Third Sunday after Pentecost

Living with love, not fear
Rev. Jennifer Masada - St. Augustine’s Episcopal Church - Kapa’au, Hawai'i
June 29, 2025 - Third Sunday after Pentecost, Year C
2 Kings 2:1-2, 6-14, Psalm 77:1-2, 11-20, Galatians 5:1,13-25, Luke 9:51-62

​Opening Prayer: O Holy One, You flow through us like living water. Help us live in our hearts and quiet our minds. Open our grip on what no longer serves. Show us how to live with love, and for love. 

In a conversation this week, a friend was lamenting the state of the world. “I think I was born at the wrong time,” she said. “What makes you say that?” I asked. “Fear,” she answered.

This past week, as events have continued to unfold across our nation and the world, the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church met in Maryland. In her opening remarks, House of Deputies President Julia Ayala Harris commented on fear. “We meet in a time of profound disruption,” she said, “in our neighborhoods, in our nation, in the world, globally, nationally, and institutionally… ...This is not a moment of chaos. It is a moment of consequence. The tactics we are witnessing are not random. They are strategic: deliberate efforts to co-opt public institutions, erode the rule of law, and blur the boundaries between faith and state... These are hallmarks of what scholars call theocratic and state capture—the systematic merger of religious and political authority reshaping how power operates in our world.”

We don’t have the answers. But as Bishop Wesley Frensdorff once said, we do know how to ask good questions. I wonder: what is ours to do in such a time as this? This feels like an important question. And, of course, we want to get it right! But we often measure ourselves—and others—by standards we rarely question: productivity. Success. Control. The “right” way to follow Jesus.

Amid the current climate of fear, we turn to scripture to ground us in something deeper. Today, we have heard about Jesus setting his face toward Jerusalem, knowing the cost of love, yet moving forward with unwavering commitment. He invites his followers—then and now—to do the same: to let go of what gets in the way of love, and to trust the deeper current of the Spirit. People said him, “I will follow you! But first I need to do this other thing.” Jesus invited them—sternly, even uncomfortably—to let go of the distractions, to let go of whatever came before love.
This story invites a question worth sitting with: What do we need to release to live more fully for love—not fear?

Sometimes the greatest obstacles to Divine love aren’t external forces, but what we grip inside: expectations, assumptions, our need to be right, our judgment of others, our fear of getting it wrong, our fear of others’ opinions of us, our clinging to what once made us feel safe. This is not easy. Letting go is not passive or automatic. It’s not apathy. It’s not erasing our past or ignoring the future. Letting go is the sacred work of surrender— of loosening our vice-like grip on things that get in love’s way.

In the Second Book of Kings, we witness Elisha clinging to Elijah. Several times he says, “I will not leave you.” And Elijah lets him come. But eventually, a chariot of fire separates them. Even devotion must give way. Even mentors must be released. Elisha tears his clothes in grief. And then—only then—does he take up Elijah’s mantle. Not before. Not while still clinging. Only after the letting go.

As Paul reminds the Galatians: “The fruit of the Spirit is love; it is joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control… If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit.” In other words, Spirit calls us to let go—not into apathy, but into active, intentional love. 

The psalmist cries out in despair, wanting to be heard by God, but then remembers that God laid a path through the sea, through the storm clouds and mighty waters. Not around it. Not over it. Through it. Letting go does not bypass grief or difficulty. Letting go moves us through, like water carving a way forward.

Over the past few weeks, we’ve been reflecting on the image of the Water of Life—the water of our baptism that connects, nourishes, and teaches us how to live in the flow of grace. Like water, love flows in the present moment. It doesn’t cling to the past or force the future. It meets the moment fully, offering itself without fear. It carries the memory of what it has touched in the nutrients and the debris it sweeps in its current. 

Water (and love) finds its way into every crack and corner. It offers itself freely, without judgment or withholding. This is what we are called to do: To live for love. Not for certainty. Not for control. Not for applause or achievement or power. But for love.

And sometimes the things that stand in our way—our losses, our failures, our pain— become the very currents that shape the riverbed of our soul. Think of someone near the end of life. They don’t cling to their résumé or their possessions. They hold their people. They remember love. They grieve the moments they missed it—the times they withheld love or turned away. But they rarely regret the struggles that led them deeper into it.

Perhaps, like my friend, we might be mourning the state of the world. And we ask: what is ours to do in such a time as this? Our ears hear scripture leading us to “set our face” toward love, even when the path is hard.  To live like water: freely, fiercely, for love.
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May we be people who let go, so we can flow with love, and follow Jesus—not back to where we were— but forward, like living water, flowing freely, fiercely toward love. May we ask ourselves honestly: What needs to be released in me today so I can live with love, not fear?

E pule kākou - Let us pray
Spirit of Love, teach us how to loosen our grip on what holds us back. Help us flow with grace, like water, carrying what nourishes, carrying the debris without burden, offering our love to the world without fear. In your holy name we pray. Amen.

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