SUNDAY, MAY 30, 2010
Holy Trinity Sunday
"The Breaking of the Bread"
The English writer GK Chesterton was a famously eccentric man, full of wisdom and silliness in almost equal measure.
He wrote wonderful mystery novels, and magazine articles and books about Christianity.
He also weighed over 300 pounds and wandered about London in the early 20th century wearing a cape and a broad brimmed hat and carrying a cane.
He once sent a telegram to his wife that said, "I am at Trafalgar Square. Where am I supposed to be?"
Someone once asked him the old party question; "If you were stranded on a deserted island for a year, what one book would you want with you?" expecting, I'm sure, some variation on KJV, Shakespeare, BCP, etc.
Chesterton said, "If I were stranded on a deserted island I think I should like to have a Guide to Practical Shipbuilding." (P. Yancey, Soul Survivor, p.45)
The preaching and teaching for this Spiritual Renewal Weekend have focused on being a guide to practical church building, an encouragement toward being the sort of community that recognizes as its primary purpose the care and feeding of souls.
To that end we have focused on a theme of being "Simply Church," building on the words of ACTS 2:42 "They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers."
Friday night we dealt with devotion to Apostles' teaching as a life time commitment to living in and struggling with God's word in community, yesterday at Hinton Center we talked about and prayed about the interplay of prayer and community and how you really can't have one without another.
This morning we will address what the breaking of the bread means for us, both as an image of Communion and as a call to love and serve the world.
Pray with me please: Pour out your Holy Spirit on us gathered here, and on these gifts of bread and wine, Make them be for us the body and blood of Christ, that we may be for the world the body of Christ, redeemed by his blood. Amen (United Methodist Hymnal, p.10)
Those words come from the standard United Methodist Eucharistic prayer.
The Presbyterians say it this way: "As this bread is Christ's body for us, send us out to be the body of Christ in the world." (Book of Common Worship, various places)
This morning we will explore the relationship between calling this bread on this table the Body of Christ
and calling these people gathered in this room (that would be us, you and me) the Body of Christ;
and the fact that the Body of Christ was broken on the cross for us,
and the Body of Christ is broken on the table for us,
and we, the Body of Christ,
are then called to be broken and sent out in service to the world.
We begin with the Bible, with our reading from Romans, particularly the first two verses:
Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand. . ."
THIS GRACE IN WHICH WE STAND
This is the golden thread, the recurring theme, he constant refrain that runs through the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation.
God has chosen us, all of us, to be God's beloved people.
God, in an act of creation like the creation of the world itself, spoke this relationship of Grace and Love into being.
God said, "I WILL be your God, and you WILL be my people." And it was so.
Have you seen the billboards with cute little quotes signed God? I saw the funniest one I've ever seen somewhere in TN. "Don't make me come down there!" - God
I don't know who pays for those ads or who writes them, but I realized that on this one they have missed the point.
The ad echoes the parent who threatens punishment if the kids don't straighten up and fly right.
It implies that when God comes "down here," it's going to get ugly.
The fact is, our inability to live up to our end of the divine covenant of Grace has already prompted God to come "down here," and in the long run, that was a good thing. Not so good for Jesus, but good for us.
The life, death and resurrection of Jesus happened because God refused to give up on us.
The Christ event created a new covenant of Grace, for a new agreement of love, a New Testament signed in the blood of the Cross, as Paul says in Romans:Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand."
From the Day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples
and threw them out to witness in the streets,
and three thousand repented and were baptized,
God's people have been bound together in communities known as churches.
And from the very beginning two things were very clear:
1) The church does not create itself; Rather the church is created by God the Holy Spirit which, in Luther's words in the Small Catechism: "calls, gathers, enlightens and empowers" us for ministry, and 2) When they gathered, they "broke bread."
It is when we come to the table that a lot of images erupt and compete for space in awareness.
Jesus holding up bread and proclaiming "this is my body," and then feeding it to his disciples.
Paul referring to the church, the covenant community as "the body of Christ."
Jesus' body broken and bleeding on the cross for us, for the world.
Jesus saying that when we feed the hungry and clothe the naked, when we do these things for the least of these, we have done it for him.
When we roll all that up together in our hearts and mull it over in our minds, we come out knowing that the breaking of the bread is more than a fellowship meal shared amongst like-minded religious folk who like each other.
It's also more than a weekly reminder of our individual and personal salvation and relationship of love and forgiveness with God in Christ.
Eucharist, Communion, the breaking of the bread, is when everything about our faith and life comes together and comes alive.
It is when we receive into ourselves the bread and wine that are most aware of God's Grace in Christ.
It is when we receive the sacrifice and love Jesus poured out on the cross for us.
It is when we receive the sweet healing of the Holy Spirit poured out for us at Pentecost.
It is when that same spirits pulls together into a communion community as the body of Christ.
So that when we rise from this table as the body of Christ in the world,the Spirit then sends us out from the breaking of the bread to be broken in service to the world.
Let us pray: Pour out your Holy Spirit on us gathered here, and on these gifts of bread and wine. Make them be for us the body and blood of Christ, that we may be for the world the body of Christ, redeemed by his blood.
Amen and amen
Monday, May 31, 2010
Friday, May 14, 2010
Easter 7; May 16, 2010
EASTER 7, May 16, 2010
Texts: Acts 16:6-10; Revelation 22:12-17, 20; John 17:20-26
A sermon preached at Christ Lutheran Church, Nashville TN.
"Simon Says" is one of my favorite kids' games. It's a very simple game.
One person is Simon and everyone else lines up and Simon calls out instructions and the kids try to obey them:
Simons says - take three giant steps;
Simons says - hop on one foot;
Simon says - scratch your nose.
Now here's the fun part; you can only do those things preceded by the words Simon says. If the leader says "pat your tummy" without first saying "Simon says," and you pat your tummy, you're out! Last one standing wins.
In our first lesson, Paul and Barnabas play "Simon Says" with God. It would take a little while to explain the geography, but the short form is Paul and Barnabas kept running into closed doors when they tried to go North to preach. God kept saying, "You're out. I didn't say Simon Says!"
Why did Paul and Barnabas keep going the wrong way before they went the right way? Why did they keep bumping into closed doors before they found one that was open?
If we're honest, all of us will admit that we struggle and get confused in our efforts to understand the will of God. I imagine God gets a little flustered while trying to get through to us.
My old friend Tom Ridenhour, Jr. said to me one time, "Sure Moses saw the burning bush, but how many other signs did Moses miss before God got frustrated and set the woods on fire?"
Tom was kidding, but he had a point; the world is full of the signs of God's grace and will and we all too often miss them.
An important question for us today is WHY IS IT SO HARD FOR US TO HEAR GOD'S VOICE IN OUR LIVES?
What is it on the human side that blocks our channels of communication with God?
One problem is that we live very compartmentalized lives.
Parts of our lives are kept artificially separate from other parts; this is work; this is family; this is play; this is church.
If we only listen for God in that small section of our lives that we call Church or Religion or Spirituality; we're going to miss most of what God has to tell us.
Moses was herding sheep when he stumbled upon the Burning Bush. Not praying; working; attending to the family business.
The prophet Amos was tending sheep and trimming sycamore trees when God got hold of him and wouldn't let him go.
Jesus' disciples were called away from the midst of plying their trades. Leave your nets, close up the tax shop, put down that hammer; follow me.
Martha in her kitchen and the Woman at the well received a word of insight into their lives whilst going about their normal, hum-drum, daily chores.
God is no less active in the commonalities of our lives.
But, we must be looking, we must be listening. In Jesus' memorable phrase, we must "have eyes to see and ears to hear." We must pay attention to our lives in order to hear the voice of God within it.
The book of Hebrews begins with one of my favorite lines in the Bible, "in many and various ways God spoke . . ."
The United Church of Christ has picked up on this theme in recent years with their slogan; GOD IS STILL SPEAKING.
What they say is true, God is still speaking, in many and various ways, calling all of us into love and community.
Perhaps our biggest problem in communicating with God is not that we can't hear God; it's that what we hear displeases us.
Mark Twain once said that he had noticed that many people were upset about the parts of the Bible they didn't understand.
Twain said, "As for me, I am more disturbed by the parts I DO understand."
I get that.
Drop everything and follow me, turn the other cheek, sell all and give to the poor, love your enemies, love your neighbor, turn your backs on your family for the sake of the kingdom of God, these things disturb me. I had rather that Jesus had never said them.
But since I am convinced that he did say them, I must confess I have all too often dealt with these uncomfortable callings by pretending not to understand.
This is a technique perfected as a teenager.
One arrives home from school. There is a note on the table spelling out chores to be done. (I'm old, this is old school. These days the parent would text the list of chores, but you get the idea.)
One is unhappy; one had plans, important plans; which mostly consisted of lying around watching TV and talking on the phone to my friends. (Though I'm old, teenagers haven't changed much in 40 years.) What to do?
Well the answer was to do little, or as little as possible and then plead ignorance when Mama got home?
I didn't know if you meant weed the flower garden or the vegetable garden.
I couldn't find the gas can for the lawn-mower.
I didn't know how much detergent to use and I was afraid of messing up the clothes.
Mother was not amused. And I am fairly certain she was not fooled.
And I am fairly certain that God is neither fooled nor amused by our equally inept protestations of ignorance about what we have been called to do in the world.
It is only because we are loathe to obey that we pretend not to hear or to understand. It was only when Paul stopped trying to do things his own way; to follow his own desire to go North and preach in Asia, that God's way into Macedonia became clear and open to him.
A few years ago, Unitarian Minister Robert Fulghum had a best seller called "Everything I Ever Needed to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten."
His point was both simple and profound. It is in Kindergarten that we learn the basic principles of being a civil human being in a group. The groups we are in and the problems they face grow ever more complex, but the principles of civility never change.
In much the same way, we don't need special signs from God to know God's will and God's way for us in the world; it is both simple and profound.
As a Church, a community of Christ, we are called to "preach the word and administer the sacraments;" that is, to teach and live the reality of God's love in Christ with as many people as possible. That's it.
In the words of Jesus himself; "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and mind and soul and your neighbor as yourself."
That is it. That is our calling. And whatever we have to do to make that happen, that is God's will for our lives.
It is really not that hard to understand.
But it is, very, often, very hard to do.
Amen and amen.
Texts: Acts 16:6-10; Revelation 22:12-17, 20; John 17:20-26
A sermon preached at Christ Lutheran Church, Nashville TN.
"Simon Says" is one of my favorite kids' games. It's a very simple game.
One person is Simon and everyone else lines up and Simon calls out instructions and the kids try to obey them:
Simons says - take three giant steps;
Simons says - hop on one foot;
Simon says - scratch your nose.
Now here's the fun part; you can only do those things preceded by the words Simon says. If the leader says "pat your tummy" without first saying "Simon says," and you pat your tummy, you're out! Last one standing wins.
In our first lesson, Paul and Barnabas play "Simon Says" with God. It would take a little while to explain the geography, but the short form is Paul and Barnabas kept running into closed doors when they tried to go North to preach. God kept saying, "You're out. I didn't say Simon Says!"
Why did Paul and Barnabas keep going the wrong way before they went the right way? Why did they keep bumping into closed doors before they found one that was open?
If we're honest, all of us will admit that we struggle and get confused in our efforts to understand the will of God. I imagine God gets a little flustered while trying to get through to us.
My old friend Tom Ridenhour, Jr. said to me one time, "Sure Moses saw the burning bush, but how many other signs did Moses miss before God got frustrated and set the woods on fire?"
Tom was kidding, but he had a point; the world is full of the signs of God's grace and will and we all too often miss them.
An important question for us today is WHY IS IT SO HARD FOR US TO HEAR GOD'S VOICE IN OUR LIVES?
What is it on the human side that blocks our channels of communication with God?
One problem is that we live very compartmentalized lives.
Parts of our lives are kept artificially separate from other parts; this is work; this is family; this is play; this is church.
If we only listen for God in that small section of our lives that we call Church or Religion or Spirituality; we're going to miss most of what God has to tell us.
Moses was herding sheep when he stumbled upon the Burning Bush. Not praying; working; attending to the family business.
The prophet Amos was tending sheep and trimming sycamore trees when God got hold of him and wouldn't let him go.
Jesus' disciples were called away from the midst of plying their trades. Leave your nets, close up the tax shop, put down that hammer; follow me.
Martha in her kitchen and the Woman at the well received a word of insight into their lives whilst going about their normal, hum-drum, daily chores.
God is no less active in the commonalities of our lives.
But, we must be looking, we must be listening. In Jesus' memorable phrase, we must "have eyes to see and ears to hear." We must pay attention to our lives in order to hear the voice of God within it.
The book of Hebrews begins with one of my favorite lines in the Bible, "in many and various ways God spoke . . ."
The United Church of Christ has picked up on this theme in recent years with their slogan; GOD IS STILL SPEAKING.
What they say is true, God is still speaking, in many and various ways, calling all of us into love and community.
Perhaps our biggest problem in communicating with God is not that we can't hear God; it's that what we hear displeases us.
Mark Twain once said that he had noticed that many people were upset about the parts of the Bible they didn't understand.
Twain said, "As for me, I am more disturbed by the parts I DO understand."
I get that.
Drop everything and follow me, turn the other cheek, sell all and give to the poor, love your enemies, love your neighbor, turn your backs on your family for the sake of the kingdom of God, these things disturb me. I had rather that Jesus had never said them.
But since I am convinced that he did say them, I must confess I have all too often dealt with these uncomfortable callings by pretending not to understand.
This is a technique perfected as a teenager.
One arrives home from school. There is a note on the table spelling out chores to be done. (I'm old, this is old school. These days the parent would text the list of chores, but you get the idea.)
One is unhappy; one had plans, important plans; which mostly consisted of lying around watching TV and talking on the phone to my friends. (Though I'm old, teenagers haven't changed much in 40 years.) What to do?
Well the answer was to do little, or as little as possible and then plead ignorance when Mama got home?
I didn't know if you meant weed the flower garden or the vegetable garden.
I couldn't find the gas can for the lawn-mower.
I didn't know how much detergent to use and I was afraid of messing up the clothes.
Mother was not amused. And I am fairly certain she was not fooled.
And I am fairly certain that God is neither fooled nor amused by our equally inept protestations of ignorance about what we have been called to do in the world.
It is only because we are loathe to obey that we pretend not to hear or to understand. It was only when Paul stopped trying to do things his own way; to follow his own desire to go North and preach in Asia, that God's way into Macedonia became clear and open to him.
A few years ago, Unitarian Minister Robert Fulghum had a best seller called "Everything I Ever Needed to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten."
His point was both simple and profound. It is in Kindergarten that we learn the basic principles of being a civil human being in a group. The groups we are in and the problems they face grow ever more complex, but the principles of civility never change.
In much the same way, we don't need special signs from God to know God's will and God's way for us in the world; it is both simple and profound.
As a Church, a community of Christ, we are called to "preach the word and administer the sacraments;" that is, to teach and live the reality of God's love in Christ with as many people as possible. That's it.
In the words of Jesus himself; "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and mind and soul and your neighbor as yourself."
That is it. That is our calling. And whatever we have to do to make that happen, that is God's will for our lives.
It is really not that hard to understand.
But it is, very, often, very hard to do.
Amen and amen.
Friday, April 23, 2010
Easter 4, April 25, 2010
THE FOURTH SUNDAY OF EASTER April 25, 2010
A sermon preached at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, Knoxville, TN
Text: John 10:22-30
In my little backyard converted shed office, I have a couple thousand books arranged on a variety of yard sale bookcases.
As I wrote this sermon, my coffee cup rested on a shelf that contains what I call my "Jesus books." In recent years, there have been a huge number of books written and debate hashed out about who Jesus was, or if he really was.I own over 30 of these books, and that's just a small part of all that's out there. They have titles like:
"Will the Real Jesus Please Stand up?"
"The Misunderstood Jew,"
"Who Was Jesus?"
"Lord or Legend?"
"Looking for Jesus,"
"The Real Jesus,"
"What Jesus Meant,"
and my favorite title: "Cynic Sage or Son of God?"
For over 2000 years the world and the church have wrestled with the question of the true identity of the wandering preacher from Galilee.The whole of Chapter 10 in John deals with this. Who does he say he is? Does his walk match his talk? Is he for real? Are the signs to be believed?
In verse 24 the people ask Jesus - Are you the Messiah? Are you the one sent from God? Jesus' answer points to actions as keys to identity, the idea that behavior reveals character.
He asks them, Do I act and talk like a Messiah, like a true king of Israel? Are the things I say and do for the benefit of the people?Do I honor God with the way I live my life?"
In the first part of chapter 10, Jesus has talked about being the Shepherd of the sheep, about how the sheep hear the true shepherd's voice and follow, about the willingness of the shepherd to lay down his life for the sheep. In verses 7 through 11 Jesus contrasts this with bad shepherds; "all who came before me are thieves and bandits." He then says that he is "the good shepherd."
In today's lesson, in verse 27, he again picks up the protective and caring shepherd theme. It may be helpful to us to think not in terms of good and bad, but rather in terms of true versus false; or real versus pretend; or fake versus genuine; or perhaps faithless versus faithful.
What Jesus lays claim to here in this text is to being not a false, not a pretend, not a fake, not a faithless shepherd of Israel; but rather to being a true, a real, a genuine, a faithful shepherd of God's sheep.
The shepherd was a powerful symbol in Israel. For much of their history they were a nomadic people dependent upon their sheep for their livelihood. Because of this, sheep and shepherd imagery was very important. The King was often referred to as the SHEPHERD of Israel, alluding back to King David, the traditional author of the 23rd Psalm. David, a shepherd boy in his youth, is the king by whom all kings are measured.
The ancient kings of Israel were different from the kings of the nations around them. The other kings were held up to be Gods on earth, divine beings in human form. The kings of Israel were not believed to be divine; they were known to be ordinary human beings who represented God on earth and ruled in God's name.
The idea was that God had placed the responsibility for the nation in their hands.The kingdom was not theirs to do with as they pleased. The kingdom was God's and they were to take care of it and God's people in God's name and with God's help. And even great King David failed to do it right all the time.
Between David and Jesus there were many years and many kings, and all the kings of Israel failed in one way or another. None of them lived up to the image of the Good, the True, the Real Shepherd of Israel, especially not the Emperor in Rome or his puppet King Herod. So the people asked; "Are you the Messiah?" "Are you the true Shepherd of the Sheep?""Are you the Saviour of Israel?" And Jesus answered them, "Yes, I am all that, and more."
In verse 25 he says, "I have told you, and you do not believe. The works I do in my Father's name testify to me." Jesus goes on to make it plain, just as they had requested. The sheep hear my voice, they know their true Shepherd and follow and respond to him.
This is for me the difficult part of this lesson. Just hearing the voice is not enough. Many people hear, but don't respond, don't answer, don't follow, don't recognize the voice of Jesus. Those of us gathered here in Church on Sunday morning have, in one way or another heard and recognized the voice of God, the voice of our savior and friend; in the voice of the Bible; in the voice of the Church.
Some of us are more sure than others, some of us hear it more clearly and distinctly than others, but all of us have heard it. That is why we are here. But we are left to wonder about those who aren't here, who have heard the word but haven't heard the Voice. Rather than wonder about why they haven't heard in the past, our calling today is to be the voice of the gospel in the world by the way we live our lives.
Pastor John Ortberg tells this story in a recent book,
A man is being tailgated by a woman in a hurry. He comes to an intersection, and when the light turns yellow, he hits the brakes. The woman behind him goes ballistic. She honks her horn at him; she yells her frustration in no uncertain terms; she rants and gestures.
While she is in mid-rant, someone taps on her window. She looks up and sees a policeman. He invites her out of her car and takes her to the station where she is searched and fingerprinted and put in a cell. After a couple of hours, she is released, and the arresting officer gives her her personal effects, saying
"I'm very sorry for the mistake, ma'am. I pulled up behind your car while you were blowing your horn, using bad gestures and bad language. I noticed the WHAT WOULD JESUS DO bumper sticker, the CHOOSE LIFE license plate holder, the FOLLOW ME TO SUNDAY SCHOOL window sign, the fish emblem on your trunk, and I naturally assumed you had stolen the car. (When the Game is Over, It all Goes Back in the Box, 2007, p. 115)
The way we live our lives sends a message to the world. When Martin Luther said that the church is a "priesthood of believers," he didn't mean we were all pastors, he meant that we all carry Christ into the world in our words and actions.
In the modern world, we, the church, all of us in the church, are the shepherds, and the hurting, lonely, lost people of the world are God's scattered sheep. Our calling is to go out to them with the Voice of the Shepherd, calling them home to safety, calling them home to love.
We are the Voice of Christ in the world. What people know of God's law, they learn from us. What people know of God's forgiveness, they receive from us. What people know of God's love, they feel from us. The Voice of Christ calls each of us out into the world today.
Will you answer? Will you follow? Will you go out there and love the world in the name of Christ? Amen and amen.
A sermon preached at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, Knoxville, TN
Text: John 10:22-30
In my little backyard converted shed office, I have a couple thousand books arranged on a variety of yard sale bookcases.
As I wrote this sermon, my coffee cup rested on a shelf that contains what I call my "Jesus books." In recent years, there have been a huge number of books written and debate hashed out about who Jesus was, or if he really was.I own over 30 of these books, and that's just a small part of all that's out there. They have titles like:
"Will the Real Jesus Please Stand up?"
"The Misunderstood Jew,"
"Who Was Jesus?"
"Lord or Legend?"
"Looking for Jesus,"
"The Real Jesus,"
"What Jesus Meant,"
and my favorite title: "Cynic Sage or Son of God?"
For over 2000 years the world and the church have wrestled with the question of the true identity of the wandering preacher from Galilee.The whole of Chapter 10 in John deals with this. Who does he say he is? Does his walk match his talk? Is he for real? Are the signs to be believed?
In verse 24 the people ask Jesus - Are you the Messiah? Are you the one sent from God? Jesus' answer points to actions as keys to identity, the idea that behavior reveals character.
He asks them, Do I act and talk like a Messiah, like a true king of Israel? Are the things I say and do for the benefit of the people?Do I honor God with the way I live my life?"
In the first part of chapter 10, Jesus has talked about being the Shepherd of the sheep, about how the sheep hear the true shepherd's voice and follow, about the willingness of the shepherd to lay down his life for the sheep. In verses 7 through 11 Jesus contrasts this with bad shepherds; "all who came before me are thieves and bandits." He then says that he is "the good shepherd."
In today's lesson, in verse 27, he again picks up the protective and caring shepherd theme. It may be helpful to us to think not in terms of good and bad, but rather in terms of true versus false; or real versus pretend; or fake versus genuine; or perhaps faithless versus faithful.
What Jesus lays claim to here in this text is to being not a false, not a pretend, not a fake, not a faithless shepherd of Israel; but rather to being a true, a real, a genuine, a faithful shepherd of God's sheep.
The shepherd was a powerful symbol in Israel. For much of their history they were a nomadic people dependent upon their sheep for their livelihood. Because of this, sheep and shepherd imagery was very important. The King was often referred to as the SHEPHERD of Israel, alluding back to King David, the traditional author of the 23rd Psalm. David, a shepherd boy in his youth, is the king by whom all kings are measured.
The ancient kings of Israel were different from the kings of the nations around them. The other kings were held up to be Gods on earth, divine beings in human form. The kings of Israel were not believed to be divine; they were known to be ordinary human beings who represented God on earth and ruled in God's name.
The idea was that God had placed the responsibility for the nation in their hands.The kingdom was not theirs to do with as they pleased. The kingdom was God's and they were to take care of it and God's people in God's name and with God's help. And even great King David failed to do it right all the time.
Between David and Jesus there were many years and many kings, and all the kings of Israel failed in one way or another. None of them lived up to the image of the Good, the True, the Real Shepherd of Israel, especially not the Emperor in Rome or his puppet King Herod. So the people asked; "Are you the Messiah?" "Are you the true Shepherd of the Sheep?""Are you the Saviour of Israel?" And Jesus answered them, "Yes, I am all that, and more."
In verse 25 he says, "I have told you, and you do not believe. The works I do in my Father's name testify to me." Jesus goes on to make it plain, just as they had requested. The sheep hear my voice, they know their true Shepherd and follow and respond to him.
This is for me the difficult part of this lesson. Just hearing the voice is not enough. Many people hear, but don't respond, don't answer, don't follow, don't recognize the voice of Jesus. Those of us gathered here in Church on Sunday morning have, in one way or another heard and recognized the voice of God, the voice of our savior and friend; in the voice of the Bible; in the voice of the Church.
Some of us are more sure than others, some of us hear it more clearly and distinctly than others, but all of us have heard it. That is why we are here. But we are left to wonder about those who aren't here, who have heard the word but haven't heard the Voice. Rather than wonder about why they haven't heard in the past, our calling today is to be the voice of the gospel in the world by the way we live our lives.
Pastor John Ortberg tells this story in a recent book,
A man is being tailgated by a woman in a hurry. He comes to an intersection, and when the light turns yellow, he hits the brakes. The woman behind him goes ballistic. She honks her horn at him; she yells her frustration in no uncertain terms; she rants and gestures.
While she is in mid-rant, someone taps on her window. She looks up and sees a policeman. He invites her out of her car and takes her to the station where she is searched and fingerprinted and put in a cell. After a couple of hours, she is released, and the arresting officer gives her her personal effects, saying
"I'm very sorry for the mistake, ma'am. I pulled up behind your car while you were blowing your horn, using bad gestures and bad language. I noticed the WHAT WOULD JESUS DO bumper sticker, the CHOOSE LIFE license plate holder, the FOLLOW ME TO SUNDAY SCHOOL window sign, the fish emblem on your trunk, and I naturally assumed you had stolen the car. (When the Game is Over, It all Goes Back in the Box, 2007, p. 115)
The way we live our lives sends a message to the world. When Martin Luther said that the church is a "priesthood of believers," he didn't mean we were all pastors, he meant that we all carry Christ into the world in our words and actions.
In the modern world, we, the church, all of us in the church, are the shepherds, and the hurting, lonely, lost people of the world are God's scattered sheep. Our calling is to go out to them with the Voice of the Shepherd, calling them home to safety, calling them home to love.
We are the Voice of Christ in the world. What people know of God's law, they learn from us. What people know of God's forgiveness, they receive from us. What people know of God's love, they feel from us. The Voice of Christ calls each of us out into the world today.
Will you answer? Will you follow? Will you go out there and love the world in the name of Christ? Amen and amen.
Thursday, April 01, 2010
MAUNDY THURSDAY APRIL 1, 2010
John 13: 1-17; 31b-35
In April of 1995 (I think) THE LUTHERAN magazine ran an article called "Is it I?" It was about Leonardo da Vinci's famous painting, "The Last Supper."
Now, while I found Pr. Schuessler's "Art Analysis" fairly interesting, I was very distracted by the fact that none of the people in the illustration of the painting seemed to be where he said they were.
What he was saying about people didn't match up with the people he claimed to be talking about.
Having had some small experience with publishing, I thought I knew what had happened, and my idea was confirmed when the text said that Judas had the money purse in his right hand while the picture showed it in his left hand.
Either Pastor Schuessler doesn't know his right from his left, or THE LUTHERAN printed the picture backwards.
I'm putting my money on THE LUTHERAN printing the picture backwards.
After I got over being first annoyed and then amused I realized that there was a deeper meaning here. (I'm sorry, I can't help it, I'm a preacher; there's always a deeper meaning!)
When I thought about it, I realized that getting it backwards is what most of us do, most of the time.
In our Gospel lesson, after he has washed his followers' feet, Jesus says to them, "Do you know what I have done to you?" And if they were honest, they would have said no. They got it backwards, and way too often, we get it backwards, too.
Today is called Maundy Thursday. The name comes from the command, the mandate, the mandatum in Latin, that Jesus gave his followers that they should Love One Another.
Though many people think of this night as the time when we celebrate the first Last Supper; in reality this night is set apart to remind us that Jesus' final words and deeds with his beloved friends were words and deeds of love, and Jesus' final command to his followers was a command to remember him with words and deeds of love of their own.
When Jesus wrapped a towel around his waist and bowed down before his students; he not only humbled himself; in their eyes, he humiliated himself.
According to New Testament Scholar Robert Kysar, "Jesus' act is a radical departure from custom, since not even servants were required to wash the feet of their master." (Augsburg Commentary on John, p. 208)
Most often, footwashing was done by students for their teacher; as a sign of humility and respect and obedience. In washing his disciples' feet, Jesus turned this backwards. His humiliating act of servanthood was a powerful sign of the radical, upside-down, inside-out nature of the new Kingdom of God Jesus brought into the world.
Jesus looked at his disciples and said, "You call me teacher, and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet." (verse 13-14)
Does Jesus really, literally, mean that? Does he want us to go around washing one another's feet in church on a regular basis?
Well, that's the way some folks with whom I grew up take it; 'course they also handle snakes and drink poison; so maybe they're not a very good example.
In this action and by these words Jesus has called us, commanded us, to be a servant people. A people who gird up their loins and get to work tending to a hurting and needy world.
He says: "I give you this commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (verses 34-35)
But we get it backwards, don't we. Instead of seeking ways to serve others, we complain about the service others render to us. Instead of looking for ways to love others, we read magazine articles about "How to GET the love you really deserve." Instead of thinking about how we can help others improve their lives, we plot and plan for how we can get ahead.
Have you ever thought about what those words mean; "get ahead?" They mean me in front of everyone else. They mean me first, They mean; I'll tend to me and mine and devil take the hindmost.
Yes, we get it backwards. No matter how much we try, we get it backwards. "This master and servant, love one another, serve the world" stuff that Jesus talks about so much is really difficult.
It is because it is difficult that we get it backwards, and because it is difficult and we get it backwards, Jesus not only told us to love one another, He showed us how.
He showed us how when he washed the disciples' feet. He showed us how when he fed his friends at table. He showed us how when he blessed the thief who died with him. He showed us how when he forgave those who killed him. He showed us how when he died upon the cross, "for us and for our salvation."
We get it backwards and we can only get it right when we die to ourselves and let the life of Christ rise up within us, following him on the way of service, the way of Love, the way of the cross.
Amen and amen.
John 13: 1-17; 31b-35
In April of 1995 (I think) THE LUTHERAN magazine ran an article called "Is it I?" It was about Leonardo da Vinci's famous painting, "The Last Supper."
Now, while I found Pr. Schuessler's "Art Analysis" fairly interesting, I was very distracted by the fact that none of the people in the illustration of the painting seemed to be where he said they were.
What he was saying about people didn't match up with the people he claimed to be talking about.
Having had some small experience with publishing, I thought I knew what had happened, and my idea was confirmed when the text said that Judas had the money purse in his right hand while the picture showed it in his left hand.
Either Pastor Schuessler doesn't know his right from his left, or THE LUTHERAN printed the picture backwards.
I'm putting my money on THE LUTHERAN printing the picture backwards.
After I got over being first annoyed and then amused I realized that there was a deeper meaning here. (I'm sorry, I can't help it, I'm a preacher; there's always a deeper meaning!)
When I thought about it, I realized that getting it backwards is what most of us do, most of the time.
In our Gospel lesson, after he has washed his followers' feet, Jesus says to them, "Do you know what I have done to you?" And if they were honest, they would have said no. They got it backwards, and way too often, we get it backwards, too.
Today is called Maundy Thursday. The name comes from the command, the mandate, the mandatum in Latin, that Jesus gave his followers that they should Love One Another.
Though many people think of this night as the time when we celebrate the first Last Supper; in reality this night is set apart to remind us that Jesus' final words and deeds with his beloved friends were words and deeds of love, and Jesus' final command to his followers was a command to remember him with words and deeds of love of their own.
When Jesus wrapped a towel around his waist and bowed down before his students; he not only humbled himself; in their eyes, he humiliated himself.
According to New Testament Scholar Robert Kysar, "Jesus' act is a radical departure from custom, since not even servants were required to wash the feet of their master." (Augsburg Commentary on John, p. 208)
Most often, footwashing was done by students for their teacher; as a sign of humility and respect and obedience. In washing his disciples' feet, Jesus turned this backwards. His humiliating act of servanthood was a powerful sign of the radical, upside-down, inside-out nature of the new Kingdom of God Jesus brought into the world.
Jesus looked at his disciples and said, "You call me teacher, and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet." (verse 13-14)
Does Jesus really, literally, mean that? Does he want us to go around washing one another's feet in church on a regular basis?
Well, that's the way some folks with whom I grew up take it; 'course they also handle snakes and drink poison; so maybe they're not a very good example.
In this action and by these words Jesus has called us, commanded us, to be a servant people. A people who gird up their loins and get to work tending to a hurting and needy world.
He says: "I give you this commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (verses 34-35)
But we get it backwards, don't we. Instead of seeking ways to serve others, we complain about the service others render to us. Instead of looking for ways to love others, we read magazine articles about "How to GET the love you really deserve." Instead of thinking about how we can help others improve their lives, we plot and plan for how we can get ahead.
Have you ever thought about what those words mean; "get ahead?" They mean me in front of everyone else. They mean me first, They mean; I'll tend to me and mine and devil take the hindmost.
Yes, we get it backwards. No matter how much we try, we get it backwards. "This master and servant, love one another, serve the world" stuff that Jesus talks about so much is really difficult.
It is because it is difficult that we get it backwards, and because it is difficult and we get it backwards, Jesus not only told us to love one another, He showed us how.
He showed us how when he washed the disciples' feet. He showed us how when he fed his friends at table. He showed us how when he blessed the thief who died with him. He showed us how when he forgave those who killed him. He showed us how when he died upon the cross, "for us and for our salvation."
We get it backwards and we can only get it right when we die to ourselves and let the life of Christ rise up within us, following him on the way of service, the way of Love, the way of the cross.
Amen and amen.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Mid-week service, Holy Week,
WEDNESDAY OF HOLY WEEK March 31, 2010
First UMC, Hayesville, NC
Sermon Texts: Luke 11: 1-4; Luke 23:34
Title: On Forgiveness
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!
Pray with me please: "May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight oh my rock and my Redeemer."
In Luke's Gospel, Jesus' students ask him to teach them to pray, and half of the lesson is about forgiveness;
Forgive us our sins as we forgive everyone indebted to us.
On the cross, Jesus lives out what he taught, praying for those who killed him, and for us; Father, forgive them;
Forgiveness is at the very heart of the Christian gospel,
and it is quite possibly the most difficult thing we are asked to do for our LORD because
it is the thing that most goes against our natural inclinations.
Clara Nun, a SS teacher in OK City told a story in LEADERSHIP Magazine.
She asked a boy in her class "Billy what must we do to be forgiven."
Billy thought about it a minute, "Well, first we have to sin."
Billy is right. Without sin, there would be no need for forgiveness.
And that is the way God originally designed the world, according to the creation stories in the book of Genesis.
Perfect world, perfect people with perfect lives.
And for perfect people to be truly perfect, God had to take a chance and give us free will.
Without the ability to choose our behavior, we would all be robots and we wouldn't like that and neither would God.
And, as we all know, with that free will came the opportunity to choose badly; which Adam and Eve both did, and with that act of choosing badly Sin came into the world.
St. Augustine called it Original Sin and talked about it in ways that were very close to saying that sinfulness is genetic, that we're biologically born that way.
I don't think we have to go that far to observe and admit that the world is full of sin and that all of us, in one way or another, participate in it.
A friend of mine says that Original Sin is the only Christian Doctrine that can be proven empirically;
he says, "I have four children and six grandchildren, I know what original sin is."
If we're honest most of us will admit that this is true, not only about our children and grandchildren but about us.
We all know how far, in Paul's words, "we fall short of the glory of God."
Martin Luther, in his Large Catechism, was unintentionally funny and cranky on this point.
He wrote, almost 500 years ago, "We still stumble daily and sin because we live in the world among people who sorely vex us and give us occasion for impatience, anger, vengeance, etc."
I served as a small 3-point parish near Burlington, NC over 30 years ago. One night I took Miss Sallie Spoon, to hear her great granddaughter sing at a Revival Meeting.
The little girl sang beautifully; then the evangelist preached a fiery sermon about sin, yelling and haranguing the crowd. On the way home, Miss Sallie said to me, "I know I sin. What I want to know is what to do about it."
That is the question, isn't it? We know, in our heart of hearts, that we, all of us sin.
And even more, we feel guilty for how our sins harm others and we feel resentment for the way the sins of others hurt us.
And, as Miss Sallie said, "What can we do about it?"
How can we stop messing up our lives and the lives of our neighbors; with bad behavior and hurt feelings, with deeply buried guilt and long-held resentments?
Well, Jesus says FORGIVENESS is the only way.
God's forgiveness of us, and our forgiveness of one another, which are deeply, inseparably, tied together; these are the only things which will rescue us from ourselves.
But we hesitate over this forgiveness business, don't we? Those of us who recite the Creed and the Lord's Prayer in our worship every week say we believe in it;
I believe in the HS, the holy catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins. . .
Forgive us our sins, debts, trespasses, . . .as we forgive those who sin, trespass against us, our debtors.
We say it, but oh, so often, it is so hard to live out.
One day on the Duke campus, a person I know ran across a seminary professor who shall remain nameless. He was a good man, but a bit stodgy and old fashioned.
They stood together on the steps of a classroom building and looked out at the Duke undergraduates celebrating a basketball victory.
They were "drunk and disorderly," and in various states of undress and publicly affectionate behavior.
The professor looked at them and said to my friend, "Well, I have come to accept the idea that Jesus died for me, but I have a hard time believing that he died for these people."
Sometimes, way too many of us are way too much that way.
We have accepted the idea that Christ died for us, and if we're not careful, we'll begin to believe we deserved it.
"Of course he forgave me," we think, "I'm really sorry for what I did.
And really, it wasn't all that bad, just a little sin. Nothing like THOSE people and THOSE things THEY did."
And it is when we begin to think that we have earned God's love, that we deserve God's Grace and forgiveness, and that the things we do aren't so bad, but those other people, they are really bad and sinful and undeserving,
It's when we begin to think like that that we begin to withhold forgiveness of others.
In Jesus' prayer, it is not by accident that he ties God's forgiveness of us with our forgiveness of one another. You cannot have one without the other.
The only way we can dig down deep enough to genuinely, completely, totally, unreservedly, with no ifs ands or buts, forgive someone else,
is if we realize how very much undeserved love and grace and forgiveness we ourselves have received, from God and from one another.
As long as we believe that we are in some way better than anyone, anyone else on this planet and that we, therefore, have in some way earned God's love, we will be incapable of true confession and forgiveness.
Holy Week is about finding that place within us that knows our failure and our need.
Holy Week is about following Christ to the Cross with our hearts in our throats, realizing that his suffering and death are the result of our sin, our fault, our evil ways and deeds.
Holy Week is about dying to our pride so that we can live in Christ.
It is in Christ that we know ourselves undeserving yet fully loved.
It is in Christ that we discover our true self, fully loved and fully loving others.
It is in Christ that we find the strength to confess our faults to others,
It is in Christ that we find the love to truly, completely forgive one another.
One of my favorite writers, GK Chesterton, once observed,
In one place, Jesus commands us to love our neighbors.
In another place, he orders us to love our enemies.
This is because, generally speaking, they are the same people.
I invite you now to stand and turn and face your neighbors across the aisle as we confess to and forgive one another, as Jesus taught us when he taught us to pray, and as he showed us when he forgave his killers from the cross:
Join me in the prayers printed in your bulletin.
RIGHT SIDE: I confess to God Almighty, before the whole company of heaven, and to you my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned by my own fault in thought, word, and deed. I pray God Almighty to have mercy on me, forgive me all my sins, and bring me to everlasting life.
LEFT SIDE: Almighty and merciful God grant you healing, pardon, and forgiveness of all your sins. Amen.
(A short period of silence is kept)
LEFT SIDE: I confess to God Almighty, before the whole company of heaven, and to you my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned by my own fault in thought, word and deed. I pray God Almighty to have mercy on me, forgive me all my sins, and bring me to everlasting life.
RIGHT SIDE: Almighty and merciful God grant you healing, pardon, and forgiveness of all your sins. Amen.
First UMC, Hayesville, NC
Sermon Texts: Luke 11: 1-4; Luke 23:34
Title: On Forgiveness
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!
Pray with me please: "May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight oh my rock and my Redeemer."
In Luke's Gospel, Jesus' students ask him to teach them to pray, and half of the lesson is about forgiveness;
Forgive us our sins as we forgive everyone indebted to us.
On the cross, Jesus lives out what he taught, praying for those who killed him, and for us; Father, forgive them;
Forgiveness is at the very heart of the Christian gospel,
and it is quite possibly the most difficult thing we are asked to do for our LORD because
it is the thing that most goes against our natural inclinations.
Clara Nun, a SS teacher in OK City told a story in LEADERSHIP Magazine.
She asked a boy in her class "Billy what must we do to be forgiven."
Billy thought about it a minute, "Well, first we have to sin."
Billy is right. Without sin, there would be no need for forgiveness.
And that is the way God originally designed the world, according to the creation stories in the book of Genesis.
Perfect world, perfect people with perfect lives.
And for perfect people to be truly perfect, God had to take a chance and give us free will.
Without the ability to choose our behavior, we would all be robots and we wouldn't like that and neither would God.
And, as we all know, with that free will came the opportunity to choose badly; which Adam and Eve both did, and with that act of choosing badly Sin came into the world.
St. Augustine called it Original Sin and talked about it in ways that were very close to saying that sinfulness is genetic, that we're biologically born that way.
I don't think we have to go that far to observe and admit that the world is full of sin and that all of us, in one way or another, participate in it.
A friend of mine says that Original Sin is the only Christian Doctrine that can be proven empirically;
he says, "I have four children and six grandchildren, I know what original sin is."
If we're honest most of us will admit that this is true, not only about our children and grandchildren but about us.
We all know how far, in Paul's words, "we fall short of the glory of God."
Martin Luther, in his Large Catechism, was unintentionally funny and cranky on this point.
He wrote, almost 500 years ago, "We still stumble daily and sin because we live in the world among people who sorely vex us and give us occasion for impatience, anger, vengeance, etc."
I served as a small 3-point parish near Burlington, NC over 30 years ago. One night I took Miss Sallie Spoon, to hear her great granddaughter sing at a Revival Meeting.
The little girl sang beautifully; then the evangelist preached a fiery sermon about sin, yelling and haranguing the crowd. On the way home, Miss Sallie said to me, "I know I sin. What I want to know is what to do about it."
That is the question, isn't it? We know, in our heart of hearts, that we, all of us sin.
And even more, we feel guilty for how our sins harm others and we feel resentment for the way the sins of others hurt us.
And, as Miss Sallie said, "What can we do about it?"
How can we stop messing up our lives and the lives of our neighbors; with bad behavior and hurt feelings, with deeply buried guilt and long-held resentments?
Well, Jesus says FORGIVENESS is the only way.
God's forgiveness of us, and our forgiveness of one another, which are deeply, inseparably, tied together; these are the only things which will rescue us from ourselves.
But we hesitate over this forgiveness business, don't we? Those of us who recite the Creed and the Lord's Prayer in our worship every week say we believe in it;
I believe in the HS, the holy catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins. . .
Forgive us our sins, debts, trespasses, . . .as we forgive those who sin, trespass against us, our debtors.
We say it, but oh, so often, it is so hard to live out.
One day on the Duke campus, a person I know ran across a seminary professor who shall remain nameless. He was a good man, but a bit stodgy and old fashioned.
They stood together on the steps of a classroom building and looked out at the Duke undergraduates celebrating a basketball victory.
They were "drunk and disorderly," and in various states of undress and publicly affectionate behavior.
The professor looked at them and said to my friend, "Well, I have come to accept the idea that Jesus died for me, but I have a hard time believing that he died for these people."
Sometimes, way too many of us are way too much that way.
We have accepted the idea that Christ died for us, and if we're not careful, we'll begin to believe we deserved it.
"Of course he forgave me," we think, "I'm really sorry for what I did.
And really, it wasn't all that bad, just a little sin. Nothing like THOSE people and THOSE things THEY did."
And it is when we begin to think that we have earned God's love, that we deserve God's Grace and forgiveness, and that the things we do aren't so bad, but those other people, they are really bad and sinful and undeserving,
It's when we begin to think like that that we begin to withhold forgiveness of others.
In Jesus' prayer, it is not by accident that he ties God's forgiveness of us with our forgiveness of one another. You cannot have one without the other.
The only way we can dig down deep enough to genuinely, completely, totally, unreservedly, with no ifs ands or buts, forgive someone else,
is if we realize how very much undeserved love and grace and forgiveness we ourselves have received, from God and from one another.
As long as we believe that we are in some way better than anyone, anyone else on this planet and that we, therefore, have in some way earned God's love, we will be incapable of true confession and forgiveness.
Holy Week is about finding that place within us that knows our failure and our need.
Holy Week is about following Christ to the Cross with our hearts in our throats, realizing that his suffering and death are the result of our sin, our fault, our evil ways and deeds.
Holy Week is about dying to our pride so that we can live in Christ.
It is in Christ that we know ourselves undeserving yet fully loved.
It is in Christ that we discover our true self, fully loved and fully loving others.
It is in Christ that we find the strength to confess our faults to others,
It is in Christ that we find the love to truly, completely forgive one another.
One of my favorite writers, GK Chesterton, once observed,
In one place, Jesus commands us to love our neighbors.
In another place, he orders us to love our enemies.
This is because, generally speaking, they are the same people.
I invite you now to stand and turn and face your neighbors across the aisle as we confess to and forgive one another, as Jesus taught us when he taught us to pray, and as he showed us when he forgave his killers from the cross:
Join me in the prayers printed in your bulletin.
RIGHT SIDE: I confess to God Almighty, before the whole company of heaven, and to you my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned by my own fault in thought, word, and deed. I pray God Almighty to have mercy on me, forgive me all my sins, and bring me to everlasting life.
LEFT SIDE: Almighty and merciful God grant you healing, pardon, and forgiveness of all your sins. Amen.
(A short period of silence is kept)
LEFT SIDE: I confess to God Almighty, before the whole company of heaven, and to you my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned by my own fault in thought, word and deed. I pray God Almighty to have mercy on me, forgive me all my sins, and bring me to everlasting life.
RIGHT SIDE: Almighty and merciful God grant you healing, pardon, and forgiveness of all your sins. Amen.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Palm Sunday
I'm not preaching this week. (Why? Nobody asked me.) So I didn't write a Palm Sunday sermon. I have a group of pastor/preacher friends with whom I share sermons. One of them, an old Duke Div. School classmate, sent me this one I thought you might find either interesting or helpful or both. The author/preacher is the Rev. Dr. Warren Casiday, Pastor of St. John's Reformed United Church of Christ in Kannapolis, NC. By the way, I edited it a bit for length ( Those Reformed; less Liturgy, more preaching, but I left in his manuscript short-hand.)
To The Edge Of Night
Luke 19.28-40
H. Warren Casiday
March 28, 2010
It’s not quite Easter yet, but it will be here very soon. Just 7 days away.And what a joyful day that will be for us – as we celebrate Jesus’ resurrection.
But we have a problem in moving from today – Palm Sunday to Easter.
We must walk through a graveyard in the dark of night that is called Good Friday.
That walk takes us from a Joyful Celebration To The Edge Of Night to total darkness to the light of the Resurrection.
We simply cannot get from PS to E w/o going through GF.
There are many churches who never observe the major event of Holy Week.
They do not have Maundy Thursday Communion Services. They never have GF services.
They rush from PS to E – neatly avoiding the unpleasantness of the week – so they can get to the trumpet sounds of E morning.
In some ways, it is easy to understand this desire to skip the events of HW.
J on the cross means death – and we don’t like to confront death. But J risen from the grave is life!
A sanctuary stripped bare for GF is can be very bleak and even depressing.
A sanctuary with Lilies and an E cross covered with flowers is uplifting & encouraging.
Why not skip through HW as if you were tiptoeing through the tulips, OR walking softly beside the graveyard at night so you don’t disturb the dead.
It is understandable.
Yet, when you read the Bible, rather than rushing through HW, to get through it quickly,the B slows down and walks very slowly through that week.
What we had just as soon get through quickly, the B takes very slowly.
In fact, in Matthew alone, nearly 30% of the book is devoted to HW.
PS is such a powerful story and so memorable that it is the 3rd best known story
after the birth narrative of J and the crucifixion/resurrection narrative in the B.
We know the story. We’ve heard it year after year. We can almost tell it verbatim.
PS is a story that leaves us spellbound with its wonder and beauty.
The borrowed Donkey. Our Lord. The Crowds. The waving of the Palm Branches. The cloaks on the ground.
The cheers and cries of the crowd:“Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!”
And your mind comes alive with that scene – as if you had actually been there.
What a wonderful story.
But it is more than just a story.
That is the story that sets in motions the events that lead to J becoming our salvation. J shows up ready – and willing – to be our Savior / the Messiah.
What does PS mean to us today? I can think of three things.
Palm Sunday Means A Time Of:
1. CELEBRATION.
How can PS not be a time of celebration! It is a parade for J – welcoming him to Jerusalem – especially as the Messiah.
There were three groups of people who mingled together along the road that PS.
A. The disciples of J
Who had put their cloaks on the borrowed donkey
Who had followed J into Jerusalem.
Who were leading the cheers for J.
B. The Jews in town to celebrate the Passover – who came out to see J.
C. The Jewish leaders – who were there to keep an eye on J
The palms that were waved and laid on the ground for the donkey carrying J to walk over.
Palms had become a symbol of Israel’s nationalism and hopes.
And now their hopes were being focused on J.
The cloaks were spread on the ground and the donkey walked over them; welcoming a new king and acknowledging his power over them.
In a real sense, the spreading of their cloaks on the ground was their Red Carpet for J.
The “Hosannas” that were shouted out were a Hebrew word that meant: Save us now!
Or as they would have understood it: Save us now from our political enemies.
“Blessed is the King of Israel” OR “Welcome to the Kingdom of our father David.”
These were greetings called out to who they assumed was to be their national liberator.
The response of the Disciples and much of the crowd was: J is the Messiah
The response of the Jewish leadership was: There ain’t no way!
But... The crowds – And the Disciples – had misunderstood J’s purpose on PS
They were looking for the conquering king to set them free from Rome.
Instead, they got J riding on a donkey – a symbol of a servant king – a humble king.
Not everyone was thrilled by the celebration – the PS parade.
The Pharisees certainly weren’t happy about the attention J was getting.
While it is not recorded here, the Roman soldiers couldn’t have been happy either.
In fact, they probably went on heightened alert for a revolution led by J.
But... The celebration ended. And the parade stopped.
The people realized that J had committed an unpardonable sin – in their way of thinking – by not being the kind of Messiah they were expecting.
Not only was PS a time of Celebration – a wonderful parade in J’s honor – it was a time of:
2. CONFRONTATION.
We are told in the B – in the stories before PS – that the Pharisees just didn’t like J.
In fact, they were plotting to find a way to get rid of him. They wanted him dead.
Now there are probably all types of reasons for this:
Jealousy – Envy – Pride – Arrogance
But it is very likely that the primary reason was their concern that J would upset their apple cart w/ Rome.
The Jews had a tenuous truce-like relationship with Rome.
With Rome’s permission, they were able to continue their worship of Jehovah.
This was a privilege Rome rarely granted to a conquered people. You must worship our gods.
But the Jews had been allowed to worship their G.
In their thinking, if J kept stirring things up, that freedom could be taken away from them. And they certainly didn’t want that.
So J rode the donkey into Jerusalem and the crowds praised him and celebrated his arrival.
And as they shouted out their praises to G for J, the Pharisees confronted J:
“Teacher, rebuke your disciples!”
Our as we might put it: “For G’s sake, man – and ours – be quiet!”
And J replied: “If they (the crowds) keep quiet, these stones will cry out.”
IE: Somebody has to praise G for J
Isn’t it ironic that even today there are times when people confront J – especially when they find out J is not who they think he is.
Not only was PS a time of Celebration – and Confrontation – it was a time of:
3. COMMITMENT.
The B simply slows down considerably during HW. Even Mark – the fastest paced Gospel – slows down for HW.
In fact, much of the Gospels’ writings are about the events of HW.
Many of the stories and parables that we love and have heard so many times were told by J during HW.
And, in one way or another, many of them dealt with the theme of our Commitment to G.
The parable of The Two Sons
One said he would work in the vineyard – but he didn’t. The other said he wouldn’t work in the vineyard – but he did. It is a story of obedience and commitment.
J told the parable of the Tenants who beat up and killed people so they wouldn’t have to give up what rightfully belonged to the Owner.
And the Pharisees understood that J was talking to them about their commitment to G.
J told the parable of the Wedding Banquet where everyone who had committed to come to the banquet backed out of their commitment. They even killed some of the ones who had been sent to invite them.
And the king brought in people from outside the wedding invitation list. Again, it is a story about commitment.
The story about Caesar’s coin – Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to G what is G’s.
The Great Commandment to Love G with all your heart and soul and mind and to love your neighbor as yourself.
The parables of the 10 Virgins and their lamps / The Talents that were used and hidden / The Sheep & Goats
The story about J’s being anointed with oil.
The story about the Vine and the Branches.
All these parables & stories are in one way or another about a person’s commitment to G
In the midst of HW, J calls us to be committed to him.
There is a strong belief among many Xns that J got himself crucified because he refused to be the kind of Messiah the people expected him to be.
They wanted a revolutionary, didn’t they? someone who would come in and free the Jews from Roman occupation. someone who could be a great king like David.
They just didn’t understand the type of Messiah J was saying he was.
The belief is that it was just a case of mistaken identity. J was just not who they thought he was – therefore, he was crucified.
But I believe that the truth of the matter is even more basic than that.
The crowds went from welcoming J on PS to yelling for his death because they knew –
just as we know – exactly who Jesus was.
Before HW is up, ALL of the people there would be united in their ultimate rejection of J.
And it wasn’t just the Jews that were united in their actions against J. It was also the Romans.
It wasn’t just the religious leaders united against J. It was also the ‘common people’ of J’s day.
It wasn’t just Judas – whom we can write off as corrupt and evil. But it was all of J’s Disciples.
Peter – the Faithful Disciple – one of the inner circle of Disc – would deny him three times.
It was all the others Disciples – who fled and hid out of fear for their own lives.
It seemed as if everyone was united in their rejection and abandonment of J.
But J had a different reason for appearing in Jerusalem.
He didn’t come to set up a rival kingdom to Rome.
He came to be crowned with thorns.To be enthroned of a cross. To bring peace between G and humanity.
J came to be our Savior
PS confronts you and me with one more thing.
It says: There Is A Decision WE Must Make.
Today, on PS, as we pause at the doorway of HW, we see the scenes of Celebration and Confrontation and the call for Commitment.
We look through the dark edge of night to the cross. And we can see the entire story of the suffering and pain and death of J.
As we gaze upon our LORD– his arms spread wide in forgiving love –
We must decide: will we accept that Love, will we live in that Love, will we share that Love?
Amen and amen.
To The Edge Of Night
Luke 19.28-40
H. Warren Casiday
March 28, 2010
It’s not quite Easter yet, but it will be here very soon. Just 7 days away.And what a joyful day that will be for us – as we celebrate Jesus’ resurrection.
But we have a problem in moving from today – Palm Sunday to Easter.
We must walk through a graveyard in the dark of night that is called Good Friday.
That walk takes us from a Joyful Celebration To The Edge Of Night to total darkness to the light of the Resurrection.
We simply cannot get from PS to E w/o going through GF.
There are many churches who never observe the major event of Holy Week.
They do not have Maundy Thursday Communion Services. They never have GF services.
They rush from PS to E – neatly avoiding the unpleasantness of the week – so they can get to the trumpet sounds of E morning.
In some ways, it is easy to understand this desire to skip the events of HW.
J on the cross means death – and we don’t like to confront death. But J risen from the grave is life!
A sanctuary stripped bare for GF is can be very bleak and even depressing.
A sanctuary with Lilies and an E cross covered with flowers is uplifting & encouraging.
Why not skip through HW as if you were tiptoeing through the tulips, OR walking softly beside the graveyard at night so you don’t disturb the dead.
It is understandable.
Yet, when you read the Bible, rather than rushing through HW, to get through it quickly,the B slows down and walks very slowly through that week.
What we had just as soon get through quickly, the B takes very slowly.
In fact, in Matthew alone, nearly 30% of the book is devoted to HW.
PS is such a powerful story and so memorable that it is the 3rd best known story
after the birth narrative of J and the crucifixion/resurrection narrative in the B.
We know the story. We’ve heard it year after year. We can almost tell it verbatim.
PS is a story that leaves us spellbound with its wonder and beauty.
The borrowed Donkey. Our Lord. The Crowds. The waving of the Palm Branches. The cloaks on the ground.
The cheers and cries of the crowd:“Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!”
And your mind comes alive with that scene – as if you had actually been there.
What a wonderful story.
But it is more than just a story.
That is the story that sets in motions the events that lead to J becoming our salvation. J shows up ready – and willing – to be our Savior / the Messiah.
What does PS mean to us today? I can think of three things.
Palm Sunday Means A Time Of:
1. CELEBRATION.
How can PS not be a time of celebration! It is a parade for J – welcoming him to Jerusalem – especially as the Messiah.
There were three groups of people who mingled together along the road that PS.
A. The disciples of J
Who had put their cloaks on the borrowed donkey
Who had followed J into Jerusalem.
Who were leading the cheers for J.
B. The Jews in town to celebrate the Passover – who came out to see J.
C. The Jewish leaders – who were there to keep an eye on J
The palms that were waved and laid on the ground for the donkey carrying J to walk over.
Palms had become a symbol of Israel’s nationalism and hopes.
And now their hopes were being focused on J.
The cloaks were spread on the ground and the donkey walked over them; welcoming a new king and acknowledging his power over them.
In a real sense, the spreading of their cloaks on the ground was their Red Carpet for J.
The “Hosannas” that were shouted out were a Hebrew word that meant: Save us now!
Or as they would have understood it: Save us now from our political enemies.
“Blessed is the King of Israel” OR “Welcome to the Kingdom of our father David.”
These were greetings called out to who they assumed was to be their national liberator.
The response of the Disciples and much of the crowd was: J is the Messiah
The response of the Jewish leadership was: There ain’t no way!
But... The crowds – And the Disciples – had misunderstood J’s purpose on PS
They were looking for the conquering king to set them free from Rome.
Instead, they got J riding on a donkey – a symbol of a servant king – a humble king.
Not everyone was thrilled by the celebration – the PS parade.
The Pharisees certainly weren’t happy about the attention J was getting.
While it is not recorded here, the Roman soldiers couldn’t have been happy either.
In fact, they probably went on heightened alert for a revolution led by J.
But... The celebration ended. And the parade stopped.
The people realized that J had committed an unpardonable sin – in their way of thinking – by not being the kind of Messiah they were expecting.
Not only was PS a time of Celebration – a wonderful parade in J’s honor – it was a time of:
2. CONFRONTATION.
We are told in the B – in the stories before PS – that the Pharisees just didn’t like J.
In fact, they were plotting to find a way to get rid of him. They wanted him dead.
Now there are probably all types of reasons for this:
Jealousy – Envy – Pride – Arrogance
But it is very likely that the primary reason was their concern that J would upset their apple cart w/ Rome.
The Jews had a tenuous truce-like relationship with Rome.
With Rome’s permission, they were able to continue their worship of Jehovah.
This was a privilege Rome rarely granted to a conquered people. You must worship our gods.
But the Jews had been allowed to worship their G.
In their thinking, if J kept stirring things up, that freedom could be taken away from them. And they certainly didn’t want that.
So J rode the donkey into Jerusalem and the crowds praised him and celebrated his arrival.
And as they shouted out their praises to G for J, the Pharisees confronted J:
“Teacher, rebuke your disciples!”
Our as we might put it: “For G’s sake, man – and ours – be quiet!”
And J replied: “If they (the crowds) keep quiet, these stones will cry out.”
IE: Somebody has to praise G for J
Isn’t it ironic that even today there are times when people confront J – especially when they find out J is not who they think he is.
Not only was PS a time of Celebration – and Confrontation – it was a time of:
3. COMMITMENT.
The B simply slows down considerably during HW. Even Mark – the fastest paced Gospel – slows down for HW.
In fact, much of the Gospels’ writings are about the events of HW.
Many of the stories and parables that we love and have heard so many times were told by J during HW.
And, in one way or another, many of them dealt with the theme of our Commitment to G.
The parable of The Two Sons
One said he would work in the vineyard – but he didn’t. The other said he wouldn’t work in the vineyard – but he did. It is a story of obedience and commitment.
J told the parable of the Tenants who beat up and killed people so they wouldn’t have to give up what rightfully belonged to the Owner.
And the Pharisees understood that J was talking to them about their commitment to G.
J told the parable of the Wedding Banquet where everyone who had committed to come to the banquet backed out of their commitment. They even killed some of the ones who had been sent to invite them.
And the king brought in people from outside the wedding invitation list. Again, it is a story about commitment.
The story about Caesar’s coin – Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to G what is G’s.
The Great Commandment to Love G with all your heart and soul and mind and to love your neighbor as yourself.
The parables of the 10 Virgins and their lamps / The Talents that were used and hidden / The Sheep & Goats
The story about J’s being anointed with oil.
The story about the Vine and the Branches.
All these parables & stories are in one way or another about a person’s commitment to G
In the midst of HW, J calls us to be committed to him.
There is a strong belief among many Xns that J got himself crucified because he refused to be the kind of Messiah the people expected him to be.
They wanted a revolutionary, didn’t they? someone who would come in and free the Jews from Roman occupation. someone who could be a great king like David.
They just didn’t understand the type of Messiah J was saying he was.
The belief is that it was just a case of mistaken identity. J was just not who they thought he was – therefore, he was crucified.
But I believe that the truth of the matter is even more basic than that.
The crowds went from welcoming J on PS to yelling for his death because they knew –
just as we know – exactly who Jesus was.
Before HW is up, ALL of the people there would be united in their ultimate rejection of J.
And it wasn’t just the Jews that were united in their actions against J. It was also the Romans.
It wasn’t just the religious leaders united against J. It was also the ‘common people’ of J’s day.
It wasn’t just Judas – whom we can write off as corrupt and evil. But it was all of J’s Disciples.
Peter – the Faithful Disciple – one of the inner circle of Disc – would deny him three times.
It was all the others Disciples – who fled and hid out of fear for their own lives.
It seemed as if everyone was united in their rejection and abandonment of J.
But J had a different reason for appearing in Jerusalem.
He didn’t come to set up a rival kingdom to Rome.
He came to be crowned with thorns.To be enthroned of a cross. To bring peace between G and humanity.
J came to be our Savior
PS confronts you and me with one more thing.
It says: There Is A Decision WE Must Make.
Today, on PS, as we pause at the doorway of HW, we see the scenes of Celebration and Confrontation and the call for Commitment.
We look through the dark edge of night to the cross. And we can see the entire story of the suffering and pain and death of J.
As we gaze upon our LORD– his arms spread wide in forgiving love –
We must decide: will we accept that Love, will we live in that Love, will we share that Love?
Amen and amen.
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Lent 5, March 21, 2010
Lent 5, March 21, 2010
TEXTS: Isaiah 43:16-21, Philippians 3:4-14, John 12: 1-8
(A sermon preached at the Installation of the Rev. Phil Harkey as pastor of Holy Trinity Lutheran church, Elberton, GA)
In an odd sort of way, today is a day of mixed emotions, of conflictual feelings.
It is the Fifth Sunday in Lent and we are nearing the end of Jesus' journey to the Cross.
As the world emerges from the dark and cold of winter into the light and warmth of spring, our religious tradition calls us deeper into the darkness and gloom of Jesus' suffering and death.
Deepening this feeling of dissonance is the fact that we have gathered here to celebrate the new thing God is doing in Elberton by bringing Pr. Harkey and Holy Trinity Church together in mission and ministry.
Sadness and celebration; darkness and light; the cold of winter and the warmth of spring, the death of Christ and the birth of new hope, all mixed up together in one day.
Just like in our Gospel Lesson.
Here we find Jesus at a meal celebrating the raising of Lazarus, a feast in honor of the fact that Lazarus has been returned from the dead.
Into the midst of this party, Mary comes and anoints Jesus' feet with perfume and wipes them with her hair; an act that symbolically prepares him for death and burial, an act which also upsets everyone present.
It is a complicated story. Let's look at it carefully.
This story is in the beginning of chapter 12 in John. In chapter 11 Jesus is out preaching and teaching when he gets word that Lazarus, his dear friend, is ill. Later he learns that he has died.
The rest of chapter 11 is about how Jesus delayed in going to Lazarus and about how Martha fussed at Jesus for not coming sooner and how when Jesus saw Mary and all the others weeping, he started weeping too, and finally, Jesus went to the tomb and cried out, "Lazarus, come out."
And Lazarus came out, bound up like a Mummy in a bad horror movie; stumbling and smelly but alive.
Chapter 12 opens with the story of a dinner that took place a few weeks later to celebrate Lazarus' amazing return from the dead. Make no mistake about it; this was a party, a fiesta, a banquet.
Where I come from we would have had a pig-picking, a fish-fry, a keg party with fireworks. Pastor Harkey, you're from Charleston, right? We're talking a Low Country shrimp boil. Out on the deck, beach music playing, couples dancing the shag, little kids running around under the boardwalk chasing fireflies, old people sitting in corners talking and watching young people;
And into the midst of this joyous frivolity Mary comes with a gallon of perfume, expensive stuff, worth thirty or forty thousand dollars. And she plops down in front of Jesus and pours this rich and costly perfume all over his feet and then wipes his feet with her hair.
And the music stops, and the dancers freeze and and the old people hush talking and the children stand with their fingers in their mouths and stare while Jesus smiles and lifts Mary up and thanks her for her generosity and her love.
There are a couple of reasons for the stunned reaction on the part of the group, one that is spoken of in the text and one that is not.
1) In the text, Judas says that which everyone else is thinking, "My God, woman, what are you doing? You could have sold that and given the money to the poor."
Jesus reply here is very important. Many times people have used his words, "the poor you always have with you," as an excuse for not helping the poor.
That is definitely NOT what Jesus meant.
Jesus meant that Mary understands his immediate present and near future better than any of them.
She bought the perfume, the nard, for a specific purpose; to anoint his body when he died, and she more than anyone else, knows that Jesus is soon to die.
Her anointing his body at this time shows that she recognizes that by coming to Jerusalem and raising her brother from the dead, he has angered the people who run things and they intend to kill him.
She knows, even if the others don't, that by coming here to this place, at this time, and working this miracle, he has sealed his fate, he has signed his own execution order.
In giving Lazarus life he has assured his own death.
Mary pours out both her gratitude and her grief when she pours the perfume on Jesus' feet.
And when Jesus reminds them that they always have the poor with them, he is reminding them, and us, of our ongoing call and duty to serve the needs of what he calls elsewhere "the least of these my brothers and sisters."
Indeed what he says elsewhere is that when we serve "the least of these," we are personally and directly serving Christ. Rather than being the end of our duty to the poor, this moment with Mary at his feet is really the beginning of a higher call and a wider duty for all of us.
2) The second reason people reacted with shock and dismay is not spoken of in this text, but is easily understood.
Jesus was a single man and a rabbi; "decent women," and "decent rabbis" just didn't touch each other like that. But in her gratitude and her sorrow, Mary had thrown caution to the wind and gave vent to her deepest and most honest feelings about Jesus, her savior and her Lord.
This text calls us to do the same.
It calls us to a deep, deep grief for the death of Jesus; a profound and abiding sorrow for our faults and failures, our evil deeds and iniquitous acts; in a word, our sins, that put him on the cross to bleed and die to save us from ourselves.
It also calls us to a full and rich and sober joy and gratitude for the new life that Christ won for us there.
Martin Luther called it a "sacred exchange," a "divine trade."
On the cross Jesus took on our sins and gave us his holiness.
Upon the cross Jesus died our death and gave us his life.
There on that tree, Jesus accepted our fate and gave us his future.
And in response we are called to weep for our sins and his death and then to pour out our lives in service of Christ through service to the poor and needy of this world.
And Pastor Harkey, it is your particular call, in this place and in this time, to lead these people in doing just that.
In the midst of all the list of things a pastor does; of teaching and preaching and giving the sacraments and visiting the sick and the healthy and involvement in community affairs and bringing new people into the church; underneath all that,
your true call is simply this; lead these people in knowing that Christ has died for them and that in response they are called to die with Christ, pouring out their lives to serve the poor and needy of the world.
Amen and amen.
TEXTS: Isaiah 43:16-21, Philippians 3:4-14, John 12: 1-8
(A sermon preached at the Installation of the Rev. Phil Harkey as pastor of Holy Trinity Lutheran church, Elberton, GA)
In an odd sort of way, today is a day of mixed emotions, of conflictual feelings.
It is the Fifth Sunday in Lent and we are nearing the end of Jesus' journey to the Cross.
As the world emerges from the dark and cold of winter into the light and warmth of spring, our religious tradition calls us deeper into the darkness and gloom of Jesus' suffering and death.
Deepening this feeling of dissonance is the fact that we have gathered here to celebrate the new thing God is doing in Elberton by bringing Pr. Harkey and Holy Trinity Church together in mission and ministry.
Sadness and celebration; darkness and light; the cold of winter and the warmth of spring, the death of Christ and the birth of new hope, all mixed up together in one day.
Just like in our Gospel Lesson.
Here we find Jesus at a meal celebrating the raising of Lazarus, a feast in honor of the fact that Lazarus has been returned from the dead.
Into the midst of this party, Mary comes and anoints Jesus' feet with perfume and wipes them with her hair; an act that symbolically prepares him for death and burial, an act which also upsets everyone present.
It is a complicated story. Let's look at it carefully.
This story is in the beginning of chapter 12 in John. In chapter 11 Jesus is out preaching and teaching when he gets word that Lazarus, his dear friend, is ill. Later he learns that he has died.
The rest of chapter 11 is about how Jesus delayed in going to Lazarus and about how Martha fussed at Jesus for not coming sooner and how when Jesus saw Mary and all the others weeping, he started weeping too, and finally, Jesus went to the tomb and cried out, "Lazarus, come out."
And Lazarus came out, bound up like a Mummy in a bad horror movie; stumbling and smelly but alive.
Chapter 12 opens with the story of a dinner that took place a few weeks later to celebrate Lazarus' amazing return from the dead. Make no mistake about it; this was a party, a fiesta, a banquet.
Where I come from we would have had a pig-picking, a fish-fry, a keg party with fireworks. Pastor Harkey, you're from Charleston, right? We're talking a Low Country shrimp boil. Out on the deck, beach music playing, couples dancing the shag, little kids running around under the boardwalk chasing fireflies, old people sitting in corners talking and watching young people;
And into the midst of this joyous frivolity Mary comes with a gallon of perfume, expensive stuff, worth thirty or forty thousand dollars. And she plops down in front of Jesus and pours this rich and costly perfume all over his feet and then wipes his feet with her hair.
And the music stops, and the dancers freeze and and the old people hush talking and the children stand with their fingers in their mouths and stare while Jesus smiles and lifts Mary up and thanks her for her generosity and her love.
There are a couple of reasons for the stunned reaction on the part of the group, one that is spoken of in the text and one that is not.
1) In the text, Judas says that which everyone else is thinking, "My God, woman, what are you doing? You could have sold that and given the money to the poor."
Jesus reply here is very important. Many times people have used his words, "the poor you always have with you," as an excuse for not helping the poor.
That is definitely NOT what Jesus meant.
Jesus meant that Mary understands his immediate present and near future better than any of them.
She bought the perfume, the nard, for a specific purpose; to anoint his body when he died, and she more than anyone else, knows that Jesus is soon to die.
Her anointing his body at this time shows that she recognizes that by coming to Jerusalem and raising her brother from the dead, he has angered the people who run things and they intend to kill him.
She knows, even if the others don't, that by coming here to this place, at this time, and working this miracle, he has sealed his fate, he has signed his own execution order.
In giving Lazarus life he has assured his own death.
Mary pours out both her gratitude and her grief when she pours the perfume on Jesus' feet.
And when Jesus reminds them that they always have the poor with them, he is reminding them, and us, of our ongoing call and duty to serve the needs of what he calls elsewhere "the least of these my brothers and sisters."
Indeed what he says elsewhere is that when we serve "the least of these," we are personally and directly serving Christ. Rather than being the end of our duty to the poor, this moment with Mary at his feet is really the beginning of a higher call and a wider duty for all of us.
2) The second reason people reacted with shock and dismay is not spoken of in this text, but is easily understood.
Jesus was a single man and a rabbi; "decent women," and "decent rabbis" just didn't touch each other like that. But in her gratitude and her sorrow, Mary had thrown caution to the wind and gave vent to her deepest and most honest feelings about Jesus, her savior and her Lord.
This text calls us to do the same.
It calls us to a deep, deep grief for the death of Jesus; a profound and abiding sorrow for our faults and failures, our evil deeds and iniquitous acts; in a word, our sins, that put him on the cross to bleed and die to save us from ourselves.
It also calls us to a full and rich and sober joy and gratitude for the new life that Christ won for us there.
Martin Luther called it a "sacred exchange," a "divine trade."
On the cross Jesus took on our sins and gave us his holiness.
Upon the cross Jesus died our death and gave us his life.
There on that tree, Jesus accepted our fate and gave us his future.
And in response we are called to weep for our sins and his death and then to pour out our lives in service of Christ through service to the poor and needy of this world.
And Pastor Harkey, it is your particular call, in this place and in this time, to lead these people in doing just that.
In the midst of all the list of things a pastor does; of teaching and preaching and giving the sacraments and visiting the sick and the healthy and involvement in community affairs and bringing new people into the church; underneath all that,
your true call is simply this; lead these people in knowing that Christ has died for them and that in response they are called to die with Christ, pouring out their lives to serve the poor and needy of the world.
Amen and amen.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Lent 4, March 14, 2010
Well, I've been on a Continuing Education trip to a retreat center near Austin Texas and I'm not preaching Sunday, so I haven't written a sermon this week, which feels very strange. I would like to suggest you go to the menu on the right of this page and click on 2007 and then click on March and then go to the sermon for Lent 4 on this text. It was tolearably good, I think.
New one next week,
peace,
Delmo
New one next week,
peace,
Delmo
Thursday, March 04, 2010
Lent Three, march 7, 2010
Lent Three March 7, 2010
(A sermon preached at Trinity Lutheran Church, Tullahoma, TN)
Text: Luke 13:1-9
Seminary professor Haddon Robinson tells the story of a young woman who talked to her pastor about her sin of pride.
She says, "Pastor, every Sunday I come to church and look around and think to myself that I am the prettiest girl in the church. I try to stop but I just can't. Am I horribly sinful?" Pastor looked at her and said, "No dear not sinful; just horribly mistaken."(1)
In today's Gospel lesson, some folks come to Jesus to talk not about their own sins, but the sins of others. And Jesus tells them that they, like the young woman, are horribly mistaken.
It's important to remember that Chapter 12 of Luke ends with several judgment stories in which Jesus warns his hearers to watch out for signs of the last days.
So it is natural that they should wonder, "Hey Jesus, did you hear about how Pilate marched into the Temple and killed those pilgrims from Galilee because he thought they were rioting? Why did God let that happen? Was it because those people were sinful and were being punished?"
We all understand this question. All pastors have gone to visit the hospital after someone has had a heart attack or a terrible auto accident or a diagnosis of cancer and the question comes, "What did I do to deserve this?"
Just this week my mother called me with what she calls "a preacher question." She has a pastor, but since he's a part-time, retired interim, she doesn't want to bother him, so she calls me, assuming I have more free time.
She said, "Help me know what to tell Roger Culler's grandsons. He was 61, died this week. They're 6 and 9 and want to know why God killed Grandpa. What do I tell them?"
My son, who is a very smart recent college graduate, told me over dinner this week that God was punishing him for going off his Lenten discipline. He had given up fast food for Lent but had dinner in a Burger King on the way to a ball game and got food poisoning. I really couldn't tell if he was serious or not, but told him his worst sin in this case was blaming God for fast food.
In the wake of the earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, some TV preachers decided they had to figure out what sins the Haitians and Chileans had committed that caused God to punish them.
And to all of this Jesus says, "You are horribly mistaken." Or as verses 3 and 5 put it, 'No, I tell you; but . . ."
Those "buts" are probably the most important words in this text. They signal a turn. A turn away from worrying about the sins and fate of others, and a turn to thinking about our sins and our own fate in life.
UNLESS YOU REPENT, YOU WILL ALL LIKEWISE PERISH!
Jesus turned the crowd away from a discussion of other people's sins and turned it to a focus on their own need for change and repentance.
The theme of our text and the theme of Lent is "turning to and fro with God; turning from fear to faith, from sin to grace, from the world to God.
And focusing on the sin or saintliness of others distracts us from paying attention to our own journey with God.
In the early Twentieth Century, The Times of London, a newspaper read all over England, indeed all over the world; invited famous writers to answer the question: What is wrong with the world?
In response, they got many long essays spelling out both the problems and also, as a bonus, the writer's assessment as to who was to blame.
God, the Devil, the Church, the Communists, the Fascists, White people, Black people, Asians, Hispanics, the Jews, the Germans, the Italians, the Chinese, the Moslems, and the Americans.
It was women, men, the Older Generation and These Young People Today.
GK Chesterton, who wrote the father Brown Mysteries and books on Christianity and published many magazines on culture and politics, wrote:
Dear Sirs,
I AM.
Sincerely,
GK Chesterton (2)
Jesus call to us today is to turn from blaming God, or the world, or others, for what's wrong with the world.
Christ invites us to turn to look at ourselves instead, and then to turn and look to God for help and salvation.
That is really what the word we translate into English as REPENT means; it means to turn, to turn from one way of thinking to another, to turn from going one direction in life to going in a new and different direction.
Luther said that the life of the Christian is a life of daily repentance, a life of constant turning from the world to God and then turning back again from God to go into the world.
The result of this turning is the fruit we bear, the acts of love and kindness to others that our lives produce.
Jesus' parable of the fig tree reminds us that a life of turning to God and then back into the world will produce fruitful lives of generosity and love.
The reprieve given to the unfruitful tree reminds us that God is a God of grace and forbearance and steadfast love, a God of the second chance.
And we all sometimes need this reminder, because all of us are sometimes "horribly mistaken" about the sins of others and the sins of ourselves.
We have an unfortunate tendency to believe our sins are easily forgiven, but those of others, well, "…not so much."
In his series of novels about the small town of Harmony, Indiana, Phillip Gulley's Quaker preacher often reminds his parishioners that, "every saint has a past and every sinner has a future." (3)
Though we Lutherans remember Luther's words about being "saint and sinner at the same time;" we often act as though our saintliness is better than that of others and our sinfulness is not as bad.
We act as though, if it were only our sins that mattered, then Jesus would not have had to die on the cross; just a good, stern talking to would have taken care of it. It was the sins of others that caused Christ to die.
But we are "horribly mistaken." Jesus says to us, "No, I tell you"
Lent is the time to repent of our own sins, not the sins of others.
Lent is a time to plow up the ground, prepare the soil, heap fertilizer onto our souls; seek the Lord's will and way and trust in the Lord's love and forgiveness, love and forgiveness of us and of others.
Lent is also a time to turn from our time with God and to go back into the world bearing fruit, spreading that love and forgiveness to others.
Victor Daley was an Australian poet who died of tuberculosis in 1905.
During his last days he called to his bedside the Nuns who had nursed him.
When he thanked them for their kindness to him, the head nurse, speaking for the others, said, "Don't thank us. Thank the Grace of God."
He looked around the room and smiled and said, "But, aren't you the grace of God!"
(4)
AMEN and AMEN.
1 - "Let My People Laugh," p. 68; Christianity Today, 2009
2 - cited in Phillip Yancey's "Soul Survivor," p. 58; Zondervan, 2001
3 - "A Change of Heart" p. 129; HarperSanFrancisco, 2005
4 - Heard in a preaching student's chapel sermon at Duke over 30 years ago
(A sermon preached at Trinity Lutheran Church, Tullahoma, TN)
Text: Luke 13:1-9
Seminary professor Haddon Robinson tells the story of a young woman who talked to her pastor about her sin of pride.
She says, "Pastor, every Sunday I come to church and look around and think to myself that I am the prettiest girl in the church. I try to stop but I just can't. Am I horribly sinful?" Pastor looked at her and said, "No dear not sinful; just horribly mistaken."(1)
In today's Gospel lesson, some folks come to Jesus to talk not about their own sins, but the sins of others. And Jesus tells them that they, like the young woman, are horribly mistaken.
It's important to remember that Chapter 12 of Luke ends with several judgment stories in which Jesus warns his hearers to watch out for signs of the last days.
So it is natural that they should wonder, "Hey Jesus, did you hear about how Pilate marched into the Temple and killed those pilgrims from Galilee because he thought they were rioting? Why did God let that happen? Was it because those people were sinful and were being punished?"
We all understand this question. All pastors have gone to visit the hospital after someone has had a heart attack or a terrible auto accident or a diagnosis of cancer and the question comes, "What did I do to deserve this?"
Just this week my mother called me with what she calls "a preacher question." She has a pastor, but since he's a part-time, retired interim, she doesn't want to bother him, so she calls me, assuming I have more free time.
She said, "Help me know what to tell Roger Culler's grandsons. He was 61, died this week. They're 6 and 9 and want to know why God killed Grandpa. What do I tell them?"
My son, who is a very smart recent college graduate, told me over dinner this week that God was punishing him for going off his Lenten discipline. He had given up fast food for Lent but had dinner in a Burger King on the way to a ball game and got food poisoning. I really couldn't tell if he was serious or not, but told him his worst sin in this case was blaming God for fast food.
In the wake of the earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, some TV preachers decided they had to figure out what sins the Haitians and Chileans had committed that caused God to punish them.
And to all of this Jesus says, "You are horribly mistaken." Or as verses 3 and 5 put it, 'No, I tell you; but . . ."
Those "buts" are probably the most important words in this text. They signal a turn. A turn away from worrying about the sins and fate of others, and a turn to thinking about our sins and our own fate in life.
UNLESS YOU REPENT, YOU WILL ALL LIKEWISE PERISH!
Jesus turned the crowd away from a discussion of other people's sins and turned it to a focus on their own need for change and repentance.
The theme of our text and the theme of Lent is "turning to and fro with God; turning from fear to faith, from sin to grace, from the world to God.
And focusing on the sin or saintliness of others distracts us from paying attention to our own journey with God.
In the early Twentieth Century, The Times of London, a newspaper read all over England, indeed all over the world; invited famous writers to answer the question: What is wrong with the world?
In response, they got many long essays spelling out both the problems and also, as a bonus, the writer's assessment as to who was to blame.
God, the Devil, the Church, the Communists, the Fascists, White people, Black people, Asians, Hispanics, the Jews, the Germans, the Italians, the Chinese, the Moslems, and the Americans.
It was women, men, the Older Generation and These Young People Today.
GK Chesterton, who wrote the father Brown Mysteries and books on Christianity and published many magazines on culture and politics, wrote:
Dear Sirs,
I AM.
Sincerely,
GK Chesterton (2)
Jesus call to us today is to turn from blaming God, or the world, or others, for what's wrong with the world.
Christ invites us to turn to look at ourselves instead, and then to turn and look to God for help and salvation.
That is really what the word we translate into English as REPENT means; it means to turn, to turn from one way of thinking to another, to turn from going one direction in life to going in a new and different direction.
Luther said that the life of the Christian is a life of daily repentance, a life of constant turning from the world to God and then turning back again from God to go into the world.
The result of this turning is the fruit we bear, the acts of love and kindness to others that our lives produce.
Jesus' parable of the fig tree reminds us that a life of turning to God and then back into the world will produce fruitful lives of generosity and love.
The reprieve given to the unfruitful tree reminds us that God is a God of grace and forbearance and steadfast love, a God of the second chance.
And we all sometimes need this reminder, because all of us are sometimes "horribly mistaken" about the sins of others and the sins of ourselves.
We have an unfortunate tendency to believe our sins are easily forgiven, but those of others, well, "…not so much."
In his series of novels about the small town of Harmony, Indiana, Phillip Gulley's Quaker preacher often reminds his parishioners that, "every saint has a past and every sinner has a future." (3)
Though we Lutherans remember Luther's words about being "saint and sinner at the same time;" we often act as though our saintliness is better than that of others and our sinfulness is not as bad.
We act as though, if it were only our sins that mattered, then Jesus would not have had to die on the cross; just a good, stern talking to would have taken care of it. It was the sins of others that caused Christ to die.
But we are "horribly mistaken." Jesus says to us, "No, I tell you"
Lent is the time to repent of our own sins, not the sins of others.
Lent is a time to plow up the ground, prepare the soil, heap fertilizer onto our souls; seek the Lord's will and way and trust in the Lord's love and forgiveness, love and forgiveness of us and of others.
Lent is also a time to turn from our time with God and to go back into the world bearing fruit, spreading that love and forgiveness to others.
Victor Daley was an Australian poet who died of tuberculosis in 1905.
During his last days he called to his bedside the Nuns who had nursed him.
When he thanked them for their kindness to him, the head nurse, speaking for the others, said, "Don't thank us. Thank the Grace of God."
He looked around the room and smiled and said, "But, aren't you the grace of God!"
(4)
AMEN and AMEN.
1 - "Let My People Laugh," p. 68; Christianity Today, 2009
2 - cited in Phillip Yancey's "Soul Survivor," p. 58; Zondervan, 2001
3 - "A Change of Heart" p. 129; HarperSanFrancisco, 2005
4 - Heard in a preaching student's chapel sermon at Duke over 30 years ago
Friday, February 26, 2010
Epiphany 2, Feb. 28, 2010
The Second Sunday in Lent
Texts: Luke 13:31-35
My Grandma Hubbard used to get eggs from the Hodges who lived down the dirt road about a mile. When I was about 5 or 6, Grandma and I would walk down there on a cool summer’s evening.
We would sit on the porch and talk and drink lemonade; sometimes I could persuade Mrs. Hodges to play the little pump organ in the living room by agreeing to pump the pedals for her. (Her legs hurt.)
Eventually we would go with Mr. Hodges out past the hen-house to the spring-house, where he kept his eggs (and the family’s milk and butter) in little wire cages submerged in a concrete tank feed by a mountain spring.
We put the eggs in little pails padded with dishcloths and walked home for supper, probably bacon and eggs with biscuit, ‘cause grandma wasn’t particular about exactly when she had breakfast.
She only put a few in my basket, because I was famous for not ever making it home without breaking all the eggs in my pail.
One day we came out of the spring-house and an awful fuss arose in the chicken yard.
There was a raising of dust, and a flurry of feathers and a scattering of hens and chickens, and much screeching and squawking, and then, just as suddenly, things calmed down and an old gray hen emerged with a large black snake in her mouth.
I thought of that day again when I read today’s Gospel lesson. The first thing that leapt out at me was Jesus’ barnyard imagery;
Herod, the king, the worldly power portrayed as a fox in the chicken yard, with Messiah, the Christ, portrayed as a Bold Female, risking all to protect her chicks. It’s an interesting play of images.
As our Gospel lesson begins, Jesus is told that he should be afraid, he should watch out, that the evil King Herod is out to get him.
Jesus appears to be unafraid, of either Herod or dying. It would be appropriate for Jesus to be scared, but Jesus shows no fear, instead he taunts Herod, saying, come and get me, or better yet, I’ll come to you.
No true prophet can die outside Jerusalem.
At the mention of Jerusalem, Jesus’ tone changes.
He cries over the people, laments their misguided rejection of God’s messengers of truth and love.
And then comes this most startling image: God, Christ, as a Mother Hen protecting her children from the evil fox in their midst.
Jerusalem is Israel and Israel is us, all of us, all of humanity.
The truth is that God has loved us, all of us,
from the very beginning,
from the time of creation,
from the time of Noah and the flood,
from the time of Abram and Sari and the Promise, from the time of Moses and Miriam and the Exodus, from the time of Deborah
and the other judges of Israel
and the kings and queens
and prophets and psalmists,
God has loved the world
and sent us signs and wonders
and messages of that love.
And all too often, we have failed to understand or respond to that love.
All too often, we have turned God’s Word of love into a life of hate, we have turned God’s call to repentance into pointing fingers and a call to arms.
The sly fox of the world has turned us away from that which is good and eternal and has pulled us in the direction of those things which satisfy now but do not linger and live with us for an eternity with God.
If you have ever loved someone you could not protect, then you understand the sadness in Jesus’ voice here.
If you’ve ever watched someone waste their life away on drugs or booze or bad relationships or chasing after material possessions or honors or notoriety or celebrity, or something.
Something undefined but just around the corner that will, they hope, make them whole and complete and healed, but which is never there; then you know the pain Jesus feels.
For you cannot save them, you cannot make them change, you cannot make anyone give up the things that are ruining them.
All you can do is open your arms, you cannot make anyone walk into them. (Repeat)
And, it is the most vulnerable posture in the world, arms spread, chest exposed.
Or, to continue Jesus’ Mother Hen imagery, Wings spread, Breast exposed.
It is interesting that this turns out to be the way Jesus died in Jerusalem, Wings spread, Breast exposed.
Jesus was able to face down and laugh at Herod the fox because he had faith in the God of Promise, the God who promises and follows through, Jesus had faith in the God who promised Abram and Sarai that they would have a Son and that they would be the parents of a people who filled the earth.
Jesus was able to go to the cross because he believed the Psalmists when he said,
The LORD is my light and my salvation - whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life - of whom shall I be afraid?
In the middle of the night, when the fox is loose in the henhouse of our lives, we grow fearful and we wonder: where is God, will God come?
And Jesus is the promise that YES! God comes.
She boldly comes across the chickenyard - clucking and screeching, Wings spread, Breast Exposed!
She comes, to rescue, protect, save her children.
Yes, God comes, that is the promise Jesus made and that is the promise Jesus kept upon the cross,
where he sheltered us from the devil’s wrath and saved us from ourselves so that we might live forever in God’s love.
Amen and Amen.
Texts: Luke 13:31-35
My Grandma Hubbard used to get eggs from the Hodges who lived down the dirt road about a mile. When I was about 5 or 6, Grandma and I would walk down there on a cool summer’s evening.
We would sit on the porch and talk and drink lemonade; sometimes I could persuade Mrs. Hodges to play the little pump organ in the living room by agreeing to pump the pedals for her. (Her legs hurt.)
Eventually we would go with Mr. Hodges out past the hen-house to the spring-house, where he kept his eggs (and the family’s milk and butter) in little wire cages submerged in a concrete tank feed by a mountain spring.
We put the eggs in little pails padded with dishcloths and walked home for supper, probably bacon and eggs with biscuit, ‘cause grandma wasn’t particular about exactly when she had breakfast.
She only put a few in my basket, because I was famous for not ever making it home without breaking all the eggs in my pail.
One day we came out of the spring-house and an awful fuss arose in the chicken yard.
There was a raising of dust, and a flurry of feathers and a scattering of hens and chickens, and much screeching and squawking, and then, just as suddenly, things calmed down and an old gray hen emerged with a large black snake in her mouth.
I thought of that day again when I read today’s Gospel lesson. The first thing that leapt out at me was Jesus’ barnyard imagery;
Herod, the king, the worldly power portrayed as a fox in the chicken yard, with Messiah, the Christ, portrayed as a Bold Female, risking all to protect her chicks. It’s an interesting play of images.
As our Gospel lesson begins, Jesus is told that he should be afraid, he should watch out, that the evil King Herod is out to get him.
Jesus appears to be unafraid, of either Herod or dying. It would be appropriate for Jesus to be scared, but Jesus shows no fear, instead he taunts Herod, saying, come and get me, or better yet, I’ll come to you.
No true prophet can die outside Jerusalem.
At the mention of Jerusalem, Jesus’ tone changes.
He cries over the people, laments their misguided rejection of God’s messengers of truth and love.
And then comes this most startling image: God, Christ, as a Mother Hen protecting her children from the evil fox in their midst.
Jerusalem is Israel and Israel is us, all of us, all of humanity.
The truth is that God has loved us, all of us,
from the very beginning,
from the time of creation,
from the time of Noah and the flood,
from the time of Abram and Sari and the Promise, from the time of Moses and Miriam and the Exodus, from the time of Deborah
and the other judges of Israel
and the kings and queens
and prophets and psalmists,
God has loved the world
and sent us signs and wonders
and messages of that love.
And all too often, we have failed to understand or respond to that love.
All too often, we have turned God’s Word of love into a life of hate, we have turned God’s call to repentance into pointing fingers and a call to arms.
The sly fox of the world has turned us away from that which is good and eternal and has pulled us in the direction of those things which satisfy now but do not linger and live with us for an eternity with God.
If you have ever loved someone you could not protect, then you understand the sadness in Jesus’ voice here.
If you’ve ever watched someone waste their life away on drugs or booze or bad relationships or chasing after material possessions or honors or notoriety or celebrity, or something.
Something undefined but just around the corner that will, they hope, make them whole and complete and healed, but which is never there; then you know the pain Jesus feels.
For you cannot save them, you cannot make them change, you cannot make anyone give up the things that are ruining them.
All you can do is open your arms, you cannot make anyone walk into them. (Repeat)
And, it is the most vulnerable posture in the world, arms spread, chest exposed.
Or, to continue Jesus’ Mother Hen imagery, Wings spread, Breast exposed.
It is interesting that this turns out to be the way Jesus died in Jerusalem, Wings spread, Breast exposed.
Jesus was able to face down and laugh at Herod the fox because he had faith in the God of Promise, the God who promises and follows through, Jesus had faith in the God who promised Abram and Sarai that they would have a Son and that they would be the parents of a people who filled the earth.
Jesus was able to go to the cross because he believed the Psalmists when he said,
The LORD is my light and my salvation - whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life - of whom shall I be afraid?
In the middle of the night, when the fox is loose in the henhouse of our lives, we grow fearful and we wonder: where is God, will God come?
And Jesus is the promise that YES! God comes.
She boldly comes across the chickenyard - clucking and screeching, Wings spread, Breast Exposed!
She comes, to rescue, protect, save her children.
Yes, God comes, that is the promise Jesus made and that is the promise Jesus kept upon the cross,
where he sheltered us from the devil’s wrath and saved us from ourselves so that we might live forever in God’s love.
Amen and Amen.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Lent 1, Feb. 21, 2010
LENT I
February 21, 2010
Text: Luke 4:1-13
(A sermon preached at Christ Lutheran Church, Prattville, AL.)
Several years ago someone gave me a tee-shirt that I absolutely loved. I wore it so much I wore it out.
Just the other day, I was dusting the furniture and found its remnants in the rag box. It read:
“To do is to be” – PLATO
“To be is to do” – DESCARTES
“Dobedobedo” - SINATRA
What we do, how be behave, what we believe; is a large part of how others define us.
Pastor, teacher, housewife, student, musician, funny, quiet, aggressive, talkative, etc.
And how we define ourselves has a major effect on how we behave.
It is, at times, a chicken and the egg question.
Which came first? Am I a Pastor because I do pastoral things; or do I do pastoral things because I am a Pastor?
The biblical position is that we act out of our identity; that who we believe ourselves to be is the determining factor in what we choose to do.
Have you ever noticed that when someone behaves in an outrageous or improper or, most often, horribly RUDE manner, the first thing people say is: “Well, just who do you think you are?”
That is the right question. Who we think we are shapes our behavior.
And the Bible shows us that Satan knew this. That is why he challenged Jesus on the point of identity in today’s Gospel lesson.
The key to understanding the story of the temptations lies in the THREE little words: IF YOU ARE.
In the last verse of Chapter Three, verse 22, following Jesus’ baptism, a voice comes from heaven and says,
“This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”
And here just a few days later, the devil says, “If you are the Son of God.”
Satan presents Jesus with the opportunity to define what it means to be the Son of God;
He is given the opportunity to win popularity by turning stones into bread,
feeding the masses and feeding his ego at the same time,
He is given the opportunity to achieve great power by worshipping the devil and turning his back on trusting God to provide.
He is given the opportunity to achieve great fame by throwing himself off the temple and showing himself to be God’s Chosen One by letting the angels catch him.
These temptations invite Jesus to imitate the Emperors in Rome who secured power by giving the people free food and free entertainment, winning their favor with bread and gladiators.
The temptations with which Jesus was faced are the very ones we, you and I, fall victim to on a regular, I would almost say, a daily basis.
In little subtle ways we seek popularity or power or possessions as a way of hedging our bets against the uncertainty of the world.
After all, we live in an age in which terrorists strap on bombs and blow up innocent people, stock markets plunge and housing prices fall, where wars rage and tornados strike and earthquakes break open the very ground beneath our feet.
A little control over our own lives and a bit of money securely invested, what’s wrong with that?
It comes down to a matter of faith, of trust, of belief and confidence in the promises of God to love and care for us throughout life’s trials and temptations.
The problem is: the things the Devil wanted Jesus to do as the Son of God are selfish, and self-serving and ultimately self-glorifying.
And Jesus rejected them because being centered on self is inconsistent with being the Christ, the Beloved, the Son of God, the one sent to save others.
It was during the forty days in the wilderness that Jesus struggled with what it meant to be the Son of God.
When he became clear about that identity, he came out of the wilderness, and began to preach the Kingdom of God and to perform mighty acts of healing and exorcism.
In the forty days in the wilderness, Jesus found out who he was and came forth ready to behave in accord with his identity.
When Jesus knew who he was, the question of what he was to do was already answered.
To be the Christ, the Son of God, laid out for him a path to follow, a way of being in the world that led to certain things to do.
Preaching. Healing. Confronting Evil.
Throughout these forty days of Lent we are called to contemplate the life of Jesus, his path of service and obedience to God, his living out his identity as the Son of God.
As we do that, we must ask ourselves some identity questions, personally and congregationally.
Who am I? Who am I, really? And what is God calling me to do?
Who are we? Who are we, really? And what is God calling us to do?
Not too long ago I turned on the TV to watch a ballgame and caught the tail end of an old episode of LAW AND ORDER.
Two lawyers, one white, one black, were sitting in a book lined office, having a drink and discussing the just ended case.
The Black lawyer said, “I used to think I was a lawyer who happened to be Black. Now I feel more like a Black man who happens to be a lawyer.”
It is a question of identity that will shape his life and work.
Who am I? Am I a lawyer, or doctor, or policeman, or office manager, or teacher, or truck-driver or nurse, or retiree who happens to be a Christian?
Or am I a Christian; who happens to be a lawyer or doctor or policeman, etc.
It is an important question, and the answer will shape your life.
Likewise, as a congregation, as a community, we struggle with identity questions.
Who are we, really? Are we a gathering of like-minded people, a little ELCA Lutheran enclave in Prattville?
If so, then the things we do should be designed to take care of ourselves.
Or are we a people whom God has called together to be the Body of Christ, as Luther says in the Small Catechism: Called, gathered, empowered and sent?
Called to be a Christian, gathered around Word and Sacrament, Empowered by the Holy Spirit, Sent into the world to spread the Love of God.
If that is who we are (and I believe it is) then the things we do will be designed to care for others.
Jesus spent forty days in the Wilderness struggling with the question of identity, struggling to discover what it meant to be the Son of God.
Throughout the forty days of Lent, we are called to do the same.
We must ask ourselves,
If we are the beloved children of God, what is God calling us to do?
Christ Church, Prattville; just WHO do you think you are?
Amen and amen.
February 21, 2010
Text: Luke 4:1-13
(A sermon preached at Christ Lutheran Church, Prattville, AL.)
Several years ago someone gave me a tee-shirt that I absolutely loved. I wore it so much I wore it out.
Just the other day, I was dusting the furniture and found its remnants in the rag box. It read:
“To do is to be” – PLATO
“To be is to do” – DESCARTES
“Dobedobedo” - SINATRA
What we do, how be behave, what we believe; is a large part of how others define us.
Pastor, teacher, housewife, student, musician, funny, quiet, aggressive, talkative, etc.
And how we define ourselves has a major effect on how we behave.
It is, at times, a chicken and the egg question.
Which came first? Am I a Pastor because I do pastoral things; or do I do pastoral things because I am a Pastor?
The biblical position is that we act out of our identity; that who we believe ourselves to be is the determining factor in what we choose to do.
Have you ever noticed that when someone behaves in an outrageous or improper or, most often, horribly RUDE manner, the first thing people say is: “Well, just who do you think you are?”
That is the right question. Who we think we are shapes our behavior.
And the Bible shows us that Satan knew this. That is why he challenged Jesus on the point of identity in today’s Gospel lesson.
The key to understanding the story of the temptations lies in the THREE little words: IF YOU ARE.
In the last verse of Chapter Three, verse 22, following Jesus’ baptism, a voice comes from heaven and says,
“This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”
And here just a few days later, the devil says, “If you are the Son of God.”
Satan presents Jesus with the opportunity to define what it means to be the Son of God;
He is given the opportunity to win popularity by turning stones into bread,
feeding the masses and feeding his ego at the same time,
He is given the opportunity to achieve great power by worshipping the devil and turning his back on trusting God to provide.
He is given the opportunity to achieve great fame by throwing himself off the temple and showing himself to be God’s Chosen One by letting the angels catch him.
These temptations invite Jesus to imitate the Emperors in Rome who secured power by giving the people free food and free entertainment, winning their favor with bread and gladiators.
The temptations with which Jesus was faced are the very ones we, you and I, fall victim to on a regular, I would almost say, a daily basis.
In little subtle ways we seek popularity or power or possessions as a way of hedging our bets against the uncertainty of the world.
After all, we live in an age in which terrorists strap on bombs and blow up innocent people, stock markets plunge and housing prices fall, where wars rage and tornados strike and earthquakes break open the very ground beneath our feet.
A little control over our own lives and a bit of money securely invested, what’s wrong with that?
It comes down to a matter of faith, of trust, of belief and confidence in the promises of God to love and care for us throughout life’s trials and temptations.
The problem is: the things the Devil wanted Jesus to do as the Son of God are selfish, and self-serving and ultimately self-glorifying.
And Jesus rejected them because being centered on self is inconsistent with being the Christ, the Beloved, the Son of God, the one sent to save others.
It was during the forty days in the wilderness that Jesus struggled with what it meant to be the Son of God.
When he became clear about that identity, he came out of the wilderness, and began to preach the Kingdom of God and to perform mighty acts of healing and exorcism.
In the forty days in the wilderness, Jesus found out who he was and came forth ready to behave in accord with his identity.
When Jesus knew who he was, the question of what he was to do was already answered.
To be the Christ, the Son of God, laid out for him a path to follow, a way of being in the world that led to certain things to do.
Preaching. Healing. Confronting Evil.
Throughout these forty days of Lent we are called to contemplate the life of Jesus, his path of service and obedience to God, his living out his identity as the Son of God.
As we do that, we must ask ourselves some identity questions, personally and congregationally.
Who am I? Who am I, really? And what is God calling me to do?
Who are we? Who are we, really? And what is God calling us to do?
Not too long ago I turned on the TV to watch a ballgame and caught the tail end of an old episode of LAW AND ORDER.
Two lawyers, one white, one black, were sitting in a book lined office, having a drink and discussing the just ended case.
The Black lawyer said, “I used to think I was a lawyer who happened to be Black. Now I feel more like a Black man who happens to be a lawyer.”
It is a question of identity that will shape his life and work.
Who am I? Am I a lawyer, or doctor, or policeman, or office manager, or teacher, or truck-driver or nurse, or retiree who happens to be a Christian?
Or am I a Christian; who happens to be a lawyer or doctor or policeman, etc.
It is an important question, and the answer will shape your life.
Likewise, as a congregation, as a community, we struggle with identity questions.
Who are we, really? Are we a gathering of like-minded people, a little ELCA Lutheran enclave in Prattville?
If so, then the things we do should be designed to take care of ourselves.
Or are we a people whom God has called together to be the Body of Christ, as Luther says in the Small Catechism: Called, gathered, empowered and sent?
Called to be a Christian, gathered around Word and Sacrament, Empowered by the Holy Spirit, Sent into the world to spread the Love of God.
If that is who we are (and I believe it is) then the things we do will be designed to care for others.
Jesus spent forty days in the Wilderness struggling with the question of identity, struggling to discover what it meant to be the Son of God.
Throughout the forty days of Lent, we are called to do the same.
We must ask ourselves,
If we are the beloved children of God, what is God calling us to do?
Christ Church, Prattville; just WHO do you think you are?
Amen and amen.
Monday, February 15, 2010
To my readers
The title "To My Readers," seems a bit pretentious to me, especially since I am generally surprised to find out I have readers!
I preached Epiphany 4 and 5 at the Episcopal Church here in Hayesville and the second week someone asked why I had not posted the previous week's sermon.
So, tonight, I have caught up by posting Epiphany 4 and Transfiguaration and a little serio-comic piece I did on Shrove Tuesday and Mardi Gras.
Thing is, I'm not smart enough to do them in correct chronological order, but you all are smart enough to figure it out.
I really would like to know who's reading this and if it is something I should keep doing. So, please email me at delmer.chilton@gmail.com and let me know you're reading and whether you'd like me to continue writing.
thanks,
delmer
I preached Epiphany 4 and 5 at the Episcopal Church here in Hayesville and the second week someone asked why I had not posted the previous week's sermon.
So, tonight, I have caught up by posting Epiphany 4 and Transfiguaration and a little serio-comic piece I did on Shrove Tuesday and Mardi Gras.
Thing is, I'm not smart enough to do them in correct chronological order, but you all are smart enough to figure it out.
I really would like to know who's reading this and if it is something I should keep doing. So, please email me at delmer.chilton@gmail.com and let me know you're reading and whether you'd like me to continue writing.
thanks,
delmer
Epiphany Four
Epiphany Four, January 31, 2010
Luke 4:21-30
My friend Sam Dixon died in the Earthquake in Haiti. He was a UMC minister who was the Director of the UM Relief agency UMCOR.
At his Memorial Service in Raleigh last week, a Methodist lay preacher used an illustration that really struck me.
He said that he and the Rev. Dixon had attended a workshop on Church Growth and that the presenter had talked about the familiar paintings of Jesus Knocking at the Door
We've all seen them in homes and in churches; Jesus knocking at the door of a 18th century cottage.
Most of us, most of the time, have seen that painting as symbolic of Jesus knocking at the door of our hearts, seeking to come in.
At this workshop, the Presenter, Professor Ken Callahan from Candler School of Theology, had suggested that while that was true, there was also another way to think about that painting.
"Perhaps", he said, "Jesus is knocking at the door of our lives, inviting us to come out of our private concerns and to get ourselves involved in the world's needs and hurts and pains."
GOOD NEWS TO THE POOR
RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES
RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND
THE OPPRESSED GO FREE
THE YEAR OF THE LORD'S FAVOR
As we heard in last week's Gospel lesson; that is Jesus' self-identified job description.
It is our job description too.
To understand what happened in today's Gospel Lesson, we have to go back to the middle of chapter three and recall what has been going on in Jesus' life.
Jesus had responded to the call of John by getting baptized,
the Holy Spirit came upon him,
he is declared the Beloved Son of God.
Then the Spirit leads him into the Wilderness,
where he resists the Devil’s temptations to fame and power,
then, still full of the Spirit,
he returns to Galilee and begins preaching and healing.
Then he comes to Nazareth, his hometown, and goes to the Synagogue and reads the text from Isaiah about being the Lord’s anointed, and then, our scripture begins.
Jesus says - Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.
Many commentators believe that this is not all that he said, but rather it is a synopsis of what he said; a summary of the short homily, or talk, or teaching Jesus gave in the synagogue that day.
At first people were pretty impressed. Verse 22 says, “All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” They are simply impressed, and not a little surprised.
Like the old men in Mount Airy will tell you about going to school with Andy Griffith, “Shoot, I knew him when he was a snot-nosed kid. We went to school together over there on Rockford Street. He warn’t nothing special. A little prissy to tell you the truth, always singing and acting and playing that trombone and such.”
It is in verses 23-27 that he makes them mad. Again, this is a shortened version of the discussion. Apparently they were pleased with his preaching, but they had heard that he had done miracles and healings elsewhere and they wanted him to do some for them.
And Jesus refused, Why? Because all they wanted was a show, an exhibition.
They weren’t interested in people being healed, they wanted to be entertained,
Jesus was having none of it.
And so, we can read between the lines and hear them saying things like, Who do you think you are? What’s the matter, you too good for us now? You gone off to the city and now you’re too big to do miracles for us?
This is where a nasty line from Mark’s version of the story comes into play, instead of Son of Joseph, Mark has them call him “Mary’s boy.” That’s another way of saying, "We haven't forgotten about the questions about who your Daddy is." Small towns are all alike in some things.
Jesus responds with two Hebrew Bible stories of healing. Elijah and the Widow of Zarephath
and Elisha and Namaan. What’s important here is that both the widow of Zarephath and Namaan were gentiles, foreigners, aliens.
Jesus points out that there were many widows and lepers in Israel, but God chose to use Elijah and Elisha to heal the outsiders, and God has chosen Jesus to bring God’s love to everybody, not just the Children of Israel.
This made them really mad. So mad that they ran him out of town and tried to kill him, but he mysteriously got away
Now, here’s the question for us today.
Are we like the people of Nazareth, pleased with Jesus as long as what he says sounds good to us, but turning our backs on him when he says things we don’t like?
Now, most of us would never come right out and say we disagree with Jesus, so we basically use wiggle room to avoid it.
Whenever we hear something we don’t like coming out of Jesus’ mouth, we blame it on somebody other than Jesus: the professors, the liberals, the over-educated preachers, the bleeding hearts, the conservatives,the fundamentalists.
Anything but admitting that Jesus said it, and I’m supposed to deal with it. For example, I’ll admit it; I’m a little hard-hearted about poor people and homeless people. My heart sneers; get a job, go to work, get busy. If you’re poor, it’s your own fault.
Despite a UNC and Duke education and years of prayer and Bible study and living with a Social Worker for 35 years, somewhere in a place I don’t visit very often, deep in my soul,
I still feel that way.
And yet Jesus said The Holy Spirit had anointed him to preach Good News to the poor.
He told the rich young ruler to sell all he had and give it to the poor.
There is the great judgment parable in which Jesus said, “If you did unto one of the least of these, the cold, the hungry, the naked, the poor, you did it unto me.”
And many more things about the poor and my, our obligation to them.
We have to deal with that.
Do we sort of ignore it or do we get mad about it, and turn our backs on Jesus, like the people of Nazareth?
Or do we swallow our pride and obey our master?
Have we stopped listening to Jesus?
He says many things about loving the stranger and the foreigner, about turning the other cheek, about living a life of prayer, about selling what we have and giving it to the poor, about the Kingdom of God being inside us, etc. etc.
Here’s the question, do we take Jesus seriously?
Or are we giving him the yada, yada treatment, nodding and smiling, but not really listening, putting him off and putting him on?
I hope not. I really hope not. But listening to Jesus is hard. Many things he says challenge us; challenge our ideas and our prejudices and our actions.
But Jesus also invites us, invites us to think about things in a new way, to think about others in a new way, to act toward others in a new way.
Jesus invites us to join him in living in the world by the rules of the Kingdom of God, not the rules of earthly success and happiness.
Jesus invites us to join him in blessing the world with God’s grace and acts of healing and love.
Jesus invites us to join him in going out to all lands and all peoples with the great Good News that the Kingdom of God has come and we are all invited to be a part of it.
So, Jesus invites us to walk the way of the cross; are you coming?
Amen and amen.
Luke 4:21-30
My friend Sam Dixon died in the Earthquake in Haiti. He was a UMC minister who was the Director of the UM Relief agency UMCOR.
At his Memorial Service in Raleigh last week, a Methodist lay preacher used an illustration that really struck me.
He said that he and the Rev. Dixon had attended a workshop on Church Growth and that the presenter had talked about the familiar paintings of Jesus Knocking at the Door
We've all seen them in homes and in churches; Jesus knocking at the door of a 18th century cottage.
Most of us, most of the time, have seen that painting as symbolic of Jesus knocking at the door of our hearts, seeking to come in.
At this workshop, the Presenter, Professor Ken Callahan from Candler School of Theology, had suggested that while that was true, there was also another way to think about that painting.
"Perhaps", he said, "Jesus is knocking at the door of our lives, inviting us to come out of our private concerns and to get ourselves involved in the world's needs and hurts and pains."
GOOD NEWS TO THE POOR
RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES
RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND
THE OPPRESSED GO FREE
THE YEAR OF THE LORD'S FAVOR
As we heard in last week's Gospel lesson; that is Jesus' self-identified job description.
It is our job description too.
To understand what happened in today's Gospel Lesson, we have to go back to the middle of chapter three and recall what has been going on in Jesus' life.
Jesus had responded to the call of John by getting baptized,
the Holy Spirit came upon him,
he is declared the Beloved Son of God.
Then the Spirit leads him into the Wilderness,
where he resists the Devil’s temptations to fame and power,
then, still full of the Spirit,
he returns to Galilee and begins preaching and healing.
Then he comes to Nazareth, his hometown, and goes to the Synagogue and reads the text from Isaiah about being the Lord’s anointed, and then, our scripture begins.
Jesus says - Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.
Many commentators believe that this is not all that he said, but rather it is a synopsis of what he said; a summary of the short homily, or talk, or teaching Jesus gave in the synagogue that day.
At first people were pretty impressed. Verse 22 says, “All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” They are simply impressed, and not a little surprised.
Like the old men in Mount Airy will tell you about going to school with Andy Griffith, “Shoot, I knew him when he was a snot-nosed kid. We went to school together over there on Rockford Street. He warn’t nothing special. A little prissy to tell you the truth, always singing and acting and playing that trombone and such.”
It is in verses 23-27 that he makes them mad. Again, this is a shortened version of the discussion. Apparently they were pleased with his preaching, but they had heard that he had done miracles and healings elsewhere and they wanted him to do some for them.
And Jesus refused, Why? Because all they wanted was a show, an exhibition.
They weren’t interested in people being healed, they wanted to be entertained,
Jesus was having none of it.
And so, we can read between the lines and hear them saying things like, Who do you think you are? What’s the matter, you too good for us now? You gone off to the city and now you’re too big to do miracles for us?
This is where a nasty line from Mark’s version of the story comes into play, instead of Son of Joseph, Mark has them call him “Mary’s boy.” That’s another way of saying, "We haven't forgotten about the questions about who your Daddy is." Small towns are all alike in some things.
Jesus responds with two Hebrew Bible stories of healing. Elijah and the Widow of Zarephath
and Elisha and Namaan. What’s important here is that both the widow of Zarephath and Namaan were gentiles, foreigners, aliens.
Jesus points out that there were many widows and lepers in Israel, but God chose to use Elijah and Elisha to heal the outsiders, and God has chosen Jesus to bring God’s love to everybody, not just the Children of Israel.
This made them really mad. So mad that they ran him out of town and tried to kill him, but he mysteriously got away
Now, here’s the question for us today.
Are we like the people of Nazareth, pleased with Jesus as long as what he says sounds good to us, but turning our backs on him when he says things we don’t like?
Now, most of us would never come right out and say we disagree with Jesus, so we basically use wiggle room to avoid it.
Whenever we hear something we don’t like coming out of Jesus’ mouth, we blame it on somebody other than Jesus: the professors, the liberals, the over-educated preachers, the bleeding hearts, the conservatives,the fundamentalists.
Anything but admitting that Jesus said it, and I’m supposed to deal with it. For example, I’ll admit it; I’m a little hard-hearted about poor people and homeless people. My heart sneers; get a job, go to work, get busy. If you’re poor, it’s your own fault.
Despite a UNC and Duke education and years of prayer and Bible study and living with a Social Worker for 35 years, somewhere in a place I don’t visit very often, deep in my soul,
I still feel that way.
And yet Jesus said The Holy Spirit had anointed him to preach Good News to the poor.
He told the rich young ruler to sell all he had and give it to the poor.
There is the great judgment parable in which Jesus said, “If you did unto one of the least of these, the cold, the hungry, the naked, the poor, you did it unto me.”
And many more things about the poor and my, our obligation to them.
We have to deal with that.
Do we sort of ignore it or do we get mad about it, and turn our backs on Jesus, like the people of Nazareth?
Or do we swallow our pride and obey our master?
Have we stopped listening to Jesus?
He says many things about loving the stranger and the foreigner, about turning the other cheek, about living a life of prayer, about selling what we have and giving it to the poor, about the Kingdom of God being inside us, etc. etc.
Here’s the question, do we take Jesus seriously?
Or are we giving him the yada, yada treatment, nodding and smiling, but not really listening, putting him off and putting him on?
I hope not. I really hope not. But listening to Jesus is hard. Many things he says challenge us; challenge our ideas and our prejudices and our actions.
But Jesus also invites us, invites us to think about things in a new way, to think about others in a new way, to act toward others in a new way.
Jesus invites us to join him in living in the world by the rules of the Kingdom of God, not the rules of earthly success and happiness.
Jesus invites us to join him in blessing the world with God’s grace and acts of healing and love.
Jesus invites us to join him in going out to all lands and all peoples with the great Good News that the Kingdom of God has come and we are all invited to be a part of it.
So, Jesus invites us to walk the way of the cross; are you coming?
Amen and amen.
Transfiguration
TEXTS: Exodus 34:29-35,
II Corinthians 3:12-4:2
Luke 9:28-36
TITLE: The Hidden-ness of the Holy
Almost every Saturday afternoon, I listen to the opera on the Public Radio Station.
Don’t look so surprised. I like opera; not as much as I like Lynard Skynard or ZZ Topp, but I like opera.
Well, actually I don’t like opera, but I do like the idea of liking opera; deep down inside I fell like an educated person SHOULD like opera, and sooo;
On Saturday afternoon’s I listen to opera; kind of on the same theory as your mother had when she kept feeding you liver and asparagus,
hoping that one day you would come in and when she said, “What would you like for dinner?,” you would say, “How about some yummy liver and asparagus?”
Not gonna happen, but hope springs eternal in the human breast.
Anyway, I listen to opera in the vague hope that someday I’ll like it and can then count myself as a genuinely educated and cultured person.
Every once in a while, I find myself liking a piece, nodding along and getting into it and thinking, “Gee, I beginning to like this opera stuff.”
But then I realized that the opera pieces I liked were the ones they used as soundtracks for Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd cartoons, and I was back to square one;
I still didn’t like opera; I was just engaging in nostalgia about my childhood.
It seems to me that many people are seeking after Spiritual Enlightenment in much the same way that I have been seeking Musical Enlightenment; it’s something they’ve heard about, many of the better people have had these experiences, so they believe they ought to have them too.
So, they go seeking after the next new thing; the latest prayer techniques and the different churches and the praise bands and labyrinth walks and Alpha Bible Study and the Men’s drum-beating Sweat Lodge, and I don’t know what all.
Whatever they’re looking for, it isn’t where they are, it must be over the hill or around the next corner.
Some of this can be traced to biblical stories like today’s scripture lessons, which tell us about extra-ordinary spiritual events.
In our First Lesson, Moses goes up on the mountain and meets God in cloud and devouring fire.
In the Gospel lesson, Jesus goes up the mountain with Peter, James and John; and while there is TRANSFIGURED, whatever that means.
And in our Second Lesson, Paul refers to Moses and the veil.
Somehow, some people are always looking for something more, something electric and kinetic and spine tingling to happen to them religiously.
Which is okay, those things do happen, sometimes, to some people.
What is not okay is when one believes that such experiences are what religion in general and Christianity in particular are all about.
What is not okay is when people think that unless one has had such an experience, one has not really encountered the HOLY.
The truth of the matter is that religion is NOT about seeking after the extraordinary, not about the quest for the next new spiritual high, not about looking for an experiential fix of the Holy to carry one through another drab and ordinary week.
NO! Religion is about seeing, and feeling and hearing and respecting the Holy in, with and under the ordinary-ness of our daily lives.
To be religious is not a matter of being otherworldly;
to be religious is to be uniquely grounded in this world, seeing the very stuff of life as the very stuff of God.
Where are we to find the Holy?
On Mountaintops and in Sweat Lodges?
Where are we to look for God’s presence in our lives?
Well, you don’t have to go to the mountaintop; it’s all around you, all the time. We know this. It’s shown to us in our sacraments.
The water in the font, the water in which we baptize.
It’s ordinary water. It’s the same water that goes into the drinking fountain, the same water that flushes the toilet.
It’s just water.
What makes it holy? The use makes it holy. We use it to baptize a child, we speak the promise of Christ, and in with that water we bring a new child into Covenant with God and into Community with us.
Look at this wafer. It’s just a little whole-wheat flour and water. We buy them by the thousands. It’s not very good to eat; if you’re not careful, it will stick to the roof of your mouth.
And this, its just wine, grapes fermented and bottled and sold at the liquor store along with Budweiser Beer and Jack Daniel's Whiskey.
It’s good wine, good with dinner, but it’s nothing special or extraordinary, not until we make Eucharist out of it.
What makes it holy? What turns this ordinary stuff into the Body and Blood of Christ? Not me, not Pastors Scott and Mark.
I don’t have magical powers, and neither do they.
It’s us; us and God together; God promising and acting and our believing and celebrating which reveals the Holy within the ordinary.
That’s what happened to Jesus up on that mountain.
Jesus was a man, just like every other man; smarter, holier than most perhaps, but still very much a fully human person.
Even though the disciples called him Rabbi, Christ even, they still saw him as a man. And then this thing happened. And then they knew; Peter James and John knew; that here was the Divine, the Holy, in human form.
And we too are ordinary people, doing ordinary things. We too, as a church, as a community of faith, as the Body of Christ in the world, we too carry in, with and under our human-ness, the brightness of the Holy-ness of God.
We don’t have to go looking for it; we don’t have to struggle after extraordinary spiritual experiences. God is here with us in all that we do.
Our calling is to pay attention; to listen, look, feel and know that God is here, in this place, and in all our places:
at home, at work, at church, at school. God is present with us in the world, all we have to do is lift the veil and look for the Holy with the eyes of the heart.
AMEN AND AMEN.
II Corinthians 3:12-4:2
Luke 9:28-36
TITLE: The Hidden-ness of the Holy
Almost every Saturday afternoon, I listen to the opera on the Public Radio Station.
Don’t look so surprised. I like opera; not as much as I like Lynard Skynard or ZZ Topp, but I like opera.
Well, actually I don’t like opera, but I do like the idea of liking opera; deep down inside I fell like an educated person SHOULD like opera, and sooo;
On Saturday afternoon’s I listen to opera; kind of on the same theory as your mother had when she kept feeding you liver and asparagus,
hoping that one day you would come in and when she said, “What would you like for dinner?,” you would say, “How about some yummy liver and asparagus?”
Not gonna happen, but hope springs eternal in the human breast.
Anyway, I listen to opera in the vague hope that someday I’ll like it and can then count myself as a genuinely educated and cultured person.
Every once in a while, I find myself liking a piece, nodding along and getting into it and thinking, “Gee, I beginning to like this opera stuff.”
But then I realized that the opera pieces I liked were the ones they used as soundtracks for Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd cartoons, and I was back to square one;
I still didn’t like opera; I was just engaging in nostalgia about my childhood.
It seems to me that many people are seeking after Spiritual Enlightenment in much the same way that I have been seeking Musical Enlightenment; it’s something they’ve heard about, many of the better people have had these experiences, so they believe they ought to have them too.
So, they go seeking after the next new thing; the latest prayer techniques and the different churches and the praise bands and labyrinth walks and Alpha Bible Study and the Men’s drum-beating Sweat Lodge, and I don’t know what all.
Whatever they’re looking for, it isn’t where they are, it must be over the hill or around the next corner.
Some of this can be traced to biblical stories like today’s scripture lessons, which tell us about extra-ordinary spiritual events.
In our First Lesson, Moses goes up on the mountain and meets God in cloud and devouring fire.
In the Gospel lesson, Jesus goes up the mountain with Peter, James and John; and while there is TRANSFIGURED, whatever that means.
And in our Second Lesson, Paul refers to Moses and the veil.
Somehow, some people are always looking for something more, something electric and kinetic and spine tingling to happen to them religiously.
Which is okay, those things do happen, sometimes, to some people.
What is not okay is when one believes that such experiences are what religion in general and Christianity in particular are all about.
What is not okay is when people think that unless one has had such an experience, one has not really encountered the HOLY.
The truth of the matter is that religion is NOT about seeking after the extraordinary, not about the quest for the next new spiritual high, not about looking for an experiential fix of the Holy to carry one through another drab and ordinary week.
NO! Religion is about seeing, and feeling and hearing and respecting the Holy in, with and under the ordinary-ness of our daily lives.
To be religious is not a matter of being otherworldly;
to be religious is to be uniquely grounded in this world, seeing the very stuff of life as the very stuff of God.
Where are we to find the Holy?
On Mountaintops and in Sweat Lodges?
Where are we to look for God’s presence in our lives?
Well, you don’t have to go to the mountaintop; it’s all around you, all the time. We know this. It’s shown to us in our sacraments.
The water in the font, the water in which we baptize.
It’s ordinary water. It’s the same water that goes into the drinking fountain, the same water that flushes the toilet.
It’s just water.
What makes it holy? The use makes it holy. We use it to baptize a child, we speak the promise of Christ, and in with that water we bring a new child into Covenant with God and into Community with us.
Look at this wafer. It’s just a little whole-wheat flour and water. We buy them by the thousands. It’s not very good to eat; if you’re not careful, it will stick to the roof of your mouth.
And this, its just wine, grapes fermented and bottled and sold at the liquor store along with Budweiser Beer and Jack Daniel's Whiskey.
It’s good wine, good with dinner, but it’s nothing special or extraordinary, not until we make Eucharist out of it.
What makes it holy? What turns this ordinary stuff into the Body and Blood of Christ? Not me, not Pastors Scott and Mark.
I don’t have magical powers, and neither do they.
It’s us; us and God together; God promising and acting and our believing and celebrating which reveals the Holy within the ordinary.
That’s what happened to Jesus up on that mountain.
Jesus was a man, just like every other man; smarter, holier than most perhaps, but still very much a fully human person.
Even though the disciples called him Rabbi, Christ even, they still saw him as a man. And then this thing happened. And then they knew; Peter James and John knew; that here was the Divine, the Holy, in human form.
And we too are ordinary people, doing ordinary things. We too, as a church, as a community of faith, as the Body of Christ in the world, we too carry in, with and under our human-ness, the brightness of the Holy-ness of God.
We don’t have to go looking for it; we don’t have to struggle after extraordinary spiritual experiences. God is here with us in all that we do.
Our calling is to pay attention; to listen, look, feel and know that God is here, in this place, and in all our places:
at home, at work, at church, at school. God is present with us in the world, all we have to do is lift the veil and look for the Holy with the eyes of the heart.
AMEN AND AMEN.
Shrove Tuesday/Mardi Gras
Shrove Tuesday/Mardi Gras Meditation
Text: Romans 7: 14-25
Title: Shriven or Fat?
OPENING:
When I was a kid growing up in Mount Airy, NC; I had absolutely no knowledge or experience of the church year. We had a Christmas play on the Sunday night before Christmas and Easter just kind of showed up one Sunday with no preliminaries and had more to do with Sunrise Service at the Moravian Cemetery and the Easter Egg Hunt during Sunday School and my sisters and mother having new dresses than anything else. We were not a liturgical people.
My favorite place to shop when I was a kid was the Robby's Army/Navy Surplus store on Main Street. Most Fridays I went to town with Mama when she went to "get her hair fixed," and went to Robby's to look at manly men stuff and to occasionally buy a knife or a shirt or something.
Across the street from Robby's was Trinity Episcopal Church; a tiny stone building that seated maybe 50 people and had a Fellowship Hall downstairs. Every year I was fascinated to see the sign go up in their yard advertising "Shrove Tuesday Pancake Dinner and Ash Wednesday Service" Two different days; one sign.
Nobody I knew could tell me what that was all about; not parents or teachers or even my preacher. The best anyone could do was my Baptist Deacon Grandaddy who said, "I reckon it's the way them 'Piskipalians has a revival and a fellowship dinner." Close enough, I'd say, for an opinion formed out of almost complete ignorance of the subject; a technique I have inherited and exploited with children over the years.
At about the same time, I became acquainted with the New Orleans tradition of Mardi Gras, mostly through my devout Aunt Ethel; who gave me Evangelical Tracts and Paperback books for Birthday and Christmas presents until she died when I was forty. (She was still hoping I would turn my back on my obvious crypto-Catholicism and accept Jesus.)
It was in a somewhat lurid paperback description of the soul-saving work of the Rev. Bob Harrington, known to his admirers as the "Chaplain of Bourbon Street." The only religious effect it had on me was making me consider going into the Baptist Ministry just so I could attend New Orleans Baptist Seminary.
It was only in Seminary that I began to connect the dots between Shrove Tuesday and Mardi Gras. Here's this from The Oxford Encyclopedia of Christianity.
On the eve of Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, the season of fasting, people first went to confession, to be "shriven," hence Shrove Tuesday, and then ate pancakes, to use up the ingredients forbidden during Lent. This turned into a longer period of pre-Lent celebration, known as Carnival or Mardi Gras. P. 468
Although I admit to having a little fun with this, I don't think it far-fetched of me to see the two different ways of observing this day as being more than a cultural difference between the repressed and dour English and Northern Europeans on the one hand and the more "party-hearty" attitude of the French and the other Mediterranean peoples on the other.
We all find it difficult to figure out how seriously to take sin; our own and that of others. We know we're not as good as we could be; or maybe should be.
But also, most of us are unwilling to admit being as bad as some other people think we are; or conversely, as bad as we think some other people are.
No matter how we have failed our own ethical and moral standards, we are all of us more than willing to look around and say, "Well, Lord, at least I'm not as bad as that person. At least I didn't do THAT!"
And so, we come up to Lent with two attitudes:
One is represented by being Shriven. We look at Lent as a time to grow spiritually, to pray, and read and draw closer to God. We see this time before Lent as a time of solemn contemplation and sober reflection; well represented by eating damp and tepid pancakes and half-cooked sausage on a paper plate that folds up and spills syrup on the Fellowship Hall table as you sit uncomfortably in your folding chair and sip bad coffee from a Styrofoam Cup.
The other is represented by getting FAT. By the wonderful phrase "Let the good times Roll!"
We have to go through this Lenten time of restriction and restraint, so we'd best get the partying out of our system before it starts.
To tell you the truth, I'm not exactly sure which of these represents Saint and which Sinner in Luther's famous simul Justus et Peccator; saint and sinner at the same time.
What I am really clear about is that each of us is just that; saint and sinner at the same time,
each of us struggles with it; each of us seeks the good, and all too often fails; fails to see it in others or to achieve it in ourselves.
And the gospel is; God loves us anyway, yes indeed, God loves us anyway;
Ye that do truly and earnestly repent of your sins, LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL!
Amen and amen.
Text: Romans 7: 14-25
Title: Shriven or Fat?
OPENING:
When I was a kid growing up in Mount Airy, NC; I had absolutely no knowledge or experience of the church year. We had a Christmas play on the Sunday night before Christmas and Easter just kind of showed up one Sunday with no preliminaries and had more to do with Sunrise Service at the Moravian Cemetery and the Easter Egg Hunt during Sunday School and my sisters and mother having new dresses than anything else. We were not a liturgical people.
My favorite place to shop when I was a kid was the Robby's Army/Navy Surplus store on Main Street. Most Fridays I went to town with Mama when she went to "get her hair fixed," and went to Robby's to look at manly men stuff and to occasionally buy a knife or a shirt or something.
Across the street from Robby's was Trinity Episcopal Church; a tiny stone building that seated maybe 50 people and had a Fellowship Hall downstairs. Every year I was fascinated to see the sign go up in their yard advertising "Shrove Tuesday Pancake Dinner and Ash Wednesday Service" Two different days; one sign.
Nobody I knew could tell me what that was all about; not parents or teachers or even my preacher. The best anyone could do was my Baptist Deacon Grandaddy who said, "I reckon it's the way them 'Piskipalians has a revival and a fellowship dinner." Close enough, I'd say, for an opinion formed out of almost complete ignorance of the subject; a technique I have inherited and exploited with children over the years.
At about the same time, I became acquainted with the New Orleans tradition of Mardi Gras, mostly through my devout Aunt Ethel; who gave me Evangelical Tracts and Paperback books for Birthday and Christmas presents until she died when I was forty. (She was still hoping I would turn my back on my obvious crypto-Catholicism and accept Jesus.)
It was in a somewhat lurid paperback description of the soul-saving work of the Rev. Bob Harrington, known to his admirers as the "Chaplain of Bourbon Street." The only religious effect it had on me was making me consider going into the Baptist Ministry just so I could attend New Orleans Baptist Seminary.
It was only in Seminary that I began to connect the dots between Shrove Tuesday and Mardi Gras. Here's this from The Oxford Encyclopedia of Christianity.
On the eve of Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, the season of fasting, people first went to confession, to be "shriven," hence Shrove Tuesday, and then ate pancakes, to use up the ingredients forbidden during Lent. This turned into a longer period of pre-Lent celebration, known as Carnival or Mardi Gras. P. 468
Although I admit to having a little fun with this, I don't think it far-fetched of me to see the two different ways of observing this day as being more than a cultural difference between the repressed and dour English and Northern Europeans on the one hand and the more "party-hearty" attitude of the French and the other Mediterranean peoples on the other.
We all find it difficult to figure out how seriously to take sin; our own and that of others. We know we're not as good as we could be; or maybe should be.
But also, most of us are unwilling to admit being as bad as some other people think we are; or conversely, as bad as we think some other people are.
No matter how we have failed our own ethical and moral standards, we are all of us more than willing to look around and say, "Well, Lord, at least I'm not as bad as that person. At least I didn't do THAT!"
And so, we come up to Lent with two attitudes:
One is represented by being Shriven. We look at Lent as a time to grow spiritually, to pray, and read and draw closer to God. We see this time before Lent as a time of solemn contemplation and sober reflection; well represented by eating damp and tepid pancakes and half-cooked sausage on a paper plate that folds up and spills syrup on the Fellowship Hall table as you sit uncomfortably in your folding chair and sip bad coffee from a Styrofoam Cup.
The other is represented by getting FAT. By the wonderful phrase "Let the good times Roll!"
We have to go through this Lenten time of restriction and restraint, so we'd best get the partying out of our system before it starts.
To tell you the truth, I'm not exactly sure which of these represents Saint and which Sinner in Luther's famous simul Justus et Peccator; saint and sinner at the same time.
What I am really clear about is that each of us is just that; saint and sinner at the same time,
each of us struggles with it; each of us seeks the good, and all too often fails; fails to see it in others or to achieve it in ourselves.
And the gospel is; God loves us anyway, yes indeed, God loves us anyway;
Ye that do truly and earnestly repent of your sins, LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL!
Amen and amen.
Saturday, February 06, 2010
Epiphany 5 - Feb. 7, 2010
The Fifth Sunday after Epiphany
February 7, 2010
A Sermon Preached at the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd, Hayesville, NC
It was during Lent, 25 years ago. I was the pastor of a very old Lutheran church in north of Charlotte. North Carolina.
On the wall of the apse, above the altar, there was a stained glass window in the shape of a cross lit by light bulbs.
One Wednesday afternoon I was putzing around the altar getting things ready for mid-week service when I noticed that one of the bulbs had gone out.
I resolved to change it, but, as often happens with me, I got distracted and forgot about it until the middle of the pre-service Fellowship Meal.
I excused myself and went into the church and then upstairs and opened a little door in the hall like the door Alice went through in Wonderland, got down on my knees to change the bulb. This is when I saw Seth.
Seth wasn't a bad kid; he was just six, and mischievous, he got into things.
This night Seth had gone into the church alone and he was pulling the big, heavy pulpit chair over to the front of the altar.
The altar was set for Communion, in country Lutheran fashion; with a plate full of wafers, a stack of trays and a cup of wine already set out under a sheer, white veil.
In a moment I realized what Seth was doing; he wanted to get a look at that table, and I visualized him pulling everything down on his head and falling out of the chair, etc. etc.
So, without thinking I barked out; "Seth, get down from there, you're going to hurt yourself!"
I will never forget the look of sheer terror that washed over Seth's face as he jerked his head up and looked into the face of Jesus staring down at him from above the Altar.
He started crying and yelling "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" and ran out of the room.
I left what I was doing and followed Seth out of the Church, across the parking lot into the Fellowship Hall, where he was weeping into his grandmother's large and welcoming lap.
Grandma, Grandma, Grandma; Jesus yelled at me. I want to go home NOW!
Isaiah said, Woe is me!. . I am LOST, for I am a man of unclean lips! . . .
And Peter, falling at Jesus' knees, says, Go away from me LORD, for I am a sinful man.
IT IS A FEARFUL THING TO FALL INTO THE HANDS OF THE LIVING GOD.
So says the writer of the book of Hebrews. A fearful thing. Be careful.
Coming to church would be easy if we could think of it as the weekly meeting of the religiously inclined.
A musically augmented study group to examine the latest findings of the theologians and scholars of antiquity.
Or perhaps a ritual dinner to keep alive the memory of a departed and influential leader and hero.
BUT NO. That is not what we do here. To gather here is to take the risk of falling into the hands of the Living God.
Make no mistake about it; the love of the living God can blow your life to bits, can turn your world upside down, can turn you inside out; can send you screaming into the arms of your Grandma, GET ME OUT OF HERE NOW!
This may be why we often tiptoe around in God's presence, why we turn our churches into carpeted living rooms, our pews into padded sofas.
We are fearful that if we talk too loudly we might wake up this Living God, so we form our worship into a comfortable thing, a friendly thing, a reassuring thing.
It's only church, it's only Sunday, it's only Jesus, meek and mild; nothing to worry about.
Isaiah knew better, and in our better moments, so do we. We know that to really stand in the presence of the Living God is to be brought to your knees.
Woe is me, I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips . . .
Here in this room, facing this Altar, and this Cross, singing a hymn, praying the liturgy; our defenses begin to crumble.
Our pretensions melt away and we realize that we ARE, right now and right here; in the presence of the Living God,
And that it is both a wonderful and a fearful thing.
Standing here, face to face with God, with one who is so good, so just, so holy, we like Peter fall to our knees and cry out:
Go away from me, LORD, for I am sinful. .
It is not any particular sin that brings us to our knees, no long forgotten indiscretion or well hidden peccadillo. It is not our sins and faults and failures that slay us.
It is rather the sudden awareness of the great and unbridgeable distance between who we are and who God is.
UMC bishop Will Willimon says that there are two ways to be terrified of God.
1 - You can be afraid of God because you believe God is cruel and harsh and you must not slip up for fear of punishment; or 2 - God is so wonderfully loving that you deeply regret all the ways you have betrayed that love.
As we gaze into the face of God, we see our reflection in God's eyes. We see every moment of our lives, every secret thought, all the good little things we have done for bad little reasons, all the pain and hurt and sorrow we have endured in ourselves and produced in others. Face to face with God, we see every second of our lives tick, tick, tick away.
And in that moment, we cannot stand to stand there in front of God. It is too much; it is too brutally honest and holy. We seek to flee back into the comfortable façade of normality. We cry out to God;
Depart from me, leave me; Grandma, I want to go home, NOW!
But God refuses to leave us or let us go. God looks at us with tender eyes; god examines us with what the writer of Ephesians calls "the eyes of the heart,"
God casts upon us a look of mercy and release.
The Living God is no cold mirror of judgment. NO, the Living God is the Lord of love. God touched the unclean lips of Isaiah and turned him into a great prophet.
Isaiah was wrong, he was not lost; when he met God in the temple, he had just that moment been found.
Jesus called Peter to be a disciple, to be a catcher of people. Jesus refuses to leave this self-proclaimed sinful man.
Jesus forgives this sinful man.
Jesus even forgives this sinful man when he denies Jesus three times.
Why? Because when the Living God gets hold of you, you are not going to get loose.
We are called today into the presence of the living God. It is truly a fearful thing to be called into that presence; to be summoned into a meeting with your Creator.
It is a fearful thing; but it is not a bad thing. Indeed it may be the best thing that ever happens to any of us.
Standing there, face to face with Good, we will discover how very much we are loved, how very precious we are to God, and what a very important job God has for us to do.
For we, like Isaiah, are called to go into the world bearing in our lives and on our lips the message of the Living God's unending love.
And we, like Peter, are called upon to become catchers of people, snaring them from the depths of despair and bringing them into God's fearful, yet wonderful, presence.
And the only question is, will we, like Isaiah, say,
Here I am Lord, SEND ME!
Amen and amen.
February 7, 2010
A Sermon Preached at the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd, Hayesville, NC
It was during Lent, 25 years ago. I was the pastor of a very old Lutheran church in north of Charlotte. North Carolina.
On the wall of the apse, above the altar, there was a stained glass window in the shape of a cross lit by light bulbs.
One Wednesday afternoon I was putzing around the altar getting things ready for mid-week service when I noticed that one of the bulbs had gone out.
I resolved to change it, but, as often happens with me, I got distracted and forgot about it until the middle of the pre-service Fellowship Meal.
I excused myself and went into the church and then upstairs and opened a little door in the hall like the door Alice went through in Wonderland, got down on my knees to change the bulb. This is when I saw Seth.
Seth wasn't a bad kid; he was just six, and mischievous, he got into things.
This night Seth had gone into the church alone and he was pulling the big, heavy pulpit chair over to the front of the altar.
The altar was set for Communion, in country Lutheran fashion; with a plate full of wafers, a stack of trays and a cup of wine already set out under a sheer, white veil.
In a moment I realized what Seth was doing; he wanted to get a look at that table, and I visualized him pulling everything down on his head and falling out of the chair, etc. etc.
So, without thinking I barked out; "Seth, get down from there, you're going to hurt yourself!"
I will never forget the look of sheer terror that washed over Seth's face as he jerked his head up and looked into the face of Jesus staring down at him from above the Altar.
He started crying and yelling "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" and ran out of the room.
I left what I was doing and followed Seth out of the Church, across the parking lot into the Fellowship Hall, where he was weeping into his grandmother's large and welcoming lap.
Grandma, Grandma, Grandma; Jesus yelled at me. I want to go home NOW!
Isaiah said, Woe is me!. . I am LOST, for I am a man of unclean lips! . . .
And Peter, falling at Jesus' knees, says, Go away from me LORD, for I am a sinful man.
IT IS A FEARFUL THING TO FALL INTO THE HANDS OF THE LIVING GOD.
So says the writer of the book of Hebrews. A fearful thing. Be careful.
Coming to church would be easy if we could think of it as the weekly meeting of the religiously inclined.
A musically augmented study group to examine the latest findings of the theologians and scholars of antiquity.
Or perhaps a ritual dinner to keep alive the memory of a departed and influential leader and hero.
BUT NO. That is not what we do here. To gather here is to take the risk of falling into the hands of the Living God.
Make no mistake about it; the love of the living God can blow your life to bits, can turn your world upside down, can turn you inside out; can send you screaming into the arms of your Grandma, GET ME OUT OF HERE NOW!
This may be why we often tiptoe around in God's presence, why we turn our churches into carpeted living rooms, our pews into padded sofas.
We are fearful that if we talk too loudly we might wake up this Living God, so we form our worship into a comfortable thing, a friendly thing, a reassuring thing.
It's only church, it's only Sunday, it's only Jesus, meek and mild; nothing to worry about.
Isaiah knew better, and in our better moments, so do we. We know that to really stand in the presence of the Living God is to be brought to your knees.
Woe is me, I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips . . .
Here in this room, facing this Altar, and this Cross, singing a hymn, praying the liturgy; our defenses begin to crumble.
Our pretensions melt away and we realize that we ARE, right now and right here; in the presence of the Living God,
And that it is both a wonderful and a fearful thing.
Standing here, face to face with God, with one who is so good, so just, so holy, we like Peter fall to our knees and cry out:
Go away from me, LORD, for I am sinful. .
It is not any particular sin that brings us to our knees, no long forgotten indiscretion or well hidden peccadillo. It is not our sins and faults and failures that slay us.
It is rather the sudden awareness of the great and unbridgeable distance between who we are and who God is.
UMC bishop Will Willimon says that there are two ways to be terrified of God.
1 - You can be afraid of God because you believe God is cruel and harsh and you must not slip up for fear of punishment; or 2 - God is so wonderfully loving that you deeply regret all the ways you have betrayed that love.
As we gaze into the face of God, we see our reflection in God's eyes. We see every moment of our lives, every secret thought, all the good little things we have done for bad little reasons, all the pain and hurt and sorrow we have endured in ourselves and produced in others. Face to face with God, we see every second of our lives tick, tick, tick away.
And in that moment, we cannot stand to stand there in front of God. It is too much; it is too brutally honest and holy. We seek to flee back into the comfortable façade of normality. We cry out to God;
Depart from me, leave me; Grandma, I want to go home, NOW!
But God refuses to leave us or let us go. God looks at us with tender eyes; god examines us with what the writer of Ephesians calls "the eyes of the heart,"
God casts upon us a look of mercy and release.
The Living God is no cold mirror of judgment. NO, the Living God is the Lord of love. God touched the unclean lips of Isaiah and turned him into a great prophet.
Isaiah was wrong, he was not lost; when he met God in the temple, he had just that moment been found.
Jesus called Peter to be a disciple, to be a catcher of people. Jesus refuses to leave this self-proclaimed sinful man.
Jesus forgives this sinful man.
Jesus even forgives this sinful man when he denies Jesus three times.
Why? Because when the Living God gets hold of you, you are not going to get loose.
We are called today into the presence of the living God. It is truly a fearful thing to be called into that presence; to be summoned into a meeting with your Creator.
It is a fearful thing; but it is not a bad thing. Indeed it may be the best thing that ever happens to any of us.
Standing there, face to face with Good, we will discover how very much we are loved, how very precious we are to God, and what a very important job God has for us to do.
For we, like Isaiah, are called to go into the world bearing in our lives and on our lips the message of the Living God's unending love.
And we, like Peter, are called upon to become catchers of people, snaring them from the depths of despair and bringing them into God's fearful, yet wonderful, presence.
And the only question is, will we, like Isaiah, say,
Here I am Lord, SEND ME!
Amen and amen.
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