We are the People of Hope

Readings:
Job 19:25-26
1 Corinthians 15:20
2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17
Luke 20:27-38

In 1982, the defense contractor Martin Marietta was the victim of an attempted hostile takeover by the Bendix Corpoation. Through some sophisticated maneuvering, Bendix had acquired a majority of Martin’s stock and set to take over the company. At the last minute … literally … Martin Marietta was saved by a very savvy lawyer. That lawyer identified that only in the state of Pennsylvania were the timelines for ownership of a corporation and corporate control of that entity distinct. A company owning a majority of the stock took ownership of the corporation at 12:00 midnight of the acquisition date, but held corporate control only at 12:01 a.m. of the same day. No, there’s no real Cinderella story here. No pumpkins and gowns at the ball. The savvy lawyer found out that in the state of Pennsylvania, and ONLY in the state of Pennsylvania, was this distinction a matter of legal precedent. At the stroke of midnight, Martin Marietta, having prepared the necessary documents for signing and covered tables with them, began signing contracts more madly than a first time home buyer with a locked-in, low fixed rate of 2.8%. By 12:00:58, it had sold off most of its corporate holdings and was buying out Bendix in the process in a sort of reverse hostile takeover. That lawyer presumably walked away with a sizable bonus for having found an obscure rule that turned the tables.

While that may have been astute (& profitable) in this world, it does miss the big picture. Jesus never did. In today’s lessons, he directs us to the Big Picture: that there is a heaven … and it ain’t nothin’ like this place. Here on Earth, and even in Pennsylvania, much separates us from one another: gender, age, race, financial wealth or status, politics, class, you name it. But none of this matters to God.

No matter what rules are held dearly to here on Earth, especially those that separate us from one another, there are no dividing lines in heaven.

The Thessalonians needed this message. Paul encounters them mired in the notion that they are stuck with their miserable lives and Jesus is nowhere to be seen.
His message to them is that we have a Savior who doesn’t worry about our rules, doesn’t buy in to ‘who gets in and who doesn’t’.

In the Gospel lesson, God looks out and sees what? … He sees only angels and children.

Pastor Johnson shared a theme in this week’s upcoming testimonials at Mt. Zion. In these witnessings, we, as a congregation, have shared that we feel safe at Mt. Zion. That’s huge!

Because the world out there is often not such a safe place. Our money isn’t safe, our houses aren’t always safe, our bank accounts aren’t safe … and beyond our boundaries, the truth isn’t safe, peace isn’t safe, the future isn’t safe. And so we worry. Always about the future and the sense that we are not safe ‘out there’. We can feel just like the Thessalonians …

… OR … we can look out and choose to see angels and children.

Because, as Pastor Johnson voiced:

We are the people of hope …

We are not abandoning hope, just because it’s easier to say ‘What’s the use? Where’s the hope?’ This IS the time for hope! We are tasked to have ‘tough hope’, hope in the face of forces that wear us down continually. A tough hope that speaks in the face of a cynicism that says ‘Where is your God now?’ Our God understands Thessalonia!
Jesus said ‘Yo, Thessalonia, you worry. I get that … but there’s nothing you can do about tomorrow. Stay in touch with today … while you have it. Look at the flowers and the birds. Concentrate on those simple beauties, and not your job and your worries. Listen to God and he’ll provide. You might not have more than anybody else, but you’ll have enough.

At the end of a study of the Book of Ecclesiastes, Rabbi Harold Kushner tells the story of the Jewish tradition of Sukkot:

Sukkot comes in the fall. Summer is over and sometimes the evenings are already chilly with the first whispers of winter. It comes to tell us that the world is full of good and beautiful things, food and wine, flowers and sunsets and autumn landscapes and good company to share them with, but that we have to enjoy them right away because they will not last. They will not wait for us to finish other things and get around to them. It is a time to (as the Book of Ecclesiastes says) “eat our bread in gladness and drink our wine with joy”, not despite the fact that life does not go on forever but precisely because of that fact. It is a time to … realize that we are at a time in our lives when enjoying today means more than worrying about tomorrow.

I was on my early morning ritual of a bike ride this morning when I was reminded of this passage, a reading we had read by a good friend in our wedding ceremony. My bike decided to eat and cough up my shoelace in 4 pieces. I stopped to reload and looked up and saw the street sign as the sun rose behind it. I was at the corner of Hope and Menomonee River Pkwy.

Recently I got to ride the big schooner Dennis Sullivan that docks in Lake Michigan. She was built by 9000 hours of pure volunteer work, all by hands of Milwaukee locals. When she was built, they needed three 100 foot long sturdy masts to hold the canvas sails. They approached the Menomonee Indian tribe in Northern Wisconsin who had amply straight white pine to do the deed, but they would not sell them to the project. The said the white pine was God’s gift to everyone and they could not sell them. But … they would donate them. And so they did. And they tower over the Dennis Sullivan today as she sails the Great Lakes and beyond, God’s gift to us all.

I was at the corner of Hope and God’s Gift to All. And they were one in the same.

Nothing separating us … save a broken shoelace that caused me to pause and see something I was supposed to see. Something that got me to stop worrying about a meeting I was to go to later that morning, and take notice of a bigger picture, if only for a short moment. But, in that moment, I was brought back into today.

God wants us not to be about ‘down with them and up with us’, We’re not here to blame, because we’re ALL to blame. We’re not here for hostile takeovers or to find out when midnight really comes. For Jesus came to give us a new rule, only one:

Love one another. By this others will know you are my disciples.

Do that and midnight won’t matter. Jesus knew what it meant to be lonely. He had no one stay awake with him at his gravest hour in Gethsemane. He had no wife, no children, an inner circle who fell asleep on him and then denied knowing him the very next day. He knew what it felt like to be abandoned.

And so God has shown Himself in his Son and given us our marching commandment. Love one another. Do not worry about tomorrow. Care today … for each other.

"Not," as the rabbi reminds us, “despite the fact that life does not go on forever, but precisely because of that fact”.

When the Saints Come Marchin’ In

Readings:
Daniel 7:1-3,15-18
Ephesians 1:11-23
Luke 6:20-31

Holy Week of 1997, I had been dating my wife-to-be for 9 months (she says 7 months) when her parents first visited and we shared a dinner of fresh West Coast salmon. I found a bone in the fillet and immediately thanked Saint Blaise. Perhaps needless to say (to Lutherans … but a surprise to me, a life-long Catholic), their eyebrows furrowed in a statement of ‘Saint Who?’.

I dutifully explained that every good Catholic school kid got his throat blessed prior to Lent each year with a blessing from Saint Blaise, the patron Saint of throat maladies, by having a pair of candles crossed about their neckline as the appropriate incantations were voiced. Not understanding that they thought the candles were necessarily lit, I was unaware why they found this absurd. I later explained, to nearly as quizzical faces, that the candles were, of course unlit. While it became surprisingly evident that everyone’s registry of best-known Saints did not include the obscure patron saint of throat maladies, what we agreed upon was that the lives of the Saints were often remarkable and outside of our purview to replicate in our own lives.

As Pastor Mohn points out, these were extremely pious individuals, extraordinary disciples, sometimes martyrs … who met excruciating circumstances and ‘came out the other side’. They are ‘other-worldly’ and share some ‘pure sense’ about life. We are not sure, any of us, where we rate in the balance. I loved when Pastor Mohn added, “I’m not even qualified to talk about it … and I’m the Pastor!” (but you CAN obtain your own personalized Saint certificate at www.sainthood.com for a mere $39.95, and for just $10 more, you can add your photo!)

She also reminded us of Martin Luther’s interpretation that Saints are people ‘close to God’ and those who spent eternity in God’s presence. As a people who look forward to a life after this life, we find meaning in the example and sacrifice of the Saints.

Pastor Mohn pointed out an interesting notion – that our Baptism is an unearned gift from God, and a covenant that makes the lives of the Saints possible. And this, in part, because of something else Martin Luther kept close by his soul side – that we are sinners ALL. Pastor Mohn points out that, as Lutherans we always have the tension of opposites. As sinners, we are broken and separated from God. We have a vague sense every morning that we should be more, do more, that we are not who God created us to be, we need to ‘get it together’. We are sinners and Saints both – holding the tension together.

What will become clearer in the coming weeks will be that Jesus tasked us to ‘be there’ for one another. What characterizes the Saints, at least in part, is a complete connection with others. The life of a Saint is very hard – it requires us to fight where the attention of the world says to focus. A Saint wakes up everyday and says:

I am addicted … to sin …, but I WILL try … again … to seek help today.

Pastor Mohn summarized her sermon with a notion of Saints as espousing the topsy-turvy nature of Jesus’ calling …

What the Saints know is that power does not come from strength, but rather from vulnerability, receiving comes through giving, life comes out of death.

In her book on Jesus brand of Omega leadership, Laurie Beth Jones illustrated that

“Jesus was always seeing things differently. Sometimes we can only see the underside of the tapestry, with all its nubs and knots and mismatched threads. Jesus could see both sides of the tapestry, and he came to tell us how it would turn out.”

Like Jesus, we are given the lives of the Saints to show us how things could be and should be and how one can work to make them reality.

The Real Reformation

Readings:
Jeremiah 31:31-34
Romans 3:19-28
John 8:31-36

Pastor Johnson started off his sermon with a smile, tapping his foot and saying

“Is that Kyrie I heard from a Lutheran Church?”

Kyrie eleison , on our world and on our way
Kyrie eleison, ev’ry day!!

Yes … that sweet sound of feet a tappin’. I love that my kids call a similar twist on the Halleluia,, The Caribbean Halleluia!

Halle, Halle, Halle … lu – u- ia
Halle, Halle, Halle … lu – u- ia
Halle, Halle, Halle … lu – u- ia

Halleluia, Hal – le - lu - ia

We are a church that changes. We change our music, our liturgy … our theology even … and especially. We are willing to change, we will change … until we find a way to include everyone. This is not your Dad’s Lutheran Church. It’s not just ‘for some’. Jesus knew we don’t win, ANY of us, until we all do.

When Jesus heard Paul as Rule Keeper, He responded “Why do you persecute me?” Paul finally, eventually gets the message that The Word is meant for everybody. There are no Gentiles or Jews; no men or women; no ‘in or ‘out’ …

… it’s what’s in our hearts that counts.

The Reformation that matters is in our own hearts.

Like the Little Prince once said,

“It is only with the heart that one can see rightly.”

In this Earthly world, there are some unfortunate ‘truths’ that inclusion in the club is a break game …

You’re male, not female … you get a break
You’re young, not old … you get a break
You’re thin, not obese … you get a break

Not so in The Word. We don’t believe in ‘measuring up’.

There’s no room in the House of God to honor some and not all.

We all need to share the word of ‘you’re in’. Out there, right now, is somebody who needs our forgiveness, our apology, our reformed heart.

Like a bully in the playground, the world is ALWAYS looking for someone to pick on. There’s no place in here for that.

If you’re a ‘rules person’, defined by your denomination, this is not a good day for you.

If you’re a person wondering, “Is it really true that my sin’s forgiven?” …
… you’re ‘in’ already. God knows how sorry you really are.

It’s time to embrace ‘the unburdening and free Spirit’ and take it into somebody’s life, somebody who really needs it.

We are tasked to take a reformed heart out into the world and let Jesus work through it to spread The Word that ‘we’re all in’.

No measurin’ up, no admission charge … and that’s the truth.

“ … and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”