Sermon for June 21st, 2020

Grace and Peace to you from God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, Amen. 

Doing what is right is not always easy. Sometimes we need to do things that are not popular or speak out when we see injustice. Sometimes we are called to speak truth to power. Sometimes when we do this or when we are called to do this, they are minor things, like speaking out when we see a friend cheating on a test or when we see someone saying something unkind or mean to a friend. Other times we are called the speak out and to act out against insurmountable odds. 

Our readings today speak to just such a time. In our reading from Jeremiah we hear one of the laments when Jeremiah calls out against God upset angry and frustrated with the fact that God has called him to do a difficult thing. God has called Jeremiah to speak truth, a painful truth, to the people of Israel. Jeremiah has been called to warn them against the sins that they are committing and warns them that God will see the wrongs they have done and will punish them for it. Jeremiah was a Prophet for 40 years, and he continually preached the truth God told him to preach, yet he did not see any change amongst the people. He also did not see God's wrath come down. Jeremiah preached and proclaimed the will of God and God's judgment on the people of Israel, and he saw and heard people ignore him, laugh at him, and laugh at God. 

Jeremiah is frustrated. In this lament Jeremiah calls out God and says God you seduced me. And I fell for it. You gave me words to speak and I spoke them, but people mocked me for it. When I try to hold my tongue, when I try to not speak the words you give me, when I try to just live a normal life to not make waves your word ignites a fire not just in my stomach but burns me to the bones and I can't stop from proclaiming it. 

Even Jeremiah's friends make fun of him, even his friends plot against Jeremiah, trying to get him to fail, trying to get him to give up preaching the scary truths God has told him to preach. But Jeremiah knows that God is trustworthy, that those things God has told him will come to be will indeed happen. Jeremiah sees a future in which God will exact revenge not only on the Israelites for their sin but for their sin of not listening to the prophets, not changing their ways for mocking the Prophet. If only it was that easy. 

In our Psalm today we need here another lament. The Psalm writer is also experiencing the same things Jeremiah is experiencing. Because of proclaiming God’s will, God’s work, and God’s view for the future the writer is mocked, their name is made a curse. God's word is mocked. The writer calls out to God in their distress asking God to be with them and to give an answer. 

In both readings, we hear the fight of the conscience. Jeremiah and the psalmist both know what is right to do, they both know what God's will is for them, and they are both terrified. God does not always ask us to do that which is easy, but God always asks us to do what is right. We do what is right, we know what is right, by the working of the spirit. 

We hear this again in our gospel reading for today. Jesus is talking to his disciples and telling them that a servant is not above their master, a student is not above the teacher, but it is enough for the student to be like the teacher and the servant to do the will of the master. Jesus calls on his disciples to be like him and do the things he does and to do those things that God has willed for them to do. It is not going to be an easy task. The people who mocked Jesus and called him the Prince of lies, Beelzebub, will not spare the students. But because they are the disciples of the son of God, they will be rejected, subject to mockery, insults, and even death. It is terrifying stuff. Where was that easy yoke that Jesus talked about?  

In our gospel reading, Jesus says three separate times do not be afraid or have No Fear. Jesus is not saying that things will not be scary that there will not be pain that there will not be suffering that there will not be death. But Jesus is saying that what is hidden will be revealed; nothing can remain hidden. Because of this the disciples are told what is whispered to them they must go out and shout it from the rooftops. What Jesus reveals to them at night they should go out and proclaim in the streets during the day. This sounds a lot like what Jeremiah is experiencing. Jeremiah hears God and even though he wants to keep the message, the will, the wrath, and the judgment of God silent for fear of other people, he cannot keep it in. He cannot remain silent. He is compelled to share the word of God. That seems to be a foreign idea to us. We live in a culture and in a time in which we're told that we're masters of our own fate that we can choose their own path. We live in a culture that believes in individualism, personal choice, personal wealth, and personal reward. Everything is “me, me, me.” That is part of why these texts today can be uncomfortable. Three different authors telling us that if we want to be free from sin we must be bound up with Christ. 

The reading from Romans is one that I have used in several funerals. It is a good summary of what we as Lutherans believe about baptism what the church teaches about baptism. Many of us, when we are at a funeral, we hear the words of the service, but we do not always pay attention to them. It is a challenging time in our lives, none of us enjoy being at funerals. But there's incredible beauty in our funeral services, yes, they are filled with morning, but they are also filled with hope. When we bury someone our service mirrors baptism. Just like in our baptism services we talk about death. In baptism the old self the sinful self-dies. We are baptized in the water into Jesus death and we are freed from sin. And if we have been united in a death like Christ's, then God who makes all things new, will Unite us in a resurrection like Jesus. 

On this our first Sunday back worshiping in the church together, I wanted to proclaim a jubilant joyful message. But I know, that while there's rejoicing at being able to worship together, today is also filled with sadness. We are so close and yet so far away. We are back to worshipping in a familiar place saying words that are familiar to us, but some things are not the same. We cannot sing, we cannot share the peace, let us be honest communion is going to be weird, and our tradition of joining together for fellowship after the service is also missing.  And some of us are still not more able to be here. I know that some of you are unhappy about this, I know that some of you feel like this is not the way you wanted to come back to serve us. I know it was not the way that I was hoping or planning for. But the reality is if we wanted to wait until we could celebrate in the old ways, we might be waiting quite a while. When we read the news there are many communities that are coming together as though things have never changed these have led to outbreaks and death. One of the odd things about the coronavirus is the fact that so many people who contract it we will never know that they were infected, but they can pass on the disease to others who might show symptoms and might even die.  

 I also know that some of you might not have been happy about the sermons or the services I have led recently.  I know of other pastors who have been fired from their congregations; I also know congregations that are looking at leaving their denominations over the church’s recent repentance and remembrance of the sin of racism.  

 If you want to talk about it, I'm open to talk to you about it. Even though it is scary for me to preach a message that I know is not always popular I will continue to preach, God's love for all of creation, God choosing to be with the poor the oppressed and those who suffer. I will continue to preach the cross. Yes, the cross brings us salvation. But first it is an indictment. The cross condemns us and condemns the world for the ways in which we brutalize, we devalue, and we murder the vulnerable, the marginalized, and the poor. The cross indicts us for trusting in our own reasoning and in our own power instead of God's will and God's word. The cross indicts us just as much as it indicted the people of Israel and the Roman Empire. We read in our gospels that above the cross a plaque was hung that said here is Jesus King of the Jews son of God. The cross indicts us because we attempt to kill God. Yet it is that same cross that indicts us that also saves us when we come to recognize that truly is God on the cross coming to earth as a sinless, vulnerable, despised, and abused person. 

Doing what is right is not always easy. Martin Luther knew this when at the Diet of Wurms, he was asked to repent and recant all he had taught. This was early in Luther's career as a monk and as a professor. Luther would say things later in his life that made what he said earlier on in his life look tame. Luther thought he was just going to tell the church about their mistakes and the church would correct their teachings. Luther was naive. And so there at the Diet of Wurms Luther is said, “I neither can nor will retract anything; for it cannot be either safe or honest for a Christian to speak against his conscience. Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise; God help me! Amen.” 

May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart.  

May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression and exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.  

May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger, and war, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and turn their pain into joy.  

And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in the world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done to bring justice and kindness to all our children and the poor.  

In the name of the Triune + God. Amen. 

Sermon for June 14th, 2020

Grace and Peace to you from the one who is, who was, and who is to come, Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen. 

The Church has had a long history of what it means to be a Christian. Is a Christian someone who believes in Christ, or is a Christian someone who has the faith of Jesus? In short is Christianity about believing the right things or right living?  

What we say about what it means to be Christian ultimately becomes a value statement. This week, I read an article by William Lamar IV, a pastor of the Metropolis AME Church, Washington, D.C. The article argued that it isn’t the coronavirus, racism, or greed that is killing us, instead, he points to our bad theology that has led the American people and the American churches and American government to this point in our history. It has been bad, dangerous beliefs about what it means to be Christian and our beliefs about God that have caused racism, individualism, and greed, the root causes of much of American injustice, American inequality by design. 

In light of this week’s texts, and really the entire trajectory and direction of the Gospel, we have a way to correct ourselves, our churches, and our government, to be responsive to God’s will and agents of the coming kingdom of God.  

We begin at the end; the Gospel of Matthew culminates in what we have called the Great Commission. 

“Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’” (Matthew 28:16-20)  

 The first disciples are commanded to do three things here: make disciples, baptize, and teach. During different parts of Christian history, we have put emphasis on different aspects of this commission. For the American age, the 1500’s until now, the dominate theology has been a settler colonialism. This theology is focused on baptism and teaching. It has been a theology that allowed early Americans to paint the native population as unchristian, and unworthy of God’s love. It was this theology that caused the creation of reservations. It is a theology that viewed all of North America as the new promised land and the Native Americans as the new Cannanites, to be purged from the land. This same belief system allows us to justify inequality and slavery, because as God’s supposedly Chosen People, everyone else and all wealth is ours for the taking. Because if God is on our side, then we will be given all good things. Today, this same theology allows us to believe that success is your reward for being a good Christian, for believing the right things. Healthcare is privatized, access to education, food, shelter, and safety are all based on wealth and not the fact that you are a human, a wonderful creation of God. Wealth that we view as being God given blessing for each of our own personal reward.  

But, these past few weeks and months are showing us increasingly that our beliefs about God are inadequate, incomplete, and, frankly, unbiblical.  

To answer this failed theology, we must look to the bible to find our roots. We have to become radically biblical again. (that’s a play on words, to be radical is to go back to the roots, think radishes, they are roots, Latin is fun). Let’s look at the Great Commission using the Bible to interpret the Bible. 

“teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.” What exactly has Jesus commanded us?  

When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22:34-40) 

What are we commanded to teach others to obey? That they love the Lord our God with our whole being, and like it, that we love our neighbors as ourselves. Loving our neighbors as ourselves means that we work for their good as we would seek our own good. We call this working for the common good. What is best for everyone, not just me, my family, my friends, or my community, but What benefits all people and all creation. This commandment calls us to think about the whole of creation as our family. By saying that loving our neighbor is like loving, God, we know that loving our neighbor is part of how we show our love of God. 

“baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” What does it mean to baptize? In baptism we are welcomed into Christ’s family through Christ’s death. We are welcomed into the family of God, in the water and the words. When we are baptized into Christ’s death, we are baptized into Christ’s resurrection, we are freed from the consequences of sin so that we can freely love God and our neighbors without fear of death, damnation, and the devil. 

 “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations,” What does it mean to make disciples. This is where we can hear this week’s gospel text.  

“Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd […] These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: […] ‘go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim the good news, the kingdom of heaven has come near. Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.’” (Matthew 9:35-36, 10:5-8) 

 The work of the disciples is the work of Christ. Jesus is proclaiming the Good News that the kingdom is near and tells his disciples to do the same. Jesus is healing the sick and tells his disciples to do the same. Christ sees the crowd as sheep without a shepherd and tells the disciples to go to the lost sheep. 

The Great Commission is our call to make disciples, to empower others to go out doing the work of Christ. And we make disciples by baptizing them, welcoming them into the family of God, and teaching them to obey Christ’s commandments to Love God with our whole being, by loving our neighbors, the whole of creation as members of our family, through working for the common good. 

That is it, that is the correction our theology needs to respond to the chaos, disquiet, and inequality that we are experiencing in our world. The answer to the disease of bad theology, is to become a church of the Great Commission, Christians who are called to be Christ to the world. Lights in the darkness. 

Luther taught that Christ died pro me, Jesus died on the cross for me. Luther didn’t stop there, but many protestants have stopped at the individualism of the pro me. Christ died for me is important in Luther, because we can only come to that realization when we have felt the conviction of the law. When we recognize that we are each individually the worst sinner that have ever been. We each separately are sinners, separated from God, all have sinned and all fall short of the grace of God works when we realize that we are each part of the all. And yet,  

 “while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:6-8) 

Since Christ died for me when I was still a sinner, the worst sinner, then I can acknowledge that Christ died for all of fallen creation, and God loves all of creation. If God loves others as God has loved me, then I must show that same love and care.  

We hear from those who still think that the Gospel teaches that individual rewards are gifts for belief, that God has chosen me exclusively, or my church or my nation exclusively, that this way of thinking is social justice church, it was meant as an insult. SJW, social justice warriors. But when we hear the words from Micah 6:8, when Israel demanded to know what form of worship God demanded from them...God responded: 

He has told you, O mortal, what is good; 
and what does the Lord require of you 
but to do justice, and to love kindness, 
and to walk humbly with your God? 

 The Bible sounds to me to be a book calling for social justice as a means of worshiping and honoring God. 

Go my family, make disciples, be Christ to the community, show God’s love, by loving your neighbors, proclaim that God’s kingdom is near. Become Christians of the Great Commission, make your Church a church of the commission, proclaim the Good news of Christ’s love to a nation and a world sorely in need of Christ’s light in these troubled times. 

Sermon for May 31st, 2020, Pentecost Sunday

Grace to you from the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.  

Today is Pentecost, the last Sunday of the Easter Season in the Church, 50 days after Easter Sunday. That’s what Pentecost, the word, actually means, 50. Pentecost existed before Christians. The Jewish people celebrated Pentecost, 50 days after the Passover.   

For us, Pentecost marks the descending of the Holy Spirit onto the disciples as tongues of flame and the birth of the Church. The earliest Christians did not call themselves Christians, instead they called themselves “The way” likely an allusion to Christ’s proclamation that he was the way, the truth, and the life. The earliest Christians viewed themselves not as a separate religion, but instead as a continuance of and a part of Judaism.  

I am going to be honest, I do not normally read the italics on the celebrate worship folder, that folder that we put in the bulletins when we meet in person, and is available for you in the church kitchen during this time of separation. The folder that has the Bible texts for the week, the prayers of intercession and the “preparing for next week.” But, I did this week, and I want to share with you what the description for this Sunday says:  

Pentecost derives its name from the Jewish festival celebrating the harvest and the giving of the law on Mount Sinai fifty days after Passover. Fifty days after Easter, we celebrate the Holy Spirit as God’s presence within and among us. In Acts the Spirit arrives in rushing wind and flame, bringing God’s presence to all people. Paul reminds us that though we each have different capacities, we are unified in the Spirit that equips us with these gifts. Jesus breathes the Holy Spirit on his disciples, empowering them to forgive sin. We celebrate that we too are given the breath of the Holy Spirit and sent out to proclaim God’s redeeming love to all the world.  

It is a wonderful summary of the texts, why we worship today, and really serves as a nice concise sermon, aside from the fact it doesn’t speak directly to our experiences here or in this time.  

It is important to see that this week we have two very different stories about the coming of and giving of the Holy Spirit. For some this might be troubling. You might be asking, “was the story of the Spirit descending like wind and fire or the story of Jesus breathing on his disciples, truth?” The answer is yes, they both are. They both tell us profound things about God and our experiences of God.  

 Both are quite miraculous when we think about it. A loud rushing of wind, flames descend and sit on peoples’ head and all can hear their voices as if they are speaking in their own language. Or Jesus, who was dead and buried appears in a shut and locked room to his disciples, breaths on the disciples and gives them the power reserved only for God, the forgiveness of sin. 

 The Holy Spirit sometimes feels like a gentle presence telling us, Peace be with you, blessing us, and empowering us to do amazing things; sometimes the Spirit comes in terrifying fashion, a sudden wind, fire, and does amazing things through us, without any effort on our part. Sometimes it is a mix of the two. 

 I don’t know how I write sermons every week. This is the 40th week in a row that I have written a sermon and some weeks multiple for special occasions and funerals. I can’t imagine how I will write likely another approximately 1,500 sermons, if I preach at least once weekly until I am 65, ha, like I will retire at 65. I don’t know what I will write or what I will say most weeks until it is written. The weeks that I have an idea of what I will say, normally something entirely different ends up on the page. I don’t claim anything special here, but I can recognize that it is the Holy Spirit at work while I write the sermon. It definitely is not me.  

Last week when I sat down to write the sermon, I did not know that I was going to write about racism, sexism, and the abuse of the marginalized, from Jesus’ prayer that his disciples be one as the Father and Son are one. When it was written, I was terrified what the congregational response would be or what response from the folk who view our services online would be. But ultimately I knew that it was a message that needed to be shared. 

 I didn't know when I wrote the sermon, or preached it that on Monday morning, a white woman would call police on an African American man who had asked her to leash her dog, as the law required. Or, that Monday evening, officers responding to a call about a counterfeit bill would kill a black man on the street. I didn’t know that there would be a week of protests, riots, and rebellion, or that people in power would leverage that power to call for further murder of an already outraged and exhausted people. I also didn’t know that the FBI would announce that they would be opening an investigation into the March killing of a black EMT in Louisville, when three white officers serving a search warrant would go to the wrong home, in the wrong part of town, fail to follow the protocol of the warrant (they arrived in plain clothes, unmarked cars, and failed to identify themselves as police before kicking in the door) to arrest a man who was already in police custody before the search warrant had been issued.   

I don’t know how many of you have experienced this, but sometimes the wind blows hard in your face and it takes your breath away. That is how this week has felt to me. But, not even just this week, but these past couple months. Crisis, calamity, a never ending stream of bad news.   

The words of George Floyd as he lay on the ground with three men on his back and neck are profound this week. “I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe.” They are profound when the world is suffering a pandemic where the disease kills by suffocating the infected, they call out, “I can’t breathe.” These are also the very words that Christ could have cried out on the cross, as he died by slow suffocation. Christ calls out, “I can’t breathe.” In all the ways that the world presses in on us, in all our various suffering, in our grief, in our pain, and in our broken-heartedness as we witness the pain and suffering of others, we call out, “I can’t breathe.” 

In our Psalm we heard and spoke the words of the Psalmist:  

When you hide your face, they are terrified;   
when you take away their breath, they die and return to their dust.  

I am not saying that God is hiding God’s face from us, but that we are just failing to see God. We are not looking to God, and in that we are terrified. We are sinners who have and who continue to turn our faces away from God. We are not meant to go about this all on our own. God is the source of all life, healing, and salvation. We turn away from God, we attempt to do things on our own, and try to cut ourselves off from our source of all things.   

But, then the Psalmist says:  

You send forth your Spirit, and they are created;   
and so you renew the face of the earth.  

And we hear again, Jesus says, “Peace be with you,” then he breaths on the disciples, giving them the Holy Spirit, and sends them into the world, proclaiming that peace, that Good News, that Jesus has be raised from the dead, your sin has been forgiven. 

 So, we today, and everyday call out, Jesus, breath the Holy Spirit into me, let me be renewed and reformed by the Spirit. Empower me with the gift of your Spirit to serve you and the world through you. Jesus Christ, send your spirit, help us to breathe again. Amen.