Are any of you big on making New Year's resolutions? And how are they working for you now that we have hit August? Have they held up? Have you re-centered and reoriented parts of your life effectively? Since we are past the halfway mark of the year, I suppose it’s time to start thinking of new resolutions for January 1st, 2011. Do I sound a bit skeptical? I’m really not. I truly admire those who can consider the past and look forward to the coming year with a fresh perspective and outlook all during one of the busiest and most emotion laden times of the year.

I am big on reflection, perspective, considering the order of things in my life. I just do it in the summer time. This summer time in particular. I’ve been privileged to spend a great deal of the summer traveling. In Alaska, where the wild life runs alongside the plane on the runway as it lands., In Sewanee, Tennessee, where they are not quite convinced that the war of northern aggression has ended, but they make lovely iced tea and sit in rocking chairs in the warm summer evenings on the mountain top. And most recently, I’ve seen the countryside of France: the Pyrenees, the Bordeaux region, and Paris - as a groupie following the Tour de France bicycle race. Each place brings a new perspective on what my priorities should be. Each place makes me look at who I am and what I am doing with my life. Everyplace I go, I must re-center, reevaluate, look again, asking myself as Luke in today’s parable, asks us all "am I rich toward God?"

So here I find myself, seriously considering life priorities, how I am and how I want to be. I pull out the scripture for this Sunday, and run smack into the list of what a Christian "should" be in Colossians. Let’s hear this list again:

"put to death therefore… fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed." And more: "get rid of all such things: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth."

This is a pretty harsh list of New Years resolutions. I think they are even more daunting in the quiet of the summer time. I feel like I’m doing ok, but let’s run down the list. Let’s see: Well, we all know I need to swear less. I’m trying. Really, but it is still there. I think I’m safe on the fornication and impurity standard. The anger and wrath thing could be an issue. I really struggled with it at the airport on the way to Paris. I was going through the usual security line. In the states they always have to examine my cpap machine. Not in Europe or Canada, but here. So it was all open, laid out in a bin just like they like it. Beside my machine was my quart Ziploc baggie. In it, a lipstick, Afrin nose spray, some hand cream and a Tide stick. You know--the kind you rub on stains while you are traveling so you don’t have those big blotches of coffee in the middle of your shirt all day? A TSA agent was examining my machine, Out of nowhere, another agent swoops in, pushes aside the agent I was talking to, grabs my little Ziploc baggie. She holds it up in the air, gives me a withering look full of power and privilege, takes out the Tide stick and says, "You can’t have this." I look completely startled, I look at her questioningly. She says again, "you can’t have this." And she saunters off with my Tide stick. Now, I am a good rule follower, so I keep my mouth shut and go on my way. But in my mind you have never heard such an explosion of anger and wrath: filled with terrible stereotypes, malice, evil desire, and abusive language. I consoled myself that I was going to Paris; you can find anything in Paris, right? Wrong. No Tide sticks anywhere in that most exquisite of ancient cities. And it took the better part of the trip for all of that malice, wrath, and evil desire to wind down. Obviously I need some work on this part of the list. And we haven’t even touched greed.

Greed is central in the story we heard in today’s Gospel from Luke. The wealthy man who had collected much produce wasn’t a bad sort. Upstanding man even. He had done well, collected many crops. We don’t hear a word about him abusing anyone, acting badly, not a single other thing on that list of things not to do from Colossians. He simply wanted a bigger barn. To collect more things. He did no harm to anyone, but he didn’t think of providing for anyone else from his abundance. He was rich toward himself, but not to God. This is the essence of greed. This one pricks at me, makes me uncomfortable. I have a love of yarn. I have a "stash" of yarn. One thing about stashes is they grow. It is in their nature. And I have to go to the Container Store to buy more bins to keep it in. I have to build a bigger barn. My yarn collection is the thing I own that I am most possessive of. I have Greed. I know it sounds like a small thing to have greed about, but greed seeps into other places, and grows. Greed is on that list of things to be rid of. Greed keeps us from being rich toward God.

The author of the letter to Colossians, that one with the long list of things to be rid of, was speaking of human nature. Not the pretty part, the parts we need to make smaller. They were speaking of preparing for Baptism. There was a long intensive time of study and preparation. And when they were to be baptized, they put on a new robe, new clothes, and they truly believed their life was a "NEW" life after baptism. They needed to live by new standards and ways of being. They were different, and had to live out their lives in a new way. Pretty daunting, isn’t it? We Christians, here in the West in the 21st century don’t experience our faith journey so acutely or intensely.

Yet here we are, welcoming Henry Cooley Holbrook to our midst. He has his new Baptismal clothes on. We will Baptize him and enfold him in our community as we are enfolded in God’s love. Marking him as Christ’s own. The Good Shepherd knows his name, and so do we. We promise to uphold and support him. We promise to help him deal with anger and malice. We will show him ways of living together in community without slander, without speaking ill to each other, showing respect, concern, and upholding those in need. We will model being rich toward God. We will show him we can live in relationship with each other as a mirror of our life with Christ. We will work on that list of New Year’s resolutions together. We are with Christ, and Christ is among us.