Sermon for Third Lent

Preached at Canadochly Lutheran and St. John Lutheran on Feb 28, 2016
Scripture texts: Isaiah 55:1-9, Acts 5:12-16, Luke 5:12-15

There is a new group in York County, a new social service organization. A number of folks from various churches noticed a certain lack of services on the far eastern side of the county. So they got together and made some plans, started a few small programs like providing backpacks to needy children in the school system. Group began to grow, began to help in other ways, giving children a good Christmas, feeding the hungry, getting books into the hands of school children, all in coordination with other community and church organizations. We know them as River’s Edge Community Services. Canadochly is a charter member of this group and we are making a difference in our community.

Last Sunday, I was pretty negative about my now-closed home congregation in WV. But it wasn’t all bad. In fact, there was one great shining light that I remember very fondly during my time as a member there. Over the course of about 10 years during 1980s, we helped resettle about 20 refugees from Southeast Asia, some families, some individuals. You may remember from your history that Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and the like were not exactly happy places to be in the 60s and 70s. A lot of turmoil, a lot of violence. We gave those people a chance at a new life away from all that. Many of them have gone on to very successful and happy lives in the years and decades since.

He may not stand out as among the best of men who’ve occupied the White House in recent decades, but you can’t help but admire Jimmy Carter’s dedication in the years since to helping people in need. The man is in his 90s, been cancer in recent times, and he’s still out there building homes for Habitat. I’d like to have his energy at age 90, but more than that I’d like to have his dedication to helping others. We all probably could use that.

Imagine for a moment if these sorts of stories were the image of the church the world around us had of us. I mean that’s the way it’s supposed to be. Jesus told us quite clearly “Love your neighbor as yourself” was among the greatest of commandments. This is part of our mission. Part of our purpose. WHAT HAPPENED?

Obviously, from these examples, you can tell that there are those still out there who get it. But far too often the picture of the church that people receive is one of intolerance, of bigotry, and of self-righteous hypocrisy. It’s a place of closed doors and closed minds, where people are only welcome if they’re the right “kind” of people and aid to those in need comes only to those who “deserve” it. (There’s that word again.)

We’ve gotten really good at playing this game with ourselves. We’re full of euphemisms that cover up our disdain for others, but we’re not really fooling anyone except ourselves.

• “Family” means “Christian only.” 
• “Traditional” means “male dominated” and/or “heterosexual”
• “Lazy” means “black.” 
• “Security” means “no Muslims or immigrants.”

Keep them out. Keep them away. Where “them” are people we’ve declared villain through an always arbitrary and often inconsistent standard.

The classic Christian rock band Petra had something to say about this 30 years ago in their song “Rose Colored Stained Glass Windows.”

Another sleepy Sunday, safe within the walls
Outside a dying world in desperation calls
But no one hears the cries or knows what they're about
The doors are locked within or is it from without 

Looking through rose colored stained glass windows
Never allowing the world to come in
Seeing no evil and feeling no pain
Making the light as it come from within, so dim, so dim

It’s not a new problem. And we wonder why churches are dying?

Contrast that to the story we have of Christ in Luke chapter 5. Jesus encounters a leper upon the side of the road. An outcast, blamed by many in society for his own illness. “Surely God is punishing him for his sins,” they would say. He “deserves” this!

I love the way he approaches Jesus. “Lord, if you choose, make me clean.” What a delightful opening for Jesus, allowing him to reveal the heart of God. “I do choose.” he replies. “Be made clean.”

“I do choose.” It is a choice and God’s choice is always love and mercy. ALWAYS.

The early church understood that, which is why you have this wonderful scene at Solomon’s Portico in Acts. People of all stripes come to the church and they’re not turned away. They receive what they need. Deserve never enters into the conversation. There’s no “terms and conditions” that they need to meet. No arbitrary standard of moral uprightness. “All who thirst, come to the waters. You, who have no money, come buy and eat.” Come, be healed, be fed, receive what you need.

But, Pastor, our resources are limited and the problems out there so big. Yes, but we have more than we think we do and those problems are not as large as we think. We can solve a lot of things plaguing our society, but we have to choose to do it. I read a statistic once, and I’m not entirely sure it’s accurate, but it is plausible. We could take the money our government spends on defense for just one week and we could use that to buy three square meals a day for every person on this planet for a year. The cost of our war in Iraq could have ended hunger worldwide for the next 30 years. It’s all a matter of choice.

But, Pastor, some of those people really are evil. They’re really mean harm and they really will rip you off. Sure, but that’s on their heads. And if you want a life without risk, Christianity is not the religion for you. We scatter the seed far and wide and sometimes the most fertile ground is found in the most vile of people.

I was reading an article about the rather colorfully named General Butt Naked, whose real name is Joshua Milton Blahyi. He was military commander in Liberia’s Civil War during the early 1990s and responsible for numerous atrocities including the use of child soldiers, murder, and even cannibalism. Don’t get much worse than this guy, but a Christian priest pleaded with him to change his ways at the end of that war and Mr. Blahyi has since gone on to not only convert to Christianity, but is now a pastor. Part of his ministry is to make restitution to the victims of his crimes. You never know what grace and forgiveness can do.

Jesus went to the cross and died for you and for me, making the ultimate statement as to what a person’s life is worth. God died and rose again for you, me, every person in this room, and every person on this planet, living, dead, or yet unborn. Are we truly going to deliberately stand in the way of that because people don’t meet our standards of moral or ethical perfection? What nonsense!

Christ chose to help, regardless of any criteria. Even when he had expectations and they weren’t met, such as when only one of the ten lepers returned to him, his grace was not withdrawn. That’s our guide. That’s our model. It’s who we are called to be in the world. It’s who we once were. It’s who we need to be again. Amen.

Weekly Devotional for Lent 2

Scripture text: Luke 3:31-35

Our Friday Bible Study at Canadochly has been spending the past several weeks (and future weeks to come) on looking at the book of Isaiah. It seemed a fitting thing as we moved through the Advent to Christmas to Lent to Easter cycle of the church year to study the Old Testament book that often accompanies us most closely through that journey. Isaiah is, after all, the most quoted OT book in the New Testament.

But beyond all that, it is the story of a prophet. The job of a prophet in the Old Testament was not to be a predictor of future events. They were not soothsayers; they were truth-tellers and there is a difference. The job of the prophet was to warn and to persuade. Beware, for this path that you are on is contrary to God's will and will lead the nation to disaster. Beware, for your neglect of the poor angers God and will lead to your destruction. Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and so forth are full of these sorts of passages.

Is it any wonder then why Jesus laments as he does in Luke, "O Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it?" Saying such things to the powers-that-be was a sure-fire way to end up on the bad side of any and every king and noble in the land. And you were not likely long for this world after that happened.

Jesus is equally doomed. Unlike the prophets, Jesus lived out God's desires in his own life. A prophet may talk about God's care for people, but Jesus lived it, demonstrated it, showed it to the world. And that was, in many ways, even more aggravating to the powers that be.

The powerful and ambitious in any society have always cultivated their power by dividing people against one another. Hitler is easily the most extreme example, with the Holocaust of the Jews and the often banal acceptance of it by society. But modern would-be leaders are not always as different as they pretend to be. Scratch the surface of many in this election cycle and you'll hear talk similar to this "Trust me, because I'll protect you from 'those people' over there who are different from you." The more things change, the more they stay the same.

But for Jesus, what mattered was not the anger of the powerful, but the love of God. And the idea that "God loves everyone" was not merely some pipe-dream or idealistic thinking, it is the truth. Jesus embodied that. He ate with tax collectors. He healed the lepers. He associated with prostitutes, the poor, and sinners of all stripes. His followers and closest associates were a who's-who of the "those people" of his day. Above anything else, that was what doomed him to the cross and he knew it. He did it anyway.

Like the prophets before him, he did it anyway. Why? Because the work was too important to be thwarted by the threats of the ambitious and powerful. The Gospel needed to be proclaimed as far and wide as possible. God loves you. God accepts you. God wants you to be his. You are precious to him, loved beyond words. In fact, God loves you so much that would even die for you, such a thing that should otherwise be impossible. Nothing else matters to God but his people. ALL his people, you included.

The torch has passed from Christ to his church and little has changed. We too are called to embody God's love to the world and that task is not without risks. It requires us to face the Other who we are taught to fear. It requires us to stand up to the powerful and their followers who would tell us those Other are not worth the effort. But they are. They were for the prophets. They were for Jesus. And they are for his Church. Why? Because God's love will not be denied. Amen.

Sermon for Second Lent

Preached at Canadochly Lutheran Church and St. John, New Freedom on Feb 21, 2016
Preaching texts: Acts 2:41-47, Luke 3:10-14

By rights, I shouldn’t be here.

In this church, that is. Or any church really. I was raised in the church. Was a member of St. Paul, Charleston, WV from my baptismal day until I left to begin service as the pastor of St. John’s in Davis, WV. But therein lies the problem. I was a member of St. Paul, Charleston. I was a member at one of the most divisive, contentious, conflicted congregations in all of WV-WMD Synod. Over 30 years, it went from 120+ in worship to less than 50 before finally closing. Over those 30 years, they chewed through six pastors, nearly all of which were either thrown out or departed in disgrace. It was, in many ways, the poster child for everything that is wrong in the church in America today. Poster child for all the reasons why people stop coming to church, why they stop attending worship, and for far too many, why they stop believing entirely.

I very easily could have been one of them. I wasn’t, but this is definitely one of those “there but for the grace of God...” kind of moments.

I loved my home congregation, but good riddance. We don’t need churches like that. But how did it get that way? What happened? Well, they forgot rule #1 (and #2). It’s not about you or me. But for St. Paul, Charleston and for many congregations throughout our country, that’s precisely what it’s about. It’s all about them. About the people inside their four walls. What they want. What Jesus wants is often quite a ways down on their list of priorities.

There were two groups at my home church. One had money and thought that gave them the right to dictate the direction of the congregation’s mission (which was usually nowhere that didn’t serve them personally.) The other were closet fundamentalists and their unwavering and unbending view of Scripture made them feel they had the right to weed out the undesirables in the pews. Sometimes these groups overlapped. Sometimes they fought each other. But between the two of them, they brought that congregation down.

Last week, we talked about evangelism and our calling to spread the Gospel far and wide out there in the world. But what is to happen within these walls Jesus is equally clear about. We are first and foremost supposed to love one another, to care for one another, and to take care of each other. But, for far too many, this place becomes their own little fiefdom and they lord of the manor.

I get why it happens. For many of us, we’re nobodies out in the world. Just cogs in the wheel of society. But in here we are somebody. We matter, as I said last week. We are children of God. But for some that’s not enough and that little taste drives us into a need to lord over others in what I often jokingly refer to as “big fish-small pond syndrome.”

We know the stories. The tyrannical treasurer. The arrogant organist. The stubborn office secretary. The terrorizing altar guild ladies. The “Herr pastor” of past generations. These stereotypes exist for a reason, because many of us have encountered them or similar before.

(I am thankful that they have been almost entirely absent from the congregations that I’ve served, so please don’t think I’m making some sort of underhanded accusation towards anyone here. I’m not.)

But contrast all that to the image of the church we see in Acts. Where everyone holds possessions in common, where they spend time together in prayer and praise, eating together and having goodwill towards all.

One can argue that this is not a realistic image and I get that. We live in a society that is highly suspicious of the word “socialism” and all of its implications and what we are seeing here in the early church is, in fact, a socialist model. But at its core, at its heart is the ideal that the church takes care of its own.

I’ve pointed out that there is a reason each of us is here in this particular place. And I doubt very highly that it has much to do with how right our teachings are or how intellectually vigorous the pastor’s scholarship is (although I’d certainly like to think mine is decent.) It has to do with how this place makes us feel and we feel good about this place because the people around us make us feel good. And we, in turn, do our part to make them feel good.

We take care of one another, first and foremost. It’s not about who is right. It’s not about who has the power or who has the money or whose family is the most loyal. It’s not about us. It’s about them and, in this case, the “them” are the people in the pews next to you. Your brothers and sisters in Christ.

I’m not saying we can’t disagree with one another. In fact, vigorous and healthy disagreement can be quite good for the church. Some of the most powerful moments of growth I’ve had in my faith journey have come at the hands of people with whom I very little to agree with, but made me think. That gave me new ideas and insight. That made me go “hey, I’ve never thought of it that way before.”

We can do that without being nasty, without being disagreeable. We can do it without fighting, without rancor and hate.

It can be done. I’ve seen it. I remember the Synod Assembly in WV around the time of the big homosexuality debate in the church. And one person would get up and they’ve give all the good reasons why the church should change on this issue. And then another would get up and give all the good reasons why the church should not change on this issue. And after debate was over and the decision was made, I wandered into the lounge where we were having our break time to see those same two people laughing it up, hanging out, and having a good time with one another. Two brothers in Christ, who didn’t agree, but never forgot that they were brothers to one another.

When we talk about our mission in the world, when we talk about spreading the Gospel and making disciples, we need to be mindful, in some ways, of what happens after. We have a baby Christian, someone new to our faith, and what do we offer them?

A place of nurturing, of care, a sanctuary where they can grow in faith, hope, and love? Or a place of ruin where we let our selfish impulses cause us to lob bombs at one another heedless of the consequences?

There’s a right way to do church and a wrong way. And as we live into these anxious times, we cannot forget that we reflect the love God has for us to others. Both within and without these four walls. We come here because we feel we matter, to these neighbors and to the God we serve. That’s the same feeling we want to give to others, because it’s the truth. We do matter to God. Christ died and rose again for us. And we show that we remember that in the way we treat one another. Amen.

Sermon for First Lent

Preached at Canadochly Lutheran Church and at St. John, New Freedom on Feb. 14, 2016
Preaching texts: Acts 1:6-11, Matthew 28:16-20

(Pastor's Note: This is the first in a preaching series I'm doing at both churches I serve, themed off the book of Acts and looking at the idea of how the church at its infancy resembles the American church of today. The series is titled "Being the Church in an Unchurched World.")

You heard me rattle off some statistics last week, that some 80% of congregations are in danger of insolvency within the next 5 to 10 years. There are numerous reasons why this is. The growth of the “Nones” (i.e. people of “no religious affiliation”), the decline of the middle class (now a minority in this country), social changes, economic changes.

But, as in any crisis, the best question to ask is not “why.” We can certainly debate the reasons why things have gotten the way they have, but that really won’t get us anywhere. The better question before us is “Now what?” And that’s the very same question that’s facing the disciples in our text from Acts today. Jesus has met them on the mountaintop. He’s said a few parting remarks and now he’s ascended into heaven. The disciples stand there slack-jawed watching this, so much so that the angels actually come down and tell them to get moving. “Why are you still here?” they seem to ask.

So what now? Jesus has ascended into heaven. The leadership of the infant church, this new religion, has fallen into the laps of these eleven men. What now?

Well, Jesus gave them the answer to that question. In a different account of the same mountaintop event, Jesus tells them precisely what they are to do henceforth. We know it as the Great Commission, “Go ye therefore...” Luke’s version uses different language but says largely the same thing. “You are to be my witnesses to...the ends of the earth.” Their job now is evangelism. Their job now is to spread the Gospel. To tell good news.

Two thousand years later and that job hasn’t changed. In many ways, we’re standing on that mountaintop again. The supports upon which we leaned have fallen away. The institutional church in this country is dying. Now what? Well, Jesus told us.

Evangelism though is one of the hardest things for us mainline Christians to do. A big part of that is because we make the same mistake as those mountaintop disciples. We make it about us. “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” That was not Jesus’ mission. It wasn’t simply about Israel, but the whole world. It wasn’t about them, but everyone. But the disciples haven’t gotten that through their thick skulls and often times, neither have we.

So rule #1 of evangelism. It’s not about you. In fact, rule #2 of evangelism. It’s not about you.

It’s not about you. It’s not about me. It’s about them. The reason for the Fight Club treatment here is because we always want to make it about us.

For instance, how often do people say the reason they don’t evangelize others is because they don’t know the Bible well enough? Common excuse, right? Well, newsflash, you’re not arguing a theological treatise here. You’re not defending a master's thesis. You’re telling and showing people that God loves them.

Consider this. Every presidential election that I can remember has been won not by the person with the best ideas, but by the one who made the American public feel good about itself. Bush, Clinton, Obama, all of them. For Reagan, it was “Morning in America.” For Obama, it was “hope.” For Bush, it was “the guy you can have a beer with.” They all sold themselves on emotion as much, if not more so, than on their policy ideas. People respond to emotion.

Consider us. Why are we here this morning? I don’t think it’s because (snooty voice) “The Lutheran church has the right and true interpretation of the Bible. We’re right about everything and we can prove it.” No, we’re here because this place makes us feel good. These people make us feel good. We’re welcome here. We belong. We matter.

That’s what evangelism really is. Make people feel like they matter. We do that all the time. Without thinking about it. We do it here. We do it with our families. With our friends. Show people they matter to you and they’ll soon start to believe they matter to God.

But what if we’re not successful? Rule #1, it’s not about you or me. We’re planting seeds. We so spoiled in this country. We make everything about success and about instant gratification. Any farmer can tell you that it takes time for a seed to grow. And we may not get to see the end result. Perhaps that gift is given to someone else. We do our part and leave the rest to God and to others. It’s not about you or me.

But what if they don’t come to our church? Here we go again. Rule #1! It’s about making disciples, not putting bodies in pews.

But what if they aren’t worth the effort? This probably the biggest reason I made rules 1 & 2 the same. It’s not about us. It’s not about you or me. It’s about them. And we cannot let our moral judgments about people get in the way. Excise the word “deserve” out of your vocabulary. I’m rapidly finding that word to be the most offensive word in the whole language; it makes my skin crawl when I hear it. (snooty voice again) “What if they don’t deserve our help? What if they don’t deserve our love and care? What if they’re Muslims or gay or they’re sleeping around or if they have tattoos or something else I don’t approve of?”

Jesus doesn’t give a damn about deserving. For him, it’s always about grace, about giving people what they need, not what they deserve. He welcomed a hated tax collector into his Twelve and had dinner with another. He evangelized a Samaritan woman of loose morals and made a Samaritan into an example of divine compassion in one of his most beloved parables. He used a Syro-phoenician woman as an example of the tenacity of faith and a Roman centurion stood tall before him as an example of the power of belief.. The most hated and feared in society were the people Jesus reached out to the most. Did they deserve that? No. He did it anyway.

On top of that, he’s welcomed each of us, all the while knowing the deepest and darkest secrets of our souls. Those horrible things within us that we barely dare admit to ourselves are laid bare before Jesus’ sight and what does he do with them? Does he care that we don’t deserve his love? Not one bit. Why should we be any different with others?

It’s not about us. It’s about them. It’s about showing the grace we’ve received to others. Passing it on. It’s really easy to do. Treat people with kindness, respect, care, and compassion regardless of who they are or what you think of them. Why do you do it? Because it’s what Jesus would do. It’s what Jesus wants. He cares about you and me and everybody. How can you or I as his disciple do any less? It’s my job. It’s your job. Make disciples. Show people they matter. Show people they’re loved. That, my friends, is evangelism. That is our job. Amen.

Weekly Devotional for Lent 1

Scripture text: Luke 4:1-13

(Pastor's note: Since I'm not preaching the lectionary this year for Lent and doing a preaching series, I figured I'd dedicate this space to my thoughts and reflections on the Sunday morning lectionary texts.)

The Power of No

In many ways, we live in a society that considers the word "no" to be profane. We are actively discouraged from saying it. A child who says "no" to a parent is often punished. A customer who says "no" to a salesperson is just asking for the pitch to be ramped up to the Nth degree. Congress has driven its popularity to record lows by saying "no" to anything and everything the President has suggested. Men's Rights Activists claim that women don't really mean it when they say "no." Some of these examples are reasonable. Others border on nonsense. But regardless, "no" is seen as a bad word.

And our text today is all about "no."

Much like the examples above, some of these are reasonable. Others make little sense. Of course, that's the devil's trap. It's perfectly reasonable to turn those stones to bread or to force the world to submit to Jesus' vision. Throwing oneself off a building, on the other hand...

Reasonable however is not always wise and Jesus thankfully knows the difference. He recognizes the "quick and easy path" of saying "yes" to the devil's temptations. (Yes, I'm squeezing a Star Wars reference in here.) Yes, Jesus is hungry and yes, it is reasonable to use his power to grant himself food. But if he uses his divine might for such a simple and largely pointless thing here, where will he stop? Welcome to the slippery slope.

And yes, it would be easier to force the world to submit. To become the king and tyrant the crowd at Palm Sunday will soon desire him to be. Power and domination are anathema however to his message of love and grace. He would completely subvert and undermine his message about his father and utterly destroy his mission to save the world.

And yes, he could claim invulnerability by jumping off the temple. But Jesus was born to die and being invulnerable to the violence of this world would subvert and undermine that purpose. If the angels protect him here, what's to stop them from pulling him down from the cross later?

So, to these temptations, he must say no.

We can and probably should take a lesson for Jesus. What is reasonable is not always wise. We too face temptations particularly in these times.

Fear and anxiety, it seems, are our constant companions these days. We worry about our nation, about our church, about our paychecks, our families. We fear terrorism and crime. And all too often we focus that fear into distrust and outright hostility towards our neighbors.

It may seem reasonable. After all our jobs are disappearing and yet those immigrants keep coming. Terrorists don't look like us. We often equate crime in the inner city with people of color. And yet, most of this is based on perceptions that cold facts do not support. What may seem reasonable is not always wise. What we are tempted to do and believe because of our fears is the very trap the devil lays before us.

Like Christ, we are called to say "no" to these temptations. To remember Christ's call to love our neighbors, to forgive our enemies, and live peaceably with all people. To also remember that these people, however they may differ from us, are also people for whom Christ went to the cross, died, and rose again. They are our mission field. The more we fear them, the less likely we are to bring Christ to them.

Which is, of course, precisely what the devil would want. Fear is his ally. And to that fear, we must say no.

Devotional for Ash Wednesday

"All things die. Even the stars go out."

Among die-hard fans, the Star Wars prequel films, released in the late 90s and early 2000s, are largely regarded as tremendous disappointments. They are, however, not without their merits. One of those highlights actually does not come from the films, but from the novelization of the third prequel film, Revenge of the Sith.

In a brief scene before the main action of the story begins, Anakin Skywalker (the future Darth Vader) witnesses a supernova. This triggers something of an existential crisis in him, a crisis that largely drives the story that follows: Anakin's fall into evil and darkness. One line of his thoughts as he witnesses the dying star stands out to me even to this day.

"All things die. Even the stars go out."

I'm ever reminded of this observation every year on this day when we come into worship and hear the words anew from Scripture: "Dust we are and to dust we shall return."

Our mortality is the fundamental crisis of human existence. It drives nearly everything that we do, all that we think, all that we build. We fear death more than anything else. It is the true unknown that we all face. Oblivion. Non-existence. We use its fearsome power to threaten and destroy others, knowing how much it terrifies us in return. All that we are centers on death and finding ways to cheat or avoid it, only to discover that there is no cheating and no escape in the end.

Even the stars, whose life spans time we can barely count, billions of years, eventually die. Our paltry planet, in uncounted years to come, will eventually be consumed by one such dying star. Even that which we leave behind will not last. All the monuments that we might build to our life will fade away. The irony of the inscription below Ozymandias' statue in the famous poem belongs to all of us.

We enter into the season of Lent with the remembrance of this unpleasant truth. Even God did not avoid it. Incarnate as he became through Christ, he too faced death. He met the cross on Golgotha. But the story of Lent and Easter does not end on the mountain of the crucifixion. And in the midst of our truthtelling, we must also remember that there is life beyond. Life we cannot see, but life that has been promised to us nonetheless. The life of the empty tomb. The life of the resurrection.

Nature echoes this truth. Yes, the stars die, but you and I made up of their very essense. The "dust" of which we are created is stardust, the remnant of long dead stellar bodies. From death came life. And as it is true in astronomy, so it is with God and so it is with us. Yes, one day, we all die. But life beyond that awaits us. Amen

Sermon for Transfiguration Sunday

Preached at Canadochly Lutheran on Feb 7, 2016
Scripture text: Luke 9:28-43

A few weeks ago, I began my sermon by cracking an old joke about change in the church. And yet, here we are again, on the day of Transfiguration, a day that is about change, a day that is about transformation, about transition from one thing to another. And so here I am again about to talk about that most dreaded of words in the church.

Truth is, though, I get it. I understand fully why people are so resistant to change. I understand why they want things to stay the same. I got a treat this week online; someone posted an old video that they had filmed at Kastu-con Ichi, one of the anime cons I used to staff back in the 1990s. It was neat seeing the people, and their anime swag of series that I love still, a few familiar faces, the venue in Virginia Beach that was so good to (and for) us for so many years. And then I looked at the date of when the video was filmed: 1995. Twenty-one years ago! What the....?

That was yesterday. Or at least, it feels like it. What happened? That part of my life is long gone, but it doesn’t feel that way. I kept hoping I would see me in the background of the footage and never did, but what would I have seen if I had? The 6’ tall 140 lbs nerd that I was then. No beard. Bad clothes. Maybe I did see myself and just didn’t recognize me. I haven’t been that person in a long time.

The changes in our lives and in our society just seem to happen so fast. We’re so full of anxiety right now and we often latch onto anger and frustration at what we’ve lost and we seem to be about to lose. We lash out at things that seem to symbolize, for better or worse, those losses. I get that there are a lot of people who disagree on specific policy issues with our president, but there is a whole lot of rage at the man simply because he looks different than all the others who’ve held that office. Obama’s come to mean something well beyond who he is as a person or even a politician. He’s a sign that things aren’t the way they used to be. If Hillary wins or Bernie or even Rubio, it’ll be much the same. A woman, a Jew, or a Latino. None of them are like the ones before either. Everything’s changed. That’s America now. And not everyone’s happy about that.

And then here, we struggle with change. It’s happening whether we like it or not. Empty pews. Empty offering plates. People who used to be here who aren’t here anymore. The prognosticators have spoken. The vast majority of congregations in this country have less than ten years of life left in them. Some 80% of Christian congregations will close by 2025. Eighty percent!

You want fear of change? My career won’t exist in a few years. I’ll be out of a job. I’ll be out of a life. Everything I’ve worked for. Everything I see myself as. Ten years. As that convention video reminded me, that’s not a very long time.

The world leaves us all behind. And that’s terrifying.

And yet, I watch Emily grow up and I see the person she’s becoming. Her interests, her opinions, her thoughts and feelings. I laugh when I hear Japanese phrases come out of her: sempai, kawaii, etc. She’s not an anime fan per se as I was, but fans like me paved the way for a lot of today’s youth culture. She’s an amazing human being and I’m constantly stunned at how much like me she is. How did that happen?

In politics, we’re probably overdue for a sea change. Something radical. Something different. Most of us agree things have been broken for a long time and doing nothing or fixing things incrementally isn’t really working. This election’s going to be big. It may be a miracle. It may be a disaster, but it will not be boring.

And in the church, you know maybe it’s not such a bad thing we’re in for such an institutional change. We’re not really supposed to be about buildings and social clubs anyway. We’re about the Gospel and that happens out there.

Change brings with it excitement. Yeah, things aren’t the same as they once were. Life would be dull if they were. I’m not sure I could handle Emily as a perpetual toddler (or a perpetual preteen for that matter.) Our political system is designed with a changing of the guard in mind. And our church was never meant to be stagnant but ever in motion.

Fear and excitement. They often go hand in hand. And the story of the Transfiguration reflects that. The disciples practically wet themselves when God starts talking to them and it’s hard to blame them. But, think about it, God is TALKING to them. They’re having an audience with the Divine. How awesome is that?

So awesome that they try to do what we humans always do: they try to freeze time. Peter’s efforts to memorialize that moment, to enshrine this event, are rather transparent. But he can’t stop the clock from turning any more than we can. Life keeps going, even when we don’t want it to. The future is coming, regardless of whether it brings fear, excitement, or both.

And yet when the moment passes, Jesus remains. Perhaps that is the best lesson we can take from this day. Much changes in our lives, but Jesus remains. Our nation undergoes its upheavals, political, economic, social, you name it, and yet Jesus remains. The institutional church dies, giving birth to whatever it will become for the next generations, and yet Jesus remains. Our families, our very lives, transform from day to day, and yet Jesus remains.

Life, death, and all that goes with it, and yet Jesus remains. It’s been the one constant in our ever changing world. God is still there. God is still at work. No matter what happens to us, for good or ill, he remains steadfast. It’s not always easy to live through chaotic or anxious times like these, but faith calls us to hold fast to what matters. Not buildings or institutions or nations or political parties or ideologies or anything else that shifts and changes with the tides. We hold fast to that which lasts forever: God and his promises. As song I once liked said, “I may not know what the future holds, but I know who holds the future.” Amen.

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

Preached at Canadochly Lutheran on January 31, 2016
Scripture text: 1 Corinthians 13, Luke 4:21-30

We’re only one month in and 2016 has already proven to be a tragic year for music lovers. So many have died. Lemmy from Motorhead. Natalie Cole. Glenn Frey of the Eagles. Jason Mackenroth from the punk rock Rollins band. And, of course, probably the most famous of all of them: David Bowie.

From the Telegraph

I can’t say I’m a big Bowie fan, but there’s no question of his impact on the music I do like. But there is one exception. One song of his that stands out, although it’s not entirely his song. It’s his collaboration with another musician who we lost far too soon, Freddie Mercury. The song is Under Pressure and it’s a duet between Mercury and Bowie about the pressures and struggles of modern life. Many of you have probably heard it.

But what does this song have to do with our purposes here today? Quite a bit actually. The answer the singers provide to this modern world is found in the last handful of lyrics of the song.

'Cause love's such an old-fashioned word
And love dares you to care for
The people on the edge of the night
And love dares you to change our way of
Caring about ourselves

Love is the answer. Love. Something we don’t do very much of in this world anymore. You turn on the news and what do you see? Violence? Rage? Hatred? From the Middle East to the campaign trail to the Oregon stand-off to the streets of our own cities. Not a whole lot of love going on there.

And yet, St. Paul tells us in this well beloved chapter of 1 Corinthians, that love is all that really matters. It’s the end and the means of all that we are as Christians. It drives us, changes us, remakes us into who we are meant to be. It is God’s love that saves us. It is God’s love that we strive to share with others.

But sharing love is not easy. Because ultimately, with our sin and selfishness, we want only to love those we believe deserve it. People like us. People who think like us. Look like us. Believe like us. People who stand under the same flag or banner as us. We hoard love. We keep it to ourselves. We believe it belongs only to us and our own.

Which brings us to Jesus. Today’s Gospel lesson is Part 2 of the story that began last week. Jesus is in his hometown and, like any good boy, he’s going to church (or synagogue in this case) with his mother and family. He’s invited to read the Scriptures, so he gets up and reads from the 61st chapter of the prophecy of Isaiah...

The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
   because the Lord has anointed me;
he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,
   to bind up the broken-hearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
   and release to the prisoners;
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour,

And then he sits down and says boldly. “Today, this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” He’s the one who will do this. And that’s where we pick up with the text today.

Everyone is thrilled by this news. God’s jubilee, his declaration of freedom from the bondage of sin and evil, is coming to pass. But then Jesus continues. He brings up a couple of examples from the Old Testament: the widow of Zarephath, Namaan of the Syrians where God showed favor on “those people.” Times when God loved “them.”

How dare he! How dare he claim that God’s love is for other people. How dare he claim that God loves those sinners, those foreigners! God loves us and us alone. And they explode into rage. They even try to kill Jesus. They try to throw him off the cliff. They don’t succeed, of course, but they do try. All because he dared say that God’s love is bigger than they thought it was and that his jubilee, his liberation, was for everyone.

They shouldn’t be surprised. After all, Isaiah says elsewhere in his book that all the nations will come to God to learn his ways. They should remember the old covenant with Abraham, which says that God intends to bless all the families of the world. Jesus isn’t saying anything new.

But what is true and what we want to be true are not always the same thing. As St. Paul writes, love is not selfish, yet we wish it were. Love does not demand its own way, yet we want it to. It is not arrogant or rude or envious, yet we try to make it so. We do this to make it our own, our own little treasure that we can hoard and keep to ourselves, a treasure we can deny to others based on our own criteria of worthiness or deserving.

And the world has become what it is for that very reason. We are “under pressure,” because we do not love as God has asked us to. We turn our backs on others and the whole world is falling apart for it.

And love dares you to care for
The people on the edge of the night
And love dares you to change our way of
Caring about ourselves

Sometimes, God shows up in the strangest of places. In the lyrics of a 35 year old song, for instance, reminding us that love is bigger than we’ve imagined it to be. That’s it’s supposed to be that way. That this is how the world will be set right. When we do start to care for those on the edge and when we do start to change our way of caring about ourselves, perhaps by seeing that “ourselves” is the whole human race.

After all, what is it that Christ does himself? He escapes death at the hands of his own hometown here, but he does not elude it forever. He goes to the cross and there he dies to put an end to sin and death. But he doesn’t just do that for just people like him or only those who agree with him or look like him. He does it for everyone. For the whole world.

Love. God loves all people, perhaps especially for those on the fringes, those most rejected by the world. Go and do likewise and we will see this world transform. Amen.