What I learned today - Preaching My Way to Faith

Sunday, March 13, 2022

Sermon - Pressing On (Lent 2C)

Lent 2 C March 13, 2022
Philippians 3:17-4:1 Panzer Liturgical Service

In 1971, I was confirmed in a Methodist church in SC congregation. I went to youth group with my friends, even attending church semi-regularly when I was in college… I’ll admit part of our motivation was eating the fancy brunch at the Clemson House with my meal card if I brought a church bulletin each week. After college, I settled in nearby Anderson and worked as a blood bank technologist at the local hospital. I joined a small UMC congregation in a crossroads called Wild Hog, near Pendleton, and with a group of youth and other volunteers, spent my summers immersed in the Conference’s youth mission camps.

Eventually, I heard the call, first as a Lay Speaker, then as a candidate for ordained ministry. My years at Duke were wonderful, expanding my knowledge and growing my faith. In 1993, I was ordained as an Elder in the South Carolina Conference. I thought that might be the most exciting thing that would ever happen to me. And then I fell in love with this tall, handsome Air Force pilot and life was never the same. In 1995, we got married with the belief that we could serve God better together than apart. 27 years later, we still think that's true, but there have been detours and bumps along the way.

When we moved to Stuttgart, Germany in 2014, it was our 11^th military move. I am amazed at the places and ways I have been able to serve God and the church, both thru appointment and as a volunteer. But there was a particularly difficult period in my life during our third Air Force move. In IL and ND, I was able to secure appointments, but in NJ, that didn't work out. For the first time in my adult life, I was not earning a paycheck. I was not a leader in a congregation. People only knew me as someone's wife, and as great as that is, it didn't feel like enough.

Sundays came and I didn't want to go to church. In hindsight, I realize that I was angry with God and maybe even with my husband that my call to ministry had been interrupted. And then on one gorgeous September morning, the world went crazy, and only 90 miles away from our base, the events of 9/11 unfolded before us.

Within a few minutes, my neighbors and new friends were calling me to ask me questions of faith. "How could God let this happen?" "What do I tell my children?" and "Where do we go from here?" When we planned a neighborhood prayer meeting, they looked to me for guidance. And when that group turned into a weekly PWOC bible study, I realized that this was my next call. God hadn't made a mistake at all; it just took a lot longer than I hoped.

It's easy to get caught in our preconceived notions about the future. Are we going to the right schools? Have we chosen the right careers? We want the perfect house in the best neighborhood with the most amazing car sitting in our three-car garage with our amazing kids and pets by our sides.

None of these things are wrong, but this part of Paul's letter to the Philippians reminds us it is actually what people see us doing that speaks volumes about who we are. We can say that we are Christian, reciting scripture left and right, but if we are not living out the Good News every day, the power of that proclamation is lost. Being a Christian is more than just claiming Christ. It's about becoming more like Christ through actions and works to point to Jesus. Paul's letter to the Philippians was written to help them stand fast and grow amid a secularized culture. Here are some things he tells them and us about how to live an authentic, fruitful faith.

First, the life of faith is a life of transformation. We have to be willing to grow into our faith. My roots in the Anglican and Methodist traditions are especially helpful here. John Wesley claimed to be a Christian long before he had a personal experience of faith. He served as an Anglican priest in several places, always exacting a strong amount of discipline on his parishioners, so much that it got him expelled from the colony of Georgia in North America under the cover of darkness, leaving his Savannah congregation behind.

But he did not stay that stubborn and willful. People related to the Wesleyan tradition celebrate May 24^th as Aldersgate Day. In his journal entry from that night, he claimed his heart was "strangely warmed," grasping the notion that Jesus didn't just die for the whole world, but for each one of us individually. That was his turning point. The rest of his ministry was focused on first helping people turn to Christ, and then growing into their faith by intentional discipleship.

So, what is intentional discipleship? If you play a musical instrument, you have to practice to get better. If you want to be a better cook or a better athlete or a better parent, you are only able to do that if you keep working to make progress toward perfection. The same is true for the life of faith. Paul calls that "pressing on." Choosing Jesus is easy. Living a life of faithful discipleship is hard. It takes courage. It takes practice. We keep pressing on, even when we don’t feel like it, even if others work against us, even when we’re not sure we believe anymore. The good news is this: God still believes in us.

Second, we come from traditions that understand the life-long nature that the life of faith calls us to. The moment of our belief/understanding/acceptance of God and Jesus is important. But they are not the end of our journey – they are important but do not define us. The faith journey is ongoing. It is a process. Sanctification is the process that fine-tunes us for God’s use. It helps us practice the ways that we put God and others first, considering our own wants later. And it is ongoing.

Next week, our Confirmation class will think about what this kind of life might look like. We will look at spiritual gifts and spiritual disciplines. I often remember how I rebelled when I figured out what my spiritual gifts were. Teaching was among them – I didn’t want to be a teacher. Anyone can be a teacher, I thought (erroneously, of course.) But once I leaned into the gift, in concert with my spiritual gifts for Faith and Shepherding, I found a joy in my faith journey that opened up activities and relationships I would have never explored otherwise.

Wesley’s vision of “pressing on” went by the name Christian Perfection. This did not mean that we are expected to live perfectly. We all make mistakes and bad choices. But we are supposed to be going toward perfection. That doesn’t mean never breaking the rules. We should be trying to get better as we move forward in faith, living for Christ. It does mean we take seriously Jesus’ command to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves (Mark 12:28-31). Pressing on is about growing in faith so that we can become "whole" - and more fully the people that God created us to be.[i]

The third way Paul challenges the Philippians is to meet people where they are, not where we want them to be. The Gentile converts in Philippi were being required to follow Jewish dietary laws, of which Paul was highly critical (See Acts 15). Instead of placing an extraordinary burden on those around us, he calls us to be imitators of him and Christ in our relationships with those around us. Sometimes this means hanging out with people and in places that make us uncomfortable.

My work with families and youth in some of the most impoverished communities in SC taught me that God is most real and present in those places, and even more so to the helpers than to those being helped. Think about how must trust it takes to invite teenagers, ministers, adult volunteers with power tools to come and work on your home. It also takes a lot of faith to go into a community very different from your own and experience God in the relationships you can build there, but only if you press into uncomfortable, God-filled places.

I last preached on this passage in February of 2016 at the church where I was confirmed and raised as a young person. At that time, Germany had received over 750,000 persons as the war raged in Syria. Resources were taxed, and many folks had difficulty assimilating into the uber-structured society. But the German community kept surprising us at their willingness to help these families and individuals make new lives and homes here. Many churches chose to take a “friendship” approach to ministry with their new neighbors, not a salvation approach. And even in the first year, many churches reported ongoing conversations with unchurched migrants asking how to have a relationship with Christ, responding to the gift of hospitality freely offered.[ii]

Six years later, we have a new exodus in Europe, again because of war. Once again, families will be moving into our communities to make new, sometimes permanent, lives. In our village newspaper this week, we had an appeal to homeowners to make houses, apartments, and even rooms available for short and long-term use by citizens of Ukraine. They also left with only what they could carry in their hands and on their backs. But many of them also bring with them their Christian identity, as Catholics, Protestants, and Orthodox Christians. They will be seeking Christian community, and once again, we will be asked to offer them the gift of friendship, as we seek to be and see Christ in the world.

We are never too far from redemption. God is waiting for us, even seeking us, to follow him down the road. He is not only waiting for us to turn to him like a father sitting by the door after a long absence, but God is actively pursuing us and present with us along the road – like on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-35). When we look through his eyes at the world around us, we see all the ways that we can be the hands and feet and voice of Christ's love in the world.[iii]

As Christians, we are called to be imitators of Christ. While this doesn’t often make our lives easier, and often pushes us far outside our comfort zones, it is what the call of Christ is all about. Will Willimon and Stanley Hauerwas wrote a book over 30 years ago that has stayed with me, called Resident Aliens. They argue that God calls us to be part of a Christian colony in the midst of the world, not just to get people to heaven, but to live lives that model the love of Christ. Rather than try to convince others to change their ethics, Christians should model a new set of ethics that are grounded in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.”[iv]

Our biggest challenges will often be the work of building bridges when it feels safer to build up walls. Our citizenship in the Kingdom of God doesn’t just ask us but requires us to build bridges when it feels more natural to put up walls. Paul reminds us to keep our eyes on the prize, press on, and stand firm in Christ... if that isn't a lifetime's work, I don't know what is.

Paul gives concrete advice to the Philippians as the letter closes:

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.

Thanks be to God.

Amen.

Peace, Deb

[i] http://wesley.nnu.edu/john-wesley/a-plain-account-of-christian-perfection/
[ii] http://www.umc.org/news-and-media/how-a-church-overcomes-hostility-to-christianity, also http://www.umc.org/how-we-serve/german-bishop-on-migrants-meet-people-not-problems and http://www.umc.org/how-we-serve/united-methodists-in-germany-welcome-refugees
[iii] Joseph Yoo, WHEN YOU REALLY WANT TO WEAR A MASK TO CHURCH, Ministry Matters, 2/15/2016 (http://www.ministrymatters.com/)
[iv] Robb McCoy, Pulpit Fiction Podcast, https://www.pulpitfiction.com/notes/lent2c/#Philippians3=

I take my identity documentation very seriously. For the last 27 years, I have carried a card identifying me as a dependent of a member of the US Armed Forces. On any given day, I may be asked to show this card between 3 and 8 times, depending on where I am going and what services I require. I have a US and a European driver's license. And because I live outside the boundary of US borders, on most days I travel with my US passport and my SOFA card (Status of Forces Agreement). The first one gives me permission to live in Germany as a sponsored foreign resident. The second allows me to travel outside of German, where I hopefully broaden my understanding of the world.

But however important my US citizenship and documentation are, they say anything about what kind of person I am. Even the things I say about myself paint only a partial picture. More than anything, people know me by the way I behave, and whether the things I say about who I am match the way I live.

To build up our spiritual gifts, we practice our faith in many different ways. Among those activities were bible study, enthusiastic worship, personal prayer and devotion time, Christian conversation, and service to those in need. We are also called to be accountable to one another. John Wesley never meant to start a new church or denomination, but asked his parishioners to join Class Meetings as a way to keep humble and keep active in the faith. He believed that our willingness to confess our shortcomings is just as important (or maybe even more so) as our willingness to proclaim Jesus as our Lord and Savior. As we develop Christian friendships and share both our joys and our failings, we are able to see how and where God is calling us to live and serve. Sometimes others see things in us we cannot see.

Monday, March 7, 2022

Sermon - Holding Ground (Lent 1C)

First Sunday in Lent, (Year C) March 6, 2022

Luke 4:1-13

The forty days of Lent bring to mind the forty days of Jesus’ struggles and testing in the wilderness and are related to Moses’ forty days without food on the mountain, Elijah’s forty days in flight to the mountain of God, and the forty years of Israel’s struggle and wandering in the wilderness. Filled with the Holy Spirit at his baptism, this same Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness and allowed for temptation to become real in Jesus’ life. Afterward, Jesus went into Galilee to minister in the power of the Spirit. In other words, throughout the whole desert experience, Jesus was never alone.

In this passage, Jesus' baptism has just taken place. In that baptism, he is affirmed as the Son of God. And at the end of his 40 days, Jesus is being tempted to be someone he is not. In our lives, how often do we allow that to happen to us? Temptation is more than just not doing something we would like to do but shouldn’t. Temptation is that which pulls us away from who we are... children of God.... those who are baptized… those who believe and trust in God.

Many of us face the same temptations that Jesus faced. First, the need to take care of our own needs immediately. For Jesus, the devil encouraged him to take care of his physical hunger by making bread from the stones readily available around him. We could all sympathize with the desire to have this deep hunger filled. But Jesus did not give in to temptation. Instead, he quoted from the book of Deuteronomy, saying in essence, that bread is not all there is to life.

Another common temptation for us is the need to use power over others. Like Jesus’ second temptation to throw himself from the top of the Temple, we often take unnecessary risks to prove something about ourselves to others. We want them to think highly of us, to understand our importance. How many times have you heard someone ask, “Do you know who I am?” when their demands are not being met? A mythic story among airline personnel is about a man to rushed through a group of people trying to get rebooked for a canceled flight, insisting that he be waited on first, then asking, “Do you know who I am?” when he was asked to go to the back of the line. Bravo to the gate agent who picked up the microphone and made this announcement, “We have a man here at gate 14 who doesn’t know who he is. If you know and can help him out, that would be great… we’re a little busy with everyone else.”

Jesus’ third temptation correlates to our willingness to sell our souls for power and wealth. Most of us think we don’t know a lot about either of those things and so we can be lured into making power and wealth our goals, instead of loving God and neighbor. To be given all the money and wealth that Satan promised, Jesus would have had to give up the most valuable possession he had – his relationship to God. Again, he warned that putting God to the test is a dangerous thing. And the Devil went on his way.

I’ll be honest, I’m often at a loss what to do with the few passages that mention the Devil or Satan. You and I both know that evil is very real in our world. But often we make light of temptation by dressing up the source of it in horns and cloven feet, the Devil of Halloween and Dante’s Inferno, not the Evil that comes disguised in our lives every day.

Under the influence of this Satan, we are tempted to do only that which is within our capabilities, but never to push onto something new. Through this evil, we are tempted to do only that which is desirable, and never that which is hard. I look at my life and the status of the world around us, and I am overwhelmed by all I see. But that’s what I get for being locked into the world's perspective. I must be constantly reminded that the power of God's Word defeats evil if we are willing to let the Spirit work in us.

Temptation has many faces. Jesus refused to turn stone into bread, then later fed 5,000 on the hillside. Jesus refused glory and power, but Paul tells us that one day every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that He is Lord of all. And Jesus refused to let the angels catch him in mid-air if he would throw himself from a high place, and then he ascended to heaven after the resurrection. Before it was done, Jesus accomplished all of the opportunities that the Devil gave him for greatness, he just did them in God’s timing and place. And it made me realize that sometimes temptation is to do good things for the wrong reasons, which doesn’t feel as bad but can be just as dangerous.

During Lent, we are challenged to rethink how we define temptation. Instead of seeing temptation as the desire for things we want, the question is more complex. Temptation is not a question of want versus need. It requires us to ask ourselves, “Will this compromise who we are as children of God?” In our first confirmation class, we did a deep dive on the Lord’s Prayer as we read through the Sermon on the Mount. One of the lines that gave us the most trouble was, “Lead us not into temptation and deliver us from evil,” taken from the King James translation of the Bible, and also in the NIV. The question the kids raised is one of the questions for today. Where is God when things are not going so well? When we are sick? When trouble comes?

To gain some insight, we looked at a couple of different translations – the NRSV, which we read today says, “">Do not bring us to the time of trial…”

Common English Version – the Good News translation from my teenage years says, “Keep us from being tempted.”

The Living Bible paraphrase gives us, “Don’t let us yield to temptation,” which I think gets closer to something helpful. But then again, we all know, temptation is often around every corner – the best advice on some days is “don’t go to the grocery store hungry.”

It was Eugene Peterson's The Message paraphrase that was the most helpful: “Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.” As it holds in my life, it’s probably true for you – our biggest temptations don’t come from God or outside influences… they come when we forget who we are created to be and how much God loves us. We are often our own worst enemy. So, what do we do about that? How do we get back on or keep focused on the journey to which we have been called?

I think that’s why the season of Lent continues to mean so much to us. If Jesus used prayer, fasting, and scripture to guide him through the "wildernesses of temptation", then as his followers we shouldn't be too quick to jettison the disciplines of Lent. Prayer, fasting, reflection on the scriptures, and Christian conversation… these disciplines will help us to know that when we are in our own wildernesses, we will never be alone.

Every day, we see what happens when the power of the world co-ops the authority of the Bible for its own use. False Messiahs are not the only ones who use prophetic bible verses to lure people to their false vision of God. Political leaders do the same, and one of our responsibilities as people of faith is to know enough about the bible and authentic faith in God and Jesus to say, “Yeah, I don’t think that’s right,” when a minister or a candidate or a political leader attempts to speak or act in hateful ways, cloaking it in religious lingo.[i]

This has been the struggle of the church from the very beginning… speaking truth to power. The Revelation of John was written to first-century Christians undergoing extreme persecution because they would not bow down to the Roman Emperor. Almost every cataclysmic event in religious and political history has some element of this misuse of scripture… The Crusades of the Middle Ages, the Witch trials and Inquisition of the 15th & 16^th centuries, all the way through the US Civil War, both World Wars, and political and church skirmishes too numerous to mention.

I can’t think of a year when we needed the season of Lent more, to get back to the basics of faith, and to reorient God at our center, rather than claiming that place for ourselves. We have at our fingertips the means to keep our lives intact. The Scriptures, our fellowship and traditions as communities of believers, our friendships with one another, our willingness to let our old assumptions be challenged and new ideas take root.

When we read the story of Jesus’ encounter with the one who tempted Him in the wilderness, we see that there is a power greater than the selfishness of turning stones to bread, giving into to world-affirming power, and the violence that often puts our own lives in danger. That does not come from inside ourselves, but is evidence that the Holy Spirit continues to work in our lives, if we are willing.

During this season of Lent, I encourage you to seek the opposites of these temptations: embrace generosity and curiosity – learn something new in your faith journey – marry things you already love like photography or reading with themes of faithful living. Practice peace with one another, and speak out for those who have little or no voice. While it makes us feel nervous to step outside our comfort zones, the power of the Spirit was given to us in our baptisms and leads us into unknown places where, if we listen, we will hear and see the power of God speaking words of life, love, and hope.[ii]

And it is just a prelude to the joy we will experience at the end of the season when we will be reminded of how Jesus overcame the power of death to give all of us eternal life.

Thanks be to God!

Peace, Deb

[i] Leah Schade, “Resisting Malignant Power: What the Temptation of Jesus Teaches Us,” https://www.patheos.com/blogs/ecopreacher/2022/02/resisting-malignant-power-what-temptation-of-jesus-teaches-us/

[ii] Ibid.

Wednesday, March 2, 2022

Sermon - To Live a Holy Lent - Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday - Year C March 2, 2022

Joel 2:1-2, 12-17a Psalm 51 Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

A man went to a Friday afternoon baseball game. While there, he did what most people do when attending a baseball game… he had a hotdog. About halfway through his delicious Ballpark frank, he had a startling revelation. It was Friday. It was Lent. And he was eating a hotdog. So, he spent the next 1 ½ innings (or 30 minutes) trying to decide if his sin was in eating the hotdog or in forgetting that it was Friday. In the end, he decided to avoid the problem altogether and never attend another baseball game on a Friday.

Thirty years ago, I presided over my first Ash Wednesday service. I was a cold February night and our chapel was half-filled with worshipers of all ages as we started our Lenten journey together. I felt really good about how it all went down, until the next day when 25+ people called the church office to complain… “that woman wore pants to church…”

I follow popular bible study author Beth Moore on Twitter and this week she shared her fear about celebrating her first Ash Wednesday since joining a more liturgical church last year. She was thinking of giving up whiskey chugging, but decided that might not be a good choice since she doesn’t whiskey. Fortunately, there were many friendly voices to encouraged her to embrace the Lenten season as a time of reflection and spiritual growth, not a time to get stuck in the performance of arbitrary fasts or tasks of contrition.

Many people look from the outside and think of Ash Wednesday and the Lenten season as a time of punishment or purposeful denial – a place where rules are the most important thing. I think that view misses the point.

The observance of a Christian calendar began as the year was divided by bishops and congregations to help us reflect on the things that can help us live a more holy life. Easter Sunday is the most important day of our year, the grandest and the best celebration that the church has to offer, and each Sunday during the year is celebrated as a "little Easter." The fifty days after Easter take the church on a journey to the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit filled the lives of those who were gathered and waiting, as Christ had commanded, recorded in the book of Acts.

But with the emergence of the Easter Season and Pentecost as a time of high celebration, people also saw the need for a time of preparation and discipline. To focus on piety and repentance, the season of Lent was born. It was a time when people who wished to be baptized or join the church were trained and brought into Christian fellowship. It was also a time to examine and reflect on one's relationship with God, with oneself, and with the church and community.

Some of the practices of the early church have stood through time. Early Christians fasted for forty or more days before Easter, usually not including Saturdays and Sundays. They were encouraged to spend the time that they would have normally been eating in prayer and to increase their support of ministries that helped the poor.

The practices that we now associate with Lent, such as fasting, eating fish on Friday, or "giving up" things we are love are not just about sacrifice. When we create a void in our schedule or our menus, it offers us more time to reflect on our relationship with God and Christ. Through these small practices, we may come to know a little bit of the suffering that Christ endured for our sakes in his crucifixion and death.

Lent is also a time to reflect on the fragileness and frailty of human life, and on how our relationship with God is not what we or God want it to be. In the early church, a feeling of true, sometimes even anguished, penitence led people to periods of severe fasting, to wear clothing made from sackcloth (a material similar to burlap) or shirts made of horsehair, both very itchy garments, or to place ashes on their faces or bodies to signify a penitent spirit. Psalm 51, today’s responsive reading, reflects the desire to say to God, "I am sorry for all I have done and thought and said that does not honor you. I know it is because of your love for me that you forgive me, not because I deserve it."

The first time I received Ash Wednesday ashes I was in seminary. As I left school, I walked across the Duke campus to the parking lot, and I noticed that people kept brushing their foreheads as they passed by. Finally, a sweet Duke co-ed flagged me down, “Ma’am, I’m sorry to bother you, but you have a smudge of something on your face… would you like to borrow a tissue to brush it off? “No, thanks,” I replied, “it’s there on purpose – it’s Ash Wednesday – the start of Lent.” Her blank smile told me all I needed to know. There, in the bowels of a United Methodist college campus, she had no idea what I was talking about. So, I countered, “That’s ok, I’ll take care of it when I get home.”

On Ash Wednesday, we participate together in the ritual of confessing our sinfulness in an outwardly visible way. Receiving the ashes is a tangible way of saying "I know that I am a sinner and that my life is a mere second in God's time. I’m sorry. Have mercy on me." By itself, that statement seems cold and fearful. But our joy comes from knowing that this is not the end of the story.

Our Matthew reading talks about practicing our piety in secret. We may or may not see the ashes on people’s foreheads or hands, but God sees all of the stuff in our hearts. God knows when we are giving it our best shot, and God also knows when we are playing to the crowd. The season of Lent is designed to help us reflect our own mortality and sinfulness, and also in how the love of God redeems us taking ourselves too seriously. We love one another because God first loved us. We repent of our sin, not just today but regularly, in response to the great sacrifice that God made for us. And in the process, we welcome the new life that we have been given, and we live it out in the world in whatever ways we can.

When you come up tonight, instead of a smudge of ashes on your forehead, you may instead receive a card with a blessing. There is a cross, reminiscent of the cross that you may have received on your forehead or hand in years before. On the card, there is also this blessing, May God who has called you forth from the dust of the earth and claimed you as a child of the light, strengthen you on your journey into life renewed.

If you take a card, I encourage you to stick it in the pages of your bible, tape it to your bathroom mirror, or place it where you can be reminded of the great and gracious love that God has for you and all of us. And if you feel the need for physical ashes, when you go home, light a candle, blow it out, and use some of the soot from the wick to mark your forehead or the back of your hand. There’s nothing magical about the ashes themselves… it’s all about the process of remembering who we are and where we are going.

In the shadow of this Ash Wednesday and these next 40 days of Lent, we are blessed, because know that Easter day will come. In six weeks, we will experience anew the life-changing resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. The seasons of Lent and Easter seem very different. But it is because we celebrate them together that we can keep our lives balanced.

Only when we hold together the knowledge of our own sinfulness AND the joy that is resurrection on Easter morning, can we have full knowledge of who God is in our lives. We must hold those two things in equal tension with each other, for until we do that, we cannot honestly reflect on our lives; past, present, and future. We are lucky because we know how Lent will end, not just with Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, but with Easter sunrise and joy. We know that after death, there is life, life eternal, and because of that special, holy day, this Lenten journey is filled with both joy and hope.

Tonight's gospel lesson from Matthew reminds us that we cannot get too swayed in either direction, that there is a balance between being too pious and not paying enough attention to what God requires of us in our Christian walk. Whatever disciplines we follow for Lent, and all the other seasons of the Christian year, we have to practice them for the right reasons. We pray and fast and give to others in service to God, because these are some of the ways we can acknowledge God's love for us, especially considering Christ's sacrifice for our sake.

None of us is immune to the temptations that separate us from God, such as the unwise use of power and money, or things that keep our focus away from God's purposes, so we must keep before us the call to live in such a way that we are constantly reminded that God's way is our way.

Pastor Rich Villodas summed it up well: Ash Wednesday is not a day to manufacture guilt. It is a day to recognize our brokenness, frailty, and trust in God’s love. It’s a day to freely come before God and declare, “I am human, I am dust, and I am love.”

On this day, be aware and accepting of God’s constant presence in our lives, which gives us the courage and strength to keep moving forward, to continue on the journey to live and to love in God's name. That is the promise of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is our joy. It is our hope. Thanks be to God.

Amen and amen.

Peace, Deb

Sunday, February 27, 2022

Sermon - Transformed (Transfiguration Sunday Year C)

Last Sunday after the Epiphany (Transfiguration Sunday) February 27, 2022

Luke 9:28-43 (Year C)

“I’ll never be the same again!” That’s what we say when something happens to us that is so amazing, so wonderful, so unbelievable, and awesome that we are changed forever. Maybe it’s the birth of your first child… maybe it’s the experience of your wedding… maybe it’s an experience of grace through service… or making it through an especially difficult time. Transformation marks our lives in a particular way. The word implies a new focus coming to our lives. It signals being more in tune with ourselves and with God. Being transformed means recognizing a turning point in our lives. And understanding that, in many ways, we can never go back to the way it was. We are different. We are changed. We are transformed.

That’s what the trio of disciples and Jesus experienced on the mountain. They went up on the mountain to have some alone time… some recharging time… and there Jesus is suddenly and inexplicably joined by two ancient figures of faith. Moses appears – Jewish representative of the Law – and Elijah with him – prophet par excellance – representative of the prophecies of all of God’s creation. And they spoke with him and talked about what Jesus, and by association, his followers would encounter in the time that remained. They talked of betrayal, suffering, and death. They spoke of glory and power and the might and wisdom of God.

And the disciples were so affected by the experience that they did what any of us would have done. They wanted to build a monument, to tell others what they had seen, and so that they would be able to return often to remember the full impact of what had happened to them. It was a very Jewish response to a very holy experience. Wherever God makes God’s presence known to humankind, let’s at least pile some rocks together so that people will know – “God Was Here!”

But that’s not what God wants for our lives. God doesn't want us to freeze the mystery in our lives nor even to sit still and ponder it forever. Instead, God calls us to enter into the mystery and use it as our fuel for living. That's really the only effective way we can deal with mystery. And how do we do that? "Listen to him," says El Shaddai. "This is my son, the beloved, the chosen. Listen to him." At the center of the mystery are not more words. At the center of the mystery are not enlightenment or understanding. At the center of the mystery is a person. Jesus. "Listen to him."

In the church, we celebrate Transfiguration Sunday just before Ash Wednesday. The prayers of the early church give us some indication of why this is appropriate. When we experience the awesomeness of God, we are given the strength to bear our cross and become more like Jesus. The Lenten season gives us a path to renewed discipleship – walking the way of the cross and rediscovering what it means to resist evil in whatever forms it presents. During Lent, we can take on opportunities to give up things that draw us away from God and take on things that bring us closer to Him. These can make our Easter that much more lovely, that much more holy, that much more miraculous.[i]

In the ancient Church, five big celebrations commemorated the life of Christ: Christmas & Epiphany (or Three Kings Day), Baptism of the Lord, the Transfiguration, Holy Week/Easter, and Ascension Day. Remarkably, we celebrate all within a four to five-month period, and the rest of the year is just about figuring out what to do with what we know about who Jesus is and how he wants us to live – that’s why we call it Ordinary Time.

Transfiguration Day is sort of the middle of the journey, and in the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), this event serves as a bridge between Jesus’ public ministry and his passion. Throughout Jesus’ Epiphany journey, we have seen him travel near and far, preaching, teaching, healing, and redefining what the Kingdom of God is all about. As we transition into the Season of Len, we will see Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem, continuing even though he knows what is to come.

If we take nothing else away from this passage into Lent, as we prepare for the crescendo of Good Friday and Easter, we must do this: "Listen to him.” According to Paul in this week's epistle lesson, the reason Moses wore a veil is so that the people wouldn't see the glory fading. We can't stay on the mountain. The shine of our encounter with the holy will fade away. But the reality does not. Jesus is the Reality, who stands in our midst as the living Word. "Listen to him." Really listen.

This Sunday, some preachers will end the reading here, with Jesus and the disciples leaving the mountain to go about their life and ministry. But the lectionary has given us the option to continue to Jesus’ next acts of ministry, service, and healing.

It’s is a real-life tragedy – down and dirty – it’s going from the sublime to the depths of despair. Whether this man was indeed possessed by a demon, or whether he was demonstrating signs of mental illness, the fear surrounding his behavior and the shadow that it cast on his family and community was a real and present danger to himself and maybe those around him.

But we have to come down from the mountain to get there. We have to go through Lent to experience the full joy of Easter. But in it all, we remember the mountain… we relive it in our minds, we know that it changed us forever, and set us on a new path of faith. Our time in worship, study, and retreat… all the places where we experience the awesomeness of God – that’s what gives us the fuel and enthusiasm and courage we need to return to the “everyday world” of human need where, often through us, Jesus heals the sick and opposes the forces of evil. We must remember that if worship is a retreat, it is not a retreat from the world but a retreat to come back to the world in love, mercy, and grace.[ii]

Jesus knew what was in store for him. He knew that his time on earth was limited and that despite his teaching and example, for a moment, evil would have its way. But he came down off the mountain anyway. He came down with his disciples and he did the hard thing that needed to be done. His ministry wasn’t over. His journey among the people taught important lessons. They were not theological lectures on the nature of God or sacred worship spaces or who are the great spiritual leaders. No, these lessons were lived out in service to God and others and brought healing and wholeness to people’s lives when they were in the depths of despair and saw no hope for the future.

God’s words from the mountain were a commandment to us – “Listen to him.” - a directive for getting on with the business of faith. And in listening, and leaving the mountain to go down to all that we know will happen to Jesus and disciples - the teaching, the healing, the suffering, and the death – those parts of the journey are the only way that we can get to the point of what Jesus’ whole story is about.

We only understand the importance of Jesus’ life and ministry when we think about the whole thing. Jesus isn’t different because he dies on the cross. Jesus is different because on Sunday when the ladies went to prepare his body for burial, he wasn’t there. Everything Jesus does when he comes off that mountain points through his death to the resurrection. That’s why we worship on Sunday – because every Sunday is a celebration of Easter… a “little” Easter if you think about it. That’s why when we are counting the days backward from Easter to find Ash Wednesday, we don’t count Sundays. Because Sundays are still celebration days. Sundays are still resurrections days, filled with all of the hope and joy and amazement of the first resurrection on the first Easter morning.

Will Willimon once shared a story about a Duke sophomore who we’ll call Mark. A life-long Presbyterian, he felt called to work in inner-city ministry after hearing Dr. Tony Campolo, a famous evangelical preacher, speak at Duke Chapel on Palm Sunday. After a rigorous interview process, Mark was asked to join a summer mission team in Philadelphia and later described his first-day experience to Will.

In mid-June, Mark met about a hundred other youth in a local Baptist church. They sang for about an hour before Dr. Campolo arrived, and when he did, the youth were all worked up and ready to go. Dr. Campolo preached to them for about an hour, and people were shouting and clapping and standing in the pews. Then Tony said, “OK gang, are you ready to go out and tell them about Jesus?” “Yeah,” the kids replied, “let’s go.”

So, he loaded them up on buses, singing and clapping. But as they began to enter the poor neighborhoods of Philadelphia, the kids gradually stopped singing, and the bus Mark was on got very quiet. When they pulled up to one of the worst housing projects in the country, Tony stood up, opened the bus door, and said, “OK gang, get out there and tell them about Jesus… I’ll pick you up at five.”

The young people slowly made their way off the bus, and they stood in little groups as the bus drove away. Mark walked down the sidewalk, faced a run-down tenement building, said a prayer under his breath, and walked inside. There was a terrible odor. Windows were out. There were no lights in the hall. Babies were crying behind thin, scrawled walls. He walked up one flight of stairs and knocked on the first door he came to.

“Who is it?” a voice called out. The door cracked open, and he could see a woman holding a naked baby. He told her he wanted to tell her about Jesus. With that she slammed the door, cursing him down the stairs and out into the street.

“What made me think I could do this,” he thought. “What kind of Christian am I?” He sat down on the curb and cried. When he looked up, he noticed a store on the corner and remembered the naked baby in the lady’s arms. So, he went in and bought a package of diapers and a pack of cigarettes, and went back and knocked on the lady’s door again.

“Who is it?” the same voice called again. When she opened the door, Mark slid the diapers and cigarettes into her arms. She looked at them and motioned him in. He put a diaper on the baby, his first, and smoked a cigarette, his first and last, and sat there talking to the lady and playing with the baby all afternoon. About four o’clock, the woman looked at him and said, “Let me ask you something. What’s a nice college boy like you doing in a place like this?” So, he told her all he knew about Jesus. It took about five minutes. And she replied, “Pray for me and my baby that we can make it out of this place alive.” And he so prayed.

That evening, when they all got back on the bus, Tony asked, “Well, gang, did any of you get to tell them about Jesus?” And Mark said, “I not only got to tell them about Jesus, but I also met Jesus. I went out to save somebody and ended up getting saved myself. Today, I became a disciple.”[iii]

In our lives, the transforming power of God is most real to us in the intense moments of knowing and is with us in both our mountain-top and valley experiences. And through it all, when we worship and when we serve in his name… through Christ, we are transformed. And we give thanks… Amen.

Peace, Deb

[i] Transfiguration Sunday: Why Do We Celebrate It Before Lent? www.umcdiscipleship.org
[ii] http://www.davidlose.net/2016/02/transfiguration-c-worship-transfigured/
[iii] [iii] Will Willimon, Pulpit Resource, Volume 24, No. 1, pp. 12-13.

Sunday, February 13, 2022

Sermon - The Great Reversal - Epiphany 6C

6th Sunday after the Epiphany, (Year C) February 13, 2022

Jeremiah 17:5-10; Psalm 1; 1 Corinthians 15:12-20; Luke 6:17-26

For the last few weeks, we have seen Jesus in different teaching situations. In the beginning, the reactions were mixed… his hometown didn’t know what to do with him, seeming to reject or at least question his call, even driving him to the edge of a cliff, not going so far as to destroy his future ministry. As he continues, word travels about him, and after preaching from a boat and calling twelve disciples to follow him, he preaches before the largest crowd yet on a large flat place. This is Luke’s version of Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount.

When we study the differences between the gospel accounts, it’s good to remember that each gospel after Mark was written with a particular audience in mind. Matthew was written for the Jewish believers, stressing Jesus’ fulfillment of the Hebrew Bible’s promise of a coming Messiah. Luke’s gospel and the accompanying book of Acts, were written to the Gentile community, spreading the message that Jesus came for everyone. That’s why in Luke we see so many crowds gathered away from the synagogue and Temple, and out in the places where a more marginalized community would gather.

These people were familiar with difficult times. They were looking for a message that encouraged them and promised an eventual even playing field. Jesus’ Sermon on the Plain starts exactly that way. Here, Jesus redefines what it means to be blessed, turning their expectations upside-down. Here’s where it’s especially interesting about what the lectionary has skipped over. In verses 1-11, Jesus not only gleans grain from a field on the Sabbath but also heals a man with a withered hand, surely knowing that the Jewish leaders trailing after him would point out his sin and rebuke him in public.

And in verses 12-16, the list of 12 disciples is completed. Among them, Matthew – identified as a tax collected in other places and reviled by Jews and Gentiles alike, and Judas, whose sterling reputation hides the way that he will one day betray Jesus and the other disciples. Even so early in his ministry, Jesus hangs out with people on the fringes of acceptable society. Therefore, it shouldn’t surprise us at all that Jesus continues to push against the expectations of the religious norms and continues to preach, teach, and minister with people that most Jews and the Roman society found unacceptable.

Don’t you wonder what they were expecting? What compelled them – and us – to seek out Jesus? Yeah, they were probably expecting to hear a sermon or some kind of teaching. And that day, they got it in spades. Even so, Jesus’ reputation as a healer probably brought many to him. I’m guessing they would have listened to whatever he had to say if, in the end, they could hear, “Go, you’re well. Your illness has been healed.” Or maybe, “Rise, your faith has made you whole.”

As we follow, Jesus was in the region of Tyre and Sidon, teaching and healing. People with physical problems came from all around to have their lives made more whole. Most of them were unable to earn a living or to participate meaningfully in society because of their problems. Leprosy, mental illness, being lame or blind or deaf… whatever the cause, people came to hear Jesus’ voice. And to feel the touch of his hand, or even to touch his garment, all in the hope that Jesus could change their lives forever. And then they could go on with life.

But Jesus didn’t just touch their damaged bodies. He also gave them a message of hope. Luke’s version of the beatitudes is less well known than Matthew’s version. And probably less popular because they do not romanticize poverty or pain or hunger or of being an outsider by saying that it will be better one day. Instead, they hit us between the eyes, because they force us to redefine what it means to be rich or poor, on what it means to be blessed or cursed. Jesus’ blessing and curse are not just hypothetical – they are here and now.

Jesus says, “Blessed are you who are hungry now, blessed are you who weep now and so on AND then he says, how terrible are you who are full now, for you will be hungry, and how terrible are to you who are laughing now, etc. It is as if he is saying, “You are rich now and there are poor now. You should be ministering to them. You are full now and there are hungry now. You should be feeding them.”

Jesus always deals in the moment of the now and we are called to do the same. As the ebb and flow of social structures change, those who are on top in one generation may very well find themselves on the bottom in the next. Those who are poor during this time of our lives may very well be the power-brokers during the next millennium -- Jesus always acts with us and through us in the now.

So, this is not so much about simply describing blessings and curses on the poor and the rich, but a statement of social justice in the now and a statement about the relationships we have with one another. And ultimately, it’s a statement about our relationship with God. For instance, how can we say we love God, when we hoard our goods as if they are ours alone? How can we claim to love God whom we have not seen, if we fail to love our brother or sister whom we have seen?

Jesus doesn’t go so far as to curse those who have plenty, but he does ask us to consider the attitude we have as we gather and save. Do we gather only to protect our status quo? How do we keep our bounty from bringing ruin to our spiritual and physical lives? I can see how easy it is to dismiss this version of Jesus’ teaching as too harsh or socialistic for the tastes of those who have worked hard to gain a lot. If that is where we fall, where is the hope in the passage us?

Maybe the questions are partially answered by another question: who do we trust? In the eyes of Jeremiah and Luke, those who are blessed are those who trust in God, often abandoned to him because no one else will care. And those who are woeful or cursed are the ones who either place their strength and trust in others, in themselves, or in the things that own them.

I have to believe that it isn’t being poor or hungry or persecuted that makes us blessed. It is knowing that we need something more than we already have. And it isn’t being rich or well-fed or laughing or well thought of that curses us. It is believing that we are self-sufficient… that we can provide for all of our own needs, and that we can be self-sufficient. Neither is the case.[i]

One of the things that a global pandemic will do is show where the cracks or breaking points in society are. Virtual classrooms are great unless you don’t have access to broadband services or computers necessary to attend. Recommendations to isolate and wear masks and take tests are intellectually sound, unless you can’t afford to take time off from work, or if masks and tests are unavailable. I’ve volunteered in several communities with backpack ministries, where low-income children took home shelf-stable foods each weekend to stave off hunger – those programs reported difficulty when kids were not in class regularly, or when caregivers were not able to provide basic needs during the week.

Think about the communities in which you have lived. You’d be shocked to know how many working families are taking advantage of programs that provide food, clothing, and housing assistance. One hospitalization or ER visit, one chronic illness like diabetes or lupus, one company downsizing… many people just like us – and maybe even us – are only a few paychecks short of becoming a family on the margins.

And even when we have “enough,” however you define that, we often feel empty. Jesus reminds us that our value is not measured by what we do or do not have. Jesus reminds us that our identities are anchored in our need for God and our connection to one another. We are called to be people who belong.

Jesus isn’t telling us that it’s preferable to be poor and hungry and sad. Or that it’s evil to be rich and full and happy. I know who I am and how rich I am by the world’s standards. The key is to use those blessings to serve others, to serve God. The choices aren’t so much about being rich or poor, hungry or not. The choices are about how we choose God and what that choice will mean for how we live our lives and use our resources to serve.

As we continue to read in 1^st Corinthians, Paul continues to explain why believing in Jesus’ resurrection is so important, even if we can’t understand it, prove it, or explain it. Jesus’ resurrection wasn’t about life taking over a once-dead body. It wasn’t mass hallucination. Those heresies were rejected by the apostles and the early church. After his resurrection, Jesus was alive and continued his work in the world. And before his ascension, he promised, “I am with you always.” And on the day of Pentecost, that promise was fulfilled as the Holy Spirit rushed through the Upper Room and out into the world.

Resurrection changes the focus of everything we proclaim about Jesus. We can’t just be people learning lessons about who Jesus was. We have to believe that he is with us still – today – and that he is still doing the work of transformation in us, and through us, in the world.[ii]

That’s why it’s important to see that Jesus’ words here are not prescriptive – they are descriptive. They are meant to get us to pay attention to the ways we are living our lives… they are like a scale that helps us measure our progress in the way of faith. They ask us to look into the mirror that Jesus holds up and see what Jesus sees. If our behaviors repeatedly favor ourselves over the needs of our neighbors, the woes Jesus speaks of may follow. They are a reminder that being a disciple of Jesus Christ is not easy and does not come without cost. And if there is no cost, then maybe it’s not Jesus we are following.[iii]

Most of us spend a lifetime looking for the answers around questions of identity, belonging, and purpose… Who am I? Where do I belong? And what is my purpose?[iv] I think Jesus speaks to all three of those questions in this sermon. And in the process, turns our world upside down. Perhaps we could call this sermon “The Great Reversal”. The riches of life come from being in God's Kingdom. The poverty of life comes from not letting God in. Ultimately, these are the questions we must consider: Would I rather be poor or rich? And which is which?

In the name of the Holy Trinity, Amen.

Peace, Deb

[i] Will Willimon, Blessed by Jesus, Pulpit Resource 2022, https://www.ministrymatters.com/all/entry/11090/february-13-2022-blessed-by-jesus
[ii] Pulpit Fiction, Epiphany 6C -https://www.pulpitfiction.com/notes/epiphany6c/#1Corinthians15%3A12-20=
[iii] Rachael Keefe, Blessings and Woes, https://beachtheology.com/2022/02/11/blessings-and-woes-a-sermon-on-lukes-beatitudes-for-epiphany-6c/
[iv] Powell, Kara; Griffin, Brad M.. 3 Big Questions That Change Every Teenager (p. 34). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Sunday, February 6, 2022

Sermon - Called from Our Work to His Work (Epiphany 5C)

FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY, YEAR C February 6, 2022

1 Corinthians 15:1-11; Luke 5:1-11 Panzer Liturgical Chapel

Imagine that most of us don't start the morning unfolding and scanning the morning paper. But if we did, we would eventually get to the classified section, where we would see advertisements for all kinds of goods and services. Imagine in the "Help Wanted" section this ad: “Wanted: volunteers to leave their lives behind to go and fish for people. Might also include public speaking, healing, teaching, and constant explanation. Loyalty strongly desired. No experience required.”

The gospel for today is the story of Jesus taking some of his disciples on a fishing expedition on Lake Gennesaret. There’s Jesus, standing by the lake with the crowds fast approaching him. There’s Simon and friends, usually fishermen extraordinaire, cleaning their nets on the beach after a very unproductive night… ready to go home and get some sleep, I’m sure. But wait, Jesus wants to teach the people from a little ways off the shore. So he asks Peter to take him out onto the lake in one of the boats. And when he was finished teaching, he asked to go out further from the lakeshore and told Peter to let down the nets.

Now Simon tried to be patient with Jesus. “Master we have worked all night long but have caught nothing, but OK, if you say so, I will let down the nets.” What followed was a fisherman's dream. The catch was so big the nets broke and the boat began to sink! Suddenly Jesus' stock as a fisherman began to rise and Simon, James, and John, the sons of Zebedee, were thoroughly impressed. Jesus told them not to be afraid and that from now on they would be catching people. The boat was returned to shore and the fishermen left everything they had and followed Jesus.

The readings for this fifth Sunday after the Epiphany, like all readings for the Epiphany season, teach us about how people were and are affected because of God’s Epiphany. That is, it makes a difference that God chose to manifest himself in Christ. It changes people’s lives. It changes their mission.

Now, most modern North Americans are not fishermen. Many view fishing as a leisure pursuit for aging baby boomers or contemplative retirees. The imagery is a bit archaic for those of us who get fish from the supermarket and restaurants and when incredibly adventurous get sushi from bars. Despite the imagery, the message is clear, those who let down their nets in faith will harvest a catch.

Today's texts can speak to the reluctant evangelists in all of us. Most of us have no problems with getting into a boat with Jesus and listening intently to his wonderful teachings, but when it comes to dropping the nets to fish, we often shake our heads. Not only can we doubt our abilities, we often doubt the fact that Jesus can catch anything either!

There are many and varied reasons why we are shy evangelists. Some of us believe that being Christian is primarily a "private matter." Isn’t that the message we get from all around us? Religion for post-modern folk is supposedly "between you and your God" like your socks are between you and your shoes. Socks are a good thing, wear them, but keep them under wraps.

Many Christians buy into this cultural view. Getting in the boat is fine, after all, water is calming and therapeutic, the relaxation is good for the blood pressure… what a great opportunity to get away from the world and contemplate what life is all about. But that’s not what God’s fishing is about at all. And today’s gospel reminds us that Jesus doesn’t call the disciples to spiritual contemplation, at least not at this moment. No, God wants us to go fishing, not just as a spiritual exercise but to actually catch some fish! “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people,” says the Lord.

And our reaction is just like Simon Peter’s. “Go away Lord, I am not up to the task at hand. You are great, and I am small, and will never measure up. Someone else will do a better job.” Often our faith is great, but we are not up to sharing it with others. We are afraid that they won't listen. We are afraid they will think we are fanatics. We are afraid they won't get it, so we don’t even get in the boat. We’ve had our eye on a particular career all our lives, and going down Jesus’ road will deter us from our goals.

You know, we are very blessed. Most of us adults got the opportunity to choose our vocations. We took a look at what we liked to do and we picked a career. Most teenagers are in the process right now of trying to decide what they want to do for the rest of their lives. And the choices are so vast… and the possibilities are so endless, you may even have several careers before it’s all over. And yet it’s important to remember that because we claim Jesus Christ, we have allowed God to claim our lives. For a very few of us, it has meant changing careers and participating in a life of particularly public ministry. But for most of us, God calls us from within our careers and lives to keep doing the same old thing, but to do it for God’s glory and honor all along the way. After all, Jesus didn’t call Peter to be a physician or an accountant… he still wanted him to be a fisherman… he was just offering him a new kind of catch on this journey called faith.

A couple of important points here: 1) in Matthew and Mark’s gospels, Jesus calls the disciples early on in his ministry, so it does feel quite remarkable that these men would follow him with so little experience of who he is and what exactly he is asking them to do. Luke’s version of the gathering of the disciples is different. We have seen in the last four weeks that Jesus has already been at this a while. He has covered a lot of physical territories and his reputation is preceding him – people are waiting for him to arrive.

Simon didn’t follow Jesus on a whim. His good regard for Jesus compelled him and his fellow fishermen to cast off with Jesus into the lake, even though they have already had an unsuccessful night of fishing. They listen to him speak, and even though they think nothing will come of it, they put their nets into the water and remarkable draw up more fish than they can handle. This made such an impression on them that they laid it all down, left their boats and nets, and followed Jesus out into the countryside. But they weren’t going to save souls. They were going to introduce people to Jesus, and bring change to the lives they were living right then, not in some unknown future.

We often think of this as Jesus’ call for us to save souls for His kingdom. But that is not what Jesus is asking the disciples or us to do. We are called to introduce people to Jesus. To remind those who know him why they are welcome in his company. We are not just calling them to be saved. We are calling them to bring people to serve.[i]

2) Our passage from the 1 Corinthians passage is Paul’s reminder to the Church there that Jesus is worth being followed, not just because he was a wise teacher or performed miracles. His arrest and death are enough to scare most rational people away. Here we have what many scholars think is one of the oldest testimonies about Jesus’ resurrection. Paul argues that believing in the resurrection is a necessary part of what it means to be a disciple. We think of the gospel accounts of Jesus’ resurrection and think of them as first evidence, but they were written 30 to 50 years after it happened. Penned in about 54CE, only 20 years after Jesus’ resurrection, Paul presents this not as a historical fact, but also as a theological foundation for what becomes the Church.[ii]

Verses 3-7 set up the historical record… he was killed, buried for three days, then rose and appeared to many until his ascension forty days later. And verse 8 tells us that the proof did not end there. Paul recounts his own experience of seeing Christ as told in Acts 9, compelling him to change his name from Saul to Paul, and setting him on an entirely new path, taking the message of Jesus, his resurrection, and his ability to change people’s lives forever to distant shores. As Saul, he was a reprehensible person, flushing out Christian believers and persecuting them for their faith in Jesus. When he becomes Paul, he is an evangelist extraordinaire. And he is our reminder that, as he wrote to the Church in Rome, nothing can separate us from the love of God, even our faults and mistakes, our feeble attempts and backslides… God’s grace and love through Jesus Christ are enough… in fact, they are abundantly able to show us that Jesus’ sacrifice was not made in vain.

We are grateful for the gospel story as given to us from four perspectives, but Paul reminds us of something more… that Jesus is not just defined by his story, but by his continued presence with us and in us, as we go out to preach Christ and be Christ in the world. The season of Epiphany is a season of revealing, an exploration of the promise of Advent – Emmanuel - God with us.

So, what do we do? I imagine that we are much like the prophet Isaiah, who when he was told he would speak for God, at first declined, believing himself to be unclean and unfit for the mission. But like Isaiah, our sin has been washed away, and so we are called to respond like he did, proclaiming, “Here I am, send me.”

Each week in our liturgy we proclaim belief through the words of a historic creed of the Church. Each week we profess belief in Jesus, who was born, lived, died, was buried, and resurrected. Intellectually, we struggle with how this all happened and what it means for us. But as Christians, our lives are not only about what we understand. It’s also about what we come to believe through faith, even if we can still not grasp all the details. Our faith grows, not only because we learn more about who Jesus was, but because we encounter him more in the world.

One last thought: remember that our salvation comes, not as a one-time event, but in the ongoing process of living out the good news. Paul says it here in verses 1-2: We have received the good news, we stand in that news, and it continues to save us as we hold firmly to the message. The gospel of Jesus Christ is alive – and our salvation is the ongoing process of hearing, believing, and doing the good news, over and over again.

I found two good quotes for this week’s lessons, and since I could not choose between them, I will use them both.

From Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Life Together, written from an underground experience in the midst of WWII. Pastors and seminarians had refused to give in to an institutional church that refused to denounce Nazi rule and atrocities. These unknown friends were trying to figure out how to find community when they were not sure who could be trusted. Bonhoeffer's words remind them that Church is not defined by building or official institutional degree: “The church is not a religious community of worshipers of Jesus Christ but is Christ himself who has taken form among the people.”

And this one, also from Life Together is especially important as we try to understand the kind of life Jesus is calling us to: “Jesus calls us [men] not to a new religion but to life.”[iii]

In the name of the Holy Trinity. Amen.

Peace, Deb

[i] Pulpit Fiction, Epiphany 5C, 2022 https://www.pulpitfiction.com/notes/epiphany5c/#1Corinthians15%3A1-11=

[ii] Will Willimon, The Core of the Gospel, Pulpit Resource, Feb 6, 2022, https://www.ministrymatters.com/all/entry/11089/february-6-2022-the-core-of-the-gospel

[iii] David Van Brakle, “Christ as community: Bonhoeffer’s antidote for Western Christianity,” https://medium.com/christian-citizen/christ-as-community-bonhoeffers-antidote-for-western-christianity-b17e0767a128#_edn2