The Voyage of Discovery

Readings:
Isaiah 2:1-5
Romans 13:11-14
Matthew 24:36-44

As we begin the Advent journey, Pastor Johnson breathed life into The Word and its message for us today – that we live our lives, day to day, hoping for something to change ourselves. The change that Advent calls for is to see the world with new eyes, through glasses that appreciate each day as a pure and total gift, a blessing from God.

The challenge: Tomorrow, at the start of our day, we should seek to ask ourselves this question:

“Is this the day I’m going to do something different? Is this the day I’m going to accept Jesus as my role model for being an agent of change? Is this the day I will have a bold enough vision, a big enough dream to be a person of the light in a world of chatter, busyness, distractions and noise? Can I find a kind way to rattle someone’s cage of complacency or entitlement … and say how wonderful life is?”

Or will I buy into the news media’s constant barrage of concentrating on the things that divide us all, on confrontation, turmoil, strife, war, and a culture that tends to view modern life through lenses of individual accomplishments, the zero-sum game, and the rat race that the world can become … if we CHOOSE to view it that way.

From a sermon of the same name, Barack Obama once heard preached, he recalls in his book, The Audacity of Hope:

“Our culture fixates on where our values clash. Spend time actually talking to (people) and you discover (we are more alike than different). We are at an empathy deficit. Empathy calls us to take task. No one is exempt from the call to find common ground. Talk is cheap. Empathy must be acted upon. If we aren’t willing to pay a price for our common values, if we aren’t willing to make some sacrifices in order to realize them, then we should (collectively) ask ourselves whether we truly believe in them at all. (Our values) demand deeds and not just words. (In so doing), we are all shaken out of our complacency. We are forced beyond our limited vision.”

I have a quote framed in my office that I find myself looking at more and more, the older I get, not so much because it’s becoming any more the truth, and only because I am only now becoming more aware of that truth:

”The voyage of discovery requires not seeking new landscapes, but rather having new eyes.”

Professor Keating, the unconventional and counter-cultural professor who introduces his poetry students to the defunct Dead Poets’ Society has them stand on his desk to ‘view the room’. In so doing, he reminds them:

“Just when you think you understand something, you must view it from a different perspective.”

In Washington, DC, the police gathered handguns confiscated in the nation’s homicide capital. The artist Esther Augsburger welded the handguns together to re-create the image of a large plow blade, reminiscent of the scriptural text from Isaiah:

“…and they shall beat their swords into plowshares”

That image also brought back to mind my days in graduate school when I asked why the rather long, and complex computer programs we were to learn and run were called, respectively, Hickory and Isaiah. The first, Hickory, was used to study the behavior of wood germane to the Colorado region where the code was written. The latter was named by a fellow student, Tim Dewhurst, who wrote the code that simulated metal forming processes. My friend is today a professor at Cedarville University where he spends equal time enriching Christian lives as performing 3-dimensional analyses of complex metal forming operations.

Rather than slabs of metals in a processing plant, Tim saw a language that helped put in some technical perspective how to alter the view of one form to another. Like Esther, he saw the world with ‘new eyes’. Esther did not see guns, but a welded monument of hope.

Do we wear those kinds of glasses? Do we have that kind of hope … that seeing things differently will allow us to, through God’s grace, change the way others view the world?

If we do, Jesus and Pastor Johnson reminded us, the world will likely, on more than an occasion, see us as fools. Pastor Johnson posed an Advent question for us to consider:

“Are we courageous enough to be called a fool for the cause?”

We are promised that, if we do, Jesus will walk that road with us every step of the way, but we are asked to start today! Today, we are tasked to offer a word of kindness, of peace, a word of hopefulness where one is usually not found.

We are to see beginnings where others see only ends. We have to discover the Word by wearing new glasses, by adopting new eyes. The landscape’s what it’s been. We are tasked to view it from a different perspective.

But, first, to do that will require that we see today as a gift and ask:

“With whom will I share that gift? To whom will I give that gift back?”

There’s an old adage that goes

“The love in your heart wasn’t put there to stay. Love isn’t love … ‘til you give it away.”

Our gift of today is very much the same.

In Thornton Wilder’s play Our Town, Emily is allowed to return from the dead to experience, again, one day of her life. Mrs. Gibbs is somewhat insistent in declaring to Emily “Choose and unimportant day. Choose the least important day of your life. It will be important enough.”

Despite that advice, Emily returns on her 12th birthday to find her mother obsessing over seemingly insignificant details in the kitchen and her father otherwise overly preoccupied. She quickly realizes that humans are preoccupied with their petty occupations and small thoughts, and know little of true joy and happiness. Stimson reminds her afterward:

“Now you know what it was to be alive. To move about in a cloud of ignorance; to go up and down trampling on the feelings of those about you. To spend and waste time as though you had a million years. To be always at the mercy of one self-centered passion or another. Ignorance … and blindness!”

We don’t have time to even look at one another. We’re too busy getting from one place to the next to see what’s in between, to just enjoy or realize or BE in the moment. We’re too busy making Christmas plans to appreciate that there even IS a Christmas and come to peace with what a gift it really is.

But … WHEN we do it, when we slow down enough to get a glimpse of it – BOY, is life ever good.

Pastor Johnson and Barack Obama are reminding us and tasking us, as Jesus did, to take action today. For we do not know the day or the hour. And that day will most assuredly come, perhaps when we least expect it.

In the meantime, there are blessings to have, people to love, empathy to be acted upon, moments to be grateful for and appreciative of. We’re not talking about Christmas gifts or business meetings, or those things that seemingly can’t be placed in perspective enough for us to enjoy our daughter Emily’s 12th birthday.

We’re talking about our very souls.

So Pastor Johnson asks us to consider Jesus’ call:

“Is this the day I’m going to do something different? Is this the day I am going to have a vision, a dream big enough? Is this the day I will be a person of the light, forced beyond my limited vision?”

As Barack Obama ends his discourse on taking action:

“To do otherwise would be to relinquish our best selves.”

The Counter Cultural King

Readings:

Jeremiah 23:1-6
Colossians 1:11-20
Luke 23:33-43

Lay Preacher: Jan Veseth-Rogers


Jan began her sermon with notions of astronomy and America’s space program, of the necessarily tedious attention to detail that studying and exploring the cosmos require, the tough challenges that must be met and overcome. Of memories of Peggy Whitson, the first female in charge of the International Space Station.

Surmounting these challenges and reckoning with the cosmos often conjures images of Leonardo DiCaprio on the bow of the Titanic shouting, “I’m King o’ the world!!!”

Or Peggy Whitson exclaiming, “I’m queen o’ the world!”

Today, Jan reminds us, is the last day of the liturgical year, but it is eerily empty of any jubilation. Christ is soon to come, but as King cut of a different cloth. This King, Jan reminds us, is given vinegar to drink; he is taunted, scoffed, mocked and ridiculed. This is the one who will be crucified with a sign above his head proclaiming “This is the King of he Jews”.

But Jan is right to remind us also that Jesus never calls himself a King. When asked if he is King of the Jews, his response is “It is you who say that I am”.

This is not the kind of King people understand. He responds in ways they do nt expect. He surprises them with his words and deed ….

The Son of Man came to seek out the lost. He is here not for the well, but to aid the sick. He came to turn the world upside down. He came with an abundance of love and compassion for the sinful, the broken, the lost.

He came for us.

His was to be a counter cultural King who turned the rule book on its head.

In the topsy-turvy world that Jesus would come to show us, He used His power to stay on the cross rather than to save himself.

In so doing, Jan tells us we are tasked to

Follow the King who follows his call

Today we celebrate the topsy-turvy, the ‘it ain’t what it appears to be’.

In the final chapter of the Indiana Jones trilogy, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Indiana must pass through a labrynth by correctly choosing, at one point, the Holy Grail from among a collection of some 100 chalices and goblets. Many are encrusted in rare jewels, others ornately constructed from rare and valuable gold and silver. Indiana reaches beyond these, way to the back and, after hesitating with his fingers circling it, chooses a small and simple goblet, handcrafted from common and ordinary wood. As he tightly wraps his fingers around its stem, he says, “This … this is the cup of a carpenter.” The gatekeeper looks at Indiana, with a wisp of a smile, and tells him “You have chosen wisely.”

Let’s do the same. Let’s look with new eyes at the world this Advent, and see, among all the ornate and glittery showiness of this world, the simple cup of a carpenter; the quiet and ordinary way that God chose to have his Son enter the world. Let’s celebrate the counter cultural King.

Thanksgiving

Today may easily be the most awe inspiring day I have ever spent in Mt. Zion Lutheran Church since arriving here 7 years ago this November. The music, the liturgy, the testimonials and the sharing all spoke a similar message to me. That message is one of comfort from business as usual, a challenge and encouragement to think outside the box, an acceptance of things easily rejected elsewhere. We reveled in each other and our common home where we celebrate more how alike we are to one another than different from one another; where we breathe our individual gifts into ‘the mix’ and collectively harvest the rewards for God’s will to be done. We spoke honestly and courageously to eachother and told one another what we meant to one another and committed ourselves to continue being a living presence for one another. We guaranteed each other we would never be alone in a lonely world; we offered our continued collaboration with each other in a competitive world. We reaffirmed our vows to one another to continue to ‘contribute to the cost of the ride’ within our home and continue to serve beyond its walls in our community. We smiled, we hugged and we felt the overriding presence of a God who created us so individually unique and yet to coexist in peaceful harmony in community. We celebrated that community in a way I’ve never experienced before. I can say no more …. Except that there may be a website listing of the words chosen by us to describe all that we mean to one another. When that compilation is ready, you will find the link to those heartfelt feelings right here. I would encourage you to read them again and know that the very people who sit next to you in Church are family. We are family. And Mt. Zion is our blessed and sacred home away from home, the home to which we always seem to return .. again … and again.

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.”

Do It Anyway

Sermon for 21st Sunday after Pentecost 2007
Mt. Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church

2 Timothy 3:14-4:5

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have known the sacred writings that are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.

In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I solemnly urge you: proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is favorable or unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and encourage, with the utmost patience in teaching. For the time is coming when people will not put up with the sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths. As for you, always be sober, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, carry out your ministry fully.

Luke 18:1-8

Then Jesus told them a parable about the need to pray always and not to lose heart. He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my opponent’. For a while, he refused; but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming’.” And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them.

And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on Earth?”


The last class of my old professor’s life took place once a week in his home, by a window, where he could watch a small hibiscus plant shed its pink leaves. The class met on Tuesdays. The subject was the meaning of life. A funeral was held in lieu of graduation. The last class of my old professor’s life had only one student. I was the student.

The story is not mine. It belongs to Mitch Albom. The story, Tuesdays with Morrie, was told about his old professor, Morrie Schwartz, who had contracted ALS, Lou Gehrig’s disease, a brutal, unforgiving illness of the neurological system with no known cure.

Now what do Morrie Schwartz and the widow in the parable have in common?

Morrie Schwartz had sparkling blue-green eyes, thinning hair, graying eyebrows, big ears, a triangular nose, crooked teeth. In his graduation robes, he looks like a cross between a Biblical prophet and a Christmas elf.

His death sentence came in the summer of 1994. In the fall of that year, Morrie hobbled onto the Brandeis campus to teach his final college course. He could have skipped this course. The university would have understood. Why suffer in front of so many? Stay at home. Get your affairs in order. But the idea of quitting never occurred to Morrie.

Instead, Mitch’s old professor made a profound decision.

“Do I wither up and disappear, or do I make the best of my time left? He would not wither or be ashamed of dying. Instead he would make death his final project. Everyone was going to die, he said. Watch me. Learn with me. Morrie chose to walk the final bridge between life and death and he would narrate the trip.

He refused to be depressed.

Instead, he jotted down bite-sized philosophies about living. At one count, he had fifty of these “aphorisms” or proverbs.

Seek the answers to eternal questions about life and death, but be prepared not to find them. Enjoy the search anyway.
Be hopeful, but not foolishly hopeful.
Accept your doubts about your ability to achieve any change. But keep trying.
You might be surprised.

Despite his grave diagnosis, Morrie trudged on.

His trudging took a lot of energy …

“There are mornings when I cry and cry and mourn for myself,” he told Mitch. “I’m a big believer in the power of complaining! Some mornings I’m so angry and bitter. What did I do to deserve this? But I don’t let it last long. I cry my cry, then I get up and say, ‘I want to live …’. So far, I’ve been able to do it. Will I be able to continue? I don’t know. But I’m betting on myself that I will.”

Today’s text is seen by Biblical scholars as describing Jesus’ coming again at the end of the world. The parable centers on a widow, a woman of low status and few rights. She, if anyone, would be justified in thinking there was no hope for a person of her low status to expect someone in the position of a judge (who neither fears God nor has respect for man) to give her what she asks for. But, after some delay, he reluctantly relents and yields to the widow’s complaint.

The judge doesn’t “find religion”. He remains unjust. But the widow, in spite of his indifference, endures and perseveres. She asks again and again … anyway.

So what do Morrie and the widow have in common?

A conviction. A conviction of the heart.
… that Pastor Johnson spoke of 2 weeks back.

The texts from the last three weeks all complement one another. Morrie and the widow – they’re us! – frustrated at not having their prayers answered. But what is their response? They trudge on anyway. And they trudge on even though justice and a cure continue to elude them.

The text is clear about the delay between the widow’s request and the judge’s yield … the widow receives her request only after some delay! And in that delay, because we’re human, it is easy to give up hope & quit.

One of Morrie’s proverbs was

“You have to be strong enough to say ‘If the culture doesn’t work, don’t buy it, make your own.’”

Our world is all about impatience and expectation. We whine because our culture is one of instant gratification. We want it yesterday. Remember Jesus surrounded by whining disciples?

But, like Morrie, the widow believes with conviction anyway. She asks again anyway, repeatedly.

Through the story of the widow, God reminds us: we need patience to be persistent, we need trust to persevere.

The world will continue to send the water downstream against us, but God says “Swim upstream anyway”. Like the widow before the judge, we may feel insignificant before God, but God wants us to plead our case anyway because he’s NOT LIKE the judge!!!

He wants us to have faith …that belief in things unseen. The belief that, in due time, He will deliver the goods.

But one of the tough lessons in all of this is that in God’s playbook, time is measured differently. A big block of ice needs a long time exposed to heat to melt. Sometimes we need to hold things before the Lord for a long time before we see any tangible evidence of change. Luke was a physician. Perhaps more than most, he understood that healing takes time and constant care. In the Science of God, Gerald Schroeder explains that the theory of relativity tells us the faster you travel, the more your time frame is compressed. Under the conditions of the Big Bang, the age of the universe (roughly 16 billion years) collapses to nearly 6 24 hour days. What may be 6 days in Genesis to God can seem “like” 16 billion years to us!

God can act outside of the laws of nature, but often it appears He chooses not to.

Even when that delay seems like an eternity, God wants us to trudge on anyway. And just like the whining disciples, we are asked to continue on even when an answer to our prayer seems out of reach.

It is said that Mother Theresa handwrote a prayer that hung on her bedroom wall in Calcutta.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.
What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.
Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.

Some feel asking God for something more than once shows a lack of faith, but the text today tells us something quite different. Jesus reassures us that asking over and over with conviction is a sign of faith!

Someone once said that Jesus didn’t want his disciples to impress others. Rather, He wanted them to surprise others … with their belief.

Morrie’s prayers weren’t always answered as I imagine he would have liked. Some would have thought him foolish, but in Morrie’s culture, he chose to:

Be hopeful, but not foolishly hopeful.
Accept your doubts about your ability to achieve any change. But keep trying.
You might be surprised.

I think Jesus understood that the element of surprise that disciples engender in others CAN change lives … I can somehow see Jesus meeting Morrie in his wheelchair and getting a huge smile on his face, approaching Morrie and saying “I can use someone like you on my team. Surprise them, Morrie, with your trudging on, despite the diagnosis, and (and this is key) despite the fact that you were going to die anyway, the disease will eventually win the battle.

But Jesus died for us all and won the war …

While Morrie may seem foolish to some, his is the faith Jesus speaks of powerfully in the final line.

If Jesus were to come in that back door right now, would he find pews full of Morrie Schwartz’s? … ready to surprise the world with their persistence, even when the world will not provide them with what they ask for?

Jesus was & is the BEST example. He prayed and sweat blood in Gethsemane. And yet even He was not spared by His own Father. But, in HIS final walk on Calvary was a lesson still celebrated world-wide to this day.

We will celebrate it here today.

What do the widow and Morrie Schwartz and, yes, Eric Clapton have in common? They had to get up every day and shake the demons of disease, addiction, and injustice off their backs again – every day – and for the rest of their lives. With conviction, they went on anyway!

What Morrie and Eric and the widow have learned, as Pastor Johnson said, is – that THIS is not our best life. Our best life is yet to come. Where God will – finally – in his time - take away the disease, the addiction, the injustice.

The good news is … It’s not between us and the judge, us and the addiction, us and the bottle – it’s between us and God!

God is SO different from the judge.

Pastor Johnson let us in on a little secret two weeks ago. We ALL suffer. Some suffer openly like Morrie Schwartz. But others suffer quietly. Their suffering often goes unnoticed. And His message to the rest of us is:

Even though you don’t know what to say, be present anyway – even though you may feel helpless.

Tell the widower he’s not alone. God walks with him.
Tell that 8th grader that they DO fit in … where it matters.
Visit your old dying professor and let him know what he meant to you.

Every Morrie needs a Mitch.

Even if you don’t know what to say, go anyway.

Morrie got up every day and penned his proverbs. A fellow Brandeis professor was so taken by them, he took them to a reporter at the Boston Globe who published them where they were read by a producer for NightLine in Washington, DC. The next week, Ted Koppel’s limousine was in Morrie’s driveway. Mitch Albom saw the Nightline episode. A sudden & timely strike the Detroit Free Press, left him available to visit Morrie for the next fourteen Tuesdays and tell his story, transforming Mitch’s life in the process.

Every Mitch needs a Morrie.

None of us is weaker than the widow. Few of us are facing longer odds than Morrie.

Jesus wants to know, “When I return, will I find faith on Earth?”

This is the voice of a teacher … leaving the class … for some unspecified delay. And “when I return, is there any chance you will be doing what it is I taught you?”

Now I’m a teacher. I know the odds that upon my return they would have “gotten religion”. In fact, I tell my students every year that if I leave the room and, upon returning, they’ve managed to “learn the lesson”, I have an envelope in my pocket for them to open and read. Eight years and counting … and the envelope remains unopened. At graduation every year, someone asks, “What’s in the envelope?” But I won’t tell them.
But I’ll tell you. It says “Dial 9-1-1. I will have fainted!”

So I know the odds … they’re not stellar. But I’m a teacher … I hope anyway. I’m hopeful, but perhaps not foolishly hopeful. You see … the teacher WANTS their students to trust the message, to have faith in the message.

As the text in Timothy tells us, there will be others who seek teachers of their own desires to tell them myths … what they want to hear.

But Jesus IS the ultimate teacher! He wants to come back to the room and find everybody’s got it.

Now forgive my Hollywood moment here. I love these kinds of endings.

When the teacher comes back in this room ……

Wouldn’t it just be wonderful if there were Morrie Schwartz’s everywhere.

What if everywhere Jesus looked, he saw people living Mother Theresa’s prayer?

What if he walked down the block, into another church and found disciples, like the widow, praying anyway, asking anyway, again, and again ……

What if he left that church, walked into a Walgreens, then back out in the street and EVERYWHERE he went he saw people

Trudging on anyway … believing anyway .. praying anyway

If this is what the teacher finds when they come back in the room ….Wouldn’t that teacher just be … …

... ... surprised?

And I’ll let you in on a little secret, something you won’t see if the teacher’s shirt sleeves are down. They will get the biggest goose bumps this side of heaven.

And a smile will be tattooed on their face.

The last class of my old professor’s life took place once a week in his home, by a window, where he could watch a small hibiscus plant shed its pink leaves. The class met on Tuesdays. The subject was the meaning of life. It was taught from experience.

The teaching … goes on …

Whaddya say when we leave here today, let’s all go surprise that teacher …

… and make them smile.

Amen.

Not Cured … But Healed

Readings:
2 Kings 5:1-3, 7-15c
2 Timothy 2:8-15
Luke 17:11-19

I don’t know if anybody here today will be cured, but, as the sign out front says, … somebody today will be healed. Because, as the story of the thankful leper tells us, there is a critical difference between being cured and being healed. They figured ou thte first part of healing is … gratitude!

Our relationship with God is often ‘quid pro quo’: God, give me this or that … and I will believe in you.

So what do Eric Clapton and Syrian Genral Naumann have in common? The general is arrogant. He’s used to winning. He doesn’t much like the type of help he’s getting from God. But then, he humbles himself, and gives up control or the façade of control) … and … he ‘gets it’. And he ‘get’s it’ not because he is cured, but because he gave up the control that was God’s and he let God be God, let God be in charge and not himself.

Throughout England were once plastered graffiti on walls claiming:

“Clapton is God”

Like Naumann, for all his fortune and fame, he had a torrid affair, his son Connor died tragically, he was addicted to heroin and alcohol. He managed to shake the heroin but not the booze … which had become his good friend. Too good a friend.

After MANY attempts … NOT one … out of fear and humility, Clapton hit his knees and screamed “God, PLEASE take this away from me!” He learned from that moment … and every morning thereafter. He prays EVERY morning that he will not take a drink. Like Naumann, Clapton is not cured, but he has been healed.

Clapton realizes that when he woke up today, JUST woke up … THAT was a bonus. To expect anything more is a ruse. We aren’t owed that, but we have been given that great gift … of another day. As James Taylor soulfully sings the song Another Day:

Another day … another chance that we may finally find our way .. another day.

So no matter how threatening my illness or diagnosis is, it can threaten my body, but not my soul. I am on my way to being healed.

The single leper gets it … it’s NOT about the leprosy. It’s about the gratitude he shows. And Jesus says to that one leper – you are HEALED – which is a whole lot different than being cured.

Helen Keller put it very well:

Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten — a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that "w-a-t-e-r" meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand. That living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free! There were barriers still, it is true, but barriers that could in time be swept away.

We ALL have stuff that needs to be swept away, that needs healing! That much is real. Pastor Johnson reminded us, “I don’t know if you’ll be cured – I’ll pray you will – but I know you can be healed. You are not defined by your disease or your leprosy, your blindness or deafness. I know this. This IS the truth. And in that truth is the power to HEAL you!

The Truth Is … …

Readings:
Habakkuk 1:1-4;2:1-4
2 Timothy 1:1-14
Luke 17:5-10

“If you had the faith of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.”

And so the saying in the parable goes, but Pastor Johnson reflected this week that often it is not just a matter of faith alone. We lack patience more than faith sometimes.

We pray and hope ‘things will change’ and … nothing changes. The text from Habakkuk speaks to our frustration:

“ … justice never prevails. The wicked surround the righteous - … judgment comes forth perverted.”

Habakkuk is the patron saint of the frustrated. It’s just too easy to give up. On the way to Jerusalem, Jesus is surrounded by ‘whining disciples’. Even Timothy fears he is not made for preaching and Paul must reassure him. When Timothy feels he does not have the right words, Paul urges him to

Go Anyway!

Paul reminds Timothy, “You have the truth. Tell it – and everything else will take care of itself.” Too often we seek a life of comfort and prosperity. It’s what we’re taught in this world from an early age is our due … or at least our goal. But the Gospel today is not about prosperity, but about suffering. We are asked to understand that we suffer for Jesus.

Because the pint is:

THIS is NOT our best life. Our best life is yet to come.

We should all realize that our personal suffering is not pointless. There is not only suffering, but also hope. When nothing’s going right, you don’t have only that – you also have Jesus.

EVEN Jesus, in Gethsemane, prays to have the cup spared him, prays to not be asked to endure the most gruesome death, abandonment and betrayal. And he lives the message for today:

“What jam are you in that God is not in with you?”

Here’s a little secret. We ALL suffer … loud and quiet suffering.

The widower struggles to make it through the interminably lonely day without their soul mate of decades who is suddenly no longer by their side. Let them know God walks with them.

That teenager struggles to make the team, and be accepted by their peers. Tell them they fit in … where it matters.

Tell the hospice patient the truth – that in the last steps of their journey, God is there.

Say it with conviction! People will come back again and again, if you say it with conviction … conviction of the heart.

In a song called Conviction of the Heart, Kenny Loggins sings:

You've heard it hundreds of times
You say your aware, believe, and you care, but...
Do you care enough To talk with Conviction of the Heart?

There's a whole other life waiting to be lived when...
One day we're brave enough
To talk with Conviction of the Heart.

Where is your conviction of the heart?

We are Jesus to one another and we all have the truth … that it’s not about prosperity or avoiding suffering, but the truth that God NEVER leaves us to travel alone. Let’s spread that truth with conviction of the heart.

Lost and Found

Readings:
Exodus 32:7-14
1 Timothy 1:12-17
Luke 15:1-10

Only the lost can be found.

The Israelites, so soon after being liberated and en route to the Promised Land, are already lost, despondent, weary, panicked.

St. Paul, in his letter to Timothy, is a self-described blasphemer, persecutor, a man of violence. And, in all of this, he believes he is right. He is self-righteous in his belief.

The Israelites and Paul are as the one sheep lost in the fold of one hundred. They become lost. And Jesus comes to find them. He will stop at nothing to find them. For there is only one stoplight that never stops searching for the lost.

And we do not become lost in a moment.

It is a gradual process, often occurring outside of our complete notice. Until, our realization finally admits we are beyond familiar ground. We struggle to find hold, to get back to a safe place, but often our bearings are off kilter. But it is within us to decide to come back.

And, when we do, the Father of the Prodigal is waiting with open arms, waiting to welcome us with the fatted calf.

Lest we dare to judge others, Paul admits, we are all “foremost sinners”. Not a one of us is fit to be “holier than thou”. But we are all of us “findable”.

How? When does the saving moment come? Often, as Pastor Johnson recalls, in quiet moments of self-reflection. In the quiet moment, when we realize our sinful nature, we are found.

He points out that he learned on his sabbatical that 70% of those at Church services this past Sunday “almost didn’t come”. And of that 70%, 80% of them felt everyone else was living a life closer to God than themselves. So why did we come?

Because we need a healing that no physician or HMO can administer. We came because we have an anxiety. We came because were battered, because we’re unemployed, because we’re ill, we have special needs, we’re old. We came because we want to go to a place where “everybody knows your name”.

We came because … maybe … just maybe … we’ll find peace.

We venture home because we are welcome there, an old familiar face. And that place is not judgmental on the face of things. It is first, and foremost, welcoming, fervently waiting for and wanting our return.

We come because we need centering, grounding, direction. Pastor Johnson admitted

“Sometimes the Body of Christ is the ONLY compass I’ve got!”

And the Great News is that we will be found!

Receive the Compass of Christ … given for you.

It’s not a compass of judgment or smugness.

It is a compass of redemption, of acceptance and unconditional love.

It is the compass of 2nd, 3rd, and 4th chances, of as many chances as it takes … to get there.

We need that compass in the worst way. We are Paul, the foremost of sinners. We are, as Luther pronounced on his deathbed, “all beggars.”

The very Good News is that no matter who told you don’t belong, you do.

Here, you’re like everybody else.

Here, everybody knows your name.

Here you matter, you are special.

Here, you’re being looked for.

Here, the compass leads you back where the fatted calf and a party await your return.

Welcome home!

Rally Sunday

Today the Youth of Mt. Zion held their annual service in which they witness to their individual and collective experiences at Group Work Camp. This past summer, they traveled to Savannah, Georgia to help the underprivileged there "Renovate" their homes and everyone's lives. Their testimonials were telling and moving. The blog of the entire trip can be viewed at:

http://mtzionlutheranyouth.blogspot.com/

I Must Be in the Front Row

Sermon for Labor Day Sunday, September 2, 2007
Mt. Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church

Hebrews 13:1-8,15-16

Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing so, some have entertained angels unawares.

Luke 14:7-11

On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the Sabbath, they were watching him closely. When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: “When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor in case one more distinguished than you has been invited by your host; and the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this man your seat.’ Then, in disgrace, you will have to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place, so your host may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at the table with you. For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humbles themselves will be exalted.

Lay Preacher: Vince Prantil

“I Must Be in the Front Row …”
Bob Euker

I was very fortunate this past year to have been in the presence of an angel … unawares.

His name was Stewart Clark. I only met him two times. The first was at a classroom function in my daughter’s 1st grade classroom. Her teacher was Debbie Clark, Stew’s wife. Stew had attended the festivities.

The second time was at a fundraiser for our kids’ daycare. We were blessed that Deb and Stew joined us on that Friday evening in late March. As often happens when teachers get together, lots of stories got told. Stew mostly sat behind us, careful to allow the teachers their moments. When he did speak, it was to ask whomever he was with about them. My memories are only of a very quiet man.

On Monday next, Stew died very suddenly of a heart attack. That Saturday, Laurna and I attended the funeral. Only then, did I learn about the man who sat behind all of us on Friday evening.

Stew was the CEO of DigiCorp in Milwaukee. He played guitar at the Community United Methodist Church in Elm Grove where he was instrumental in creating their contemporary service. Testimonials by family, friends, and colleagues told the story of a caring brother, a successful businessman, a dynamic and Christian leader, a gifted musician, a wonderful father and husband, a humble servant. His stories were about a man who was content with his place in the grand scheme of things, and, without fanfare, seemed at peace with who God intended him to be.

In Rembrandt’s painting Night Watch, he chose to use whispers of yellow around the edges that naturally guide the eye to the center of the painting where brighter reds, blacks and whites illuminate a Captain and his Lieutenant. Stew’s funeral had me wondering … if we were colors used by the artist, would we, as humans, not seek to be in that place to which all are drawn? Or would we be content to be the subtle, oft not recognized yellows that, without credit or mention, play their part & point the way?

At the Youth Work Camp this summer, Mike Naumann approached Laurna and I one evening. He said he had been approached by a young girl on his work crew. She said, “Mr. Naumann. I know we don’t come here for the credit or for the mention … but it’s just good to know sometimes that it makes a difference.”

I was reminded in that moment:

As human beings, we have many needs, and often, these needs come in conflict with one another.

On the one end, we want to know that our being here, what we do and contribute makes a difference, that, on some level, we matter to the world. At the other end, we have a tugging on us to “do the right thing” … even if that means our good deeds goes seemingly unnoticed, not unlike Rembrandt’s yellow brushstrokes. Some will say that we can do BOTH. But often it is hard to do one well without sacrificing the other.



Rabbi Harold Kushner writes:

“Each human life is like 2 slightly blurred images rather than a single clear one. Much of our lives will be spent in this struggle (between two often conflicting needs) – to close the gap between the longing of the soul and the scolding of the conscience, between the assurance we need that we’re good and the satisfaction that we have mattered … In our quest for significance, we litter the world with our mistakes, more than we bless it with our accomplishments. Our souls are split ….”

We, as humans, live in the continuum between these two places. Jesus, maybe, is warning us to be watchful over our desire to matter, a desire that may lead us to become overly ambitious to make our mark on the world. He warns us that, in trying so hard to make a difference, we can lose our way. We are all in a constant struggle between accepting with humility God’s intended role for us and wanting to make our mark, even if that means we force fit another role onto ourselves.

Today’s text is sometimes referred to as the Parable of the Ambitious Guest.

I’m not so sure Jesus is saying anything at all about where you sit in Church or a daycare fundraiser, for that matter. He was talking about how we each come to understand our spiritual gifts in Christ. From the moment of our conception, God forms us for a high purpose. Perhaps if we are too ambitious with our own goals, we run the risk of not fulfilling that purpose.

The metaphor of “a back seat” is a good one … it illustrates the example of humility lived by Jesus, a humility I came to know only too late in the life of Stewart Clark.

Maurice Boyd, Minister of the 5th Avenue Presbyterian Church, New York once said of ambition:

“We must recognize in ambition just how ambiguous it is. We say of him ‘He’s sooo ambitious’ and of her ‘Problem is, she has no ambition’. Ambition can be a good thing … so we should praise it, but not over much. For in excess, it can become demonic. The dishonesty it can engender has a particular twist to it. Is it good to be ambitious? Well yes … and no. If we are ambitious, we need to be aware of it, to keep it in check and keep it consistent with our personal integrity, morality and dignity.”


God help you if there’s something you want so much, you’ll do anything to get it. It can drive you to do things that you really don’t want to do. In our conflict between knowing what is the right thing to do and wanting to matter, humans can and have exaggerated their virtues, compromised their values, forsaken their integrity, betrayed confidences, abandoned their morality, neglected family and rationalized it all away “for a cause that was deemed worthy”.

Political candidates compromise their values to raise money and gain votes. Salesmen exaggerate the virtues of their wares. Athletes pump performance enhancing drugs. Doctors, lawyers, and businessmen neglect their families in the pursuit of professional and financial success. We often will rationalize away such behavior by saying “that’s the way the world is” … “it’s what ya gotta do”. God must remind us to live a humble life that is based more in the Spirit and less in this Earthly world and its definition of success.

Stew Clark walked in what Thomas a Kempis called “a multitude of peace”. He had Earthly success, but he had no need for you to know what he’d accomplished, no need for “a front row seat”. If we are at peace with who we are, we will be content with a lower place, even the lowest place. If we take the lowest place, we’re only doing what Jesus did. Children of God don’t need to prove who they are to themselves or anyone else.

“The humble walk in a multitude of peace”, not the ruthlessly competitive. The trouble with being inordinately competitive is that eventually it is never enough to have enough. You want to have more than everybody else. And you never can. Carl Jung points out that “chapter one in a young person’s life is their setting out to conquer the world.” After some wisening up “chapter two is their realization that the world is not about to be conquered by the likes of them.” Lots of learning going on between Chapters 1 and 2.

In the movie “A Man for All Seasons”, Richard Rich was ambitious for power and to get it he lied. For his perjury, he was rewarded & made Attorney General of Wales. Sir Thomas Moore had earlier told him that he couldn’t handle power, and shouldn’t have it, but that he would make a fine teacher. But Richard didn’t want to teach.

He said “Even if I taught well no one would know it”.

Sir Thomas replied, “Richard, your students would know it; Richard, you would know it … and God would know it”. He thought that was a good audience.

Pastor Johnson has reminded us from this pulpit that God often chooses the humble to be his prophets. He picks them out of the back row where they lie in wait to be called forward to serve their high purpose with very special gifts. God will call us forth when the time is right for us to fulfill our high purpose. And he will not call you because you’re “better than someone else”. Our high purpose doesn’t make us higher than anyone else … …

Like all good parents, God loves his children uniquely, not equally.

Don’t your children vie for your attention, compete with one another to show you how good they can be? And, don’t you, as a parent know that they only have to be themselves to matter? Are there any of your children in “the front row” and others in the back?

Humility, then, requires the strength and wisdom to accept our unique roles in spite of our own desires. We will, in fact, matter MOST when we add to His magnificent tapestry in the way He guides us. And, despite a seemingly human need to matter that leads us to compete, we’re surrounded by more and more evidence that there is a real and true cooperative spirit to the universe.

A physics professor, Eric Mazur, at Harvard University wrote that there are three distinct parts to evolution: mutation, selection, and, only now we are beginning to realize … cooperation. And the patterns we observe in nature owe themselves to individual parts cooperating for the greater good of the whole. In Mazur’s computer model of cell growth, behavior of cancerous tumor cells results from a breakdown in cooperative behavior.

In the movie “A Beautiful Mind”, John Nash unfolds his Nobel Prize winning Nash Equilibrium in the halls (and bars) of Princeton, wherein he states that he and his cohorts, if they are to meet the blond, must do what is best for them individually AND for the group.

“Adam Smith”, he proclaims in a moment of epiphany, “ was wrong!”

So maybe competition alone … or to the extreme, is not the answer.

There is an old Indian saying that goes

“Western man struggles in climbing a mountain because he views the mountain as something to be conquered. He should, rather, become one with the mountain and allow the mountain to raise him up.”

Too often, we view ourselves as “outside of it all” rather than as part of something bigger.

Life is not a zero sum game, in the end. Jesus knew that. He believed we don’t win, ANY ONE of us, until we ALL win. He knows we each have a gift within us that is ours alone, a passion, a longing, a calling at which we were masterfully created to excel. But becoming overly ambitious to a calling that is not our own can undermine our true nature. So Jesus warns us.

“Undertow is extremely strong. Swim with caution.”

The warnings are direct, blunt, to the point, and attention-grabbing. Because the undertow, like ambition, is often more powerful than we are; it is easy to approach it unaware; and be overcome by it in the end. In so doing, the line one crosses is nebulous. It’s foggy, grey, not always clear. And, like the undertow, by the time we realize or admit we are in its strong grasp, it can be a very long and hard road back to a safe place. So a stern warning is not out of line. Think of your own children again. Sometimes it takes the direct message to gets their attention.

Jesus, I think, is only warning us of the dark side of becoming too ambitious.

He might be saying:

“Don’t jump the gun. Take a seat in the back. I have a plan for you. I’ll be calling you.”

“Do you want to matter? The good news is … you already do!”

You matter so much Jesus died for you. You matter so much because you are a child of God. There is no higher purpose than the one God created you for. Revelations reminds us “He has made us all kings and priests”. Just this morning, I turned to my son, Lorin, when he shared something with his sister. I said Lorin “You’re a prince”. He quickly replied, “No, Dad … I’m a King!”

As the Desiderata reminds us:

“If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time. Be yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, the universe is unfolding as it should.”

Humility is many things. One element is walking in that “multitude of peace” where you recognize you are a child of that Universe, a child of God and you already make a difference whether anybody knows it or not …

… but, in the end, only those you humbly serve may ever know it,

only those who share your gifts and passions may ever know it,

maybe only you will ever know it

but know this … God, who will choose you out of the back row, will know it.

And Stewart Clark reminded me … that’s still a mighty good audience.

Let it Go, Let it Go, Let it Go

Gospel Reading:
John 20:1-18

Lay Preacher: Robyn McGuire

What’s familiar is what I most want to
And it’s all I know to hang onto
And if we’ve no place to grow
Let it go, let it go, let it go

As Robyn McGuire reminded us this week, we do hang onto a lot of things. Because of our human nature, we tend to “get comfy” with our own individual forms of “the familiar”. We fluff them up, feed them, care for them, nurture them, and, yes, hold onto them. In part, we can allow them to define, at least in part, who we are. That’s not entirely a bad thing, but this week Jesus reminds us that we can hold on too much. He showed us that change is inevitable and we should, if not embrace it, be prepared for it and to accept it. Much transformation requires, first, letting go.

Robyn reminded us of all that we hold onto: our jobs, our pets, our relationships with friends and family, our comfort zone. She associated letting go of at least some of these with the process of grieving, that we grieve whenever we sever a part of ourselves from our being. And that grieving takes many forms unique to our individuality.

Robyn points out how “the questions” asked in the Gospel are thought provoking.

First, Jesus asks us all:

“What are you holding onto?” This question requires self-reflection for all of us to answer. Often our reflections reveal things we would not have imagined. When you examine all that you “hold onto”, you can appreciate, in that light of reflection, how much weight you are carrying by holding on. Is it good? Or only familiar?

The angel asks Mary, “Why are you weeping?” and “For whom are you looking?” When the familiar takes exit and we are face to face with change, sometimes our disorientation will leave us in a daze. We do a double take. As Mary did at the tomb when she realized Jesus was no longer there. When we look at things from a new perspective, it is important then to ask ourselves “What are you looking for?”

In the movie Dead Poets Society, Keating tells his students “Just when you think you know something, you must look at it from a different perspective!” He has them all line up and approach his desk and stand on top of it to SEE what the room looks like from “up there”. Just when you think you know something, approach it from a new light! What a message to hear in the throws of Pastor Johnsons sabbatical. Jesus implores us to not hold onto the familiar for its own sake. He says “Watch. I will make a new thing.”

Mary discovers at the tomb that things have been transformed, made new. The angel asks her why she is weeping. Weeping for change? Because her familiar Jesus is no longer? What growth does not involve some form of transformation? Some leaving of the old and stepping out into the new?

Pastor Johnson returned to Mt. Zion this week. He shared stories of his personal transformation. We witnessed a man embracing the new, self avowed (as described by Krista) that he was “not a looking back kinda guy”. But it might have taken some hindsight to help catalyze the transformation. I only yesterday was privileged to listen to Robyn’s sermon of late July. With it came the message of the journey of a caterpillar to chrysalis to pupa to magnificent butterfly.

She was right. The Easter story transcends Easter. It is a message for other times – even the quiet cool evenings of late July.

She summarized beautifully by quoting Pastor Johnson in a voice reminiscent of the angel at the tomb.

You will not find your old friend here. He has changed. He is , in many respects, not the person you knew before. He has gone on.

“I was called to Mt. Zion. Mt. Zion is my home. I’m glad to have Mt. Zion to come home to. I will return wiser, stronger, with a new fire in my belly. This is already clear. But I caution you – I will not be the same person – physically, mentally or spiritually. I’m not sure exactly what shape that will take, but it will be a spectre of a new person with new ideas and new passions.”

In a lot of ways, who we are owes itself in many ways to who we were. But we need to reflect how much of who we were we will continue to carry around and hold onto. A sabbatical is the time for that sort of reflection. When we recognize that the journey best embraces making a new thing, we can grow into that beautiful butterfly.

I can’t help but hear a collective voice … as we come to terms with the new person Pastor Johnson has become, as the tombstone has been turned away, as the cocoon breaks open, a cloud of witnesses happily says …

“Welcome home”

Don’t Shoot Me … I’m Just the Messenger

Readings:
Isaiah 66:10-14
Galations 6:1-16
Luke 10:1-11,16-20

Lay Preacher: Jan Veseth-Rogers

Today’s text from Luke brings home a message often at the heart of Jesus’ teaching:

It’s Not About Me!

In a theme that has been and will be revisited by others preaching this summer, Jesus’ words are sometimes hard to take, to hear, to “wrap our heads and hearts around”. Today is no exception.

Jan points out that Jesus, as He so often does, chooses His words deliberately. As is also often the case, those whose eyes remain on the prize often choose words that are direct, concise, blunt. Here we are called to evangelize, from the Greek “to proclaim”.

A calling with which we are often not comfortable, one we have to wrap our heads around, but often are not successful in doing. Jan points out several characteristics of evangelizers:

They are chosen (but they need to answer their call).

They are “sent out in pairs” because God is aware that human beings, in their nature, seek relationship. Jesus also knew it would too often be too hard to “go it alone” as disciples in His cause. These people take the form of mentors, friends and soulmates with whom we travel on our spiritual journeys.

Evangelizers are sent out ahead of Jesus, an advanced press corps, of sorts.

Jesus warns those sent ahead to be prepared for rejection. The overriding message is that “at the very heart of it, we are only ever messengers”. And it’s about the message, not about us! We will, most assuredly, encounter rejection, but Jesus is reminding us that it is His message that is being rejected.

Don’t take it personally, he offers. Keep at it! I’m right behind you.

Jan drew a picture of traveling as a young girl and knowing she could “travel light” as her parents would “take care of her every need”. Perhaps, she also offers, Jesus is telling us to trust that God will also be our spiritual parent. And to travel light in that knowledge.

The words Jesus chooses do not invoke us to “quit our jobs and become itinerant preachers and missionaries. We are not called to “have all the answers”. We cannot. We only have to ever know “who sent us”. We need to constantly remind ourselves “It’s not about us, but He who sent us”.

Rick Warren opens his book A Purpose Driven Life with those simple remindful words:

It’s Not About You!

Hearing these words, a sermon by Pastor Mohn was brought to mind. She drew the farming analogy quite well and likened us to sowers of seeds. And that we should remind ourselves that ours is not to always overly worry about the ground rejecting those seeds. We are called to plant His seeds.

God does the harvesting.

It’s Not About Us ……

Reaching for the Language of the Sacred

Readings:
1 Kings 19:15-16,19-21
Galations 5:1,13-25
Luke 9:51-62

Lay Preacher: Pam Shellberg

Today’s text from Luke brings what appear to be harsh words from an “otherwise” loving Jesus, a warning that hits at the heart. But Pam Shellberg takes those seemingly harsh words in which that warning is delivered, and unwraps what is perhaps an underlying message that brings the supposed and allegedly harsh tone into a broader context.

Jesus speaks very explicit words in Luke’s Gospel. His disciples vow they will “follow wherever you (Jesus) go” to which He replies, “The foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” Upon asking another to follow Him, Jesus has a man reply “First let me go and bury my father” to which Jesus replies ”Let the dead bury their own dead; but, as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” To another who asks to put his affairs in order first, He replies that “no one who puts a hand to the plow and los back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

Harsh words, indeed.

Pam Shellberg delivered a thought-provoking interpretation of the lesson underlying the words, I believe. As a very wise pastor once told me:

“There is ambiguity in this message, now isn’t there. And, if there is, it might just be that we were meant to ponder and examine that ambiguity.” That we might learn a message it was meant to convey.

In my heart, Pam did this most effectively today. And from several different vantage points, as I heard her words.

First, let’s examine the voice of God as Father: “If you take of yourself first, your family, your affairs first, you are not fit for the kingdom of God.” Translation? To be fit, you must perform in a certain way, to a certain standard. God as Father figure often speaks harsh words in a demanding tone. The words are not “Jesus loves me!” This perhaps would be the voice of God as Mother, but this is not the voice we hear today.

Second, the Samaritans do not receive Jesus. To be received, it is necessary for Him to fulfill his destiny, to die in Jerusalem. But neither do the Samaritans reject Jesus. They reject where He is heading – toward Jerusalem, his destiny. What does this mean?
Pam gives an eloquent metaphor for us to consider. Jesus is focused on Jerusalem, his Eye on the Prize. He does not forget His destiny, His mission, His predominant reason for being on this Earth, His role, His gift, His calling. Jerusalem is the metaphor for our role for the kingdom, our place in the tapestry.

It is human nature, at times, to forget this or even deny it. There is a good book written called The Imposter Phenomenon, addressing a psychological phenomenon well known, particularly to artists and those pursuing creative-minded occupations. Those gifted to be writers often settle for being text editors, artists settle for being salespersons of great art. They are close to their calling, but all suffer a single common flaw in obtaining their rightful place in the tapestry. They get almost uncomfortably close to their calling but resist embracing it. It may very well be human nature that drives us this way.

As Pam points out, we believe we can find God “in a little town, along the way”. As humans, we want “to stay home and have God come to us”. Perhaps, as she also deftly points out, Jesus is warning us it doesn’t work that way. Mohammed doesn’t want to go to the mountain, he wants the mountain to come to him! Perhaps when Jesus tells us “the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head”, he is saying “you will not be able to follow me comfortably to your home; to follow me, someone who has no place to lay His head, means you must be prepared to be homeless yourself, as was I”.

Pam describes the very personal circumstances of burying her own father: designing the butterflies on his funeral bulletin, penning thoughtful letters to his oncology doctors and others whose presence in those last days and weeks of a life, bring meaning and comfort to the terminally ill. She wrote to offer an awareness to those people that they were, indeed, the bearers of God’s presence in a life near death.
In the days following her father’s passing, she stood close to, in the mystery of death.

To one so thoughtful, faithful, and aware of the importance of living presence in the face of death and resurrection; aware of the commandment to “honor thy parents”, Jesus’ words, Pam admitted, were ones she ‘struggled to wrap her head around”. This must have been a feeling all too common in that sanctuary. I have not buried my father, but I felt the ambiguity and the struggle to find meaning in those seemingly harsh words. Perhaps, that is only human nature.

Pam then found a way to wrap those words around … a heart.

Jesus, she reminded us, was not, is not without compassion for the dying, for the survivors of those closest to those in death. Perhaps, as she points out, Jesus is only saying that it is possible for these events to become all-consuming to our human nature. In so devoting our God-given energies for these, we may take our “eyes off the prize”, “off our individual roads to Jerusalem” – our destinies, our places in the grand tapestry. In a book I have quoted often in this blog, Jesus CEO, one chapter is entitles “He Guarded His Energy”. In it, Laurie Beth Jones reminds us that Jesus knew his eyes could be taken off his destiny and he zealously guarded against any attempts to derail his purpose, even to the point of reminding His mother Mary why He had to be preaching in the temple.

Jesus is not anti-family. He recounts the parable of the Prodigal Son, he attends weddings, he revives the dead son of a widowed mother. But in the game of family vs. discipleship, He has a stern warning, words as harsh as his compassion is sincere in those other encounters.

Family commitments can put us on slippery slopes with obligation. This is, perhaps, because these are our most profoundly intimate and our deepest relationships on this Earth. In such relationships, Pam most beautifully reminds us we “reach for the language of the Sacred”. In birth, there is creation; in becoming parents, we are aware for perhaps the first time what it feels like to know you would sacrifice your life for another human being; we celebrate covenants and promises of infinite love; and in death, we embrace the language of honor and hope for the reunion in the Resurrection.

Our deepest expressions are in our families and our homes.

As with other good things, even the best things … all things still are best in moderation or dangerous in overt excess. Perhaps, the more meaningful these relationships are to us, the harder for us, as humans, to recognize when they may come to cloud our vision of the road to Jerusalem and our destinies for God’s plan.

Pam confessed that at key times in her life when she sought answers, she would ask “What would my father do?” She told us how he served as her moral compass. Jesus is reminding us to also remember that “What would my father do?” does not always equate to “What would Jesus do?” … however much we reach for the language of the Sacred.

So here’s the question …

Jesus is not looking for His family or His home town; he has his sights fixed on his destiny that is on the far horizon; He sets his face toward Jerusalem.

Perhaps seemingly harsh words are less than subtle reminders that we, too, are called to keep our eyes on the horizon, on our further purpose, higher purpose, our calling, or destiny. We are all called to keep our eyes on a personal Jerusalem and a personal cross.

Pam reassured us that there is a dearth of clear answers – one thing she is all too aware of as she attempts to complete her dissertation. I can assure Pam that that is a realization faced by those who complete their dissertation in fields as far flung as the physical sciences, as well, and all of us struggling to answer any questions with lasting meaning. All searches for truth go through the rough fields of ambiguity. She concluded her sermon these wisely chosen words:

“There is an assured dearth of clear answers … surely (those answers) have to do with something of which I am presently unaware.”

Those words left me with a lump in my throat. We are without clear answers, but, in light of that, we are called to keep our eyes on the collective horizon. There, God is calling us and we may need all our energies to hear that calling.

The Silence That Speaks

Readings:
1 Kings 17:17-24
Galationas 1:11-24
Luke 7:11-17

Lay Preacher: Jan Veseth-Rogers

Today’s text from Luke recounts the story of Jesus’ reviving a widow’s only son. Jan picks up on a very interesting notion in this text, one that, in so doing showcases the Jesus described therein. I believe Jan saw something in this text that took some “looking”.

What is of import in the telling of this story. Is it that the woman is a widow, that the dead man is her only son? Perhaps, as Jan points out, it is not a story only about a widow or only about a son. Perhaps these are devices to introduce us to a much bigger picture, characters used to showcase Jesus’ actions. Perhaps it is not the circumstances that are altogether crucial, but how Jesus reacts to them.

Case in point. Jan points out several very deliberate actions on the part of Jesus that might otherwise go unnoted. As he approaches the town of Nain, the dead man is being carried out, surrounded by a large crowd.

The widow is one of many in that crowd. The widow doesn’t speak … BUT Jesus knows which one is the mother!

How?

Even though she does not speak to him or identify herself, He knows who she is. He feels her pain; he knows the mourning of a woman, alone, the look of a woman mourning the death of her only son … a mourning his own mother will, in time, know only all too well. He speaks to her. Yet he does not have to have her pointed out. He recognizes the face of pain, of longing, of loss.

And though that loss, that longing, that pain have no voice, He “hears” it and feels it as if it were His own.

Jan very eloquently and quietly struck me in a particular way on the morning of June 10th. She struck me as, in some sense, an ideal messenger for this sermon. I felt very oddly and strongly that this sermon could be given most powerfully by … a mother. Her lips pursed, her face had well-defined structure as she delivered the key that unlocked a message hidden in this story.

Jesus is here for those with no voice, the ordinary, those with seemingly no hope. He hears into their hearts and knows their innermost need.

Jesus hears into the silence and the silence speaks … for those that have the ears to hear. Jesus does. He gives voice to the voiceless; He hears in the silence our needs, our longing, our empty void … and He comes to fill that void with hope.

Not all heartaches are not to be named in words – but some remain so … out of fear, sin, out of confusion. These all take our voice away at critical defining moments in our lives. But, in those moments, we are never alone. There are ears to hear through the confusion, the denial, the pain, the loss, the longing, into our heart of hearts.

Declarations of faith are NOT always demanding.

Sometimes they are quiet moments, unspoken moments, when our fallibility as humans leaves us without a voice. As a man, not a mother, I fear I would not have recognized this woman. But Jesus did. Jan could relate on a more intimate level. Through her eyes, I was able to see more clearly what Jesus might have been intending for us to hear … a woman with no voice … for whom our Lord felt compassion.

He hears into the silence … and the silence speaks.