Sermon for Trinity Sunday 2019

Preached at Grace and Canadochly on June 16, 2019
(Adapted from a sermon preached at St. John's, Davis on June 19, 2011)
Preaching text: None

Trinity Sunday. (sigh). Easily one of the most difficult Sundays in the church year to preach. The only festival day of the church that is dedicated to a teaching of the church rather than to an event in the life of Jesus or one of his apostles. And what a teaching it is, the divine mystery of the Trinity. Mystery is a good word here, because we are discussing something that neither easy to understand or believe. It’s is probably the quintessential example of a theology question where the correct answer is “I don’t know.”

Because we don’t. No one fully grasps the Trinity. No one fully understands it. I’ve told this joke before, but there is a saying that if you can explain the Trinity, you’re probably a heretic.

And yet, we believe in it, despite our inability to fully comprehend or explain it. But asking how it works is really the wrong question. Because the Trinity is not about how. The Trinity is about who. Who is God?

Who is God? God is the Father. God is the Son. God is the Holy Spirit. The fog of the mystery begins to clear somewhat. This makes some sense to us. We know what a father is. We know what a son is. We know what a spirit is…mostly.

Now the traditionalist in me likes this old formula, but even I have to admit there is an extra layer of interpretation that has to go on for us to fully understand it. That is one advantage of the more modern ways of talking about the Trinity. For instance, the popular “Creator, Redeemer, Sanctifier” formula. Who is God? God is my creator. God is my redeemer. God is my sanctifier. The advantage to this formula is that the relational nature of the Trinity changes from being about their relationship with one another to being about their relationship with you.

Of course, that’s in the traditional formula too. God is my father. Jesus is his son, therefore he is my brother. The spirit is, well, the spirit, the spirit of God both within and beside me. But now we begin to see what is at the heart of what the Trinity is really about. It’s all about relationship.

Who is God? If we were to ask him directly, his answer would likely be to throw the question back at us. Who am I to you? What do you need me to be? Your Father? Your brother? Your savior? Then that is who I am.

One of the most curious and most wonderful passages in the Scriptures is the passage from Exodus where Moses pins God down to ask his name. Moses, although a Hebrew, had grown up with the Egyptian mythos. Those gods had names, much as people do: Osirus, Horus, Bast, Set, Anubis, etc. But now he is being introduced to the god of his fathers, of his people, and Moses is expecting that the same rules apply. They don’t. God’s answer is to say a variation on the Hebrew 1st person singular of verb “to be”, Yahweh. I am.

Ok. It seems inadequate, and yet there is a world of possibility there. I am what? I am God. I am your father. I am the way, and the truth, and the life. I am the Good Shepherd. I am your brother. I am your creator. I am the one who brings light out of darkness. I am the one who loves you.

I am the one who has saved you. I am the one who is with you always even to the end of the age. I am all these things and so much more. What do you need me to be, and that I am.

Do you hear the wondrous grace within that? The deity, the god, the creator of all that is makes it about us and our relationship with him. That’s what matters to him.

What do we need him to be? Do we need a nurturing parent, on whose shoulder we can weep out all the woes of our lives? Do we need to be awed by his power, seeing his might in the vastness of a galaxy or the complexity of a single atom? Do we need someone to rescue us from the threat of death? Do we need someone to forgive us those wrongs we can’t even forgive ourselves? Do we one to remind us of our relationship with our fellow human beings, to see ourselves as part of one vast family? Do we need someone to challenge us to better ourselves in service to others? God is all these things.

The Trinity is a gift. God even gives us his very identity. He is who we need him to be. We need a Father, a parent, a creator, for without that we would never be. We need a Son, a brother, a savior, one who delivers us from the power of death, for without that we would be lost. We need a spirit, a guide, a follower, one always eager to remind us of how much God loves us. God is what we need in every hour of every day of our lives. Without him, we are nothing.

Who is God? We can all answer that question, and yet our answer is incomplete. Our answer may change as the circumstances of our lives change. But no matter what God is there, in some way, in some form, granting us his love and grace unbounded. Who is God? The Trinity reminds us that there is no single answer to that question. He is Father. He is Son. He is Holy Spirit. And he is all these things so that we may know him and know what he’s done and is continues to do for us. Amen.

Sermon for Pentecost 2019

Preached at Canadochly and Grace on June 9, 2019
Preaching text: Acts 2

“Suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak...”

What a powerful moment that must have been. The Spirit came down upon an unsuspecting world and it caught it completely flat footed. Even the disciples, who had been instructed by Jesus to wait in Jerusalem for the Holy Spirit, did not know what that would look like until it happened. It caught them just as much by surprise as it did the Jews who had come to Jerusalem for the festival. No one, not even the believers, saw this coming.

Our God is a god of surprises.

I’ve preached on that so many times I’ve lost count, particularly at my first congregation in WV. Our God is a god of surprises. He likes to do the unexpected. Jesus himself is perhaps the greatest example of this. People expected a king like David, a warrior, a man of strength and power. They got a carpenter, a rabbi humble of birth and attitude, who rather than storm the castle and defeat the enemies of God’s people, submitted himself to death and then rose again to bring sin and death, the greatest enemies of humanity, to heel.

As strange as it may sound, we should come to expect the unexpected from our God.

Why am I reminiscing on these truths? Because I find myself envious of the people of Jerusalem on that first Pentecost. Maybe that’s because I’m tired. Synod Assembly takes it out of all of us who attend. “Making the sausage,” to use the old idiom, is hard work and doing the business of the Church institutionally is wearying. I hunger to witness God working in powerful and dramatic ways, not in the drudgery of Robert’s Rules, voting, resolutions, bylaws, and so forth. I want God to shake things up. I am impatient for the kingdom of God made manifest in the world. I eagerly wish to see a world where all are valued, all are precious, all know how they are loved. I want the things I preach about to come to pass in powerful ways. Let this world be remade and God’s kingdom reign.

But, our God is a god of surprises. And just as Pentecost came unexpectedly upon the world, perhaps too God is at work in ways right now in ways that I do not expect. In ways I do not see. In things that astound and astonish all of us, perhaps by being so ordinary and everyday we don’t even notice them.

I had a conversation at Assembly with the folks from Reconciling Works. That’s the ELCA group that’s promoting greater inclusion of LGBT folk in our congregations and communities. I make no secret that I am an ally of their cause and purpose, but as the conversation progressed, I came to tell the story of my internship congregations. In 1998, two years before me, they had a gay intern and felt terribly betrayed by this intern because of who he was. In 2001, the year after I was there, they were to be assigned another LGBT intern and I got to witness the hatred and fear of the congregation of “those people” first hand. It was ugly. It was not Christian. Suffice to say, that intern never showed up.

Two years ago, however, those same two congregations who were so vehement in their disdain and hatred of the sexual other declared themselves openly as “Reconciling in Christ” congregations. That is to say they are open and eager to welcome anyone regardless of their sexual persuasion or identity. What a difference those 16 years made. God was at work in quiet, subtle, and unexpected ways.

At another point during Assembly, I got ambushed by a fellow pastor. She looked at me with wild excited eyes when she realized who I was. “You’re the one at Grace and Canadochly. I need to talk to you.” Suffice to say, I was a little nervous about this. What had I done?

I had lunch with her at Assembly yesterday. She outlined her plan, a new ministry project that she’s looking for congregations to participate in. A project both Grace and Canadochly would be perfect for. I became excited. Something we can perhaps offer to the wider church, something that might invigorate some things here. Provide us options. A new way to look at ministry. While I can’t say everything about the plan here, it is something we need and can use. Again, God at work in a way I wasn’t expecting. I certainly didn’t expect anything like that to happen.

Last evening, I came back directly from Assembly to Canadochly. We were hosting the second meeting of what has come to be known as TAGS, the Analog Gaming Society, a new club that my friends and I are putting together to promote gaming. This is a group eager to help create community and fellowship between people around games. It’s not explicitly a church group (nor would it be), but as we concluded our meeting several of those who attended came up to me to share some of their personal faith journeys. People I’d known for a while in a very different context than this were talking about faith. What moved them to do that but the Holy Spirit? Relationships are forming. Fellowship was coming to be. God was being surprising yet again.

We say, somewhat flippantly, that God works in mysterious ways and that’s true. Sometimes, so mysteriously that we often fail to see it. But sometimes in the least likely places, God reveals himself. Hey, look here. Look at what’s happening here. Pentecost didn’t end on that day so long ago. The Spirit is still moving, perhaps not quite so dramatically, but still moving. Still changing lives. Still making a difference. Still changing the world. Still bringing the kingdom. It’s in your life and mine. All around us all the time, if only we have eyes to see the fire and ears to hear the mighty wind. It’s still there and the world is becoming new because of it. Amen.

Sermon for the Sunday of Ascension (Part Three of the Love One Another series)

Preached at Canadochly and Grace on June 2, 2019
Preaching text: None

I hadn’t intended it this way, but this Easter season has become a pair of mini-sermon series. The first one, towards the beginning of the season, was about all the things that get us stuck and prevent us from following Jesus the way he or even we would like. That was three sermons. Then, two weeks ago, I preached on the New Commandment: Love one another as Jesus has loved us. That led to a challenge where a congregation member asked me “How do we love?” So I tried to answer that in the following sermon; last week. Today, as we mark the Ascension of Jesus into heaven at the end of his earthly ministry, I find myself drawn to answer another question related to the New Commandment: Why?

Why should we love as Christ has loved? So part three of my second sermon series this Easter season.

Some of you who helped out on Tuesday got to meet some of my gamer friends. They’re a diverse and interesting bunch. Some are Christian, many are not. Some are agnostic or atheist and are quite skeptical of any religion, including and often particularly ours. Some are quite critical or even derisive towards Christianity. I try not to let them get under my skin when they start doing that. Instead, I try to understand why they think and feel what they do about God and about Christians. One of the more taunting things say about God is they’ll call him the “invisible sky god.”

You know, there’s a lot of truth to that mocking title. Most of us, I think, understand heaven to be “elsewhere,” but for simplicity’s sake, we typically refer to it as above us, in the sky. As to invisible, well, yeah. We don’t see or experience God with our physical senses. Walk by faith, not by sight, and all that.

Now when Jesus was here on Earth, God was tangible to us. We could see him, talk to him, touch him, hear his voice. He was “real” in a physical sense. But that was 2000 years ago and Jesus has long sense left this world in a bodily sense. We no longer see him, touch him, listen to him with our physical senses. He is invisible once more.

Now I firmly believe that God understands this to be a bit of a problem. It is easier for us physical creatures to believe and trust in that which we can experience in this physical reality. That is why we are gifted with the sacraments. In those holy rites, God gives us something physical, something we can see, touch, taste, hear, and experience with our bodily senses. He gives us his presence in and through the water, the wine, and the bread. He makes himself real to us in a physical sense yet again.

But that is our gift here in the Church. A gift we receive in faith that has little meaning to those out there. But what makes God real to all of them? What is their sacrament? After all, God hardly limits his grace and love to the Church alone, but his heart beats for all the world and all its people. How does he become “real” to them?

Well, you can probably guess the answer. We are the world’s sacrament.

You, me, all of us. We are the ones that make God real to the world. There’s an old saying, “You may be the only Bible some people ever read.” And that’s true. What does your life say to them?

No pressure.

Truth is, it really isn’t that hard. Most of us have a heart for God. We want to become better people, better believers. We want to grow in faith and love. We want the world to be a better place. By in large, our motives align closely with our creator, even if our actions don’t always align with those motives. That’s sin, our seemingly constant plague and our inability to perfectly follow even our best of intentions.

But, you know something. We fail, but God picks us up, lovingly brushes off the dirt, and tells us to try again. That’s forgiveness, another wonderful gift of his. We fail all the time, but as he never stops forgiving, we also are driven to never stop trying.

So be kind. Be loving. Welcome the stranger. Aid the sick. Speak up for the voiceless. Stand up against evil. Love one another. And as we do that, together and individually, the world will start to see God. He will become real to them because his love will become real in and through us.

People will start to realize how important they are. How much they matter. How beloved they are. Jesus is not here in body, but he’s passed the torch to us. What was once his job is now ours.

A long time ago, back right after I graduated from college, I remember we were having one of our late night parties. Pretty sure we were drinking. One of my friends let the booze get to his head a little too much and he got real dark. Started talking about how worthless he felt and how his life was meaningless. He was dead serious and we started getting worried. Where was he going with this? Was he going to do something dangerous? So we rallied around him, starting telling him how much he meant to each of us. How important he was. All his good qualities. How we believed in him and trusted him and cared about him. College age guys aren’t usually the type to pour their hearts out like that, but we did it. It was a holy moment and it’s stayed with me for almost 25 years.

That not-so-young (now, anyway) man is married, father of two kids, great job, veteran of our armed services. He got his life together. He’s also now a believer. That is what Jesus is talking about. That is what “love one another” does. It makes God real. It makes his love real. That’s our job. Now that Jesus has ascended, it falls to us. Can we make God real for those we encounter in our lives? I hope so. Love one another. Amen.

Sermon for the Sixth Sunday of Easter (Part Two of the Love One Another series)

Preached at Canadochly and York on May 26, 2019
Preaching Text:

It seems I have about a million different things rattling around inside my head this week. I’m eagerly looking forward to my move and to the new chapter of my life that’s about to begin on Tuesday. I’m enjoying my Memorial Day Weekend, even if I’m spending most of it packing. There’s also a solemnity to this time, as I remember the family tradition of tending to the graves each year on these weekend and, in particular, I remember my late grandfathers who both served this country during WWII.

I’m also wrestling with what to preach today. Thinking about Jesus’ promise of the Holy Spirit in our Gospel lesson, but also thinking about Jan’s challenge from last week. After the sermon last Sunday, a sermon on embracing love regardless of the consequences, she came up to me and said, “Great sermon. I agree with everything, but HOW do we do that?” Of course, it’s the Holy Spirit that helps to inform the answer to that question. The Advocate acts as our guide through life and learning to tune in to its prompts and urges is an important part of our faith journey.

All of this is jumbled up inside my head and yet there’s a way in which I feel they’re all pieces of the same puzzle. The Holy Spirit, Memorial Day, the question of how to love, all come together somehow.

Well, when you are putting together a jigsaw puzzle, you have to start with the picture. What does the completed puzzle look like? In our case, we must ask ourselves what sort of world does God want? One can assume that our acts of love are part and parcel of helping Him create that world. But what is that world?

To answer that, we must turn to the Scriptures and, in particular, to Christ himself. Who is Jesus? What is Jesus? What does he do in his life to show us that world? This is, as Jesus himself, says a fundamental purpose of the Holy Spirit, to remind us of Christ and his work and his teachings. He is, again, our guide to the person of Christ himself.

What do we find in those stories? Kindness, compassion. Welcome to the outcast and stranger. Health to the sick and infirm. Restoration to the lost. Lifting up of the lowly and rejected. If that’s who Jesus is, then it follows that is also who I am to be, at least as much as I can. If Jesus wants a world where such behavior is commonplace, how do I make that happen?

I think there are two very important steps that we can all take to do that very thing. The first is to resist. Now I know that’s a loaded term in these times, but I am not referring to resisting a political order. I am saying to resist the spirit of these times. This impulse to fear, hate, and mistrust. I am saying to reject those impulses in ourselves. I am saying to give no heed to the voices in media and society who encourage those impulses. Ask yourself when you hear such a voice if it sounds anything like Jesus? If not, reject it. Unsure of what Jesus might sound like? Turn to the Gospels and read again who he is.

The second thing I feel we should do is go deeper. Evil is never more insidious than when it looks like good, and that’s a clever trick that is often played in these times. Take the culture war for instance. People talk all the time about how we’re supposed to be a Christian nation, but what do they mean by that? Do they truly want this country to reflect Christ or do they only want the appearance of some sort of cultural Christianity that bears little to no resemblance to Jesus’ teachings? Forcing children to pray or posting the Ten Commandments on walls in public buildings sounds nice, but does it really accomplish anything that he who knows are inmost hearts would truly want? Or is it just trickery and appearances?

Saving babies by passing abortion restrictions sounds good, but if we do nothing for those children and mothers afterwards, what good is it? Who will care for those children? Who will aid those mothers? Are we willing to do that work? Are we willing to pay for it? We must go deeper. We must go further. If we want to love as Christ loves, then there are no half measures.

No tricks. No gimmicks that sound good, but in the end accomplish little to nothing. God will not be fooled and neither will the world. Our love must be real and it must be total. And again, if we are uncertain of what that love should look like, look again to Christ. Read the Gospels and see him anew.

I do believe this country was founded on Christian principles, but not in the way most people think of it. This was meant to be a place where people were valued, respected, and would have the freedom to be who they are and believe what they wished. Jesus values every person he encounters, even his opponents and enemies. He loves everyone, regardless of whether they follow him or not. He forgives sin; he does not reject people because of it. A world where those things are true and people practice that same sort of compassion and mercy is one I want to live in. It’s one I want to help create. And to be honest, as we remember the sacrifices of those who fought and died in wars past and present, I believe that’s what they fought and died for. It was not for a flag or the personality of a President, but for a vision, an ideal. A dream of America as the herald of a better world that what had been before.

We all want that better world. We here gathered, I presume, all want to follow Jesus as best they can. Those two things work in parallel and what unites them is love. How do we love? Jesus shows us how. How does Jesus love? The Spirit reminds us again and again of his unconditional compassion and kindness, his welcome to all, his aid to those in need. As a Christian, I am to strive to live like Jesus and love as he did. I never going to match his standard, I get that. But I want to try, because I’ve been a recipient of that love. He’s embraced me despite my sin and failings. He’s loved me enough to endure the cross. And so too you. And if we all strive to be like him, what sort of world will we create? I’m curious to see and I suspect God is too. Amen.

Sermon for the Fifth Sunday of Easter (Part One of the Love One Another Series)

Preached at Canadochly and Grace on May 19, 2019
Preaching Text:

“Love one another.” It’s so simple. So basic. So elementary. One would think that such a commandment would be easy as pie to obey, that Christianity would spread like wildfire by all those who would practice this simple easy basic command. Perhaps that was the hope, maybe even the expectation. In the early years of the church, it certainly seemed that way. Even accounting for the fact that Luke probably exaggerated a bit on the number of converts, the first century world was clearly being set alight by the followers of Christ.

What happened?

“By this, they will know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” Sadly, we know today that the mark of the Church is not our love. All too often it is our legalism, our intolerance, our bigotry, our anger, our hate. It’s inflexible morality, harsh judgment, self-righteousness, and self-superiority. It is disrespect and apathy towards anyone who is not us. It is anything but love.

What happened?

Even within the Church, we see these evil marks. I grew up in a congregation that’s primary mission and ministry was finding new and creative ways to tear each other apart. We went through 5 pastors in 20 years, each one leaving either because they were thrown out or because of scandal. We bled members, good people, who couldn’t stand the atmosphere anymore or those who were targets of someone else’s ire. My church was hardly alone. I’ve heard other stories. Some even worse.

What happened?

As I often do, I was scanning Facebook earlier this week, looking at the various posts from my friends and groups. One caught my eye, a piece of artwork from the fantasy art group I’m a member of. The artist had chosen to, in addition to posting her picture, include a quote from fantasy author Amelia Atwater-Rhodes. "Love is the strongest emotion any creature can feel except for hate, but hate can't hurt you. Love, and trust, and friendship, and all the other emotions humans value so much, are the only emotions that can bring pain. Only love can break a heart into so many pieces."

I wonder if that’s it. Love is hard. Love means we have to be vulnerable. Love means we risk ourselves. Love means we can be hurt. Love means we can be damaged. And that’s scary. Hate, on the other hand, demands nothing of us. Hate is easy. Hate is armor. Hate means we are not vulnerable or at risk. Hate keeps us safe.

In these times of uncertainty, safety is what we want. The world is a scary place, as I’ve mentioned before. I can see its appeal.

But here’s the thing: Christianity isn’t supposed to be safe. This is a religion of risk, of danger, of being vulnerable and doing the right thing when it’s neither politic or popular. We are called to love and yes, that means often times loving those who are unloved by the greater whole. It means loving those the rest of the world fears and rejects.

And it means bearing the consequences of the choice to love.

What set the world on fire during that first century, when the Church was at its infancy? Love. It was people risking themselves to do what was right. Welcoming the stranger and outcast. Helping the downtrodden. Ministering to the sick. There were no tests of worthiness for these acts of compassion. People were not helped because they were worthy; they were helped because they needed it.

And the world responded. John was exiled. Peter crucified. Paul beheaded. Stephen stoned. The world in its rage and hate responded to love with violence. Killed the apostles. Made martyrs of them. But instead of frightening the Church into silence and subservience to the world’s standards, this made it bolder. It loved even more.

We look around and we see a world full of chaos and uncertainty. We look around and see a church empty and struggling. You want to turn this around? You want to see real change in the world and in our lives? I know I do. But the way to do it is not to play by the world’s rules. It’s not to embrace hate, easy as it is. Nor is it to play it safe.

To put it mildly, if we’re not out there trying to make the world kill us because of how and who we love, we’re doing it wrong.

Now, I get it. That’s not exactly the most appealing sales pitch. Join the church and become a martyr. But nothing in life worth having is gained without risk. And we could have a whole new world. One closer to the kingdom of God. One where the churches aren’t empty and people aren’t consumed with hate. We could have that, if we take the chance on love.

And, let’s be honest about something else, is it really a risk when we cannot die? Oh, sure, we can still suffer physical death. But we are promised eternity through Jesus Christ. The apostles, who died horribly at the hands of Roman persecution, banked on that. They knew Jesus had lived, died, and defeated death for their sake. He’s also done so for ours. What really do we have to fear when Christ has gone before us and his tomb is empty, just as ours will be one day?

So take a chance. Take a risk. Love one another. Love your neighbor. Love your enemy. Let that be the mark of the Church again. A bright light in a dying world. A world that needs that light. A light we can bring to it, if we choose to love. Amen.

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday of Easter (Good Shepherd Sunday)

Preached at Canadochly and Grace on May 12, 2019
Preaching text:

“Who are these, robed in white? These are they who have come out of the great ordeal.” Many years ago, I was doing a Bible Study on the book of Revelation. It was during my internship; It was 1999 and there was great anxiety about the coming millennium. So much riffraff had been thrown about with the year 2000 being the end of the world, people were scared and we channeled that fear into taking a deep long look at the apocalyptic texts in the Scriptures.

This particular verse stuck with me long after that Bible Study concluded and the paranoia that generated it faded in the face of reality. “What was the great ordeal?” That was the question we asked. Many like to believe it is some manner of mass persecution or some other calamity. We came to conclude the calamity was life itself, with all of its trials and struggles and setbacks. Our lives are an ordeal. We have to navigate our way through this crazy world and all that it throws at us.

There isn’t a single one of us that doesn’t struggle in life from time to time. We face tragedy, setback, difficulty. Sometimes it’s of our own creation, the consequence of mistakes made and vices embraced. Other times, it’s completely unfair, pain inflicted by disease or the evil deeds of others or simply bad luck. But none of us gets out of this without a few scars. The world is broken and we suffer for it.

I’m tired. I’m tired of seeing evil win. I’m tired of seeing good people too frightened to fight back. I’m tired of seeing the innocent suffer. I’m tired of wondering what sort of world our children are going to inherit from us and how much worse even still it will probably be. One million species expected to go extinct in the next few decades, perhaps including even the human race. Warmongers and saber rattlers abound across the world, with merchants of hate in our own neighborhoods, spewing their garbage across the internet and the airwaves. To put it mildly, it’s becoming harder and harder to hold onto hope. Unlike the new Avengers movie where the world recovers from the apocalypse thanks to some plucky superhumans and some magic gems, we will not have any such luck. If we die, it’s over. Or at least, that’s how it feels.

Revelation was written to a group of people who were facing the exact same sort of feelings under very similar circumstances. It’s there to remind us that no matter how bleak things may seem, God remains and that he’s going to win.

In fact, that’s the overarching message of all of our texts today. Death claims a beloved disciple, but God’s power revives her. The uncounted thousands and millions upon the Earth who have washed their robes in the blood of Christ and now celebrate life eternal. The Shepherd who carries us through the valley of the shadow of death to green pastures and still waters. The one whose voice we know, who claims us as his own, and who will never leave nor lose us. God wins.

God wins.

That’s really what this season of Easter is all about. Nowhere has ever been more bleak than the hill of Golgotha when Christ was nailed to the cross. That was it. That was the end. God died that day. Evil had truly won, or so it seemed. And yet, from that came the impossible: Christ is risen. Death is defeated. Sin is forgiven. The world would be set right after all.

God wins.

I mentioned the new Avengers movie a few sentences ago. I’m not going to spoil it for anyone who might be interested in seeing it and hasn’t yet, but it’s not hard to guess how the story goes, because all the best stories go this way. The heroes are on the verge of triumph and then suddenly the villains win somehow. The initiative shifts, the momentum turns. A great victory for evil, a terrible setback for good. But then, when all seems lost, the heroes rally and emerge victorious, perhaps with great sacrifice, but in the end they win.

This happens in hundreds of stories. King Arthur, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, comic books, nearly every TV show or movie. Even in romance stories there’s a moment when the lovers are pulled apart and that maybe, just maybe, they won’t end up together after all. Stories wouldn’t be worth telling if we didn’t have that moment of setback. There’s no drama, no stakes. The triumph is meh, meaningless without the struggle. The cross was Satan’s moment where evil almost won, but it was not to be.

And perhaps, that’s what’s happening now. We are in the valley of the shadow of death, with the looming threat of climate change and political unrest, with school and church shooters and economic instability and all sorts of scary things around us. It feels like all is lost. This is the end. This is the moment when evil almost wins, but it will not be.

Because God wins.

Take comfort in that. The Good Shepherd is still by our side, as he always has been. The world has thrown calamity at us before and we have endured thanks to Christ. We will always endure, because there is nothing that this world can do to us that can take us from Christ’s side. We are his and always will be. Are we moving towards the Apocalypse? I don’t know. I do know things feel bleak, uncertain, frightening. But God still wins. The tomb is still empty. Christ is still risen. Amen. Alleluia.

Sermon for the Third Sunday of Easter (Part Three of the Stuck Series)

Preached at Canadochly and Grace on May 5, 2019
Preaching Text: Jesus and Disciples by the Seashore in John

One of my favorite pop theologians is the late Brennan Manning. At Canadochly, we did a book study on his book, The Ragamuffin Gospel, a few years ago. In that book, he talks a great deal about his struggles with faith, in particular trying to believe in a God whom he could never please, that he was never good enough for, that he believed his sins would always keep him apart from the divine.

For us Lutherans, that struggle should sound somewhat familiar, since it’s very similar to the struggle Martin Luther himself had with his faith. He too believed God was this unyielding judge who held every last mistake and misstep against him. He too felt he could never earn God’s love and forgiveness, no matter how hard he tried.

Many Christians today, perhaps even some of you, still struggle with this sort of thing. I remember well the pain experienced by one of my former pastors, the man who confirmed me when I was a teenager. Pr. Crozier’s daughter had died horribly from cancer and he was convinced that the reason it happened was because he didn’t pray hard enough or faithfully enough. Guilt became his constant companion. Just as it was for Luther or for Fr. Manning.

And also Peter.

I didn’t really plan this, but it seems my Easter sermons are forming something of a series about the things that we get stuck on in our faith journey. On Easter itself, I talked about how the women we’re stuck in grief. Last week, I spoke of how the disciples were stuck in fear. Today, I’m going to talk about Peter. He’s stuck in guilt.

How? Well, let’s look back at the last few weeks of Peter’s life. As Jesus has begun the last legs of his Jerusalem journey, Peter has, on more than one occasion, pledged his very life to defend Jesus. Even during the Last Supper, Peter has said that he would die for Jesus’ sake, to which Jesus responded with a dire prediction: Three times before the cock crow, Peter would deny Jesus. When the soldiers come for Jesus in the garden, Peter is determined to keep his word. He draws a sword and attacks the soldiers, cutting off the ear of a slave of the high priest. He’s determined to go down fighting and only stops when Jesus tells him to.

Even after this, he follows the soldiers back to the council, hoping to listen in, to spy and eavesdrop on the proceedings. This is when he gets caught and is identified. Three times, people call him out as one of the followers of Jesus and, as predicted, Peter denies any association with Jesus. Then a rooster crows at the dawn. Peter realizes what he’s done and he goes away, weeping and consumed with guilt and regret.

Jesus is, of course, dragged between the various authorities: the chief priests, King Herod, Governor Pilate. Then he’s given over to the Roman soldiers, who mock, abuse, and torture him. He’s taken out to Golgotha and killed on a cross. A few days later, word comes that he has risen. Peter, like the others, does not believe this at first, even though he sees the empty tomb with his own eyes. He’s likely thinking that even if it is true that Jesus is alive, things could never go back to the way they were. Not after what Peter has done.

Jesus then comes to the disciples twice in the upper room, confirming beyond all doubt that it’s him, that he is alive, that the miracle of resurrection has indeed happened just as he said it would. But even after this, Peter still carries a burden. And so we come to today’s Gospel lesson. Jesus meets the fishermen yet again by the seashore in much the same way that he did the first time when he called them to come fish for people. They don’t recognize him at first, but Jesus performs another miracle, Peter realizes who it is. Caught up in his emotions, he jumps into the sea to meet his Lord.

Jesus prepares a fire and they break bread together. As they are eating the fish, Jesus turns to Peter. Fully aware of his burden of guilt, Jesus asks him three times if Peter loves him. Once for each denial. This is truly one of the most powerful moments in all the Scriptures. Here, perhaps more than anywhere else, we see the heart of Christ. Is Peter forgiven? Of course, he is. This is Jesus, who forgave even the soldiers as they pounded in the nails. God can and has forgiven Peter for his denials, but Peter cannot forgive himself. So what does Jesus do? He gives him the means to do so. Here, you denied me three times, now affirm your love three times. Show yourself that you love me.

Jesus is what gets us unstuck. For the women, it was the gift of an empty tomb and angels speaking the truth of his resurrection. For Mary, it was Christ himself calling her by name. For the disciples and for Thomas, it was a visit to the upper room and showing his hands and side. And now, for Peter, it is a meal by the seashore where Peter is given the opportunity to forgive himself for the denials Christ has already forgiven.

Jesus gives Peter and all his disciples (including us) a clear command to tend and feed his sheep, his people. So often, we have failed to do so and see the results in a world consumed with hate and fear and a church paralyzed by empty pews and lack of resources. But God has not abandoned us. Nor would he, no matter how often we fail. Again and again he comes to us to give us strength and encouragement. He is speaking now, within, behind, and beneath my voice as I preach. He is here in the waters that remind you that you are his and always will be. He is here in the bread and wine that remind us how much he gave for your sake. He is sitting next to you in your friends and family. Whatever we need, he will give. He’s proven that time and again in these stories. We are not so different from those disciples. We see them as paragons of faith and yet they too failed. God did not abandon them, nor will he us. Trust in that and go forth. Feed my lambs, Christ says. We can, thanks to him. Amen.