Have Mercy

Reformation Sunday 2007

A sermon based on Luke 18:9–14

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Last week Jesus told us a parable about prayer. It was the story of a widow who repeatedly went before an unjust judge to plead her case. Eventually the judge granted her justice because he was tired of dealing with her.

At the end of the parable Jesus reminds us that God is not an unjust judge, but a just judge who listens to us and comes quickly to our aid.

I asked you all to finish my sermon last week by finding a partner and sharing your name and a prayer concern then praying for one another. This was not an easy task for all of you. One person I talked to afterwards said that while it was uncomfortable it was a good opportunity to meet other people in the congregation. Now, that wasn’t one of my goals last week, but it was a bonus.

I want you all to pray for one another and to do that it helps if you know the person you are praying for.

Last week I also asked you to pray for a woman I knew in college named Karen who is dying of breast cancer. She is a friend of my brother who called me yesterday to tell me that he had just been to the hospital to visit her. She is not doing well and, in his opinion, will probably not last much longer. She is the mother of two small children and the wife of a loving husband. So I ask you again this week to keep her and her family and friends in your prayers.

When we pray for the sake of others we are doing holy work. So, don’t stop.

But prayer does not need to be for others in order for it to be holy.

This week Jesus tells us another parable about prayer. In this parable we hear the prayers of two different men, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.

The Pharisee’s prayer might seem shocking to us, but to the audience who heard it for the first time it was not a surprising prayer. In fact it sounded much like other prayers that Pharisees prayed daily.

Praised (be the Lord) that He did not make me a heathen, for all the heathen are as nothing before Him (Is 40:17); praised be He, that He did not make me a woman, for woman is not under obligation to fulfill the law; praised by He that He did not make me ... an uneducated man, for the uneducated man is not cautious to avoid sins. [t. Ber. 7.18] [p. 59]

The Pharisee’s job was to perform the religious duties of the people in the Temple. His prayer might sound self-righteous, but he had a duty to God and the people not to be like those people who were considered sinners or else he could not perform the religious duties in the Temple. His thanking God that he was not like the tax-collector also implied that he was grateful he could do his job.

The second man, the tax collector, prays a different prayer: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

It might sound like a more appropriate prayer, but the tax collector was perceived as a sinner. Tax-collectors, as a rule, were cheats and liars, and thieves. If anyone needed to say this prayer, it was the tax-collector.

So which prayer was the right prayer?

It’s not until Jesus finishes the parable that we know which man’s prayer was acceptable to God.

“I tell you,” Jesus says, “this man (the tax-collector) went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted."

The Pharisee’s prayer might have seemed like a proper prayer for a Pharisee to pray, except that his prayer was spoken to exalt himself, not to exalt God.

Had the Pharisee thanked God for making him righteous so that he could fulfill his duties that would have been an acceptable prayer.

The tax-collector, on the other hand, recognized his need for God in his life. As a sinner, only God could grant him mercy.

When we go before God, how do we pray for ourselves?

We should always go before God with humility and gratitude, knowing that God is the one who makes us righteous, knowing that God is the one who grants us mercy.

So I want to have you all do another prayer exercise this week. I’m going to give you all pieces of paper and ask you to write either a prayer of gratitude for what God has done for you or a prayer asking for mercy for something in your life.

And again, when you say “amen” think about what Martin Luther said in his explanation of the conclusion of the Lord’s Prayer.

“I should be certain that such petitions are acceptable to and heard by our Father in heaven, for he himself commanded us to pray like this and has promised to hear us. “Amen, amen” means “Yes, yes, it is going to come about just like this.

Amen, amen.

Pentecost 21 Year C

A sermon based on Luke 18:1–8 .

In the name of Jesus; amen.

For the past few weeks we have been praying for a woman named Karen who has been added to our prayer book. Karen was one of my brother’s friends in college. Because he and I went to the same school and graduated at the same time I knew Karen a little bit. She was a bubbly blonde who was in the service fraternity, Alpha Phi Omega, with one of my roommates and so we often hung out in the same circles.

Karen is only a year or two younger than I am and is married with two children ages 4 and 14 months. Two weeks ago she had a double mastectomy only to return to the hospital because she spiked a fever. While in the hospital her doctors gave her the news that the cancer had spread throughout her body.

You are between a rock and a hard place with very little wiggle room, her doctor told her.

My brother has been keeping me updated about Karen’s progress through emails. The subject line of his last email about Karen, when he shared the news of her cancer spreading, was “Get the prayer warriors out again.”

I mention this story for two reasons. The first reason is that October is breast cancer awareness month. Karen suffers from a form of breast cancer that is very hard to treat and was recently featured in an article on the ABC News Web-site. It is important that woman take care of their bodies and October is set aside specifically for us to remember to do that.

The second reason I want you to hear Karen’s story is so that you will pray for her and her family and friends who are scared, but haven’t yet lost hope.

In today’s gospel Jesus tells a parable about prayer. Luke tells us that he told the disciples this parable to explain their need to pray always and not lose heart. If an unjust judge will eventually listen to and grant the request of a bothersome widow, how much more will God come to the aid of the chosen ones who cry out to God day and night?

There are a great deal of rationales and imperatives for prayer. Martin Luther, who was the founder of Lutheranism, said that the 2nd Commandment, “You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God.” was a commandment for us to pray. “We are to fear and love God,” he wrote in his explanation of the commandments in his Small Catechism, “so that we do not curse, swear, practice magic, lie, or deceive using God’s name, but instead use that very name in every time of need to call on, pray to, praise, and give thanks to God.”

Jesus, himself, went off to pray often and even taught the disciples how to pray using words we still use today, “Our Father in heaven…”

But today Jesus teaches that we should pray so that we do not lose hope.

I do not know Karen’s odds as she fights the cancer that is seeking to destroy her body. I imagine they are pretty bad and yet she still has hope.

Hope and prayer are linked to one another. We pray because we have a certain hope that God listens to us and cares about what we need and prayer keeps our hopes from falling apart and dying in the face of certain disaster.

I don’t know if God will cure Karen of her cancer; I do know that God will be quick to be with her and those who love and care for her and that our prayers are not in vain.

As we prepare for the ritual of laying on of hands and anointing with oil I want to ask you all to do something. I’m going to ask that you turn to the person sitting behind you or in front of you or if need be to get up and find someone else to sit with.

Share your name with that person (even if you think they already know it) and then share something that you would like to have prayed for. And then I’m going to ask you to pray for one another. Just a simple prayer, like… Dear God, let your will be done for___ or Dear God, take care of ___, or whatever might come to you. Don’t be afraid you won’t be eloquent; God doesn’t care about eloquence and when you say “amen” think about what Martin Luther said in his explanation of the conclusion of the Lord’s Prayer.

“I should be certain that such petitions are acceptable to and heard by our Father in heaven, for he himself commanded us to pray like this and has promised to hear us. “Amen, amen” means “Yes, yes, it is going to come about just like this.

Saying Thank You

Pentecost 20 Year C

A sermon based on Luke 17:11-19

In the name of Jesus; amen.

A grandmother sat on the beach watching her grandson play in the surf. Suddenly a huge wave came up and covered the boy then dragged him out to sea. The grandmother panicked and cried out to God, “Help me Lord! He is my daughter’s only son! I love him and can’t lose him! Please bring him back!”

Suddenly another wave washes on shore and leaves the boy dripping wet, but alive and well, at her feet. She raises her hands up in the sky and cries out, “He had a hat.”

On his way to Jerusalem Jesus passes between Samaria and Galilee. As he enters a village he is stopped by the cries for mercy that he hears.

The cries come from people living outside of the village. As soon as he sees them he knows why; they are lepers.

Because of their disease they live separately from the rest of the community. By law they have to. By law they have to always keep their distance and if anyone who is clean comes near them they are required to shout out “Unclean! Unclean!” as a warning.

Because they were in a region between Samaria and Galilee the leper community they lived in was mixed. Samaritans and Jews found a commonality in their condition, though we don’t know how well it made them get along with one another.

As Jesus passed through, these ten lepers cried out in one voice for mercy. It was the voice of people ostracized and hurting and Jesus heard them and responds with a simple command, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.”

They all obey and as they are on their way to show themselves to the priests, the ones within the community who can legally allow them reentrance, they are made clean.

The miracle could have ended there, but for at least one of the lepers it doesn’t because this one stops and says thank you.

As soon as he sees that his leprosy is gone he begins to praise God and running back to Jesus falls to his knees and thanks him.

Jesus has two reactions to the Samaritan at his feet. The first is to wonder where the other 9 are. “Weren’t there 10 of you?” he asks. “Where are the others?” “Weren’t they made clean too?”

The second reaction Jesus has is to offer this one man an extra blessing. “Get up and go on your way” he tells the man. “Your faith has made you well.”

In the world that Jesus lived in one did not say thank you to those who were socially equal. Thanking someone who was considered socially superior was honorable, but it signified that the socially inferior person was unable to adequately repay the socially superior person for what they had done.

When the Samaritan stopped and returned to thank Jesus he was doing the only thing in his power he could do to repay Jesus for the mercy he had shown.

Saying thank you is a humbling experience. To say thank you to another person for a kindness they have done signifies that what they did was important to us and needed by us.

There are things we cannot do for ourselves. Try as he might, this Samaritan leper could not cure himself of the disease he had. He could not reconnect with the people he loved or be a part of a community on his own volition. And while his leprosy connected him to the other 9 he most likely was an outcast even in that group by virtue of his nationality. He was a Samaritan, a foreigner, and that made him an outsider no matter how much he had in common with the others.

If he had been the richest man in the world he would not have been able to repay Jesus for what he had done. He, perhaps more than the rest needed this healing that Jesus offered.

The others needed it too; they had begged for mercy just like the Samaritan had and they might’ve even been grateful, but they didn’t recognize their need to humble.

Saying thank you changes a person. All ten men were healed of their skin infirmities, but the Samaritan, because he gave thanks to Jesus, received another blessing: a relationship with Jesus and a new faith.

All this takes place as Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem. It’s a remarkable coincidence really because Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem to answer our calls for mercy by dying on the cross.

Mercy for our sins and sorrows and sufferings, mercy we cannot achieve on our own, no matter how hard we may try. Mercy we can only receive from him. Mercy we have been granted.

So say thank you. Say it in everything you do. Say that you are grateful for the new life and community that Jesus has given each one of us in that transforming act of dying and being resurrected.

Say thank you. Say it in the way you care for others and in the way you care for yourself. Let is humble and transform you as a person of faith and faithfulness.

Say thank you and be blessed with healing and joy.

Amen.

Patience and Faith

Pentecost 19 Year C

A sermon based on Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4; Psalm 37:1-9; 2 Timothy 1:1-14; and Luke 17:5-10

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Habakkuk From Eugene Peterson’s “The Message”

1:1 The problem as God gave Habakkuk to see it: 2 God, how long do I have to cry out for help before you listen? How many times do I have to yell, "Help! Murder! Police!" before you come to the rescue? 3 Why do you force me to look at evil, stare trouble in the face day after day? Anarchy and violence break out, quarrels and fights all over the place. 4 Law and order fall to pieces. Justice is a joke. The wicked have the righteous hamstrung and stand justice on its head. God Says, "Look!"

2:1 What's God going to say to my questions? I'm braced for the worst. I'll climb to the lookout tower and scan the horizon. I'll wait to see what God says, how he'll answer my complaint. Full of Self, but Soul-Empty 2 And then God answered: "Write this. Write what you see. Write it out in big block letters so that it can be read on the run. 3 This vision-message is a witness pointing to what's coming. It aches for the coming - it can hardly wait! And it doesn't lie. If it seems slow in coming, wait. It's on its way. It will come right on time. 4 "Look at that man, bloated by self-importance - full of himself but soul-empty. But the person in right standing before God through loyal and steady believing is fully alive, really alive.

This past week, 3 teenagers from Wolcott were driving home. They had just come from breakfast with friends because school had been canceled. As they were driving their car clipped the back of a boat being towed by another car. It was sent out of control and crashed killing all three of the teens and injuring the driver of the other car.

This was a tragedy and tragedies often make us question the goodness of God.

The prophet Habakkuk questioned. “O LORD, how long shall I cry for help and you will not listen? Or cry to you ‘Violence!” and you will not save? Why do you make me see wrongdoing and look at trouble?”

The world around Habakkuk was filled with destruction. The Judean King who sat on the throne was immoral and unjust and the Judean enemy, Babylon was gaining power. It was only a matter of time before they attacked and drove them into exile.

Habakkuk had every right to question where God was, to wonder if justice would ever be done, to know if tragedy would ever be overcome. I imagine there is a whole community of people wondering similar things in Wolcott this week.

As the introduction in our bulletin asks: How can a good and all-powerful God see evil in the world and seemingly remain indifferent?

It was a question our ancestors asked and it is a question that people still ask today.

The readings today, all of them in fact, seem to have a common theme… and that is the theme of faith.

God tells Habakkuk: “the righteous live by their faith.” The Psalmist advises us to “commit your way to the LORD; put your trust in the LORD, and see what God will do.” Paul reminds Timothy that he should “rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of hands” and when the apostles beg Jesus to “increase our faith” Jesus replies: “If you had faith the size of a mustard see, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.”

Faith seems to be the answer to the question of tragedy. Stay faithful, even in the middle of bad things. Wait and you’ll see that God really is good and that God makes all things right in the end. Even if your faith is small, hang on and commit to that faith, then watch and see what God will do.

There is a lesson here: God’s time is different from ours and healing happens in God’s time, but it does happen for us. “For there is still a vision for the appointed time;’’ God tells Habakkuk “it speaks of the end, and does not lie. If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay.”

Do not mistake our need for patience with God’s indifference. God is far from indifferent from our sufferings and our sorrows.

God is not indifferent about those things that hurt us or anger us. God is far from indifferent, but God is not far from us. God instead is very close, so close in fact that God resides in the very places that threaten to strip our faith.

God resides right next to us the moment we hear about car crashes, or illness, or job loss, or threats against us. God lives next to us in tragedy and reminds us to stand firm, we will not be abandoned, or forgotten, or neglected.

Instead we will be loved until our sorrows are destroyed.

This is the promise, trust in it and be patient.

Amen.