Blessed are the Cheese Makers

All Saints Sunday Year A 2008

A sermon based on Matthew 5:1-12.

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Four years ago I preached on this text shortly after coming here to Salem. Truth is that I never liked preaching on the beatitudes, but I had a great idea. I found pieces of a script from the Monty Python Movie, the Life of Brian and read it to you.

In perfect sacrilegious Monty Python fashion, The Life of Brian is about a man whose life parallels Jesus. He’s born in the stable next door to Jesus, winds up at the same major events as Jesus, and is even crucified along side of him. In one scene Jesus climbs up onto the mountain and begins preaching what we now call the beatitudes, but the people in the back have a hard time hearing him and the message gets lost as they hear it.

“Blessed are the peacemakers.” Jesus says, but the folks at the back hear something else entirely. What they hear is: “Blessed are the cheese makers.”

After church, once I had greeted everyone at the door, I was making my way down the aisle to check on the Parish Life committee who had gathered in a pew to discuss plans for my installation.

They had two questions for me. The first was: who did I want to ask to pour the coffee? I remember saying, “I don’t know.” It took awhile for me to understand that pouring the coffee was a big deal. “Pastor, it’s considered an honor” I was told by one member of the committee, “maybe your mom would want to do it.”

Well, I was sure my mom wouldn’t want to do it, but in the end I asked my dad who was indeed honored.

The second question they wanted answered was what did I want written on my cake? Again I answered, “I don’t know” then irreverently added, “Blessed are the cheese makers.”

And sure enough, on the day of my installation as your pastor there was a cake with the words, “Blessed are the cheese makers.”

The point of that sermon 4 years ago was that we often mishear the words that Jesus says in this gospel. We read it as a directive or as a pie-in-the-sky-when-you-die text. Jesus’ sermon that day was meant to be gospel for those who were suffering and struggling. It was a sermon for those who endure the harsh realities of discipleship and wonder if it will ever get any better or if it will really be worth it in the end.

The point of this sermon today is a little different.

The point of the sermon today is, “Blessed are the cheese makers.”

My friends, you are cheese makers and you are blessed.

Let’s get the obvious pun out of the way first. I have spent a lot of time laughing here at Salem. Often times the laughter has come from cheesy jokes; some of you have even been brave enough to tell me some off-color jokes. Some of the laughter has come from irony and some has been the kind of laugh one makes when the only other alternative is tears. But we have laughed together.

Laughter is a blessing in and of itself. God laughs with us when we share joy with one another and when that feeling of joy erupts from our bellies out through our mouths.

And to prove the wonder of just how God made us research has shown health benefits of laughter ranging from strengthening the immune system to reducing food cravings to increasing one's threshold for pain.

Blessed are the cheese makers.

There is perhaps another obvious pun and that is that we have done a lot of eating while I’ve been here. We haven’t always had cheese at every meal, but we have eaten some wonderful food. From pancake breakfasts to Italian night dinners we have had pot lucks and bread and soup. Each meal is a blessing. Every coffee hour and sheet cake has connected us because families eat together.

Jesus fed thousands with five loaves and two fish and then every Sunday he has invited us to eat his very own body and blood. When the disciples encountered the resurrected Christ on the road to Emmaus they ate together. Each time the altar has been set, the good china taken out, the pancake mix poured onto the grill, or a box of Dunkin Donuts Munchkins has been put out for coffee hour Jesus has blessed that meal and that time.

Blessed are the cheese makers.

The abundance of food produced in this place has never been limited for our own consumption. 150 cans of green beans, countless Stop and Shop Cards bought with money from the Fund for the Needy, strawberries cut for the festival at the Lutheran Home, cookies for Glendale residents and shut-ins, and so much more has been collected in this place and sent out to feed others.

Together we have been a blessing to those who hunger and thirst, not just for righteousness, but for sustenance.

Blessed are the cheese makers for they shall know the joy of laughter and food; laughter shared with God and food eaten at Jesus’ own table.

Blessed are you, my brothers and sisters who have been food for me these four years. Even in lean times I have been fed here. Blessed are you, cheese makers because you have become a blessing.

I have tried as often as I can to remind you in my sermons that God loves you; loves you so much that through baptism you became children of God who share in Christ’s resurrection and glory.

But God doesn’t love you because you are cheese makers. It’s God’s desire that you make cheese; that you share laughter and love, food and fellowship, but it is not the reason why God loves you.

God loves you because God is our maker. God sculpted and crafted us, called us beloved, adopted us through baptism, and recreated us as saints. God loves us because we are God’s.

God will forget our sin, but God does not forget to love us.

Remember that; see it when you look at yourself in the mirror and when you look into the face of another. Remember that God loves you and keep making cheese.

Amen.

Truth

Editor's note:

Next Sunday will be my last Sunday at Salem and therefore my last sermon posted here. I have truly enjoyed sharing these sermons with you and hope that they have been meaningful reading.
May God bless you with peace

Reformation Sunday Year A 2008.

A sermon based on Psalm 46 and John 8:31–36.

In the name of Jesus; amen.

“You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”

But what is the truth?

Jesus says that the truth is continuing in his word and being his disciples. Jesus’ word is the message of grace and love, but it is also the message of being what God intended for us and that is to be disciples.

Discipleship is not an easy thing. Over and over again Jesus tells his disciples that they will encounter troubles for believing in and following him. Throughout time, disciples who have followed Jesus have been persecuted, imprisoned, tortured, disowned, and killed. But while discipleship comes with a cost it also makes us free.

The people who listened to Jesus that day refused to believe that they were enslaved in any way, they forgot their history of being slaves in Egypt, and they didn’t understand that sin held them captive.

The true definition of sin is separation from God. Sin keeps us from being in relationship with God. It makes us turn our backs to the one who made us, makes us believe that we don’t really need God in our lives, that we can be just fine without him.

Scripture reminds us that we all fall short, that in fact we do need God in our lives; in every moment and in every breath. We cannot live fully in this life or the next without God.

This is truth: the knowledge that we need God; God in our everyday and in our out of the ordinary. We need God in the mundane and in the miraculous.

The truth is that when we continue in Jesus’ word and do those things that God intended for us we most clearly see our need for God.

We don’t think about need as freeing. Dependence doesn’t sound liberating. But it is in our need that God is able to be in relationship with us and relationship with God frees us from the trappings of sin.

This isn’t bad news; it is good news. It is the power of grace and the outpouring of God’s love that unlocks the prisons we find ourselves in.

The truth is that God loves us, loves us with a love so great that nothing else in all of heaven, or earth, or hell is greater.

This is Reformation Sunday; it is a day that marks a great change in the Church. We gather in this place as Lutherans because a few hundred years ago a man named Martin Luther was bold enough to remind people that God’s love and grace have the final say.

I am assured of God’s love. I’ve felt it over and over again in my life. It is the thing I have held onto when nothing else can support my weight and it has lifted me up time and time again.

And God’s love is assured for you; God our refuge and strength is with you. I have felt it here, that love that knows no bounds is present in this community.

For some time now I have kept a distressing truth from you. The fact that I have not been well has been a terrible burden for me to keep from you and while my heart is filled with sorrow I can tell you that I have experienced a release by finally letting you know that I am leaving in order to find health and wholeness again.

That release has come in the outpouring of love and compassion I have felt from you. This is a gift from God and the response that disciples make. You are Jesus’ disciples in the way in which you have offered your support, not just to me, but to others as well.

I want to say, from this pulpit, that I am not leaving because I do not love you. I love you dearly, but as much as I love you know that God loves you far more and with a fierce intensity that no pastor could ever match.

This is the truth about God’s love; it frees us to love one another, it re-forms us into disciples, and it is greater than any other force known to you or me.

Live in that love, let it guide you, comfort you, and keep you.

Amen.

Reflections

Pentecost 23 Year A 2008

A sermon based on Matthew 22:15-22

In the name of Jesus; amen.

How many of you have at least one mirror in your home? How often a day do you think that you look into it?

The first house I ever remember living in as a child had a large living room and one wall was completely covered with mirrors. I remember my mother having to wash that mirror with vinegar and water and newspapers, but what I really remember is that I used to look in it all the time. The couch was right in front of it and if I was talking to someone sitting on it and I was standing my mother would have to remind me to stop looking at myself and look at the person who I was talking to.

What do you see when you look into a mirror? Whose image does it reflect?

The Pharisees and the Herodians set out to trap Jesus. They were two groups of people who made strange bedfellows. The Pharisees were the religious leaders of the people and the Temple was their realm. The Herodians were those who followed King Herod, who was mostly a Roman puppet. In the Jewish world the Pharisees were the religious leaders and the Herodians were the secular leaders. They rarely if ever agreed on anything or worked together. But on this occasion they joined forces against Jesus.

He was becoming too popular with the people and they wanted to discredit him so they came up with a plan. They would ask him a question he couldn’t possibly answer without getting into trouble, like asking a man when he had stopped beating his wife.

If he answered that it was lawful to pay the tax the people would turn against him. Now we are supposed to pay our taxes joyfully no matter what the politicians say. Our taxes pave our roads; they educate our children, and ensure that when we call 911 someone comes to help us.

But paying taxes to the Roman Emperor was different. Those taxes financed an occupation by a foreign and ruthless government. The Romans may have built roads and kept order, but they did it with cruelty and with a swift iron hand.

When Matthew wrote his gospel, late in the first century his readers would have heard this story and thought back to the disastrous rebellion in 70 AD, that had been inspired by this tax. They would also have remembered that the Romans responded to the rebellion by destroying the Temple, the city of Jerusalem, and most of the city’s inhabitants.

On the other hand, if Jesus answered that it was unlawful to pay the tax that same vicious Roman government would have been all over him like white on rice. It would have been a treasonous statement and the Romans would have had him arrested and executed quickly.

It was a no win situation for Jesus, or so they thought. A colleague of mine pointed out the other day that if you are the Son of God you probably have a pretty high IQ.

The Pharisee’s disciples and the Herodians begin by trying to butter him up. They give him a compliment, then ask him the question they are sure will be his downfall, “Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?”

The first clever thing that Jesus does is ask them to show him one of the coins used to pay the tax. Standing there in the Temple one wasn’t supposed to have such coins on their person. It was why the money changers set up shop outside the Temple, to change the Roman coins, with the image of Caesar, who called himself a god, into coins that were acceptable inside the Temple.

It’s clever because it showed that he didn’t have one, but they did. The very people who were supposed to trick him into either speaking against the government or God had the coin they weren’t supposed to have in the Temple.

The second clever thing that Jesus does is answer their question by asking a question: “Whose head is this (literally whose image) and whose title?” And when they answer that it is the emperor’s head he tells them to “give therefore to the emperor those things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
Matthew tells us that when they heard what he said they went away amazed. It is an amazing story, but not because Jesus is more clever than the Pharisees or the Herodians, but because of the message that he gives.

We are responsible to give to the government that which holds its image. Now we could argue what things hold the government’s image, but I think it means that we are responsible for paying our taxes and obeying traffic laws. The government has put its seal on these things; its stamp.

But if we are to give to the government that which holds the government’s image then we are also responsible for giving to God that which holds God’s image.

I would bet that before you all came here today you looked into a mirror at least once. What you saw was a reflection of you, but it was the image of God that projected that reflection.

We were made in the image of God. The hair you brushed, the wrinkles, the scars, the blemishes, the eyes, lips, and nose; all those things hold the image of God.

Look around at one another. We are supposed to see Christ in our neighbor, but they are supposed to see Christ in us because we have God’s image.

So it stands to reason that what we are to give to God, literally render to God is us. We belong to God because God has imprinted his image on us.

Render yourselves to God. Do it through prayer, and service, and thanksgiving, and sacrifice, and love for one another. And when you look into the mirror remember that you are not alone; God is with you and in you turning sin into beauty and blemishes into grace.

Amen.

A New Lease

Pentecost 21 Year A

A sermon based on Matthew 21:33-46

In the name of Jesus; amen.

People have been taking stock of what they have lately. This is a pun, perhaps a bad one, but if you have been paying attention to the news lately you know that things are not in the best shape.

I don’t understand economics. My husband pays our bills and manages our money. I know how to spend it and that’s about it. I honestly admit that I am a capitalist and that I have lived on credit just like most Americans do.

Capitalism in itself is not an evil thing, but neither is socialism or even communism. It’s all in how the system is used. We can use it well or we can use it poorly. We can use it to the advantage of ourselves and others or we can have happen what happened the other day when the stock market dropped almost 800 points.

In today’s gospel reading Jesus tells a parable about a vineyard. He tells it to the chief priests and the scribes who are angry at him because the day before he had entered the Temple in Jerusalem and turned over the money changers’ tables. The money changers were not in and of themselves evil, in fact they were considered necessary because their job was to exchange the money that the people used every day with the money that was used in the Temple to purchase animals for sacrifice.

I could preach a whole sermon on that, but it isn’t our story for the day. Our story for today is Jesus’ response to the people who were angry at him because Jesus didn’t like the system that was being used. He didn’t like that people believed that they had to buy sacrifices in order to be forgiven or made right with God.

So he tells this story about a landowner who puts his land in the hands of tenants to take care of it for him. When it’s time for the tenants to pay the rent they kill the rent collectors. They even kill his son.

Really Jesus is telling a story about God and the history of God’s people. God creates a world and puts tenants (that’s us) in it to take care of it. But the people (still us) are terrible tenants so God sends prophets and they get killed off. Then God sends more prophets who are also killed off until finally God sends his son, Jesus… and guess what happens to him.

Simply put, the world belongs to God; we are only tenants living in it. And what do tenants do? They pay rent to the one who owns their home.

This story that Jesus tells should make us a bit uncomfortable. We can be late in our payments, skip them, ignore them, feel entitled to live here for free, or decide that we don’t owe anybody anything because there is no one to owe anything to. And many times we all do just that.

When Jesus finishes his story he asks the people what they think will happen to the tenants when the owner of the vineyard comes. They have killed off his slaves and his only son and the people are certain that “he will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will produce at the harvest time.”

It makes sense. That’s what would happen in the movies. The owner would send in commandoes that would utterly destroy those murderous tenants, but Jesus doesn’t end the story like that.

Instead he randomly quotes Isaiah saying, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes.”

Today A.C.B. is going to be baptized. Today Christ Jesus will make A. his own. A. will become more than just a tenant in the eyes of God; he will become one of God’s own children; a part of the vineyard that God wants to produce fruit.

Baptism is not a free ride; God does have expectations of us to produce fruit.

We have hope that A. will do just that. We hope that A. will come to love God, worship God, trust in God, and do works that will glorify God throughout his life. But just like the rest of us who are tenants, but more than just tenants through baptism, he will probably do many things that displease God.

He will take stock of what he has and forget that it is only a loan from God because that is part of the nature of being human and he, like the rest of us, will deserve exactly what the people said the tenants deserved: a miserable death.

But Jesus doesn’t end the story that way. His parable about the vineyard owner doesn’t end with the death of the tenants, that’s the way the people ended it. Jesus ends the story by proclaiming himself the cornerstone on which salvation is based.

Jesus goes to the cross rejected and becomes the cornerstone of our faith through resurrection.

This story should make us all uncomfortable, but it should also produce hope in us. We have been given the vineyard because God loves us and baptism gives us a new lease on life because through baptism God promises to make us children of God who share in the inheritance of the vineyard.

God has given us the vineyard so that we might also enjoy the fruits that grow and so that we might also find forgiveness and renewal when our plants wither and our fruit begins to rot.

A., you are being called to live in the vineyard, to work the land and to let your light shine so that God might be glorified in the fruit that you produce. But you are also called to be loved by God, who is your Father in heaven.

May we all be blessed in our baptismal call to produce fruit worthy of the Father and may we experience the forgiveness and renewal that comes along with the work that we do.

Amen.

Cleaning House

The Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost

A sermon based on Ezekiel 18:1-4, 25-32; Psalm 25:1-9; and Matthew 21:23-32

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Slowly, but surely I have begun the process of deep cleaning my house, what most people might refer to as “Spring Cleaning.” I actually prefer to do it now, right before the holiday season. Everything will get cleaned, or put away, or thrown out. I go through drawers and cabinets, behind furniture, under beds; every nook and cranny will get cleaned out.

I started this past Friday. The house is in desperate shape, but I have a plan of action: one room at a time. Usually I would begin with common areas like the play room or the kitchen or the dining / living room. But this Friday I cleaned my bedroom. Usually the bedroom, mine at least, is last on the list. It becomes the collector of things and never gets dusted because by the time I reach the bedroom all I want to do is sleep.

There is a peace that comes from cleaning. I slept so well on Friday night after I was done. It felt as though my soul had been washed and dried in a warm dryer or out on the line on a bright sunny spring day.

When I talked to my brother on Saturday I told him about cleaning my bedroom and how it made me feel. He reminded me that our external circumstances usually affect our internal circumstances and vice versa.

There is a theme to this week’s readings and that is the theme of repentance. Theologian Daniel Clendenin says that “repentance is central to life rather than peripheral. It’s essential rather than dispensable, obligatory and not optional. And contrary to modern misconceptions, when done well, repentance is entirely life-giving rather than death-dealing. Repentance is a movement toward health and wholeness rather than a descent into repression and self-recrimination.”

I have known for some time now that cleaning up my surroundings would make me feel better and repentance is like that too. Repentance, literally turning back to God, is like cleaning house. It can be a long and tiring task, but it puts us right with God.

The chief priests and the elders of the people were upset with Jesus when he told them that the tax collectors and the prostitutes were going to the kingdom of heaven ahead of them. They believed that their houses were clean and that they had less need for repenting.

But anyone who keeps house knows that there is always something that needs to be done. Dishes, laundry, the bed all have to be done on a regular basis or your house will start to look like mine.

As Christians there are just some things that we must do to keep right with God. God will always be right with us; loving us, caring for us, yearning for us, but we have to live lives of consistent prayer, and worship, and giving, and repentance.

Ezekiel’s message in our first reading warns the people that their transgressions will cause them to die. We can read into this literally because sometimes the wrong we do causes death, but living with our transgressions means living apart from God and that is a much worse kind of death.

As I swept under my bed on Friday the dust and pet fur began to make me cough and sneeze. The dirt literally hurt me. I was living with stuff that hurt me. Sweeping it up and throwing it out was actually good for my health physically and emotionally.

Repentance is our way of sweeping up the dirt from our spiritual lives. When we ask for forgiveness we are putting the trash out on the curb, trusting that God is going to come by and pick it up and get rid of it.

When the room was clean I put a brand new bed set on the bed. New pillows, new sheets, a new comforter now adorn my bed. When we repent and let God take away our sin we make room for something new to happen in our lives: something soft and warm; something comforting and beautiful.

Ezekiel puts it this way, speaking for God he says: “Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed against me, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!”

Repentance renews us because it gives God a chance to enter into us and live through us. It’s why we confess our sins and hear the words of forgiveness every Sunday, so that we have a new heart and a new spirit before we enter into worship with God.

But it is not a once a week activity. If you save all the repentance for Sundays before church the work will pile up. Make it a constant in your lives, turning to God in all things.

The psalmist writes: “To you, O LORD, I lift up my soul. My God I put my trust in you…Remember, O LORD, your compassion and love, for they are from everlasting. Remember not the sins of my youth and my transgressions; remember me according to your steadfast love and for the sake of your goodness, O LORD.”

Lift up your souls daily, trusting in God. God will not forget you. Turn to God in every moment, God will always be there in goodness and steadfast love for you.

Amen.

Ridiculous Equality and Fair Trade

The Nineteenth Sunday After Pentecost

Editor's note: There are several links in this sermon that I would invite you to check out. Lutheran World Relief is an organization that continues to endeavor to do justice in this world. It is also a way for ordinary people to do something simple and easy to make a real change in the lives of people who suffer throughout the world.

A Sermon based on Matthew 20:1-16

In the name of Jesus; amen.

This past weekend several of us took turns at the Harvest Moon Festival selling Fair Trade crafts. I’ve explained it before as being the idea that people get paid a fair wage for the work that they do.

We also asked people to sign letters to all the grocery stores in Naugatuck asking that they offer more Fair Trade products in their stores. Some signed the letter and some didn’t.

I explained to one man what fair trade was all about using the example of coffee growers who get paid very little for their labor by big corporations. Before he was willing to sign the letter he wanted to know if it would drive up the cost of coffee to the consumer.

It seems ironic to me that the gospel for today is a story about fair wages when what we did this weekend was also about helping people receive fair wages for their work. People who get up at sunrise and work hard all day should be able to make enough money to feed, clothe, and house their families, but many of them do not. And I’m not just talking about people in 3rd world nations or some place far away. There are people who live right here in Naugatuck who know what living like that is. And more people are struggling with the current economy.

People deserve what’s fair; children shouldn’t starve, no one should go without decent clothes, and no one should have to decide between paying their rent or getting the medication they need.
But not only that, people should have the ability to live their lives with joy; to have time to enjoy the gifts of family, friends, and laughter without worrying about money.

Sarah Jessica Parker, who played Carrie on the show, Sex and the City, designed a clothing line where no one item costs more than $20. Her motto is “Fashion is not a luxury.” Her concept is that women should be able to feel good and look good in their clothes no matter what their income.

It isn’t always enough to have a roof over your head, food to eat, and something to wear.

But life, as I tell my 9 yr old, isn’t always fair.

Last week I told you all that God always gives us what we need. We don’t always understand the gift, or how to use it, or how to share it. People go without because, by nature, we are wasteful and hoard what we get.

Well, this week I want to tell you the God always does the right thing, even if we don’t always understand or agree.

In the parable that Jesus tells the workers who worked all day were upset when they received the same amount of pay as the workers who had only labored for a short time. One way to interpret their anger is that they were upset that those who had worked less time received the same amount as they did. They thought that was unfair.

Another way to interpret their ire is to imagine that they were upset because they didn’t get more.

They watched as those who had worked less time received what they were expecting and believed that since they had worked so many more hours that they should get even more pay.

But God, like the landowner, always does what is right. God has a ridiculous sense of equality when we measure by human standards. And by human standards this ridiculous sense of equality seems unfair.

Jesus tells this parable about the kingdom of heaven. And while it might be hard for some to believe that those who join the faith later in life deserve the same nice room in heaven as they, lifetime Christians will get, this parable is about more than the afterlife.

God’s ridiculous sense of equality means that each person has the same value no matter who or what they are. And while it isn’t always easy to translate that into the real world that we live in on a day to day basis, God’s truth, ridiculous as it may seem, calls us to be workers in the kingdom of this world as if it were the kingdom of the next.

Something else happened at the harvest Moon Fair. Our brothers and sisters at Immanuel took on the theme of world hunger. Part of their booth was dedicated to writing letters to our political representatives asking them to pass legislation that would put an end to hunger throughout the world.

It took me until the end of Saturday night to get my two letters written (and I wanted to write 3), but the fact of the matter is that we are not helpless or incapable of doing the things that God calls us to do. Our current president once said that he was the decider, but God is the true decider and it is God’s decisions that should fashion our lives. God’s fashion is not a luxury; it is a gift that we are called to put on and feel good and look good in.

It is time to get dressed in the baptismal garments that we have been given and wear them for the world to see.

Amen.

The Serpent and the Cross

Holy Cross Year A 2008

A sermon based on Numbers 21:4b-9; 1 Corinthians 1:18-24; and John 3:13-17

In the name of Jesus; amen.

God always gives us what we need. Sometimes we get more than we bargain for; as Mother Teresa once said: “I know God won’t give me anymore than I can handle; I just wish he didn’t trust me so much.”

God always gives us what we need, but sometimes we can’t see it that way. People often like to explain the bad things that happen to others this way: “It’s all part of God’s plan.”

This doesn’t always bring comfort. It can be hard to believe or trust in a God who seems to plan for us to suffer.

Almost a year ago I asked you all to pray for one of my brother’s friends who was dying of breast cancer and then did die right between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

At the funeral, the preacher said that he knew that people were struggling with why Karen had to die. Was it really a part of God’s plan that she leave behind her devoted husband, 2 young daughters, and all her family and friends? Take comfort he said, in knowing that Karen now understood God’s greater plan even if we couldn’t understand it.

God always gives us what we need, but people do go without. People live in cardboard boxes, children starve in the streets, and people die because they can’t get the medical treatment they need or deserve.

But God ensures that there are enough resources in creation for everyone to have what they need. Sometimes, more often than not, we just don’t know how to share. And with this economy it is easy to want to hoard and not want to give more to those with less.

God always gives us what we need, but sometimes we grow impatient and tired of what we do have. The Israelites in the wilderness grew impatient with their seemingly endless wandering through the dessert and the manna that they had once been overly grateful for now seemed tasteless and boring.

And they began to complain. The second commandment tells us that cursing is taking the Lord’s name in vain. But complaining, well, that’s taking the Lord’s promise in vain.

And the complaining brought poisonous snakes out from their hiding places and they did just what God had cursed them to do when he caught the serpent in the garden with Adam and Eve. They struck at the heels of the people and the people died. (Genesis 3:15)

The people died from complaining; from taking the Lord’s promise in vain.

But God always gives us exactly what we need.
In this case God had Moses make a bronze serpent and put it on a pole. Each time the people were bitten they had only to look at it and be healed.

God always gives us what we need, but sometimes understanding the big picture of God’s plan seems illogical, or crazy, or foolish. Sometimes it is hard to open our eyes to see the thing right in front of us and experience its healing power.

God always gives us what we need, but what do we look to for healing and satisfaction?

Today we read that verse from John, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”

God gave him to us and stuck him up on a pole with a cross bar so that we may look at him and live.

The bronze serpent became a symbol for medical workers, those who care for our physical selves, but the Son on the cross has become even more than a symbol of healing – he is healing – and life giving.

God turns instruments of death into the instruments that save us; not just in the after life, but in this life right now.

Look at the cross, beyond the symbol to the act of it – it puts everything back together again. It gives us everything that we need:

The strength to carry on even when there is too much to do
The promise that God’s plan does make sense even if we can’t understand it;
The will to share our resources with those who have none;
The bread from heaven, which is the body of Christ, his dear son, and our savior.

Look to the cross. Amen.

Community

The Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost Year A

A sermon based on Ezekiel 33:7-11; Romans 13:8-14; and Mathew 18:15-20

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Jesus was once asked what the greatest commandment was. His answer was “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' 38This is the greatest and first commandment. 39And a second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' 40On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matthew 22)

The two commandments are interconnected and intertwined. You cannot have one with out the other; you cannot love God and not love your neighbor. The man who asked the question then asked who his neighbor was and Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan. This is a story about 2 men; one man the crowd would have not cared for at all: a Samaritan. The other man was a person in great need.

Loving our neighbor means loving even those we don’t like or have the worst opinion of and loving those who are in the greatest of need.

You can’t show love for your neighbor without also loving God. When we love others we also love God. Atheists might disagree, but when we care for someone else we are also caring for God.

Not long ago letters that were written by Mother Teresa were published where she writes about a deep struggle she experienced with her faith. She often felt the absence of God in her life, but she knew that in loving the people of Calcutta, India she was also loving God and it kept her going in her work.

Commandments are not simple rules or guidelines that God wants us to follow to make us good people. And while the word commandment is often translated: law, the commandments are much more than laws we are supposed to follow.

We know that Jesus saved us through his death on the cross and that God’s grace was the reason Jesus would do this. We can never do enough on our own to earn our salvation, no matter how good we try to be, but the commandments are a gift of grace that help us to live the life that God intends and wants for us.

Our readings for today offer guidelines of the ways God would have us live our lives; not just for our own sakes, but for the sake of the whole community.

Ezekiel is appointed by God to remind the people to follow God’s word and turn from their wickedness. The Hebrew Scriptures are full of the stories of Israel’s wickedness and how they turned away from God’s desires for them. This turning away brought down punishment and disaster on the whole community.

Living apart from God and God’s word brought about physical suffering and death in these ancient stories.

As we approach another anniversary of 9/11 and remember the devastation of hurricane Katrina as other storms batter our coastlines we can fall into a terrible trap of believing that God was punishing us for our wickedness and sin, but to do that would be to uplift a theology that misses the point of God and our relationship with God.

How we love God and how we love our neighbor can either build up or destroy a community. How we care for one another, even if that requires tough love, can lift up or tear apart a community.

Paul tells us that “the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.” Then he tells us to wake up and smell the coffee; recognizing what time it is: time to put aside the unimportant desires of the self and instead live wearing the armor of light.

We are to act as a public community, where the things we do are public. Where the things we do in private are as honorable as the things we do in public.

Jesus’ words are similar: we are to confront, with love, the things and the people who hurt us, not for our own sakes, but for the sake of the whole community.

God values each and every one of us as individuals. We are all precious and Jesus tells us that God has every hair on our heads counted. But we were made for community. It is why God didn’t just make one human but two in the beginning and it is why God gave us the gift of church… so that we could live in community.

Love God, love neighbor – the whole of scripture can be interpreted into these four words with only one addition:

God loves us and this is why we were sent the prophets, and the psalmists, and the evangelists, and Jesus, so that we would know just how deep that love goes. And these commandments- these gifts- offer us a way of experiencing that love the way God intended for us to experience it.

Love God, love neighbor- because God loves us.

Amen.

I thirst

This week's sermon isn't being written down. It is based, however, on Matthew 10:40-42 and what Mother Theresa says here about satiating Jesus' thirst.

I hope to blog here about some of what I will say tomorrow.

God's Peace y'all... especially in Palestine and Israel.

Send us Forth

The Fifth Sunday After Pentecost

A sermon based on Exodus 19:2-8a and Matthew 9:35-10:23

In the name of Jesus; amen.

We’ve been singing this song for a few weeks now: “The Lord now sends us forth with hands to serve and give, to make of all the earth a better place to live. The angels are not sent into our world of pain to do what we were meant to do in Jesus’ name; that falls to you and me and all who are made free. Help us, O Lord, we pray, to do your will today.” (Enviado soy de Dios)

It’s a song from Central America written by an anonymous author. Maybe it was a prayer at least it sounds like one when spoken out loud. I’ve been grooving on it though. We sung it a few times at the synod assembly a week ago and I found myself often playing auntie to Pastor K’s baby who was 6 ½ weeks old at the synod assembly. Like many babies he liked being sung to and I found myself humming this tune into his ear every time I had a chance to snuggle with him and hope that I could get him to fall asleep for his mom.

It’s the lullaby I want to sing to you. A lullaby that would make you dream and desire to make the world a better place. It’s liberation theology; theology that teaches that God desires a just world where people are freed from oppression. It is a theology that works through us as we hear the word of God and then go out and do something that realizes God’s purpose and plan.

The readings today speak about God’s purpose for us. In the Gospel Jesus sends out the disciples in order to bring in a harvest of those eager to hear the good news. It’s a purposeful harvest; you don’t just go out and collect wheat and let it sit… you do something with it.

In the psalm we are told to praise God; make a joyful noise and serve the Lord with gladness.

In Exodus God claims the people as a priestly kingdom and a holy nation and the people answer together as one: “Everything that the LORD has spoken we will do.”

And as soon as Moses hands them the law on stone tablets (all that the LORD has asked them to do) they make a golden calf and start worshipping it.

We fall short of doing just what God has asked us to do. We speak quite a few things as one in this congregation: We confess our sins as one; we sing and pray as one, we recite what we believe as one in the creed, we even come to the table as one in order to receive the one body and blood of Jesus, but we fall short when we are sent as one out into the world. It is part of our sinful nature to not always be the priestly people that God calls us to be.

Even the disciples, in the gospel we read today, fall short. After all Jesus says about sending them out – they don’t actually go anywhere. Well, at least not until the end of the Gospel of Matthew, but that is probably because they don’t understand the mission at the point where they are in chapters 9 and 10. Because in this reading, Jesus tells them to not go anywhere among the Gentiles or the Samaritans, only those of the house of Israel. But, at the end of the Gospel he tells them to baptize all nations in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Called to be a priestly people to all people the disciples go out and do acts of wonder and miracle in the name of Jesus… called to be a priestly people we are meant to go out and do acts of wonder and miracle in the name of Jesus too.

And there is no excuse for any of us because we are all priests. That’s right; I am not the only one in the room right now. In baptism we were called into what Luther called the priesthood of all believers. Each one of us is called to minister out in the world and here in this place.

We are not meant to go and do our own thing, but to answer God’s call together as one: “Everything that the LORD has spoken we will do” because the angels are not sent to do what we were meant to do in Jesus’ name.

And here’s the thing. It isn’t meant to suck the life out of us or make us feel alone, or that we are carrying the weight of the world on our shoulders. It’s meant to be life-giving and life-enriching and life-affirming because what we do for God is good.

So I am giving you homework this week. I want you all to pray that God will make us one and that God will show us how to do the work of angels in the world. I want you all to pray that God would help us to do his will today and every day to send us out as laborers into his harvest.

Amen.

Hoping against Hope

The Fourth Sunday After Pentecost

A sermon based on Romans 4:13-25 and Matthew 9-13, 18-26

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Now the Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’

So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother’s son Lot, and all the possessions that they had gathered, and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran; and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. (Genesis 12:1-5a)

Some 4,000 years ago a family of Semitic nomads left Ur of the Chaldeans, perhaps in southeastern Iraq, and settled in Haran, Turkey, on the Syrian border. In Haran the father Terah died and his son Abram received a divine command to continue his journey: "Leave your country, your people, and your father's household and go to the land I will show you."

It was a leap of faith. Abram left behind a familiar place and packing up his family and all those who he was responsible for set off into an unknown. He left behind the comfort of the familiar and opened his arms up in an embrace of the unknown and strange.

And he did it at 75 years of age! It might be hard for some of you to believe that I am set in my ways, but at 38 I really am not a fan of change. Sure I like new things, but once I get into a habit I’m happy and content with I don’t really see a need to do something else.

For example, these past few days I have been at the New England Synod Assembly in Worcester, MA. For the last 3 years I have gone to the same restaurant for either dinner the first night or lunch the second day and ordered the same exact thing because I like it and I don’t really see a need to try anything else that I might not like. And now that I am used to going to Worcester, MA and I know my way around the convention center and the hotel I found out that we are going to another place next year and I really don’t wanna.

In the book of Hebrews it says: "By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the Promised Land like a stranger in a foreign country" (Hebrews 11:8–9).

There is something counter-intuitive about what Abram/Abraham did. It’s worse than planning a trip to a place you’ve never been and not first looking up directions on Yahoo.com or going to AAA for a map or even knowing if you will have a place to stay when you get there.

But Abram does even more than simply allow God to make his travel plans for him. Abram lets God change his name and listens to and believes a promise that God makes saying: ‘Look towards heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.’ Then God said to him, ‘So shall your descendants be.’ 6And Abram believed the Lord; and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness.

Abram and his wife Sarai are 70-some years old when they make their move to the land that God promises. They are even older when God promises to make them the parents of un-countable descendants. In fact they are so far beyond the point when they can have children of their own that Paul later writes in his letter to the Romans that when Abraham considered his own body and the barrenness of Sarah’s womb he decided he might as well be dead.

This kind of faith is a journey all its own; a journey into an unknown, impractical, and counter-intuitive land where there is no other road map except hope.

Author and theologian, Daniel B. Clendenin says this of Abraham’s journey: “In his journey into the unknown, Abraham embraced his ignorance. He relinquished control. He chose to trust God's promise to bless him in a new and strange place. But this required a second choice on his part. He had to leave not only his geographic place. He had to leave behind his narrow-minded, small-minded, parochial vision, the tendency in all of us to exclude the strange and the stranger. God gave a staggering promise to this obscure, Semitic nomad: in response to his obedience God would make him the heir of all the world.”

But Abraham isn’t the only one to take a journey like this one. Approximately 2,000 years later a tax-collector named Matthew listened to and followed a man named Jesus on a journey of wonder and resurrection. A woman, outcast from society because of a horrible infirmity, journeyed from a place of illness and ritual impurity to wholeness and reunification with her community because she journeyed in faith with the tips of her fingers. And the grieving father of a dead daughter went on a journey of hoping against hope and once again held his child, alive and smiling in his arms.

We are invited on a similar journey on the nonsensical path of faith where hoping beyond hope is not just our map, but a righteous act. It is not an easy path because it takes us into an unknown world where we risk everything, but where we are reminded that there is nothing that God cannot do if we are willing to trust in the promises made to us.

Indeed God gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist all for our sake. This gift of grace given to us is a gift of purpose meant to take us out into the world to experience the wonder of God’s love. It doesn’t always make sense and certainly there are times when belief in God is counter-intuitive. But the gift of grace through faith is meant to justify us and make us right with God.

Abram went off into an unknown world and trusted that God would create new life out of his old life and God did. Matthew dared to follow Jesus and became a disciple. A sick woman believed that she could claim health in the tips of her fingers and a grieving father, hoped that his dead daughter would come to life again.

Imagine what God will do for you. Amen.

A Life-Giving Lesson in Faith

Editor's Note: Without really meaning to I have neglected to post sermons for the last several weeks. This is somewhat due to the fact that the sermons for both Pentecost and Holy Trinity needed to be edited before being published because they contained the names of people in the congregation. All the sermons from the rest of May and this one from June 1 are now available and I hope you have a chance to read them and find meaning in them.


The Third Sunday after Pentecost


A sermon based on Romans 1:16-17; 3:2228 [29-31] and Matthew 7:21-29

In the name of Jesus; amen.

This gospel troubles me. Actually, the gospel of Matthew often has that affect on me. By the end of this liturgical year, which will end the Sunday before Advent begins, I will be grateful to no longer have to preach on it. By the end of Matthew we will hear all about the gnashing of teeth that takes place to those who fall outside the scope of salvation and wind up in the eternal fires of hell.

By the end of this cycle of Matthew we will be thoroughly challenged by the law and commandments that have been given to us by God and reinforced by Christ and I will be relieved.

This text is scary. It should frighten you. It frightens me. I like to think that heaven is an infinitely large place where all are welcome and this text tends to contradict that thought. This gospel does not suggest some universalistic, everybody goes to heaven theology, but rather that Jesus will actually turn people away, telling them literally to “Get out of my face; I don’t know you.”

Those that Jesus recognizes will be those who did the will of his Father. They will get a pass to enter into the kingdom of heaven. But not everybody who acts as though they know Jesus will make it through the pearly gates. There will be some who will say they know Jesus who will not enter.

It’s as if heaven was an exclusive night club and Jesus is a celebrity who gets to decide which of us standing behind the ropes will be let in by the bouncers.

Jesus will point out those cool enough to be let in and the rest will be left out trying to get his attention, “Jesus, Jesus, remember me?”

This text doesn’t just challenge my universalistic tendencies, but also my Lutheran tendencies as well. It’s not enough that I know Jesus; I also have to do stuff too. We believe as Paul writes that a person is justified by faith apart from works prescribed by the law. In other words, we aren’t saved by anything we do. We cannot earn our way into heaven. We can’t do anything that will get us into heaven. Following the law doesn’t get us saved. We are saved by grace alone.

Only God saves us and we trust that God saves us because of the work that Jesus did.

But this reading seems to say that what we do does matter to our salvation.

We live in what most consider a meritorious system; that is a system which operates on merits. We get things because we earn them. Most people work hard to get the things that they need and the things that they want. And we tend to want to punish those who get things by taking them. And we tend to want to despise those who get things just because they are lucky or born into the right family.

So the idea of getting into heaven based upon what we do makes a lot of sense. And actually from a preacher’s perspective it sounds like a helpful tool: want you parishioners to act differently, put more money in the plate, volunteer more hours of their week, come to church more often? Make sure they hear loud and clear that to do otherwise would be against the will of God and would send them to hell for certain.

But here’s the problem: can any of us ever do enough to be certain that we’ve done enough to get into heaven?

Entrance into heaven doesn’t work based on merits, except for the merits that Jesus earned for us. We are saved because Jesus did the work and gave us the credit. This means that even though we cannot do enough we are still welcomed into heaven.

And here is the trick: because we have been saved, not by our own works, but by the work of Jesus, we should do the will of the Father. We shouldn’t follow the law, or what we know God wants from us because we are afraid that we won’t make it into heaven if we don’t. We should follow the law and do what God wants from us because God has given us everything.

There are some people who claim that they know Jesus; they even use Jesus’ name, but they do not follow the will of God by loving God and loving their neighbor. And perhaps we can all agree that there are days and moments that we fall right into that category.

What Jesus wants from us is not to use his name to drive out demons, but to let his name use us to drive out demons: to follow the way of loving God and loving neighbor because God loves us.

What Jesus wants is for us to do more than say we are Christians, but to actually be Christians in the way we live our lives. Not so we will get into heaven, because we can’t ever do enough for that, but because it pleases God who has already made certain that we will go to heaven.

The funny thing is that in doing those things that please God we actually live better lives and help those around us live better lives too.

So take this wonderful gift that we have been given of God’s grace and let yourself be used by it by loving God and loving others. And suddenly you will discover that these words of Jesus aren’t scary, but life-giving.

Amen.

The Second Sunday after Pentecost Year A

A sermon based on Matthew 6:24-34

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Here is a little song I wrote - You might want to sing it note for note - Don't worry be happy - In every life we have some trouble - When you worry you make it double - Don't worry, be happy......

Ain't got no place to lay your head - Somebody came and took your bed - Don't worry, be happy - The land lord say your rent is late - He may have to litigate - Don't worry, be happy

Ain't got no cash, ain't got no style - Ain't got not girl to make you smile - But don't worry be happy - Cause when you worry - Your face will frown - And that will bring everybody down - So don't worry, be happy (now).....

There is this little song I wrote - I hope you learn it note for note - Like good little children - Don't worry, be happy - Listen to what I say - In your life expect some trouble - But when you worry - You make it double - Don't worry, be happy......

In 1988 Bobby McFerrin wrote the song, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” You might remember it because McFerrin used his own vocals for all the music; no instruments were used at all.

It was a happy song, with a ridiculous video that costarred comedian Robin Williams dancing around in silly, brightly colored clothes. It was incredibly popular and won several Grammy awards including Song of the Year.

McFerrin was actually inspired to write this song when he saw a postcard with an Indian Holy Man named Meher Baba who coined the phrase.

Today we are asked to be inspired by similar, but different words that we read in our gospel: “Do not worry about your life… can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.”

Certainly there are plenty of things to worry about. I’m worried about being able to afford the gas we will need to go on our annual family vacation. But that doesn’t mean that I’m not also worried about being able to afford the gas I need to put into my tank today. And I’m worried that people are going to start to choose to stay home on Sunday mornings rather than come to church in order to save money on gas. And I’m worried about whether or not the church will be able to afford heating costs next winter if no one comes to church this summer.

But I am also worried about all those people who now have to choose between buying food and buying gas in order to get to work.

Of course worrying about the cost of gas isn’t going to bring the price of gas down at all.

Jesus’ words come in the middle of his sermon on the mount shortly after the beatitudes. The people that he spoke to had plenty to worry about as well. The worried about their livelihoods, about their children, about their own health, and about the clothes they would wear and the food they would eat. Their worries weren’t much different from ours. And what Jesus wanted them to hear was that worry would never solve their problems, but that faith would bring them through every situation.

Jesus wanted them to know that God cared deeply for them and would not forget them, would in fact suckle them at his very breast until they were satisfied and quieted.

He knew that worry trivializes the significance of our lives. Isn’t life more than the clothes we wear or the food we eat? Yes! Those things are important to life, but they aren’t life. God is life.

Worry distracts us from eternal pursuits. "Strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." We’re taught that getting good things is most important to life; having the right clothes and the right things are supposed to define us. But they don’t. Our beliefs and how we act them out define us.

(3) Worry denies the love of God for us and his providential care for us. If God cares about little birds wouldn’t God care even more about us because we are of more value than birds.

(4) Worry dethrones God in our lives. In the end we are to trust God. Sometimes we can’t help but worry, and God forgives us for that; but ultimately God wants us to trust that we are cared for.

There are a great deal many things we worry about; some things even warrant our worry, but Jesus’ words are for us today just as they were for his disciples so long ago: do not worry about what will happen tomorrow, about whether or not we will have enough, God will provide for us because God cares deeply for us.

As Paul writes in his letter to the Philippians: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:7).

Amen.

In God's Image

Holy Trinity Sunday and Confirmation

A sermon based on Genesis 1:1-2:4a and Matthew 28:16-20.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit; Amen.

If there is one story that you: L, G, and I, should hear today it would be the story of creation. I think one of the reasons that it was chosen to be read on Trinity Sunday might be verse 26 when God says, “Let US make humankind in OUR image, according to OUR likeness.”

Some people say that God was referring to the Holy Trinity by speaking in the plural instead of the singular. When God said “us” God meant “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” But there are other reasons or options for why God would have used “we”.

The writer of Genesis could have been using what is called the “royal we” when God spoke these words. If you watch movies or read books about kings and queens sometimes you’ll notice that royalty refers to itself in the plural.

It’s also possible that God was talking to the other beings in heaven: the whole heavenly host of angels and archangels and cherubim and seraphim we sometimes hear about.

Yesterday my father called me and asked me if I was done writing my sermon for today. He told me to take it seriously… this was Trinity Sunday – Holy Trinity Sunday and I had to be careful not to be heretical because the salvation of your souls depended upon me delivering an orthodox and theologically correct sermon about the Trinity. If I wasn’t careful, he told me, I might damn you all to hell.

He wasn’t being serious, but the truth of the matter is I was somewhat relieved when we decided to hold confirmation on this day rather than on Pentecost. It gave me a good excuse to ignore the Trinity which always makes me worry that I will be heretical; that is… say something that isn’t true or in line with what the Church tells us is true about the Trinity.

We only talked about the Trinity once in class and some of the questions that you asked were near impossible to answer. “How could God be on earth and in heaven at the same time?” “Did this mean that Jesus prayed to himself?” and “If so, why would he do that?”

The truth is that people smarter than me have a hard time understanding or explaining the Trinity and so they will often give the same answer that I give: some things about our faith are just a mystery.

How the Trinity works is a mystery. How God is three people in one is a mystery. And just who God was referring to by using the plural “us” is a mystery.

Here’s what isn’t a mystery: God made us in God’s image, according to God’s likeness. God made us and when God was done God saw that what was made was good. We were made in the image and likeness of God, which of course means to some people that we look like God or that God looks like us. But in actuality what it really means is that God made us so that we could be in relationship with God.

We were made to be in relationship with God.

L, G, and I … you three were made to be in relationship with God. That relationship began when your parents brought you to the baptismal font and asked that you be drowned in the waters and reborn not just their child, but God’s child.

When they did this they made promises that they would teach you to pray, and encourage in you the study of scripture by giving you a Bible, and that they would teach you the creeds: those things that say what we believe about God, and that they would bring you to the table so that you could be fed by God’s own body and blood.

And then some pastor poured water over your heads in the name of the Trinity: The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit and you became a child of God.

Today, the church has deemed you old enough to make promises of your own; to say that you will continue in the lives that your parents gave you when they brought you to the waters of baptism.

These promises that you make are promises that you will continue to ask questions and strive to understand what it means to be made in the image and likeness of God. In other words, what it means to be in a relationship with God.

I ask that you honor these promises – God will always be there for you in your lives and so you should be present for God as well. Relationships require commitment and conversation; come to church and continue to pray.

God made you in such a way that you could receive the gift of grace and peace and so that you could share it with others. You were made to care for creation and for all those others who share creation with you.

Today is a gift for you, but it is also a gift for the rest of us because today we remember that we too were baptized and made into children of God. Today we too remember that God gifted us with grace and peace and called us to share our gifts with others.

Today we remember that, despite all the other mysteries of our faith, we know that God made us so that we could be in relationship with God.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

Fire

Pentecost Year A

A Sermon based on Acts 2:1-21

In the name of Jesus; amen.

This past weekend members of our congregation experienced the destructive powers of fire when they suffered the loss of their home from a grease fire that took several other condominiums at Lantern Park.

I had just gotten home from church last Sunday and realized that there was a voice mail on my phone from D telling me what had happened. I called him back and talked to him and A for some time about their ordeal. The fire had burned away just about everything they had with the exception of a pick-up truck worth of things.

I had barely gotten off the phone with them when another fire began burning. My phone started ringing over and over again as other members of this church began to call me, “Pastor, I just read about the M Family in the paper. Are they ok? What do they need? What are we going to do? How can we help them?”

It was a different kind of fire but it burned through quite a few people and by Monday people had offered me, for them, a sofa, love seat, ottoman, television, computer, set of dishes, pots and pans, bedroom furniture, and almost $400 worth of gift cards… and that’s just the list from Monday.

Today N, T, B, and R are going to become members of this congregation and there is something they should know about us. We are a small church, but we burn. Once the flames start it’s near impossible to put them out and this past week is not the first time I’ve seen and experienced the fire in this church. We are a small congregation, but I have seen us engulf a problem and burn it away until all that is left is a clear picture of God’s grace.

This fire will burn you too. At least I hope and pray that it will. This fire is a gift of the Holy Spirit and just like it was given to the disciples that very first Pentecost it has been given to us. The spark was lit in the waters of our baptism, the flames were fed by the food of the holy supper that we have been given, and it burns through us into those around us as we engage in the mission of this church: to Proclaim Christ through worship, fellowship, and caring for our neighbor.

This is a fire that does not destroy but that builds up and creates us into a community, a family. But let me be clear that while we care for the members of this church, for our brothers and sisters in this community we are also to care for and support our brothers and sisters who live outside the walls of this home.

The fire that was ignited in our baptism also united us with all those who are baptized and believe. And when we go to the table of grace we are fed with the same food that feeds our neighbors at Immanuel in Naugatuck and at a Baptist Church in Harlem, a Methodist Church in Iowa, an Episcopal Church in Honduras, a Pentecostal Church in Tanzania, at the Vatican in Rome, and in a little Lutheran church in Palestine. And that same baptismal fire calls us to reach out to others… even those who are not believers, to care for and support them whether they live next door to us or around the world from us.

We do not contain the fire of the Spirit here at Salem Lutheran Church; we are only a part of it with our gifts to share with each other and with the other. As Paul writes “For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body.” Together we are the body of Christ and it is the breath of God that flows through us and kindles the fire in our hearts.

Breathe in the fire that burns but does not destroy. Breathe in the fire that brings peace and forgiveness of sins. Breathe in the breath of God, the power of the risen Christ, and the gift of giftedness for the whole world.

Amen.

Remembering

The Ascension of Our Lord/ The Seventh Sunday of Easter

A Sermon based on Luke 24:44-53

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Today isn’t actually the Ascension of Our Lord. The Feast of the Ascension happened this past Thursday. It is the day when we remember that Jesus ascended into heaven after his resurrection. It is also the day when he makes a promise to his disciples that God will send the Holy Spirit which will baptize them with fire.

The gospel reading for today, which is actually the 7th Sunday of Easter is from John 17:1-11

“After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, ‘Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.

‘I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.”

But Thursday wasn’t just the day when we remember the Ascension of Jesus. Thursday was also Yom Hashoah or Holocaust Remembrance day. Since 1989, The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority, performs a ceremony called "Everyone Has a Name" in which the names of all of the Holocaust victims are read aloud. 6 million names of Jews, Poles, Gypsies, Homosexuals, Political Prisoners, French, Lithuanian, and Russian people are read aloud so that they are not forgotten.

My senior year of seminary there was a bus trip planned to go to the National Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. Everything about the museum is purposeful and symbolic. When you arrive you are given a passbook with the story of someone who was a victim of the Holocaust and at certain points along the way you were supposed to open up the book and read a piece of their story.

The name of my person was Dora, a 19 year old Jewish girl who escaped being taken away to a concentration camp and joined a group of resistance fighters. When the people she was with were caught by the Nazis they revealed that she was a Jew. The Nazis shot her in the head, tied a rock to her feet and threw her in a river.

At one point you go through this tunnel like bridge where the walls are covered with pictures taken of all the inhabitants of a little village in Lithuania. Hubby’s father had been a Lithuanian Jew and as we looked at the pictures of these people together he mentioned the fact that it was quite possible that he could be related to someone in one of those pictures.

At the end of that part of the exhibit we read that not one person in those photographs had survived a massacre inflicted by the Nazis.

These aren’t exactly pleasant memories and yet when things like this occur we have to remember. More than 10 years have passed since I went to the Holocaust museum, but I remember Dora’s name and I remember the rows and rows of photographs of people my children could be related to. Those memories connect us and bind us to one another.

Jesus ascended into heaven 40 days after he rose from the dead in order to make a place for the Holy Spirit. In John’s gospel Jesus prays that God would make us one. “And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.”

The Spirit comes because Jesus ascends and works to gather us together into one body… to make us one with each other.

The Spirit makes us one. The Spirit gathers us together and makes us sisters and brothers, not just in this community of faith, but out in the world too.

Dora was my sister; those people in those photographs were my sisters and brothers.

The Spirit offers us many, many gifts, but this is a gift that was given to the world. Too often we have forgotten to make use of it, to remember that Jesus prayed for us to be one and that God then sent the Spirit in order for that to happen.

But we have been given that gift all the same; the gift of connectedness is a gift for the whole world. It is a healing gift because helps us to see those things about others that make them just like us while at the same time it gives us the ability to honor and respect those things that make us different.

Listen to the words of the communion hymn we will sing today:
“Sing! Sing a new song! Sing of that great day when all will be one! God will reign, and we’ll walk with each other as sisters and brothers united in love.”

Remember that love. Amen.

Walking with the Paraklete

The Sixth Sunday of Easter

A sermon based on John 14:15-21

In the name of Jesus; amen.

Last week I told you all about this crazy detox I am going through and how I have had to give up several food items I really and truly enjoy. In place of the things I’ve given up I’ve had to add some things and one of those things is exercise, specifically walking.

Now I have always enjoyed walking, but I have never really seemed to have the energy to do it and strangely enough eating fruits and vegetables instead of chips and cookies has given me some energy and I have started walking 2 miles almost daily.

Friday the Princess Kitty had to have her tonsils out, but her surgery wasn’t scheduled until 1pm which meant that I had time to go for my walk in the morning. I’ve started walking at Baumer’s pond across from Lantern Park Condominiums and the Princess Kitty knows it because the daycare often walks there in the summer time for field trips.

So Hubby had the crazy idea that he and the Princess Kitty should come along and after making it very clear that my walking was serious business they agreed that they wouldn’t interfere and that they would just hang out until I was done my 2 miles.

We got to the pond and I put on my headphones and cued up my walking music. I waved to them and was off to start my first lap. When I was about ¾ of the way around I ran into them. They both stopped and began to cheer me on. The next time around the Princess Kitty pretended to be holding a microphone and interviewing me. On another lap Hubby did the wave- all by himself.

On my 5th lap (it takes 6 laps to equal 2 miles) they stopped to cheer me on and another walker commented that she really liked my cheering section to which I responded, “”Yeah, I should bring them along every time.”

Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever.”

The word that John uses for Advocate is Paraklete.

The Greek word Paraklete has been translated as Comforter, Helper, Counselor, and Advocate but no single translation captures all the aspects of the Christian meaning of the word. Paraklete is composed of two root words that mean "one called to your side." It was used to describe a person who stood up with another who was on trial or under pressure. It was not a lawyer in the sense that we now think of lawyers or advocates; the paraklete didn't speak to the judge, s/he spoke with the person on trial encouraging and helping them through it.

Hubby and the Princess Kitty were my parakletes on Friday. As silly as it was it was really great to have them there as I started to feel the burn in my legs and the desire to stop and just sit down.

It felt good knowing that each time I passed them they were supporting me and cheering me on.

It felt so good in fact that when the other walker who had made the comment about them cheering me on was doing her last lap as we were leaving the 3 of us stopped and cheered for her.

“Whoo-Hoo! Way to Go! You Can Do It! Keep Up the Good Work! Don’t Stop Now!”

This is how the Holy Spirit works. The Paraklete gives us encouragement in our walk of faith. The Spirit resides in us, just as Jesus says, but the Spirit also stands at those pivotal moments in our lives and offers us encouragement, and comfort, and help, and counsel.

Sometimes the Spirit does this by cheering us on, “Whoo-Hoo! Way to Go! You Can Do It! Keep Up the Good Work! Don’t Stop Now!” Sometimes the Spirit does this by pushing us through that last lap. Sometimes the Spirit does it by showing us how much we are loved by God through the love of family and friends or through the kindness of strangers.

And the Paraklete is with us always; the one whom God sends us because Jesus asks that we not be left alone is there to keep us on the path of faith and to bring us back when we stray. And to push us towards others to share with them the same encouragement, and comfort, and help, and counsel we have been given.

May you feel the presence of the Paraklete in your life, cheering you on, Whoo-Hoo! Way to Go! You Can Do It! Keep Up the Good Work! Don’t Stop Now!”

Amen.

Yummy

The Fifth Sunday of Easter.

A sermon based on Psalm 31:1-5, 15-16; 1 Peter 2:2-10, and John 14:1-14

In the name of Jesus; amen.

On Tuesday I started doing something radical: I went on a detoxification diet and I’ve been complaining about it ever since. For 3 weeks all I can eat is fruits, vegetables, simply cooked lean meat, organic eggs, brown rice, and these special shakes that are nice and grainy. My only saving grace is that I am also allowed to have sea salt and extra virgin olive oil (within reason). And since Tuesday I have been cranky because of the lack of all the wonderful things I usually eat like bread and chocolate and coffee.

So yesterday, while others were here at church doing the spring clean-up I was in Torrington at the first Mission Area Assembly for the southwest part of our synod. I got there right as worship began. It was an interesting service.

St Paul’s in Torrington has a puppet ministry and a youth group which does a contemporary kind of liturgical dance which they performed for us in place of a sermon. But my heart was only half into the service until we got to the beginning of communion and I realized that I could drink the wine. I was only slightly disappointed that they had wafers instead of a huge loaf of bread which might likely have made me start to speak in tongues right there in the pew in which I sat.

“Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation- if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.”

There have been other times when I have yearned for communion; times when I’ve gone to church and needed to eat and drink the body and blood of Jesus Christ. I remember the Sunday before the funeral for the father of one of my dearest friends. Scott and I were on our way to Virginia to mourn his terrible loss and had spent the night with his mother and went to church with her before hitting the road.

I needed communion that day, but they only served it every other Sunday and this wasn’t one of the “on” Sundays. I felt starved for the spiritual food that is the holy supper as we headed for 95 South that afternoon.

There have been many, many times when I have needed that sustenance and perhaps, hopefully, you all can say the same. Sometimes the food of communion is the only thing that will satisfy what is missing inside, but never, never before have I cared so much about what it tasted like.

“Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation- if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.”

These words of Peter may very well have been spoken to new Christians, those who had only just been baptized and joined the rest of the community at the table. They would have been like infants, newborn in the faith and the words of Peter would have been good advice to them: long for the pure, spiritual milk the way that newborn babes long for their mother’s breast. Long for the sustenance that helps you grow into salvation, because you know, if you have already tasted it, that the Lord is good.

The Lord tastes good and everything else follows after that. Tasting that the Lord is good helps us to hand over to God our very spirits as the psalmist writes: “Into your hands I commend my spirit, for you have redeemed me, O LORD, God of truth.”

Tasting that the Lord is good makes us living stones, building blocks that form a house, a dwelling place for God in this world.

Just as God, the Father, makes dwellings for us in the next world, we are created to be dwellings for God in this world.

Tasting that the Lord is good satisfies us and our need for mercy. The food that is God makes us a “chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that (we) may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called (us) out of darkness into (the) marvelous light.”

Yearn for it, this stuff that tastes like mercy. It is the stuff that nourishes our souls so that we may grow into the salvation that God so wants for us.

May it delight your senses; tantalize your taste buds, and fortify your will to serve God and neighbor.

Amen.

I shall not want

The Fourth Sunday of Easter Year A

A sermon based on the 23rd Psalm.

In the name of Jesus; amen.

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Well, actually there are lots of things that I want. I want some new clothes. I want a nicer car or maybe to fix up the one I already have. I want new furniture for my house. I want a little more money. I want to go on vacation… well, you get the idea.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Whenever I go online the page I see on my computer has a word of the day. I usually don’t take much notice to the words, except when one catches my eye because it looks strange. Last night one of the words was “penury” and I decided to click on it to find out what it means.

penury: DEFINITION: (noun) Extreme want or poverty; destitution. SYNONYMS: indigence, pauperism, pauperization, beggary, need.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

This past week Rachel, Scott, and I watched American Idol Gives Back. They raised over 60 million dollars from people calling in and making donations or going on line and charging their credit cards. The money they raised is meant to go to people all over the world, especially children who live in a state of extreme want.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Growing up my parents spent a great deal of time trying to get me to understand the difference between the things that I needed and the things that I wanted. Needs were much more important than wants. I didn’t always get what I wanted, but I almost always had everything that I needed.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

It’s hard to understand the concept of shepherd. We don’t live in a society where there are a lot of shepherds. So it’s easy to romanticize the notions of shepherds tending their sheep. I think I mention this every time I preach on Good Shepherd Sunday perhaps because each year that I prepare for Good Shepherd Sunday I find the same information:

Shepherds were dirty, on the fringe of society; they were necessary, but not well thought of. Sheep are stupid animals. They have a tendency to stray. They have to be well guarded. They flock together for safety because it makes it harder for predators to pick them off.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

It’s a popular psalm for funerals. Maybe because of the 4th verse which says, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

But the purpose of a real shepherd’s staff is meant to push the sheep along, sometimes fairly roughly or to beat off the wolves that prey on the flock.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

To identify with this psalm means that we have to identify with being sheep, and not just sheep happily grazing in the pasture, but sheep being lead out of the safety of our pens into a world where predators wait for us, where the valley of the shadow of death is a real pathway.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

But even more so, to identify with this psalm, this well beloved psalm means understanding that it is Jesus who is our shepherd. Jesus is the shepherd whose rod isn’t just a comfort, but a protection against the enemy. Jesus is the shepherd whose staff isn’t just a comfort, but a prod meant to lead us out into the world.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

This is the anti-penury psalm. (Remember that penury is extreme want.) It is the abundance psalm; the psalm of overflowing cups and restored souls. It is the anti-fear psalm; the psalm of comfort even in the valley of the shadow of death. It is the anti-loner psalm; the psalm of being lead to green pastures, still waters, and right pathways.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Lead by Jesus it’s not just our needs that are taken care of, but all of our wants. This is a psalm of grace because Jesus is our shepherd and Jesus does lead us.

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.

Amen.