Provocative Proclamations: October 2015

Monday, October 26, 2015

Re-form

Reformation Sunday/Pentecost 22B, 10/25/15
Mark 10:46-52

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God, you are our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

It was the evening before All Saints Day – All Hallow’s Eve. The year was 1517.

Martin Luther, a Catholic monk and priest, was discontented with the state of the church. He had written up a long list of complaints against church leadership – 95 theses that both expressed his frustration and offered an alternative vision.

Martin Luther knew that the following day, November 1, All Saints Day, was a holy day of obligation for Catholics, and so the church would be full of worshipers coming for mass. He jumped at the opportunity to get his message out to a large group of people.

On October 31^st, 1517, Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on the door of the church in Wittenberg, Germany, so that his message of repentance to the Catholic church would reach as many people as possible.

Thus began the Reformation – a movement led by Luther and other people who were protesting the current state of the church, who themselves would end up leading various protesting – Protestant – branches of Christianity.

Because of Martin Luther’s courageous actions on the last day of October, 1517, we as Lutherans now celebrate his call to reform every year on the last Sunday of October, which we call Reformation Sunday.

Martin Luther went on to write more documents about and against the Catholic church in his day. He ended up being defrocked and excommunicated. He continued to write, teach, and preach his message of reform to the church.

And, to his great chagrin, the people who followed him named their movement “Lutheran,” after the man they saw as their founder.

Martin Luther never intended to break from the Roman Catholic Church, which was the only Christian church in Germany in the 1500s. He certainly never expected to have a denomination named after him.

Martin Luther genuinely wanted reform. He wanted the church to do better at proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus.

Unfortunately for Christians, the Gospel of Jesus tends to be controversial and divisive. People never seem to be able to agree on what Jesus is saying, or how to apply it to everyday life.

In an effort to re-focus on the Gospel, Luther helped to create a rift in the church that has yet to be healed, even after 500 years.

The controversy of the Gospel is as true for us today as it was in Martin Luther’s time.

This past week I was involved in a conversation with other Lutheran pastors about the importance of Reformation Sunday in today’s church.

One of those pastors was making the case that Reformation Day is irrelevant and outdated – like Columbus Day, he said.

I disagree.

Here’s the thing. Some churches celebrate Reformation Day by lecturing about Martin Luther, singing hymns that he wrote, reading his favorite Bible passages, and extolling the virtues of the Protestant reformers.

Some churches ignore the fact that the Reformation was also the cause of warfare and suffering among common people, and Luther wrote some things that were blatantly anti-Semitic and have been used to perpetuate discrimination over the centuries.

The Reformation itself was not an inherently good thing. It had some really wonderful results, but it also had a serious dark side, and there were lots of cons to go along with the pros of trying to reform the church.

So, if all you do for Reformation Sunday is read from Romans and sing A Mighty Fortress Is Our God, then that other pastor is right – it is an outdated church festival, and Luther is probably rolling over in his grave to know that there are churches who believe that they are honoring him by doing these things.

Celebrating the Reformation like this misses the entire point of the Reformation – it ignores the challenge of refocusing on the Gospel of Jesus.

The point of Reformation Sunday isn’t to celebrate Martin Luther. It’s not to memorialize that one moment in time when he nailed his 95 theses to the church door in Wittenberg.

The point of Reformation Sunday is to re-form.

As a congregation, as a denomination, as part of the church universal – the Reformation can teach us that we may not have everything put together as tidily as we would like to believe.

Reformation Day is a call to change.

So on Reformation Sunday, we deck out the church in red on the pulpit, the table and the pastor. Red is the color of these paraments only one other day of the church year, Pentecost, the day we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit.

In honor of the reformers who were instrumental in forming this Lutheran church to which we now belong, we set aside one of the Sundays in the year to listen attentively for the voice of the Holy Spirit speaking to us today.

Where is God leading us?

How can we become better disciples?

What would God have us change?

Those are the important questions of Reformation Sunday. God doesn’t want us to stay the same as we’ve always been. God wants us to change.

My response to that pastor with whom I disagreed was this: Reformation Sunday is about courageously living out your faith and listening carefully for the leading of the Spirit.

If boldly daring to embody the Gospel is the point of remembering the Reformation, then it is certainly not outdated – it is our mission statement!

And so, on this Reformation Sunday, we are celebrating the work of the Holy Spirit among us by welcoming a young member of our congregation into the adult voting membership of Lake Edge Lutheran Church.

One young woman will be courageously declaring her faith in the triune God this morning, and we as a congregation are going to support her in that declaration of faith.

When Kayla is confirmed in a few minutes, she will become just as important a voice in this congregation as you or me. We recognize that God speaks through priests and monks, but also through young people who have not yet finished high school.

God also speaks to us today through the witness of other denominations, like the Baptist Church, the Moravian Church, the United Methodist Church – our many neighborhood partners in ministry.

God speaks to us today through traditional organ music, through guitars and drums, through 7-stanza hymns and through simple praise choruses.

God speaks to us today through women and men, children and the elderly. God speaks through immigrants and native-born citizens, and through people with skin every color along the spectrum of browns and tans and creams.

God speaks to us in today’s Gospel lesson through the person of Bartimaeus.

Let’s take a moment to pause here. Think of some of the other miracle stories you’ve heard.

Jesus heals ten lepers, the man who is possessed by the demons named Legion, the woman with the issue of blood, the widow’s son, the man born blind, the paralyzed man…

What all of these people have in common is that they are unnamed. Most of the healings that Jesus performs are for people whose names we never learn.

The healing of Bartimaeus must be important, because here we actually have a name for the recipient of the miracle.

Hold that thought, we'll come back to it in a minute.

Bartimaeus calls out to Jesus, and the people try to silence him, just like they tried to keep the children from Jesus in our Gospel reading a few weeks ago.

For some reason, people are always trying to protect Jesus from the very people he came to serve.

But Jesus, thankfully, doesn’t let the people stand in Bartimaeus’ way. He calls the blind man to him, and asks him what he wants.

Notice – Jesus doesn’t assume that he knows what Bartimaeus wants. Sure, restoring his sight is the obvious answer, but maybe this guy wants something different. Maybe he’s hoping that Jesus will forgive his sins, or get rid of his back pain, or just give him a meal.

We could take a page out of Jesus’ book here, on listening to people in need before assuming that we know what they are looking for.

OK, so Jesus calls Bartimaeus to him, asks what he wants, and it turns out that the request was, in fact, the most obvious one. Bartimaeus wants his sight restored.

So Jesus gives him the ability to see.

And then Jesus tells him to “go.”

Your faith has saved you, so go on your way.

But Bartimaeus doesn’t go, he stays. He follows Jesus, who in the very next passage will enter Jerusalem, and within a week after that will be arrested and put to death for his preaching about the kingdom of God.

Here’s the point that I said we’d come back to.

Remember how Bartimaeus is actually named, even though most of the recipients of miracles in the Gospels remain unnamed?

Bartimaeus is remembered by the author of the Gospel of Mark.

There is good reason to assume, then, that Bartimaeus remained a disciple, even in the face of Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion.

Mark names the blind man who Jesus heals because Mark knew the blind man who Jesus healed – he was still a disciple, still someone who was furthering the message of Jesus in the community, years after Jesus had died, had been raised from the dead, and had ascended into heaven.

It just makes sense.

The Holy Spirit was working through Bartimaeus when he called out to Jesus, and the Holy Spirit was at work when Bartimaeus decided to become a disciple of Jesus.

And the Holy Spirit continued to work through Bartimaeus for the rest of his life as he lived as a disciple of Jesus.

These are the moments that we celebrate on Reformation Sunday.

Yes, Jesus performed a healing, and it was wonderful and miraculous and life-changing.

But just as important is the fact that Bartimaeus listened to the calling of God, and chose to follow Jesus. He joined the ranks of disciples after Jesus healed him, and that became life-changing not just for him, but for everyone else he encountered and shared the Gospel with.

Martin Luther was discontented with the church, and chose to do something about it by calling the church to reform itself and refocus on the Gospel.

Kayla feels a personal faith in God, and has decided to profess that faith in front of this congregation this morning.

Jesus could heal every sick, injured, disabled, oppressed and unhappy person in the world – but the reason we know about and celebrate his work is because of people who are changed and choose to follow Jesus. These people don’t just go back to life as usual, they spend their lives among the ranks of disciples.

On this last Sunday in October, we remember where our denomination came from – we honor the legacy that Martin Luther and the other reformers left us with, while also acknowledging that they weren’t perfect.

So on Reformation Sunday, we look for ways to re-form the church as it is today. What is working? What isn’t? Where is the Spirit leading us today?

And on this festival in the church year, we celebrate the work of the Holy Spirit, which continues to move among us and guide us and teach us how best to follow Jesus.

May that Spirit move among us, and may God give us the grace to listen and follow where it leads. Amen.

Monday, October 19, 2015

Hats

Pentecost 21B, 10/18/15
Mark 10:35-45; Isaiah 53:4-7; Hebrews 5:1-10

God of grace, open your Word to us today. Help us to hear the calling that you have for us, and give us courage to serve others in your name. Amen.

One of my colleagues recently posted a picture online of the entryway to her house. Right by the front door, there are some hooks on the wall, and there are a bunch of baseball caps hanging on those hooks. This collection of hats tells a lot about who she is. There are hats for the churches and organizations she works for. One of the hats says “preacher’s wife,” because in addition to being a pastor herself, my friend is also married to a pastor. It’s a great picture showing the many roles that one person can hold in life.

If Jesus had a row of hooks in the entryway to his house, with hats for his different roles hanging on them, it would have to be a very long line of hooks.

Jesus would have a hat that said “teacher.” He’d have one that said “savior.”

He’d have a “human” hat and a “divine” hat – or maybe that would be the same hat, you could just turn it inside out to change the writing.

Jesus would have a hat that said “son of Mary,” one that said “son of God,” and one that said “son of Man.”

As we heard in today’s second reading, Jesus would have a hat that said “great high priest.”

And as we heard in the first reading, he would have a hat that read “oppressed and afflicted, wounded and crushed” – or perhaps more simply, it would just say, “sacrifice.”

Jesus would have a hat for being a healer and a king and a rabbi.

Most importantly, Jesus would have a hat that said “servant and slave of all.”

Jesus wore a whole bunch of hats, metaphorically speaking. He had a whole bunch of different titles to live up to in his life and his ministry.

In each of these roles that Jesus lived, he was both called by God and blessed by God.

Jesus didn’t just assume these roles, he didn’t claim that he had earned each one.

Instead, God called Jesus to live as the son of God, to be a teacher and healer, and to exemplify the meaning of living life as a servant to others.

As Jesus accepted and fulfilled each of these roles, he received the blessing of God and passed that blessing along to others.

Jesus was called and blessed by God in all the many hats that he wore.

Last week I was at a meeting with a bunch of chaplains from the hospital.

Some of you already know this about me… I’ve been doing chaplaincy at this hospital for over 5 years now. Once a month I take an overnight on-call shift, from 5pm to 8am, so that if anyone wants to talk to a chaplain during the night, they can do so.

There are about two dozen of us who serve as night chaplains at this hospital, taking one shift a month, and most of us either have day jobs or are retired.

We were doing introductions at the beginning of last week’s meeting, and as everyone shared their name, they also shared their ministry position.

Everyone had at least two ministry roles to share.

Sue, retired Episcopal priest, spiritual caregiver association board member, and night chaplain.

Aaron, Lutheran pastor, volunteer for advance care planning, and night chaplain.

Bill, former lawyer, candidate for ordination in the Unitarian Universalist church, hospice chaplain, and night chaplain at Meriter.

And these were only the ministry roles that people shared.

Add to the list things like mother, brother, wife, son, caregiver for family members, coordinator of a social justice group, member of the PTA, volunteer with a theater group, and the list goes on and on.

It really struck me in that meeting last week how many roles each of us has in our daily lives.

And it’s not just groups of chaplains who wear many hats. The same could be said for everyone here.

Father, grandmother, sister, husband. Teacher, nurse, doctor, administrator. Church member, volunteer, activist, friend. What else?

God calls you and me to be many different things, and to wear many different hats. In each of these roles to which God calls us, God also blesses us with the gifts and abilities we need to fulfill our calling.

Because of God’s call and God’s blessing, we can do all this work – teacher, mother, grandfather, volunteer, friend – in the service of God.

This sounds all right so far, I think.

All of this is good news.

God calls us and blesses us in all the different facets of our life, just as God called and blessed Jesus throughout his life and ministry.

And the purpose of that call and blessing is to do everything in service to God.

That last little bit is where it gets more complicated.

Living our lives in service to God.

When God calls us and blesses us to live out certain roles in life, it is not so that we can have power and dominion over other people.

God does not bless us at the expense of other people.

God does not give us authority to control others, or to control the Word of God, or the gates of heaven, or anything else that people of faith are constantly claiming to control in order to instill fear in the hearts of their sisters and brothers.

In fact, if you use your God-given calling to create fear in your neighbor, you have ceased to use it in the way that God intended. A faithful life is a life of service, and you can’t be serving another person if they are afraid of you.

God’s call is not to power and greatness, contrary to what televangelists and politicians might tell us.

God’s call is to serve.

James and John were called to a life of service. Jesus walked past them as they were mending their fishing nets on the shore of the sea of Galilee. He told them to follow him, and they dropped their nets, left their father behind, and followed without question.

They weren’t promised greatness. They didn’t get into the whole discipleship thing expecting riches or power or any special kind of authority.

But by today’s Gospel story, they’ve been following Jesus faithfully for quite some time. It seems like Jesus’ ministry is coming to a critical point. He’s been talking about going to Jerusalem and telling the disciples some nonsense about suffering and being put to death, which none of them really believe.

James and John, as good Jews, know that the Messiah is supposed to be a political revolutionary and military hero, who will return the rule of the Promised Land to the descendants of Abraham, as it was meant to be.

So, if Jesus was going to usher in this kingdom, James and John wanted to make sure that they had front row seats.

They felt that they had earned it, after all, by faithfully following Jesus all this time.

James and John tried to live the life to which Jesus called them.

But they didn’t get it. They prove that to us today.

James and John asked things of Jesus which he never intended to give to them or to anyone else. They asked to be made great in the kingdom that Jesus was going to rule.

But in the kingdom of Jesus, the true measure of greatness isn’t political or military power.

In the kingdom of God, the true measure of greatness is whether you act as a servant to everyone you meet.

Last week the sermon mentioned how the Kingdom of God is not so much a place as a perspective.

This is the perspective that defines the Kingdom of God:

A person of power in God’s kingdom is someone who serves other people with every breath that they take.

God calls people to action in this world, and the more faithfully we follow, the closer we get to experiencing what God’s kingdom is really like.

When we spend our time, our talents, our possessions, our whole lives in service to others, then we start to understand what Jesus meant when he said to James and John, “can you drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized by the same baptism as me?”

James and John said, “yes, we are able.”

And Jesus said, “good luck.”

You can try to live as God has called you, and God will bless you as you try to live out that calling… but it’s not going to be easy.

People might not like you.

People might not like the message that you’re trying to share.

But worse than that, people might try to change you.

The people you used to work with might wonder why you left your fishing nets behind to follow this itinerant preacher.

Your family might wonder why you give so much of your money away to charity.

Your friends might wonder why you spend so much time volunteering for MOSES or Luke House or Habitat for Humanity.

People who love you might, with all the best intentions, try to get you to be more selfish.

It’s your money, you’ve earned it, so why should you give it to people who don’t deserve it? If you invest that money now, you can live comfortably for the rest of your life. And in fact, your money will grow over the next number of years, so that when you do pass away, if you still want to support some charity, you can make them a beneficiary of your will and they’ll get even more money then.

Isn’t that better?

Well, no, it’s not.

Because someone today still needs to be fed and housed and given assistance to navigate the medical system or find a job or whatever, and those needs won’t wait until your investment has matured.

God’s call to us is now, in this life, in this world, with these neighbors.

God calls us to a life of service, just like James and John were called, and just like Jesus himself was called.

It’s natural for us to want to get out in front, to be better than other folks, to have more status or money or popularity.

In his sermon on this passage, Martin Luther King called this the “drum major instinct.” It’s the basic human desire to lead the parade, to achieve greatness, and to be recognized for our efforts.

This “drum major instinct” is diametrically opposed to the purpose of a life of faith.

No matter what hat we’re wearing – whether we’re a faithful spouse, a loving grandparent, a generous volunteer, a dedicated professional, a thoughtful writer, an inspiring musician – whatever role we’re filling in life, the purpose of that role is to be of service to other people.

Not to ourselves.

To others.

Can we share in Christ’s cup and his baptism?

James and John said yes, and Jesus took them at their word. He knew that they had it in them to live as servants for the rest of their lives, even though they didn’t understand what it meant when they asked.

Can you?

God has called you to be many things in life.

We know that God blesses us in our calling, just like Jesus was blessed throughout his life and ministry.

And this is the good news of today’s Bible readings.

But the challenge of today’s Bible readings is to honor that call and that blessing by using everything we have in service to other people.

Can you do it?

Next week we will celebrate confirmation with one of our young people as she affirms the promises that were made on her behalf when she was baptized.

I will ask her, “Do you intend to continue in the covenant God made with you in holy baptism . . . to serve all people, following the example of Jesus?”

Can you drink of the cup from which Jesus drinks, and can you be baptized with his baptism?

Can you commit to focusing the rest of your life on service to others?

I’m pretty sure that the young woman in question will be answering yes to that question. Or probably, “I do, and I ask God to help me,” which is really a much more honest answer.

Because this whole life of faith thing is hard.

Yes, God calls us to be people of faith in every aspect of our life.

And yes, God blesses us in every single role that we are called to, just like God blessed Jesus in the many roles he lived out in his ministry.

But there are constant pressures to give in to the lure of power, like James and John did. And that’s not how God intends us to use our blessings.

God’s blessings are given to each one of us, in every aspect of our lives, so that we can use those blessings to serve other people.

God’s blessings aren’t for earthly power, or wealth, or fame, or physical strength, or military might, or the ability to control other people, or for instilling fear, or for manipulation.

God’s blessings are for none of those things.

God wants us to live each day of our lives as servants, just like Jesus did.

God you call us and bless us in every aspect of our lives. You give us what we need to be the best that we possibly can be in all of our roles and relationships in this world. Help us to use those blessings in service of others. In your holy name we pray. Amen.