Peace. Peace. It’s a fickle thing to hold onto, isn’t it? We’re all for peace, but we seldom find it. Sometimes, we don’t even want it, for the moment at least, but, even if we are fighting, we’re often doing it for peace, right? Doing it for a good cause. For our peace of mind. Fight for peace! How many times have I heard that said, or read it on a sign somewhere within a peaceful demonstration—against fighting. Peace is truly hard to come by. In our world. In our community. Even, and especially, within our hearts.
We need peace right now. Especially right now at Saint Peters. Our peaceful lives were interrupted by tragedy just a little over a week ago. And now we are trying to find our way again. A good friend of ours is at peace with the Lord, but, for the rest of us, well, it is a little harder to come by. Even those of you who are our honored guests this morning know what I’m talking about even though you may not know the exact details of our tragedy. You’ve had your own along the way, maybe you are having one right now. Peace is a fleeting wish so often in our lives. We want peace, but how to get it is another thing entirely.
The writer of psalm 85 was also in the midst of a crisis when he wrote the words we read today. The Psalm, this prayer, begins by telling about what God has done, those marvelous things done in he past when their community was under stress. Let me read for you what was said since it’s not typed out for us in the insert, “Lord, you were favorable to your land; you restored the fortunes of Jacob. You forgave the iniquity of your people; you pardoned all their sin. You withdrew all your wrath; you turned from your hot anger.”
You see, this community had also seen its share of devastation and wrath. Both this community so long ago as well as ours. The question is, “Was God faithful?” Through those times of trial and tribulation? You’ve all had your times of burden and despair. What happened next? What did God do with that despair? What did God do with those burdens? On the back of our church’s card, it is written that Jesus said, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens and I will give you rest.” What did he do with yours? With your heaviest of burdens. Why do you continue looking to God for peace? Because he has given you peace before.
Today’s Psalm continues by explaining that tragedy has struck the community again and the writer cries out to God for help, “Restore us again, O God of our salvation, and put away your indignation toward us. Will you be angry with us forever? Will you prolong your anger to all generations? Will you not revive us again, so that your people may rejoice in you? Show us your steadfast love, O Lord, and grant us your salvation.”
I don’t know how many times I’ve heard in the past week, “Cornwall has had enough!” I think that there is both frustration and fear behind these words. We’ve had a lot of sadness in the past several weeks, too much for us to take. And we are scared because we know that at some point in all of our lives, we’ll each be going through tough times like this again. Not just here, not just with friends, not just with death, but with finances, and with our children, or with our cars, or with our nation. It’s just a matter of time—and that’s kinda scary. We want peace now and we want it to stay. Peace for our hearts. Peace for our world.
Peace is more than just the absence of war or the absence of fighting. The Hebrew word for peace is Shalom and it refers to one’s whole well-being. There are times in my life when the world seems at one and peaceful yet within myself, my own heart, the world is shattering all around me. The sun is out, the breeze is calm, but there is a gray cloud over my spirit. Shalom seeks to speak of that time when the fullness of God’s presence fills your heart, your mind, your household and the world. All of it. As you can see, we may seek peace ourselves, our country may seek peace, even the world may become peaceful, but “Shalom,” true peace, only finally comes from God.
And that’s I guess why we are all finally here this morning. Because peace is so fleeting, so fickle, so far from us at times. We come here to seek peace from its only source and pray that God creates this peace, promotes peace and does peace even through us, using our hands, our feet, our hearts and our voices. It is why we come together and continuing grieving ones we love while at the same time promising life and salvation to the little children in our midst.
In baptism, God gives life, peace and salvation. We can trust that little Charlie here this morning has peace with God not based on how much or how loudly he cries, but because his sins have been washed clean away in God’s sight. We find peace through trusting God’s promises. Remember when you heard the promises spoken and watched water poured over him? Charlie’s baptism today is an example of how God “does” peace to us. We can all fight for peace or pray for peace, but true “Shalom” only comes from God. He’s got to GIVE us peace and DO peace to us.
The last part of Psalm 85 expresses this: What is God doing to create peace, “Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, to his faithful, to those who turn to him in their hearts.” Sometimes I think that we all have the tendency, myself included, to believe that, somehow, being faithful and having peace are contradictory. Perhaps we get that false impression from stories about Martin Luther and the Reformation. We believe that in order to reform ourselves and the church, to be faithful to God’s Word, we must also be at odds with others and not at peace. The same is true of tolerance which also gets a bad rap so often. But tolerance means to be at peace with others, no matter how different from you they are or how different your opinions are than theirs'. Tolerance doesn't mean "compromise" but being at peace with others--loving others-- even when fighting might be easier. To be faithful to God’s Word means to desire and move toward peace with others always and in all ways.
God’s righteousness and his faithfulness are notsimply adjectives describing God they are so much more than that! God’s faithfulness DOES something. It’s an action word. God is always creating peace; He is always desiring peace. God’s faithfulness creates peace in your heart by never abandoning you even when the earth is falling apart around you. Finally, God promises to create peace in this community and in this world by staying faithful to it despite our social injustices, our wars and our hatred. He will not abandon our world to fall in upon itself; instead, he comes deep down into your life and is faithful to you and your struggles.
What is the result of all this talk and promising of peace, love and righteousness? The Psalm says that “Faithfulness will spring up from the ground, and righteousness will look down from the sky.” And smack, when the two meet, when they kiss, the world won’t collapse on itself, it will become whole. The place between my hands isn’t the world, the whole world is all around them.
What might this faithfulness look like, springing up from the ground? For those of you at the funeral yesterday, it might look like God creating a celebration out of a tragedy. We came in sadness and perhaps, even for a moment, you found peace. What might faithfulness look like, springing up from the ground? Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream, that little children of every color, race and creed would not just hold hands but maybe even change the world, their institutions and the content of their character. We're called to continue that dream and work for tolerance that is a part of peace. What might this faithfulness look like, springing up from the ground? When a sinner comes to hear God’s promise, gets water splashed on him and finds himself at peace with God forever. This happens both at baptism and when you hear that your sins are forgiven on account of Jesus Christ alone. Peace, Shalom is difficult to find. Peace, it's hard to find because it doesn’t happen just through your efforts, but because God is faithful to you. He has been before. And he will be again. Amen.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Sermon for July 5th
“Whenever I am weak, then I am strong”, Paul says. Paul prayed, appealed, pleaded to God for help. Paul prayed that God in all his immense power would take away Paul’s weaknesses. The Lord said, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” In weakness, even in suffering, in death—there, right there, is where God abides, when he stays, where he makes him home. Right there in your suffering and in your weakness, this is where you will find God for you, in all his power and in all his majesty. Not in glory, but in the cross. Not in your strength, but in your weakness.
Power, miracles, strength, prosperity, perfection. These are what we want, what we have been taught that God is all about. Ask around and people will tell you that God must be omnipotent, omnipresent, unchanging, untouchable, unimaginable. But these fancy words, these images and symbols of glory are a mirage leading to a God far from us reigning up in heaven somewhere. A God of ideas and myths—a God of glory. So God, the Father of Jesus Christ, gave you a different path to life, a road he struggled down himself first, a way to the cross. You have a God who died, a God cursed, a God who bleeds, a God who cries, a God who cries out, a God wounded, a God spit on, a God abandoned. A God of flesh and blood just like you—a God of the cross.
Paul was struggling with what he called a “thorn in his flesh”. A “messenger of Satan” he called it. Was it a temptation? A disease? A limitation of some kind? The Lord only says, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect is weakness.” In North Dakota, in the middle of winter, four farmers stared into a freshly dug grave looking for the frostline, looking for signs of Spring—the end of Winter and the promise of a new hope. Paul had been looking for God to manifest his power in glory, but he is pointed, instead, to the cross. Where the promise of new life, of strength, of hope is found in death and an empty tomb.
One moment, Paul is pleading for God to deliver him, the next moment he finds true deliverance in a God who does not just save him from pain and death, but who enters into that pain and death and settles in. But not simply in solidarity. Jesus has come not to merely ease the pain, to take away your weaknesses, so that you might continue on the glory road. He has come for you. He has come, finally, to take you away from pain and death once and for all. To bring you into a new life where there is no suffering.
Why does Paul say that he is content? Why does he say that he is content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ? It is counter cultural both in his time and in ours. We are a society that thrives on becoming better and better, at easing suffering, at improving our weaknesses ourselves, at evading as many hardships as possible. When people are being persecuted in foreign lands, we are not content, are we? No, we are enraged! When calamities happen, tragedies occur and we buckle underneath the sadness, we may be depressed, shocked or paralyzed, but not content.
But Paul says he is even more than simply “at ease” with these things, the word “content” could just as easily be translated as “to delight in, to approve of”. Paul delights in his weaknesses and the insults he receives. He approves of these hardships, persecutions and calamities he is going through. How? Why? I encourage you NOT to assume that you should also approve of the sadness in your life. Suffering cannot be denied. This is much more than just some psychological attempt to “put on a happy face”. Paul is not supporting self-denial.
In fact, just the opposite. Paul is not denying the weakness he has to put up with. Paul does not pretend that the insults do not hurt. Paul admits that he is being persecuted, he is experiencing hardship, he is in the midst of tragedy BUT HE IS NOT ALONE there! Paul finds himself in the pit of despair and lo and behold there is Christ already at his side! And Jesus does not stay silent, but gives strength. Gives power. Give all of himself to one who is both powerless and weak and hopeless apart from this one and only Savior.
And so Paul is content to trust God’s power, God’s presence, God’s salvation rather than to simply trust in his own abilities. He delights in this fact. He even boasts of how weak he is! Laughing, taunting the forces of sin, death and the devil to take their best shot at him, or have they already done their worst?! “Death, where is thy victory! O Hell, where is thy sting!” This “thorn” in my flesh is not mine alone, Paul says, but is imbedded into my Savior as well. And not a cross, not a nail, not a tomb and not even death has ever held Him down.
“O Lord, Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast. If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light around me become night.” Even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.”
You will struggle and suffer and cry out for help to God. But you need only whisper the words to a God who is right here with you. Holding you in your weakness. Listening to your every need. God has come down in the flesh for you, on a cross, in a grave, and even so far as into hell, so that you will never be as strong as when you are at your weakest. For in your darkest hour, there is where you will find the light of the world. There is where you will find your faith. There is where you will find the hope of the hopeless. There is where you will find your Savior, Jesus Christ. His grace is sufficient for you. In your weakness, you may cling to Jesus for your strength. Amen.
Power, miracles, strength, prosperity, perfection. These are what we want, what we have been taught that God is all about. Ask around and people will tell you that God must be omnipotent, omnipresent, unchanging, untouchable, unimaginable. But these fancy words, these images and symbols of glory are a mirage leading to a God far from us reigning up in heaven somewhere. A God of ideas and myths—a God of glory. So God, the Father of Jesus Christ, gave you a different path to life, a road he struggled down himself first, a way to the cross. You have a God who died, a God cursed, a God who bleeds, a God who cries, a God who cries out, a God wounded, a God spit on, a God abandoned. A God of flesh and blood just like you—a God of the cross.
Paul was struggling with what he called a “thorn in his flesh”. A “messenger of Satan” he called it. Was it a temptation? A disease? A limitation of some kind? The Lord only says, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect is weakness.” In North Dakota, in the middle of winter, four farmers stared into a freshly dug grave looking for the frostline, looking for signs of Spring—the end of Winter and the promise of a new hope. Paul had been looking for God to manifest his power in glory, but he is pointed, instead, to the cross. Where the promise of new life, of strength, of hope is found in death and an empty tomb.
One moment, Paul is pleading for God to deliver him, the next moment he finds true deliverance in a God who does not just save him from pain and death, but who enters into that pain and death and settles in. But not simply in solidarity. Jesus has come not to merely ease the pain, to take away your weaknesses, so that you might continue on the glory road. He has come for you. He has come, finally, to take you away from pain and death once and for all. To bring you into a new life where there is no suffering.
Why does Paul say that he is content? Why does he say that he is content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ? It is counter cultural both in his time and in ours. We are a society that thrives on becoming better and better, at easing suffering, at improving our weaknesses ourselves, at evading as many hardships as possible. When people are being persecuted in foreign lands, we are not content, are we? No, we are enraged! When calamities happen, tragedies occur and we buckle underneath the sadness, we may be depressed, shocked or paralyzed, but not content.
But Paul says he is even more than simply “at ease” with these things, the word “content” could just as easily be translated as “to delight in, to approve of”. Paul delights in his weaknesses and the insults he receives. He approves of these hardships, persecutions and calamities he is going through. How? Why? I encourage you NOT to assume that you should also approve of the sadness in your life. Suffering cannot be denied. This is much more than just some psychological attempt to “put on a happy face”. Paul is not supporting self-denial.
In fact, just the opposite. Paul is not denying the weakness he has to put up with. Paul does not pretend that the insults do not hurt. Paul admits that he is being persecuted, he is experiencing hardship, he is in the midst of tragedy BUT HE IS NOT ALONE there! Paul finds himself in the pit of despair and lo and behold there is Christ already at his side! And Jesus does not stay silent, but gives strength. Gives power. Give all of himself to one who is both powerless and weak and hopeless apart from this one and only Savior.
And so Paul is content to trust God’s power, God’s presence, God’s salvation rather than to simply trust in his own abilities. He delights in this fact. He even boasts of how weak he is! Laughing, taunting the forces of sin, death and the devil to take their best shot at him, or have they already done their worst?! “Death, where is thy victory! O Hell, where is thy sting!” This “thorn” in my flesh is not mine alone, Paul says, but is imbedded into my Savior as well. And not a cross, not a nail, not a tomb and not even death has ever held Him down.
“O Lord, Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast. If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light around me become night.” Even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.”
You will struggle and suffer and cry out for help to God. But you need only whisper the words to a God who is right here with you. Holding you in your weakness. Listening to your every need. God has come down in the flesh for you, on a cross, in a grave, and even so far as into hell, so that you will never be as strong as when you are at your weakest. For in your darkest hour, there is where you will find the light of the world. There is where you will find your faith. There is where you will find the hope of the hopeless. There is where you will find your Savior, Jesus Christ. His grace is sufficient for you. In your weakness, you may cling to Jesus for your strength. Amen.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Sermon for June 28th
In today’s passage from 2nd Corinthians, you might think that Paul is trying to shame the Corinthian church into giving more. He starts his conversation by referring to a poor church in Macedonia and how their giving overflowed because of God’s grace. But since Paul says that he is not giving a new command, we must then assume he is trying to coersively manipulate the Corinthian church. Goad them into giving. Motivate them into emptying their pocketbooks and write a big check for the sake of the kingdom of God!
But why would we assume that Paul is suddenly turning his back on all that he has said up to this point? Is Paul finally getting his head out of the clouds and getting “realistic” on us? Is Paul giving up on the message of forgiveness that is in Jesus Christ and the new creation he is known to go on and on and on about just because he wants to pile up the money in his coffers to take to the poor? Is this really all that we have learned from Paul this whole time?
No. Not at all. Paul is not commanding, nor is he manipulating, or shaming or “comparing”. He is giving faith to the Corinthians. He says to the Church in Corinth, “We want you to know, brothers and sisters, about the grace of God that has been granted to the churches of Macedonia; for during a severe ordeal of affliction, their abundant joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part.” “Look at them!” Paul says. Look at what God has done in that impoverished church in Macedonia! Imagine what God will do here with you! God is going to do something amazing!
If this concept still seems a bit too theoretical, or “pie in the sky”, let me give you an example of the same technique in a more contemporary context. A professor of mine at seminary took many trips to Africa, to a particular town where he and his wife, among others, were working for the Lutheran church in Tanzania. The people there were so happy to receive the gospel! He would always talk about how thankful the people were and that they poured out their thanksgiving not only at the feet of Jesus but upon him, my professor, as well.
In fact, the last time he was there, he explained that, when a friend of his in the village saw him, his friend invited him over and invited the whole village to celebrate the occasion of his arrival by slaughtering a goat and eating it for supper. Now, this might seem like a nice gesture until you realize, as my professor told us, that this goat was equal to about 1/3 of this man’s food and income for the year. If the man had sold the goat, he could have eaten for about four months on the money. If he has eaten the goat, his family would have had meat for a very long time. But instead, because of the message my professor gave to this man, that because of Jesus’ death on a cross this man’s sins were forgiven, even in extreme poverty this man saw abundance.
This isn’t about what this one man in Tanzania did. He is not a model for you to follow. This is what God did in Tanzania through this man! This is how God works, and will work even here, even through you. As an old professor sued to say, “If you still think this sounds like “pie in the sky”, well, don’t you like pie? It’s yours. The whole kit and caboodle.
This is what the love of God does, in real life, in Tanzania, with a man, a professor and a goat. Do you really think that the gospel message will not do the same thing here? In Cornwall? In this church? In your communities? In your life? With your money. Out of your abundance? Out of your poverty. I am not trying to shame you into giving more, do you think that that is all the gospel is good for? Shame? To make you feel badly?
I am not trying to force you to do something against your will. Because I don’t care about your stinky old will, your old way of doing things, the gospel of Jesus Christ gives you a new will and you come out smelling like a rose. You are a new creation by faith alone. Because if God’s Word can do amazing things in Tanzania or in Arizona; in South Korea and in Germany; in Macedonia and in Corinth--he will do it here too. Because giving comes from certain hope in Jesus Christ pure and simple.
Some people have assumed that Paul is encouraging communism here. But what is communism but another law to MAKE people give up their money. Another law to force poorer people to TAKE money from others to meet their needs. Jesus Christ is not another lawgiver, he has killed the law and given you freedom. Communism is not about freedom, but law. Where there is freedom, people may give out of their riches to someone in need, but those in need may also give from their poverty to those with riches. The kingdom of God is like a poor man from Tanzania slaughtering his only goat to feed a rich, fat American. Think about the widow that gave all she had. That’s what grace does to people. It makes givers. Grace creates giving and equality, not by force, but by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps we would understand this better if we were reading from an older translation of the Bible, the Revised Standard Version from a few years back, instead of the NEW Revised Standard Version, which translated the opening verse of today’s reading by using the word “prove” rather than “test”, “I do not say this as a command, but to prove by the earnestness of others that your love also is genuine.” Paul is not comparing two churches as if to see if the church in Corinth can test out better than the church in Macedonia. Paul gives the gospel of grace, truth and justice to the Corinthians so that they might know the power of God just as the Macedonians did. He’s not so much looking for more money, but for God to create new hearts that are eager to give, “For if the eagerness is there,” Paul points out, “the gift is acceptable according to what one has—not according to what one does not have.” Paul says, “Since God is at work in you, giving you the eagerness to give, then do it! “So that your eagerness may be matched by completing it according to your means.”
This is why, as I have said before, giving is not about how much you have or don’t have. It’s about planning to give and having the faith to put those plans into practice. The plans you can make yourself, through budgeting and living financially responsibly, but the faith you cannot create yourself. You can try and try to WANT to give or “fake it until you make it” as some say, but faith is a gift. However, once that desire to give, that eagerness finds its way into your heart, the gift of abundance—use it. Do it. Give. This is what God has made you to be—a giver.
So today’s stewardship sermon takes a page from the apostle,: “You who were dead in your sins are now alive in Jesus Christ. God has given you everything.” Through the power of the Holy Spirit, God gave the gift of faith to a church in Macedonia, he gave the gift of faith to a man in Tanzania. I declare to you what God has done in the past to PROVE to you that God’s grace here, now, in this place, will have the same power for you. God intends to give you all the eagerness to give and then, once you have done it, once you have put into practice the gift of faith God has given you, God will use you as an example for somebody else. Amen.
But why would we assume that Paul is suddenly turning his back on all that he has said up to this point? Is Paul finally getting his head out of the clouds and getting “realistic” on us? Is Paul giving up on the message of forgiveness that is in Jesus Christ and the new creation he is known to go on and on and on about just because he wants to pile up the money in his coffers to take to the poor? Is this really all that we have learned from Paul this whole time?
No. Not at all. Paul is not commanding, nor is he manipulating, or shaming or “comparing”. He is giving faith to the Corinthians. He says to the Church in Corinth, “We want you to know, brothers and sisters, about the grace of God that has been granted to the churches of Macedonia; for during a severe ordeal of affliction, their abundant joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part.” “Look at them!” Paul says. Look at what God has done in that impoverished church in Macedonia! Imagine what God will do here with you! God is going to do something amazing!
If this concept still seems a bit too theoretical, or “pie in the sky”, let me give you an example of the same technique in a more contemporary context. A professor of mine at seminary took many trips to Africa, to a particular town where he and his wife, among others, were working for the Lutheran church in Tanzania. The people there were so happy to receive the gospel! He would always talk about how thankful the people were and that they poured out their thanksgiving not only at the feet of Jesus but upon him, my professor, as well.
In fact, the last time he was there, he explained that, when a friend of his in the village saw him, his friend invited him over and invited the whole village to celebrate the occasion of his arrival by slaughtering a goat and eating it for supper. Now, this might seem like a nice gesture until you realize, as my professor told us, that this goat was equal to about 1/3 of this man’s food and income for the year. If the man had sold the goat, he could have eaten for about four months on the money. If he has eaten the goat, his family would have had meat for a very long time. But instead, because of the message my professor gave to this man, that because of Jesus’ death on a cross this man’s sins were forgiven, even in extreme poverty this man saw abundance.
This isn’t about what this one man in Tanzania did. He is not a model for you to follow. This is what God did in Tanzania through this man! This is how God works, and will work even here, even through you. As an old professor sued to say, “If you still think this sounds like “pie in the sky”, well, don’t you like pie? It’s yours. The whole kit and caboodle.
This is what the love of God does, in real life, in Tanzania, with a man, a professor and a goat. Do you really think that the gospel message will not do the same thing here? In Cornwall? In this church? In your communities? In your life? With your money. Out of your abundance? Out of your poverty. I am not trying to shame you into giving more, do you think that that is all the gospel is good for? Shame? To make you feel badly?
I am not trying to force you to do something against your will. Because I don’t care about your stinky old will, your old way of doing things, the gospel of Jesus Christ gives you a new will and you come out smelling like a rose. You are a new creation by faith alone. Because if God’s Word can do amazing things in Tanzania or in Arizona; in South Korea and in Germany; in Macedonia and in Corinth--he will do it here too. Because giving comes from certain hope in Jesus Christ pure and simple.
Some people have assumed that Paul is encouraging communism here. But what is communism but another law to MAKE people give up their money. Another law to force poorer people to TAKE money from others to meet their needs. Jesus Christ is not another lawgiver, he has killed the law and given you freedom. Communism is not about freedom, but law. Where there is freedom, people may give out of their riches to someone in need, but those in need may also give from their poverty to those with riches. The kingdom of God is like a poor man from Tanzania slaughtering his only goat to feed a rich, fat American. Think about the widow that gave all she had. That’s what grace does to people. It makes givers. Grace creates giving and equality, not by force, but by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps we would understand this better if we were reading from an older translation of the Bible, the Revised Standard Version from a few years back, instead of the NEW Revised Standard Version, which translated the opening verse of today’s reading by using the word “prove” rather than “test”, “I do not say this as a command, but to prove by the earnestness of others that your love also is genuine.” Paul is not comparing two churches as if to see if the church in Corinth can test out better than the church in Macedonia. Paul gives the gospel of grace, truth and justice to the Corinthians so that they might know the power of God just as the Macedonians did. He’s not so much looking for more money, but for God to create new hearts that are eager to give, “For if the eagerness is there,” Paul points out, “the gift is acceptable according to what one has—not according to what one does not have.” Paul says, “Since God is at work in you, giving you the eagerness to give, then do it! “So that your eagerness may be matched by completing it according to your means.”
This is why, as I have said before, giving is not about how much you have or don’t have. It’s about planning to give and having the faith to put those plans into practice. The plans you can make yourself, through budgeting and living financially responsibly, but the faith you cannot create yourself. You can try and try to WANT to give or “fake it until you make it” as some say, but faith is a gift. However, once that desire to give, that eagerness finds its way into your heart, the gift of abundance—use it. Do it. Give. This is what God has made you to be—a giver.
So today’s stewardship sermon takes a page from the apostle,: “You who were dead in your sins are now alive in Jesus Christ. God has given you everything.” Through the power of the Holy Spirit, God gave the gift of faith to a church in Macedonia, he gave the gift of faith to a man in Tanzania. I declare to you what God has done in the past to PROVE to you that God’s grace here, now, in this place, will have the same power for you. God intends to give you all the eagerness to give and then, once you have done it, once you have put into practice the gift of faith God has given you, God will use you as an example for somebody else. Amen.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Sermon for Sunday June 21st
This has been a difficult week. A difficult week for a lot of you and a hard week for the towns in our area as a whole. If you have not heard, we’ve experienced a couple of dramatic crises this past week involving the youth in our area, including a car crash and the tragic death of one young man in the river that we live so close to everyday. Throughout all of these events, our hearts go out to the family and friends of those affected. But if we think that THEY are the only ones affected we are very wrong. We are all affected, quite personally, by these things even if we do not have know anything about the people involved, what happened or how things occurred. Why? Because we understand that it is not right that a young person should die or suffer in any way. It’s one thing when something awful happens to an adult, but when a child gets hurt or killed, we search our hearts and minds for an answer why.
And so, this past week, some of you may have wondered out loud or asked yourself silently. Why did this happen? How could this have happened? Or, to be more precise, “Why did God let this happen?” These are children, caught up in the primes of their lives, and yet God just lets them drown or run off the road or live with the guilt of surviving. We seek answers to justify these events, of course, hoping that if we could justify their happening or explain why things happened the way they did, it would all make more sense. We do this to defend ourselves. Because if we can understand why something took plac3, we do not have to be afraid of dying or getting hurt ourselves and our fear of death is placated. But, more importantly, if we can explain why something happened we can get God off the hook. For God to ALLOW these things to happen, he looks impotent and incompetent—unworthy of our praise. For God to MAKE this happen, he appears to be cruel, heartless and capricious.
We are not the first people in the history of the planet to run up against this dilemma. Why do bad things happen to good people? Why do bad things happen to bad people? Why do bad things happen at all when we believe that the creator of the universe is a loving and compassionate God? We can only blame ourselves, our sins, our mistakes or our stupidity so long before we come up against the wall of God—he is finally responsible for both life and death. How can you love God after this past week of suffering? How will you continue to love God after you experience any great suffering in your life?
The book of Job tries to speak to this issue. Job was a man who had everything going for him. He had a big family. He was rich and, more importantly than all of this, he was righteous in God’s eyes. As God puts it, “There is no one like Job on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil.” But, Satan challenges God to allow sickness to affect Job and to take away all the blessings in his life. Satan argues that Job only loves God because good things happen to him. If all those good things were taken away: his health, his possessions, his family and his livelihood, the bet is that Job will curse God. Satan knows that when bad things happen to good people, the first reaction is to lose faith.
Job’s family is killed, all of them, in one day. His land is destroyed and all his possessions are taken away. Then he is afflicted with an awful skin disease and left to suffer alone. Eventually, three of his friends come to sit with him, but after a week of silence, they ask him the obvious theological question: What did you do to deserve this Job? What did you do wrong Job? Job answered that he had done nothing wrong.
You see, we think we DO understand why bad things happen to bad people. It reflects some kind of justice in our eyes and, even though it’s difficult to understand why a loving and forgiving God would allow awful things to happen, we can chalk it up to the victim’s bad behavior most of the time. That’s all that Job’s friends were doing. They were just assuming that Job must have done something wrong in order to get in so much trouble with God. And yet, Job insists that he hasn’t done anything to deserve what is happening to him. He maintains that this situation is truly something bad happening to a good person—him.
Job maintains his innocence. He demands an answer from God for what is happening to him. What gives? Why does he deserve such harsh treatment from a God he has always loved and served? In one of today’s readings, God gives his answer.
But God’s answer is not what you might expect. We want God to justify himself for his utter carelessness or justify himself for his meanness. Or, even better, we want to justify ourselves so that we either deserve our fate or deserve our fortune. But God neither justifies his actions, nor does he explain to us, or to Job, why bad things happen to good people. He simply makes the point that he is the creator of all things, whether good or bad in our eyes.
Job passes the test. He shows his faithfulness by looking to God for the answer to the problem of God. He cries out to God. Many others have simply lost their faith and turned to themselves or to other “spiritualities” for comfort when faced with the problem of God, rather than crying out to God for the answer. Many have left the faith when great suffering comes into their life. Perhaps because right in the middle of their greatest time of need, most Christians, and most of us, argue for God’s innocence, thus making him appear either implausible or powerless. If we cannot cry out at God in our suffering, as Jesus does on the cross, why would we bother praising him when suffering has passed? Job continues to look to God for the answers and ends up with a God who is faithful to him.
At this time in our community, you will no doubt ask yourself how God could allow such awful things as car accidents and drownings to occur. Some others might even challenge you to explain how you can still believe in a good God when so much suffering appears in this world. Where are you going to turn in these times? Where have you turned?
We cannot praise God as a creator, finally, because much of what he has created terrifies us. So, he has given us Jesus Christ crucified. We will not and finally cannot worship God in his infinite glory, so we worship him in suffering-on a cross. When God looks like your enemy, run. Run to the arms of Jesus where you can find a loving God who is for you, rather than against you.
God has not abandoned you nor has he abandoned any of those who have suffered so much this past week. But we are still threatened by God, both by what we see as his justice and by what we deem as his capriciousness. He is our creator and we, the creatures. He always will have the advantage and the upper hand. The only answer to Job’s dilemma, and ours, is Jesus. For only in Jesus do we see God’s final word is not suffering. Not car accidents. Not wars. Not death. Not tragedy. But hope, love and eternal life . Amen.
And so, this past week, some of you may have wondered out loud or asked yourself silently. Why did this happen? How could this have happened? Or, to be more precise, “Why did God let this happen?” These are children, caught up in the primes of their lives, and yet God just lets them drown or run off the road or live with the guilt of surviving. We seek answers to justify these events, of course, hoping that if we could justify their happening or explain why things happened the way they did, it would all make more sense. We do this to defend ourselves. Because if we can understand why something took plac3, we do not have to be afraid of dying or getting hurt ourselves and our fear of death is placated. But, more importantly, if we can explain why something happened we can get God off the hook. For God to ALLOW these things to happen, he looks impotent and incompetent—unworthy of our praise. For God to MAKE this happen, he appears to be cruel, heartless and capricious.
We are not the first people in the history of the planet to run up against this dilemma. Why do bad things happen to good people? Why do bad things happen to bad people? Why do bad things happen at all when we believe that the creator of the universe is a loving and compassionate God? We can only blame ourselves, our sins, our mistakes or our stupidity so long before we come up against the wall of God—he is finally responsible for both life and death. How can you love God after this past week of suffering? How will you continue to love God after you experience any great suffering in your life?
The book of Job tries to speak to this issue. Job was a man who had everything going for him. He had a big family. He was rich and, more importantly than all of this, he was righteous in God’s eyes. As God puts it, “There is no one like Job on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil.” But, Satan challenges God to allow sickness to affect Job and to take away all the blessings in his life. Satan argues that Job only loves God because good things happen to him. If all those good things were taken away: his health, his possessions, his family and his livelihood, the bet is that Job will curse God. Satan knows that when bad things happen to good people, the first reaction is to lose faith.
Job’s family is killed, all of them, in one day. His land is destroyed and all his possessions are taken away. Then he is afflicted with an awful skin disease and left to suffer alone. Eventually, three of his friends come to sit with him, but after a week of silence, they ask him the obvious theological question: What did you do to deserve this Job? What did you do wrong Job? Job answered that he had done nothing wrong.
You see, we think we DO understand why bad things happen to bad people. It reflects some kind of justice in our eyes and, even though it’s difficult to understand why a loving and forgiving God would allow awful things to happen, we can chalk it up to the victim’s bad behavior most of the time. That’s all that Job’s friends were doing. They were just assuming that Job must have done something wrong in order to get in so much trouble with God. And yet, Job insists that he hasn’t done anything to deserve what is happening to him. He maintains that this situation is truly something bad happening to a good person—him.
Job maintains his innocence. He demands an answer from God for what is happening to him. What gives? Why does he deserve such harsh treatment from a God he has always loved and served? In one of today’s readings, God gives his answer.
But God’s answer is not what you might expect. We want God to justify himself for his utter carelessness or justify himself for his meanness. Or, even better, we want to justify ourselves so that we either deserve our fate or deserve our fortune. But God neither justifies his actions, nor does he explain to us, or to Job, why bad things happen to good people. He simply makes the point that he is the creator of all things, whether good or bad in our eyes.
Job passes the test. He shows his faithfulness by looking to God for the answer to the problem of God. He cries out to God. Many others have simply lost their faith and turned to themselves or to other “spiritualities” for comfort when faced with the problem of God, rather than crying out to God for the answer. Many have left the faith when great suffering comes into their life. Perhaps because right in the middle of their greatest time of need, most Christians, and most of us, argue for God’s innocence, thus making him appear either implausible or powerless. If we cannot cry out at God in our suffering, as Jesus does on the cross, why would we bother praising him when suffering has passed? Job continues to look to God for the answers and ends up with a God who is faithful to him.
At this time in our community, you will no doubt ask yourself how God could allow such awful things as car accidents and drownings to occur. Some others might even challenge you to explain how you can still believe in a good God when so much suffering appears in this world. Where are you going to turn in these times? Where have you turned?
We cannot praise God as a creator, finally, because much of what he has created terrifies us. So, he has given us Jesus Christ crucified. We will not and finally cannot worship God in his infinite glory, so we worship him in suffering-on a cross. When God looks like your enemy, run. Run to the arms of Jesus where you can find a loving God who is for you, rather than against you.
God has not abandoned you nor has he abandoned any of those who have suffered so much this past week. But we are still threatened by God, both by what we see as his justice and by what we deem as his capriciousness. He is our creator and we, the creatures. He always will have the advantage and the upper hand. The only answer to Job’s dilemma, and ours, is Jesus. For only in Jesus do we see God’s final word is not suffering. Not car accidents. Not wars. Not death. Not tragedy. But hope, love and eternal life . Amen.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Sermon for Sunday June 14th
Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.
I met a lady in North Dakota who lived there all her life. By the time I met her, though, she was in her nineties. She was a twin and, after her husband died, she lived with her twin sister. She had had a stroke, at least one as I can recall, but her sister took care of what needed to be done. While I was on internship, however, this lady had another stroke and that is when I got to know the family much better.
She had grown up in a small rural town in North Dakota, one among many other small towns in North Dakota that now has houses lying abandoned on the side of the road that you look at briefly as you fly by on your way to your real destination. She was a teacher, as was her sister, and attended church all her life. One of the funny stories that was told about her was that one night in Lent there was a horrible North Dakota snowstorm that kept everyone from coming. Everyone except for these two ninety year old twins, who called to get a ride from a 95 year old man so that they wouldn’t be dangerous.
But as I mentioned, by the time I met this lady, she had had a stroke and couldn’t really respond to anything I or anyone else said. She got to get out of the hospital briefly, but then was placed back soon after into a nursing home for the end of her life. I visited her often there, spoke to her without ever getting any response for months, just like most everyone else in her family that came and visited. But one time, as she laid there, after weeks and weeks in her trance, the family and I held hands around her bedside and said the Lord’s Prayer. And as we said the prayer, her lips began to move and mouth the prayer with us. A couple of weeks later she died.
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” The kingdom of God is like a ninety year old woman who comes out her stroke induced trance to mouth the Lord’s Prayer with her family, one last time, when everyone had given up hope.
Augustine of Hippo, Saint Augustine as you and I might know him now, was the son of a pagan father and a Christian mother in North Africa. He was sent to study in Carthage, known for its great education system, in order to become a lawyer, teacher or some other well-respected profession. Among other things, Augustine took on a concubine and lived with this woman he was not married to for around fourteen years, even having a son with her. He joined various Christian movements outside of the mainstream, but was always quite skeptical of the Christian faith and, as he said later, was really just waiting and looking for another plausible alternative. He was a rational being and didn’t like the idea of having to have something as ephemeral as “faith” in order to prove himself; he was much more interested in his career and in having a good time. As he put it, he was “panting after honors, profits, and marriage”. He was like a lot college graduates you might know today.
Then in a garden in Milan, Italy he overheard a children’s riddle being yelled over and over again on a street nearby, “Take and read, take and read”. Finding a Bible handy, he opened it and read this verse from Romans, “let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.” Augustine realized that his inner search for truth and his outward behavior didn’t make sense placed side by side. He would soon become baptized and then become a pastor and then, eventually, a bishop in the Roman Catholic Church. He is one of the most celebrated Christian leaders in history.
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” The kingdom of God is like a man bent on his own pleasure and power, with a wife at home and a woman on the side, with a mind focused on wisdom and rationality, suddenly leaving it all behind and becoming a pillar of the Christian faith because he heard a children’s riddle and read a verse of the Bible one day. No one knows how this happened, but it did, and now our faith is supported by the depth of this man’s understanding. In fact, Martin Luther started as an Augustinian monk.
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” Who is it in your life that shows no signs of faith? The one who has left the church or is leaving. The one who was baptized and never seen again. Jesus promises that the kingdom of God isn’t based on your understanding. Jesus promises that the kingdom of God doesn’t need you to see it for it to happen, for it to be real. You can keep digging up those seeds in your garden to see if they are sprouting yet, but you can’t make it grow all by yourself. You plant. You water. But God gives the growth.
Four decades ago, a little boy was baptized in a small Norweigian church. In the front row, a middle aged lady witnessed the promise, but decades passed without ever seeing that boy again. God told the man Simeon that he would not die before seeing the Messiah, even though the Jews had waited patiently for thousands of years already. God promised Abraham and Sarah that they would have a child, even though Abraham was already a hundred years old and, “as good as dead” as the Bible puts it. Isaac was born and God’s promise was fulfilled. Simeon took the baby Jesus in his arms and praised God.
The kingdom of God is like waiting for a promise even when you should’ve stopped hoping for it long ago. The kingdom of God is like praising God for his timing even when you’ve cursed him for years of forgetting.
A young, handsome seminarian from Minnesota and his beautiful wife and family were waiting for a call into the ministry for much longer than they had expected after graduation. All they really wanted was to serve God and the church . . . that and they really hoped to live in Nebraska where all their family was. But then, after a few emails, a couple of phone calls, and a couple of plane trips, they headed off to Connecticut of all places to a little town and church in Cornwall. But the people of this church, this pastor and his family believed that God still had plans for them, plans for a future and a hope, even though they were all so small, they were a little beaten down, and nobody was really sure how and if it was all going to work out in the end. The kingdom of God is as if . . . well, what IS the kingdom of God? You are living in it!
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how..” The kingdom of God is waiting for a promise and a future that you probably should’ve given up on long ago. The kingdom of God is expecting God to work in the most unlikeliest of places and through the most undeserving of people. The kingdom of God is finding faith where there was only death and despair a moment before. Jesus said, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near, repent, and believe in the good news.” Amen.
I met a lady in North Dakota who lived there all her life. By the time I met her, though, she was in her nineties. She was a twin and, after her husband died, she lived with her twin sister. She had had a stroke, at least one as I can recall, but her sister took care of what needed to be done. While I was on internship, however, this lady had another stroke and that is when I got to know the family much better.
She had grown up in a small rural town in North Dakota, one among many other small towns in North Dakota that now has houses lying abandoned on the side of the road that you look at briefly as you fly by on your way to your real destination. She was a teacher, as was her sister, and attended church all her life. One of the funny stories that was told about her was that one night in Lent there was a horrible North Dakota snowstorm that kept everyone from coming. Everyone except for these two ninety year old twins, who called to get a ride from a 95 year old man so that they wouldn’t be dangerous.
But as I mentioned, by the time I met this lady, she had had a stroke and couldn’t really respond to anything I or anyone else said. She got to get out of the hospital briefly, but then was placed back soon after into a nursing home for the end of her life. I visited her often there, spoke to her without ever getting any response for months, just like most everyone else in her family that came and visited. But one time, as she laid there, after weeks and weeks in her trance, the family and I held hands around her bedside and said the Lord’s Prayer. And as we said the prayer, her lips began to move and mouth the prayer with us. A couple of weeks later she died.
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” The kingdom of God is like a ninety year old woman who comes out her stroke induced trance to mouth the Lord’s Prayer with her family, one last time, when everyone had given up hope.
Augustine of Hippo, Saint Augustine as you and I might know him now, was the son of a pagan father and a Christian mother in North Africa. He was sent to study in Carthage, known for its great education system, in order to become a lawyer, teacher or some other well-respected profession. Among other things, Augustine took on a concubine and lived with this woman he was not married to for around fourteen years, even having a son with her. He joined various Christian movements outside of the mainstream, but was always quite skeptical of the Christian faith and, as he said later, was really just waiting and looking for another plausible alternative. He was a rational being and didn’t like the idea of having to have something as ephemeral as “faith” in order to prove himself; he was much more interested in his career and in having a good time. As he put it, he was “panting after honors, profits, and marriage”. He was like a lot college graduates you might know today.
Then in a garden in Milan, Italy he overheard a children’s riddle being yelled over and over again on a street nearby, “Take and read, take and read”. Finding a Bible handy, he opened it and read this verse from Romans, “let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.” Augustine realized that his inner search for truth and his outward behavior didn’t make sense placed side by side. He would soon become baptized and then become a pastor and then, eventually, a bishop in the Roman Catholic Church. He is one of the most celebrated Christian leaders in history.
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” The kingdom of God is like a man bent on his own pleasure and power, with a wife at home and a woman on the side, with a mind focused on wisdom and rationality, suddenly leaving it all behind and becoming a pillar of the Christian faith because he heard a children’s riddle and read a verse of the Bible one day. No one knows how this happened, but it did, and now our faith is supported by the depth of this man’s understanding. In fact, Martin Luther started as an Augustinian monk.
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” Who is it in your life that shows no signs of faith? The one who has left the church or is leaving. The one who was baptized and never seen again. Jesus promises that the kingdom of God isn’t based on your understanding. Jesus promises that the kingdom of God doesn’t need you to see it for it to happen, for it to be real. You can keep digging up those seeds in your garden to see if they are sprouting yet, but you can’t make it grow all by yourself. You plant. You water. But God gives the growth.
Four decades ago, a little boy was baptized in a small Norweigian church. In the front row, a middle aged lady witnessed the promise, but decades passed without ever seeing that boy again. God told the man Simeon that he would not die before seeing the Messiah, even though the Jews had waited patiently for thousands of years already. God promised Abraham and Sarah that they would have a child, even though Abraham was already a hundred years old and, “as good as dead” as the Bible puts it. Isaac was born and God’s promise was fulfilled. Simeon took the baby Jesus in his arms and praised God.
The kingdom of God is like waiting for a promise even when you should’ve stopped hoping for it long ago. The kingdom of God is like praising God for his timing even when you’ve cursed him for years of forgetting.
A young, handsome seminarian from Minnesota and his beautiful wife and family were waiting for a call into the ministry for much longer than they had expected after graduation. All they really wanted was to serve God and the church . . . that and they really hoped to live in Nebraska where all their family was. But then, after a few emails, a couple of phone calls, and a couple of plane trips, they headed off to Connecticut of all places to a little town and church in Cornwall. But the people of this church, this pastor and his family believed that God still had plans for them, plans for a future and a hope, even though they were all so small, they were a little beaten down, and nobody was really sure how and if it was all going to work out in the end. The kingdom of God is as if . . . well, what IS the kingdom of God? You are living in it!
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how..” The kingdom of God is waiting for a promise and a future that you probably should’ve given up on long ago. The kingdom of God is expecting God to work in the most unlikeliest of places and through the most undeserving of people. The kingdom of God is finding faith where there was only death and despair a moment before. Jesus said, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near, repent, and believe in the good news.” Amen.
Sunday, June 7, 2009
Sermon for June 7th
Let me read for you a few statements, “The nice part about being a Lutheran is that we read the Bible ourselves and don’t have anyone else telling us what to think.” “Martin Luther fought against the authority of the Roman Catholic church so that Christians could decide for themselves what they wanted to believe.” “What you decide the Bible means for you is just as true as what someone else decides the Bible means for them.” “There are no facts, only interpretations.”
That last quote was by Fredrich Nietzsche, but all the others are anonymous quotes I have heard said from time to time. Many times Lutherans, as well as Protestant denominations, as well as non-denominations, think of the Bible in this way, “There are no facts, only interpretations.” Luther is considered to be the hero of the Bible, proclaiming the emancipation of God’s Word so that every man, woman and child could read it themselves and interpret it themselves without the authority of the church telling everyone what to think and do. But while Martin Luther and the Reformation definitely did promote the reading of scripture by the masses, rather than by the educated elite, we are misled if we think he was reacting against all authority. On the contrary, Luther promoted an authority that, for most of us, is more difficult and hard-nosed to deal with than any other. Luther argued that Scripture is the final authority over all church authorities and, most importantly, the final authority over every single particular reader and interpreter. The Bible is your final authority.
“Scripture interprets itself,” Luther argued. But based on the few statements I read at the very beginning of this sermon, we tend to disagree. We like being in charge. We like being the subject. The Bible, the Scriptures, are simply another book, an object for our use. And, as an object we read it, study it, challenge it, discuss it, critique it and, finally, judge it based on our own interpretations and experiences.
If you’ve ever been in a pottery clinic, or molded clay with your fingers, you understand the difference between a subject and an object. A subject is something that does things, makes decisions, makes choices, manipulates things and creates things. An object just sits there, passively, is done to, is manipulated and is created. When a subject meets an object, the object has a chance to be changed, but the subject stays the same.
“Scripture interprets itself,” Luther argued. Why? Because Scripture is the cradle of Jesus Christ. It carries the message of salvation to all the world. And, as the book of Hebrews puts it, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Jesus does not change, no matter how we interpret him. No matter how we argue about what he did or what he said. Reading the Bible, then, is a much more dangerous activity than you might suppose. It is true that there is no one else who can authoritatively demand that you think of a passage in a particular way—no one gets to decide what is true in scripture and what is not. However, when the Reformation took the final authority away from the pope, the bishops and the church, it was also taken away from you. The final authority over all of us is Jesus Christ and when you read or hear God’s Word in scripture, both in the commandments and in the promises, you are at risk of being changed. You are no longer the subject reading along in a story, deciding the truth as you go—you are the object of the story. You can expect to be changed.
There is no better time to remind you of this than on Trinity Sunday, which, by the way, is today. If I were to ask you to raise your hands, how many of you would say that you believe in the Trinity, that God is truly only one God and yet known in three persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit? Some of you would, no doubt, not raise your hands because you didn’t think it is important to believe in. You would be testing your abilities at being your own subject against any other authority that would have you believe otherwise. To believe in the Trinity would undermine your own authority to believe whatever you wanted to believe in.
Some of you, when posed with this question about the authenticity of the Holy Trinity would say that yes, you believe it. Why? Well, because that is what you were taught in Sunday School, or in confirmation or by a pastor along the way. The church has believed in the Trinity for centuries and, since you are a Christian, you believe it as well. The problem is that you probably don’t believe that the church is a reliable authority anymore, you certainly wouldn’t want to give up your freedom to believe whatever you wanted just in order to believe in the Trinity would you? To believe in the authority of the church would undermine your own authority as well.
Some of you would say that you believed in the Trinity because the Bible told you so, but you probably couldn’t tell me where. You probably couldn’t tell me exactly why I should believe you. And, even if you could, I could just argue back with my own Bible verses that said why God is NOT a Trinity and, since you would want to keep your own authority to read the Bible as you choose, who would you be to disagree with me? To argue with my interpretation would undermine your own authority to interpret.
As long as you think of yourself as a neverending subject in a world full of objects to be manipulated, interpreted and judged by you, you will never believe in the Trinity, nor will you ever have faith in Jesus Christ. Why? Because your authority will always interfere with the authority Jesus Christ has over you. You will not want a God, you will want to be a god. You will not want a Savior, you will want to save yourself. You will not want to receive the Holy Spirit, you will want to be holy in yourself.
But do not fear, for you are not a neverending subject in a world full of objects. You are simply a creature—an object with a definite and distinct subject. You were created. You are loved. You were died for. You were set apart. You are under judgment. You have been saved. You are blessed. You are forgiven. God is the subject of all the verbs and you are the object of the story of Scripture from the beginning to the end. It might be difficult to see yourself in it, but you are there. In every commandment God made for your wellbeing and in every act of forgiveness that someone didn’t deserve. You are the world God so loved that he gave his only Son. You are the one who was created so long ago. You are the one born again by water and the Spirit.
There are certainly lots of ways that we can read and interpret scripture. Just look at all the denominations out there and you will see what happens when we all decide we’ve got the truth and that we are the subject interpreting the truth of scripture. However, just because we can and often do interpret scripture for our own means and for our own uses does not mean that we are finally the ones who get to decide what is right and what is wrong, who is saved and who is not. When Jesus says that he died so that you might have eternal life, he doesn’t ask you how you interpret what he is saying. He just does it for you. If that makes you feel objectified or like a piece of meat, that is because you can longer pretend that you are the one in charge. God is.
I do not demand that you believe in the Trinity. The church does not demand that you believe it either. But as you read scripture, you will find that God has molded you. God has saved you. God has given you faith. The Trinity has happened to you. God is your subject and you are his object or, to put it more biblically, “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”
That last quote was by Fredrich Nietzsche, but all the others are anonymous quotes I have heard said from time to time. Many times Lutherans, as well as Protestant denominations, as well as non-denominations, think of the Bible in this way, “There are no facts, only interpretations.” Luther is considered to be the hero of the Bible, proclaiming the emancipation of God’s Word so that every man, woman and child could read it themselves and interpret it themselves without the authority of the church telling everyone what to think and do. But while Martin Luther and the Reformation definitely did promote the reading of scripture by the masses, rather than by the educated elite, we are misled if we think he was reacting against all authority. On the contrary, Luther promoted an authority that, for most of us, is more difficult and hard-nosed to deal with than any other. Luther argued that Scripture is the final authority over all church authorities and, most importantly, the final authority over every single particular reader and interpreter. The Bible is your final authority.
“Scripture interprets itself,” Luther argued. But based on the few statements I read at the very beginning of this sermon, we tend to disagree. We like being in charge. We like being the subject. The Bible, the Scriptures, are simply another book, an object for our use. And, as an object we read it, study it, challenge it, discuss it, critique it and, finally, judge it based on our own interpretations and experiences.
If you’ve ever been in a pottery clinic, or molded clay with your fingers, you understand the difference between a subject and an object. A subject is something that does things, makes decisions, makes choices, manipulates things and creates things. An object just sits there, passively, is done to, is manipulated and is created. When a subject meets an object, the object has a chance to be changed, but the subject stays the same.
“Scripture interprets itself,” Luther argued. Why? Because Scripture is the cradle of Jesus Christ. It carries the message of salvation to all the world. And, as the book of Hebrews puts it, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Jesus does not change, no matter how we interpret him. No matter how we argue about what he did or what he said. Reading the Bible, then, is a much more dangerous activity than you might suppose. It is true that there is no one else who can authoritatively demand that you think of a passage in a particular way—no one gets to decide what is true in scripture and what is not. However, when the Reformation took the final authority away from the pope, the bishops and the church, it was also taken away from you. The final authority over all of us is Jesus Christ and when you read or hear God’s Word in scripture, both in the commandments and in the promises, you are at risk of being changed. You are no longer the subject reading along in a story, deciding the truth as you go—you are the object of the story. You can expect to be changed.
There is no better time to remind you of this than on Trinity Sunday, which, by the way, is today. If I were to ask you to raise your hands, how many of you would say that you believe in the Trinity, that God is truly only one God and yet known in three persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit? Some of you would, no doubt, not raise your hands because you didn’t think it is important to believe in. You would be testing your abilities at being your own subject against any other authority that would have you believe otherwise. To believe in the Trinity would undermine your own authority to believe whatever you wanted to believe in.
Some of you, when posed with this question about the authenticity of the Holy Trinity would say that yes, you believe it. Why? Well, because that is what you were taught in Sunday School, or in confirmation or by a pastor along the way. The church has believed in the Trinity for centuries and, since you are a Christian, you believe it as well. The problem is that you probably don’t believe that the church is a reliable authority anymore, you certainly wouldn’t want to give up your freedom to believe whatever you wanted just in order to believe in the Trinity would you? To believe in the authority of the church would undermine your own authority as well.
Some of you would say that you believed in the Trinity because the Bible told you so, but you probably couldn’t tell me where. You probably couldn’t tell me exactly why I should believe you. And, even if you could, I could just argue back with my own Bible verses that said why God is NOT a Trinity and, since you would want to keep your own authority to read the Bible as you choose, who would you be to disagree with me? To argue with my interpretation would undermine your own authority to interpret.
As long as you think of yourself as a neverending subject in a world full of objects to be manipulated, interpreted and judged by you, you will never believe in the Trinity, nor will you ever have faith in Jesus Christ. Why? Because your authority will always interfere with the authority Jesus Christ has over you. You will not want a God, you will want to be a god. You will not want a Savior, you will want to save yourself. You will not want to receive the Holy Spirit, you will want to be holy in yourself.
But do not fear, for you are not a neverending subject in a world full of objects. You are simply a creature—an object with a definite and distinct subject. You were created. You are loved. You were died for. You were set apart. You are under judgment. You have been saved. You are blessed. You are forgiven. God is the subject of all the verbs and you are the object of the story of Scripture from the beginning to the end. It might be difficult to see yourself in it, but you are there. In every commandment God made for your wellbeing and in every act of forgiveness that someone didn’t deserve. You are the world God so loved that he gave his only Son. You are the one who was created so long ago. You are the one born again by water and the Spirit.
There are certainly lots of ways that we can read and interpret scripture. Just look at all the denominations out there and you will see what happens when we all decide we’ve got the truth and that we are the subject interpreting the truth of scripture. However, just because we can and often do interpret scripture for our own means and for our own uses does not mean that we are finally the ones who get to decide what is right and what is wrong, who is saved and who is not. When Jesus says that he died so that you might have eternal life, he doesn’t ask you how you interpret what he is saying. He just does it for you. If that makes you feel objectified or like a piece of meat, that is because you can longer pretend that you are the one in charge. God is.
I do not demand that you believe in the Trinity. The church does not demand that you believe it either. But as you read scripture, you will find that God has molded you. God has saved you. God has given you faith. The Trinity has happened to you. God is your subject and you are his object or, to put it more biblically, “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”
Monday, June 1, 2009
Sermon for May 31st - Confirmation Sunday
As I announced at the beginning of our service, today is a day of celebration for this congregation. It is the day when four young adults from within our midst will be affirming the promises God gave them at their baptism. We call this their confirmation. But in the Lutheran church, confirmation is thought of much differently than in many other denominations so, while you may have a general idea or impression about what is going to happen today, you might still wonder what all the fuss is about or whether it means much of anything.
For some churches and denominations, confirmation is the completion of baptism. When a child is baptized, or dedicated as some traditions call it, the understanding is that the parents promise to raise their child in the faith but, since they believe a child is too young to understand or believe anything, it is not until confirmation that a child can be old enough to enter into a full relationship with God. As a friend of mine from another faith tradition puts it, a relationship with God is like a marriage, where both the believer and God must say, “I do” or else there is no real commitment. Following this line of thinking, confirmation would be the time in a young person’s life where they “make up their mind” after a long drawn out engagement. It is a “coming of age” ceremony, a kind of Christian debutante ball inviting those chosen into the high society of a congregation.
When the event of confirmation is seen in this way, the confirmation classes leading up to the ceremony are pushed in a particular direction. The teaching, reading and the conversation are all aimed at one important goal: a conversion experience. Somehow, the pastor must motivate the youth to believe what a Christian is supposed to believe and really mean it too and prove it at the confirmation ceremony. You can lead a horse to water, they say, but you can’t make it take a drink. But many pastors in many different churches understand that they have two or three years to motivate, scold, pressure, educate and plead to their young horses to take a drink from the fountain of every blessing, Jesus Christ himself. If and when it happens, the pastor is affirmed and so are the confirmands.
Another traditional understanding of confirmation seeks not a conversion experience but an acceptance of responsibility. This tradition believes that while original sin is forgiven at baptism, there is still a smoldering tinder of sin always lingering, ready to get those young men and women in hot water with God. So, when a child gets to the proper age, they learn to take responsibility for confessing their sins and being absolved. But in order to help fend off the temptation to sin in their lives, they need to learn as much as possible about Jesus Christ. Therefore, the pastor, or priest, seeks to educate confirmands so that they understand what is expected of them in their relationship with God and the church. Confirmation is about leading those horses to water and teaching them the benefits of drinking it and the need to drink it often.
Confirmation in the Lutheran church is different than either one of these other possibilities. At confirmation, we do not expect our children to prove their faith, but to affirm the promise that God made to them so long ago. Jesus says, “You did not choose me. I chose you.” During the three years of confirmation, my prayer is that these four young adults, Sam, Meredith, Phillip and Stephen have learned these promises of God. They may not know exactly what they think of God, I pray that God blesses them with many more years to figure it out, but they do know what God thinks of them. Whether or not you were confirmed in the Lutheran church, you also may no know exactly what you think of God. But I pray that you now hear what God thinks of you: at your baptism, you were made God’s beloved child forever. Your sins were forgiven once and forever and God’s promise of eternal life was given to you—no strings attached. “For the call and promise of God are unthwartable.”
Responsibility for your faith does not finally lie in your hands—it lies in God’s hands. But, just as with those who will be confirmed later this morning, though I pray that you will continue to worship God consistently and stay firm in God’s Word, I also know that you are sinners. I know it from personal experience with you as well as from what the Bible says about all humankind, “No one is righteous, not even one.” Jesus told stories like the prodigal son and the lost sheep, not because they are just sweet stories, but because that is a much more common experience for people like us. You may not be a young teenager, but you may still find yourself missing from church more often than you should be, doubting God and even questioning your faith, but remember God’s promise, “My sheep hear my voice, they know me and they follow me, I give them eternal life and nothing will snatch them out of my hand.” Nothing will separate you from God’s love.
In the Lutheran church, when we bring in our young stallions, neighing and stomping with wild unbridled hormones for confirmation classes, we don’t tell them only the benefits of drinking water or attempt to motivate them to take a drink for their own good. We get a bucket of that water and throw it at them, drenching them with the promises of God over and over again. We don’t use confirmation class to demand faith—we give faith—we teach faith. Confirmation is not about trying to tickle the free wills of these young Christians into great feats of faith. Instead, like the rest of us, we believe that they are so bound up in sin that they are unable to freely do anything. So, we give them Jesus Christ so that they might know the freedom of life in him.
In fact, this is the same thing that we do at our weekly worship services. For while you may not have to stand up in the front and give an accounting of the hope that lies within you, each week God’s love and his spirit is poured out upon you and you must make your confession. Just like the confirmands, God gave you each a promise at your baptism and he will continue forgiving you and pursuing you all the days of your life. Today, just like them, you will confess that yes, indeed you know that God has made you these promises. You’ve heard it. You’ve learned it. You believe it actually happened to you. Not because of your own understanding or strength does God love you, but because you are his chosen—his beloved.
Jesus Christ died for each one of you to free you from sin, death and the Devil. For those of you who were baptized, you were each named and claimed by Jesus Christ a long time ago, but this promise is still yours today. For you, as a Christian, everyday is your confirmation day, for at any time, God may call upon you to confess your faith. When the time comes, I pray that you will find strength not in your own power to believe, but in God’s power to give you faith. Not in your own ability to drink water, but in the fact that you are still wet from the grace poured out on your minute after minute in your life. And just as we will pray that the Holy Spirit fills the hearts of the youth in a couple hours with faith to empower them to continue living in the love of Christ, I pray that the Holy Spirit also fills your heart and mind with faith, love, peace and joy to continue in the amazing grace God has given you.
Let us pray, “Father in heaven, for Jesus’ sake, stir up in these people the gift of your Holy Spirit; confirm their faith, guide their lives, empower them in their serving, give them patience in suffering and bring them to everlasting life.” Amen.
For some churches and denominations, confirmation is the completion of baptism. When a child is baptized, or dedicated as some traditions call it, the understanding is that the parents promise to raise their child in the faith but, since they believe a child is too young to understand or believe anything, it is not until confirmation that a child can be old enough to enter into a full relationship with God. As a friend of mine from another faith tradition puts it, a relationship with God is like a marriage, where both the believer and God must say, “I do” or else there is no real commitment. Following this line of thinking, confirmation would be the time in a young person’s life where they “make up their mind” after a long drawn out engagement. It is a “coming of age” ceremony, a kind of Christian debutante ball inviting those chosen into the high society of a congregation.
When the event of confirmation is seen in this way, the confirmation classes leading up to the ceremony are pushed in a particular direction. The teaching, reading and the conversation are all aimed at one important goal: a conversion experience. Somehow, the pastor must motivate the youth to believe what a Christian is supposed to believe and really mean it too and prove it at the confirmation ceremony. You can lead a horse to water, they say, but you can’t make it take a drink. But many pastors in many different churches understand that they have two or three years to motivate, scold, pressure, educate and plead to their young horses to take a drink from the fountain of every blessing, Jesus Christ himself. If and when it happens, the pastor is affirmed and so are the confirmands.
Another traditional understanding of confirmation seeks not a conversion experience but an acceptance of responsibility. This tradition believes that while original sin is forgiven at baptism, there is still a smoldering tinder of sin always lingering, ready to get those young men and women in hot water with God. So, when a child gets to the proper age, they learn to take responsibility for confessing their sins and being absolved. But in order to help fend off the temptation to sin in their lives, they need to learn as much as possible about Jesus Christ. Therefore, the pastor, or priest, seeks to educate confirmands so that they understand what is expected of them in their relationship with God and the church. Confirmation is about leading those horses to water and teaching them the benefits of drinking it and the need to drink it often.
Confirmation in the Lutheran church is different than either one of these other possibilities. At confirmation, we do not expect our children to prove their faith, but to affirm the promise that God made to them so long ago. Jesus says, “You did not choose me. I chose you.” During the three years of confirmation, my prayer is that these four young adults, Sam, Meredith, Phillip and Stephen have learned these promises of God. They may not know exactly what they think of God, I pray that God blesses them with many more years to figure it out, but they do know what God thinks of them. Whether or not you were confirmed in the Lutheran church, you also may no know exactly what you think of God. But I pray that you now hear what God thinks of you: at your baptism, you were made God’s beloved child forever. Your sins were forgiven once and forever and God’s promise of eternal life was given to you—no strings attached. “For the call and promise of God are unthwartable.”
Responsibility for your faith does not finally lie in your hands—it lies in God’s hands. But, just as with those who will be confirmed later this morning, though I pray that you will continue to worship God consistently and stay firm in God’s Word, I also know that you are sinners. I know it from personal experience with you as well as from what the Bible says about all humankind, “No one is righteous, not even one.” Jesus told stories like the prodigal son and the lost sheep, not because they are just sweet stories, but because that is a much more common experience for people like us. You may not be a young teenager, but you may still find yourself missing from church more often than you should be, doubting God and even questioning your faith, but remember God’s promise, “My sheep hear my voice, they know me and they follow me, I give them eternal life and nothing will snatch them out of my hand.” Nothing will separate you from God’s love.
In the Lutheran church, when we bring in our young stallions, neighing and stomping with wild unbridled hormones for confirmation classes, we don’t tell them only the benefits of drinking water or attempt to motivate them to take a drink for their own good. We get a bucket of that water and throw it at them, drenching them with the promises of God over and over again. We don’t use confirmation class to demand faith—we give faith—we teach faith. Confirmation is not about trying to tickle the free wills of these young Christians into great feats of faith. Instead, like the rest of us, we believe that they are so bound up in sin that they are unable to freely do anything. So, we give them Jesus Christ so that they might know the freedom of life in him.
In fact, this is the same thing that we do at our weekly worship services. For while you may not have to stand up in the front and give an accounting of the hope that lies within you, each week God’s love and his spirit is poured out upon you and you must make your confession. Just like the confirmands, God gave you each a promise at your baptism and he will continue forgiving you and pursuing you all the days of your life. Today, just like them, you will confess that yes, indeed you know that God has made you these promises. You’ve heard it. You’ve learned it. You believe it actually happened to you. Not because of your own understanding or strength does God love you, but because you are his chosen—his beloved.
Jesus Christ died for each one of you to free you from sin, death and the Devil. For those of you who were baptized, you were each named and claimed by Jesus Christ a long time ago, but this promise is still yours today. For you, as a Christian, everyday is your confirmation day, for at any time, God may call upon you to confess your faith. When the time comes, I pray that you will find strength not in your own power to believe, but in God’s power to give you faith. Not in your own ability to drink water, but in the fact that you are still wet from the grace poured out on your minute after minute in your life. And just as we will pray that the Holy Spirit fills the hearts of the youth in a couple hours with faith to empower them to continue living in the love of Christ, I pray that the Holy Spirit also fills your heart and mind with faith, love, peace and joy to continue in the amazing grace God has given you.
Let us pray, “Father in heaven, for Jesus’ sake, stir up in these people the gift of your Holy Spirit; confirm their faith, guide their lives, empower them in their serving, give them patience in suffering and bring them to everlasting life.” Amen.
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