Sermon for October 16, 2011

October 16, 2011 Gospel: Matthew 22:15-22 Psalm 96:1-13
1st Reading: Isaiah 45:1-7 2nd Reading: 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10

Really all of October has been Stewardship Month. We snuck it in on you, without you really knowing it. On the 2nd, we blessed the pets and thanked God for all of God’s creation. We talked and prayed about taking care of the earth and the animals that are gifts from God to borrow for a little while. Last week, we used the word “Rejoice” a lot and thought more about what it means to give thanks to God as a way of life. Today is commitment Sunday where we make out our estimate of giving cards and let the church know about how much we each intend to give in the coming year so we can make a realistic budget.

Stewardship has to do with God being in charge and us being stewards. It is about how we use what God has made and let us borrow. It is about God entrusting so much to us, and how we use and share and manage all that.

Let me go through the readings one by one and see what they each have to say about Stewardship. The first reading from Isaiah has the novel concept that God is the only God. The first commandment says, “You shall have no other gods before me.” It kind of sounds like there could be other gods, but Yahweh is the supreme. Here, God is saying that’s it—there is only one God.

Some scholars believe that the devil or Satan represents another god. It can be hard to answer the question about why bad things happen if you only have one God who is good. Some people answer that by explaining evil forces with the concept of the devil. Here in Isaiah, God claims responsibility for both the good and the bad, the light and the darkness, the prosperity and the woe. It can all be attributed to God.

I usually attribute all the good to God and all the bad to humankind. But who is to say what is good or bad since almost everything has some good and bad. And God can make good out of a bad situation. Even a victim of molestation can come through life as a survivor and help others in a similar situation. Joseph in the Old Testament said to his brothers, “What you intended for bad (selling him into slavery) God intended for good.” God used the evil hatred of the brothers to save a whole generation of people from starvation. It is no good to tell someone in the midst of a horrible situation that God intends it for good. However, looking for the good in any situation, or understanding that something good may come out of it later can be a helpful way to get yourself through something horrific. I also don’t believe that just because God makes something good out of it that God caused it in the first place. God gives free will and we choose evil sometimes, but God can make something good out of it.

So if there is only one God, who created everything, then everything belongs to God. That is our stewardship implication here. It is all God’s.

In the second lesson the major stewardship implication has to do with turning “to God from idols to serve a living and true God.” Of course one of the major idols we serve can be our money. It is a false god and we put our trust in our money more than anything else. We think it can make us secure. We rely on it. We try to get more of it. We are nice to people who have more of it. We use it to get people to do what we want. And we put a lot of trust in our possessions. The more money we have the more possessions we can get. We gather more junk around us than we can possibly use and we get caught up in storing it and keeping it up and acquiring new and better stuff and we get distracted. But also the more disposable money we have, the more people we can help and the more good we can do in our neighborhood and around the world. We can’t use it as an idol that we worship because then it controls us. Instead if we see it as a tool we can use for good, then we control it and hopefully make a better world from it.

Now we come to the Gospel. This is right after Jesus cleansed the temple and got everyone all worked up and determined to arrest him. The Pharisees and Herodians are trying to catch him in a trap. They ask him if they should pay taxes or not. This is sure to get him! If he says pay taxes, he is telling them to honor Caesar who is oppressing the Israelites and claiming to be god. If he says don’t pay taxes, he is telling them all to commit treason and rebel against Rome which will then attack Israel and destroy it.

Instead, Jesus puts them on the spot. He asks them to show him a coin of the empire. By doing so, they reveal that they are breaking the rule against graven images in the temple. They also show that they are profiteers of this temple system and that it is corrupt and they are part of the problem. This temple system, where they change the graven image money into temple money and sold animals for the sacrifices kept the Pharisees and Herodians in power and all the little people had to pay the fee to have any access to God.

Then Jesus tells them a riddle. He’s going to let them figure it out for themselves. He says, “Give to the emperor the things that are the emperors and to God the things that are God’s.” So what does that mean? God made everything, everything is God’s. Give God everything. So what is the emperor’s? He needs his image stamped all over everything—that’s how insecure he is. And the coin had the words in scripted on it saying that Caesar is god. He’s saying to give Caesar meaningless words and images and titles and give him a boost to his ego if that’s what the inferior guy needs. God is above all that. God has already left God’s mark on absolutely everything by giving it life, creativity, power, etc.

So that leaves the question for us about where our loyalty lies. Can we be good Christians and good citizens, at the same time? Can we be loyal to our country and God? It is a question that I’m not going to answer for you—I’d rather imitate Jesus on this one than stick my neck out. But also, God gave you a brain to decide.
It is clear that we should be loyal to God first. God gave us everything—didn’t withhold even his own Son. God made everything and shares with us. We can trust God completely so that’s where our loyalty goes first. That doesn’t mean we can’t also be loyal to our country. But we have to remember that our country is fallible. It is human-made and has flaws and we can’t always rely on it to protect us or look out for our best interests or to be loving and just. There are many times we can rely on it to do that, but at times it will fail to do that. So we have to be ready to ask the hard questions of our country and our citizens and understand our motivations and use our voice and our vote to try to make this country better, more just and fair and compassionate. We can also give to God what is God’s—everything, and still have something to give to our country, our service, our hope, our vote, our protest, our critique. And in the places our God and our country are on the same page we can rejoice.

The same is true of our church. Giving to our church may not necessarily be giving to God. Yet, just as we make up our country, we are the church. We have a say here to be more loving and compassionate and generous and to make decisions about where our financial gifts go. Sometimes I’m surprised that God only asks for 10% back from each of us. In our congregation we give more than 10% of your gifts to help others here and around the world between the benevolence we give to the Oregon Synod and King’s Cupboard, Backpack Buddies, Pastor’s Discretionary Fund and various other people and groups that you support in your giving when you write that on the memo line of your check or on your envelope. We also know that many of you give outside the church to places like Habitat for Humanity, The Sierra Club, The Heiffer Project and on and on, as well as volunteering your time to help others. We can also honor God when we use our money to support local businesses, buy American and/or sustainable products. We get to try to use everything for God’s glory. God has given us everything we have, let us share and use those gifts of God in ways that would please God and help our neighbor and give life to those around us.

My grandma used to give us $20 each year when we started school. That was a lot of money to us and we could really make it stretch. When we went as a family to spend that money on school clothes mom always reminded us to use it in a way that Grandma would have appreciated. Even though she had given it as a gift, we recognized how special a gift that was, and wanted to use it in the way she would have wanted us to. In the same way, God gives us many gifts, everything we have. And we can remember to use it in ways that please God and make our whole lives a “thank-you” note to God for all he has given us.

Sermon for October 9, 2011

October 9, 2011 Gospel: Matthew 22:1-14 Psalm 23
1st Reading: Isaiah 25:1-9 2nd Reading: Philippians 4:1-9

“Praise” “rejoice” “let us be glad.” I, of course, wrote all this before yesterday when my dad's wife took her own life. It is certainly affecting me, but even after all that, I still stand by these words and believe joy to be a state of being that doesn’t change based on happenstance. I picked out these commands from our readings this morning because sometimes I can be too serious and sometimes I look around and wonder if we’ve come here to church to be solemn and feel guilty or to give thanks to God for how good God is. And there is no reason it can’t be both, but sometimes I look around for that joy and don’t see it on people’s faces. There is a nearby church who calls the sanctuary the “celebration center” and another one nearby that has for its baptismal font the “celebration bowl.” This word reminds us of the joy that comes from believing in God. We are a reserved people. We don’t want to look stupid. We often keep our feelings hidden, whether they are joyous or sad. We don’t want to be like those holy rollers with their Amens and Hallelujahs, do we? I remember I used to sing, “If you’re happy and you know it then your smile will surely show it” and looking around and not seeing anyone smiling. We’re Lutherans.

So let’s see does anyone have anything to praise God about today? I invite you to share one thing with your neighbor that you have to praise God about. I’d say, don’t stop here. Share that with someone else you meet this week. You can leave all the religious stuff out of it and just say how thankful you are that this or that is the case.

Isaiah is praising God for many things. God has done amazing things, made wonderful plans and carried them out. God has been a refuge—has anyone here experienced God as a refuge or a safe place? God has fed the people—we experience that every time we share the Lord’s supper, but this supper is found in every meal we eat. Let’s remember that this morning at coffee hour. Sip that cup and taste the Lord’s plan, planting those beans, the hard work that goes into growing them, the harvest, the processing of them, getting the husks off, washing and soaking and drying them, the sorting them, the roasting them, the grinding of them and the shipping and stocking and brewing. And then that feeling of coffee in your mouth, God’s plan, the third Lutheran sacrament, the goodness, the holiness, something greater than its parts. And pay attention when you eat your lunch and dinner, the texture, the flavors, the ingredients and where they came from and what it took to gather them and get them in this form, who cooked it and where the energy came from to do so. There is so much to be thankful for, to pay attention to in God’s plan for feeding us with rich food and well-aged wine. God has a plan for the future, to swallow up death, to wipe away tears. God has done so much for us and still plans to do more—much more. We have so much to smile about. We have so much to be thankful for.

Paul also tells the people of Philippi to rejoice and in case they didn’t get it, he repeats it and tells them to do it always. None of us feels like doing it all the time, but Paul seems to be saying it is a state of being, a choice. You can’t always be happy. You can’t always get what you want, or so say the Rolling Stones and they would know. It is saying whatever your circumstance, focus on the positive. Focus on what is true, honorable, just, pure, commendable, excellent, and worthy of praise. There is always something to be grumpy about or feel guilty about. Don’t dwell there. Instead, turn your thoughts toward what is positive in any situation and focus on that and you will experience God’s peace.

Now this Gospel is really puzzling. I’d almost rather not even read the ending paragraph there where the poor guy gets thrown out of the wedding but if you start throwing things out of the Bible, it gets to be a slippery slope. It seems to go against the whole parable where Jesus says that everyone is welcome, the good and the bad. It seems petty to exclude someone because of what they’re wearing. Some scholars have suggested that Matthew embellished Jesus’ story a little bit because his community was uncomfortable about including absolutely everyone. This part of the story only appears in Matthew, so maybe that could be true. He might have misremembered part of the story to fit his community.

I’m thinking, though, that maybe this guy came to the party, but he wasn’t really partying. He wasn’t really celebrating or rejoicing. His heart wasn’t in it. He wasn’t fully dressed for the wedding. He wasn’t putting any effort into it. Many times you get out of something what you put into it. It seems those wedding garments were available to everyone who came to the party. It is like he wouldn’t wear a party hat or have cake or sit and eat with the others. At a party, you have to make an effort to enjoy yourself and get into the spirit and this guy just isn’t there and he’s spoiling it for everyone else. He was just going through the motions, making faces, and being a spoil sport. So he’s asked to leave.

I wonder if sometimes we encourage people to subdue their joy and check it at the door at church. Sometimes this doesn’t seem like that joyful of a place. Other times it does. I know it is a matter of balance, but I fear more that we don’t celebrate enough than that we do so too much. When visitors come, do they sense our joy and hope and get swept up in it on a regular basis? When we sing, do we feel like smiling? Do we come in our wedding robe, in full sequins and feathers and in our shiny shoes and sparkling eyes or do we sometimes hide our lamp under a bushel? I’m sure it is a little bit of each, probably more on the reserved side.

Let me tell you some things that I have found very joyful around here lately. Little Nicholas, Barry and Ellen’s grandson, helping to read the lessons brings a smile to all our faces. It gives me joy when Jessica and Cheyenn light the candles so respectfully at the altar. I leaped for joy when Doug’s email came this week that there was no trace of his cancer on the PET scan. I smiled at the sound of the tone chimes practicing the other night. I rejoiced when our visitors last week were shown the candle table and engaged in a conversation with several standing around there. I gave much thanks to God when our office helpers showed up and gave their help while Susan is on vacation. I rejoiced to see food piling up in the barrel and the girl scout troupe come to sort it. I give thanks that my uncle is staying with my dad over the coming week and that our family comes together to support each other. I give thanks for a beautiful day yesterday. I give thanks for my wiggly fetus and all the people getting ready to welcome this new person. I smiled inside when I saw each of you drive in this morning and come in to the church. There is so much to be thankful for, to smile about, to rejoice and praise God for if we just look. And if there is any place to let it all hang out and to let your smile really show it, this is the place, God’s house, and then take that bright smile out to show others the light of Christ.

St. Francis Day Sermon

October 2, 2011 Gospel: Matthew 21:33-46 Psalm 80:7-15
1st Reading: Isaiah 5:1-7 2nd Reading: Philippians 3:4b-14

In the past few years we’ve had a number of stray cats staying in our yard. I don’t know if this is part of the downturn in the economy that people are abandoning their pets because they can’t afford them or not spaying or neutering their animals because they can’t afford that, or just some co-incidence. Three strays have lived in our yard. I suppose they chose us because they know we’re suckers. They know cat people. They know how hard it is to say no. I hate to see an animal starving, so I’ve looked into what I can do about it. With the first cat, I called the Humane Society. At the time there was a 6 month waiting period for them to receive strays. I put a flier around the neighborhood and asked people of it was their cat. I could have taken “Stachey”—named for his mustache—to the pound, but the likelihood that a perfectly healthy, beautiful cat would be euthanized was too much to bear. And I took him to the vet to see if he had a microchip. He didn’t, but he panicked and I learned he was feral—had probably never been indoors before and too wild to sterilize. We gave him to someone who lived out in the woods and needed a barn cat, because he had killed a squirrel and several birds, but he instantly ran away and we don’t know what became of him. Now that we have two other strays in our yard, we are feeding one and our neighbor is feeding the other and I don’t really know what else to do.

Maybe it is because we know what it is like to be rejected that we latch on to these creatures who need us. Maybe we have soft hearts. Maybe we are suckers. Maybe we have compassion.

The Gospel reading for this morning says, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” God knows what it is like to be rejected. In the first reading, God puts in all this hard work constructing a vineyard. The rocks are cleared. The vines are planted. The watchtower is built. The wine vat is in place. The fence goes in. You can just imagine the vineyard owner’s anticipation. Every rock removed is a sign of the hope he has in the upcoming harvest. He believes that very sore muscle is going to be worth it. It takes a long time for grape vines to get established and mature enough to produce grapes. He has delayed gratification and put everything into this venture.

And it is all for nothing. The grapes are wild.

Think of God, preparing this earth, developing every tree, perfecting every river and brook, evening out the seasons, bringing night and day, setting the earth on its axis and spinning it, placing the stars in the sky, painting every sunset, providing snow melt every spring. All this will nourish us and help us thrive, and yet, here we are, wild grapes, not acting like God’s people at all—not producing what God was expecting.

And put it in the context of the Gospel, God sending prophets and teachers to help us understand what God wants for us and to help us out. And we kill those prophets. We don’t want to hear it. And God sends more people to show us a better way and we do the same with them. And God sends the Son and we don’t want anything to do with him. We kill him, too. God knows what it is like to be rejected—and mocked and spit on and tortured. We rejected him until he couldn’t be rejected anymore, because we had killed him.

Understandably, God is upset, just like we are when we get rejected. In the Gospel, the vineyard owner is really, really mad. The Kingdom of God is taken from those who reject God and kill God’s representatives. The cornerstone crushes those who don’t produce the fruit of the Kingdom.

In Paul’s letter to the people of Philippi, there is a different response. Instead, God makes us all his own. God doesn’t take the fact that we’ve rejected God and use it to reject us. Instead, God comes back to us again with compassion and understanding and adopts us again. That’s what any parent does with their kids. Parents teach their kids the best they can to make good decisions. Most children don’t do everything the way their parents taught them. That is part of becoming their own person. Parents may even feel rejected by their children. Yet parents continue to love their children and help them.

That’s the nice thing about our pets, it is very rare that they reject us. They can be so loyal. They might disobey us. They might destroy something important to us. They might get away and run around the neighborhood, but none of it is malicious. They are innocent. More often, we reject them. Every night I throw the cats out of our bedroom. I have lately been throwing the cat out of the crib. I have it covered with a sheet and yet she finds a way to climb on top of it and lay down in a warm, satisfying sleep! I put my cats out in the rain. I may not pet them for days. Yet, every morning when I get up, they trust me to feed them. As soon as I sit down at the computer in the evening, they are walking on the back of the chair or begging to get in my lap, which unfortunately for them is getting smaller and smaller. They are loyal and loving, like God.

The truth is, we have all been rejected and we’ve all done some rejecting. We’d like to think we’re not rejects—we’d like to think we’re somebody important. But we are quirky and vulnerable and weird and are afraid of being rejected.

The good news for this morning is that there is a place for rejects, with God. God, who knows what it is like to be rejected, accepts and loves all of us just as we are. That kind of acceptance, after all we’ve done against God, can help us be more compassionate toward those who have rejected us and those we once rejected.

We are the stray cat that is hanging out in God’s yard, abandoned by our friends, scruffy, hungry, pathetic. But God sees the potential there. When he tries to comfort us, we may scratch or bite. We might keep our distance. But when the food bowl is filled, we come running. Everyone, even a reject, could use a good meal and some love. So we are invited to the table from all our various corners, not to claw and scratch, but to be redeemed rejects with value and hope for a brighter future.

Discussion question for this week:
In what ways has God blessed you through your pets or through nature?

Sermon on the 10-year Anniversary of the 9-11 Attacks

September 11, 2011 Gospel: Matthew 18:21-35 Psalm 103:1-13
1st Reading: Genesis 50:15-21 2nd Reading: Romans 14:1-12

We come to this house of worship because we are incomplete. There is something necessary in our lives to help make us whole. We need each other. We need God. We need to mend our relationships. We need to learn from our mistakes and find a better way to live. We come here because, as it says in the letter to the Romans this morning, “We do not live to ourselves.” Sometimes we realize this when we make a mistake or have an argument with someone. Sometimes we realize it when we get sick or can’t do all the things we’ve done before on our own. And sometimes we realize it during a time of national disaster and mourning, such as on September 11, 2001.

That day affected us all in a different way, yet that day did affect us all. We were going about our usual business, self-sufficient in our own little worlds, living for ourselves, satisfying our own desires, oblivious to others in a lot of ways—to our neighbors down the street, and to our neighbors around the world and how we might be impacting them.

Suddenly there was no business as usual anymore. Our world changed that day. We realized there was some broken relationship that we weren’t aware of. Someone wanted to hurt us and we didn’t know why. We were suddenly alert to the person driving next to us, tears running down their faces, the crowd glued to the television screen in the hospital lobby, the person desperately trying to get through on the phone to New York. We were seeing the panic, the sadness, the anger in each other’s eyes. We were suddenly aware of each other and that we couldn’t and didn’t live unto ourselves, like we thought.

Joseph’s brothers thought they lived unto themselves. They didn’t think they’d ever see Joseph again after selling him into slavery and lying to their dad he’d been eaten by wild animals. They just wanted him out of the picture out of jealousy. They did whatever they want. Then the famine hit and they realized they don’t live unto themselves. They need others to get by in life. They needed the grain that Egypt could provide. And they realized even more that they don’t live unto themselves when they went to ask for help and who shows up to talk to them but their own brother they sold down the river years before. They actually needed him, the one they had sought to destroy. They suddenly realized that all things are interconnected. None of us is an island.

The servant of the king in this morning’s parable was living life unto himself. How else do you accumulate billions of dollars worth of debt? Suddenly the King comes to collect and the servant realizes that he needs the king’s mercy. He is responsible to someone else. So he begs for that mercy from the king, who forgives the debt and forgives him and releases him. He sees his interconnectedness with those who can do something for him, and is willing to accept their help and their relationship, yet he is willing to destroy the life of someone more vulnerable than he is, rather than show that same mercy and connectedness with another.

I did not pick the readings for this Sunday, but if I were going to pick them, I don’t know if I would be so bold as to pick these. To advocate forgiveness and mercy on September 11 is asking a lot. But I am not asking that. These texts were picked many years before September 11, 2001 came about and will be texts that are used on this particular Sunday every third year for many more to come. So you could say that the Holy Spirit had something to do with it.

God is the one telling us to forgive. Was God ever so wronged as we were on 9/11 that God could give us such a mandate? Did we ever owe God so great a debt as a billion dollars?

The truth is, we act as if we are entitled to everything God has let us borrow. We take it for granted that God will continue to lend it to us when we abuse it and damage it and hurt other people around us. We put ourselves in the place of God, saying we earned this or that privilege we have, acting as if we made it all by ourselves, and denying our relationship with God and each other. How often do we say, “My house,” “my car,” “my church,” “my yard,” “my children?” And we do think of them as our own, but they are really gifts from God that we get to borrow for a little while and care for.

Of course God is the one who should get the credit for every good thing we have—for every bite we eat, for the roof over our heads, for our family and friends and health and pets and clean water to drink and all our blessings. God didn’t have to give us all this. God certainly has reason to deny connection and relationship with us—we’ve screwed it up millions of times. We’ve turned our backs on God and God’s friends. We’ve wasted what God has given us and ruined it. We’ve taken it for granted and taken credit for us. And when God came to be among us and try out our life, we nailed God to the cross and killed him. So yes, God has been as wronged as we have and more and yes we owe God more than a billion dollars. And God has forgiven us all of it. Every last cent is erased from the record. It is an amazing sense of relief to know that it won’t be held against us. We’ve still got that relationship. We can still go to God and sit on God’s lap and receive that love and comfort and help God’s always given us.

So we have the choice of how to respond. I always say this about a time of grieving for a family and maybe it is the same for a congregation or a country, “It can bring out the best in people, or it can bring out the worst.” We have a choice to respond with anger and vengeance and retaliation. We can decide it happened because “They hate our freedom.” We can kill and destroy and try to make this world better through those means.

But God says that never works. When people came to kill his Son, Jesus, one of the disciples cut off the ear of one of the guards in the garden of Gethsemane. But Jesus stopped him. Jesus went without resistance. When we nailed him to the cross and left him to die and mocked him, he did not return violence for violence.
God teaches us the way of forgiveness, reconciliation, relationship. Forgiveness is a sticky subject. It doesn’t mean forgetting what happened. Instead it means remembering so that we can learn from it. It doesn’t mean simply pronouncing forgiveness without examining the situation. Jesus says, “Forgive your brother or sister from your heart.” That doesn’t just happen overnight.

Forgiveness is a process of learning from the other person, understanding what brought them to that point. It means claiming your own part in the situation—taking responsibility for the brokenness that occurred and for the healing that can occur with God’s help. It means moving forward in a different way than before, learning from this terrible tragedy what to do differently in the future.

Many of the results from September 11, 2001 have been anger and retaliation. Not only has our country become involved in several wars in which many innocent people have died and one could argue that the economy suffered greatly as a result of these wars, a mosque in our own state was bombed, Arab Americans have been singled out and threatened, kept from flying, and held without charges. We continue as a country and individuals to meet violence with violence.

I often wonder, what can I really do about it? I feel helpless at the same time that I feel responsible. Sometimes I wonder if it is up to me to do the forgiving or leave that up to others who lost loved ones or suffer from respiratory illnesses from the cleanup. In some ways, we aren’t capable of such forgiveness as Jesus commands. When we realize this is another way we fall short, may that turn us back to God to do the forgiving for us and soften our hearts toward one another.

Whether we can forgive all or part or none of these wrongs, there are ways we can become better informed about why these attacks happened. We can read about other perspectives. We can pay attention to news that is more than just sound bites of what we like to hear, but digs deeper to hear people’s stories. We can try to understand. We can sit down with an Arab American or invite a Muslim person to come to talk to our adult forum class as we have in the past. We can examine our purchases or our stock portfolios to see if we are supporting companies that support the war. And we can take actions of nonviolence in all areas of our lives, toward the earth and in our advocacy work and as we volunteer to empower people to have options other than violence.

This kind of tragedy can also bring out the best in us and in some ways it has done that, as well. On that day we found ways to reach out to those around us. Strangers who hadn’t been to church in ages, or maybe even ever, gathered in houses of worship to pray together. Many of us contacted our loved ones that day and told them how much we loved them. Maybe we don’t take so much for granted anymore—all the gifts we have from God, how much we owe God and those around us for their love and support. And if we can begin to see our neighbors around the world as family, too, and be in relationship with those we see as so different from us, we won’t be living unto ourselves but for each other, as God hopes we would do.

Although God did not cause the events of September 11, God can make something good out of it and build a world where we all understand our relationship to God and one another and are generous and loving toward all our brothers and sisters around the world.

Sermon for September 4, 2011

September 4, 2011 Gospel: Matthew 18:15-20 Psalm 119:33-40
1st Reading: Ezekiel 33:7-11 2nd Reading: Romans 13:8-14

“Wherever two or three are gathered…” has become a joke that we use to refer to dwindling church attendance, so how apt that it comes on Labor Day weekend. It has the feeling of resignation about it, because it has a piece of the truth, that church attendance isn’t what it was in the ‘50s or ‘70s. And it helps us to remember that God is still with us, so all is not lost. It is a good thing if we can laugh at ourselves, or else we might cry!

“Wherever two or three are gathered…” there is the potential for great love. There is opportunity to work together, to have companionship and understanding, to learn about yourself and the world, to give of yourself, to be in relationship, to listen and be listened to. The benefits of love go on and on. Love is the highest good, wanting the best for another person, looking beyond yourself and having compassion, putting the best spin on another’s actions. Love is the ultimate blessing. Love is an experience of God. We can experience God/love in our family relationships, in marriage, in domestic partnerships, at work, in our neighborhoods, in our volunteering, and in our church.

And “Wherever two or three are gathered…” there is the chance for arguments. That’s what the lessons are focused on today. There are a million things that can go wrong in a relationship that can lead us away from love.

The reading from Ezekiel doesn’t lay out what the house of Israel has done, but God is heartbroken and angry because they’ve broken their relationship with God. If you read the book of Ezekiel, you can see that Israel has worshipped other Gods and not followed God’s commandments. Israel has ignored the widows and orphans and not cared for the poor. God is letting Israel know that God is displeased, hoping that they will listen and change their ways. Of course they keep right on the same path, despite all warnings and eventually are taken as slaves into Babylon and the temple destroyed.

Paul writes the Roman Christians who argue and can’t agree on much of anything. He gives some examples of what happens when love breaks down: Adultery, murder, theft, envy, reveling and drunkenness, debauchery and licentiousness, quarreling and jealousy. “Why can’t we all just get along?!” Instead he tells them to put on the armor of light and to put on Jesus Christ—to put on love, compassion, justice and so on.

Now isn’t it too bad that we’ve now found a community of peace and we never disagree so we can’t use these words of Jesus anymore? Sometimes churches pretend to be places of peace when they aren’t or we pretend to agree with someone when we don’t. I’ve been guilty of it plenty of times before, too. It is a fine line between putting a good spin on something someone does or says and shoving it aside while still holding anger deep down inside that someday is going to need to get out.

Martin Luther reminded us to put a good spin on other people’s “bad” behavior. We say to ourselves, “They are just having a bad day,” or “They must be driving like that because they are trying to get to a hospital in a hurry,” or “They didn’t really mean that.” But thinking the best of others can become a game of make-believe that as time goes on and these encounters stack up, we may not be able to play so easily anymore. To love is not only to think the best of others, but to build relationship with that person, to go to them and apologize for unkind thoughts, to find out what is going on with them. It becomes easier to be kind and compassionate when we learn what people are really going through and share our feelings with them before they are bottled up so long that they start leaking out in gossip or passive aggressive behavior. There is another scripture that says “Live peaceably with all, so far as it depends on you” Romans 12:18. There are times when you try to make peace and build relationships with those you disagree with and they won’t participate. The way to love in that instance has to be to let them go and let it go, maybe until the timing is better or maybe forever.

Especially at church we tend to gloss over our differences and pretend that we all get along, but is that really love? We want people to like us. I want people to think that I am a nice pastor so they will come to me with their troubles and concerns and trust me to be there with them in their time of crisis. Don’t we want a nice Jesus to tell us what we want to hear, that we’re doing mostly ok and just keep up the good work? Wouldn’t we rather pretend to be at peace than deal with conflicts out in the open?

Sandy and I went to seminary together. I didn’t like Sandy very much. She was kind of a flirt. She was living together with a man about 20 years older than her and talked about her relationship openly. I thought she ought to be ashamed of herself. Seminarians are expected to live a certain life and she was not meeting the requirements and she didn’t think she was doing anything wrong, plus she flaunted it in front of everyone. Sandy and I ended up in the same year-long chaplaincy program. I pretended to be her friend. I fed her cat when she was out of town. We had lunch together. We supported each other. And yet I was still judging her. I was not being real with her. Chaplaincy is all about knowing yourself and being real with each other so at some point during the year, my supervisor encouraged me to tell Sandy what I thought of her behavior. It really hurt Sandy. And I then had to confront all the ways I am also a hypocrite and break the rules, just like her, because that was what my anger toward her was really all about. As hurt as she was, Sandy didn’t give up on me. We met for lunch once a week to work out our mess. We started sharing on a deeper level. We got real with one another. And now that is one of the relationships I treasure most in my life. We can share anything with each other after that.

In church, too, we can have fake relationships and gloss over our differences, put on a smile when someone hurts our feelings, hold our judgments deep inside hoping the other person will change. Or we can love. I think this is one of the major complaints that outsiders have about church—people aren’t real with each other. But it doesn’t have to be this way. We can engage each other and learn their point of view. We can look for our own responsibility within the situation. We can ask ourselves, “What am I doing to contribute to this problem and what can I do to be part of the solution.” We can take responsibility for our own feelings rather than believing that someone else made us feel that way. We go to someone and say, “You really puzzle me sometimes, I’d like to know you better. Would you like to have lunch?” We can go to someone and say we’re sorry or that there is something we don’t understand in their words or actions. If both people are willing to be adults about it, love can blossom that makes for deep friendships that can withstand anything.

As the body of Christ, our unity can’t be based on what we agree on, because we will always disagree and have different opinions. It has to be based on love, relationship, compassion, because that is the only thing that lasts. It has to based in love, because God is love and God must be the basis for everything we do as the body of Christ.

Many of you have set a good example for me. Here are some ideas I’ve noticed you trying for carrying this idea out. Some newer members have been inviting some longtime members over to their homes to build relationships. Some of you have invited neighbors over who are full of negativity and don’t have very many friends as a consequence to make friends with them and learn to love them. Some of you have thought of leaving this congregation because some things didn’t sit right with you, and instead you came and talked to me and helped me understand what you needed. Many of you have worked to make this place one that is comfortable for to worship, for instance purchasing new microphones or making artwork that has enhanced the worship space. Some of you have started sitting somewhere besides your usual spot during worship or coffee hour, even coming to the front row, in order to meet new people and build new relationships. You’ve stretched and challenged yourself to be on council or on committees here to learn more about each other and yourself and your church. Some of you have invited your friends and neighbors and family members to attend church or provide special music here. Some of you have reached out to someone you know was having a similar difficulty that you’ve faced before, for instance reaching out to someone who has an adult child with a mental illness or who is facing addiction.

You’re already doing this love work that Jesus invites us to do. You’re already reaping the rewards, feeling that satisfaction when you’ve made a real connection. I’d encourage you to keep up that good work until God’s love is obvious to all around us and we truly experience God with us.

Sermon for August 21, 2011

August 21, 2011 Gospel: Matthew 16:13-20 Psalm 138
1st Reading: Isaiah 51:1-6 2nd Reading: Romans 12:1-8

I promised to tell you about camp, and now that I have had a week to reflect, I might be able to start putting my experiences into words. I see some connections to the readings for today that I will try to explain. Let me start with a little disclaimer, that camp was an experience that is difficult to put into words, like many things in life.

The main connection with the texts and what I experienced at camp has to do with identity. There in the texts it is talking about who Jesus is, and who Peter is, and who we are—whether we are conformed or transformed. The readings explore who these individuals are and who we are in community and what it means to be the church.

Camp Odyssey was very much concerned with these issues too. We first built a safe place where we all trusted each other and learned to work together. We built community where we knew we could face tough challenges together and rely on each other, make mistakes and forgive ourselves and each other.

That was the first day when we had our challenge course. In our small groups we learned to problem-solve and work together using everyone’s gifts to reach a goal. For instance we were given 2-foot lengths of gutter and told to get a golf ball from point A to point B—a distance of about 20 feet. There were about 7 of us with pieces of gutter and we had to get it in a hat. The ball had to keep moving forward at all times. We problem- solved together. We learned to put our pieces of gutter at only slight tilts so the ball would roll slowly enough for the people at the front to get to the end and line up their gutter. We learned to point our gutters directly at the goal. We learned about communication and encouragement. We had a fabulous sense of accomplishment when we finished this exercise. And then we were given the extra challenge of having 2 of our group members blind folded. But we weren’t discouraged. We helped each other even more and met the challenge in even less time than the original assignment.

This community of King of Kings has built communication and trust and teamwork over the years. You didn’t have to do it all in one day like this group of teens. You’ve problem-solved and hit roadblocks and started all over again and encouraged and assisted and used everyone’s gifts. You have gone through your own challenge course, over the years, and become closer as a result and that will continue to go on. You’ll continue to face new challenges with hope as your mission statement affirmations suggest. On some of these challenges you will succeed and others fail, but you will know that you will be loved and included. It is really about the process of becoming together and learning who you are that matters rather than the end result about whether you met your end goal, whatever that is.

Jesus and the Disciples had a three-year challenge course. They worked together. They met challenges. They failed at challenges. They built confidence. They encouraged each other. They became a very close-knit community.

Once we built trust in community and confidence in ourselves, at camp, we moved on to learning about ourselves. We have to know who we are before we can begin to understand who another person is. You’ve probably seen this plenty of times and we’ve all done it—when we’re unsure of who we are, we might try to become someone we’re not. I remember when I was 12, getting a red ten-speed just like my friend Trinidy. She had one and I wanted one, too.

In the Gospel, Peter is learning who he is as reflected in the eyes of Jesus. Peter is becoming. He’s just tried to walk on the sea and fallen in and been called “you of little faith” by the person whose opinion he cares about the most, Jesus. Now, he gets it right and he’s being commended and told that he is actually a rock—that would make sense why he would sink. He is a rock—that would make sense why he is so dense and doesn’t get it. He is a rock—he is strong and faithful and Jesus will build something on this strong foundation. Peter is becoming. His identity isn’t so simple. He’s discovering who he is through experience and reflection and interaction.

At camp, too, we spent time reflecting on who we are as individuals and who we are as groups of people. We got into groups with those who were like us and tried to discern our own identity together. Being a woman, I got to ask with the other females, what does it mean to be a woman? Those of us who are white got together and asked ourselves, who am I as a privileged white person in this culture? Immigrants asked themselves what it means to be an immigrant in this country. It is a question none of the groups could answer for the other but we each had to answer for ourselves to know ourselves more fully.

We asked ourselves: Where do I come from? What are my communication styles? What assumptions do I hold about others and where do these come from? What makes me, me? What makes us, us?

The default answer to the question about who I am is just to give in to all the pressures and become conformed to this world. It might be easiest to make ourselves in the world’s image—to take on the priorities of the world, to believe the messages we hear that what is most important is to gather power, money, pleasure and focus on these. But even by the teenage years, most of us can see that this isn’t working. The campers could see how these pursuits were failing. They’d experienced divorce, alcoholism, violence. They’d seen the other side of power. They had all been personally hurt in someone else’s pursuit of power.

So what is the alternative to being conformed to this world? Paul says it is to be transformed and Jesus offers that transformation. Who among us can transform ourselves? It is only through interaction with others that transformation can take place. It is something that happens to us, not that we do to ourselves. But some of us seem more ready for transformation than others. How do we set ourselves up for transformation?

I saw all these campers, so honest about their pain, so open in their experiences, so trusting and eager for something different than the BS they were hearing from their families about who they should be and from the media saying who they should be and their school saying who they should be. They were so ready for transformation and they trusted us to take them through a process. At times they were angry at us. At times they almost gave up. We took them to the places they were most ashamed of and hurt by. And they stuck with it and faced how they had internalized all these messages from the world and put them on each other. Seeing that clearly, they were able to set them aside and really see each other as human beings, and allowed themselves to be seen as more than just a set of assumptions but as people, and they were truly transformed, and I was transformed, too.

Jesus too takes us the deepest darkest places within ourselves and asks us to look down deep—to see how we bind and loose one another with our assumptions and with our pressures of how others are supposed to be, how we keep each other down by not sharing what we have, by not seeing others as people, how not knowing who we are and who others are keeps us all imprisoned in sin. And Jesus goes to that darkest, scariest place within himself, where he feels abandoned by God and all his friends and where even his life is taken away, yet he still is. His identity stands in relationship—he is God’s Son, he is our savior, he is the Messiah of the world, he was there at the creation of the universe. Nothing could change that.

In the same way, nothing can change who we are at the core of our identity. Our friends might reject us. We might be losing our battle with a debilitating disease. Our child or parent or sibling might die. We might lose our home, go hungry, and be despised. Yet we are still of value to God. We are children of God. And this community as Christ’s body in the world is here to truly see each person as they really are and show each person that they are of value. The church is here to be a safe place for transformation and to encourage it in one another. At times the church may prevent transformation, which means it isn’t really being the body of Christ. At other times God works through the church to cause this transformation. It might be happening for one and not another, or we might be someplace on that journey of transformation and not even know it. Let us be open to God’s transforming love, being honest, looking deep within ourselves, learning who we are, and sharing of ourselves.

We didn’t talk much about God at camp. But those youth developed a love for one another based on truth-telling and trust-building and really seeing each other. They saw each other’s faults and weaknesses and continued to love each other and allow themselves to be loved. From what I know, God is love. I saw God/love reflected in that community at camp. I cried from the beauty of it. And I often see God/love reflected here, too, and am at times overwhelmed by it. Let’s offer that God/love even beyond our walls until those around us can see God/love clearly and be invited into their own journey of transformation until we can all be freed to become who we truly are.

Struggles of faith

July 31, 2011 Gospel: Matthew 6:25-34 2nd Reading: 1 Peter 2:1-10

For the last Sunday in my “Burning Questions/Stump the Pastor” sermon series, I’ll be addressing the question: “What do you struggle with? What do you really question either from scripture, tradition, etc?” On the one hand, it is nice to be asked this question—it shows someone is curious about what goes on in my head that I might not otherwise share. Also, it points out that you, too, struggle with scripture and tradition and parts of your faith and maybe it might be nice to know you’re not alone. I might tend to be a cheerleader of Christianity and Lutheranism—obviously I am a bit attached and biased. But yes I also struggle with it and in it, just as you do. So I’m glad to share about my struggles with my faith. On the other hand, I don’t want this to become a gripe-session. I love my job. I love my congregation. I love being a Lutheran Christian. I love this neighborhood. How could I serve, otherwise? But love isn’t blind, and I do struggle.

I have loved and struggled within Lutheranism my whole life—I was born a Lutheran and always considered myself one, even when I attended an Episcopal church for a few years and explored other denominations and faiths. I do feel that I choose to be a Lutheran Christian, even though in some ways it was decided for me when I was an infant. But many of my friends who were raised in the church didn’t decide to stay Lutheran or anything at all really, so it is a choice.

When I was a teenager, I read the Bible cover to cover. I struggled with understanding the Holy Spirit. There were years when I didn’t say the part of the creed about the Holy Spirit that goes, “with the Father and the Son, he is to be worshipped and glorified.” I couldn’t find it in the Bible and I didn’t understand the trinity very well. In time I learned not to take myself so seriously and to look at both scripture and tradition in my understanding of how the Holy Spirit fit into the picture of who God is and I found a few places in the Bible that seemed to say that we can worship the Holy Spirit.

I struggled with sexism in the Lutheran church—even though women could be ordained, they can’t find a call as easily as men. I remember there were only about 7 of us who graduated on time. The men had calls right out of the gate, even though in my humble opinion some of them wouldn’t be as good of pastors as some of the women and weren’t as mature. Some of those men didn’t have successful first calls although there is no telling if that was their own fault or not. The women all waited for calls. I waited three years for a call. Now I know that God had a purpose in that—to find me a good match in Oregon where we could be near family and afford to buy a home and where I would have a loving, healthy congregation to raise me up to be a good pastor and teach me what I need to know.

I have struggled with homophobia in the church. When I was 16 I went to Camp Odyssey, the one I am volunteering at this year so that others can have a similar experience. We tackled racism. We tackled sexism. I felt we could conquer the world with love and acceptance. And I sat down on that Thursday afternoon in 1991 and heard from people I had never had the chance to listen to before, a lesbian couple, describe their very ordinary lives together, doing laundry, supporting each other, loving each other, just like any other couple. And it blew my mind. And I read an article in the Lutheran magazine about churches in San Francisco where gay and lesbian pastors were serving. In my mind, we needed gay pastors so that gay people could have role models and pastors who understood their situation. And I got to the Bay Area and I realized that a gay or lesbian person could be a role model for any of us and who of us can say another person’s call isn’t from God to preach and preside? But it has taken the Lutheran church a long time to catch up and still this issue fragments us.

I’ve worked through a lot of my arguments with the Bible. I am not too fond of the passages about hell and eternal fire and gnashing of teeth. I know from word studies and research that descriptions of hell usually refer to the garbage pit outside the city of Jerusalem that burned day and night. Or it refers to the grave. It can be hard to reconcile the concept of a loving God with one who would torture us for all eternity. I don’t believe in that kind of hell. I believe hell is something we make for ourselves here on earth. I also believe that someday all those painful things and all our problems and shortcomings will be no more—I don’t know if they will be burned up in a fire, but that would be fine. I don’t like trying to scare people into believing and doing good.

And I struggle with the role of the pastor. Often I hear and get signals from some of you that my idea of what I do and your idea of what I’m supposed to do don’t always match up. I get the feeling you expect me to do a lot of things for you—that’s what you pay me for. I should lead the children’s message. I should lead the singing. I should organize and lead adult forum. I should lead the prayer at the meeting or meal, and so forth. But I see my job as teaching you all to do those things. You are the priesthood of all believers. You have gifts and talents. I get to help empower you to use your gifts. I get to try to work myself out of a job.

Someone said to me recently regarding my maternity leave and some community projects I’m involved in outside of King of Kings, “You should be careful how much you’re away, we may realize we don’t need you.” That’s exactly what I hope you do realize—it is my job to make you realize that! You can do most of this yourself. That is part of what Pastor Solveig was trying to teach you when she made all those red stoles for you. You are the church. You can do this yourselves. You have God’s help and everything you need, so don’t get discouraged. And this is why I am particularly excited to see what comes of my maternity leave, besides a little munchkin and motherhood for me. There is a very special gift here for you as well. This is your time to take on many of the tasks that are yours anyway. My job is to preach and preside at the sacraments. Everything else is on you. I get to teach you how to be that priesthood that you are and give you the confidence to do it and this is a very good excuse to do just that. And that is why I need you to sign up to make visits with me, so you can learn to do your job, which I will not be able to do for you while I am away. Please be sure to check the sign up sheet on the door to the social hall so I can start taking you on visits with me so you know what to do if I am gone for 6 weeks or one day.

I get frustrated when I hear or feel that our congregation is the only place you’ll go to worship—not Oak Hills when we have worship there, not on vacation when you’re away, not at Thanksgiving Eve, not at St. Stephen for Advent services, and so forth. I realize that some of that is a shyness and awkwardness about being in a new place. But I just know there are so many places to experience God’s loving presence, and when we go to a new place, we might see something a little differently than we did before and it may give us a more complete picture of who God is. Sometimes I wonder if after you die, the angels will be inviting you into heaven and you’ll refuse because it isn’t King of Kings.

And I am concerned that the whole Christian church in general and Lutheran church in America doesn’t adapt to our culture to be relevant for people today. There is a good chance there won’t be a job for me in 20 years. I don’t think the Lutheran church will die by then. But many congregations will close because of an inability to reflect God in a way that people today can understand and be touched. I don’t like the idea of Katy Perry-type music at church, so I can understand some of you don’t want guitar or percussion. But is church really about what you or I want, or should it be what a world in need really needs? I do have hope that we will become what we need to be to share the love of God with those who aren’t like us. And if we don’t we will die, and others will do it for us. Either way, the love of God will go on. I would hate to see myself standing in the way of others experiencing the love of God, though.

The Gospel reminds us that whatever bothers or worries us isn’t the end of the story. Worrying and fretting won’t add a single day to our lives. God is in charge. I have spent nights sleepless concerned I had offended one or more of you, going over words I said that maybe I shouldn’t, or analyzing something you said to try to understand where you’re coming from. But those nights have been relatively few. And I am learning to come to you instead of letting it eat away at me. I was concerned that the unknowns of pregnancy and motherhood would make me fret more. So far, though, I feel very calm about the future. I feel very hopeful. I see a bigger picture that is about the circle of life and family and each of us having a place in the universe and our church’s development and growth. Some things that might have worried me before pale in comparison to the bigger picture of God’s amazing grace and creativity.

I know you struggle, too, sometimes, and worry and wonder about your place in the church. I’m not going to say, “Don’t worry” because that doesn’t work. Instead, I’ll say, look at the wildflowers growing outside this window and see how we don’t do a single thing to make them so beautiful. Look at your beautiful family and give thanks. Look at all the blessings of health and food and community and living in this part of the world. And praise God because there is so much more to be thankful for than to gripe about!

What is truth?

July 24, 2011 Gospel: John 14:1-7 Psalm 15 2nd Reading: Ephesians 4:25-32

This week I have the question from one of you “What is truth?” This question came to me in the context of some family strife and an argument where some people had more information than others, and some were unwilling to look at the information right in front of their eyes. So this is a question that we deal with everyday and we deal with when we think of Biblical truth, as well. And those two things aren’t unrelated. So on this big topic of truth, I am going to pick a couple of themes to explore.

Truth. Reality. Facts. Christians have been arguing over this kind of thing for centuries and denominations have split off from others because of how they regard truth. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod have a main difference in how they regard the truth of the Bible. The Lutheran Church Missouri Synod believes the Bible is the inerrant word of God—that every word in the Bible actually happened and was written down the way God intended it and has no errors or discrepancies or misunderstandings.

Now if that describes your view, have no fear. You are welcome here. I imagine we each have a different understanding of the Bible. It is the official stances of our church bodies that see us as divided. Christ says there is no male or female, citizen or illegal immigrant, inerrant-believing or inspired word of God believing. We are one in the Lord. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America says officially that the Bible is the inspired word of God. That means that God inspired the words of the Bible in human hearts and we wrote it down. Sometimes we may misunderstand what God said and sometimes human ideas can get in the way a little from what God intended. Each writer comes from his own perspective and some of that influences what gets written in the Bible. However we as ELCA Lutherans don’t see that as interfering in any way with the truth of the Bible.

This congregation is rather advanced in their understanding of the Bible, so I don’t feel I have to tiptoe around you. We were told in seminary not to rip the rug out from anyone—not to tell you more than you could handle in understanding the Bible as literature and as a living document that is always changing based on advances in translation and who is reading it and the context it was written in. But you’ve had some good Christian Education in the past that has taught you to look critically at the Bible. Not that you criticize it or say it is wrong, but that you analyze it and try to understand when some of these things were written and why and how the Bible evolved over time to include the stories and books that it does.

When you read the book of Genesis, for example, and you see two creation stories side by side and they aren’t the same. How can we understand the truth of the Bible? Is one of the stories right or wrong? Or when you read that Jonah was swallowed by a whale and you know from science that he’s not going to survive and then later in the story you read that even the cattle put on sackcloth and mourned and repented. Do you go home and put sackcloth on your cat or dog? Or do you consider that maybe there is a greater meaning behind these stories than the absolute fact. Or when you read in the Old Testament that a “young woman shall conceive” and in the New Testament that prophecy gets translated that a “virgin shall conceive,” how do you decide if that is a necessity in your belief or it doesn’t matter to you? I think Mary would have been pretty embarrassed that the whole world discusses her virginity so often!

There are facts and there is truth. Writing hadn’t been invented when creation first began, so that story was passed from one person to another over the camp fires, and you know what happens when you start that game of telephone. Two stories emerged. We get both, because they both have a greater truth than their facts to tell us. They tell us that creation didn’t happen all at once. They tell us that we are charged with caring for creation. They tell us that there is more than one way at looking at creation—a good lesson for those of us who argue about evolution verses creationism. We get a lot more truths than just facts so we should dig deeper to understand what God is trying to tell us, instead of arguing over who is right.

And the story of Jonah and the whale—it may be telling us to watch out for large fish. And it might be telling us something deeper about running away from God and how it doesn’t get us anywhere, but how God gives us second chances and can turn a hopeless situation into one of joyful celebration.

And the story of Jesus born of a virgin. Maybe it is about the miracle of virgin birth or about purity or something. And maybe it is telling us that his birth was very special and different from most, so we should pay attention to this Messiah.

When you read the Bible, even if you’re a literalist and you are believing all the facts just as they are written, and that’s fine, also look a little deeper and try understand the full truth of what is being said. There are so many layers to this amazing book. There is so much to take in. You’ll always find something new there.

And there are layers of truth in the people we know and interact with every day. Sometimes they seem like liars. Sometimes they don’t have all the information. But also look deeper and try to see why they can’t face that truth just then. Try to see it from their perspective what is true and what isn’t. There are few things in life that are so clear cut as to have right and wrong answers. Usually the truth is somewhere in between.

In the Gospel Jesus says he is the way, the truth, and the life. Some have taken that to mean that you have to confess the exact name of Jesus to be accepted into heaven or God’s love. Even the angel Gabriel didn’t get Jesus’ name right. He called him Immanuel—God with us. So what does it mean that Jesus is the truthi Certainly he told the truth, no matter how unpopular. He was honest with people of importance that they were missing out on something big because of all the distractions in their lives. He was honest with the nobodies—telling them parables, stories with details that weren’t about anyone factual, but told a deeper truth, that didn’t insult their intelligence, but made them think. He was honest with the disciples that he would have to die and be raised. And he lived his life in an honest way, not bowing to pressures from those who were rich and not sugar-coating his message for anyone. He was truth, pure and simple, and many times truth is not pretty.

When I was looking for hymns to help me tell the story of truth, I was surprised how few of them I found in the hymnal. Maybe truth isn’t a big Lutheran focus. But I would say trust is. We want to know if we can trust God and how to trust God and how to live in trust in an imperfect community where sometimes people let us down or we let others down. Trust is a lifelong journey. Think of trust growing or getting broken down in a marriage. We are born with trust. We don’t have any choice. It was beautiful to see the trust of the little children at Bible School. I know I will have a helpless infant soon who will fully trust in me because it will have no other choice. I will do my best to keep that trust, but I will fail at times. And we get to relearn that trust when we get older or other times we can’t do things for ourselves. Usually, people around us are helpful. Sometimes they fail us. Do you know people who are centered and generous and hopeful, no matter the facts and details? There are some people who are calm and trusting even when it seems so much is going wrong. For others of us, everything can be going right, and we are waiting for the other shoe to drop, for it all to fall apart.

Trust is an attitude we can cultivate that isn’t based on the facts, but the deeper truths that God never fails us. Sometimes God makes a different choice than we’d make. And sometimes we have bad things happen to us that are a consequence of our own actions or the sin in our society and world. But that is the world we live in, not God that has let us down. God is love. God is everything that is faithful and true and good.

So how do you cultivate trust in God? Some similar ways to cultivating it in any relationship: Daily conversation and open communication, sharing meals together, devoting time to the relationship, learning about the other, working side by side, paying attention to what is important to the other, compromising, being honest. All these things are going to be helpful in a loving relationship of any kind whether it be with a partner or with our partner we refer to as God.

What is truth? For Christians, I would say our main truth, is that God created us good, came as Jesus to show us how to live, and lives among us in our neighbors and enemies alike, that God loves us and is the love we share with others, and is a force that unites us as one with each other and the whole universe. I suppose that’s my creed, if I were to write one. You might have more in your creed or less. But I respect your truth and I am your sister in this Christian family, this family of God’s cosmos.

Every Saint and Sinner

July 10, 2011 Gospel: Luke 23:32-43 1st Reading: Job 38:4-11
2nd Reading: 1 Timothy 1:12-17

For this week, I was asked to reflect on this quote from Oscar Wilde, “Every saint has a past and every sinner a future.” I always think it is important to find the context of any quote, so I searched everywhere to find out what other words surrounded these and whether it was a play or a poem or a letter or where this was written. That information is sadly missing. Instead I found out this is a questionable quote and that Oscar Wilde may likely have never said it. It may have been attributed him randomly.

But whether he said it or not, it is a popular quote today. You can find it on t-shirts, coffee mugs, and a lot of people quote it on Twitter, Facebook, or on their website. It makes you think. When I first read it I was really puzzled and had to let it percolate for a couple of days. I studied the scriptures for verses that might have something to do with it and read a little more about Oscar Wilde, hoping for a glimpse of what it might mean and how it might relate to us today.

The reading from Job is a good one for us to review. Job has lost everything at this point. He has been questioning God about why God is making his life so miserable and ranting against God and feeling sorry for himself. Many of us have been there. It seems like God is against us or at least not listening very well. We’re not sure if we can take one more setback. We’re overwhelmed. Maybe some of us were taught that you don’t talk to God this way. But I say, go ahead, Job did it. The Psalmists did it. It is Biblical. There is precedent. And being angry with God isn’t a sin. It is a true emotion we have inside of us. And it is especially healthy when we have it out with God. Just like newlyweds think they should pretend to get along and push aside their little peeves, but then it all bubbles up into a huge argument because they haven’t been honest with each other—if we hide our little arguments with God, they can build up until sometimes we give up on religion or get a divorce from God. The old hymn says, take it to the Lord in prayer. Job did it. We can do it. God can take it.

And God might come right back with a response like God has for Job, which is good for us to hear and remember. “Where were you when I was creating this amazing planet?” “Do you know my greater plan for all the universe?” We can tend to focus on our own little world and forget the bigger picture.

An example from my own family: Last year my grandma got a kitten and puppy at the same time, so they could grow up together and be best buddies. She was lonely after grandpa’s death and all her other pets had passed away. She had been looking forward to raising these 2 animals together. Last month, my cousin’s dog got into the house and killed the cat right there in her living room. She was devastated. I would be, too. And she cried for days. And she couldn’t sleep. She just felt terrible for herself and the cat and her ruined plans. The following week a cousin of mine miscarried at 7 months along. Suddenly the whole thing was put in perspective. She didn’t feel sorry for herself anymore. She was there supporting Abby whose grief was absolutely immeasurable.

Praying, even if it is railing against God, can open our minds to the bigger picture and put our own problems into perspective. What God points out to Job is that God is in charge and always has been and always will be. Which is part of what every saint has a past and every sinner a future means to me.

We all come from somewhere. In our society we talk about a “self-made man,” who “pulled himself up by his bootstraps,” as if they created themselves from the dust of the earth out of nothing and did every last thing for themselves. Of course this is a myth. We need other people to succeed. And we need this planet we live on, which we did not create, but God is lending us for a little while to care for and make good use of. Of course God made us in the first place and our family nurtured us—so none of us is self-made. We are a part of something greater and can’t really do anything on our own.

Every saint has a past partly refers to the good things that make for a saint, coming from somewhere outside that person, definitely from God and others God has placed in that person’s path. It also means that every saint may have negative things in their past, too, so don’t misdirect your worship toward saints instead of God because they are bound to disappoint you. Even Jesus’ family and friends in his hometown were reluctant to listen to him because they had known him as a child and couldn’t believe that God was working through him or that he could do miracles. That doubt left him powerless to help them so he had to move on.

The reading of Paul’s letter to Timothy for this morning refers to the kind of past that Paul had. Even the bad things of his past made him who he is when he is writing this letter. He came from somewhere. He’s not proud of the things he did. Paul refers to himself as the “chief sinner, a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence.” Yet there is enough forgiveness and love through Christ even for him. God was able to turn his life completely around and appointed him to service. This is good news for sinners, because we find that God forgives us and can work through us. This is good for saints, because when we find ourselves getting too proud of our own good deeds, we can remember all the times we failed and our life lived up until now and get humble again.

And of course we are both, aren’t we? We are sinners—every day we find ourselves separate from God and those around us. We have faults. We are broken, fallible creatures. And we are saints—Christ has redeemed us and made us his own. We are saved. God is working through us, even when our intentions and actions are all messed up. So we are both saints and sinners and we have both a past and a future.
Then we read the Gospel for today. Jesus on the cross, has on either side of him, two criminals also being crucified. And leave it to Jesus to take this opportunity as he is dying to include other people in his concern, and convicted criminals at that. One criminal acknowledges Jesus at the last minute. Even though that poor guy is dying there, he has a future. Jesus tells him, “Today you will be with me in paradise.” It is never too late to confess Jesus as our savior and to learn from him. Probabaly better to spend a whole life knowing about that grace and love. However if you don’t get to it until the end, that’s ok, too. And don’t we all at times get it and other times don’t? God’s love is revealed to us over a lifetime and in those times of crisis and suffering we may come to a deeper sense of the presence of God and hope for new life.

We can also remember from this quote to treat everyone with respect. We don’t know where they came from. We don’t know everything about a person’s past and what makes them act the way they do. It can help us treat them with grace when we find out. And we never know what kind of skills and talents someone might have that may shape our future together and build a stronger community. What an opportunity to ask someone you’re curious about of their life and faith and how they got to where they are now, whether you see them as a saint or a sinner or some combination of the two. That is one of the principles in organizing which we practice in the Metropolitan Alliance for the Common Good—to be curious and listen to build relationships between people, to understand where we have come from and what makes us tick and then to use that information to act in the future to make a better future for everyone.

So whether you are a saint or a sinner you have a past and a future. We all come from somewhere and are going somewhere. Use this quote to remind you to love one another and learn about one another’s past and to encourage you to look toward the future with hope. God loves you. God has always loved you. God will always love you. Go forth into that future in love and hope.

Gospel: Luke 24:13-35 Psalm 116:1-4, 12-19
1st Reading: Acts 2:14a, 36-41 2nd Reading: 1 Peter 1:17-23

The heart is a wondrous and mysterious organ. I bring it up because it is mentioned in all three readings this morning. Plus the fact that on Wednesday morning I got to see my fetus’ heart beating on the ultrasound. We could see all four heart ventricles and see them beating. The heartbeat was 130 beats per minute, which is in the normal range although it could be higher. I just take it as evidence that I will have a calm child. I would have been fascinated to see that kind of image on any kind of creature, but multiply that curiosity by ten because this creature is inside me with half my DNA and someone I’m going to be caring for in a few months.

When I was a chaplain in the hospital I had the most amazing opportunity to witness a bypass surgery. I’ve never seen anything so amazing in all my life. I don’t want to gross you all out, but to see them when they were ready, put the heart back in the chest cavity, and to watch it start beating again—it was truly a miracle. The life-saving surgery, itself, was a miracle. The fact that that tissue beat as a heart was a miracle. The way the blood carries oxygen to the cells and the carbon dioxide and other poisons away from them—I just can’t get over the miracle of the heart.
There is a lot more to the heart than just blood being pumped all over the body. When we get upset, our hearts race. When we are in love, our hearts leap—literally, I have felt it myself. We associate hearts with love, maybe because of that tight feeling in the chest that we feel. Our hearts send our bodies messages with different chemicals. Our hearts tell us things our minds can’t.

The first reading this morning talks about a crowd being cut to the heart. Something that Peter has said has touched them very deeply. It wasn’t a soft, comfortable feeling like a pat on the back. It was a jolt. It might have been a little painful. They were cut, not to the skin, not to the bone, but to the heart. Peter is telling them that Jesus is the Messiah. And they recognize some truth in what he’s saying. It isn’t easy information to take in. If Jesus is really is the Messiah, their lives are going to change. They thought they’d be following a strong Messiah and take up arms to fight the powers of oppression with him. They thought he would ascend the throne and tell them all exactly what to do. They thought when the Messiah came, they would be rich and well-fed and their enemies would be their slaves. But this isn’t the Messiah they got.

Instead of all the things they expected to be doing, they have to repent, turn around, change direction. Their minds have to change direction. Their hearts have to change direction. They have to be washed clean in baptism. They have to die with Christ. They have to be vulnerable to the powers like Christ. They have to give of themselves like Christ. What else could they do? Their hearts are being cut with a knife. They see clearly. Their hearts perceive the truth of Jesus’ way, of Jesus’ teaching. Now that they have heard Peter’s testimony, they can’t go back. Their hearts are going forward. The heart only pumps in one direction. Sometimes the heart doesn’t get all the blood pumping the right way and it gets stuck in a ventricle in a circular pattern and causes the heart to become enlarged. When the heart pumps the blood forward, the enriched blood goes out and nourishes the body. And the blood on its return picks up all the nasty stuff that needs to be removed. It is only forward with the blood and the heart and it is only forward with God’s people and God’s plan.

The second lesson talks both about the blood and the heart. It says we were ransomed by the precious blood of Christ. The blood in the Jewish faith, is the life. They understood without blood you can’t have life. That’s why they are so careful with blood. When they butcher an animal, they are careful to spill the blood in a certain way to cause the animal little to no suffering. Where blood is spilled, special handling instructions are found in the Old Testament. If you have someone with a hemorrhage, that person must be isolated. Women had to be purified after childbirth or menstruation. It was all considered very powerful and potentially dangerous. So now we’ve got this powerful blood of Jesus coming to our aid. And in Holy Communion we also drink that blood. It seems for one thing, the Christians wanted to differentiate themselves from Judaism. The early Christians said, “We’re not Jewish.” They asked some people to choose one religion or the other and this blood imagery and communion was one way to do that. They co-opted a symbol of danger and power to be avoided and turned it around to one with saving powers that you should come into contact with. It was Jesus being willing to pour out that blood, to die, that showed us how to die and rise to new life. And maybe some of this blood imagery was because early disciples of Christ did die in horrific ways for their faith. And this was another way to reassure them.

The second reference in the second lesson says, “Love one another deeply from the heart.” This has nothing to do with blood. This isn’t about our physical bodies. This is a love that cuts deeply. It isn’t just actions. It isn’t just feelings. It isn’t just going through the motions. It is forgiveness. It is sacrificial love. It is a deep connection of community. It isn’t based on what you can do for me. It is the kind of love that Christ has for us. And when you think of that kind of love, it makes it hard to keep hating your enemies.

This whole debate about how we should feel about Osama bin Laden’s death and whether we should celebrate or mourn more violence in our world. We are probably never going to love OBL as he’s now being called, and certainly not deeply from the heart. But can we acknowledge that God knew him when he was smaller than my fetus? Can we acknowledge that his mother and wife and children loved him? Can we picture him in God’s arms? Can we picture Jesus’ arms outstretched for him? I don’t know if there was any part of that man worth redeeming. But if there was then surely Jesus came even to redeem him. Maybe part of us is secretly or not so secretly celebrating, or relieved. And maybe there is part of us that is from God that is sad that it has to come to bloodshed and violence and wonders what further violence this could generate. Let’s pray for the soul of OBL and for his family and friends and for love instead of hatred in our world. That’s what it means to pray for your enemies.

And now to the gospel reading. The disciples on the road to Emmaus—their hearts are slow to believe. Hearts can believe! Hearts can hope. You can ponder things in your heart, like Mary did. Later these two realize their hearts had been burning while Jesus was talking to them. It wasn’t heartburn. It was that feeling when your heart knows something and you don’t. Your heart is trying to tell you something. “Pay attention!” Maybe it is part of what we call intuition.
By the time I am fully pregnant, my blood flow will have increased 50%. It might make me dizzy. I need to drink more water. I need to eat right and take more iron and vitamins. As that part of me increases, I can’t help but think about the growth that can’t be measured on the sonogram or by standing on a scale. How will that intuition part of me grow and how will I grow toward motherhood? It is a work of the heart that is apparently never finished as many of you have been showing me.

Our faith is never just a matter of the eyes because we believe what we haven’t seen. It isn’t just a matter of the brain, getting our mind around God’s love for us—it just can’t be done. It is a matter of the heart: God reaching our hearts with a word, a promise, a loving act. It is a matter of God challenging us and cutting to our hearts, softening our hearts in love toward one another, and filling our hearts until they are overflowing and until we love the world with the heart of God.