Category: Sermons

[Jesus said:] “I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.”

He also said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, ‘It is going to rain’; and so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, ‘There will be scorching heat’; and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?”

Luke 12:49-56

My sermon from the 10th Sunday After Pentecost (August 18, 2019) on Luke 12:49-56.

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Today’s reading from the gospel according to Luke isn’t typically one of our favorites. I haven’t met too many people who have these words written on a piece of reclaimed wood that is now hanging in their family room. It’s a bit hard for us, I think, to connect the Jesus who was born in a manger with the one we hear today. We remember that at Jesus’ birth, the angels told the shepherds to “not be afraid.” Yet here he is, pointing to fire. 1600 years ago, Ambrose, the Bishop of Milian, wrote “are we to believe that [Jesus] has commanded discord within families? …How does [this Jesus] say, ‘My peace I give to you, my peace I leave with you,” if he has come to separate [children] from [parents] and [parents] from [children]…” For a long time, the church has struggled with passages like this one. We’ve tended to ignore them, push them aside, or only use them as a tool to attack those we disagree with. But when it comes to our practice of faith, especially in our families and in our churches, we prefer a Jesus who is softer and more gentle. We want our Jesus to unite us, to overcome the divisions of our world, since we’ve seen how he invited even little children to come close to him. Yet the Jesus depicted in today’s text seems to almost relish splitting families apart. I’ll admit this isn’t the Jesus I turn to in my own devotions and prayers. And when I do see someone use these verses, they tend to weaponize them as a way to justify their own lust for power, control, and violence. It’s not hard to be comfortable with a fire-bringing Jesus when you assume you’re not the one who’s getting burned. So how do we reconcile the Jesus who brings us peace with the one who also burns?

Now, when verses like this show up, my first step is to admit everything that I’m feeling. I name my discomfort, accept my hesitation, and put my Bible aside as I go find something in my kitchen to eat as a distraction from my general distaste. Once I’ve eaten one or a dozen cookies, I then get back to work. I highlight the verses I don’t like and I try to put them back into context. Because one of the most dangerous things we can do is pull a verse or two out of the Bible and wave it around, removed from all the other words God connected them to. Yet chapter 12 in Luke is tricky. Luke, it seems, took many different sayings of Jesus and sort of haphazardly placed them one after another. We don’t really have the full story of why Jesus said what he did. All we do know is that at some point during Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem, he spoke these words. So when the immediate context, the words around these problematic verses, does not help – that’s when I take a step back and see how these verses fit into the entire story Luke was telling. And to do that, we need to journey back to the beginning of Luke’s version of Jesus’ life and ministry. We need to return to the shores of the Jordan River – when John the Baptist prepared the way for the Lord – and go back even further, to those moments before Jesus was even born.

Now, in the beginning, Luke showed how Zechariah – John the Baptist’s father; Mary, Jesus’ mother; and John the Baptist himself – told us who Jesus was meant to be. Jesus is the one who will scatter the proud, bring the powerful down from their thrones, and fill the hungry with good things. He will shed a light on those hidden in shadow, overturn every oppressor, and transform our self-centered lives and communities into something new. Jesus will, according to John the Baptist, baptize us with water and fire – a fire meant to refine us as if we’re a piece of metal in a blacksmith shop that’s being transformed into Jesus’ own image. Jesus, through us, will make sure that the poor receive good news; that all captives are released; and that all who are oppressed by our greed and our fears will finally be freed. The fire Jesus brings is a fire Jesus gives to us – to the baptized – so that we, through Jesus, can shift our priorities away from ourselves and instead towards God. The Jesus we know and love promised to bring us peace and hope. Yet the peace Jesus brings is not a peace that always plays nicely with the world because good news for the poor is not necessarily good news for the rest of us. Jesus’ words in today’s text doesn’t contradict the more gentle Jesus we prefer. Rather, his words reveal just how serious it is for Jesus to be in our world. The peace, love, forgiveness, and justice Jesus brings means that our priorities, our goals, and what we think is right – sometimes needs to be transformed into what is actually God’s will. Jesus knows that this kind of transformation isn’t always easy. But it is essential – because Jesus’ presence in your life is meant to do something. His grace, his words, and his love refines you into who God knows you can be. Yet that fire can, and does, sometimes hurt – because its fuel is the truth about ourselves and our world that we don’t always want to see.

When we come across a Jesus we don’t like, we should resist every attempt to make him more comfortable. We shouldn’t ignore him, downplay him, or use him to attack other people. Because when we ignore the uncomfortable Jesus, we push aside the responsibilities Jesus gave us for our lives. When we were baptized, we were baptized not only with water – but with His fire. That fire was meant to refine us, to transform us, so that we can see the world more fully. Jesus’ fire lets us be honest about the ways we divide ourselves from each other, the ways we fail to love and serve one another, and how we often act as if there’s never just enough…so we horde everything for ourselves. We tend to act as if the words spoken at the beginning of Luke’s version of Jesus’ story – about a topsy turvey world where power over is replaced by power with; where freedom from is replaced by freedom for; and one where a love that is passive is, instead, made active – we act as if those words of fire were extinguished by the more gentle Jesus we prefer. Yet that true fire – the fire that reveals the world as it truly is and the one that transforms it into what God knows it can be – that fire Jesus brought is, through the Cross, already kindled and it still, through your baptism, burns within each of you. The love and care we give to each other does form relationships that can bridge over what divides us. Yet those bridges will create their own divisions because the world still struggles to accept God’s priorities of love, grace, and mercy as its own. But even though divisions still exist in our world, that doesn’t mean we are called to somehow stop being who God made us to be. We are a community filled with people rooted in love, grounded in forgiveness, filled with mercy, and one that is called to offer grace before it gives anything else. Because the fire Jesus spoke about is already burning. And we are called to be refined by its flame so that God’s priorities, rather than our own, always rules.

Amen.

“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 11, 2019) on Luke 12:32-40.

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What did Jesus talk about the most during his three year long ministry from the Sea of Galilee to Jerusalem? Now, we know Jesus talked about a lot of things. The four gospels attributed to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John – are filled with his quotes, conversations, and teachings. Some of those conversations are found in only one of those books while others can be found in up to 3 of them. Scholars have argued that before the four gospels were written, a document was passed around that was just a long list of things Jesus said. Because Jesus was a talker – and what he talked about was varied and vast. So as you reflect on every piece of Jesus’ story that you remember and on every biblical book that you’ve read, what do you think Jesus spent the most time talking about? 

Now, if you said the kingdom of God, then congratulations – you’re correct. The thing Jesus talked about more than anything else during his three year long ministry was about what happens when the kingdom of God comes near. The kingdom of God wasn’t, according to Jesus, something that matches what we imagine a kingdom to be – like a nation or a country with a capital city, borders, political leaders, and the like. Since God holds the entire universe in God’s own hands – if the kingdom of God was just a place, then we’d already know we’re a part of it. Yet God’s kingdom is, according to Jesus, something more: God’s kingdom is really a way of life. It shows up in the relationships and interactions we have with each other. And it’s when the very systems and structures that support our life are reconfigured and re-ordered, so that, in the words of Rev. Matthew Skinner, our whole new reality “[reflects] God’s intentions [for] human flourishing.” God’s kingdom was personified and given flesh in the person of Jesus – who showed us what happens when God’s kingdom comes near: the poor are raised up, the sick are healed, the unwelcomed are included, the hungry are fed, and the brokenness of life is resurrected into something new. God’s kingdom, for Jesus, was always something that was lived out which is why it’s sometimes, so hard to see. God’s kingdom shows up every day – through the big and small interactions we have with one another. 

So now that we know what Jesus talked about the most during his ministry, can you imagine what was number 2 on his list? I’d like to believe that what Jesus talked about after the kingdom of God was some kind of how-to guide so that we could integrate his words into our everyday life. We know that showing love, mercy, and forgiveness can sometimes be really hard – which is why Jesus, several times, reaffirmed our call to love God and our neighbor as ourselves. God’s kingdom is reflected in how we treat, care, and value those we know and those we don’t. So I want the number two thing that Jesus talked about the most to be something that I can use. And the annoying thing is that Jesus gave us exactly that. What Jesus talked about the most after the kingdom of God was about our money and our wealth. 

Today’s reading from the gospel according to Luke, in its first two lines, gives us the number 1 and number 2 thing that Jesus talked about the most. Jesus re-affirmed that God wanted God’s kingdom to “take root in the real, lived experiences” of those who followed Him. When we love, serve, and honor the dignity of others like Jesus did, we gain a sense of purpose and joy in our lives. This purpose is rooted in a generosity that begins first in God but is translated through our work and our hands. God’s kingdom, according to Jesus, is built on generosity which why, I think, Jesus spent so much time talking about one of the primary ways we show generosity – through the choices we make when it comes to our money. This is, according to Jesus, part of his how-to guide when it comes to God’s kingdom. After reaffirming that God’s promise of the kingdom is given to those wrapped up in the body of Christ, Jesus told them to “sell your possessions and give alms.” That isn’t the most easy command to follow so we might latch onto the fact that Jesus didn’t say that we should sell all our possessions, giving us an out when we look at all the things we possibly own. But when we spend our time trying to make Jesus’ words easier for us, we miss noticing what he has to say about being generous. The command to sell our possessions and give alms is intimately connected to Jesus’ statement in verse 34. How we spend our money ends up shaping “our [will] and [our] ways of thinking.” If we spend our money only on ourselves, we end up falling into a cycle where we, and no-one else, becomes the focus of it all. Yet when we give to those in need, we can train our mind and our heart to see our neighbors and our world in a new way. When we give, we experience more than just a warm feeling that we’ve done something good. We actually, without realizing it, end up meeting God. Because, as articulated in another gospel, what we do to the least of these – to the poor, to the marginalized, and to those who are truly oppressed – we do Jesus himself. The act of giving is one of the tools we can use to help ourselves see that God is already all around us. 

Yet God’s generosity doesn’t end with money. The almsgiving Jesus had in mind was more than just donating our excess funds to those in need. Generosity, according to Jesus, should be at the core of everything we do and be reflected in all our relationships and interactions. There are other things we can be generous about. There are sacrifices we can make – other kinds of possessions and advantages we can sell – so that all people, friends and strangers, can flourish. This kingdom of God way of life admits and names the inequities and indifference in our world and chooses not to accept that as the status quo. We choose to be generous because God’s kingdom is different from our own. The choices we make when it comes to our money shapes and forms who we are. Yet we already have a different model and experience of life that should do that shaping, instead. We have, through our baptism, our faith, and through the body and blood of Jesus we share each and every week, the promise and the reality that God’s kingdom has already come near. Jesus’s generosity towards us is what shapes, informs, and redefines everything that we do. So We are invited to embrace that generosity – to integrate that part of God’s kingdom into every interaction of our lives – so that our will, our soul, our minds, and even our hearts discover a new treasure where love, mercy, and grace always shines. 

Amen. 
Quotes: http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=4142

Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. There they gave a dinner for him. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those at the table with him. Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was about to betray him), said, “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” (He said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief; he kept the common purse and used to steal what was put into it.) Jesus said, “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”

John 12:1-8

My sermon from the Fifth Sunday in Lent (April 7, 2019) on John 12:1-8.

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On Thursday morning, I was sitting in my office in the middle of a conference call when odd messages started popping up. At first, these messages showed up in my email. But then came the texts. And before you know it, I was getting phone calls, asking me weird questions about something I didn’t really understand. Many different people from this church seemed to be responding to an email I never sent. They wanted to know why I, out of the blue, needed them to buy some gift cards. I didn’t and that’s when I realized we were being scammed. Now, as a pastor, I’m used to being scammed. Every few weeks or so, I receive an email or phone call from someone asking for money. Since asking for help is one of the hardest things a person can do, I have a personal policy where I believe every story someone tells me. I believe them when they mention their recent medical trauma. I believe them when they describe the family they’re taking care of. I believe them when they talk about the tank of gas they need to make it to their next job interview. And I believe them when they mention they only need a hotel room for one night because they’ve got a place lined up right after that. I believe them because that’s sometimes true. And when I let them know how I can help, you can hear the tone of their voice change when they suddenly realize they’re being heard. But when a scam is taking place, that’s all pretend. The story we’re told isn’t real no matter how much detail they put into it. A scammer knows how to use our trust, our relationships, and our empathy against us. Someone went to our church website, noticed my contact information, and created a fake gmail account pretending to be me. They then, I think, tried to find email addresses for anyone listed on our website. When they found one, they immediately sent that person a note, hoping you believed it came from me. Once you replied, their ask would follow. All they needed was for you to go buy a few gift cards and send them electronically. At that point, it probably felt weird because I was asking you something I’ve never asked before and the emails I sent you never used your name. But, you’d ask yourself, what if Pastor Marc was really asking for help? And that’s exactly what the scammer hoped you would think. They tried to use the strength of our relationship and your generous nature to make a quick buck for themselves. Once your money was sent, it was as good as spent – and the scammer would go find another faith community to target in the same exact way. 

When it comes to scams, if something feels off, it probably is. As your pastor, I would not personally ask you to buy gift cards via email nor act as if I didn’t know who you are. When it comes to emails, phone calls, and anything we see online, we need to approach these situations with the same kind of suspicion we bring to the internet every April Fool’s Day. If it feels weird, it probably is. Our feeling of unease in those moments is not something we should quickly push aside. Instead, we should stay there, knowing that sitting with unease isn’t comfortable but it can be holy. And that kind of holy moment might actually be a gift from God. 

Today’s reading from the gospel according to John asks us to sit with a lot of unease. In the verses immediately prior to this one, people wondered if Jesus would risk coming to the Passover festival knowing that the religious and political authorities were planning to arrest him. What they didn’t realize was that he was already on his way. A few days before Passover, Jesus stopped in the village of Bethany, two miles outside of Jerusalem. Jesus’ old friends Lazarus, Mary, and Martha lived there and so they invited him to dinner. I imagine their meal was full of the kind of conversation, laughter, and joy that only comes when we dine with old friends. Yet, Jesus was eating with someone that wasn’t only a friend. He was breaking bread with the man that he, a few chapters before, raised from the dead. That dinner party in Bethany was a moment that shouldn’t have happened. Yet because Jesus was at the table, our expectations were replaced by the new thing God was doing. The unease we feel when we realize who was on that guest list is how we notice how holy that moment already was. Without our unease, Mary’s response to Jesus seems a little weird and a bit off. But when we pull up a chair and take our place at His table, Mary’s response to Jesus is the only reasonable response when God shows up. 

Because when God shows up, there’s nothing about it that’s pretend. Jesus is never anything but Jesus no matter where he is. He’s Jesus when he’s raising Lazarus from the dead and he’s still Jesus when he’s sitting at Lazarus’ table, chewing on a piece of bread. Jesus is the one who patiently taught his disciples even though they never quite knew who he was. And Jesus is Jesus when he’s welcoming the unwelcomed, offering them seat at the Lord’s table. Jesus was Jesus back then on his final journey to Jerusalem and he’s still Jesus, right now, when he shows up in our lives, in the bread, in the drink, and in the ways we love one another. Jesus never takes a day off from being himself even though he knows the risk being Jesus entails. Not everyone will choose to sit with his guest list nor will we always trust that the gifts of faith, hope, love will transform us into something new. We will, through our own experiences of sin and brokenness, believe that being as wise as serpents means we can never truly be as gentle as doves. We will be scammed and, over time, use that as an excuse to live a life thinking we’re safeguarding ourselves from death but, in reality, we’re denying ourselves true life. In the words of Michael Koppel, “so often we… store up precious resources – whether material, spiritual, or emotional – with the intention to use them eventually, yet the activity of saving can itself consume our lives and limit the opportunity for the outpouring of gifts. Our inclination may be to hold back, [afraid] that sharing the resources means losing them, unaware that some resources can become activated only through wholehearted offering.” When we are in the presence of Jesus, can we truly hold back? Mary couldn’t help but be grateful for God’s presence around and within her even though she knew the kinds of scams people played. Mary refused to let what others do be what defined her. Instead, she leaned on Jesus who never stopped being Jesus to her. As we go about our lives, we will face many situations that feel a little bit off, filling us with unease. But we can trust that unease because that might be how God shows us a new holy moment in our lives and how Jesus is already with us, leading the way. 

Amen.

Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to [Jesus]. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.” 

Then Jesus said, “There was a man who had two sons. The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.’ So he divided his property between them. A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living. When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. He would gladly have filled himself with the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.”’ So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. Then the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ But the father said to his slaves, ‘Quickly, bring out a robe—the best one—and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate. “Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. He replied, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.’ Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. But he answered his father, ‘Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!’ Then the father said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.’”

Luke 15:1-3,11b-32

My sermon from the Fourth Sunday in Lent (March 31, 2019) on Luke 15:1-3,11b-32.

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The words we use to name and title the different stories we have in the Bible matter more than we usually think. If we’re not careful, these short summarizing phrases can cause us to miss what’s actually happening in the text. If, for example, we opened our Bibles to the very first page, to the book of Genesis, chapter 1, verse 1, we might find in bold print, a title placed there by an editor to help prepare us for what’s about to come. In one of the Bible I used, the word “Creation” is that title. Now, that title makes sense because the first chapter of the book of Genesis lays out one vision describing how God created the universe. Yet “creation” is a word with its own temperament and depth of meaning. To me, “creation” is a word that sounds historical, describing how something came into being and is now completed. That title seems to imply that God created the universe from nothing and sort of finished up by the beginning of chapter 2. The word “creation” invites us to see in the text a process that happened and is now mostly over. But what if that title was different? Would that cause to read the text differently? What if, instead of calling Genesis 1 “creation,” we called it “chaos,” since the story begins there, with a formless void? Or what if the title was a tad more active, pointing to what God actually does in the text? God, over and over again, speaks, using words to create a brand new song of life. What if the title we used for the opening chapter of the Genesis was something like “God speaks” or “God sings?” A title like that might invite us to remember that the God who created the universe is still speaking and singing, today. The names and titles we use for the stories we find in the Bible do more than provide a short summary of the text that follows. They also, on one level, frame how we choose to interpret that text as well. 

So in the spirit of creating different titles for the stories we find in the Bible, I’ve going to invite you to take a moment to give a new title to a piece of scripture I just read. Now, you might already know the traditional heading for this parable from Jesus from the gospel according to Luke but, if you can, try to forget it. Come up with your own title instead. I’m going to give you about 15 to 30 seconds to think one up before asking you to share that title with the people around you. So – focus on the text for the next 30 seconds – and I’ll let you know when it’s time to share. 

After 30 seconds, invite them to turn and share. 

After a minute or two, return to the sermon. 

Now, instead of asking everyone to go around the room and share what the title they came up with, let’s use a show of hands to see what common words or phrases showed up. 

So how many of your titles included the word “son or sons?” 

How many included the word “father?”

How many of us only focused on the younger son who went away? 

Did anyone focus only on the older brother who stayed? 

Did you include in your title anyone else, like maybe the slaves? 

Did your title include any action words like “run,” or “love,” or “grace?” 

Did anyone’s title only include God? 

Did anyone’s title only focus on the Father? 

Now, the traditional title for this parable is “the Prodigal Son.” And, if I’m honest, I’ve never really known what “prodigal” means. It’s one of those words I’ve heard so often, I assume I already know it. It must, somehow, describe the first son we meet in today’s text. This younger son, after demanding and receiving his inheritance from a father who is very much alive, traveled to a distant place and spent every penny he had. He spent freely and extravagantly, with no regard for his future or the relationships he left behind. When his money finally ran out, he was hungry, tired, dirty, and working in the fields with pigs. He decided to go home. But he’s not sure exactly how his father will respond to him. So the younger son prepared a little speech, one that I imagine he practiced over and over again. He would admit that he’s sinned, that he broke their relationship, and that he’s no longer worthy to be called his father’s kid. With that hard bit of honesty out of the way, the son would then make another demand on his dad. He would ask to be fed, paid, and treated like one of his father’s employees. But that final demand is one the younger son never gets to ask. When his father, who never stopped looking out for the son who left, finally sees him, the father runs to embrace him.  him. The younger son, believing this is finally his chance to make things rights, starts to recite his practiced speech. But after admitting who he truly is, that he is someone who no longer deserves a relationship with the one who is literally surrounding him with love, his father interrupted him. The younger son never gets to make his final demand on his dad. Instead, his father showered his kid with a recklass, extravagant, and almost wasteful response of over-the-top love and grace. 

Prodigal means being wastefully and recklessly extravagant. And the man and his two sons in this story were prodigal in their own ways. The younger son was a pro in spending his money on wasteful kinds of living. And the older son, the one who stayed, was prodigal in a kind of self-centeredness that, like the younger son, can only make demands on his father. Yet their actions, while as relatable to each of us, are not the focus of the story. This isn’t a parable about the prodigal son or sons. This is, in the end, a story about a man who had two sons. And he can’t help but be prodigal with grace and forgiveness to those he loved. That love didn’t depend on what others said and did. Instead, the father loved his children with abandon because that’s just what the father did. The title we should use for this text from the gospel according to Luke shouldn’t be focused only on the younger son. Rather, this is a story about a prodigal father who describes the God who loves you just as extravagantly, just as recklessly, and just as freely, as the man in Jesus’ parable did. God’s love for you doesn’t depend on what you do, where you go, or what you say. Rather, you are loved not because you are perfect but because you are worth the kind of love that can only come from a prodigal God. 

Amen.

At that very time there were some present who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. He asked them, “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them—do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”

Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, ‘See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?’ He replied, ‘Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”

Luke 13:1-9

My sermon from the Third Sunday in Lent (March 24, 2019) on Luke 13:1-9.

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“What does this mean?” is a pretty Lutheran question. If you opened up your copy of The Small Catechism, Martin Luther’s booklet to help parents teach their children what faith is all about, you would see a version of that question all over. Luther used the Apostle’s Creed, the 10 commandments, and the Lord’s prayer as tools to show everyone why Jesus matters. Now, if you grew up Lutheran, hearing that question might make you a bit uncomfortable. Because for generations, we traumatized 13 year olds at the end of their Confirmation programs by making them stand in front of the entire congregation and recite, from memory, Luther’s answers to that question. In the Confirmation program I teach, I no longer make kids do that. But we do spend a lot of time with the question: what does this mean? In fact, that’s pretty much the standard question we all ask whenever we are face-to-face with the Bible and with Jesus. When we discover terms, ideas, or stories that confuse us, that question helps us to find meaning in the things we don’t understand. But the search for meaning is more than a search for understanding. We also want to make this encounter with faith useful for our everyday life. That usefulness can be as simple as finding a moral argument we can use in our decision making or, when we’re confronted by a text that makes us a uncomfortable, we might want to find way to explain it away so we can ignore it. In the words of Diane Jacobson, we sometimes approach the bible, looking to “…[boil it] down to its core essentials.” We want every verse to have a obvious meaning, every paragraph to be a statement of faith, and every story about Jesus condensable into 140 characters or less. If we can strip down faith, we can then insert that faith into the things we already do, think, and feel. The question, “what does this mean?” is one of the ways we try to turn an encounter with faith into an actual faith that’s lived out in our lives. 

But that question doesn’t show up only in our encounter with the Bible. Because how many times have you starred in the mirror, looking at your current life, and wonder, “what does this mean?” How many times have you reflected on your family, your community, and maybe the entire world and found yourself praying, “what does this mean?” Our search for meaning isn’t limited to only our engagement with the Bible. Our search for meaning shows up in every moment of our lives. When we have a chance to catch our breath while living through a whirlwind of joy, despair, tears, and sorrow – “what does this mean?” is the right question. It’s a faithful question and one I believe God wants us to ask. But the simple, quick, and easy answer we want might not be the actual answer God’s telling us to hold on to. 

In our reading today from the gospel according to Luke, “what does this mean?” is a question the people around Jesus knew very well. We find ourselves dropped into the climax of a conversation Jesus began in chapter 12 while surrounded by a crowd of thousands. Jesus switched back and forth between talking to his disciples and to the crowd. He told those who followed him to be ready; to live confidently, trusting God, and encouraging them to remain faithful to what God was already doing. But that faithfulness wasn’t a call to wait and see what God was up to. Rather, since Jesus was with them, God had already made the first move. Everyone was invited to participate in what was already happening. People were being fed; the sick were being healed; the demons that drove people apart were being casted out; and those society chose to ignore were being seen, noticed, and restored to the community by Jesus himself. God was literally on the move and they were told to join in. The answer to the question of “what does this mean” when Jesus showed up was to get behind him so that God could take you where God knew you needed to go. 

Now, it’s at that moment when some in the crowd asked Jesus a “what does this mean” question of their own. They had watched the government brutally murder a group of people who had gathered for worship and they knew of a building disaster in Jerusalem that had killed 18 people. Neither of those groups had the opportunity to jump on board with what God was currently doing. The crowd wanted to know what does it mean since they missed Jesus. Did they die because they were worse than others? Was their suffering, pain, and sorrow caused by their sin and does God, somehow, love them less? Jesus answered: no. Violence, pain, suffering, and the things we don’t understand are not a sign that God loves us less. Nor are those kinds of experiences an example of God abandoning us in our hour of need. I honestly believe God’s heart breaks everytime ours does and we have a Jesus who knows exactly what it’s like to weep. Jesus’ divinity does not overwrite his humanity and his love for us cannot be overwritten by our brokenness, sorrow, or sin. 

Yet we will not always receive a simple, clear, or exact answer to the question, “what does this mean?” Pilate, the Roman governor, was wrapped up in an ideology and way of life that had no problem killing those who didn’t believe, act, or serve Rome like he did. His behavior seems like something we might understand or, at least, see other examples of in the world around us. But when the tower of Siloam collapsed…that’s just what it did.   We would like to know what it all means. We would like to know how we can take reality, mix in a little faith, and come out on the other side with an answer protecting us from what comes next. Yet the reality of our being alive means that we also need to come to grips with the mystery of meaning and the uncertainty of not knowing. And that kind of uncertainty is at the heart of parable Jesus used about the fig tree and the gardener. 

In the words of Eric D. Barreto, “Many of Jesus’ stories leave us with uncertainty…. we do not know if manure and a gardener’s touch ends up making any difference whatsoever. Does the gardener just delay the inevitable? Does the gardener hold off for one year the fig tree’s destiny of serving as compost for another, more productive tree?” Jesus’ parable ended before it could reach any kind of resolution. We are left with that tree, in the uncertainty of “one more year.” We find given the opportunity to notice what God is doing while realizing the urgency of what such a call truly means. Following Jesus isn’t something we’re asked to do tomorrow. Following Jesus is something we get to do today. In your baptism and in your faith, you are wrapped up by Jesus who isn’t waiting for you to be perfect before he called you to follow him. Instead, he came to you as you are so that you, through Him, can become exactly who God knows you can be. But, if we’re honest, we’re not always sure exactly what that means. A life with faith is a life that will sometimes be uncertain. A life with faith is a life that’s often doubting. A life with faith is a life that will often ask “what does this mean?” Yet, even when we don’t know the answer and we’re at a loss of what to do next – that doesn’t mean we’re alone or that God loves us less. When we find ourselves not being able to see the way forward, that’s when we’re called to get behind Jesus, because he’s already leading the way. 

Amen.

Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me, and observe those who live according to the example you have in us. For many live as enemies of the cross of Christ; I have often told you of them, and now I tell you even with tears. Their end is destruction; their god is the belly; and their glory is in their shame; their minds are set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. He will transform the body of our humiliation that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, by the power that also enables him to make all things subject to himself.

Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.

Philippians 3:17-4:1

My sermon from the Second Sunday in Lent (March 17, 2019) on Philippians 3:17-4:1

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Everything we do on Sunday morning had to be invented. The type of prayers we say, the kind of music we sing, and the special vestments I wear – all of it comes from somewhere. Some items are pretty easy to explain, like my alb, the robe that I wear. It’s colored white as a reminder of our baptism and it resembles the kind of basic, everyday clothing, that people actually wore in the Roman world 2000 years ago. But not everything we do on Sundays is so easy to explain or so old. In the mid 1890s, the New York Times and other newspapers reported on a new trend in holy communion that had gone viral. Some of the more “hip” churches in Brooklyn were starting to use, for the very first time, individual communion cups. This trend was so compelling that reporters went to church to see how the people would react. Yet the energy behind this new movement in communion didn’t come from theology or some rediscovery of an ancient church practice. No, individual communion cups were all the rage because by the 1890s, the world had finally discovered germs. 

Now, it’s sort of amazing to imagine a time when we didn’t know about germs. Pretty much every cleaning item today brags about how many viruses and bacteria it can kill. But before the 1870s, germ theory and the dangers of microorganisms were not widely accepted. Yet as the science matured, people discovered how diseases could be transferred from person to person and how hygiene mattered. Hospitals began, for the first time, sterilizing their equipment and cities worked on the problem of sanitation. Dozens of new scientific journals dedicated to the wonders of hygiene started being published. And as indoor plumbing started to become more widespread, taking baths more than once a month became part of our cultural standard. A certain kind of cleanliness, once reserved for the very rich, was now available to many people, including the new “middle class.” It wasn’t enough to just own a large house. Your home, your body, and your entire life needed to be cared for, maintained, and “cleaned.” In other words, you needed to match society’s new definition of what was hygienic and everything that didn’t match this new spirit of “clean” was pushed away. 

Entrepreneurs, caught up in this moment in history, noticed how all kinds of people drank out of the same cup when sharing holy communion. A new technology needed to be invented to bring the spirit of hygiene to the practice of holy communion. Many different people, all at the same time, filed patents for individual communion glasses as a way to combat the supposed scourge of unhygienic holy communion. By the time individual communion cups finally reached New York City, the buzz had been brewing for so long that a Brooklyn church advertising their use was standing room only on Sunday mornings. Soon after, religious newspapers and theological journals were full of letters and articles debating the new practice. Some challenged it on theological grounds while others advocated for the individual cups as a way to make Sunday morning as clean as Jesus wanted it to be. The debate over individual communion glasses lasted decades with the question of hygiene dominating every argument. Science, not theology, was now the go-to for the how-to of holy communion. 

Yet in the dozens of articles, letters, and minutes from Lutheran churches who argued about this issue that I’ve read, it seems that the idea of hygiene rather than any scientific evidence was the real driving force behind the debate. Rarely did anyone show bacteria growing on chalices or give evidence showing how one communion cup spread some infectious disease. Instead, that conclusion was assumed to be true. Communion chalices had to be, according to advocates for the new practice, covered in germs. But that wasn’t the chalice’s fault. Rather, the real problem was the kind of people who drank from that chalice. And if you weren’t careful, the wrong kind of people would have touched that cup before you and they would make you sick. 

Over and over again, early advocates for individual communion cups moved from a general statement about hygiene to detailed arguments designed to make you afraid. They weren’t worried about people who dressed like you, looked like you, or lived in the same economic class as you. Instead, they were concerned about that other person who happened to be kneeling next to you at the communion rail. And since the authors couldn’t use science to diagnosis that fictional person, they vilified them instead. Using every ethnic, racial, and economic dog whistle they could, the authors of these writings tried to frighten so-called “respectable people” from being contaminated by what the “other” might have touched. Actual science and facts didn’t matter. Consciously or unconsciously, the early advocates for the individual communion glasses gave in to, and promoted, fear. It wasn’t germs they were worried about. Rather, they were concerned about who God might want them to share communion with. They had no problem communing with someone who fit into their ‘clean’ world but if someone didn’t dress like them, talk like them, shop in the same places like them, live in the same economic class as them, or look like them, then holy communion was literally off the table. Their claim as citizens of their so-called hygienic world was only available to a select few and that opportunity for citizenship was denied to anyone who they didn’t already pre-approve. 

Paul, in his letter to the Philippians, made a claim about citizenship that’s almost easy to miss. He was, as he wrote this letter, probably in prison writing to one of the many church communities he founded. That community, like all early church communities, struggled in the face of persecution, challenge, and internal conflict. Paul wanted to offer the two dozen or so followers of Jesus in Philippi some hope. The community there was surrounded by thousands of people who didn’t believe. Many of these early followers of Jesus probably didn’t grow up Jewish and they came from a variety of social and ethnic backgrounds. A few were probably even slaves. We can assume that a sizable portion of the church in Philippi were not Roman citizens and that they never expected to be granted that status. It wasn’t easy for them to keep the faith since so many other people were against them. So Paul wrote to strengthen them, encourage them, and remind them whose they are. No matter where they came from, what they used to believe, what language they spoke, what status they had, or what their personal hygiene actually was – they, because of the gift of faith and the gift of their baptism, belonged to God. Their citizenship in God’s kingdom, as they were, was already secure. Even in the midst of fear, terror, and conflict, they were Christ’s and Christ was already there’s. By standing firm in the Lord, they could live into a hope that would transform them into something brand new. They were no longer merely what they once were or limited by what the citizenship of the world could offer them. They were citizens of God’s eternal kingdom and that, to Paul, changed everything. 

But that citizenship isn’t a citizenship that’s only to come. Rather, for all who follow Jesus, that citizenship is here, right now. Jesus’ own ministry was a sign of God’s kingdom come near and as citizens of God’s kingdom, our very lives are called to do the same. We are rooted in an identity that will not let he worlds we create for ourselves hold us back from fully embracing the diverse world that God not only created but, through Christ, God truly loved. We are called to dismantle, uproot, and undo any  worldview that aims to do the opposite of what Jesus did. We are not here to deny citizenship of others; rather, we are called to live as if our citizenship actually matters. In the face of hate, evil, extremism, violence, and the very small worlds that we too, try to create and maintain, we are reminded that we are, first and foremost, citizens of heaven. And as citizens of heaven, the only thing we can do is to be like Jesus and that means, no matter the cost, we’re here to just love. 

Amen. 

¹⁴Then Jesus, in the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee, and a report about him spread through all the surrounding region. ¹⁵He began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by everyone.
  ¹⁶When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, ¹⁷and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:
 ¹⁸“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
  because he has anointed me
   to bring good news to the poor.
 He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
  and recovery of sight to the blind,
   to set free those who are oppressed,
 ¹⁹to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
²⁰And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. ²¹Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

Luke 4:14-21

My sermon from the 3rd Sunday after Epiphany (January 27, 2019) on Luke 4:14-21.

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It takes about three or four cold spells to hit our area before I start dressing correctly for the weather. Now, to be sure, I’ve never been the kind of guy who wears shorts when it’s snowing out but it takes time for me to adjust my wardrobe once the temperature drops below freezing. What I do first is switch out my summer newscap for my winter one, pretending that I’ll be warmer even though my ears, face, and neck are still totally exposed. I then put on a thin hoodie under my fake leather jacket so that when I’m standing outside my kids’ school in the middle of December, I can tell myself I’m “feeling fine.” But when the temperature finally gets cold enough to freeze the pipes in my house, I just give up and I start layering my shirts and my pants correctly. After each weather event, it takes time to adjust to the new climate we’re in. We might try to hold onto the weather we’re about to lose, acting as if our fashion choices are powerful enough to change mother nature itself. Or we might be so wrapped up in our own lives that we miss seeing the pattern each individual weather event is pointing to. When we don’t step back and re-adjust our perspective, we end up mistaking the weather for the climate. And this mistake ends up giving us a false picture of the world. So, for example, our experience of the cold caused by a polar vortex might blind us to the reality of climate change. As we busily wrap ourselves up in our down winter jackets, we might miss seeing how, over the last fifty years, our warming climate has caused trees to literally move, shifting their natural habitat further north. We might complain about having to wear heavy wool socks while sitting in our homes yet we don’t realize that our homes were never designed for the new climate were already in. Camp Koinonia, an outdoor ministry that we’ve supported for almost sixty years, had to temporarily close last summer because a wetter and warming climate their buildings were never designed for left them with a ton of mold. We can be so wrapped up in our personal moments that we end up missing the bigger picture we’re already in. When we mistake the weather for the climate, when we act as if our personal perspective is the only perspective worth having, and when we start saying that our opinions are really the only true facts there are, we end up placing ourselves at the center of the universe. And when we put ourselves at the center of it all, we do more than just fail to see the climate we’re already in. We end up missing Jesus, who came to upend our climate once and for all.

So as a way to keep Jesus at the center of it all, we’re going to do something different for the next two weeks. Our lectionary, the three-year cycle of Bible readings we read in worship every Sunday, decided to turn this climatic moment from the gospel according to Luke into two smaller events. The first part sets the stage, which takes place in Jesus’ hometown of Nazareth. Jesus, according to Luke, began his public ministry there. After gaining  some reputation as a teacher while visiting the surrounding communities, Jesus returned to Nazareth and, as was his custom, went to worship. He attended the synagogue he grew up in which means he was surrounded by people who thought they knew exactly who he was. Jesus, as worship got underway, volunteered to be a lector, a reader of scripture, and so they gave him a scroll to read outloud. After unrolling the scroll of Isaiah, Jesus found the specific pieces of scripture he wanted to share. He read those verses outloud, rolled the scroll back up, and handed everything back to the attendant. Jesus, then, sat down, signalling to everyone that he was about to teach. Everyone in that synagogue turned their eyes towards him because they expected him to speak. And so, after reading about bringing good news to the poor and letting the oppressed go free, the lectionary chose to end this first part with Jesus’ one line sermon at verse 21: “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 

Now, that verse is really at the middle of the story. There’s still a lot of text that follows. But if we chose to limit our story to what took place between verses 14 and 21, we could imagine this moment as a happy one. Jesus is at his hometown synagogue, he’s got a good reputation, and he seems to be saying that God is about to bring the community good things. The people in that synagogue heard Jesus say that the blind will see, captives will be released, the oppressed will go free, and that Jesus will bring good news to the poor. Jesus’ words here are very specific, not only implying that these things will happen in the future; he says they’re going to happen in the here and now as well. Nothing in Jesus’ scripture reading and short sermon, on the surface, imply that he might be doing anything that upsets or challenges the people around him. And at first glance, Jesus’ words don’t seem as if they are going to cost those in the synagogue practically anything. And yet, when we go through the whole story, finally grasping the full climate of what’s going on, we see everyone filling with rage and trying to throw Jesus off a cliff. 

When we focus on the weather and miss the climate, we end up with an incomplete picture of what is going on. We let ourselves get wrapped up in smaller stories that end up derailing the wider narratives that demand our attention. We find ourselves chomping at the bit whenever some event dominates our short national attention span, choosing to fight over the details of that story instead of addressing the systematic and social realities that allowed such an event to happen in the first place. We see this lived out whenever a discriminatory act is described as fake news or whenever an ugly act of hate is downplayed as an act of “a lone wolf” or “someone who didn’t know better.” Our fights about the weather are our way of ignoring the climate we live in yet the more we ignore this climate, the more unpredictable and scary our weather becomes. The people listening to Jesus in that synagogue assumed they knew what weather Jesus was living in. What they didn’t expect was that Jesus was here to change the climate that impacted everyone. No longer would we be bogged down in whatever weather we are caught up in. Instead, Jesus promised a new reality where restoration, care, and justice was the focus of us all. That kind of climate is a one that knows we can’t decenter ourselves from our universes on our own. So Jesus, at the Cross, did that for us. Through his life, death, and resurrection, God made all of us the center of God’s universe so that we, through our baptism and faith, could make God the center of ours. That new center, rooted in a God who anoints; a God who sets free; a God who restores; and a God who brings good news to the poor; grants to us a new climate where the weather of love, hope, and mercy rules. And since we are part of God’s climate, we can live as if God’s climate truly matters, helping ourselves, our neighbors, and our world change into the place where God’s weather always reigns. 

Amen.