Category: Faith

Pencil Pusher. From Pastor Marc – My Message for the Messenger, September 2017 Edition

When was the last time you used 60 #2 pencils? When was the last time you saw that many pencils in one place? Growing up, I longed to be the kid with the fancy mechanical pencil with the right kind of lead for the scantron tests. I didn’t want to use those yellow pencils ever again. And now that I’m older, I rarely write. Instead, I give my fingers a workout on a keyboard, and I keep my thumbs busy on the screen of my smartphone. I didn’t expect to spend a day this summer surrounded by those yellow pencils. But on the last day of Vacation Bible School the kids, volunteers and I were elbow-deep in those pencils I avoided. We were also knee-deep in glue sticks, crayons and two pocket folders. We spent the day packing 20 backpacks full of school supplies for students in need. The supplies we packed were graciously donated by the kids at VBS themselves and members of CLC. The 3 through 11 year olds that made up our VBS classes were packing backpacks for kids their age to actually use. The week the kids spent wasn’t only about trying to have fun with God. It wasn’t just an excuse to dress up as superheroes every day. They were there to learn how God makes them heroes, and they spent a day being the heroes God calls them to be. Being a hero isn’t only for those with super strength. Sometimes a hero means finding 60 #2 pencils and giving them to a kid who needs them.

This September is the start of a busy programming year at CLC. Our 2 worship Sundays kick-off is on September 17th. Confirmation classes, Sunday School and Youth Group will start up right after. Our committees and ministry teams are gearing up for an exciting year. And our interfaith and community partnerships are hitting the ground running. We’re going to spend the year finding new and exciting ways to be the body of Christ in Northern New Jersey. One of the gifts God gives us every day is the very faith that drives us to know that God’s love, mercy and hope are not abstract. These attributes of God are part of who we are. As we start a busy September, let’s see the different and unexpected ways God is calling us to make a difference in our church and in our community. Because being engaged with our neighbors is how we can be like Jesus who never stopped engaging with a world who desperately needs him.

See you in church!

Pastor Marc

A Living Sacrifice

I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect. For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness.

Romans 12:1-8

My sermon from the 12th Sunday after Pentecost (August 27, 2017) on Romans 12:1-8. Listen to the recording at the bottom of the page or read my manuscript below.

****************************

I can’t imagine 46” of rain in just a few days. When it rains an inch here in New Jersey, my backyard starts to look like a pool. So if we had 46”, I’m sure my house would just float away. It’s hard to imagine that much rain falling from the sky but that was the forecast I saw yesterday morning as Hurricane Harvey stalled over the southeastern coast of Texas. When the Hurricane made landfall on Friday night, I watched online as a hurricane-chaser was broadcasting the storm coming ashore. I couldn’t actually see anything. It was too dark and too stormy. I could only see these white pixelated blobs, being blown around violently. The stormchaser narrated what he was experiencing which, as the hurricane eye came ashore, was only fear and terror. Even though they were surrounded by thick concrete blocks while taking shelter in the stall of an automated car wash, their car shook back and forth. Once the storm passed, these broadcasters posted pictures of the damage. Houses were blown apart, lakes now exist in what used to be farmer fields, and boats are inland, far from shore. Harvey has weakened into a tropical storm but its threat has skyrocketed. Cities and towns, including Houston, are flooding. They will receive as much rain in a few days as they get in a year. This morning, I saw reports that Houston received 20” of rain overnight and in only 3 hours, broke all their projected once-in-500 years rainfall amounts. People are in danger because not everyone evacuated. Some stayed because that’s what they were going to do. But others were stuck because of health issues, age, or immigration status. The storm is still there. The rain is still falling and falling and falling. It’s hard to even imagine what will happen next.

Now, those of us who lived in this area when Sandy hit, know what storms can do. It’s been years but youth groups from Lutheran churches across the country still come to New Jersey to rebuild and repair homes. These once-in-a-lifetime kind of storms now seem to happen every few years. And the damage they cause can’t be fixed overnight. Once the homes are repaired, the rebuilding of people’s lives begins. And many will never have the kind of life they used to because these kinds of moments, these kinds of storms, change everything. Storms like Harvey, where forecasters don’t even have enough colors in their map legends to show just how much rain will actually fall, disrupt lives, change the physical landscape, and leave lasting wounds on the physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being of everyone who lives through it. The damage from storms like Harvey lingers. Time can’t make this new reality fade away. Instead, the world and our lives become different when we experience a storm like Harvey, or Sandy, or experience a personal hardship that we know we will never get over. Instead, we keep on living because that’s all we can do.

But what does living look like? Paul, in our reading from Romans today, calls us to be a living sacrifice which is a weird phrase to begin with. We mostly think of sacrifices as something we give up or it’s some kind of mental exercise that stays in our head and remains abstract. But in Paul’s day, sacrifices were an everyday reality. Rome was a city full of temples dedicated to various gods who needed real sacrifices. Cows, goats, birds, vegetables, and all sorts of living, breathing, things were regularly killed, burnt up, and sprinkled on altars everywhere. Sacrifices were not abstract to Paul, because he could walk out his front door and see an animal being offered to a god. A sacrifice in Paul’s day meant that a very real thing had to die. This kind of sacrifice asked a god to do something for you or for the nation. Some gods demanded a regular sacrifice as a way of maintaining this human and divine relationship while other sacrifices were one time deals, like buying a lotto ticket and hoping for the best. Sacrifices were also something even God accepted and encouraged at the temple in Jerusalem. People in Paul’s day knew what sacrifices were and what they meant. Something had to die so that others could live. The thing be sacrificed didn’t actually benefit from what happened because it didn’t keep on living. But it was hoped this sacrifice would make a difference for others.
So Paul, writing to these Romans who understood sacrifices and who, as I shared at the start of this journey through Romans weeks ago, were trying to figure out what they needed to do to master their passions and feelings and become the best Romans they could possibly be, Paul knows that these Romans want to know what a Christian life looks like. And he tells them to live a life for others and be that living sacrifice that makes a difference for others instead of themselves. “A living sacrifice” is a ridiculous phrase that doesn’t make any sense but it’s a phrase that shows us what living with Jesus actually looks like. This is Paul taking Jesus’ “love your neighbor as yourself” and fleshing it out. Our relationship with God isn’t just about the big G and me. It’s about you and I and the person sitting next to us being for everyone else. Love, as Paul and Jesus both knew, isn’t just an emotion. Love is a life lived for others.

And that kind of love is…hard. It isn’t easy. And it’s the kind of love that doesn’t always know what to do when we see our friends, neighbors, or even strangers suffering. When we watch as storms uproot and change people’s lives forever, it’s easy to be overwhelmed because we don’t always know exactly what others need. When we ourselves are undergoing our own storms, this call to live for others becomes almost impossible because we are barely keeping our own heads above water. When we can’t help, we need others to step in and when they need help, we need to take a hard step, a difficult step, a step that might cost us something very real and get involved. It’s not easy, as an individual, to be a living sacrifice but Jesus doesn’t ask us to live this Christian life alone because being a Christian isn’t something we can do alone. Storms happen. Floods come. And even if we discover how to turn back climate change, there is still going to be some natural or man-made disaster or war or personal tragedy that is going to make this life hard. We need each other and Paul knows we do because the “you” in this passage isn’t singular. It’s plural. It’s about…all of us…right now. When we were baptized, we were drafted onto Jesus’ team. We were connected with a savior who knew what humans can do, who faced the evil we do to each other, and still went straight to the cross for all of us. We are united with those followers of Jesus in all times and in all places who just lived…and loved..and made a difference even when their hope was just a flicker that only a few people could see. We get to be a living sacrifice because Jesus was, and is, a living sacrifice for us. And we are connected to a community of individuals called to live for each other, no matter what. Our Christian life needs others and is lived most fully when we are in a community because it’s by being in a community that we can get through the storm.

Amen.

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Children’s Sermon: Better Know A Liturgy – Rocks (the prayers)

Bring little rocks and a sharpie that you can write things on.

I’m so happy you’re here today!

We’re still talking about the liturgy this week – the different things we don on Sunday morning that make up our church service. Last week, we talked about the puzzle of the Creed – words that we say because they show us who Jesus is and why Jesus matters. We don’t always necessarily believe all of it, or maybe there are parts that we don’t understand or that confuses us, and all that. But we share it because it helps us realize who Jesus is. So after the Creed, we do something else. We say a lot of prayers. And to talk about that – I’ve got these. Show rocks.

So what are they? Rocks! These are small rocks I found outside. What do these rocks look like? Small. Round. Gray. Blue. Do they look like special rocks? Nope. Just boring rocks. These are totally just everyday rocks. You can find these kinds of rocks everywhere.

Now rocks are fun because we can do a lot with them. We can make a wall with them, play with them, take them to a lake and trip to skip them over the water. Rocks are hard, they can be heavy, they can be strong – but they can also, over time, be worn down by water and wind and more. I like playing with rocks and I like being careful with rocks too. But I think rocks are important today because of a story we’re going to hear. Jesus is going to tell his friend Peter that he is a “rock.” Jesus tells him that because Peter is going to be someone who tells Jesus’ story, love like Jesus does, and be a leader. So Peter will need to make decisions, and keep talking about Jesus even when he doesn’t want to or he’s tired or maybe he’s not feeling very faithful. Jesus tells Peter to be a rock, a strong foundation, and a leader so that people can hear how much God loves them.

And one way we share that love is by prayer. Prayer is something very active. It’s something we do. And it’s something God tells us to do. So we say a lot of prayers. We pray for the church, for the government, for creation, and for all sorts of people. We pray for those who are sick or happy, tired or scared, and those who have no one to pray for them. We pray because Jesus tells Peter to be a rock – and Jesus tells us to be a rock – and being with Jesus means we pray. And we pray even when we don’t want to.

So let’s write our own prayers. On each rock, we’re going to write a name of someone or something to pray for. Write the prayers. Hand the rocks to the kids. Now this is your prayer rock. I want you, later today, to take this rock out and pray the name or word on it. It reminds us that Jesus calls us to pray – because prayer is how we are strong, like a rock, with Jesus. So make sure to go back to the pews and give these rocks to your parents. They’ll keep them safe until later!

Thank you for being up here and I hope you have a blessed week!

Each week, I share a reflection for all children of God. The written manuscript serves as a springboard for what I do. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship on the 12th Sunday After Pentecost, 8/27/2017.

Pan Pizzaz: Peter is the Rock

Today’s passage from Matthew 16:13-20 is a passage the church has fought over for centuries. For the Roman Catholic Church, this text illustrates why Peter (and his spiritual descendants – the Popes) are central to church leadership. Martin Luther disagreed, seeing Peter’s confession (“You are the Messiah”) as the true cornerstone of all church leadership. There is also debate over what the “keys” actually are. Is this passage an invitation for the spiritual leaders of the church to decide who gets forgiveness and who doesn’t? Is this a passage letting us tell other people “I’ll pray for you” as a way to be passive aggressive with other people? Can priests, pastors, and Christians actually claim who are true Christians and who are not? It’s a powerful passage that has inspired debates and schisms for 2000 years. We should remember the history of interpretation because it shows how the interpretation of this passages changes depending on our cultural, historical, and political context. This passage invites us to remember why we need the Holy Spirit to open up God’s word for us because what the Holy Spirit gives us might not match, 100%, with what came before it.

When I look at scripture, I spend time putting it into context. Where does this passage appear in the wider story? What message is the author trying to get across? And what would the original hearers actually hear? A big part of my interpretation process also involves real estate. Location matters and location plays a big role in what Jesus is saying today.

The city of Caesarea Philippi was at the edge of northern Galilee, the tip of Israel’s ancient homeland. In Jesus’ day the city was new but the location wasn’t. For hundreds of years a temple located at the city site was dedicated to the Greek god Pan. The temple sat next to a large spring that provided water for the Jordan River. Over time, the temple complex grew. Images of Pan and other pagan gods were carved on the rocky hill behind the spring. When the city was finally established a few years after Jesus’ birth, the city became very Roman. Even it’s name, Caesarea Philippi honors the Roman Emperor – Caesar. This was a city that treated the Roman Emperors as gods.The rocky hill behind the spring was soon the Mt. Rushmore of the area, including images of Pan and the Roman Emperors as a sign of what was the rock, the foundation, of the wider world.

Today’s passage takes place with Jesus, Peter, and the other disciples overshadowed by images of the Roman emperor and Greek gods. It’s under the watchful eye of these rocks when Jesus calls Peter his rock. We can argue about the details of Jesus’ command to him mean but we shouldn’t ignore the impact such words would have made. Peter’s confession is a direct refutation of the government surrounding him. Jesus tells Peter that he will be a leader of a different kind of kingdom. These words are revolutionary words. They are powerful words. And they are words that remind us that no government on earth can be seen as the end all, be all, of the kingdom of God. Instead, Jesus’ followers are invited to see the world as it is, a place that struggles with sin, injustice, inequality, and power, but live as if Jesus makes the difference that we know he does.

Each week, I write a reflection on one of our scripture readings for the week. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship Bulletin for 12th Sunday After Pentecost, 8/27/2017.

Prayer Rally for Love and Solidarity

[Paul writes:] With what should I approach the Lord
and bow down before God on high?
Should I come before [God] with entirely burned offerings,
with year-old calves?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with many torrents of oil?
Should I give my oldest child for my crime;
the fruit of my body for the sin of my spirit?
[God] has told you, human one, what is good and
what the Lord requires from you:
to do justice, embrace faithful love, and walk humbly with your God.

Micah 6:6-8

Pastor Marc joined clergy from throughout the Upper Pascack Valley for a Prayer Rally for Love and Solidarity. More than 100 people from at least 8 congregations (Christian and Jewish) attended the event at Veteran’s Park in Park Ridge. Pastor Marc offered a reading and a reflection during the event.

****************************

Was anyone else outside this afternoon watching the solar eclipse? Did anyone else forget to put on sunscreen before they climbed on the roof of their church to watch the moon move in front of the sun? I know I’m going to be a tad sunburnt tomorrow but I’m glad I was able to participate in a celestial event where people from all over this nation posted jokes and memes about it online, ate moonpies and other lunaresque treats, and we all looked a tad dorky wearing those paper sun filters over our eyes. And even though the glasses made us look silly, we needed them. Without them, the UV rays and light from the sun would literally burn our eyes. In the days leading up to today’s event, news articles and tweets and Facebook posts said the same thing over and over again. Don’t look directly at the sun. Don’t take a #selfie with the eclipse in the background because that won’t stop the UV rays from reflecting off your phone and harming your eyes. We needed to get the right kind of NASA recommend polarized shades. And if any of this is news to you right now, just keep the information in your back pocket as preparation for the next eclipse in our neighborhood in 2024. These warnings about observing the eclipse shows us how intense the sun actually is. We needed to do a lot to prepare ourselves to engage and observe and witness such an event. Solar eclipses happen without any input or help from us. They are a product of the dance the moon and earth and sun do together. We witnessed today something that is part of our world and our universe right now. We know eclipses happen – but we have the choice in how to engage with them.

This evening, as we gather together as neighbors and friends, as we unite to say yes to peace and love and unity – and as we say no to hate, anti-semitism, racism, homophobia, nazism – and to anything and anyone that tries to split us apart, I am personally grateful for each and everyone of you. I am grateful for the intensity, the power, and the love and hope each of you brings here tonight. I am grateful for the shared witness my colleagues and friends from the Upper Pascack Valley Clergy Group show by being here in body, mind, and prayer. And I’m eternally grateful for the same Spirit that compels each of us to be here right now. This Spirit, I believe, is embedded in God’s good creation. It’s a Spirit that’s moved over the waters, breathed life into our souls, and is even now, moving among us. It’s the same Spirit that moved the prophet Micah to speak out against those who oppressed the people and it’s same Spirit, I believe, that brought us here together tonight. This Spirit wants us here so that we can speak, with one voice, loudly proclaiming that the rallies, movements, and groups supporting Nazism, Confederate ideology, white supremacy and terror are not who we are and this isn’t who God wants us to be. The evil lurking in the hearts of those who use cars, trucks, and vehicles to cause death, violence, and destruction is not something God endorses, supports, or believes. Those who drive into crowds, march through college campuses with lit torches, and who shout words that deny the very human diversity that God intended are not living in God’s Spirit. They are trying to make fear and violence the cornerstone of our human community and they hope we will just accept it, as if this kind of evil is part of the universe that we choose not to engage with.

Yet the Spirit that lived in Micah is a Spirit that refuses to let fear win. It’s a Spirit that compels us to engage with this evil forcefully, honestly, and with an intensity that cannot be blocked. As a Lutheran, I am mindful of how communities bearing the Lutheran name worked against the Spirit of God and were part of some of the worst violence in living memory. As an American, I am mindful of the different ways own communities push our neighbors to the margins. I am mindful of the ways Christians throughout history have twisted the true and expansive vision God has for our human community. Yet I also know this Spirit that lived in Micah refuses to give up on us. I know that this Spirit, when she recorded the words “love your neighbors as yourselves, ” truly meant it. I know that this Spirit is active right now, empowering us to uncover the ways we fail to match the unlimited love God has for each of us. And I know that this Spirit helps us do more than just gather together. The Spirit inspires us, strengthens us, and compels us to know what justice is and to seek it; to know what love looks like and to go do it; and to walk faithfully and humbly with the God who will never stop showing us what God’s vision of the world truly looks like. May our love for our neighbors burn with an intensity matched only by the sun. And may the moments we share this evening, moments reflected in anti-hate rallies in Charlottesville, Boston, New Orleans and in vigils and rallies locally and nationwide, reflect that Spirit of hope, love, and unity that God wants everyone to share.

Amen.

Children’s Sermon: Better Know A Liturgy – Puzzle Pieces (the creed)

Bring a puzzle. Show the VBS 2017 video.

I’m so happy you’re here today!

We’re back to talking about the liturgy this week – the different things we do on Sunday morning that make up our church service. We’ve talked about a lot so far – why we preach, sing, shake hands, and confess our sins and ask God for forgiveness. Today we’re going to talk about this thing we do right after my sermon and right after we sing a song together. And that’s….the Creed.

Creed is a funny word. Can we say that word together? Creed. There are three different creeds that we could use in church but usually we only use 2. The one we’re using today is the shorter one and it’s called the Apostles’ Creed. We call it the Apostles’ creed because legend says that the apostles, Jesus’ friends, put the Creed together. And how did they do that? By thinking about this – show a puzzle.

This is a puzzle that has a few pieces still to put together. And that’s house puzzles work – we look at the picture and try to use different pieces to put it together. Do the puzzle with the kids for a bit.

Look! Here’s our finished puzzle. Each piece was needed to show the rest. And that’s how this creed works. The creed is made up of different part of Jesus’ story and why Jesus’ story matters. Each piece is important because, without it, we won’t know fully how God loves us. We recite it each week because it helps remind us just how much Jesus loves us and why Jesus is important. And we also recite it because, sometimes, there are different parts of the puzzle that don’t make a lot of sense to us, or parts we don’t understand. Or parts that we don’t necessary think are true that day. The creed isn’t here as a test – as if we have to understand or get or fully believe every single part to call ourselves a Christian. The Creed matters for us because it’s a complete picture of who Jesus is. And when we don’t understand pieces of the puzzles, we know that the person next to us might get it. And we might understand the pieces of the puzzle that the person next to us doesn’t get. The creed helps remind us that we are all, as a community, growing closer to Jesus. All of us, together, are needed to figure out who God wants us to be. The creed is, then, what we as a community, teach and share, the fullness of Jesus’ story. The creed is a picture of Jesus and faith that helps us see Jesus – and live out the Christian faith.

So, in honor of the creed and how it’s a statement that shows what this community teaches, we’re going to show a short slideshow about how we taught, and sang, and ate, and played this Jesus thing out in last week’s VBS.

Thank you for being up here and I hope you have a blessed week!

Each week, I share a reflection for all children of God. The written manuscript serves as a springboard for what I do. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship on the 11th Sunday After Pentecost, 8/20/2017.

Children’s Sermon: God Makes Us a Hero(VBS)

Blessing our VBS Volunteers and More. Bust out the superhero gear.

I’m so happy you’re here today!

So we’re going to do something a little different today – we’re not going to be talking about the liturgy – about what we do on Sunday morning. We’re taking a break – we’ll do it again next week. Today, instead, I want to do something else: I want to talk about….being a hero.

Start putting on all the different gear. You’re becoming all the superheroes. Now, I know we talk about superheroes quite a bit during children sermon’s. And I know you have your favorite ones. I went through all the stuff I have at my house to see all the different kind of superhero stuff that I have. Walk through it. Explain each one. Who they are, etc. Then put on all of it.

With all this stuff, I look like a pretty whacky superhero, don’t I? It’s almost like, if I took all the different parts of a superhero and put them together, I’d be a super-super hero. If I had the strength of Iron Man, the speed of the Flash, the eating habits of Michelangelo, I would be awesome. Each superhero has different strengths, different abilities, that help them make a difference. And you know what? Just like superheroes have special strengths, you have special strengths too. Because God loves you, because God is with you, and because you are a beloved child of God, you have strengths too. You have your own gifts that help you make a difference in this world.

So this week, at VBS, we’re going to spend the week talking about the qualities God gives us to be heroes. God’s Heroes have Heart, Courage, Wisdom, Hope, and Power. They do good, seek peace, and go after it. They always love and never let hatred win.

We aren’t heroes on our own. Instead, we need help, and guides, and people to show us how God helps us be heroes. And that’s why God has blessed us with these super volunteers to help with the week. And since they’re helping us this week, we’re going to say a special prayer and blessing for the week.

So let us pray.
Dear Jesus, we are honored to have the opportunity to serve the children you will bring to us during Vacation Bible School. Please be with us as we prepare to do the work you have given us. Help the children to experience your live. Help us teach them about faith as we guide them to see your love in action. This is a week showing children the active life of God through Jesus Christ – a life that let’s us, in the words of Psalm 34, Do Good, Seek peace, and go after it. In your holy name we pray, Amen.

Thank you for being up here and I hope you have a blessed week!

Each week, I share a reflection for all children of God. The written manuscript serves as a springboard for what I do. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship on the 10th Sunday After Pentecost, 8/13/2017.

Total Eclipse of the Heart

[Paul writes:] I ask, then, has God rejected his people? By no means! I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew…For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. Just as you were once disobedient to God but have now received mercy because of their disobedience, so they have now been disobedient in order that, by the mercy shown to you, they too may now receive mercy. For God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all.

Romans 11:1-2a,29-32

My sermon from the 11th Sunday after Pentecost (August 20, 2017) on Romans 11:1-2,29-32. Listen to the recording at the bottom of the page or read my manuscript below.

****************************

29% and 99%. Those two numbers are important for tomorrow afternoon. That first number, according to last night’s forecast, will be the amount of sky covered by clouds at 2:44 pm. The other number is the probability that I’ll be outside, looking straight at the sun, with gigantic eclipse sunglasses protecting my eyes. I know our zip code will only get a partial eclipse but I’m still excited to see the roughly 70% of the sun covered by the moon. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen any kind of solar eclipse and the last time I did, I was putting holes in a cardboard box, wearing it as a strange kind of helmet, and watching a little dot of sunshine grow dim on a white piece of paper. I’m a little disappointed that I won’t be in the path of totality, watching the sun as it disappears behind the moon. I wish I could see the ring of fire that shows up around the moon and then experience our tiny bit of the world being consumed by the moon’s shadow. Eclipses are natural but they’re also kind of weird. We don’t expect the sun to just disappear like that. We expect the sun to be there, doing what it always does. We rarely acknowledge just how necessary the sun is to our lives. I mean, when I’m at a party and someone asks “what do you do?,” I’ve never heard anyone respond by saying, “well, without the sun, I wouldn’t be able to do much.” We get to live our lives the way we do because the sun is there and it works the way we expect it too. It burns, rotates, and shines – day in and day out. The sun is the unacknowledged foundation to who we are because without it, we’re not here.

Paul, in our reading from Romans today, isn’t talking about a solar eclipse. But he is, I think, poking the Gentiles in Rome, trying to get them to see the foundation of what makes them who they are. In this handful of verses, Paul lifts up an assumption some in this Christian community had. And this assumption isn’t, in fact, strange to us at all. I would argue that their assumption is still at the heart of a lot of our Christian theology, identity, and practice. According to Paul, there are people in this Jesus’ community who believe that God has rejected the Jewish people. The Jewish people had their chance to accept Jesus as the Messiah but they didn’t. They turned away. The followers of Jesus, then, are starting to act as if they are true people of Israel, the right followers of God, and the Jews are not. Even in Paul’s day, when the number of Christians was ridiculously small, and Jews who didn’t believe in Jesus outnumbered people who did by the millions, there were followers of Jesus who believed that their smallness, their specialness, made them part of the “winning” side. They picked God. They chose to believe. So they, according to this kind of thing, are the new Chosen people. Christianity has superseded the old covenants God made with the Jewish people, making Christians the new and improved version of God’s holy family. And since different parts of the Jewish community rejected Jesus, those who call themselves Christians believed they now get to treat the rest of the Jewish people as the opposite of God’s beloved children.

This kind of theology has been part of the Christian story for a long, long, time. It’s such a part of our history and story that it’s sometimes difficult for us to see how this kind of thinking, how this kind of ideology centered on Christians replacing Jews as God’s chosen people, has embedded itself into our own personal theology, thinking, and point-of-view. Even if we see ourselves as good people, we have inherited thousands of years of thoughts, practices, and language filled with this kind of anti-Jewish thinking. It’s part of who we are even though we didn’t actively put it there. Our baptism didn’t embed replacement theology into our bones but our Christian history did. And we feed and sustain this kind of thinking, teaching, and way of life when we focus only on being “winners,” because if there’s a winner, we need to identify, and ostracize, and penalize the loser.

This ideology of winners and losers, this way of life that tries to make ourselves the only true Chosen People of God, only works if we refuse to take Paul’s own words seriously. Paul knows there are people in Rome saying that God has rejected the Jewish people. And Paul responds with a “no.” Our translation today doesn’t really reveal the tone Paul is actually using here. Paul isn’t just saying, “no.” He’s saying “NOOO.” He’s saying that kind of “no” an almost three year-old says when you tell him it’s time to leave the pool. He’s answering with a “no” that can’t even believe you’re making this kind of statement in the first place. Paul is affirming, 100%, that God has not rejected the Jewish people and, in fact, God’s relationship with them hasn’t changed. They are still chosen. They are still God’s people. And we know this because Jesus himself was a Jew. Paul affirms and celebrates his own identity as a Jew, too. And even though there are other texts in the New Testament, verses from Matthew, John, and Hebrews, that people have used to convince themselves that they are chosen and the Jews are not – Paul rejects that kind of thinking and interpretation. The covenants, the promises God made to the Jewish people, still stand. God is still loving, caring, and tending the relationship God has with them. Paul is telling us to not let our own assumptions about winners and losers blind us to our true, and honest, reality. We are here because God loves, and cares, and is in relationship with all of us. God tends and nurtures non-Jews in a way that is unique, special, and rooted in the promises God made centuries ago to a man named Abraham who looked up, saw the stars, and knew his diverse and multicultural descendants would be countless. God promised to be with them, treasure them, and, through the Jewish people, make them whole. We don’t expect Paul to write these kinds of words that are universalist in scope. We don’t expect God to be intent on leaving no one behind. We expect God to care about winners and losers just like we do. But God is focused on creating a world where wholeness, mercy, and justice is something everyone has. Because the only thing that can outlast the evil and hatred in this world is God’s promise of mercy, hope, and love. And in a world where the shadow of terror and hatred is long, touching lives in Charlottesville, Barcelona, Kissimmee,Turkey, Finland, and more – we can live and advocate and struggle for a world where hate does not win because our sin can’t eclipse God’s ultimate expectation.

Amen.

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

The Persistent Canaanite Woman

It’s strange for Matthew to call the woman in our gospel reading (Matthew 15:21-28) a Canaanite. By the time of Jesus, the Canaanite culture was long gone. The land of Canaan included parts of Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Jordan and Syria. When the people of Israel fled Egypt, they came into a territory dominated by Canaanite kingdoms. Gradually as the Philistines took over the coast and the kingdom of Israel dominated the interior, the Canaanite culture shrunk. By the time of the Exile, when the people of Jerusalem were taken to live in Babylon, Canaan no longer existed. Wars, invasions, demographic changes, and migrations mixed the Canaanite communities wither others. By Jesus’ time, after years of Greek and Roman rule, Canaanites didn’t exist. But we know, based on modern science, that the Canaanites never left. Recent DNA studies show how modern people living in Lebanon and the surrounding areas still have DNA matching skeletons buried 3500 years ago. By calling this woman a Canaanite, Matthew is making a statement. This woman is related biologically to Jesus and his disciples. But she is defined as someone who is completely different. She is a woman set apart, an outsider living in the old Philistine territories of Sidon and Tyre. She’s unworthy of Jesus’ time. And yet, she’s a mother who persists because her daughter is in trouble.

Jesus is a bit of a jerk in this passage. The Canaanite woman believes Jesus is who everyone says he is. She knows he has cured others and she wants her daughter to be cured too. Jesus hears her shouts but chooses not to answer. Even the disciples are annoyed by her persistent shouting. Since her words are failing, she takes the drastic step to get in Jesus’ way. She physically uses her body to disrupt his path. And once she’s stopped Jesus, she asks for help. Jesus responded harshly but she will not give up. She knows who Jesus is and will not let Jesus ignore her. Her faith is her persistence. She won’t let Jesus be anything but Jesus. Her persistence is also a description of who her God is. Her God cares. Her God heals. Her God will not let her family go and will keep God’s promises. She refuses to let Jesus be anything but Jesus. And if she can be persistent with Jesus, we can be too.

Each week, I write a reflection on one of our scripture readings for the week. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship Bulletin for 11th Sunday After Pentecost, 8/20/2017.