Author: MASadmin

“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. “Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them. If he comes during the middle of the night, or near dawn, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves. “But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.”

Luke 12:32-40

My sermon from the 9th Sunday After Pentecost (August 7, 2016) on Luke 12:32-40.

*****

So is anyone else paying attention to the Olympics? I love this time of year because, for two weeks, I basically leave my tv on the entire time. The sounds of Barney and Sesame Street and Spider-man – the shows that are usually on during the day – are replaced by cycling, swimming, gymnastics, and sports I’m reminded every 4 years that they exist – like dressage and race-walking. The sounds of Olympic competition becomes my background soundtrack. I really do love the Olympics – but I might, just might, love the commercials during the Olympics even more. They’re just so…amazing, awe-inspiring, and, usually, head-scratching. Like, that commercial that tries to connect track-and-field athletes with the tires for our cars or the ones that tell us we can be just as unique and awesome as Michael Phelps as long as we buy this car, watch this new tv show, or visit this fast food restaurant. And the commercial that recently got my attention is one for Dick’s Sporting Goods. The commercial claims that all of us, in our bodies, carry tiny bits of gold. It’s in our cells, our hair, and in our blood. With an uplifting soundtrack, and a moving narration, the commercial moves to a climax saying that all of us have the strength – the drive – and the passion of an olympian because the highest concentration of gold in our bodies is found in our heart. We all carry the treasure of an Olympic gold medal winner inside of us – so let’s go out there and buy some sporting equipment. 

When we hear in scripture a reference to the heart, we need to take a moment to step back in time and ask ourselves what those standing around Jesus would have heard. And to do that, we need to sort of turn off our brains because the people around Jesus didn’t have our knowledge of the human body. They didn’t know what each organ did and they didn’t know that our brain, what’s in our head, is the source of who we are. They didn’t know that different parts of the brain control our emotions, our creativity, or that it even stored our memories. For them, the brain was just…there. It wasn’t worth much because the source of who we are – the center of our thoughts, our identity, our desires, and our will came from right here – our heart. The heart represented our entire life because it pumps, through our body, the stuff of life. So today, when Jesus is gathered with his disciples, teaching them about their relationship to God, and those disciples hear the word heart – they’re not thinking of only passion or desire or emotions. Jesus is telling them that where they put their treasure, that’s the center of their entire life. What they do with their money illuminates who they are. We might carry trace amounts of gold in our body but where we put our gold, that tells everyone, and God, a lot about who we are.

Which is exactly why brands and companies love the Olympics just as much as we do. If we just buy this car, visit this resort, wear this perfume, or apply for this credit card, we too, can feel like we’re an Olympic champion. We can be unique, different, and important. We can become somebody just by buying the right pair of shoes or pants or messenger bag. Brands and companies advertise in this way because they know this is how money works. We give our money over and, if we have a positive experience, they get our loyalty. They get a little part of our life. When we need a new item or when we want to purchase a replacement, the first thing that pops into our mind is that brand. It becomes a default option for us. And I…I will totally admit that I am heavily tied to my brands. From my iPhone to my macbook, my Red Converse chucks, pants from Uniqlo, and my Jack Spade bags – I am a walking billboard for brands. And I’d like to say that, when I’m up here on Sunday morning, that brands don’t play a role in my presentation…but they do. From where I buy my stoles to the clergy shirt under my alb – there are brands I default too even when I’m worshipping God. Now, being tied to brands is not necessarily a bad thing. Clergy who are not a five foot, 11 inch middle aged man, have a really hard time finding anything that fits and is cut right. It’s only in the last few years that women finally have clergy shirt brands they can trust even though the Lutheran church has been ordaining women as pastors for over 45 years. For us to live the lives we do, brands play a role in how we present ourselves and make a statement to the world. And I don’t think Jesus is criticizing the brands we buy but he does want us to look at what’s under the surface. When we spend our money, we are giving away a promise of loyalty. So when we spend our gold, how does that spending reflect where God is for us, for our household, and for our community? Whenever we use our treasure, is our faith, is our God, being made visible? Are we making Jesus known? 

These are big questions. These are..scary questions too. But these questions are not isolated questions. They don’t come out of the blue. Jesus is asking us about how we spend our money just a few moments after he says ‘Do not be afraid.’ This isn’t a question designed to only scare us. It’s a question to pull us back into the arms of the one who is with us, no matter what comes next. When we’re taking our first steps towards some place new, Jesus is with us. When we’re facing a tough decision where no answer seems right, Jesus is with us. When life seems to be going right, Jesus is with us. And when our life is about to end, Jesus is still with us. When the waters of baptism were poured over us, we didn’t only get a Jesus who is always with us – we became part of Jesus’ brand. We became part of what God is doing on earth. We became part of this love that wants nothing more than to serve all. Jesus is reminding us that our spending of our treasure should make known that we are a piece of God’s treasure – a treasure not just for ourselves but for the world. Gold might be in our veins and we might imagine ourselves with a gold medal around our neck one day, but our true gold rests in a Jesus who claims us, love us, and sends us out to spread that love by bringing a word of healing, a word of mercy,and a word of forgiveness, so that this world can become a place where no one is afraid. 

Amen.

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Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.” But he said to him, “Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?” And he said to them, “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” Then he told them a parable: “The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’ Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”

Luke 12:13-21

My sermon from the 8th Sunday After Pentecost (July 31, 2016) on Luke 12:13-21.

****

Yesterday, I was in Philadelphia saying goodbye to my Great Uncle Tony. He died earlier this week, just a few weeks after his 89th birthday. He lived a very full life, a man who loved his family, loved God, and loved a good game of pinochle. He spent his last few years living in a small apartment in an assisted living facility. And he loved it there. He attended mass every day, knew every aide, nurse, and resident on his floor, and he would spend hours outside reading and greeting everyone who came by. But before this move, he lived by himself in a condo. So when he moved into this new facility, he had to downsize. He didn’t need all the furniture and things he had. When the moving truck came, it took everything out of his condo, dropped some off at his new place – and put the rest in my Uncle Mike’s basement. My Uncle Mike has done pretty much everything he can to just give that stuff away. Every time I moved, I’d get an email asking if I needed a mirror or a chair or a coffee table cut out of a giant piece of driftwood. I would, politely, turn down this offer down because I already had what I needed. I already had my stuff. My great uncle Tony has gone to meet his maker – but the possessions he used and collected in this life are still here. He wasn’t a rich man but he still had things – those physical artifacts that make our life work – and they’re now in storage, in a basement bigger than his original condo, waiting for someone to come by and use them, one more time. 

Today’s reading from the gospel is about stuff, about money, about our possessions and what possess us. Jesus is in the middle of his long journey to Jerusalem. He’s walking around, healing, feeding, and teaching anyone who he comes into contact with. And it’s during one of these gatherings that someone comes up to him with a demand. Now, we don’t know any of the backstory behind this demand. We don’t know if this person is claiming something they shouldn’t or if they are being cheated by their brother. All we know is that their parents are dead and these parents had enough wealth to leave an inheritance. There’s money and land in their estate and family members are fighting to possess it. This struggle, this conflict, has consumed them to the point where they have no problem standing in a crowd, surrounded by strangers and people they might know, and, in one sentence, lay at the feet of Jesus their entire family drama. They don’t ask Jesus for a teaching, or for healing or for words. They ask Jesus to judge. They plead with Jesus, in a very public way, to side with them and what they want. They want Jesus to act. And so he does, by doing exactly what the other person doesn’t want him to do: instead of proclaiming a decision, Jesus tells a story. 

Now, there’s a few tricks I’ve learned over the years to help decipher just what Jesus is saying in these stories, in these parables. And the one that I found helpful today is to take Jesus’s words and circle the pronouns. Those I’s and you’s, he’s and she’s, me and mine – they are a window into what Jesus is talking about. The very first pronoun in Jesus’ parable is he, the rich man, who is caught in a dilemma. They are a farmer who earn their wealth through their land. This land – this gift from God that is fed by rain that only God can give – produced abundantly. It produced too much. The rich man has no place to put all this extra stuff. So he has a conversation with himself about what he should do and he comes up with a plan. He’ll tear down his barns and build bigger barns to hold all the abundance that he grew. He’ll rest secure knowing that he has more than enough to keep his life comfortable. In a conversation filled with I statements, the rich man looks to his own wits, his own wisdom, and his own concerns to figure out what he should do with this amazing gift that God has given him. He takes this gift – and stores it, trusting that this abundance will give him life. But there’s a bit of a flaw in his internal conversation. He actually forgets where this gift of abundance comes from. “The crops are mine – the barns are mine…the grain and goods – are all mine. And what is mine is what I trust to give me life.” God is never part of the rich man’s conversation because the man has made his wealth and his possessions the source of his life. He stops trusting God. He, insteads, trusts money. He puts his hope and his security in a bigger barn that he can make. By trusting something other than God as the source of his life, the rich man creates more than just a bigger barn. He creates his own god. He creates an idol. 

When we take this parable and circle the pronouns, we find who the rich man makes as the center of his life: himself. He becomes the source of his life, he becomes his own savior. He’s a person who doesn’t see the gifts he’s received. He only sees what he possess. His trust only extends to himself. He ends up living in a universe of one, a universe of me, myself, and I – and creates a universe of self that’s way too small, with no space even for God. 

When my Uncle Tony died, he left stuff. There are a few old paintings, a lot of 1970s era white and gold furniture, a dozen or so news caps, and a bunch of worn leather loafers sitting in my Uncle Mike’s basement. He was a working class guy, spent over 40 years as a U.S. letter carrier, and whenever you told him about something you’ve done or something you were proud of, he always responded with “holy smoke.” He was never rich, and he didn’t always feel rich, but he did have wealth. He had stuff. He retired from his working life with social security, a government pension, and some long-term care insurance that helped him get the care he needed during the last five years of his life. His wealth always helped him live but his stuff was never his life. He didn’t cling to it for support, nourishment, or hope. He clung to Christ, to his faith, to his church, and to his family because he knew that the universe was bigger than just himself. The source of all he had, the source of his life, was always the Son of God who, 2000 years before, said that life doesn’t consistence in only possessions. Life rests in a God who didn’t send Jesus to be a rich man, who didn’t send Jesus to live in purple robes, gold plated palaces, or ride on a chariot with his name in big letters on the side. Jesus grew up a carpenter’s son, knew fishermen and those who worked with his hands. He called men and women, young and old, rich and poor to be his disciples and sent them off to love the world. And when he was crucified on the cross, he didn’t curse the world but he blessed it, giving new life to all. Christ took his gifts, his wealth, his life – and used it to give everyone a new life too. And with this new life he gives us, we break out of a universe centered on I – and into the universe God made – a universe filled with our families, our neighbors and strangers, friends and even enemies – and we spread this love, this new life, because Christ is our primary treasure – and the rest of our wealth is to spread that love here and throughout this universe that God has made. 

Amen.

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The words of the Teacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.
Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher,
vanity of vanities! All is vanity.
What do people gain from all the toil
at which they toil under the sun?
A generation goes, and a generation comes,
but the earth remains for ever.
The sun rises and the sun goes down,
and hurries to the place where it rises.
The wind blows to the south,
and goes round to the north;
round and round goes the wind,
and on its circuits the wind returns.
All streams run to the sea,
but the sea is not full;
to the place where the streams flow,
there they continue to flow.
All things are wearisome;
more than one can express;
the eye is not satisfied with seeing,
or the ear filled with hearing.
What has been is what will be,
and what has been done is what will be done;
there is nothing new under the sun.
Is there a thing of which it is said,
‘See, this is new’?
It has already been,
in the ages before us.
The people of long ago are not remembered,
nor will there be any remembrance
of people yet to come
by those who come after them.

Ecclesiastes 1:1-11

My sermon from the 10th Sunday After Pentecost (July 24, 2016) on Ecclesiastes 1:1-11 & Luke 11:1-11.

*****

“Vanity of vanities! All is vanity.” 

What image comes to mind when you hear these words from the start of Ecclesiastes? For me, I can’t help but imagine I’m in the middle of a giant industrial warehouse. I’m alone, lost in this great big building, with no idea how I got there or how I can get out. I’m stuck, surrounded on all sides, by the same kind of product, each one only slightly different from the one standing next to it. When I walk up to one and fiddle with the knobs, I notice it’s connected and working. I put my hands in the sink, letting the water flow over them, and then I look up to see my reflection in a mirror in front of me. Now, it might be because my family and I are about to start renovating a bathroom in our house, but when I hear the word vanity – I can’t help but think of a bathroom sink, a quartz countertop, chrome fixtures, and a crisp silver mirror hanging over it all. So when the author of Ecclesiastes claims that everything is vanity – well – I can’t help but imagine an unending expanse of bathroom vanities and their mirrors, creating a reflection not only of myself – but of the whole wide world too. 

That sense of reflection is at the heart of Ecclesiastes. This book is expressed from the point of view of the Teacher – an elder who, after a lifetime of living, – is now reflecting on what they’ve done, where they’ve been, and what was worthwhile. The book is about meaning. So Ecclesiastes feels like a grandparent telling us to pull over a chair, sit down, and listen as they share their advice on life. And the very first thing this elder says is…vanity – everything is vanity. Now, the Hebrew word translated as vanity can be translated in many different ways. Meaninglessness, nonsense, and emptiness all work. So the second verse can also read as simply, “Everything is meaningless.” That’s sort of a downer, a depressing way to start a reflection on life in this world. We might expect to hear some kinder, more optimistic words, when an elder shares their story. But the Teacher does the opposite. Instead of beginning with our expectations, the Teacher removes them. Our understanding of what gives our lives meaning is not where the Teacher begins. The Teacher doesn’t start this search for meaning by looking at our work, our hobbies, our family, or where we come from. The Teacher starts looks with us into our mirror and starts at nothing – the very beginning of it all. 

Now, looking into a mirror is hard because a mirror, especially the mirror God holds up to us, can’t hide all we want it too. When we look into a mirror, we’re looking forward as our past and present stares right back at us. The days, months, and years of our lives – the things we’ve done and the things that have happened to us are all right there, carried on our face or lying just underneath the surface. Each wrinkle and gray hair, each sunspot or scar, contains our story. And the longer we stare, the more imperfections we fine and the more failures we remember. When we, like the Teacher in Ecclesiastes, look into the faith-filled mirror that God gives us, we are not invited to romanticize what we see. We’re here to honestly see our scars, see our wounds, see when our sin has made itself known in our lives and in the lives of others. The faith-filled life is a life that does more than look forward. A faith-filled life looks backwards; a faith-filled life reflects. This kind of life admits its sin – the ways we personally forget our God and the ways our communities fail to live the way God wants us too. As we stare in the mirror, looking at ourselves, looking for our meaning – the imperfections, fears, anxiety, and concerns stare right back at us. This isn’t the meaning we necessarily want to see. And all we want to do is use that water in the sink below to wash this grime of life, away.  

I don’t think the disciples, when they asked Jesus how to pray, I don’t think they expected to hear Jesus talk about meaning. They were truly just asking for some insight in how they should talk to God. And I’ll admit that I read their request a little cynically. I hear a little competition in their words. They remind Jesus that even John the Baptist taught his followers how to pray – so Jesus should teach his disciples too. By knowing the right way to talk to God, the disciples might gain a way to get God on their side. They might get God to grant them what they want. But Jesus, in the Lord’s Prayer and in the parables that follow, flips their script. He changes their expectations because praying to God is always a prayer with God.  It’s a conversation with the one who created us, the one who loves us, and the one who walk with us. Prayer is about being united with the one who is the source of who we are. It’s about connecting with the one who gives us meaning. In the words of Henri Nouwen, “Prayer uncovers the hidden motives and unacknowledged wounds that shape our relationships.” Prayer lets us stare at the mirror above the vanity, see all of who we are and yet still hear what God wants each of us to know – that we are loved. “That we are God’s beloved son and God’s beloved daughter.” The disciples wanted to know what they could get from prayer. Jesus tells them to ask for anything, being all their concerns and wants and desires to God because when we pray, we are greeted by the God’s own Spirit who gives us our entire life, identity, and meaning. 

Luke’s version of the Lord’s Prayer isn’t exactly the prayer we share each Sunday. The one we will say later is fuller, with bits and pieces added to it from the gospel according to Matthew and from our own church tradition. And we say this prayer over and over again, like a mantra, a manifesto of sorts, because it’s a prayer that recognizes who we are and whose we are. In the quest for meaning, we can lose sight that we are already worth more than we could ever admit. We are loved by this God who not only walks for us, but who stares in the mirror with us, and sees a new way forward. In the Cross, our limits, our sins, our imperfections staring at us are met by God’s gracious gaze. In Jesus, our meaning is nestled in the life God gave us, showing us all that life can bring. And in our baptism, the water pouring out from the faucets of our vanity is used to unite us with our God who says that this world, and all who are in it, are loved. Our meaning begins in the God who created us, the God who lives with us, and this God who redeems us. We are not limited by the meaning we earn, the meaning we chase, or the meaning the world gives us. We matter because God says we do. That’s our meaning. That’s our value. That’s the gift God gives us, helping us look at ourselves, look at our world, look and see all that is just vanity – and then take a step away from our reflection, away from our vanity, and into this wider world that God loves. 

Amen.

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Now as they [Jesus and his disciples] went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

Luke 10:38-42

My sermon from the 9th Sunday After Pentecost (July 17, 2016) on Luke 10:38-42.

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