Transfiguration

Mateo 17:1-9

I preached this sermon in the Spanish service; the English translation is below. 

Oremos…

Sean gratos los dichos de mi boca y las meditaciónes de nuestros corazónes delante de ti, oh Jehovah, Roca mía y Redentor mío. Amén. (Psalm 19:14 RVA)

Durante las últimas tres semanas, hemos estado escuchando a Jesús predicar a sus discípulos lo que llamamos el Sermón de la Montaña. Hay mucho ministerio que sucede entre ese primer sermón y el Evangelio de hoy. Pero justo antes de esto en el evangelio de Mateo está la escena donde Pedro confiesa que Jesús es el Mesías, Jesús da una predicción de su pasión – o muerte – y Pedro lo reprende. Es donde Jesús le dice a su audiencia,

“Si alguno quiere hacerse discípulo mío, niéguese a sí mismo, tome su cruz y sígame”. (Matt. 16:24)

Entonces sus discípulos saben que seguir a Jesús será costoso: en comodidad, en seguridad y en sacrificio.

Y luego, en el Evangelio de hoy, según Mateo, apenas seis días después de los eventos de esa confesión y reprensión, Jesús, Pedro, Jacobo y Juan suben a una montaña alta donde presencian la transfiguración de Jesús. Es una epifanía, un evento majestuoso y misterioso que revela y manifiesta a Dios.

¿Y no es tentador querer quedarse en la cima de la montaña, en este momento de gloria extática?

Ese anhelo es lo que provoca la entusiasta pregunta de Pedro acerca de quedarse allí y construir viviendas o tiendas de campaña en la cima de la montaña. Pedro, el discípulo bien intencionado pero a veces tambaleante, todavía no entiende. En el Antiguo Testamento, Dios estaba presente en la tienda o tabernáculo (Éxodo 26), pero en Jesús, Dios está con nosotros dondequiera que estemos.

Recuerde, hemos dicho que, especialmente para Mateo, Jesús es el nuevo Moisés. Él es el cumplimiento tanto de la Ley como de los Profetas.

En afirmación, Dios habla desde una nube brillante, anunciando que Jesús es el propio Hijo de Dios, el Amado, con quien Dios está complacido.

No escuchamos a menudo hoy en día acerca de Dios hablando audiblemente, ¿verdad?

Pensamos en ello como algo que sucedía más a menudo en el antiguo Israel. Pero en el Antiguo Testamento, los textos que los discípulos habrían conocido, Dios habló en la creación y a Noé, Abraham, Jacob, Moisés y luego a Gedeón, y finalmente Dios habló a través de los profetas. No era algo cotidiano. Y aunque las palabras son las mismas que se pronunciaron en el río Jordán cuando Jesús fue bautizado por su primo Juan, no estamos seguros de quién escuchó esa proclamación.

Entonces, no es de extrañar que Pedro, Jacobo y Juan tengan miedo.

La parte del Evangelio de hoy que me llamó la atención fue cómo Jesús respondió a sus miedos. Mateo nos dice,

Jesús se acercó y los tocó, diciendo: "Levántense y no tengan miedo". (Mateo 17:7)

Escuchamos esas palabras “no tengáis miedo” una y otra vez en las Escrituras. Son dichos por Dios a Abram y Moisés y Josué y repetidos por los profetas y más tarde por los ángeles del Señor enviados a José, María y Zacarías. Jesús mismo las dice a los discípulos cuando está enseñando y sanando y haciendo milagros.

En cada instancia, Dios afirma la presencia de Dios con nosotros en medio del cambio, el miedo, la incertidumbre y las pruebas.

Pero aquí la seguridad no está solo en las palabras que Jesús habla.

Mateo nos dice que Jesús tocó a los discípulos. Las otras ocasiones en que Jesús toca a alguien en el evangelio de Mateo están en las historias de sanidad:

toca al leproso, y queda limpio;

toca a la suegra de Pedro, y ella se cura de la fiebre;

toca a los ciegos, y pueden ver.

Se nos recuerda que la fe no es solo una cuestión de lo que creemos, con nuestras mentes, sino de lo que sabemos en nuestros corazones. El amor de Dios por nosotros es encarnacional: amor con piel. Plenamente divino y plenamente humano, Jesús disipa nuestros miedos, nos consuela y nos alienta.

Mientras reflexionamos sobre esta historia de Jesús iluminado por la presencia y la Palabra de Dios, espero que podamos escuchar la seguridad de que Dios está siempre con nosotros, especialmente cuando tenemos miedo o estamos inseguros.

Durante la Cuaresma, que comienza esta semana con el Miércoles de Ceniza, podemos vislumbrar la gloria de Dios, pero la mayor parte del tiempo estaremos en el desierto con Jesús, y la gloria visible de Dios será eclipsada por la tentación y el sufrimiento de Cristo.

Que nuestra fe sea sostenida por nuestra confianza en que Dios está con nosotros.

Amén.

-----

Matthew 17:1-9

For the last three weeks, we have been listening to Jesus preach to his disciples what we call the Sermon on the Mount. There’s a lot of ministry that happens between that first sermon and today’s Gospel. But just before this in Matthew’s gospel is the scene where Peter confesses Jesus is the Messiah, Jesus gives a prediction of his passion – or death – and Peter rebukes him. It’s where Jesus tell his audience,

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” (Matt. 16:24)

So his disciples know that following Jesus will be costly – in comfort, in security, and in sacrifice.

And then, in today’s Gospel – according to Matthew, a mere six days after the events of that confession and rebuke - Jesus, Peter, James and John go up a high mountain where they witness the transfiguration of Jesus. It is an epiphany – a majestic and mysterious event revealing and manifesting God.

And isn’t it tempting to want to stay on the mountaintop, in this moment of ecstatic glory?

That yearning is what prompts Peter’s enthusiastic question about staying there and building dwellings or tents on the mountaintop. Peter, the well-intentioned but sometimes stumbling, disciple doesn’t yet understand. In the Old Testament, God was present in the tent or tabernacle (Exodus 26), but in Jesus, God is with us wherever we are.

Remember, we’ve said that, especially for Matthew, Jesus is the new Moses. He is the fulfillment of both the Law and the Prophets. In affirmation, God speaks from a bright cloud, announcing that Jesus is God’s own Son, the Beloved, with whom God is well-pleased.

We don’t often hear today about God speaking audibly, do we?

We think of it as something that happened more often in ancient Israel. But in the Old Testament– the texts that the disciples would have known –God spoke at creation and to Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Moses and later to Gideon, and finally God spoke through the prophets. It was not an everyday occurrence. And while the words are the same as what was spoken at the Jordan River when Jesus was baptized by his cousin John, we aren’t sure who heard that proclamation.

So, it isn’t surprising then that Peter, James and John are afraid.

The part of today’s Gospel that stood out to me was how Jesus responded to their fears. Matthew tells us,

“Jesus came and touched them, saying, "Get up and do not be afraid.” (Matt. 17:7)

We hear those words “do not be afraid” again and again in Scripture. They are spoken by God to Abram and Moses and Joshua and repeated by the prophets and later by angels of the Lord sent to Joseph, to Mary and to Zechariah. Jesus himself says them to the disciples when he is teaching and healing and performing miracles.

At each instance, God affirms God’s presence with us in the midst of change, fear, uncertainty and trials.

But here the assurance isn’t only in the words that Jesus speaks.

Matthew tells us that Jesus touched the disciples. The other times where Jesus touches someone in Matthew’s gospel are in the healing stories:

he touches the leper, and he is cleaned;

he touches Peter’s mother-in-law, and she is healed from fever;

he touches the blind men, and they can see.

We are reminded that faith is not only a matter of what we believe, with our minds, but what we know in our hearts. God’s love for us is incarnational – love with skin on it. Fully divine and fully human, Jesus dispels our fears, comforts us and encourages us.

As we reflect on this story of Jesus being illuminated by God’s presence and Word, I hope we can hear the assurance that God is with us always, especially when we are afraid or uncertain.

During Lent, which begins this week with Ash Wednesday, we may have glimpses of the glory of God, but most of the time we will be in the wilderness with Jesus, and the visible glory of God will be overshadowed by the temptation and suffering of Christ. May our faith be sustained by our confidence that God is with us.

Amen.

Epiphany 6A

Matthew 5:21-37

Today’s Gospel is one of those passages where I find myself wrestling with the text to find the Good News. Out of context all we hear is Jesus talking about prison, adultery, divorce, dismemberment, sin and hell.

It hardly makes us eager to keep listening.

But before you shut down or tune out, let’s take a step back and review what’s happening in the text.

This is the third week that we are hearing parts of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. It’s the first of five speeches by Jesus that Matthew includes in his gospel, and it’s the one that gives us some of our most quotable words by Jesus. The Sermon on the Mount gives us the Beatitudes (Mt. 5:1-12) and the words about disciples being the salt of the earth (5:13) and the light of the world that shines for others. (5:14) It is where Jesus teaches his disciples how to pray (6:9-13) and where we hear the instruction that “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (6:21)

Throughout this sermon, Jesus is teaching his disciples how to understand the Scripture they have been taught and the explanations they have been given.

And last week’s gospel ended with Jesus telling the disciples that he did not come to abolish the law of the prophets, but to fulfill it (5:17) and then he called them to a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees – the religious teachers and leaders in Jerusalem. (5:20)

It doesn’t make the words any easier to hear, but it does help us understand why Jesus is tackling difficult conversations. Four times in today’s Gospel, Jesus says, “You have heard that it was said” followed by one of the commandments that we first hear in Exodus 20 or, in the case of divorce, in Deuteronomy 24. And then, in each case, Jesus says, “But I say to you.”

Each time, Jesus takes a commandment that can be followed to the letter of the Law and makes it a matter of the heart. After all, the Commandments were never simply a list of rules that say what not to do; they were given to teach us how to be in relationship with God and with each other.

Remember as Jesus is teaching about the Law, he is not replacing it, so we shouldn’t hear correction in his words. Instead, what Jesus is revealing is that the Law is more expansive than it first appears.

He begins with murder, suggesting that murder is not only physically and mortally wounding another person. Martin Luther’s explanation of the fifth commandment in the Small Catechism reflects this, saying, “we neither endanger nor harm the lives of our neighbors, but instead help and support them in all of life's needs.”

Jesus encourages self-examination. When we let resentments or anger fester, we are guilty. Jesus invites us to acknowledge when a chasm exists between us and another person, or where we are withholding our forgiveness. And then he urges us to reconciliation.

And before we begin to object about whether it is fair or deserved, we can remember Jesus’ own words at his crucifixion, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34)

As we continue to reflect on Jesus’ words, it is important to say out loud here that forgiveness and even reconciliation does not mean that you are ever expected to remain in relationships or circumstances that are abusive or dangerous.

When Jesus talks about adultery and then divorce, he is speaking at a time when husbands could divorce wives for trivial reasons, when women had no rights and when women who were divorced were scandalized and often left without financial support. As he talks about adultery and divorce, he is urging honesty in our relationships and concern for the other person’s welfare.

In every example, Jesus speaks against our human instinct to manipulate God’s Word to make it easier to follow or to lower the cost of discipleship.

And in every example, Jesus invites us to look beyond how we are or aren’t following the Law and look at how our actions are hurting or loving others.

In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul reminds the church there that “we are God’s servants, working together” and “we have a common purpose”: that people would know God’s love. (1 Cor. 3:8-9) We are being called to live according to God’s Word in ways that fulfill the Law, not only in letter, but in our hearts.

The Good News in the difficult conversations Jesus has with his followers is that Jesus doesn’t look at us and say, “Y’all missed the mark; I’m going to start over with different people.” Instead, in God’s abundant mercy, we’re forgiven, and if that wasn’t enough, he teaches and gives us this Word of God and Word of Life, that we may learn and draw near to God, always seeking understanding.

Let us pray…

Good and gracious God,

We give you thanks for Your grace, that you do not turn away from us.

We give you thanks for your Son Jesus who shows us how great your love is, and invites us to love others as You love us.

Encourage us to be honest, knowing You already know our hearts and minds. Help us confess our anger and resentments and seek reconciliation.

Enable us by your Holy Spirit to live according to your will, trusting in your Word and promises for us.

We pray in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

Epiphany 4A

Matthew 5:1-12

One of my preaching professors reminded us to preach grace because we are all too good at preaching law for ourselves. And today’s Gospel is no exception. We live in a world dominated by rules and condemnation and motivated by rewards, so immediately, we hear Jesus’ teaching as a to-do list – a moral or ethical checklist we should pursue if we want to have God’s blessing.

But God’s blessing isn’t anything we can earn – that’s what makes it God’s action for us; there’s nothing we can do to earn God’s love and nothing that can separate us from God’s love.

So if that’s not what Jesus is on about, what is he saying?

It’s helpful to remember that, for Matthew, Jesus is the one fulfilling all righteousness, the Messiah of whom the ancient prophets told. In his Gospel, Matthew draws parallels between Moses and Jesus. And scholars draw parallels to the traditional “five books of Moses” or the Pentateuch and the five speeches by Jesus that Matthew records.

Our gospel today begins with the first twelve verses of his initial sermon, the Sermon on the Mount. Following the parallel to Moses, this speech corresponds with Genesis, when God spoke creation into being. Only now, Jesus is speaking the new creation, the kingdom of heaven, into being.

In these first twelve verses, known as the Beatitudes, Jesus is addressing the disciples, but he’s not talking about the disciples. Instead, he is drawing attention to the reversal that God is bringing about in the world.

In ancient Israel, suffering, disease and poverty were all considered to be signs of being out of God’s favor or at least signals that the person had some fatal flaw or made some irredeemable mistake.

In contrast in the Roman Empire, divine blessing belonged to those who were members of the Roman Senate, soldiers and kings. Divinity was something bestowed on, or withheld from, leaders after their death. The Empire celebrated loyalty, victory and conquest, and proclaimed that the Roman Empire was eternal and everlasting. The images of these values were everywhere, in sculpture and art, even on the coins used in commerce.

So it is against this religious and imperial landscape that Jesus goes up a mountain and begins to teach.

And immediately he tells his followers that the ones who have God’s blessing, the ones whom God honors, are not the religious leaders, the powerful politicians or the battle proven conquerors but the meek and the merciful. They are not the ones who have demonstrated loyalty to the emperor, but those who have been persecuted and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. They are not those whose peace comes from the Pax Romana – the “Roman Peace” inaugurated by Augustus – but the peacemakers who work for shalom, the well-being and peace of others. And finally, the blessed are not those who propagate the Empire, but those who are pure in Spirit, or singularly focused on God.

What Jesus describes is what the kingdom of heaven, here on earth and among us, looks like.

And, because we live in the “already but not yet”, what he describes are the marks of what will be when God’s will is accomplished. And it is a transformation that only God can initiate.

In the last two verses of our gospel reading, Jesus changes from saying “Blessed are they” to saying, “Blessed are you.” It’s one word but with that one word, Jesus makes it clear that while this transformational coming of God’s kingdom is God’s will and work, his followers have a role, and it’s not always going to be comfortable. 

The words from the psalmist and the prophet Micah guide us here. What will please the Lord?Lead a blameless life. Speak truth from your heart.
Do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with your God.

Comparing his followers to those ancient truth-tellers, Jesus invites us all to participate in this new creation, this new way of being in relationship and community with each other. In the same way that Moses brought the ten commandments to the Israelites and told them how God envisioned them in relationship with God and with each other, Jesus tells us how to see the people in our lives, community and world: to see them through God’s eyes, with God’s blessing upon them, even, and perhaps especially, when the rest of the world won’t. 

Recently in confirmation, our middle-school students used their own words to write their own beatitudes. Some of the ones they wrote said,

“blessed are the ones who aren’t as fortunate as others for they will always be in God’s presence”;

“blessed are those who grieve because they realize what is most important in life”;

“blessed are those who are bullied for they will be strengthened by God”; and

“blessed are those starving for God’s grace for they will be overflowing in love”.

God wants us, God’s children, to imitate Jesus when we look at God’s people and show others how God’s blessing or honor, and God’s love, flood the world, soaking each one of us in God’s grace.

As we go into the world today and this week, may we have our eyes opened to see as God does.

Let us pray…

Good and gracious God,

We give you thanks for your Son Jesus who shows us your love.

We thank you for your grace, for your forgiveness, that we cannot earn, and we thank you for your promise that nothing separates us from you.

Open our eyes to see our siblings and neighbors as blessed and honored in your sight.

We pray in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

Epiphany 3A

Matthew 4:12-23

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

A popular question for pastors is “What is your call story?”

It may be surprising to you, but from those I’ve heard, it’s more often characterized by a persistent or bothersome nudging than the clarion call we hear Jesus make to Simon Peter and the others in today’s gospel.

My own certainly was. Although I’d considered going to seminary after college, I didn’t pursue it then. A few years later, after Jamie and I had met and married and our oldest daughter was born, I was 26 and diagnosed with cancer, and it was there that I first experienced the holy work of hospital chaplains. But it wasn’t until ten years later, when our two children were in elementary school, that I began to ask what God wanted me to do, as I was pretty sure it was something different from the work I had been doing in nonprofits. And it was in the conversations with pastors that followed, and at each step of candidacy, seminary and internship that confirmed I was listening well and following God’s call for my life.

Like the disciples in today’s gospel, I wasn’t called to work that is wildly different from what I had been doing. It’s not like Jesus called me to build wells in Kenya or teach farmers in Guatemala. God is using what I know to make a difference with God’s people.

I still have deep conversations with people and learn about their lives. But instead of connecting their interests and passions to a cause or campaign, our conversations are more often centered on their faith stories and how God is calling them to live and serve. I still talk with people about giving but now it’s from the perspective of seeing our giving as a faith practice where we remember that we are custodians of what God has first given us. One of the very best, new parts of this call God has given me is helping people hear that God’s grace is for them and not only for other people; it sounds like foolishness when we use the world’s measures and standards, but that’s why grace is God’s gift to us and nothing we earn.

Each one of us has a call story. You may say, “Oh, I’m retired” or “I never went to seminary” or any number of other things to tell yourself you aren’t called, but you are. Like the pronouncement from the heavens when Jesus was baptized by John, at baptism, God pronounces you a child of God. In this way, God calls each one of us.

There’s a saying that goes, “God doesn’t call the equipped, but God equips the called.” In today’s gospel, we see Jesus call fishermen – laborers without education, credentials or power. Jesus calls them and tells them,

“You know all you need to know – instead of fishing for fish in the sea, now you’re going to fish for people. Help people be caught by the love that God shows you and you show the world.”

 “The call that Jesus casts over the waters of today is the same as the one that those first disciples heard.” (Jennifer Moland-Kovash, “Living by the Word”, Christian Century) Our call begins with our identity as children of God and continues with using the gifts God equips us with to show God’s love to the people we meet.

In calling them to join him, Jesus tells Simon Peter and the others that what they do matters, and we learn that there is a connection between what we believe and what we do. Disciples hear God’s Word and do it.

The gospel shows us that discipleship or following Jesus means leaving what we know or what is comfortable and going into an unknown future. Following Jesus means dying to the old and beginning anew.

It is what St. Paul talks about in Romans 6:

we have been buried with [Christ Jesus] by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. (Romans 6:4 NRS)

In another of Paul’s letter, the one to the church in Corinth, we hear again about discipleship, and the importance of unity among the followers of Jesus. We don’t know exactly what is happening there, but Paul addresses the rise of factions or divisions within the community there and chastises them for placing their loyalty to one teacher or missionary above their unity in Christ Jesus. He calls the disciples there to set aside their divisions and focus on the power of God, known in the cross of Christ and what God is doing in their midst.

It isn’t easy to surrender to the disruptive love of God, leave what we know and follow God into a new and unknown future. But that is exactly what Jesus calls Simon, Andrew, James and John to do, and it’s what God calls us to do, also.

We are called to be unified by God’s good news for the world as we figure out how God is calling us, individually and as a congregation, to bear that Good News to our neighbors and world.

As a community of God’s beloved, we’re called to be a place of welcome and acceptance, and a place where lives are transformed by hearing God’s word taught and where people experience healing. (David Lose, “In the Meantime”)

Reflecting on the gospel, as a congregation – a community of people following Jesus - we want to help catch people in the love of God.

When we share our lives with each other, when we tell others where we have seen Jesus in our day or our week, and when we invite friends to come and see what God is doing here at Grace or in one of the ministries we partner with, we are creating a giant net, woven together by relationships, where people can be caught up in God’s love.

Just imagine what that bountiful catch could be!

 

Let us pray…

Good and gracious God,

Thank you for calling each one of us your beloved child.

Thank you for the gift of your grace that invites us to die to the old and begin anew, every day.

Help us live in your love for us and share that love with the world.

Amen.

Christmas Day 2022

Titus 3:4-7

While we hear the familiar Christmas story in Luke and Matthew’s gospels, and watch it play out in pageants, movies and television specials, Linus never takes the stage to say the verses from our first reading – the only time we hear these verses is on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

They’re from the book of Titus, one of the pastoral epistles, or letters, in Scripture. And while some of the letters we have are attributed to Paul, it’s believed that this letter to Titus and the two letters to Timothy – all of which we think were written toward the end of the first century CE, or possibly even in the second century - were written by an anonymous author who credited Paul in order to honor him. Using Paul’s name on a letter that was written after his death is like producing a new Walt Disney movie; Mr. Disney died in 1966 but dozens of movies produced since then bear his name because the legacy he built endures.[i]

Whenever we listen to one of these letters, it’s helpful to remember that it’s as if we are looking over the author’s shoulder as the words are being recorded or perhaps like we found a stack of letters tied up with twine in a box in the attic. We aren’t the original recipients, and we don’t know a lot about who that was, or even about the author. The letter, then, invites our curiosity.

In this letter, the author is writing to Titus – a Gentile leader - on the island of Crete about the Christian community there,

and at the center of his letter,

he writes about the manifestation of God’s love in the world –

the very incarnation of God that we celebrate in the nativity, or birth, of Jesus at Christmas.

In Jesus, God defies the people’s expectations of a Messiah or Savior sent from heaven

as a triumphant warrior king,

and instead,

God breaks into the lives of ordinary women and men

and delivers our Savior, who arrives as a vulnerable newborn

held in the tender embrace of his mother.

Jesus our Savior brings salvation for all, manifesting the goodness and loving kindness of God, in the flesh. Salvation is ours, not because of anything we have done,
but because God so richly loves every one of us.

And so, it’s not only Jesus’ birth that we celebrate at Christmas; as the author reminds us, in the waters of baptism we too are born again and renewed by the Holy Spirit. So, as we remember the Son of God arriving in the world as an infant, we also remember our own baptism when we were named + child of God.

In Jesus, God’s grace is born in the world for all to see and know.

So on this Christmas morning,

I wonder how and where we see grace appear in our lives today?

Is it

In the person next to us reaching out their hand to hold ours?

In someone’s praying for us when we need it?

In the quilts sewn and delivered to neighbors who are trying to stay warm against the winter cold?

In the knitted prayer shawl wrapped around the shoulders of someone who is grieving?

In the laughter around an abundant table?

In the stillness of the night sky or the quiet of the early morning?

Wherever it is that you notice God’s grace, know that it is God’s gift to you, given without conditions or requirements.

In a cynical world that measures achievements and rewards status, that seems - like a newborn Savior - an impossibility. Surely, there’s a catch!

But there isn’t.

God simply pours out love and grace and mercy through Jesus

and invites us to respond to this goodness in our lives by drawing near to God and sharing Jesus with the world.

Let us pray…

Holy God, 
Thank you for sending your Son Jesus to us,
and showing us how much you love us.
Thank you for the gift of baptism, that you call us your children;
And thank you for your unfailing grace.
By your Holy Spirit, renew us and lead us
to share Jesus with the world.
We pray in the name of our Savior, Jesus.
Amen.

---

[i] Lutheran Study Bible. 1952.

Advent 1A

Matthew 24:36-44

With twin warnings, Jesus tells the disciples “Keep awake!” and “Be ready!”

Contrary to the success of the popular fictional “Left Behind” series, these verses are not about God seizing the elect and forgetting the rest of us. And while they may be entertaining, bumper stickers and church signs telling us, “to look busy because Jesus is coming” miss the mark here too. The purpose of apocalyptic literature in Scripture is not to terrorize us into obedience, but to provide revelation about God and to encourage hope.

Instead of being anxious about a capricious God whose promise of eternal life is based on our attitude or behavior, as we begin anew the season of Advent, both Isaiah and Matthew call on God’s people to wait on God and to look to God to do something new again.[i]

Isaiah is addressing the Israelites before the exile, urging them to trust God to fix what is broken and to live in anticipation of a peaceful future, despite the conflict roiling around them.

Matthew is speaking to Jesus’ followers who were likely living in Antioch in Syria where there were both Jewish and Gentile Christians. He’s addressing them after the destruction of the Jerusalem temple and in the midst of disagreements with both rabbinical Jewish leaders and Roman authorities.

Their messages to their communities remind us that faith is always communal, nurtured in the space where we gather together and draw near to God.

In this season, here at Grace, we are waiting and preparing for the coming of the Light of the World, God’s own Son Jesus - God’s love incarnate, born into the world for us.

Knowing what we are waiting for shapes how we wait. Instead of being anxious or afraid, we are invited to believe that God’s future will be different because it is a future is based on God’s promises; it is a future

where God will be with us;

where God will mediate or make a way through the division and enmity between nations and peoples,

and where God will bring peace to our lives.

That sounds implausible if not impossible as we witness violence in our communities and world. Is it surprising that we’d rather retreat into the merry comfort and nostalgia of Christmases past and pin our hopes on gift giving and holiday feasting?

But what is faith if not “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”? (Hebrews 11:1 NRS)

The prophet Isaiah begins his speech with a call to return to the house of the Lord, to the centering place where the people experience the rhythms of life together with God. This Advent season we are invited to gather here, to practice our faith together in worship and “to get ready for the new movements of God’s Spirit in our lives.”[ii]

We come together to learn God’s ways and God’s paths. But to be ready to learn we must be tender-hearted, and not let our hearts be hardened toward God. Remembering the mistakes of Pharaoh and the Egyptians, we must have a willingness of Spirit to hear God’s Word and go God’s way. 

It's easier said than done, of course. Submitting ourselves to God’s Word and God’s ways requires a re-orientation, turning away from the world and towards God, as when Saint Paul says, “lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light”.

The works of darkness are the sin and self-centeredness that distract us from God and what God is doing in this season. And wearing the armor of light, like being clothed in Christ at baptism, is not about being transfigured into dazzling majesty, but receiving the grace that God has given us freely and finding our strength in Christ. Instead of swords we carry weapons of righteousness, equipped by God to bear the Good News of Jesus coming into the world.

Finally, Isaiah calls to the house of Jacob, the people of Israel, and to us, “Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”

Pastor Nathan Nettleton paraphrases the verse from Isaiah as “let us stick to the tracks that the LORD lights up!”[iii] (Isaiah 2:5)

This time of year, I sometimes wear a headlamp to walk the dogs because it gets dark so early; with a headlamp, you don’t see very far ahead – just enough to take the next step, and the one after that as you move forward. Walking in the light of the Lord isn’t about having a floodlight that illuminates your surroundings so you can see everything at once; instead, it is taking the next faithful step, trusting in the One who is lighting the way. 

“Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord” this Advent season. Let us gather here with tender hearts and willing spirits to listen for what God is saying. Let us be ready and alert to how God is working in our lives and those around us. Let us not be distracted by bright lights and tinsel but focus on the Light that is coming into the World.

Let us pray…

Holy God, We give you thanks for giving your Son Jesus to the world that we may all know your love for us.

Help us turn away from the ways of sin that draw us from you,

and teach us to walk in Your light.

Let our light so shine that the world may know You.

We pray in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

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[i] Fairless, John; Chilton, Delmer. The Lectionary Lab Commentary with Stories and Sermons for Year A (p. 3). The Lectionary Lab. Kindle Edition.

[ii]  ibid, p. 4.

[iii] Nathan Nettleton, Laughing Bird Liturgical Resources. https://laughingbird.net/index.php/occasion/a01/2022-11-27/ , accessed 11/25/22.

All Saints Sunday

Luke 6:20-31

On All Saints Sunday we remember the saints who have gone before us even as we include ourselves within the community of the saints, a blessed community, bound together, through time, and over and against death.

Just last week Anne Marie and I were talking with the confirmation students about saints. We took a field trip from the youth room to the narthex – the space just beyond the glass doors of the sanctuary – and talked about the saints whose symbols are on shields that hang there. We talked about apostles – people sent into the world with the Good News – and about disciples – people called to follow Jesus.

“The community of the saints is not an "ideal" community consisting of perfect and sinless men and women, where there is no need of further repentance.”[i] If you go and examine those shields, you’ll count twelve of them because even Judas – who betrayed Jesus – is included among the saints.

Learning that God loves us, redeems us and makes us holy or sanctifies us even in our imperfections is a gift of our faith.

We aren’t saints because we are perfect and blameless; we are saints because, in God’s sight, we are wonderfully created, beloved children of God, and even when we are petulant and selfish,

God offers us forgiveness.

We aren’t saints because we can overcome grief or be stoic survivors of trauma; we are saints because God and God’s son Jesus are above every power, victorious over grief and suffering, and victorious over the brokenness of sin.

We aren’t saints because our hearts grew three sizes and now, we can forgive the people who have hurt us; we are saints because God’s mercy is new every morning. We are sinful, and every day, we turn away from God and inward on ourselves, refusing to confess our dependence on Him. But God never refuses his grace and God never gives up on us.

That is Good News. God is steadfast and abounding in love and mercy for you and for me.

With the confirmation students, we also talked about the people in our lives who have helped teach us about Jesus. Often it is a parent or grandparent, but sometimes it’s a neighbor or a family friend.

I tell the story of my college roommate Lori inviting me to go to campus ministry.

I think our children remember Ms. Nancy, a woman whom I worked with who also taught our one room Sunday School in a tiny congregation in Harpers Ferry.

So on this All Saints Sunday, I wonder who are the saints you have met in your life?

We gather as living saints today because others have poured out God’s love in their care for us.

And we gather as the community of saints because together we remember God’s promises for us.

In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul reminds the people there – people who are facing trouble and persecution – that they have already set their hope on Christ (v 12).

This hope empowers us to imagine the future that God is preparing, to see with not only our eyes but with what one pastor calls, “the eyes of our hearts”.

The hope we have in Christ helps us see beyond the divisiveness of the world now and see each other as God’s beloved children and to see each other as fearfully and wonderfully made in God’s image. It is a hope that reaches beyond any one of us and is nourished in community and in relationship.

An old Hasidic tale tells of a disciple who asked his rabbi the meaning of community one evening, when they were all sitting around a fire. The rabbi sat in silence while the fire died down to a pile of glowing coals. Then he got up and took one coal out from the pile and set it apart on the stone hearth. Its fire and warmth soon died out.[ii]

In his letter, Paul encourages the disciples at Ephesus to return to this enduring hope that is grounded in God’s saving power. (v. 18) He reassures them that God is at work in and through all that they are experiencing, having “put all things under his feet” (v. 22)

Jesus embodies this same hope when he delivers his sermon on the plain in Luke’s gospel. Instead of ascending to a mountaintop and making pronouncements from on high, Jesus comes into the crowd and meets the people there. Apostles, disciples and curiosity-seekers alike. He heals people’s illnesses and casts out demons and he talks with them about their lives.  

When Jesus makes the declarations of blessings and woes that we hear in today’s gospel, he isn’t talking abstractly. He has witnessed the hunger, the grief and sorrow and the ways some are ignored or shut out. These are vulnerable people who come to Jesus with hearts laid bare. And Jesus meets them in their need.

His woes aren’t curses against the people who are satisfied with their lives as much as alarm bells to awaken complacent people who have become comfortable and convinced that they don’t need God. Jesus calls on them to be as vulnerable as the rest of the crowd; to recognize their own deep need for God’s love.

Because it is in Christ and in God’s loving action for us that our hope resides.

Let us pray…

Holy God,
We give you thanks for your Son Jesus who shows us Your love for all people.
Thank you for redeeming us from our sin and counting each one of us among our saints.
As we follow Jesus, give us a spirit of wisdom and revelation and help us live in response to your love for the whole world.
Amen.

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[i] Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Cost of Discipleship.

[ii] Heidi B. Neumark. Breathing Space: A Spiritual Journey in the South Bronx (Boston: Beacon Press, 1994), 61.