INVITATION TO A CARING COMMUNITY

A Sermon for Pentecost 19

September 30, 2018

James 5:13-20

The book of James offers us a vision of a caring community—of people who are committed to the practice of their faith and in doing that, are committed to one another. Because of our faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ (James 2:1), it says, we put away anger, we listen, we care for the widow and orphan in distress, we act with gentleness, we treat poor and rich alike, we love our neighbor as ourselves. He covers all that and more in the first part of this letter.

Now, he moves on to describe other practices for a caring community and these include: prayer, the singing of songs of praise, being present to one another and when healing is needed, offering the laying on of hands and anointing—administered by the elders. So this is a group of people who not only believe but live it out their belief together. They look to God for healing but they realize something significant: They, themselves, are that healing presence to one another. God is always relational and so a Christian community is centered on relationship as well.

What do you lack? James writes at the start of the letter that whatever you lack, God will provide. Turn to God in prayer, trusting that God will respond “generously and ungrudgingly” (James 1:5). That confidence is now reiterated at the end of the message. He says that prayer has the power to “save” the sick, to “raise them up,” and to offer the “forgiveness of sins” (James 5:5). To pray in this way together as a caring community is powerful. If does not offer some wistful hope of the peace in the hereafter but of a praying, healing, vibrant community that transforms people right here, right now.

What do you think about prayer? How do you pray? We often think of prayer as an individual endeavor. In your quiet time alone, you pray to God. Most people I know are not confident about praying out loud anywhere. Ever. They much prefer to have the pastor pray for them. 

But that’s not how James is talking about prayer here. For him, it is not an individual thing to be done by yourself—I mean you can do it that way but it really is a communal thing. We pray together. So not only do we feel closer to God, but we feel closer to one another. We sense a deep belonging. 

Maybe that’s how it was in the first century church to whom James was writing, but that’s not very *today* is it? Today we’re an individualistic culture. Got a problem? Fix it yourself. Go buy a self-help book, try a little harder, grin and bear it, make better use of the happy face emoji. Even our social media doesn’t necessarily make us more connected to one another. It can easily become a way to showcase our individual identities and brag how many “friends” or “retweeters” we have. So instead of lifting others up by our posts, we just make them feel jealous. We, as a society, feel more alone than ever.

Let’s admit it: It’s hard for us to even imagine the kind of communal life that James is talking about. He’s not holding up an individualistic lifestyle at all. He’s not telling us we have to be awesome and get others to notice us. Instead, he’s suggesting the opposite. Want to belong? Want to be in a healing, relational community? Then be vulnerable. Be yourself. And let that true self be known. It’s an imperfect self loaded with shame, regret and self-doubt but that’s okay when you’re in a caring community. In fact, you can confess your sins to one another. Seriously? Confess your sins? That’s the last thing most of us would think about doing. It’s damn scary. But it opens the doors wide for forgiveness and unity. Keep in mind that the community to which this letter was written was one that was in conflict over class discrimination. They had many squabbles and it was hard for them to be kind to one another.  And yet, James advised that they risk being rejected and confess their sins to one another with radical openness.

And if that wasn’t enough, James told them to pray for one another and together. Why? Because it is effective and powerful. And it heals. 

Think of a time when someone prayed for you. How did it feel to know that someone, or perhaps a whole congregation, was praying for you? And now think of a time when you prayed for someone else. What was that like? Did it cause you to feel more connected to and loving towards the recipient of your prayer? Of course it did. We may not understand the mysteries of prayer and it may not always work in the magical way we want it to but we do know that prayer is social glue. It holds us together even when that seems like a miraculous thing to do.

If we take this letter seriously, it offers an important invitation to become a caring community. Like the community to which James wrote, we’re far from perfect. Perhaps you’ve been hurt by others. Maybe you don’t quite feel like you belong or that it’s safe to be your true self here.  You may well feel afraid.

That’s understandable. But think for a moment why we are here (other than the coffee). I think we’re here because we believe in God and we want help to keep that faith alive. We know that the love God has for us is limitless. In Psalm 23 it says that goodness and mercy are following us—they are actually pursuing us and will not stop because that’s how much God desire us. This love is here for us. And it is so helpful to know that we’re not alone. Right next to us in the pews are other beloved children of God who are saved by grace. God deems us all worthy and like a loving parent, wants us to get along.

If we believe this, then let’s risk living this way. Why not? Let us endeavor to love one another as God loves us. Let us sing praises of thanksgiving, let us confess our sins to one another, and let us pray for one another and with one another, trusting that the healing of God comes to us most profoundly through one another. We have the chance to be a gift to each other. A healing, marvelous gift. Open your heart and be that gift.  Open your heart and be that gift.

Later in our service, we will follow this advice from James and you’ll have the chance to come forward for prayers of healing with the laying on of hands and anointing with oil. Normally, the pastor alone says the prayer but today, we’re going to try in the ancient church way and invite our church elders (in our case it will be our church council) to join in the circle or prayer for each person. May these prayers heal us  and bring us closer together, closer to being the kind of caring community we are called to be through the boundary-breaking love of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

© 2018 Laura Gentry

DOERS OF THE WORD

James 1:17-27

A sermon for the 15th Sunday after Pentecost, 2018

Our Epistle lesson for today comes from the book of James. We don’t get passages from James in our lectionary that often. When the bible cannon was being formed, James was nearly left out and even when it did make the cut, it was regarded with suspicion. Martin Luther, for example, would have happily banished it altogether, referring to it as the “Epistle of straw”.  As you know, he was a grace guy and this book, with it’s emphasis upon doing good seems almost anti-grace. He was worried it would confuse believers. 

Fortunately, you’re not the kind of believers who would be confused about something as important as grace so I think I can safely preach on this passage today. You know full well that your salvation comes from the grace of God in Christ and it is not your own doing at all. So don’t boast. But now that you’ve got grace, what are you supposed to do with it? Well, that’s where the book James comes in with advise for how to live. Spoiler alert: it does not advocate couch potato Christianity. It exhorts us to get up off our duffs and do God’s work.

The manuscript of this book attributes the authorship to James, the son of Zebedee but later it was traditionally held that it was James, the brother of Jesus. While the authorship is still disputed, whoever wrote it was passionate about helping the believers of the early Christian community live our their faith.

The Christian life is an ongoing journey according to this book. You don’t ever arrive but you keep on trucking, following in the footsteps of Jesus no matter how much you stumble and fall short. 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.”

The entire book of James is only 108 verses long and each one is dense with wisdom to help us follow Christ more faithfully. So let’s examine each of the 10 verses in today’s passage with the hope of gaining new inspiration for our journey.

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

Did you hear that? It says giving is a gift. Did you ever think of giving as a gift? It is. The old saying is true: it is better to give than to receive. God gives to us and all the gifts are good, so when we share this goodness with others, we are generous and God’s blessing expands. Thrivent Financial has T-shirts that say “Live Generously” and I love seeing people wearing them because that’s the advice of this verse and so many other in the bible. 

It also refers to God here as the “Father of Lights.” This refers to the lights of heaven—the sun, moon and stars—which God has created. These lights change throughout the day and the season. Now as we enter the autumn season we notice the hours of daylight diminishing. Yet God is the creator and author of all this light and, therefore, does not change, even as the shadows fall. This is a God we can rely upon and trust to supply us with all the gifts we need. That’s why we can always be generous.

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

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 give us words of discouragement, but God doesn’t. 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 fruits 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. Are you a sign of hope? Is that how you live? Do people look at you and say: “Oh the world’s going to hell but look at her! She give me hope!”

It reminds me of the abolitionist Wendell Phillips, who had the courage to fight against slavery at a time when it wasn’t the popular or accepted thing to do. Yet he found the Holy Spirit’s wisdom guiding him onward. One day, after giving an impassioned speech condemning slavery, somebody asked him, "Wendell, why are you so on fire?" 

He said: "Brother, I'm on fire because I have mountains of ice before me to melt." 

You can call the book of James ancient wisdom but I think it was never more relevant. Just take a look around and you’ll see that there are mountains of ice that need melting. There is growing hatred and injustice and despair. Yet God is here and we trust that God is love. Are you shining forth that love? Are you on fire? Do you provide the first sign of hope to people looking for a spark of light? Well, if you’re looking for something to do with the grace that is within you, this would be a good start.

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

This one is so straight-forward and so powerful we should commit it to memory: “be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger.”

Are you quick to listen? Most people aren’t. Here’s a bit of brain science: the average speaker says about 125 words a minute in normal conversation and our brains have the ability to comprehend 400 words a minute. Our brains are bored. They’re busy doing other things. We aren’t listening, we’re thinking of the next thing we want to say or making a to-do list or contemplating the forms.

And that doesn’t result in real communication or connection. In America today we have become especially good at not listening to each other when we have differing opinions. Yet when we listen, we begin to understand each other and walls fall down. Fear fades and enemies can even become friends. So be quick to listen and slow to speak.

If you do that, you’ll be slow to anger as well. 

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

Living a life of anger will not produce God’s righteousness. Holding onto anger against people is bad for our bodies and souls. It can cause hypertension, high blood pressure, heart disease, depression and more.  As people of faith, it’s not like we’re not angry, but we should be angry at injustice and heartlessness, not people. So we need to let the Holy Spirit direct our anger to fighting evils rather than our fellow human beings. Because plain old anger just tears up our communities. And that’s not how God wants us to live.

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. In the original language the word translated here as “rid” was more like “strip”. The way you’d quickly strip off dirty clothes to go into the washing machine, you ought to strip off wickedness. Then, free of such filth, you can really welcome the implanted word. This is a wonderful image of how God’s 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 and given light. When we focus our hearts upon God’s word, then the word within us can grow and guide us from within.

But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. 

—James 1:22

This is the poster-child of the passage. See? It made the cover our bulletins this week. James is all about action. When we believe God, it changes 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 you were a Christian, could they figure it out based on your actions? Hmmm, that’s a tough question to ask yourself. James would prefer we ask if of ourselves often. Chances are we could be much better doers. Time to get to work.

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

What if you looked into a mirror after eating lunch and saw a big glob of mustard on your nose and then walked away and said: “Hey, I forget: did I have mustard on my nose? Or was it ketchup? Maybe it was on my chin. I just can’t remember.” If you did that we’d say you were pretty stupid, wouldn’t we? 

James’ point here is that God’s word is like a mirror—it shows you who you are. So when we look at God’s word what does it say you are? In these few verses of James alone it has a lot to tell you about who you are. It says you are blessed—blessed with God’s unchangeable love and gifts. You have been given a whole new life and you are like a first fruit of creation, giving hope to everyone around you. 

Now if that’s who you are and you believe it, then you’re going to be living out that reality. You’ll be a doer of the word and not someone stumbling around in the dark forgetting their purpose.

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

More doing. We did say James was big on action, didn’t we? Here, he talks about God’s perfect law. It is hard to follow but it brings liberty. Persevere in your efforts to follow God’s law and that will make you a doer. It will make you happy to live in God’s love.

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 and he’s often on about their danger as is the book of Proverbs. For example, in Proverbs 13:3 it says: He who guards his mouth preserves his life; he who opes wide his lips comes to ruin. Think about the cliche: Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me. What an idiotic notion! Words totally hurt.  Think for a moment about something hurtful that was said to you. How did it shape your view of yourself? Have you healed from it? Maybe it was said when you were a child but it still hurts and shames you. That’s the danger of words and that’s why followers of Christ shouldn’t just “tell it like it is.” We shouldn’t be “Midwest Nice” and gloss over our concerns, either. If we’re quick to listen, slow to speak as it advised a few verses back, I think it is possible to communicate authentically but still keep from hurting people with our words. 

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 final verse of today’s lesson. James pushes us onward to compassionate action. To live in God’s love—to be doers of the word—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 why all the ancient prophets called on people to care for them. If we want God’s kingdom to come, we must not ignore the helpless and marginalized. Who is that today? There are a lot of groups you could identify as marginalized, as pushed to the side and not given fair justice in our system. What’s been on my heart so much lately is the immigrant children who our government separated from their parents at the border, some of whom were abused while in federal custody.

Keep yourself unstained by the world. That’s really hard to do when we hear political messaging and want to believe it. But when our primary allegiance is to God we not stand for children being caged in the name of national security. Like Wendell Phillips we’ll have the moral courage to fight against oppression. We will remained unstained by the world and on fire because we have mountains of ice before us to melt. 

—————————————

As you can see, there is a lot for us to contemplate in these ten short verses and you should probably go home and read the whole book of James. It’s only 108 verses so it won’t take you long. I pray that this book of timeless wisdom challenge us to not just say we’re Christians but to act like we are, to continue faithfully down the path of faith and really walk the walk of love. Amen. 

TAKE UP YOUR CROSS & FOLLOW

A SERMON FOR THE 2ND SUNDAY IN LENT, YEAR B

BY LAURA GENTRY

MARK 8:31-38

Peter was an awesome disciple. That’s why he was called the Rock—and no, he was not a pro-wrestler. Jesus called him that because of his rock-solid faith. 

Like the other disciples, Peter had left his old life behind to follow Jesus and now, after working alongside this amazing teacher, he had a revelation. 

“Why do you say that I am?” Jesus asks him. 

“You are the Messiah,” he says.

Obviously, Peter was a faith rock-star. Pun intended. But maybe not. There was something Peter wasn’t getting. He thought back to words of the prophets who foretold the coming of the Messiah who would deliver them. In this line of thinking, the Messiah would be like the great King Solomon. Only better. He would come in power and flex his political muscle and send those foreign occupiers packing.

Yes, it will be fabulous, Peter was probably thinking. And when Jesus usurps Rome and is put on the throne, well, I’ll probably get to be Chief of Staff or some other high office. I am his right-hand man, after all. I’m his Rock. I ought to be wealthy and powerful when all this goes down. God rewards faithfulness, right?

There are a lot of preachers out there who say: Yes! Yes, of course! If you are a Christian—if you love Jesus—then you will be healthy, wealthy and beautiful. You’ll always smell nice. Divine providence will rain riches upon you and your family. 

This theology is popular these days. It’s known as “Prosperity Gospel” and it sounds great, doesn’t it? Who doesn’t want an easy life with, you know, lots of toys? And it makes sense: if God is God of all and God loves us, then we should have everything we want.

This kind of thinking was also popular 500 years ago and Martin Luther found it extremely disturbing. He called it a “theology of glory.” It declared that God works through things and people that are powerful. If things are going well for you it must be a sign that God is with you. So if you’re suffering or weak or poor—well, you must be doing something wrong. But then along comes Jesus and he’s all of that: he’s so weak and powerless that he’s put through the incomprehensible suffering and the shame of death on a cross. So, Luther concluded, this must mean that contrary to popular thought, God works through weakness. God isn’t punishing the suffering for some alleged wrong-woing. No, in fact God is most profoundly with the suffering. In the midst of our brokenness God is with us and is working to call us back to life. This is what Luther called the “theology of the cross.”

Hmm, maybe Luther got it wrong. Weakness, shame and death. Doesn’t sound all that fun. That’s certainly where Peter was coming from. In today’s Gospel text from Mark, Jesus tells his disciples quite openly that he must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elites of the faith: the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 

That’s stupid! At least according to Peter, so he speaks up and tells Jesus not to talk like that. The text says he rebukes him. It could be translated: “Shut up!” Peter’s that vehement in his opposition to Jesus’ plan of suffering and death. Shut up, Jesus! Don’t do it. You’re supposed to be the triumphant king, not die like a shameful criminal. I won’t stand for it.

Then Jesus lashes back at him with even more force. “Get behind me, Satan!” he says, “For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” 

Satan? Yikes! This is forceful language but Jesus doesn’t mean in a name-calling way. He’s addressing Peter as “tempter” because he’s tempting Jesus to turn away from the path of humility, shame and death and go after worldly glory instead. This had to be tempting even for the Son of God. Peter is very devilish in this regard. He’s setting his mind on human things and trying to throw off the entire divine plan. Jesus won’t stand for it.

As if exasperated that his own rock-solid disciple has missed the point, Jesus calls the crowd together to teach them. Maybe they’ll get it this time. They need to hear it (and we do, too). Here’s what he lays on them: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?”

Mark Twain once wrote: “It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it’s the parts that I do understand.” This here is one of those passages that bother us because it’s so clear: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

Or is it? What exactly does Jesus mean when he asks us—his followers—to deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow him?

It certainly isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme or a magic ticket to the easy life as the prosperity preachers would tell you it is. It is a call to complete devotion. It asks us to give up our selfish pursuits and follow Christ. And I believe that’s what we’re all trying earnestly to do. But how!? How do we do it today in our hurting world?

Well, we could look at how Jesus did it. His first century world was different from ours but it was hurting, too. People were oppressed, crushed and crying out for deliverance. God could have looked at all that suffering and decided to keep it at arms-length. You know, it’s too awful. But instead, God decided to enter the world and walk with—suffer with—those broken people all the way to the cross, even though Peter begged him not to.  Isn’t that incredible? I can never quite wrap my head around it.

We all suffer. The older we get, the longer our list of suffering—loved ones die, spouses leave, health declines, disappointments and failures accumulate. We hate to think about how vulnerable we are but indeed, suffering is a pretty constant companion on the road of life.

Take up your cross and follow Jesus. Maybe that means first admitting we suffer. Like Christ, we have our crosses to bear. At times we are broken in two by them. 

A friend of mine, whose child died, recently posted this quote by Leonard Cohen: “I greet you from the other side of sorrow and despair with a love so vast and shattered it will reach you everywhere.” I was touched by it because it reminded me that when we are broken, there is the opportunity for our shattered hearts to expand with love. We’ve suffered, so now we can empathize with other people who suffer. Despite the pain—actually because of the pain—our compassion can grow. 

This is what Jesus did. He suffered and in doing so, he suffers with each one of us. He proves to us that God gets it. God is there in not just in our happy moments but in our weakness and hurt. And we are called to do the same. 

Take up your cross and follow Jesus. Maybe that means entering into the suffering of others rather than pushing it away. We can make space in our hearts and our schedules for those who are suffering. We can listen to and believe the victims of abuse, we can allow grievers to grieve as long as they need to, we can look at discrimination and understand how the system is rigged against some people rather than blaming them for their situation, we can get outraged when we discover injustice, and this can stir us to action to advocate on behalf of our brothers and sisters in pain.

When Jesus was telling his disciples about what he must undergo, he got to the part about being killed but did you notice, he didn’t stop there? He went on to say that after three days he would rise again. I wonder if Peter even listened to that part. Maybe if he had, he wouldn’t have objected. Jesus suffered and died, yes, but that wasn’t the end of the story. God raised him to new life and in doing so, promises us the same. The cross, you see, leads into suffering and death but ultimately it leads to resurrection.

Take up your cross and follow Jesus. Maybe that means setting our sights on the risen life. The world might offer comfort and power but Christ offers risen life both now and in the world to come. But you have to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow him. You have to suffer yourself and with others. You have to serve instead of seeking priviledge. You have to love instead of hate. And this may seem like it’s such hard work that you’re giving up your whole life but surprizingly, Jesus says the opposite will happen: “those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.” It sounds counterintuitive but the selfless way is the best way. It will save your life.

I’m sorry to break it to you, but I’m not a prosperity preacher. I just stick to the Bible so I’m gonna give it to you straight: following Jesus is hard work. Don’t even bother if you’re not for real.  We are called to follow Christ—to completely, wildly, passionately, and recklessly give over our lives. We are asked to take up our cross and follow Jesus: to give up pursuit of wordly power, to embrace our weakness and suffering, to enter into the suffering of others and let it expand our hearts that we may be and transformed into new people, risen people who love God and are eager to go wherever the Spirit leads. This Lenten journey reminds us that’s what it’s all about. Now get out there and follow Jesus.

A PENTECOST ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION

This sermon was the second half of a sermon for Pentecost Sunday at a Heritage Service celebrating the 150th Anniversary of Our Savior's Lutheran Church in Lansing, Iowa. It followed a reflection of about the "giants" of the bible and the "giants" of the congregation's history who were channels of divine power. At the start of the service, worshipers were instructed to divide by gender and sit on separate sides of the sanctuary (with men on the pulpit side) to experience how the earliest members would have worshiped.

We are so grateful to Pastor Don Berg for being a part of our service today and reflecting with us on how God has worked through the “giants” of our congregation over the years. And on this, the anniversary of our church, celebrated on Pentecost, the anniversary of the coming of the Holy Spirit to launch the entire Christian church, it is fitting to look back at the events of the past—to muse, to marvel and to learn. We are enormously blessed by the work of our member and historian, Barbara Scottston, who uncovered such a rich history for us.

It is important that we grab hold of what we’ve learned to help us as we go forward. And so my portion of the sermon will focus on the future. In order to do so, we need to get you out of this historical, gender-segregated seating and back to modern seating, yes? Okay, then. When I say “go” you’ll get up and return to your original pew.  On your way, you are going to stop and shake the hand of at least one person you do not yet know. Introduce yourself and tell how you’re connected to this congregation. Don’t talk too long, though, because I’ve got a great message to preach. Ready? Go! (everyone moved back to their original pew).

Ah, that looks more normal doesn’t it? Men and women sitting side by side in the pews, reflecting equality because God’s word isn’t just for men any more. It’s for women, too.  And not only can women hear God’s word from any pew they wish, they can now proclaim it!

Do you realize that for more than two thirds of this congregation’s history, women were not allowed to be ordained as pastors? In April of 1970, the Lutheran Church in America voted to ordain women at their Fifth Biennial Convention, as did the American Lutheran Church at their convention that year. I’m going to reveal my age, but I have to tell you that decision by the LCA, was made a month before I was born. So I like to think that I embody the new era of female clergy. But even though the Lutherans that formed the ELCA have allowed women to be ministers for my entire life, I’m only the second woman minister this church has ever had. And I’m happy to say that the first pioneer, Pastor Debra Samuelson, is here with us today. We also have Pastor Diane Koshmeder and Pastor Terrie Rae Anderson, participating in our service today. Not only that, the Reverend April Ulring Larson is with us, too, and she was the very first woman in the entire ELCA to be elected as a synodical bishop. Oh, and our presiding bishop, the Reverend Elizabeth Eaton, as you might have guessed by her name, is also a woman. She has this to say about it: "I give thanks for all women in ministry. We are doing what Mary, the mother of our Lord, and Mary Magdalene did before us – proclaiming the gospel.” So let’s have a round of applause for women everywhere proclaiming the gospel!

That’s a big deal. A big, big deal. A gigantic change. Old Reverend Hjort (our church's first pastor) and the founding members of this congregation would have surely gasped in disbelief and rolled their eyes about in their heads if you’d have told them their church would have a sesquicentennial celebration in 2017 in which men and women would be allowed to sit together in the pews for a full half of that service and that a woman would be preaching. Yes, change happens. Even to Norwegians.

But you see that’s the problem of the Holy Spirit. That Spirit’s something else. We like to think the Holy Spirit—or the Holy Ghost as we used to call it—as a nice little thing. We often use a dove or a candle to symbolize it but the ancient Celtic church used a wild goose to symbolize the Spirit. Seriously? A goose? When I was a kid my neighbor had free ranging geese and I thought they were cute so I stopped my bike to pet one and you know what happened? It bit me! Took a chunk out of my arm. Geese are hard core. So a wild goose is a crazy symbol for the Holy Spirit. Crazy. But the Celtic church specifically chose this animal because they understood the untamable and dangerous nature of the Holy Spirit. It is powerful. Unexpected. Uncontrollable. Beware, my friends: it shows up and bites you!

Today is Pentecost Sunday—the day when Christians around the world celebrate this passionate, powerful, fiery Spirit that came upon the early disciples. It blew through them like a mighty wind and gave them new languages with which to proclaim the gospel. You see that? It immediately changed their agenda. They were planning on telling the good news but probably not to everybody. Then the wild goose of a Spirit comes honking in and bites them and *poof* they are the boldest proclaimers in the universe. Ordinary people became extraordinary and changed the world. It was outrageous! That’s why the cynics looked on and thought the disciples thought must have been drunk off their butts.

Those pioneers from Norway, well, they just thought there oughta be a church here in Lansing so they drew up the paper work in 1867 with nothing but a handful of faithful immigrants and a pastor with a five-point parish commuting to worship by horse and buggy. There’s no excuse for such behavior. It had to be the wild goose Spirit whispering in their ears (well, probably chomping on their ears) telling them they could do what could not be done, telling them to risk it all and trust God that their little church was going to last.

And that, I believe, is the most important legacy they’ve given to us: faith. Martin Luther wrote that faith is “a living, daring confidence in God’s grace, so sure and certain that believers would stake their lives on it a thousand times.” 

That’s what the Holy Spirit allows us to do: to trust fall into the arms of God’s grace. It doesn’t make sense to anybody else. It might make us look drunk. But it enables us to give up controlling things ourselves, to allow the undomesticated Holy Spirit to fly where it may, even if that means lots of changes ahead. 

In addition to being a pastor, I teach laughter seminars to get people laughing with abandon, tapping into the joy and freedom Christ gives us. So people give me a lot of jokes and bulletin bloopers. This one’s my favorite: “We pray for those who are sick of this church.” You know, after 150 years, you’d think we’d all be a little sick of this church. But when the Holy Spirit is allowed to reign supreme and take us where we didn’t plan to go, urging us:

• to live among God’s faithful people

• to hear the word of God and share in the Lord’s supper

• to proclaim the good news of God in Christ through word and deed

• to serve all people—all people—following the example of Jesus

• to strive for justice and peace in all the earth

And to carry all this out in ever outreaching ways: like having Holy Hilarity services were we laugh at death, and inviting donkeys to lead the Palm Sunday processional (even if they sometimes poop in the church) and worshiping on a boat and baptizing people in the Mississippi River if that’s where they want to be baptized and holding special services just to bless animals, and producing albums of worship music and who knows what's next?!

If we give the Holy Spirit freedom to do this and more—well, then we’ll never be sick of this church. Living the life of faith will be way too much of an adventure.

I don’t mean to say that it is not a challenge. This is an incredibly difficult time to be the church. Worshiping communities are shrinking across the country. It’s a constant effort to be seen as relevant. We have real struggles. But so did our ancestors in the faith. And yet they persisted and trusted that they had a mission to accomplish and with God, it was possible. 

As we go forward, let us do so with their tenacious spirit. I pray that we will have a living, daring confidence in God’s grace. And I pray that the wildness of the Holy Spirit will flap in here and take over our lives and our church and lead us forth with fiery passion, fearlessness and with great joy! Amen.

© 2017 Laura Gentry

The pastors who were part of the Heritage Service on June 4, 2017: back row—Pastor Peter Samuelson, Pastor Laura Gentry, Pastor Diane Koshmeder, Pastor Kris Snyder; front row—Pastor Debra Von Fisher Samuelson, Bishop April Ulring Larson, Pastor Judd Larson, Pastor Don Berg.

AN OUTRAGEOUS SERMON ABOUT LOVE

A Sermon for the 4th Sunday after Epiphany

 Corinthians 13:1-13 • Luke 4:21-30

Our Epistle reading for today from I Corinthians 13 is America’s most popular wedding verse. I’m sure you’ve heard it at many a wedding. And because it is so popular, you might kind of think of it as cliche and tune out when it’s read, assuming it to be the feel-good Hallmark card of the New Testament. 

But here’s the thing: this text is not about romantic love. Sorry, happy couples, this letter wasn’t written for you. No, it was sent to the early church in Corinth, a community in conflict. What’s love about? Paul says love is actually most important when people can’t stand each other. If we want to be followers of Christ, we need to learn how to love even though it’s not the fun or easy thing to do.

Just before this passage about love begins, in verse 12:31, it says the love is “a still more excellent way.” In the Greek, this phrase has even more punch. It could be translated something like “love is beyond measuring.” In this troublesome congregation, people were busy measuring their worth against each another. It was all competition and backbiting. They wanted to one-up one another with their great spiritual gifts but Paul wants them to see that they need to move past this way of relating and into a different way, a way that is not about such measurement but instead, is a steeped in love beyond measuring. 

That’s the kind of love that ought to shape our lives together as the church. If we do great things but don’t have love, Paul proclaims, we are like a clanging gong. It’s empty. We’ve missed the point. Today’s our annual meeting. We will be looking at our church business, our budget, our various ministries. Let’s keep these words in mind as we conduct our meeting. What do our building and our budget and our missional strategies matter if we don’t have love? First and foremost, we are called to be a community that lives out the love of Christ.

Okay, okay, so we’re supposed to love but what does that look like? According to this letter, it is active. Love is the subject of 16 verbs in a row here. In English it kind of sounds passive: “Love is patient. Love is kind.” Don’t start yawning yet, though, because in the original Greek it is more like: “Love shows patience. Love acts with kindness.” See the active tense of the verbs? Throughout these phrases, love is an action-filled thing, not a warm gushy feeling that we have for people who are like us. So you see, this passage isn’t so Hallmarkish after all! It’s a very difficult teaching. Love requires a lot of us.

Then, at the end of this reading, it makes the boldest claim of all: “Love never ends.” Paul names three most important values to the church: faith, hope and love. These summarize the life of the church, which is why we chose them to be in the Our Savior's Lutheran Church mission statement: “Making Christ known by inviting all to grow in faith, hope and love.” Yet, Paul reminds us that even among these three great things, love is the greatest. Love is what will remain. We are drawn into that love which is offered by God and we are reformed into people who work together despite our difference to share that love.

It is too bad that we as a society assume love feels good because the love to which we are called rarely feels good. It’s a demanding task that is set before us. And it is not a request, it’s a mandate that we love. 

I think this talk of love is still too abstract. So let’s turn to Jesus to see more clearly what it means to love. Did you check him out in today’s Gospel lesson? There he is chilling with his own peeps in his home synagogue. This is his community, the place he was raised. He’s come back now as an adult, as a rabbi, and he’s teaching the scriptures. Jesus opens the scroll and reads to the congregation from Isaiah. They are poetical words the people would have known well. They speak of God’s promise to release, redeem and heal those who have been cast off by society. And then Jesus declares that this scripture has been fulfilled in their hearing. Wonderful! They all rejoice and think highly of their hometown boy because they think it means they are the ones who are going to get released, redeemed and healed. After all, they have been living under the oppressive Roman occupation for so long and now their time of political liberation has finally come. No wonder they are excited.

Jesus, however, doesn’t mean it this way. He goes on to clarify. No, he basically tells them, when I talk about God coming to free the oppressed and bless the poor, I’m not talking about you! I’m talking about God blessing the people you don’t like, the people you don’t want to be near, the people you are afraid of, the ones you call enemies.

Just to drive the point home, Jesus recalls a couple of familiar stories from the scripture where God gave a blessing not to Israel, but to Israel’s enemies. Then suddenly the hometown crowd is no longer happy with him. In the same way they were all initially excited about Jesus’ teaching, they are now all upset with him. Upset doesn’t capture their outrage, you see, because they turn into a lynch mob and try to kill him. This is Mary and Joseph’s boy—the village kid they’ve watched grow up—but he’s made them so mad they want him dead.

Their sudden violence is hard to understand. Why do they get so furious so fast? It’s because Jesus is redefining God’s love. It’s not just for you, he reminds them. It is for everybody. Everybody. Now Jesus brought up Israel’s enemies in the stories he told, but what if he were here today in our context and he talked about our enemies? What if he said something like: 

“American People, I know you are afraid, but your persistent desire to keep people who aren’t like you away, your disdain for the poor, the addicts, those in prison, those with a different sexual orientation, your discrimination against people of color, your attempts to keep Syrian refugees and Latin American immigrants out of your country, your hatred of Muslims, your desire to build walls instead of bridges—well that’s just wrong! That’s not God’s way. That will never be God’s way. God loves all people—even dangerous people. There are no exemptions. Listen to me: God loves all people and you have to deal with that!”

This is an offensive message, right? Can you hear the offense? It is truly outrageous! That's why it sends Jesus’ congregation into a rage and they try to throw him over the cliff of Narareth. See? Love is not a sentimental thing in the way Jesus lived it. There’s no Hallmark about it. It’s actually—dare I say it—a political thing. It calls us to take a stand, to move beyond our fear and to love in word and deed without discrimination. Do they deserve love? Doesn’t matter. Love them anyway. “Love,” as Mother Theresa used to say, “until it hurts.”

Now I have been your pastor for almost 15 years and I have been preaching this message of God’s radically inclusive love but I am going to apologize to you today. I’m afraid I haven’t preached it forcefully enough. If I had preached it like Jesus did, I bet you’d have thrown me into the river by now. That's how outrageous Jesus' message is. I’m afraid you think I’m nice. Well I’ve got news for you: I am trying to un-nice myself! As your pastor, I am called to a prophetical role. I’m bound by Christ to preach his message. When I took the vow of ordination that’s what I promised to do. So I’m standing with Christ and telling you that you’re all wrong. I am too. We do not love as we ought. We are so so discriminatory and afraid and so we only love the people we already like. That’s not love. That’s not the more excellent way. That’s just a clanging gong.

But love never fails. And that’s good news, since we’ve apparently gotten an F on the love exam. God’s love overrides our failure to love. In verse 12 of this chapter of I Corinthians, it asserts that we have already been fully known. God sees right through us and knows how much we have fallen short of our calling to love all people. The Lord knows and yet loves us anyway. That means you and I, despite our earnest attempts, are saved not by our works but by grace. We must always come back to that self-understanding that we are saved by grace. That is the only hope we have of widening our hearts. If God can love me, I can love others, I must love others.

Let us pray: O come, Holy Spirit, and fill our church anew, that we may stand together and we may courageously and actively love all people with your radical, all-inclusive, never-failing, beyond-measuring love. Amen.

© 2016 Laura Gentry