruthers, and Dorothy Streutker stepped off Council at the end of the year.

2018 brings three new Council members, Carol Lloyd, Linda Young, and Sara Laferte, and we are looking toward a Council retreat soon to get ready for this year. We have set a plan to redo our landscaping, with the generous donation from Jill Bryans’ Estate, as soon as the rains stop, and we are discerning the timing of redoing the patio, stairs, and deck outside the Social Hall. Meanwhile, the Person of the Planet team, working with the Board of Mission and Social Justice, are writing a Covenant statement to be part of the application to the United Church of Christ asking that ACC is designated a Creation Justice Church. The Covenant will also be used as a liturgical element periodically in worship as we welcome new members and celebrate who we are as a congregation. I have also asked the Pastor Parish Relations Team (Elena Caruthers, Barry Cammer, and Susan Yourd) to work with me, Council, and the congregation to evaluate all of our ministries at Arlington Community Church and how each of us connects to them, which I hope will lead to a frank discussion about my job description and duties.

Well then, that is a lot of stuff already in the works for 2018. Perhaps we are not just testing the waters of 2018, but moving from a shallow end to deeper waters. The waters we swim in surround us and hold us afloat. They are the waters of baptism, the water that makes up most of our body mass, and the waters that make up the bulk of the earth’s surface. The waters we swim in are the blessing waters of God, and they are part of the body of God. As we glide from 2017 to 2018, we see that we do not leave behind anything, because the pool we swim in is continuous from year to year. Our work is still in God, and our work is an extension of what we did last year. Even so, you can see that what lies ahead are some big tasks, and we can always use your prayers, your gifts, and your service to accomplish them.

On this the 12th day of Christmas, I wish you a blessed New Year, filled with the Epiphany Light of Christ.   

Peace, 

Pastor Tony

Some Optimism for the New year (part 1)

(from a Christian Science Monitor’s Dec. 30 article, "18 Leaps To Watch For...")

Sponsored Article from Person of the Planet- Shirley Lutzky

“The coming year will probably bring many surprises, but we can be confident in making at least one prediction: Technology will advance. And despite headlines warning of malevolent artificial intelligences, unscrupulous hackers, and greedy tech billionaires, many of these improvements will actually help make the world a safer, saner, and more prosperous place for the majority of us. Fueled by advances in electronics, software, and materials science as well as by the imaginative researchers and inventors, a number of new technologies promise to help curb global warming and biodiversity loss, ease commutes, and stretch the planet's natural resources to feed and house the nearly 10 billion people who are expected to be sharing it by 2050. . .from rooftop fans that pull carbon dioxide from the air to 3-D printed homes to radical concepts in transportation...

[Here are four that will contribute to the thriving of the planet. Part II will conclude with five more, in the next POP issue ]:          

1. Designer Solar

If you want solar panels, you don’t necessarily need to make your home look as if it’s covered with cereal boxes. Many companies are developing technology that lets homeowners integrate photovoltaic cells right into their houses’ existing architecture. Tesla, the electric car innovator, makes solar tiles that look like ordinary roof shingles. The company has installed them on about a dozen homes so far, including that of the company’s founder, Elon Musk, and orders for more are already sold out well into 2018. And...A team of Australian researchers has developed solar-powered paint. It works by soaking up water vapor from the air and then using the energy from sunlight to split the water into oxygen and hydrogen gas. The collected hydrogen is used in fuel cells.

2. Looks Do Matter

Facial-recognition systems have been used for everything from stadium security to unlocking a phone. But humans, it turns out, aren’t the only ones with machine-readable mugs: US researchers have developed a system that can reliably distinguish the faces of red-bellied lemurs - the furry primates with eyes like headlights that are among the world’s most endangered mammals.

The system, called LemurFaceID, could enhance wildlife conservation efforts by allowing biologists to identify and track the animals, found only in the wilds of Madagascar, without having to sedate and tag them. The technology works by identifying the fur on the lemur’s face, and its inventors suspect it could be used to monitor other species with distinct facial fur patterns, such as red pandas, raccoons, and sloths.

Already, scientists have used facial recognition with fish. In 2016, the Nature Conservancy’s FishFace project received a $750,000 prize from Google to develop a smartphone app that could be used on fishing boats worldwide. The technology could offer a low-cost way to manage fisheries, allowing more precise monitoring of stocks and better tracking of declining species.

3. Digital Farming

Quick: Which country is the second-largest food exporter in the world behind the United States? Surprisingly, it’s the Netherlands.

The country has become a global produce rack even though it is 1/270th the size of the US and lies at the same latitude as Newfoundland. It has achieved this by being in the forefront of the “precision farming” revolution.

Around the world, farmers are increasingly tapping new technologies to increase yields. Drones and satellites provide infrared and thermal imagery that measure the photosynthesis rates of crops. Sensors embedded in fields relay moisture levels and allow farmers to remotely control their irrigation pumps from their smartphones. Even the farmer’s trusty water bucket has gone high-tech: The WatchDog wireless rainfall collector measures temperature and rainfall down to a hundredth of an inch - turning farmers into instant meteorologists.

All of this data can be aggregated to help growers divine when and where to plant seeds, spread fertilizer and lime, and spritz fields with pesticides. The monitoring reduces both labor costs and environmental waste.

4. A Soft Pedal

Electric bicycles have been around since the 1890s, but they have long had a reputation of being ungainly, expensive, and heavy. Now advanced sensors and control systems are reviving the e-bike’s image - and its practicality as a form of urban transport in an era of irrepressible traffic congestion. 

Superpedestrian, an e-bikemaker in Cambridge, Mass., has created the Copenhagen Wheel, which looks like a rear bicycle wheel with an oversized red disc as the hub. It uses data from sensors to estimate the torque, cadence, and position of the pedals to emulate the feel of riding a normal bike, only with far less effort, since the battery is doing most of the work.

“E-bikes will really get going when they start to feel like regular bikes, but the riders become superhuman,” says Assaf Biderman, Superpedestrian’s chief executive officer. “That’s when we know we’ve nailed it.”

The $1,500 wheel can be purchased as a replacement rear wheel for a standard bicycle. The company also sells bikes with the wheel built in.

Other e-vehicles are blurring the line between bike and car. The egg-shaped ELF, produced by the Durham, N.C., company Organic Transit, sports three wheels and an enclosed cab with solar panels on the roof. Retailing for about $9,000, it is powered by a combination of pedals and a solar-powered rechargeable battery. Two other bike/cars are plying roads in Germany - the Twike, a fully enclosed electric vehicle, and the four-wheeled Schaeffler Bio-Hybrid, which looks like a cross between a baby buggy and an all-terrain vehicle. It can be propelled by pedal power, batteries, or both at once.

The next article, Part II, will present 5 more promising new developments that give reason for some optimism.

Looking for Good News in the Environment: January 2018 From Person of the Planet by Ruth Robinson

A U.S. subnational delegation committed to keeping America’s Paris Climate Goals. 

In June this year, U.S. President Donald Trump announced that the country would be pulling out of the Paris Agreement on climate change. However, a rival coalition of U.S. governors, mayors, business and religious leaders paid for, and opened, an unofficial pavilion dubbed “America’s Pledge: We Are Still In.” This delegation, representing non-federal actors in 15 U.S. states, 455 cities, 1,747 businesses and 325 universities, proclaimed its commitment to the Paris Agreement on behalf of the American people. Governor Jerry Brown of California and former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg led the delegation.

Pastor Tony's Sermon Christmas Eve, 2017

Mary was a shame.

She was a shame to her family.

She was a shame to her fiancé.

She was a shame to her village—or she would have been if they had known,

if she had shown

if she had grown

and given birth to her shame.

Mary was young and pregnant and also unwed.

If she didn’t know how that happened, everyone else did.

“Of course, a girl like her would end up like that. What did you expect?”

the villagers would say.

“Mary, tsk, tsk, tsk, what a shame!”

“She should have known better!”

“Where are her parents, anyway?”

Then someone decided how she should shun shame:

to keep pure and clean her family name

they would play an age-old game.

Before she began to show very much,

while her loose clothing still hid her baby-bump

and before the shame within her could grow

and show

just what kind of wild woman she really was—

they declared that she must go

away,

to the hills,

to her distant cousin Elizabeth’s distant house.

Elizabeth was pregnant, too, and the public play

could be

that young Mary

went to help her older cousin give birth.

Perhaps they might deliver on the same day!

“Oh, look. Twins!!!” “A blessing!” the gossips would say.

“A definite improvement in Elizabeth’s social worth.”

And Mary could return

unburdened by unwed shame

and, thus, she could shamelessly wed Joseph and take his name.

It was a pre-arranged marriage, into King David’s line,

a path that was paved by paternal practices of the time.

Yet their masculine determinations were denounced and undone by the Divine.

While Men decreed, decried, declared, determined to dismiss and divorce,

and decided how to dominate her body,

the Divine said her body was sacred, and her baby was godly.

An angel appeared and said, “Mary, this may sound odd;

this baby’s not a shame; he’s the Son of God.”

Instead of shame Mary was given both grace and glory.

          --And now for the rest of the story.

She was sent away to bear her shame in an undisclosed location.

Elizabeth, her hostess, look at her and said, without hesitation,

“My God, Mary.  You shine. You glow! Your face!

You know, Mary, Mother of God, you are full of grace!”

Then Mary, the one who was newly pronounced graceful

Cried out with joy from the depths of her soul,

“My God, I praise.

Yahweh has saved me from shame.

Yahweh saves! Yeshua. Yes, Jesus shall be his name.”

And then, Mary returned to Nazareth full of grace.

A few months later as she neared her term, her husband-to-be

came to take her to a census and fulfill another man’s decree.

Other men shaking their heads, in mock apology,

 They said they couldn’t find room in their inns

Wary

of this young, pregnant Mary,

unwed, full of sins.

Perhaps an innkeeper’s wife peering through the door

didn’t see a girl, full of shame, destitute, and poor,

But rather

she saw a young mother--

 full of glory and with near-term desperation.

Then the innkeeper’s wife snuck out the back door,

and whispered, “Psst. Hey hon.

We’ve got a barn;

it’s not very pretty,

but, dearie, you look tired and worn,

and, for one such as you, I’ve got some pity.”

She led them to a respite from the crowded, loud city,

to a barn, a stall, a warm and dry space,--

yet, a straw-lined shed is a shameful place

to give birth to King David’s Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson.

Giving birth in a barn like a common cow?

Yet once again Mary’s shame, somehow

became a miraculous, angel-filled story of grace,

when short-shorn sheep

and shepherds who smelled like sheep

showed up to see the baby sleep.

And when they returned their flocks to their keep,

they danced and sang,

inviting, exciting,

rejoicing, reciting,

“God’s kingdom is come,

in great David’s Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson.

She, who was once called shameful, is now proclaimed Mary, Full of Grace

And unexpectedly, a manger is the Messiah’s birth place.

And now because of the birth in that crèche,

Those who are called shameful or worthless

are now full of grace, full of worth, and blessed.

and the Divine promise--

hope for the hopeless

joy for the joyless

peace for the warriors, the wounded, and war-torn

love for the lost, the least, the last, the lonely and forlorn

the promise was fulfilled when God was born.

The angels sing “Glory, Glory, Glory be!”

Shame has shed its shackles, Glory be!

For now has come the time

          for God’s grace and light to shine.

For you and me,

for Mary,

and for all humanity.

May Christ be born again in all of your hearts this Christmas Day.

Amen.

Pastor Tony's Sermon December 24, 2017

Luke 1: 26-38 & 46-55    12-24-17    4th Sunday of Advent   ACCUCC Rev. Tony Clark

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?” The angel said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.” Then Mary said, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” Then the angel departed from her.

And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.

What does it mean to bring a child into a world such as this?

I’m guessing that many parents wonder this as they find out they are pregnant, and I imagine Mary and probably Joseph asked that exact question. What does it mean to bring a child into a world like this? There is such profound beauty and such profound joy in our world, and there is such profound suffering and pain. Sometimes they are found in the same place, or the same person.

Mary and Joseph knew their world was created by God to be beautiful, to give pleasure, to move them to worship the Divine spirit flowing through all things. And they also knew their world to be defined by unrest in Jerusalem, high taxes for the poor and continued accumulation of wealth for the wealthy. It was a world that shamed women for what men do to them, a world full of refugees, and the mentally ill and homeless. What does it mean to bring a child into this kind of world?

For Mary, young, pregnant, unwed, she still can sing praise to God, name the profound beauty and the profound joy in this world, and proclaim that the profound suffering and pain has been removed by God.

Today, we are moved by her joy; Tomorrow we mark that a child was born into a world of both joy and pain. Today, perhaps many of us woke up to realize that little has changed. There still is profound beauty and joy. And there still is profound suffering and pain.

Today, nothing may have changed, yet we know that tomorrow, Christmas Day, is a day to mark a change. Tomorrow, Christmas, is a celebration not just of traditions and remembrances past, but a celebration of a turning world, a changing world, and God’s hopes for what is new.

 Tomorrow we mark that a child was born and, like all children, the child was beautiful, and bright and blessed by God. We even say that the child was God.

He was connected to the Divine and pointed to the Divine in ways that many of us lose as we grow up. As he grew up, that child lost neither the connection to the Divine nor the ability to point to God. That child pointed out God in the world, reminding the people around him of a different time when God brought change. The child pointed to change, and the child was change.

Yet the world is still full of profound beauty and profound joy, and it is still filled with profound suffering and pain. There is unrest in Jerusalem, taxes are going up for the poor while the wealthy continue to accumulate wealth, we are awakening to how we shame women for what men do to them, we are overrun by refugees, and mentally ill and homeless.

If nothing has changed, then what has changed?

Everything.

Little changed when Jesus was born. It took 30 years or more for his life to begin to have meaning, and another 3 years after that for his death to have meaning. The man brought change. The death brought change. The world turned. The world changed.

And maybe for a few years, or decades, or even centuries, there was a different way of living in the world.

There was still profound beauty and profound joy. And, yes, there was still profound suffering and pain. The change that this child brought was to remind us to bring beauty and joy where there was pain and suffering. He reminded us to bring love to the least, the last, the lost, and the lonely. He reminded us to bring peace where there were wars and warriors, wounded, and wandering, wondering minds. He reminded us to bring justice where there is injustice, fairness where there is unfairness, and equality where there is inequality. And for a while his followers seemed to do all of that.

What he reminded us was not anything new, but it was a bit different than what they were doing. The world had gotten weary, and worn down, and it was easier to follow a formula of faith and the letter of the law than to follow the initial intention of the faith. It was easier to celebrate with traditions than to trade them for true turning of hearts toward God.

It was a world much like today. There is weariness, and we are worn down. There is suffering and pain. There are people for whom beauty and joy are rare, hope is empty, and justice never seems to give them a break. Traditions have taken the place of the turning of our hearts. Formulas of faith take the place of initial intention.

Today, it seems the same. And Tomorrow, as Christmas dawns, this may still be the case; there may be nothing different. There may be nothing new in our weary, worn down, woeful world.

Or maybe there will be a turning, a transforming. Maybe there will be a change. Maybe tomorrow is the day for mystery, and mystique, and magic. Maybe tomorrow is the day of hope for the hopeless, and joy for the joyless, and peace where there is war and love for the lost, the last, the least, and the lonely. Maybe tomorrow, we will celebrate not just with traditions and remembrances past, but we will wake up and celebrate the turning toward God.

What does it mean to bring a child into a world such as this? Perhaps it will change nothing. 

Or perhaps, as that young, pregnant, unwed mother sang, it could change everything. It could bring hope to the hopeless, joy to the joyless, peace to the wars and love to the lost, the last, the least, and the lonely.

So Tomorrow, dear ones, may your hearts by turned. May Christ bring you beauty and joy if you are suffering or in pain. May Christ bring peace to wars and warriors and wandering minds. May Christ enter your hearts, that you might bring love to the last, the lost, the least, the lonely and the unloved. And as you celebrate with traditions, remember they not a trade-off for true faith; the traditions are intended to connect you with the Divine and point out God in our world.

Tomorrow, may you experience God in the child, in the change, in the turning, and in this world of beauty and joy. Prepare your hearts for the shining of God’s light. Amen.

Pastor Tony's Sermon December 17, 2017

John 1; 6-8, 19-27 (28-29)     12-17-17     ACCUCC     Rev. Tony Clark

Listen to This Week's Complete Sermon by Clicking Here.

There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light.

This is the testimony given by John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, ‘Who are you?’ He confessed and did not deny it, but confessed, ‘I am not the Messiah.’ And they asked him, ‘What then? Are you Elijah?’ He said, ‘I am not.’ ‘Are you the prophet?’ He answered, ‘No.’ Then they said to him, ‘Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?’ He said,
‘I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, “Make straight the way of the Lord” ’, as the prophet Isaiah said.

Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. They asked him, ‘Why then are you baptizing if you are neither the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?’ John answered them, ‘I baptize with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandal.’ (This took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing.

The next day he saw Jesus coming towards him and declared, ‘Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!)

“Prepare! Prepare the way of the Lord,” cries the prophet.

Wait, what are we preparing for?

This is my question this time of year. In Advent we wait, we hope and dream, and we prepare. What are we preparing for?

We are preparing for Christmas, when we celebrate the birth of Jesus, and look toward the re-birth of Christ.

Yet, if we are preparing for a birth, we don’t act like it. There is no preparation of a nursery, no purchasing of diapers, no buying or borrowing car seats or cribs or baby carriages. Instead we put trees in our living rooms and string lights and ornaments on them.

If it is a birthday celebration we are preparing for, why don’t we buy gifts for the birthday boy? No other birthday celebration do we buy gifts for each other and get nothing for the one celebrating their birth. And there aren’t very many people for whom we celebrate birthdays after they’ve died, particularly after many centuries of death. Instead of buying gifts for Jesus or even Mary and Joseph, we buy gifts for each other.

We celebrate with presents and lights and gathering around for a big meal. The meal takes as much preparation as the decorating or gift buying and wrapping. Preparations for a feast came early in my family—“What are we going to have for Christmas dinner?” was the first question my Mom would ask. It went along with, “Where are we going to have Christmas this year?” because whoever hosted also got to choose what the main course would be. Preparing the meal became part of the preparation for the holiday, and even if you didn’t cook the main course, you cooked some part of the meal—the Jell-O® salad, the green bean casserole, the bread rolls, or the pecan pie.

The preparation that goes into Christmas Day--the meal, the gift giving, the decorating—is supposed to remind us of what we are preparing for—the re-birth of Christ, the return of God into our lives, the light that the darkness of night cannot put out. God’s return is to be good news to the poor, release for captives, freedom for the imprisoned, so why aren’t we preparing for a river of poor that have newly granted purchasing power, or a flotilla of captives to land on our shores, or a flood of prisoners who are returning to society? Now that would be preparing for the birth of Christ!

Some Christians fear that Christmas is being taken away from us, and I agree with that. I disagree with them on why. Some  say that Christmas is being lost because store employees say, “Happy Holidays.” Saying, “Happy Holidays” is polite when we are in a multi-cultural multi-faith society; it recognizes that there are many celebrations near the winter solstice, and not all of them are Christmas. The meaning of Christmas has not been stripped away by other religions, or atheists, or even liberals or progressive Christians.

The meaning of Christmas has been stripped away over time because we’ve lost focus on what we are preparing for—the arrival of God, who doesn’t arrive with boxes and ribbons, trees and lights, and a meal of epic proportions. The stores simply support our mistaken notion of how to prepare for the return of Christ. Decorating, buying and giving gifts, and making a feast keeps us busy, distracted, from facing the depth and importance of God re-entering our lives. The return of Christ is so big an event that we have no idea how exactly to prepare for it.

We know pretty well how to prepare for a baby—diapers, a nursery, car seats. We know pretty well how to prepare for a birthday party—hats and streamers, maybe a piñata, birthday cake, and gifts. We know how to prepare for a family feast—turkey or ham, dungeness crab, Jell-O® salad, green bean casserole, or maybe tamales. We have recipes and decorator magazines and even retail stores to show us how to prepare these things.

Yet we don’t really know how to prepare for the arrival of God. The Bible isn’t much help—From Isaiah: make straight the highways, fill every valley and level every hill; or from Mark: repent! and be baptized; or From Luke: go visit your cousin Elizabeth, and go to Bethlehem to register for the census; or from Matthew: dream of angels. These are not very practical ways to prepare for the birth of God today.

So how could we prepare for God’s re-entrance into our lives?

First, I’d say, we must pray.

Second, I’d say, we must pray. Pray for strength and patience and compassion, because God’s return will be an upheaval.

Third, I’d say, train doctors and nurses, because there will be a wave of poor who finally receive health care; and I’d say prepare housing and jobs for the imprisoned who will be released. Graduate psychologists for the captives who have PTSD, and social workers for helping to get through the bureaucracy of life. Get churches and synagogues and mosques and temples ready for the influx of people struggling with their faith in the upheaval of all of society.   

Fourth, in the words of a famous Christmas Carol, I’d say, “let every heart prepare him room.” With the river of refugees, and the flood of prisoners, and the flotilla of captives, we will probably be frustrated. Language barriers, new holidays and food, not to mention cultural differences around how we drive, how we wait in line, how we celebrate life’s ups and downs, all of these may become points of frustration, and we will need room in our hearts for all of it. We will need to practice compassion.

Oh, and don’t forget the decorations, the gifts, and the feast. We will need lights to celebrate way into the night, and for the late comers to see their way in. We will need gifts to pass out, and extras for those who were released from captivity after the stores closed. We will need food to sustain us through the festivities and all that comes next. Prepare for a day of celebration--not merely a day off, not merely a day with family and friends and football, not merely a day for giving and receiving gifts, not even a day filled with traditions. Prepare for a day of Justice and Joy. Prepare for a season of health. Prepare for a period of affordable housing and an era where no one goes hungry, or lives in a tent under a bridge, or is addicted to opioids or alcohol or anything else to escape the misery and suffering of life. And prepare for people whose lives are suddenly changed, improved, filled with peace, and hope, and joy.

Prepare! Prepare the way of the Lord!!! For all people shall see the salvation of our God.

And that will be messy.

God, in this season of preparation, may we not forget the real reason for the season. May we prepare for your arrival and all that comes with it. May we prepare our hearts with room for you, with compassion for the prisoners that will be released, and the immigrants who will enter our communities, and the homeless who are already here. Amen.