Luke 2:1-20
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
A few weeks ago I told some of you how I only discovered the author Madeleine L’Engle a couple of years ago. A storyteller best known for writing A Wrinkle in Time L’Engle also wrote this book, The Twenty-Four Days Before Christmas. In this story, a young awkward girl, a middle child named Vicky is going to be in the church Christmas play and she has been given the role of the angel who announces the birth of the baby Jesus. In Vicky’s own words, L’Engle tells us about her worries and fears and how she prepares. We also hear about her mother who is preparing for their own baby’s arrival.
On the twelfth day before Christmas Vicky is practicing her lines when one of the grown-ups wonders out loud if Vicky’s mother will be home at Christmas, or if she will be at the hospital with the new baby. And suddenly, all of the little girl’s expectations for the Christmas play, and for this new baby, are turned upside down, and she is afraid. She even tells her daddy, “Let’s not have the baby!”
On the twenty-third of December, the children have their dress rehearsal, everyone is beautifully prepared, and snow begins to fall, promising a white Christmas. But the snow doesn’t stop, and by the next day, on Christmas Eve, the snow is too deep for anyone to travel and the play is cancelled.
At the end of the story, Vicky and her family are at home together when their new baby arrives early Christmas morning, and after he is born, when Vicky looks out her window, she sees the bright Christmas star shining in the clear, dark sky.
Expectation, waiting, fear and wonder are all part of our Christmas stories too.
At the time of Jesus’ birth, ancient Israel had been expecting the promised Messiah or Savior to come and set them free from the oppressive Roman empire. They remembered the stories of David and they were waiting for a new Shepherd King to bring about a new realm or Kingdom here on earth and challenge the rulers and governors.
Truly, I tell you, hope is born on earth tonight as a tiny baby whose name is Jesus.
But the advent or arrival of this Messiah upends all expectations:
Instead of being clothed in majestic purple robes, he is wrapped in bands of simple cloth;
instead of laying in a gilded cradle, he lays in an animal trough,
and instead of being celebrated by royal officials,
his first visitors are humble shepherds who leave their flocks to go to Bethlehem to see what God has done.
Luke and Matthew are the only gospel writers who tell us anything about the birth of Jesus. Luke especially is careful to locate his gospel in history and draw our attention to the people to whom God first brings the Good News of Great Joy. Beginning with Mary and her relative Elizabeth and then the shepherds, Luke shows how God works in the lives of powerless people whom the world would like to ignore, turning the world upside down to invite us into a new Kingdom that is being born.
And the shepherds, like Mary before them, first are terrified, and then express wonder and amazement and in the end praise God for coming into their lives.
Tonight as we are here singing and listening again to the story of Jesus being born into the world,
we are filled with the hope found in faith in Christ Jesus,
and we are invited to share in all of the responses that the people felt that First Christmas:
to acknowledge our fears about what is happening in the world or things we do not understand;
to enjoy the wonder and awe of seeing God’s promise of salvation — forgiveness and grace — fulfilled;
to look upon the world amazed that God includes us in the
unfolding story of God’s Kingdom on earth; and,
to glorify and praise God even as we return to our lives and work in the days ahead.
Let us pray:
Holy God,
Thank you for the gift of Your Son Jesus, born this night to save us from our sin and sorrow;
May we know hope this Christmas as the Holy Spirit, the Wonderful Counselor, makes the good news known to us and through us.
Amen.
Monday, December 24, 2018
Sunday, December 23, 2018
Fourth Sunday of Advent
Luke 1:39-55
This Advent, as we have accompanied Jesus’ mother Mary through the season, our Advent reflection has had us questioning,
“How do we participate in bringing about the Kingdom of God here on earth?”
“How do we bear God into the world?”
and, “Who else is the Church beyond those of us who gather here this morning, whose names are already known to us?”
Responding to John’s call for repentance we remember that when we turn away from ourselves, we can see new ways to serve others.
So having spent time with Mary and with John, now we meet Mary’s relative Elizabeth, a woman who is married to a priest named Zechariah and lives in a village in the hill country of Judea, about ninety miles south of Nazareth.
Earlier in his gospel, Luke tells us that Elizabeth already is “in her old age.” She has lived her life childless in a time and place where a woman’s role was to bear children and barrenness was mis-understood as failure.[i] Perhaps there would have been whispers behind her back or she might have been openly scorned and excluded by other women in her village.
But now, like Mary, Elizabeth has conceived a child, and Luke says that she is in the sixth month of her pregnancy when we hear her respond to the surprise arrival of her relative Mary with joy and with celebration.
Luke says Elizabeth “exclaimed with a loud cry” when she heard Mary’s greeting. We don’t know why Elizbeth cries out; she could have been reacting to her sudden awareness of the Holy Spirit or to the baby’s kick in her womb. The Rev. Dr. Judith Jones, a religion professor at Wartburg College, suggests Elizabeth’s speech is prophetic; she proclaims what hasn’t been announced to anyone but Mary. She alone sees what others can’t or won’t; she recognizes that the child Mary carries is the promised Messiah and Lord.
Listening to the Holy Spirit, Elizabeth uses her prophetic voice to stand against social conventions that would have shunned an unwed pregnant woman when she declares that Mary is blessed. Welcoming Mary instead of shaming her, Elizabeth embodies the radical love that we receive first from God, embracing Mary instead of rejecting her.
Elizabeth’s story prompts more questions this Advent:
“How do we listen to the Spirit’s prompting in our lives?”
And, “How do we receive those who arrive on our doorstep unexpectedly?”
After Hurricane Florence crawled through the Carolinas in September, dumping feet of rain in places, one Myrtle Beach business owner who owns a motel in the resort town gave away one thousand hotel stays to provide shelter to neighbors and residents who were now homeless. CBS News updated the story just after Thanksgiving to share how his generosity has now been multiplied through donations from others that are providing assistance to people who are just beginning to get back on their feet. [ii]
Here in Shelby, at Aldersgate United Methodist volunteers work with the social workers in the schools to organize a “Christmas Store.” Similar to an angel tree where you can take a tag that lists several items for a child, the volunteers collect the wish lists and then they buy and sort items and invite families to come in and pick up their Christmas bags, but there are also books to go home with each child and parents have an opportunity both to shop for extra items that have been donated or collected, and they are invited to make a small donation that then helps another family. Last week when there was still snow on the ground a young mother arrived at the church without a coat and after some conversation with her, the volunteers learned the extent of the family’s needs. Our larger Shelby community, united in our faith in Jesus Christ, was able to help that family.
Elizabeth and Mary remind us that we do not journey through this life alone.
Maybe you are like Mary, frightened and astonished at the events in your life, and searching out a person you can trust. Or perhaps you are someone’s Elizabeth, the person to whom they can turn when the world has been upended, and you speak words of blessing and assurance to them, reminding them that God is still present.
Listening to the Holy Spirit, this Advent, may we be bound together by the love God has first given us and respond with joy and celebration to each person we meet.
Let us pray…[iii]
Merciful God, Thank you for embracing the faithful,
one generation to the next;
Thank you for the promise of Your Son coming as the light of the world at Christmas,
The incarnation of Your presence that restores us and saves us.
By Your Holy Spirit, strengthen us in our journey of faith that we will walk in the ways of peace, and be ready to greet the coming Lord with joy and celebration.
Amen.
[i] The Rev. Dr. Judith Jones, “Commentary on Luke 1:39-45 (46-55).” Luther Seminary WorkingPreacher.com, accessed 12/22/2018.
[ii] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jaret-hucks-midtown-inn-myrtle-beach-south-carolina-update/, accessed 12/22/2018
[iii] Adapted from Laughing Bird liturgical resources
This Advent, as we have accompanied Jesus’ mother Mary through the season, our Advent reflection has had us questioning,
“How do we participate in bringing about the Kingdom of God here on earth?”
“How do we bear God into the world?”
and, “Who else is the Church beyond those of us who gather here this morning, whose names are already known to us?”
Responding to John’s call for repentance we remember that when we turn away from ourselves, we can see new ways to serve others.
So having spent time with Mary and with John, now we meet Mary’s relative Elizabeth, a woman who is married to a priest named Zechariah and lives in a village in the hill country of Judea, about ninety miles south of Nazareth.
Earlier in his gospel, Luke tells us that Elizabeth already is “in her old age.” She has lived her life childless in a time and place where a woman’s role was to bear children and barrenness was mis-understood as failure.[i] Perhaps there would have been whispers behind her back or she might have been openly scorned and excluded by other women in her village.
But now, like Mary, Elizabeth has conceived a child, and Luke says that she is in the sixth month of her pregnancy when we hear her respond to the surprise arrival of her relative Mary with joy and with celebration.
Luke says Elizabeth “exclaimed with a loud cry” when she heard Mary’s greeting. We don’t know why Elizbeth cries out; she could have been reacting to her sudden awareness of the Holy Spirit or to the baby’s kick in her womb. The Rev. Dr. Judith Jones, a religion professor at Wartburg College, suggests Elizabeth’s speech is prophetic; she proclaims what hasn’t been announced to anyone but Mary. She alone sees what others can’t or won’t; she recognizes that the child Mary carries is the promised Messiah and Lord.
Listening to the Holy Spirit, Elizabeth uses her prophetic voice to stand against social conventions that would have shunned an unwed pregnant woman when she declares that Mary is blessed. Welcoming Mary instead of shaming her, Elizabeth embodies the radical love that we receive first from God, embracing Mary instead of rejecting her.
Elizabeth’s story prompts more questions this Advent:
“How do we listen to the Spirit’s prompting in our lives?”
And, “How do we receive those who arrive on our doorstep unexpectedly?”
After Hurricane Florence crawled through the Carolinas in September, dumping feet of rain in places, one Myrtle Beach business owner who owns a motel in the resort town gave away one thousand hotel stays to provide shelter to neighbors and residents who were now homeless. CBS News updated the story just after Thanksgiving to share how his generosity has now been multiplied through donations from others that are providing assistance to people who are just beginning to get back on their feet. [ii]
Here in Shelby, at Aldersgate United Methodist volunteers work with the social workers in the schools to organize a “Christmas Store.” Similar to an angel tree where you can take a tag that lists several items for a child, the volunteers collect the wish lists and then they buy and sort items and invite families to come in and pick up their Christmas bags, but there are also books to go home with each child and parents have an opportunity both to shop for extra items that have been donated or collected, and they are invited to make a small donation that then helps another family. Last week when there was still snow on the ground a young mother arrived at the church without a coat and after some conversation with her, the volunteers learned the extent of the family’s needs. Our larger Shelby community, united in our faith in Jesus Christ, was able to help that family.
Elizabeth and Mary remind us that we do not journey through this life alone.
Maybe you are like Mary, frightened and astonished at the events in your life, and searching out a person you can trust. Or perhaps you are someone’s Elizabeth, the person to whom they can turn when the world has been upended, and you speak words of blessing and assurance to them, reminding them that God is still present.
Listening to the Holy Spirit, this Advent, may we be bound together by the love God has first given us and respond with joy and celebration to each person we meet.
Let us pray…[iii]
Merciful God, Thank you for embracing the faithful,
one generation to the next;
Thank you for the promise of Your Son coming as the light of the world at Christmas,
The incarnation of Your presence that restores us and saves us.
By Your Holy Spirit, strengthen us in our journey of faith that we will walk in the ways of peace, and be ready to greet the coming Lord with joy and celebration.
Amen.
[i] The Rev. Dr. Judith Jones, “Commentary on Luke 1:39-45 (46-55).” Luther Seminary WorkingPreacher.com, accessed 12/22/2018.
[ii] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jaret-hucks-midtown-inn-myrtle-beach-south-carolina-update/, accessed 12/22/2018
[iii] Adapted from Laughing Bird liturgical resources
Sunday, December 16, 2018
Third Sunday of Advent
Luke 3:7-18
On Tuesday night I went to a yoga class and heard the instructor tell us several times, “Keep your eyes open.” That was new to me, and I thought, “Oh, ok. There must be some deep, philosophical reason we keep our eyes open. Something about remaining alert to movement or body awareness.”
After class, I asked someone, “Why did he tell us to keep our eyes open?” and she said, “Because you’re less likely to fall.” I laughed at myself because I had made it so much more complicated than it was. The teacher’s instruction was simple and practical – “Keep your eyes open so you don’t fall!”
As we hear John the Baptiser proclaiming his message of repentance in today’s gospel, it’s easy to hear his instruction to repent, and then wonder, like the people around him, “What then shall we do?”
After all, repentance is one of those church-y words that we don’t hear other places, so it can sound strange to our ears. It must be complicated, right?
But John’s answer to the crowds, the tax collectors and the soldiers is very simple and practical –
make sure no one is naked or hungry;
don’t exploit or bully people you encounter.
Repentance involves turning away from ourselves and toward others.
I hear John’s instruction echoed in Martin Luther’s explanation of the commandments that he writes in his Small Catechism; there as he explains the seventh commandment not to steal, he writes, “We should fear and love God that we may not take our neighbor's money or property, nor get them by false dealing, but help him to improve and protect his property and business.
Repentance doesn’t earn our salvation, God’s love or relationship with us; it is our response to God’s redeeming love and steadfast presence in our lives.
It is action or activity that is grounded in servanthood or service to others. Turning away from ourselves, our egos and self-interest, we see how we can live in service to others in our everyday lives.
So, a life lived in repentance doesn’t have to mean you are sitting like Jonah in sackcloth and ashes;[i]
it is the caregiver who sleeps lightly, listening for a cry for help or comfort from their charge;
it is the friend who calls to check to make sure you have what you need before the storm;
it is the volunteers working at odd hours and in raw temperatures to get us ready for Sunday morning;
and it is all of you collecting socks to keep our neighbors warm this winter.
On this third Sunday of Advent, John’s words call us to a life of active and vibrant faith that we live out in community. Not with perfection, but with repentance and with the redeeming grace that God provides us all.
Let us pray…[ii]
Holy and Redeeming God,
We give you thanks that you come to baptise us in your Spirit and fire, renewing us in love and banishing our fear,
so that we might praise your name forever
and draw freely from the well of your salvation.
Amen.
[i] Jonah 3:6
[ii] “Short Preface, Third Sunday in Advent”, Laughing Bird Liturgy, http://laughingbird.net/ComingWeeks.html, accessed 12/15/18
On Tuesday night I went to a yoga class and heard the instructor tell us several times, “Keep your eyes open.” That was new to me, and I thought, “Oh, ok. There must be some deep, philosophical reason we keep our eyes open. Something about remaining alert to movement or body awareness.”
After class, I asked someone, “Why did he tell us to keep our eyes open?” and she said, “Because you’re less likely to fall.” I laughed at myself because I had made it so much more complicated than it was. The teacher’s instruction was simple and practical – “Keep your eyes open so you don’t fall!”
As we hear John the Baptiser proclaiming his message of repentance in today’s gospel, it’s easy to hear his instruction to repent, and then wonder, like the people around him, “What then shall we do?”
After all, repentance is one of those church-y words that we don’t hear other places, so it can sound strange to our ears. It must be complicated, right?
But John’s answer to the crowds, the tax collectors and the soldiers is very simple and practical –
make sure no one is naked or hungry;
don’t exploit or bully people you encounter.
Repentance involves turning away from ourselves and toward others.
I hear John’s instruction echoed in Martin Luther’s explanation of the commandments that he writes in his Small Catechism; there as he explains the seventh commandment not to steal, he writes, “We should fear and love God that we may not take our neighbor's money or property, nor get them by false dealing, but help him to improve and protect his property and business.
Repentance doesn’t earn our salvation, God’s love or relationship with us; it is our response to God’s redeeming love and steadfast presence in our lives.
It is action or activity that is grounded in servanthood or service to others. Turning away from ourselves, our egos and self-interest, we see how we can live in service to others in our everyday lives.
So, a life lived in repentance doesn’t have to mean you are sitting like Jonah in sackcloth and ashes;[i]
it is the caregiver who sleeps lightly, listening for a cry for help or comfort from their charge;
it is the friend who calls to check to make sure you have what you need before the storm;
it is the volunteers working at odd hours and in raw temperatures to get us ready for Sunday morning;
and it is all of you collecting socks to keep our neighbors warm this winter.
On this third Sunday of Advent, John’s words call us to a life of active and vibrant faith that we live out in community. Not with perfection, but with repentance and with the redeeming grace that God provides us all.
Let us pray…[ii]
Holy and Redeeming God,
We give you thanks that you come to baptise us in your Spirit and fire, renewing us in love and banishing our fear,
so that we might praise your name forever
and draw freely from the well of your salvation.
Amen.
[i] Jonah 3:6
[ii] “Short Preface, Third Sunday in Advent”, Laughing Bird Liturgy, http://laughingbird.net/ComingWeeks.html, accessed 12/15/18
Sunday, December 9, 2018
Second Sunday of Advent
Luke 3:1-6
Last week on the first Sunday of Advent I invited you to listen to the voice of Mary this season. In Luke’s Gospel, the lowly servant girl is the first person on earth to use her voice to tell about God coming on earth — the first one to name and praise the great things that God has done. The pregnant young woman who physically carries Jesus into the world as a newborn also bears God into the world with her words.
And now, in today’s gospel reading, we hear another voice –John the Baptizer who is crying in the wilderness; quoting the prophet Isaiah; he, too, is a God-bearer, bringing the living God into the world
Both Mary and John use their voices to name who they know God to be and declaring the truth of the promises God makes and fulfills in our lives. We talk about this same pattern in the psalms where the songwriters first say who God is and then appeal to God to act in ways that reflect what they already know about God. These appeals testify to the steadfastness of God, “who was and who is and who is to come.” (Rev. 1:8)
Importantly, the emperors, governors and high priests — the politically and socially powerful people — who Luke names in the beginning of this passage are not the ones who are given the news of God’s coming reign; instead it is entrusted to Mary and now to John to proclaim the good news to those around them, at great cost.
Mary could have faced stoning for being pregnant with someone else’s child, and as Methodist pastor William Lamar IV (the 4th) wrote in a recent essay about John’s proclamation, “[Spiritual leaders who] leave the social order uninterrupted don’t get beheaded by the state.”
The disruptive gospel that Mary delivers is that God “has scattered the proud …; He has brought down the powerful…, and lifted up the lowly; He has filled the hungry with good things.” (Luke 1:51-53)
And while we will hear John’s message of repentance in more detail next Sunday, in verses 4 and 5, he declares that when the Lord comes, “every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth….”
Advent puts us on alert that changes are coming — that God’s kingdom coming on earth will look different!
Like Mary and John, as people of faith, we know God as One who listens to and responds to us. We are confident that God is steadfast and present with us. We believe that God’s kingdom coming on earth will mean the world is reconciled, not divided; peaceful not warring; and hope-filled, not despairing — changed from what we are experiencing now. We carry this vision for God’s kingdom into the world by our actions and with our words, not just because we want to be “nice” but because, just like Mary and John, as Christians we too are messengers for God, entrusted with a responsibility to bear God’s love and mercy into the world around us.
Surely, one of the ways we prepare for the Lord is in worship. Worship isn’t a spectator sport or a performance given for our entertainment; we are participants, active and invited to use all our senses to praise God through the music and the liturgy, taking in the colors of the seasons that we see on paraments and banners and remembering the light of God with candles. Surrounded by elements of God’s story, we are reminded that God’s story connects to our own story. Worship is also where we clear our minds of all the chatter and noise of the world and stop to listen to God. Sometimes we talk to God in prayer, but the silence we offer God is where we can hear God speak to us. Worship is where we are reconciled with each other in the sharing of the peace, which isn’t a casual greeting, but sharing the restorative gift of God’s own peace with one another. And, worship is where we lay down our burdens before God and receive the bread and the wine that nourishes us for the journey of discipleship. And then we are sent out into the world, as messengers and God-bearers.
Earlier in the week, I shared with our congregation council one question that has been on my mind since I was with the Synod Council last weekend, and that is, “How do we bear God to the people who aren’t in worship?” Another way to ask that is “Where do we show up and reveal God to others?” Or “How can we be the capital-C Church in the world, unafraid to love and live like Jesus?” Whether with our words or with our presence, we bear God into the world when we show up.
Before the weekend snowstorm, there was a meme, or picture, on Facebook that showed one of those electronic, programmable highway signs over a road; the sign read, “LIZZARD WARNING Saturday to Sunday” and it was captioned, “You had one job…”
In this life of faith, we have one job, and that is to carry the Good News into the world, even when it costly or disruptive.
Let us pray…
Holy and disruptive God,
Thank you for Your promised Son Jesus coming as our Savior and Lord;
Awaken us to the world’s deep need;
By Your Spirit help us use our voices to carry Your love, mercy and forgiveness into the world
Amen.
Last week on the first Sunday of Advent I invited you to listen to the voice of Mary this season. In Luke’s Gospel, the lowly servant girl is the first person on earth to use her voice to tell about God coming on earth — the first one to name and praise the great things that God has done. The pregnant young woman who physically carries Jesus into the world as a newborn also bears God into the world with her words.
And now, in today’s gospel reading, we hear another voice –John the Baptizer who is crying in the wilderness; quoting the prophet Isaiah; he, too, is a God-bearer, bringing the living God into the world
Both Mary and John use their voices to name who they know God to be and declaring the truth of the promises God makes and fulfills in our lives. We talk about this same pattern in the psalms where the songwriters first say who God is and then appeal to God to act in ways that reflect what they already know about God. These appeals testify to the steadfastness of God, “who was and who is and who is to come.” (Rev. 1:8)
Importantly, the emperors, governors and high priests — the politically and socially powerful people — who Luke names in the beginning of this passage are not the ones who are given the news of God’s coming reign; instead it is entrusted to Mary and now to John to proclaim the good news to those around them, at great cost.
Mary could have faced stoning for being pregnant with someone else’s child, and as Methodist pastor William Lamar IV (the 4th) wrote in a recent essay about John’s proclamation, “[Spiritual leaders who] leave the social order uninterrupted don’t get beheaded by the state.”
The disruptive gospel that Mary delivers is that God “has scattered the proud …; He has brought down the powerful…, and lifted up the lowly; He has filled the hungry with good things.” (Luke 1:51-53)
And while we will hear John’s message of repentance in more detail next Sunday, in verses 4 and 5, he declares that when the Lord comes, “every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth….”
Advent puts us on alert that changes are coming — that God’s kingdom coming on earth will look different!
Like Mary and John, as people of faith, we know God as One who listens to and responds to us. We are confident that God is steadfast and present with us. We believe that God’s kingdom coming on earth will mean the world is reconciled, not divided; peaceful not warring; and hope-filled, not despairing — changed from what we are experiencing now. We carry this vision for God’s kingdom into the world by our actions and with our words, not just because we want to be “nice” but because, just like Mary and John, as Christians we too are messengers for God, entrusted with a responsibility to bear God’s love and mercy into the world around us.
Surely, one of the ways we prepare for the Lord is in worship. Worship isn’t a spectator sport or a performance given for our entertainment; we are participants, active and invited to use all our senses to praise God through the music and the liturgy, taking in the colors of the seasons that we see on paraments and banners and remembering the light of God with candles. Surrounded by elements of God’s story, we are reminded that God’s story connects to our own story. Worship is also where we clear our minds of all the chatter and noise of the world and stop to listen to God. Sometimes we talk to God in prayer, but the silence we offer God is where we can hear God speak to us. Worship is where we are reconciled with each other in the sharing of the peace, which isn’t a casual greeting, but sharing the restorative gift of God’s own peace with one another. And, worship is where we lay down our burdens before God and receive the bread and the wine that nourishes us for the journey of discipleship. And then we are sent out into the world, as messengers and God-bearers.
Earlier in the week, I shared with our congregation council one question that has been on my mind since I was with the Synod Council last weekend, and that is, “How do we bear God to the people who aren’t in worship?” Another way to ask that is “Where do we show up and reveal God to others?” Or “How can we be the capital-C Church in the world, unafraid to love and live like Jesus?” Whether with our words or with our presence, we bear God into the world when we show up.
Before the weekend snowstorm, there was a meme, or picture, on Facebook that showed one of those electronic, programmable highway signs over a road; the sign read, “LIZZARD WARNING Saturday to Sunday” and it was captioned, “You had one job…”
In this life of faith, we have one job, and that is to carry the Good News into the world, even when it costly or disruptive.
Let us pray…
Holy and disruptive God,
Thank you for Your promised Son Jesus coming as our Savior and Lord;
Awaken us to the world’s deep need;
By Your Spirit help us use our voices to carry Your love, mercy and forgiveness into the world
Amen.
Sunday, December 2, 2018
First Sunday of Advent
Luke 1:25-55
It turns out that Thursday would have been author Madeleine L’Engle’s 100th birthday; L’Engle’s probably best known for Wrinkle in Time which won a Newberry Medal in 1962. While I had heard Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories and Charles Dickens’ Pickwick Papers as a child, I didn’t discover L’Engle’s books until about four years ago, and I’m delighted at how she weaves her understanding of God into her writing. She writes often about story as truth in the same way that we read parts of Scripture as myth or metaphor and yet hold them as sacred texts. But as I discover more of her writing, I can’t help wonder, “Who else have I missed?” “Whose voices haven’t I heard?”
In the same way, one of the questions I am learning to ask when I read Scripture is, “Whose story are we hearing?” and, perhaps even more importantly, “Whose story is missing?”
This week we begin a new church year, and a new year in the three-year cycle of the lectionary – the selection of Scripture texts we hear read in worship each week; in the coming year, often our Gospel texts will be from the Gospel of Luke.
But Luke’s gospel was written after the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D., and it shares the accounts of witnesses to Jesus’ ministry nearly forty years earlier. Scholars tell us that Luke had access to Mark’s gospel, and to Matthew’s, and to still another unnamed source, so we cannot simply listen to his gospel as though there’s only one person speaking.
Asking whose voice we hear in Scripture isn’t new. Preachers have crafted sermons that tell the Christmas story from the perspective of one of the shepherds or even one of the stable animals, and sermons have been preached in the voice of minor characters in the gospels like Simon of Cyrene who carried the cross on the road to Golgotha before the crucifixion. The ELCA’s Book of Faith initiative that began here in North Carolina eleven years ago teaches us to read Scripture with devotional, historical, literary and Lutheran lenses, and paying attention to the characters is part of that literary reading. Comparing and contrasting their experiences and understandings with our own, we discover meaning.[i]
More than any other Gospel writer, Luke included the voices of women in his gospel. Just in its first two chapters we meet Elizabeth who becomes the mother of John the Baptiser; Mary who becomes the mother of Jesus; and Anna, the prophetess who is in the Jerusalem temple when Jesus is presented there and there are still more women both in the remainder of his gospel and in the Acts of the Apostles which is the second volume of his gospel.
This Advent season, I invite you to listen to the voice of Mary.
You have a bulletin insert with the gospel text, or if you’d like to open up the Bibles in the pews, Luke’s gospel begins on p. 830. We meet Mary in verse 26 of the very first chapter.
Typically, Lutheranism doesn’t include the same kind of devotion to or reverence of Mary that is given by our Catholic brothers and sisters, but Mary’s story is still an important one for us to know. That’s part of why I have shared the weekly Advent devotion with you. “Mary’s Song” is the song of praise that we hear later in that chapter. We’ll hear the song during next Sunday’s Hanging of the Greens, and it’ll show up in our lectionary readings in the fourth week of Advent, too. But, as frequently as we hear her song in worship, I don’t know that we pay that much attention to Mary herself.
So, who was Mary? She wasn’t royalty and she wasn’t from a powerful family or city. She was an unmarried young woman in the unimportant village of Nazareth, in Galilee, several days travel north of Jerusalem.
What do you imagine what she looked like? Not from the museum portraits by Renaissance painters, or from Christmas pageants and plays, but in your own words and images?
I think she would have had olive or brown skin and dark hair, and she probably would have been barefoot. If she had a house, it would have had bare dirt floors and mudded walls. She wouldn’t have had fine robes; her clothes would have been simple and unadorned. She wouldn’t have had the chance for a formal education so she wouldn’t have been able to read or write; instead she would have learned what she needed to know at the knees of the mothers and grandmothers and aunties in her village.
What else do we know about Mary? In her song, she calls herself a lowly servant. We know that slavery and servitude were prevalent in the first century and more than thirty percent of the populace were slaves or bond servants.[ii]
And yet this unmarried pregnant young woman was entrusted to bring the Son of the Most High, the Son of God, into the world.
Like Mary, we are invited to participate in bringing about the Kingdom of God here on earth. God invites us to stand up and be alert to what God is doing.
Like Mary, we are invited to use our voices to praise God for the unexpected ways that God uses us and the unexpected places where God shows up in the world around us.
Like Mary, we are invited to speak with hopefulness into the uncertainty of the world around us.
Let us pray…
Holy God of righteousness,
Thank you for giving us the promise of a Savior, that gives us hope in a hurting world.
Thank you for inviting a lowly servant girl to bring the Savior into the world, shaking up our expectations and awakening us to the possibilities of your Kingdom on earth.
By your Holy Spirit, enliven our souls that we too may magnify Your love and grace in all we say and do.
We pray in the name of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
Amen.
[i] “Bible study methods”, Book of Faith Initiative. http://www.bookoffaith.org/biblemethods.html, accessed 12/1/2018
[ii] Merritt, Carol Howard. I Am Mary: Advent Devotional (Kindle Locations 120-121). CBP/Chalice Press. Kindle Edition.
It turns out that Thursday would have been author Madeleine L’Engle’s 100th birthday; L’Engle’s probably best known for Wrinkle in Time which won a Newberry Medal in 1962. While I had heard Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories and Charles Dickens’ Pickwick Papers as a child, I didn’t discover L’Engle’s books until about four years ago, and I’m delighted at how she weaves her understanding of God into her writing. She writes often about story as truth in the same way that we read parts of Scripture as myth or metaphor and yet hold them as sacred texts. But as I discover more of her writing, I can’t help wonder, “Who else have I missed?” “Whose voices haven’t I heard?”
In the same way, one of the questions I am learning to ask when I read Scripture is, “Whose story are we hearing?” and, perhaps even more importantly, “Whose story is missing?”
This week we begin a new church year, and a new year in the three-year cycle of the lectionary – the selection of Scripture texts we hear read in worship each week; in the coming year, often our Gospel texts will be from the Gospel of Luke.
But Luke’s gospel was written after the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D., and it shares the accounts of witnesses to Jesus’ ministry nearly forty years earlier. Scholars tell us that Luke had access to Mark’s gospel, and to Matthew’s, and to still another unnamed source, so we cannot simply listen to his gospel as though there’s only one person speaking.
Asking whose voice we hear in Scripture isn’t new. Preachers have crafted sermons that tell the Christmas story from the perspective of one of the shepherds or even one of the stable animals, and sermons have been preached in the voice of minor characters in the gospels like Simon of Cyrene who carried the cross on the road to Golgotha before the crucifixion. The ELCA’s Book of Faith initiative that began here in North Carolina eleven years ago teaches us to read Scripture with devotional, historical, literary and Lutheran lenses, and paying attention to the characters is part of that literary reading. Comparing and contrasting their experiences and understandings with our own, we discover meaning.[i]
More than any other Gospel writer, Luke included the voices of women in his gospel. Just in its first two chapters we meet Elizabeth who becomes the mother of John the Baptiser; Mary who becomes the mother of Jesus; and Anna, the prophetess who is in the Jerusalem temple when Jesus is presented there and there are still more women both in the remainder of his gospel and in the Acts of the Apostles which is the second volume of his gospel.
This Advent season, I invite you to listen to the voice of Mary.
You have a bulletin insert with the gospel text, or if you’d like to open up the Bibles in the pews, Luke’s gospel begins on p. 830. We meet Mary in verse 26 of the very first chapter.
Typically, Lutheranism doesn’t include the same kind of devotion to or reverence of Mary that is given by our Catholic brothers and sisters, but Mary’s story is still an important one for us to know. That’s part of why I have shared the weekly Advent devotion with you. “Mary’s Song” is the song of praise that we hear later in that chapter. We’ll hear the song during next Sunday’s Hanging of the Greens, and it’ll show up in our lectionary readings in the fourth week of Advent, too. But, as frequently as we hear her song in worship, I don’t know that we pay that much attention to Mary herself.
So, who was Mary? She wasn’t royalty and she wasn’t from a powerful family or city. She was an unmarried young woman in the unimportant village of Nazareth, in Galilee, several days travel north of Jerusalem.
What do you imagine what she looked like? Not from the museum portraits by Renaissance painters, or from Christmas pageants and plays, but in your own words and images?
I think she would have had olive or brown skin and dark hair, and she probably would have been barefoot. If she had a house, it would have had bare dirt floors and mudded walls. She wouldn’t have had fine robes; her clothes would have been simple and unadorned. She wouldn’t have had the chance for a formal education so she wouldn’t have been able to read or write; instead she would have learned what she needed to know at the knees of the mothers and grandmothers and aunties in her village.
What else do we know about Mary? In her song, she calls herself a lowly servant. We know that slavery and servitude were prevalent in the first century and more than thirty percent of the populace were slaves or bond servants.[ii]
And yet this unmarried pregnant young woman was entrusted to bring the Son of the Most High, the Son of God, into the world.
Like Mary, we are invited to participate in bringing about the Kingdom of God here on earth. God invites us to stand up and be alert to what God is doing.
Like Mary, we are invited to use our voices to praise God for the unexpected ways that God uses us and the unexpected places where God shows up in the world around us.
Like Mary, we are invited to speak with hopefulness into the uncertainty of the world around us.
Let us pray…
Holy God of righteousness,
Thank you for giving us the promise of a Savior, that gives us hope in a hurting world.
Thank you for inviting a lowly servant girl to bring the Savior into the world, shaking up our expectations and awakening us to the possibilities of your Kingdom on earth.
By your Holy Spirit, enliven our souls that we too may magnify Your love and grace in all we say and do.
We pray in the name of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
Amen.
[i] “Bible study methods”, Book of Faith Initiative. http://www.bookoffaith.org/biblemethods.html, accessed 12/1/2018
[ii] Merritt, Carol Howard. I Am Mary: Advent Devotional (Kindle Locations 120-121). CBP/Chalice Press. Kindle Edition.
Sunday, November 25, 2018
Christ the King Sunday
John 18:33-37
Today in the church year, we are celebrating The Feast of Christ the King, instituted by Pope Pius XI (11th) for the universal church in 1925. At the time, non-Christian dictatorships in Europe, like those of fascism and communism, were rising. Mimicking the ancient Roman emperors who had taken the title Messiah and acted as divine gods over their kingdoms, those dictators attempted to assert their authority over the Church and its people. Pope Pius connected the increasing denial of Christ as king to the rise of secularism; writing that Christ our Lord is given all power in heaven and on earth and therefore, nothing is exempt from his empire, the pope reminded Christians that Christ, not earthly rulers, must reign in our minds, in our wills, in our hearts and in our bodies (paragraph 33, Quas Primas).
Today is also the last Sunday of the church year marking the end of the long green season of Ordinary Time that we have enjoyed since the beginning of the summer. Next Sunday we enter the season of Advent and turn towards Bethlehem as we anticipate the birth of our true Messiah and King at Christmas.
When we name the infant Jesus as King, we assert his kingship and authority over every part of our lives, and we deny it to all other powers and principalities.
In today’s gospel reading, Jesus has been arrested and is on trial before Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, who is interrogating him. Pilate asks Jesus whether the charge that he is King of the Jews is true or not. “As Rome’s chief authority in Palestine, …Pilate is pressing Rome’s full authority against Jesus when he asks the question.”[i]
But Jesus doesn’t bow to the governor’s pressure or answer his question. In all four gospel accounts, Pilate questions Jesus but it is only here in the gospel of John that we get this extended conversation between the two men where Jesus contrasts His kingdom and truth with the world saying,
“Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”[ii]
The Christian life compels us to submit to the authority of the true God instead of listening to the myriad of competing voices that call out to us from across our lives.
Israel’s prophets had instructed God’s people to listen to the voice of the LORD but we are mistaken if we think God stopped speaking when the last of the prophets died.
In the first chapter of this gospel John the Baptizer shouts in the wilderness, calling us to repentance and baptism;
in the tenth the shepherd calls to her flock to save the ones who are lost; and,
in the twelfth, Lazarus is restored to life when Jesus calls his name.
Listening to Jesus’ voice, we hear the truth of God’s grace and love and the promise of life found in it.
In confession we hear the words, “God, who is rich in mercy, loved us even when we were dead in sin, and made us alive together with Christ.” and we recognize how God pours grace upon us and God’s mercies are given anew to us each day.
Around this Table, we hear how God sent to us the Son, who reached out to heal the sick and suffering, who preached good news to the poor, and who, on the cross, opened his arms to all” and we are wrapped in God’s great love for us all.
And through the bread and the wine that we share here we receive that grace and love in the sacramental elements of bread and wine, nourishing us for this life together.
On this Christ the King Sunday, the Good News of the Gospel is that Christ’s kingdom and rule has not ended and is not thwarted by the powers that we see here on earth. Every time we gather as people of faith, whether it’s in worship, in Bible study or fellowship, in our homes or on the sidewalks uptown, we are witnesses to the testimony Jesus gives because God continues to speak through God’s people to accomplish God’s purposes.
I know it’s not yet Advent but as I read this text and reflected on this day that asserts God’s authority over that of humankind, and what it means to listen to Jesus’ voice, I recalled the Christmas song “Do you Hear What I Hear?” In each of its verses the question that is asked changes; first, it is “Do you see what I see?” and then “Do you hear what I hear?” and finally, “Do you know what I know?” and then the song’s final verse calls out to hearers, “Listen to what I say.” My prayer for this season in our lives is that while the world is clamoring for our attention with brightly lit baubles and headlines continue to amplify the harshest rhetoric, we might pay attention to what God sees and hears and knows and listen more carefully to Jesus’ voice in our lives.
Let us pray…
Holy God, the Alpha and the Omega,
Thank you for your Son Jesus Christ,
Our Savior and shepherd and King;
Help us listen for his voice over the cacophony of noise around us,
And send us, strengthened by Your Spirit, into the world as faithful witnesses to the one who reigns forever. Amen.
[i] Bartlett, David L.. Feasting on the Word: Year B, Volume 4: Season after Pentecost 2 (Propers 17-Reign of Christ) (Feasting on the Word: Year B volume) (Kindle Locations 11946-11947). Presbyterian Publishing Corporation. Kindle Edition.
[ii] John 18:37, NRSV
Today in the church year, we are celebrating The Feast of Christ the King, instituted by Pope Pius XI (11th) for the universal church in 1925. At the time, non-Christian dictatorships in Europe, like those of fascism and communism, were rising. Mimicking the ancient Roman emperors who had taken the title Messiah and acted as divine gods over their kingdoms, those dictators attempted to assert their authority over the Church and its people. Pope Pius connected the increasing denial of Christ as king to the rise of secularism; writing that Christ our Lord is given all power in heaven and on earth and therefore, nothing is exempt from his empire, the pope reminded Christians that Christ, not earthly rulers, must reign in our minds, in our wills, in our hearts and in our bodies (paragraph 33, Quas Primas).
Today is also the last Sunday of the church year marking the end of the long green season of Ordinary Time that we have enjoyed since the beginning of the summer. Next Sunday we enter the season of Advent and turn towards Bethlehem as we anticipate the birth of our true Messiah and King at Christmas.
When we name the infant Jesus as King, we assert his kingship and authority over every part of our lives, and we deny it to all other powers and principalities.
In today’s gospel reading, Jesus has been arrested and is on trial before Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, who is interrogating him. Pilate asks Jesus whether the charge that he is King of the Jews is true or not. “As Rome’s chief authority in Palestine, …Pilate is pressing Rome’s full authority against Jesus when he asks the question.”[i]
But Jesus doesn’t bow to the governor’s pressure or answer his question. In all four gospel accounts, Pilate questions Jesus but it is only here in the gospel of John that we get this extended conversation between the two men where Jesus contrasts His kingdom and truth with the world saying,
“Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”[ii]
The Christian life compels us to submit to the authority of the true God instead of listening to the myriad of competing voices that call out to us from across our lives.
Israel’s prophets had instructed God’s people to listen to the voice of the LORD but we are mistaken if we think God stopped speaking when the last of the prophets died.
In the first chapter of this gospel John the Baptizer shouts in the wilderness, calling us to repentance and baptism;
in the tenth the shepherd calls to her flock to save the ones who are lost; and,
in the twelfth, Lazarus is restored to life when Jesus calls his name.
Listening to Jesus’ voice, we hear the truth of God’s grace and love and the promise of life found in it.
In confession we hear the words, “God, who is rich in mercy, loved us even when we were dead in sin, and made us alive together with Christ.” and we recognize how God pours grace upon us and God’s mercies are given anew to us each day.
Around this Table, we hear how God sent to us the Son, who reached out to heal the sick and suffering, who preached good news to the poor, and who, on the cross, opened his arms to all” and we are wrapped in God’s great love for us all.
And through the bread and the wine that we share here we receive that grace and love in the sacramental elements of bread and wine, nourishing us for this life together.
On this Christ the King Sunday, the Good News of the Gospel is that Christ’s kingdom and rule has not ended and is not thwarted by the powers that we see here on earth. Every time we gather as people of faith, whether it’s in worship, in Bible study or fellowship, in our homes or on the sidewalks uptown, we are witnesses to the testimony Jesus gives because God continues to speak through God’s people to accomplish God’s purposes.
I know it’s not yet Advent but as I read this text and reflected on this day that asserts God’s authority over that of humankind, and what it means to listen to Jesus’ voice, I recalled the Christmas song “Do you Hear What I Hear?” In each of its verses the question that is asked changes; first, it is “Do you see what I see?” and then “Do you hear what I hear?” and finally, “Do you know what I know?” and then the song’s final verse calls out to hearers, “Listen to what I say.” My prayer for this season in our lives is that while the world is clamoring for our attention with brightly lit baubles and headlines continue to amplify the harshest rhetoric, we might pay attention to what God sees and hears and knows and listen more carefully to Jesus’ voice in our lives.
Let us pray…
Holy God, the Alpha and the Omega,
Thank you for your Son Jesus Christ,
Our Savior and shepherd and King;
Help us listen for his voice over the cacophony of noise around us,
And send us, strengthened by Your Spirit, into the world as faithful witnesses to the one who reigns forever. Amen.
[i] Bartlett, David L.. Feasting on the Word: Year B, Volume 4: Season after Pentecost 2 (Propers 17-Reign of Christ) (Feasting on the Word: Year B volume) (Kindle Locations 11946-11947). Presbyterian Publishing Corporation. Kindle Edition.
[ii] John 18:37, NRSV
Sunday, October 28, 2018
Reformation Sunday
John 8:31-36
On this Reformation Sunday, we celebrate the freedom that we have in faith,
the very same freedom that the apostles claimed even when they were imprisoned for witnessing to “all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day he was taken up to heaven” (Acts 1:1-2), and, the very same freedom that the Augustinian monk Martin Luther seized when he criticized the Catholic Church for false teaching and abuses of power.
But, dear Church, dear Church, please hear me when I say that this “freedom” is not the same freedom that western culture, and especially our American culture, has embraced; the freedom we have through Jesus Christ is not unfettered individual choice.
It is not the freedom to construct and deliver explosives that can kill or maim, regardless of how much you dislike a person, resent their power and position, or disagree with their political viewpoints.
And it is not the freedom to violently act out against a group of people in their place of worship and murder men and women who believe differently about who God is.
The freedom we have in faith is a freedom for the neighbor and the stranger.
Yesterday afternoon, after a man killed eleven people and injured others at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, these words were lifted up by colleagues:
Goodness is stronger than evil;
love is stronger than hate;
light is stronger than darkness;
life is stronger than death;
vict'ry is ours, vict'ry is ours,
through God who loves us.
Vict'ry is ours, vict'ry is ours,
through God who loves us.
Text from An African Prayer Book selected by Desmond Tutu, © 1995 by Desmond Tutu.
That hymn, “Goodness is Stronger than Evil” was written by Archbishop Desmond Tutu in 1995 when he was chairing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that examined the atrocities committed by both pro- and anti-apartheid groups during the period of white minority rule in South Africa in the second half of the 20th century. Unlike Nelson Mandela who was jailed for 27 years for his leadership in the African National Congress, Tutu lived and worked in Johannesburg throughout the 70s and 80s advocating for change by building consensus in his community. Working from within the Anglican church first as the dean of the cathedral and then as Bishop he also worked in the secular world to address injustice and in 1984 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his achievements.
Tutu’s witness embodies the freedom we have in faith that is not self-centered or motivated by self-interest but rooted in love for the neighbor and the stranger.
But all too often, we exercise our freedom at the expense of others and when we do that, we are not free at all, but captive to sin.
In today’s gospel, Jesus is telling the Jewish leaders about this freedom that is found in faith when,
as if their ancestors had never fled Pharaoh’s Egypt,
or wandered in the wilderness for forty years,
or been exiled to Babylon and later persecuted by the Romans, they said, “Wait, we've never been slaves! We are descendants of Abraham.” (v. 33)
Comfortable and complacent now, they had forgotten where their very own grandfathers and great-grandfathers came from and how their own ancestors suffered. They were oblivious to the weight of sin they carried and to the ways they remained bound and shackled.
Jesus tries again, saying, “everyone who sins [which, by the way, is all of us] is a slave to sin.” (v. 34) And then, again he names that freedom from sin that is the promise received through faith.
The Prayer of the Day we said earlier in worship was inspired not by Desmond Tutu, but by another Anglican priest, a 17th century Archbishop of Canterbury named William Laud. In its words, we called on God, remembering that Jesus continues to free us from our sin.
In the petitions we asked for God’s promised redemption, publicly and institutionally, in the capital-c “Church”
where it is corrupt – as in the decades of sexual misconduct by Catholic priests that was first covered up and now is being addressed there and across denominations to ensure the safety of children and adults;
We asked for God’s promised redemption, where there is error – on Saturday, the family of Matthew Shepard, the young gay man who was killed in Wyoming twenty years ago in a hate crime, inurned his ashes at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. in a reversal of (again) the capital-c “Church"’s historic position rejecting LGBTQ people.
We asked for God’s provision for the Church and among its people where it is in need – not because we live in fear of what we do not have or cannot see, but because we trust God that will equip us for the ministry we are called into for this time and place.
And we asked for God to unify the world where it is divided – as Bishop Elizabeth Eaton wrote last night,
Many of you will remember Pastor Dee Liss who preached here in the summer; her husband Howard, one of the co-owners of Bicycles here in Shelby, attends Temple Beth El in Charlotte with his father, and last night, I asked their permission to write notes of encouragement to their congregation. So on your pews you have notes like this and you have pens. I ask you now to write words of encouragement and prayers for their community. If you’d like to just sign your name or our church’s name, that’s ok, too. I will send our notes to their rabbis this week.
Thank you.
Now, in a tradition that reaches back through generations, may we ask for God’s ever-reforming presence and power to accomplish what God has begun in us.
Let us pray… [1]
Almighty God, through the death of your Son you have destroyed sin and death. Through his resurrection you have restored innocence and eternal life. We who are delivered from the power of the devil may live in your kingdom. Give us grace that we may believe this with our whole heart. Enable us, always, to steadfastly praise and thank you in this faith, through your Son Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Amen.
[1] “Martin Luther’s Prayer for strengthened faith,” in Herbert F. Brokering. Luther’s Prayers.
On this Reformation Sunday, we celebrate the freedom that we have in faith,
the very same freedom that the apostles claimed even when they were imprisoned for witnessing to “all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day he was taken up to heaven” (Acts 1:1-2), and, the very same freedom that the Augustinian monk Martin Luther seized when he criticized the Catholic Church for false teaching and abuses of power.
But, dear Church, dear Church, please hear me when I say that this “freedom” is not the same freedom that western culture, and especially our American culture, has embraced; the freedom we have through Jesus Christ is not unfettered individual choice.
It is not the freedom to construct and deliver explosives that can kill or maim, regardless of how much you dislike a person, resent their power and position, or disagree with their political viewpoints.
And it is not the freedom to violently act out against a group of people in their place of worship and murder men and women who believe differently about who God is.
The freedom we have in faith is a freedom for the neighbor and the stranger.
Yesterday afternoon, after a man killed eleven people and injured others at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, these words were lifted up by colleagues:
Goodness is stronger than evil;
love is stronger than hate;
light is stronger than darkness;
life is stronger than death;
vict'ry is ours, vict'ry is ours,
through God who loves us.
Vict'ry is ours, vict'ry is ours,
through God who loves us.
Text from An African Prayer Book selected by Desmond Tutu, © 1995 by Desmond Tutu.
That hymn, “Goodness is Stronger than Evil” was written by Archbishop Desmond Tutu in 1995 when he was chairing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that examined the atrocities committed by both pro- and anti-apartheid groups during the period of white minority rule in South Africa in the second half of the 20th century. Unlike Nelson Mandela who was jailed for 27 years for his leadership in the African National Congress, Tutu lived and worked in Johannesburg throughout the 70s and 80s advocating for change by building consensus in his community. Working from within the Anglican church first as the dean of the cathedral and then as Bishop he also worked in the secular world to address injustice and in 1984 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his achievements.
Tutu’s witness embodies the freedom we have in faith that is not self-centered or motivated by self-interest but rooted in love for the neighbor and the stranger.
But all too often, we exercise our freedom at the expense of others and when we do that, we are not free at all, but captive to sin.
In today’s gospel, Jesus is telling the Jewish leaders about this freedom that is found in faith when,
as if their ancestors had never fled Pharaoh’s Egypt,
or wandered in the wilderness for forty years,
or been exiled to Babylon and later persecuted by the Romans, they said, “Wait, we've never been slaves! We are descendants of Abraham.” (v. 33)
Comfortable and complacent now, they had forgotten where their very own grandfathers and great-grandfathers came from and how their own ancestors suffered. They were oblivious to the weight of sin they carried and to the ways they remained bound and shackled.
Jesus tries again, saying, “everyone who sins [which, by the way, is all of us] is a slave to sin.” (v. 34) And then, again he names that freedom from sin that is the promise received through faith.
The Prayer of the Day we said earlier in worship was inspired not by Desmond Tutu, but by another Anglican priest, a 17th century Archbishop of Canterbury named William Laud. In its words, we called on God, remembering that Jesus continues to free us from our sin.
In the petitions we asked for God’s promised redemption, publicly and institutionally, in the capital-c “Church”
where it is corrupt – as in the decades of sexual misconduct by Catholic priests that was first covered up and now is being addressed there and across denominations to ensure the safety of children and adults;
We asked for God’s promised redemption, where there is error – on Saturday, the family of Matthew Shepard, the young gay man who was killed in Wyoming twenty years ago in a hate crime, inurned his ashes at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. in a reversal of (again) the capital-c “Church"’s historic position rejecting LGBTQ people.
We asked for God’s provision for the Church and among its people where it is in need – not because we live in fear of what we do not have or cannot see, but because we trust God that will equip us for the ministry we are called into for this time and place.
And we asked for God to unify the world where it is divided – as Bishop Elizabeth Eaton wrote last night,
“We are reminded that hate-filled violence knows no bounds – whether a Sikh Temple in Oak Creek, [Wisconsin], a Christian church in Charleston, [South Carolina] or a Jewish synagogue in Pittsburgh [Pennsylvania]. As people of faith, we are bound together not only in our mourning, but also in our response.”Today, we can respond by claiming our freedom in Christ to love the neighbor and stranger.
Many of you will remember Pastor Dee Liss who preached here in the summer; her husband Howard, one of the co-owners of Bicycles here in Shelby, attends Temple Beth El in Charlotte with his father, and last night, I asked their permission to write notes of encouragement to their congregation. So on your pews you have notes like this and you have pens. I ask you now to write words of encouragement and prayers for their community. If you’d like to just sign your name or our church’s name, that’s ok, too. I will send our notes to their rabbis this week.
Thank you.
Now, in a tradition that reaches back through generations, may we ask for God’s ever-reforming presence and power to accomplish what God has begun in us.
Let us pray… [1]
Almighty God, through the death of your Son you have destroyed sin and death. Through his resurrection you have restored innocence and eternal life. We who are delivered from the power of the devil may live in your kingdom. Give us grace that we may believe this with our whole heart. Enable us, always, to steadfastly praise and thank you in this faith, through your Son Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Amen.
[1] “Martin Luther’s Prayer for strengthened faith,” in Herbert F. Brokering. Luther’s Prayers.
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