7 WAYS TO BE THANKFUL

A Sermon for the Thanksgiving Eve

November 25, 2009

Pastor Laura Gentry

Luke 17:11-19

Here we are on the eve of Thanksgiving; the time of year designated to be thankful. We can gloss right over the giving thanks part and head straight for the turkey, or we can see this holiday as an opportunity to cultivate a renewed sense of gratitude in our hearts.

Like the Samaritan in tonight’s reading, we can recognize how completely dependent upon God we are. And like him, we can praise God in a loud voice and throw ourselves at God’s feet, recognizing that what we have is not our entitlement. It is a gift. All is gift.

It’s one thing to know this and it’s another to really live as grateful people. But it is important that we find a way to do so, for as the Roman philosopher Marcus Cicero said: "gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others." Elie Wiesel, an award-winning author who survived the Holocaust, said, “when a person doesn’t have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity. A person can almost be defined by his or her attitude toward gratitude.”

We are not fully alive if we are not fully grateful. So how can we get grateful? Perhaps you’re not the perky-cheery type—you don’t naturally see the cup as half full and so it’s more difficult to be appreciative. That’s okay because even YOU can learn. Like any other skill, gratitude can be learned. Thus, on Thanksgiving eve, I offer you 7 ways to be thankful. There are countless ways to be thankful, but these are my favorites.

1. Decide to be Thankful
Sounds so easy, doesn’t it? But our intention is very powerful. Just by deciding that you want to be thankful, you’re already well on your way. Better yet, put it in writing. Write: “I want to be thankful” and hang it up where you’ll see it often. This will help motivate you to develop your thankfulness.

2. Say Thanks
You probably already thank people when they do nice things for you but you may still be missing opportunities to say thank you. Whenever anyone does anything for you—big or small—jump at the chance to thank them. And do it with a smile. It makes them feel good and makes you feel good too.

Dan Baker, Ph.D., writes in What Happy People Know: "Just as changing your life can change your language, changing your language can change your life." Most people run themselves down a lot. Do you realize we have about 10,000 conversations with ourselves every day? So what we say to ourselves really matters. When we say thank you to ourselves instead of heaping up condemnation, we can change our lives for the better. Then it is even easier for us to speak thankfulness to others.

3. Start a Thanksgiving Journal
You’ve heard me push this point before but that’s because it really works. In research done by Robert Emmons and Michael McCullough, those who kept a daily journal expressing their thanks experienced higher levels of emotional and physical well-being.This research also proved that keeping such a journal can improve your health: raise energy levels, promote alertness and determination, improve sleep, and possibly relieve pain and fatigue. If there were a free pill available that promised all these things, you’d probably want to to take it, wouldn’t you? Then why not try this simple exercise? It is just a structured way to count your blessings.

Here’s how it works: Get a notebook. At the end of each day, reflect back upon the day’s events and write down five things for which you feel grateful. They can be anything big or small: a nice conversation with someone, an important task accomplished, the beautiful weather. It doesn’t matter what you write, just do it—every day. Five things and as you write them down, think about them and bring to mind the positive emotions associated with those things or events. It generally takes less than 5 minutes to do this and in just 30 days, you will have formed a new habit, thus cultivating a stronger sense of thankfulness.

4. Connect with Thankful People
People who achieve great things always have coaches pushing them to do their best. This same principle works with thankfulness. It’s all to easy to get grumpy, lose our gratefulness and fall into negative patterns when we are trying to go it alone. That’s why we gather together for worship as a congregation: we need to help one another. Find people who can help you see that things are a lot sunnier than they might seem. They are your thankfulness coaches and you are theirs. It’s exciting that you can provide mutual encouragement and urge each other to be your most thankful selves.

5. Write a thank you letter
A great exercise suggested by Dr. Emmons, known as "the father of gratitude," is to compose a thank you letter to a person who has made a positive and lasting influence in your life. Emmons says the letter is especially powerful when you have not properly thanked the person in the past, and when you read the letter aloud to the person face to face.

6. Pray
This quote is attributed to Meister Eckhart: "If the only prayer you say in your life is 'thank you,' that would suffice.” Thankfulness and prayer go hand in hand. Take time daily—perhaps even regularly throughout the day—to pray in thankgiving to God. You can throw up “bullet prayers” that are quick and to the point thanking God for things as they happen. You can also try doing a breath prayer in the quietness of your meditation time where you simply breathe in and out while saying “thank you” in your mind.

7. Give
An important way to cultivate thankfulness is to give out of our abundance to help others. This could be spending time helping people, sharing your talents and gifts as well as giving money to charitable causes. There is joy giving. As we heard in the reading from 2 Corinthians tonight, God loves a cheerful giver. Generosity opens our hearts and allows even more blessings to flow into our lives.


This Thanksgiving, I’m here to tell you, we cannot afford to miss being thankful. Our hearts need gratitude—it is good for what ails us. Jesus knew this, the Samaritan leper knew this, the Pilgrims knew this and scientists know this. The question is do we want to miss out like the nine lepers or do we want to praise God with a loud voice and know that joy of being thankful for the grace bestowed upon us? It is my prayer that these 7 ways to be more grateful will help put you on the thankfulness track so you can cultivate a deeper attitude of gratitude that will transform you and those around you—not just this Thanksgiving, but always. Amen.

And now, may the peace which passes all understanding keep our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

© 2009 Laura E. Gentry

COME ALIVE

A Sermon the 23rd Sunday after Pentecost

By Pastor Laura Gentry

Mark 12:38-44

In this morning’s Gospel story, Jesus is in the temple with his disciples when he notices a widow who does something interesting.  Though she remains unnamed, she becomes an object lesson of faith. And yet if we take time to notice her as Jesus did, we can learn something extraordinary from her.

In biblical times, you must remember, women could not own property or work for a living. Even if woman had a wealthy husband, she could not inherit his property upon his death.  An unmarried woman, widowed or otherwise, had to rely upon the charity of others. This is why Jesus often spoke about taking care of widows and orphans—these were the two most vulnerable groups of people in their society and so it would be unethical to ignore them. 

Mark doesn’t give us many details about this scene. All we know is that Jesus has been teaching in the temple courts. At this point, he and the disciples are on their way out. But then he stops by the treasury to watch as people make their offerings.  They didn’t pass the plate for offerings like we do today. Instead, people would line up in the outer courtyard of the temple. This was known as the Court of Women because, unlike the rest of the temple, women were allowed to be here. There were 13 trumpet-shaped receptacles along the wall of this courtyard, attended by a priest.  Each person was expected to say aloud the amount and purpose of their gift in order to be heard by the priest.

Can you imagine what an impressive sight this would have been? Most of the people lined up were wealthy. They would have been wearing fancy clothes and tossing in huge sums of money. How would you even notice a poor little widow in such a scene? Why would you care about a woman tossing the two smallest coins in the realm into the offering? Yet, in a move that is so like him, Jesus notices it and calls attention to her act of faith.

I remember reenacting this story in Sunday school class when I was a child. The teacher would let us take turns playing the part of the widow. She’s give us two pennies and we’d get to toss them into the church-shaped Sunday school bank.  It was all very exciting. It made an impression on me that the widows gift was so small: just 2 cents! And that was in the day when you could buy a candy bar for 25 cents. Still, 2 cents seems like nothing to me. Later, in seminary, I learned that the widow’s gift was even less than 2 cents. They were worth one four-hundredth of a shekel—about an eighth of a penny each. They were so small and worthless, they didn’t even bear an imprint like other coins. They were considered the grubbiest of coins in the empire of Rome.

Yet, as she tosses these coins into the treasury, Jesus calls his disciples together and says, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

Jesus has the knowledge that these are not just any two coins, they are the woman’s last two coins. The text says, “All she had to live on,” but the Greek is starker. It says she put in her “bios.” It’s the word from which we get “biology,” the study of life. Jesus, then, is saying that the widow put her “life” into the temple treasury that day.

This sermon is not a sermon about tithing. The woman did not give 10 percent of her income, she gave 100 percent. If this were a gamble, she would be placing all her bets on God. But it is not a gamble, it is something far more dangerous than that—it is called faith. Though she has no money to live on, she can confidently throw her life into God’s hands because she has faith.

In Mark’s typical style of simple storytelling, he doesn’t give us the details we’d like to hear. Does Jesus pus his arm around the woman has he is saying this to his disciples? Or does he teach from a distance so that the widow never even knows that Jesus noticed her?  Does Jesus give her money so she will be able to eat this evening? Does she become a follower of Jesus’? Is she one of the women who journey with Jesus from Galilee to the cross and beyond? And what was her name? We’ll never know.

What we do know is that in facing a bleak future, this widow holds nothing back: she offers her very life to God.

Now that we’ve noticed the widow’s faith, what does it have to teach us? The theologian Soren Kierkegaard, explained that God’s grace in Jesus Christ is entirely free, but it costs us everything because we must take the leap of faith.  We must trust God with our whole lives.  Being a disciple of Jesus is a serious endeavor—it is not for hobbyists. 

And I invite us to consider what this means for our congregation. This text is often used by preachers for a stewardship sermon. They urge parishioners to be more like the widow by putting more money into the plate. And while this is a good, scripturally supported point, I think Jesus is painting with even broader strokes in this teaching moment. He wants not just our loose change—he wants our very lives to change. He wants us living in God’s grace fully.

I recently read a quote by Howard Thurman, the influential American pastor, author and civil rights leader, and it really inspired me. He said: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world need is people who have come alive.”

What makes you come alive? It is all too easy to sleep walk through this life and find ourselves surprised when it is over. God has given us this life. All that we have is from our Creator. We are called to live it—I mean really live it. We must be alive. I think that’s what stewardship is all about. 

What makes this church come alive? God has blessed this congregation with 142 years of ministry. We have a particular responsibility to keep it going. In the midst of a national trend where churches are shrinking and closing their doors, we are still growing. How can we keep it up? How can we provide relevant, exciting ministry that makes you want to stay involved and makes you want to invite your neighbors to get involved too? Our church must be alive.

And when we ask ourselves how we can come alive and how our church can come alive, I think we need to look back at that widow for clues. She did not panic about what she didn’t have. Instead, she focused on what she did have: a God who could be trusted even when all evidence seemed to point to the contrary. She was able to summon the courage to give her “bios”—all that she had to live one, her whole life. What if you and I could do the same? What if we absolutely turned over the driving wheel of our lives to God? How would that change the way we live? How would that make us come alive and in doing so, inspire others to do the same?

Jesus invites us to come alive today. May we open our hearts to trust God so entirely that we may. Amen.

© 2009 Laura Gentry

ALL SAINTS DAY REMINDS US WE'RE ALL SAINTS

A Sermon All Saints Sunday
by Pastor Laura Gentry

On the October 17th show of the NPR news quiz show “Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me!” comedian Susie Essman played the game called “Not My Job” in which the contestant is asked three questions about a subject her or she knows nothing about. Since Susie plays a character on the HBO TV show “Curb Your Enthusiasm” who is anything but a saint, they thought it would be funny to ask her questions about famous saints. Indeed, she did, know nothing about them. Still, she managed to make enough educated guesses to win. Now because it is All Saint’s Day, I’m going to ask you those same questions and we’ll see how much you know. If you heard the show, you’ll have to restrain yourself and not give away the answer. (Answers are at the bottom of this blog post)

1. Saint Simeon Stylite of 5th Century Syria was so popular that he drew pilgrims from all over the world. What caused this stir?
a. He ate nothing but tree bark and yet lived.
b. He stood on a pillar outside for 37 years.
c. He could command worms to appear on the surface of the earth whenever he so desired.

2. Saint Joseph of Cupertino, a monk from the 17th Century in Italy. He became famous, too famous in the eyes of the church because he could do what? Was it...
a. Fly
b. Hold his breath for a whole day
c. Talk in the voice of Noah, King David and other Biblical characters

3. Saint Claire of Assisi, famous medieval nun who is known for her good works and her vow of povery. She has a particular role in today’s church, what is it and why did she get it?
a. Because of her famously rapid walks around the monastery, she is the patron saint of NASCAR and other automobile races.
b. Because of regular visions she had on the wall of her room, she is the patron saint of television.
c. As she regularly spoke in tongues she is the patron saint of translators.

When you hear stories about saints like this who could stay on a pillar for years to pray, fly in religious ecstasy and see visions on the wall, it makes us of think of them as being people who are otherworldly, super-hero types. They seem unattainably perfect in the stories we now hear.

For about a thousand years, Jesus and the saints have been portrayed in art with a halo around their head. This is to represent holiness. Christian artists believed that the halo was symbolic of the light of grace bestowed by God. It comes out in an orb around the head like the holy energy of the saintly one. Sometimes, children get confused by this and ask why the people have golden plates stuck on the backs of their heads.

So between the incredible, hard-to-believe stories and the idealized imagery of the saints in art, I don’t think most people associate themselves with saints. Around here we often hear people refer to a scoundrel by saying, “He’s no saint!”

All of these things, I think, contribute to the thinking that saintliness is something earned. We become saints by our exemplary behavior, by our bold faith and our ceaseless obedience to God’s commands, right? Nope. The Bible say we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God. We can kinda be good but no matter how we hard try, we cannot make ourselves saints.

Does that mean the game is up? Should we throw in the towel and head home because there is no way we are going to attain the status of sainthood? By no means! The good news that we celebrate today is that saint-making is God’s work, not our own.

It all begins in the waters of baptism. Together, the water and God’s word claim us. We are born children of a fallen humanity but in the waters of baptism we are reborn children of God and heirs of eternal life. That’s exciting news because it means that day after day, God gives us grace of righteousness regardless of our worthiness. Martin Luther called this “alien righteousness” because it comes from something outside of ourselves—it is alien. It is certainly not our own righteousness, it is the righteousness that comes from Christ. Paul wrote in II Cor. 1:3; “Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.”

Through faith in Christ, therefore, Christ’s righteousness becomes OUR righteousness and all that he has becomes ours—yes, Jesus himself becomes ours. And so his saintliness is our saintliness. This alien righteousness is a gift of grace.

This is not the only type of righteousness, however. Luther called the second kind righteousness our “proper righteousness.” By this, he meant that the alien righteousness given to us by Christ doesn’t just sit there. It has power to change us—to bear fruit. And as we read in Galatians 5:22, the fruit of the Spirit is “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.” This righteousness enables us, by the power of God, to be transformed into the likeness of Christ. We may never fly like Joseph of Cupertino or get visions on the wall like Claire, and I don't even recommend you try to sit on a pillar for 37 years like Simeon, but we can still become Christ-like. It doesn’t happen all at once, but bit by bit throughout our lives and is finally perfected at the end through death. Yet all the while, we are children of God, and therefore saints. I’m a saint and you’re a saint!

And since there are no halos above your heads like in the paintings, I am going to give you the opportunity to see yourself as the saints you really are, by virtue of your baptism. That’s why I’ve made this “be a saint” painting. Let me show you how it works (puts face through saint painting). Don’t I look saintly?

Now as we sing the hymn of the day, I’ll need some volunteers from our studio audience to come forward and show us their saintliness. And for those of you not brave enough to come now, don’t worry, I will get you later. My plan is to photograph every single one of us in this. After all, it’s All Saints Sunday and we’ve got to celebrate that we are all saints! And in doing so, we celebrate our Savior who has made us his own and infuses us with his righteousness so that we are transformed into the saints God wants us to be. Amen.

See the slideshow of these saints:

Answers to the NPR quiz: 

1. Saint Simeon Stylite of 5th Century Syria was so popular that he drew pilgrims from all over the world. What caused this stir?
b. He stood on a pillar outside for 37 years.

2. Saint Joseph of Cupertino, a monk from the 17th Century in Italy. He became famous, too famous in the eyes of the church because he could do what? Was it...
a. Fly

3. Saint Claire of Assisi, famous medieval nun who is known for her good works and her vow of povery. She has a particular role in today’s church, what is it and why did she get it?
b. Because of regular visions she had on the wall of her room, she is the patron saint of television.

TRUE GREATNESS

A Sermon for 20th Sunday after Pentecost
By Pastor Laura Gentry

Mark 10:35-45

There they stand before Christ, the two sons of Zebedee, James and John—the same ones who had zestfully thrown down their nets and left their father to answer the call of Jesus. They are devout followers of Jesus. No one would question that. And in this scene from today’s Gospel lesson, they place an important request before him: “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” This is such an audacious request that in Matthew’s Gospel, this question is attributed to their Jewish mother, as if Matthew is too embarrassed to admit that Jesus’ own disciples would make this bold request themselves. It had to have been their mom (mothers say those kind of obnoxious things, you know). But the way Mark tells it, James and John, themselves, ask Jesus for glory.

Of course, they are still under the expectation that Jesus is going to be a great military leader who will lead the Israelites to political victory, and they are eager to be a part of this glory. I imagine Jesus just shaking his head in disbelief that these two still don’t get it. He’s just explained to them the painful torture and death about to befall him, and these two knuckleheads are still talking about a military takeover. They’ve missed the point entirely. The frustrated Jesus looks at these misguided disciples and replies, “You do not know what you are asking! Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”

These seem like random questions for Jesus to ask. And this is because the references he lays out here would make a whole lot more sense to his ancient audience than to us. So let’s look at each of them for clarification.

His first question is: “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink?” In biblical times, it was the custom for kings to hand their banquet guests a cup of something—and the guests would simply accept what was handed to them. Today when you attend a party, you are usually given a choice as to what kind of beverage you want. But that was not the case for the ancients. As the guest, you were expected to happily accept and drink whatever you were given.

Jesus uses this concept as a metaphor for life. God is like the king and you are the guest. You don’t get to choose your lot in life, that is given to you by God. So in this context, Jesus is using “cup” to mean your set of circumstances. In his prayer on the Mount of Olives, Jesus himself pleads with God for his cup to be taken away from him. This cup for Jesus includes his death on the cross. Of course, he would like for this cup to be taken away, yet he knows that he must endure this for the sake of the world.

So Jesus is asking James and John: Do you REALLY want to take on the mission I’ve been given? Can you follow me even though that means following me all the way to the cross?

And then he asks them: “Are you able to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” The Greek word used here refers to being dipped in or submerged. It is likely that Jesus is not describing the sacrament of Holy Baptism here, as we might suppose, but simply asking: are you willing to be submerged in the experience in which I am submerged? And just what was that submersion? Well, Christ left the riches of heaven to be submerged in poverty, he left his throne to be submerged in humble service, and in the end, he allowed himself to be submerged in an excruciatingly painful death to win eternal life for a largely ungrateful humanity. That’s quite a humbling experience in which to be submerged.

These are difficult questions Jesus asks James and John: “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink? Are you willing to be submerged in the experience in which I am submerged?”

“We are able!” they quickly reply. The way Mark writes it, it almost sounds like they answer in unison like a couple of Double Mint twins. “We ARE able!” You can almost picture them grinning awkwardly as they say this. Whether they really know what they are getting themselves into or not at this point, we don’t know. In any case, they do accept his challenge—they do drink from his cup, and they willingly submerge themselves in a life of humble service. We now know that James will go on to lose his life in this submersion. Even though they were originally asking for glory, they get redirected by Jesus and instead, take Jesus’ path of humble service and suffering.

But this cup, this submersion—is not the popular choice. Most people don’t answer, “We are able.” Who wants to choose the life of service instead of the life of glory? As humans, we naturally prefer glory.

I remember when John F. Kennedy, Jr. and his wife were tragically killed in a plane accident. There was a massive outpourings of candles, flowers, and cards springing up in make-shift shrines all across the country. On the news, there were a lot of “person on the street” interviews where I recall people say things like, “I am so sad about this tragedy. What I loved about John is that he was so humble and so kind.” That answer made me laugh. That is not why the world loved him! There are millions of humble and kind people all around us who go unnoticed. When they die, there aren’t shrines all over the country. While JFK, Jr. may well have been an extremely kind and even a humble person, that is not what made him a worldwide obsession—it was the legacy of his family name that gave him notoriety, power, wealth, fame, and loads of glamour. It’s not the death of this man we mourned—we didn’t even really know him. What we mourned was the death of the glorious myth he embodied. His death reminds us once again, that earthly greatness is fleeting—even though that’s what the world continues to strive for.

I supposed I don’t need to tell you that we live in a power-crazed world. Everyone wants to be great. We want to get the right education and a profession or at least the money that gives us power over others. We want to surround ourselves in possessions that prove our status. We want to launch that successful business or buy that winning lottery ticket that will finally set us free from the bondage of being a humble servant of the working world so we can finally tell our boss where to go like in the lotto commercials. All the advertisers know that’s what we secretly want so they spend billions continuing to market this myth of earthly power and domination to us. But Jesus tells us that this is not the way to attain true greatness. It’s not at all the way.

In the face of this striving for glory, Jesus comes out with the question: “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink? Are you willing to be submerged in the experience in which I am submerged?”

Jesus did not come this earth in the form of a Kennedy. He was born in a dusty stable to a poor carpenter and his wife. As the God-become-man, he painted a living portrait for us of what humanity ought to be. And the example he provided was one of love and humility; one of service, of foot-washing. In this scene from Mark’s Gospel, he tells his followers directly that: whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be a slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. (Mark 10:43-45)

You see, to be a follower of Jesus, means to be radically countercultural. Some of you remember just a short time ago when mainline Protestantism was in the height of it’s heyday in this country. To be a Christian did not mean to be radical. Being a Christian just meant being an American. Everybody who was anybody went to church. It was just the thing normal people did. And with that kind of “it’s the status quo thing to do” mind-set about Christianity, it is easy to forget how countercultural Jesus’ message really is. To follow Jesus means to reject the striving-after-glory life that is the norm of our world. It means we stop trying to get things for ourselves; and seek instead, to give of ourselves. This is the only way to attain greatness. John Kennedy Senior put it so well when he gave that stirring line, “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”

That’s the spirit of this call. Jesus is saying: “Don’t ask for glory, ask to drink from my cup, ask to be submerged in a life of service. Ask what you can do for the kingdom of God.”

This reminds me of Princess Alice. She was the second daughter of Queen Victoria. She had a four-year-old son who contracted the disease known as “black diphtheria.” Alice was devastated. The disease was highly contagious, and without modern medicine, it was deadly. The nurses continually warned the Princess, not being in the best of health herself, to stay away from her son. And so she tried. She really did.

But one day as Princess Alice was standing in the far corner of her son’s room, she heard the child whisper to the nurse, “Why doesn’t my mother kiss me any more?” That was more than Alice could bear. As tears streamed down her cheeks, she raced to her son’s bed, held him in her arms, and smothered him with kisses. Tragically, this turned out to be the kiss of death. Princess Alice contracted the deadly disease and in a matter of weeks, both mother and son were buried. A foolish thing to do? Crazy? Yes, of course. But who ever said love was logical? To love as deeply as the cross: that is a calling so high it flies in the face of common sense.

That’s the calling Jesus gives his disciples: to drink from his cup even if the price is death, to be submerged in a life that abandons itself in loving service. That is true greatness. And we don’t even have muster up this love on our own. We are able to freely love and give of ourselves in humble service because God first loved us. We are held in the arms of a loving God who didn’t get fed up with our relentless search for glory and throw us out as we deserve. No, this is a God who actively seeks us out as a shepherd who leaves ninety-nine sheep to go find the one who has strayed away. In a ridiculous act of selflessness, similar to that of Princess Alice’s, Christ gave his life to redeem us. And in response to this lavish outpouring of love, we are called to throw out our personal aspirations for fame and glory and humbly stand with James and John with the answer: “We are able!”

RE-PRIORITIZE NOW

A Sermon for 19th Sunday after Pentecost
by Pastor Laura Gentry

Mark 10:17-21

Sometimes when you are driving along, road signs can be quite funny, especially when they seem to be stating the obvious, like: “Caution: Water on road during rain.” Gee, I didn’t see that one coming.

Some road signs confuse, like one I saw that said: “Keep Right” and next to it was an arrow to the left. Or another one: “Entrance only. Do not enter.” Hmmm?

Other times, there are signs that can be taken either way like: “Lane closed to ease congestion.” And you are saying to yourself: But my nose isn’t congested at all. I am breathing just fine. Why should they close a lane for me?

One that stopped me dead in my tracks was a sign on a busy highway where an interchange was coming up. The sign read: “Re-prioritize now.” It meant that you should get into the lane you want for the interchange, but I read it’s deeper meaning. In fact, it sent me into a state of metaphysical dread. I thought: HOW does this road sign know me so well? How does it know my priorities are all out of whack? What can I do to re-prioritize now? Needless to say, I was so engaged in this line of thinking that I missed my exit.

Re-prioritize now! That is what Jesus is inviting  the man in today’s gospel reading to do. This guy approaches Jesus with a question and instead of a simple answer, he is given an amazing but demanding invitation. This is a man with great spiritual passion, he runs up and kneels before Jesus. He asks: "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" He sounds pretty serious. We can imagine his longing eyes peering up at the teacher with anticipation. Clearly, he is filled with a spiritual hunger that he needs satiated. He's been a follower of God all his life and he has followed the law. Yet somehow, he knows he's not yet at peace. It reminds me of the U2 song "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For." So now he has come to ask for advise about how he can find that inner peace for which he is searching. It stops Jesus in his tracks and forces him to acknowledge the question.  

The answer Jesus gives him is filled with love.  "You lack one thing," he says. "Go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor and you will have treasures in heaven."

This is radical claim that Jesus is making on the man. He's showing him how much he needs the mercy and grace of God. Working to earn salvation on his own is futile. He can never do it. Only with God is this possible. Can he put all of his material wealth behind him and cling to God first and foremost? An exciting opportunity to re-prioritize has been presented to him!

Do you remember the old “Nestee Plunge” commercial where they showed happy people holding a glass of iced tea falling backward into a pool? It was as if to demonstrate that the flavor of the tea could take you away—it would make you want to absolutely surrender to it. As kids, we spent long hours at the pool trying to reenact this scene. You know, it’s really hard because you have to trust that the water will break your fall, will hold you up and keep you safe even when you can’t see where you are falling.

In a spiritual sense, that’s what Jesus was inviting the man to do. He understood the Savior's absolute call to take the plunge and fall into the arms of God’s grace. But he just could not trust. He couldn’t let go of his own control and place himself fully into God’s care. Yet the man slumps down with grief because his things have a higher priority in his life than the call of Jesus.He is to encumbered by the cares of the world. So he walks away without accepting the invitation. What about you? Do you accept the invitation? Are you ready to re-prioritize now?

The famous author Henri Nouwen wrote a story about an incident that happened to him. He was walking along the road and then found himself on the ground. It happened so fast he didn’t know what hit him. When a man man came to his assistance, he realized that he’d been hit by the rearview mirror of the man's van. At the hospital, Henri thought about the accident further. He writes: “Faced with the possibility of dying, it came to me that the mirror of the passing van had forced me to look at myself in a radically new way.” It was a metaphor for him to consider how God may be calling him to re-prioritize his life.

Henri found it difficult to be in a position in which he was not in control. He had to let go and trust the doctors to perform surgery on him and get him back on the road of health. And on a spiritual level, he had to trust God in a way that was deeper than he had ever trusted before. He writes of this: “What I experienced then was something I had never experienced before: pure and unconditional love. Better still, what I experienced was an intensely personal presence, a presence that pushed all my fears aside and said: ‘Come, don’t be afraid. I love you:’ a very gentle, nonjudgemental presence; a presence that simply asked me to trust completely. It was not a warm light, a rainbow, or an open door that I saw, but a human yet divine presence that I felt, inviting me to come closer and let go of all fears.”

For Henri, death then lost its power and shrank away. He allowed God’s love to surround him and keep him safe. He felt it was a homecoming. Jesus was saying: come home to me. And Henri came home.

You and I are being give the same priority: re-prioritize now. Whatever is standing in the way of your intimacy with God has to get out of the way. Let it go. Take the plunge of faith. Let go of your fears and come home to God. This alone, offers you absolute freedom. As baptized children of God, we know that we can trust God to carry us. May you say yes to this call today.

Let us pray: Lord Jesus Christ, we give you praise that your promise is strong enough, your love faithful enough that you will not let us go. Whatever our life's circumstances, I pray that your presence would be tangible, your promise uplifting that we can let go of our old lives completely and fall into your arms of limitless love. Amen.

LOOK WITH AWE

A Sermon for 18th Sunday after Pentecost
by Pastor Laura Gentry
Psalm 8 

During our trip to Chile last month, William and I saw the constellation known as the Southern Cross for the first time. It is one of the most distinctive constellations because it is in the shape of a cross. Reportedly, it has been easily visible from the southern hemisphere at practically any time of year, since the time of Christ. You can see it from the northern hemisphere, but only in tropical latitudes and only for a few hours every night during the spring months.  It was pretty awe-inspiring to look up at the infinite night sky from a totally different place on earth to behold a constellation we’d never seen before. It gave us a sense of the vastness of the universe.

Perhaps you’ve gotten than sense too, gazing up into the night sky or just looking out a beautiful scene in nature. Some of my relatives from Germany were visiting and they had just been at Yellowstone. It was the third time they’ve visited the national park and they say they believe it is one of the most beautiful places on earth.

Many people report having religious experiences when they are in nature. Drinking in the beauty of a natural scene can be overwhelming. It can fill you with a feeling that is hard to describe because it is so powerful. You can call it “awesome” but these days, that word is so overused it seems inadequate to simply say that it is awesome.

Well, that’s the sense that the Psalmist had when he wrote the Psalm we read today. The 8th Psalm expresses amazement: “O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.” God’s glory is overwhelming—it is above the heavens. Clearly, he is looking at Creation with awe.

When the astronauts were returning to earth from their first trip to the moon in 1969, there was a radio broadcast. In it, Buzz Aldren, the second man to set foot on the lunar surface, put his experience in a Biblical perspective.  He quoted Psalm 8: “When I consider Your heavens, the works of Your fingers, the moon and stars, which You have ordained, What is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visited him?”  

And among the items left at Tranquility Base on the moon, there was a silicon disc carrying statements from Presidents Nixon, Johnson, Kennedy, Eisenhower and leaders of 73 other nations. The Vatican was invited to place a message on this disc too. What was chosen included the words of Psalm 8. So when you look up at the moon, you should remember that this Psalm is there. These powerful words have been placed there.

Yes, God created the whole universe, of which the earth and our moon are just a small part. It’s rather mind boggling to consider the work of God’s creation. Even scientists can’t fully explain this amazing universe. It is so vast and wonderful that it remains largely a mystery. 

And yet, as the Psalmist declares, God created us in God’s image and is mindful of us. It seem rather bold to make this statement. I mean, why should God even be mindful of us? After all, the universe is so big and we are so small. 

Furthermore, there are so many of us. How many people live on Planet Earth? I went to a earth population calculator web site to find out. Using mathematical principles to estimate the births and deaths of the planet, this calculator has numbers that are constantly in motion as it displays how many people are on earth. Last night, for example, the number was: 6,948,161,486 and this morning at 6:32 a.m. it had grown to: 6,948,327,953. That’s 166,467 people more than there were just last night!

Now how in the world does God have time to be mindful of that many people? If God spent just one second paying attention to each person it would take God over 220 years! Fortunately for us, God is able to pay attention to each one of us simultaneously. Only God could handle that job.

Yet the amazing thing is that God seems to love the job. God is apparently delighted with creation. Remember that in Genesis, God declared every part of creation God and people were declared “very good.” God has created each one of us in God’s very own image and loves us. God wants to have a relationship with us.

Now if that doesn’t cause you to be enthusiastic, I don’t know what will. The God who created our expansive universe knows YOU and is excited to spend time with you. God has crowned you with glory and honor. This is remarkable news, indeed!

But with this good news, there comes a great responsibility. Our Creator is mindful of each one of us. So that means that we, who have been made in the image of God, are  called to be mindful of one another. This is more than just a hymn of praise, this is an imperative. We cannot say that we love God and then go around dismissing our neighbor. We must attempt to view our neighbors as God does.

While this may sound daunting, I think it is best approached through gratitude. You didn’t have to wake up this morning. In fact, you didn’t have to have life at all. But you you do have life and you did wake up! That in itself is a blessing that deserve gratitude. When we really acknowledge all that we’ve been given by God, we are filled with the joy of thanksgiving. Count your blessings, it will make you feel great. And then give God thanks for your blessings because it will make God feel great. Gratitude is music to our Lord’s ears. The theologian Meister Eckhart once wrote: "If the only prayer you say in your whole life is 'thank you,' that would suffice." Thank you is THAT powerful.

As we ponder our place in the universe and our identity as human beings, we must first and foremost give thanks. When we do, it opens us up to the gift that we have in one another and we begin to find more and more gratitude for those with whom we share the earth.

Gratitude will also give us deeper appreciation for earth-home God has given to us. It will make us more mindful about the ways in which we pollute and harm this good earth.   In Lynn White's now-famous essay, "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis" (1967) he argues quite persuasively that Christianity bears a "huge burden of guilt" for the environmental problems that now face us. He explains that we have interpreted God’s imperative that we have dominion over the earth to mean that we are free to destroy it. The worst environmental problems, it has been pointed out, have been caused by those countries that are predominantly Christian. 

Today, however, Christians of many different denominations are coming to see that having dominion may mean just the opposite—that we are to be good stewards of  God’s creation and do what we can to take care of it. Christianity, many argue, is actually an eco-friendly religious tradition. 

Yes, this psalm seems like a simple little song of praise that we could easily read and then forget. But when we look at it in this way, we realize how meaningful it is. Simply to follow the indications of this single text presents work enough for a lifetime. May it inspire us to look at God’s creation with awe and deep gratitude so that we will look upon our fellow human beings with love and respond that together, we may work to preserve and protect the awesome world we’ve been given by our Creator. Amen.

Now may the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord.  Amen.

 

TEN TWEETS OF WISDOM

A Sermon for 13th Sunday after Pentecost + August 30, 2009
Pastor Laura Gentry

James 1:17-27

When I read the critical bits of wisdom contained in our Epistle reading for today from James, I get the sense that I’m reading a Twitter feed. If you haven’t already heard the buzz about Twitter, it is a popular social networking Web site that allows users to share little messages with the world. The messages are short because they are limited to 140 characters—about a sentence in length. These fragmented bits of information are called “tweets” and there are a lot of tweeters out there. According to an article in the New York Times I recently read, there are 14 million users, who visited the site 99 million times last month to post messages and read the messages of others.

Because Twitter limits these communications to 140 characters, it forces people to be extremely concise. Messages simply can’t be long and flowery—it they have to get right at the heart of what needs to be conveyed. In our day and age, we expect this kind of economy of words, not just with tweets, but with just about everything. It’s a busy world and we have developed pretty short attention spans as a result.

That’s why I find the words of James’ so contemporary even though they were written for an ancient audience. The writer of this book, traditionally believed to be James, the brother of Jesus, is passionate about helping the believers of the early Christian community live our their faith. The authorship has been disputed but regardless of who wrote it, the wisdom contained within it is still valuable.

Lutherans don’t dig into this book all that much because Martin Luther didn’t like it. He called it the “Epistle of Straw” because he felt the emphasis upon good works might diminish our understand of salvation by grace. We are saved, Luther insisted, by the grace of God through Jesus Christ and not at all by our works. Other Christian scholars have argued that James seems to understand that we are saved by grace but that he is also interested in what we do with this gift of grace. Do we just hide it under a bushel or do we live it, thus allowing the light of Christ to grow within us and illuminate the world?

Reading James we get the sense that Christianity is an ongoing journey. You can’t ever just say: I AM a Christian. It is more like: every day, I am becoming a Christian. We don’t ever walk in the footsteps of Jesus perfectly, but with each step of our journey, we can work to walk in those footsteps more closely. Mother Teresa understood this. She once wrote: “Keep in mind that our community is not composed of those who are already saints, but of those who are trying to become saints. Therefore let us be extremely patient with each other's faults and failures.”

This entire book of James is only 108 verses long—many of them the length of a tweet or less—but it is steeped in wise and timeless advise designed to help us walk the walk of faith so that we can become Christians and we can be patient with our fellow becomers. So let’s take the 10 verse passage from the lectionary reading today and look at it one tweet at a time in hopes that we can be inspired by God’s word anew.

1. Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. —James 1:17

Giving is a gift? Have you ever thought of giving a gift? That kind of makes the giving we do like a double gift—the gift we give it coupled with the fact that God’s spirit gave us the gift to enable us to give it. Generosity is a good thing and we must be grateful that God helps us to be grateful, as it is a “perfect gift” that is given to us from the Father of lights. This God is pure light and will always be pure light. God’s light doesn’t have a “dark side” like the Force in Star Wars. We can trust in God’s goodness and we don’t need to fear that it will ever change.

Imagine you are reading this verse at Twitter and it stands all by itself. Just this tweet alone gives us wisdom if we contemplate it and allow it to shape our ideas and behaviors. It bids us ask ourselves important questions.

• In your Christian walk, how do you act generously?
• Think of a gift you recently gave. How did you feel blessed in the giving of it?
• What can you do to invite the Father of lights to give you even more generosity and other perfects gifts such as wisdom, love and joy?

2. In fulfillment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures. —James 1:18

Now in the second tweet here, James reminds us that we have been given new birth by the “word of truth.” This refers to the good news of the Gospel. The world may speak a word of discouragement. The Media, for example, presents only 1 positive story out of 17 negative ones. But that’s not at all the way God words. The word of truth which our Lord speaks is all positive, all good because it is about redemption through Christ.

And so with this new birth as children of God, we become the first fruist of God’s creatures. In biblical tradition, the first fruits are the first ripe sheaves of grain or the first fruits that appear on a tree. They are signs of a greater harvest that is to come. They give hope. That’s why these first fruits were offered to God to show that they trusted in God for not just these fruits, but the entire harvest. So for us to be first fruits is to be the sign of hope and change. We are not going to listen to the word of the world. Instead, we are going to listen to the word of truth. We are going to give God our hearts and really belong to God, to walk in God’s ways.

Being the first fruits of creation means we’ve got to put our heart and soul into the living of our faith. We can’t do it half-heartedly. It reminds me of the abolitionist Wendell Phillips, who, after making an impassioned speech condemning slavery, was asked, "Wendell, why are you so on fire?"

Phillips looked at his friend and said: "Brother, I'm on fire because I have mountains of ice before me to melt."

Indeed, we have mountains of ice before us even today. 

• Are you on fire with the Spirit’s passion?
• Do you want more than anything to let your lives reflect your status as a first fruits of God’s creation?

3. You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger;
—James 1:19

This one certainly reads like a tweet. But it is not detached from the tweet that came before it about being the first fruits of creation. Here, he is giving us absolutely concrete advise for how to live as a first fruit. It is so simple but so important. I think this is one we ought to commit to memory: “be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger.”

Not enough people are quick to listen these days. G.K. Chesterton once said that there is no such thing as an uninteresting subject, only uninterested people. The average speaker says about 125 words a minute in normal conversation. Yet our brains have the ability to comprehend about 400 words a minute. So we can get bored with a speaker and let our minds wander—thus, not really hearing and comprehending what’s being said. When we turn all of our focus to someone and really hear them out without judging immediately, we can connect with them in a most powerful way.

Think of people who you consider to be good listeners: folks that give you their full attention when you talk to them and ask meaningful questions to help you further unpack your ideas. What a gift they are giving you when they listen attentively! Being a good listener is key to forming strong relationships with others. That’s why James reminds us to listen first, being quick and eager to do so.

Then, only after careful consideration, should we speak. This would really keep us from putting our foot in our mouth as we so often do. Slow to speak, it says. Some people love to say whatever is on their minds. They brag of themselves: “I just tell it like it is.” But these words can often be hurtful and damaging. James would advise these folks to be much more cautious about speaking. Furthermore, we should also aim to be slow to get angry.

• Am I quicker to listen, to speak, or to get angry?
• What can I do to learn the art of listening better?
• How would being quick to listen improve my relationships?

4. For your anger does not produce God’s righteousness. —James 1:20

Now this one is a no-brainer. Living a life of anger will not make us filled with God’s righteousness. The American Psychological Association says that anger must be expressed when it is felt because if we turn it inward, it can cause hypertension, high blood pressure, or depression. But allowing our anger to fly out at others isn’t helpful either. As people of faith, we are called to turn our anger and other undesireable feelings over to God and ask God to transform us from the inside out. This is why we pray and worship and read scripture. These things help direct our focus upon God and the righteous ways in which God wants us to walk.

• How much do I struggle to manage my anger?
•  What can I do to give my anger over to God so that I can be transformed?

5. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls. —James 1:21

As with anger, we are also to let go of other wicked behaviors and welcome the implanted word. This is a wonderful image of how God’s mighty word is given to us and dwells in our hearts, like a seed that has been planted. It is a gift and it must be nurtured just as a plant must be watered. When we focus our hearts upon God’s word, then the word within us can grow and guide us from within.

• How can I work to rid myself of wickeness?
What am I doing to nurture the implanted word in my heart?

6. But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. —James 1:22

This is probably the chief tweet of the whole book. James is all about action. If we believe God, it should change the way we live. We should be doers of the word. As Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote:”Go put your creed into your deed. What you do speaks so loud that I cannot hear what you say.”

• If someone didn’t know I was a Christian, could they figure it out based upon my behavior?
• How can I make my actions more consistent with my belief in Jesus?
• If I were a true “doer of the word” how would my life be different?

7. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like.
—James 1:23-24

Now if you looked into a mirror and then walked away and forgot what you’d seen in the mirror, we’d say you were pretty ridiculous, now wouldn’t we? James’ point here is that God’s word is like a mirror—it shows you who we are. Who are you? You are someone who has been blessed by God's gifts, someone who has been brought to new life through God's word—a person who is a first fruit, set aside as someone who belongs to God. If you want to walk in God’s way, you have to remember who you are in Christ. And when you do, it will enable you to be a doer of the word.

• How would it change your life if you were more constantly aware of who you are?
• What can you do to keep your identity as God’s child ever in your mind?

8. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.—James 1:25

Look at yourself again, James says, in the perfect law of liberty. The law brings liberty because it directs us to live in love. Yes, it demands a lot of us but it is freeing. The law it shows us how very loved we are and how much love we can give.

• How does following God’s law free you?
• What will it take for you to persevere in the law of liberty?

9. If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. —James 1:26

James has a thing against tongues. This isn’t the only place he talks about their danger. Just a few verses earlier, remember, he said we should be slow to speak. Obviously, he knows how painful words can be and how we must use our ability to communicate wisely. Just as a horse is a great and powerful animal but it must be bridled or it could hurt someone—so our words have the potential for good or ill. Therefore, we must be careful to bridle them. This is about Christian maturity. To be mature in faith means knowing what to say and what not to say.

• How have my words been hurtful?
• How have they been helpful?
• What can I do to bridle my tongue so that my words can honor God and help others?

10. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.—James 1:27

Here we are at the tenth tweet of today’s lesson. James pushes us toward compassionate action. To live in God’s love means that we must help those most vulnerable in our society. In biblical times, it was widows and orphans. They would starve if it were not for the kindness of others. The prophets of old all called out for this same kindness to the widows and orphans. If we want God’s kingdom to come, we must seek out those in trouble and give them what they need. This is what it means to be a doer of the word.

Finally, it says we must keep ourselves unstained by the world. It would be easy to fall into the self-serving patterns of our society. But as Christians, our calling is higher. We’ve got an exciting challenge to live out God’s love each day.

• How can I be more intentional in caring for the vulnerable?
• What can I do to stay unstained by the world?

James has an immense amount of wisdom for us to contemplate in these ten short tweets. May we ponder these insights and allow them to challenge us and move us into a deeper, more meaningful walk of faith. Let us continue to BECOME Christians. Amen.