The No Matter Whatness of God

John 8:31-36

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” They answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free’?” Jesus answered them, “Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.

Jeremiah 31:31-34

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

So… “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?”  Right!  “Practice, practice, practice!”  It was only when the pandemic locked everything down and Jorge started using our parish hall to practice that I REALLY started to understand the deep truth of that little joke.  Nearly every day, there was Jorge, for hours and hours, practicing the violin.  There weren’t any performances to practice for, but there he was anyway.  Hours of just the basic scales alone!  I was in awe of the commitment.  But it is exactly that level of commitment to the basics that allows him the freedom to fly when it’s time to perform. THAT level of commitment was what God was hoping for from us when God made that covenant on Sinai with God’s people.  “Here are ten of the basics” God said.  Practice, practice, practice them, and in the practicing you will learn to not just live life, but to really fly!  

That was God’s intent, but God is continually more confident in our dedication to practice than we seem able to pull off in real life.  We practice less like Jorge and more like I did in sixth grade and you see the results.  Jorge has played Carnegie Hall, and I... have not!  Clearly our practice of the Law was not going to get all of us living the life God created us to live so God shifted gears and began writing on our hearts!  Now, that doesn’t mean that practicing was no longer important!  It just means that the God of “No matter Whatness” as Gregory Boyle calls it, is simply not content with just “some” of us at God’s Feast!  This God… Our God… is determined to have everyone at the table… no matter what!  

And yet it seems that we continually push away God’s plan of “No Matter Whatness” and dredge back up the god Gregory Boyle calls the God who’s on the lookout for “One False Move”.  That’s what the people gathered before Jesus in today’s Gospel were doing.  Pushing away God.  The God who had brought them out of Egypt NO MATTER WHAT.  That’s what the Church in Luther’s day was doing.  Pushing away God.  The God of grace NO MATTER WHAT.  That’s what Luther himself did.  He pushed away God.  The God in whom all of creation lives and moves and has it’s being… which includes EVEN the Calvinists and Papists!  GASP!  And still to this day… that same thing happens.

This past week a friend posted a picture on Facebook of a sign meant for Halloween trick or treaters.  It said, “Attention Satanic Socialists”  Nice start huh?  Oh it gets better, and by better… I mean horrifically worse! “Attention Satanic Socialists, This is the home of a patriotic christian family.  We work hard and pay taxes.  We do not celebrate satan’s day.  We do not give away free candy to lazy entitled freeloaders.  No Handouts!  Welcome to America!  If you want candy, get a job!  And find Jesus!”

Over and over and throughout the ages, this is what we do!  We cry, “We were never slaves in Egypt!  Jesus never gave away free bread and fish!  God loves us, but could never love YOU!  We push aside the God of “No matter Whatness” and haul back out the god who is always looking for “One False Move.”  And that, my Lutherpalians, is why all of us are always in constant need of reformation.  We needed reformation when we couldn’t seem to practice enough, so God wrote it on our hearts.  We needed reformation when we took God’s Word and skipped over the parts about Grace through Faith.  And we need reformation today and every day as we fail to love our neighbors with the same “No Matter Whatness” with which God has first loved us!  

Recognizing and remembering our need for constant reformation is really what Reformation Sunday is all about.  One Luther’s quotes that I love the most (other than the ones about beer) helps us do just that.  Luther said, “When you wash your face, remember your Baptism.”  It was Luther’s little trick to help us remember our need for daily reformation.  So, when you wake up and wash your face, remember that the shortcomings of yesterday have all been washed away and the wrongs of your past are remembered no more, no matter what.  When you wake up and wash your face, remember that your Baptism has given you everything you need to live into the day ahead with love, compassion, grace, and forgiveness for everyone no matter what.  And when you wake up and wash your face, remember that you… you… just as you are… are fiercely held in the arms of the “No matter whatness” of God’s infinite love and you always, always, always will be.  And then, after you've washed your face take that “No Matter Whatness” that you have first received from God and then pass it on so that they might embrace their own daily reformation too.  Amen.    

Welcome to Kindergarten

Mark 10:35-45

James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to Jesus and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” And he said to them, “What is it you want me to do for you?” And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” They replied, “We are able.” Then Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.”

When the ten heard this, they began to be angry with James and John. So Jesus called them and said to them, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”

You KNOW James and John tried this same thing on their dad Zebedee back in the day.  “Dad, we want you to say yes.”  “Say yes to what?” replies dad, not having just fallen off the turnip truck.  “Just say yes and then we’ll tell you!”  How do I know they tried it?  Because we’ve ALL tried it!  And how often does it work?  Right!!  It NEVER works!  So why were James and John trying this kindergarten trick on Jesus?

My guess is that’s all they had left!  This little exchange, you see, is happening right after Jesus has told them… not once… not twice… but three times now that the Kingdom of God was not happening the way they expected.  Jesus would NOT be raising an army, kicking out the Romans, and becoming a King like David.  The Kingdom of God was coming in one way, and one way only… by way of death and resurrection.  But no matter how many time Jesus said it, they just stuck their fingers in their ears and said, “LALALA, I can’t hear you.”  The first time Jesus told them he was changing from a “king style” Messiah to a "death and resurrection" style Messiah, Peter spoke for the group and said, “By no means!”  The second time, the disciples just changed the subject and talked about who among them was the greatest.  This last time James and John just started working on the seating chart for the new throne room!  

You see, what Jesus was telling them was NOT how they wanted it to happen!  It wasn’t how they were taught it would happen!  How on earth could this crazy “death and resurrection” idea possibly work!  Jesus!  What are you thinking?  Jesus!  You’re not doing it right!  Jesus!  I don’t LIKE this!  Jesus!  This is scary!  Jesus!  THIS IS REALLY, REALLY, REALLY HARD!  And you know what?  A year and a half into a never ending pandemic, I’ve found a new appreciation for James and John.  Jesus I don’t like pandemic church!  Jesus this isn’t how I was taught church should be.  Jesus, I can’t even plan for next week let alone Christmas!  Jesus, this is HARD!  

And do you know why all of this was so hard for James and John and feels so exhausting and hard for you and me?  Because all of it is really hard and exhausting!  Everything that had been one way, is now tossing and turning and churning in the middle of changing into what it will eventually be!  And it’s been like that for a year and a half now!  Just like James and John had NO IDEA what Jesus was talking about when he went on about being “raised from the dead”… You and I have NO IDEA what church, our town, this country, our world will all look like when this overloaded, off balance, never ending spin cycle of life finally winds down and God pulls us out on the other side.  

But wait!  RIGHT THERE… that’s it isn’t it?  That’s the piece James and John were missing!  That’s the part we too often miss too!   GOD ALWAYS PULLS US OUT!  James and John, you and me, we all tend to forget that when we’re in the middle of the mess.  But GOD’S thing, going WAY back, IS getting God's people through to the other side.  It’s easy to forget that in the midst of it.  And in the middle of this latest spin cycle of life, I want to insist that God tell me HOW it’s going to happen!  But that's just as kindergarten as saying, “Hey Jesus, do whatever I ask!” isn’t it?

The truth is, when James and John where in the middle of it… when you and I are in the middle of it… even when we can’t see a plan or any possible end… God is always at work, for our benefit and not our harm, in ways we can never even begin to wrap our minds around.  When James and John heard “Resurrection”.  REALLY!?  It had never been done!  But then, there it was!  And the same is true for us!  As we continue to tumble, rinse and spin through pandemic cycle after cycle, we get to be (understandably) just like James and John… unable to even begin to image how God will get us through.  

To James and John it seemed impossible!  To you and me… all this seems impossible!  And yet… story after story reminds us that God’s thing is seeing God’s people into the impossible… Abraham and Sarah having a child.  Dry land in the middle of the Red Sea.  Manna in the wilderness.  A Promised Land.  Loaves and Fish.  A Camel through the eye of a needle.  All these stories remind us of God’s remarkable track record of working with the least likely sorts of people in the most impossible situations to accomplish the most wonderful and miraculous things!

  

James and John were looking into an impossible future… a future that included the death of the One they gave up everything to follow… from a present where resurrection was an unheard of fantasy.  They did the best they could in that moment.  It was kindergarten level to be sure, but sometimes, kindergarten is the best we can manage!  On many more days than I’d like, we too look into an impossible seeming future… frightening, unpredictable, exhausting and strange.  Sometimes the best WE can do is kindergarten level stuff, no better than James or John.  And it turns out… that’s okay.  Because it wasn’t James or John that saw to it that Jesus was raised from the dead and it won’t be me or you who ends this endless pandemic.  It always has been and it always will be, the One who splits seas, rains manna, makes the blind see, pulls camels through the eyes of needles and raises the dead who will do THIS impossible thing as well!  

Today it was James and John’s turn to remind us of that.  Tomorrow, if you’re able, take a turn reminding someone else who’s finding it hard to remember… someone whose best has been reduced to only kindergarten moves.  Remind them today and then take a turn yourself tomorrow when you’re having a James and John sort of day… that God’s way is to reach through needles and pull out camels and reach into tombs and pull out abundant life!  Amen.  

I Did My Own Research

Mark 10:17-31

As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your father and mother.’” He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”

Peter began to say to him, “Look, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”

One of the newest Halloween decorations you can get for your yard this year is a tombstone that says, “I did my own research.”  My tank, usually filled with charitable Christianity, has run pretty much dry for folks who think their own research is better than the research of the best scientists in the world, but that said, their “research” isn't what landed us in this spot that we're in.  The part that landed us here is the arrogant, individualistic, idolatrous notion of “I.”  I know best.  I am free to do what I want.  I know what’s right.  I have done my own research.  I have the freedom to do whatever I want.  I, I, I, I, I, I, I!  

It was that very same notion of the all powerful “I” that had the man in the Gospel story walking away from Jesus shocked and grieving.  Jesus saw this man's reliance on “I” the moment he came up to him and said, “Good teacher.”  When kids come up to the adult in charge and say, “You’re the best!” you know they're trying to beat the system.  Whether it’s a cookie outside of cookie time, a later bedtime, or a loophole for an off shore tax haven.

What must “I” do to enter the Kingdom of God? He asked.  There it was… he was looking to beat the system by getting into God’s Kingdom ON HIS OWN.  Whether on his merit, his money, his wits, or his strength... it really doesn’t matter.  Because the main problem wasn’t with his merit, money, wits, or strength… It was with his thinking that “I” could make it happen.  He THOUGHT he could do an end run on THIS thing, just like he had with everything else in his life… ON HIS OWN.  THAT was his real problem.  He had made an idol of his individualism.  He made himself into his own god.

But here’s the thing about the Kingdom of the big “G” God.  It’s harder to get into God's Kingdom ON YOUR OWN than it is to get a camel through the eye of a needle.  And that’s no metaphorical camel nor some giant carnival prop needle either.  It is harder to get into God's Kingdom on your own than it is to get a real, 1300 lb. humped back, spitting camel through a normal sized sewing needle with an eye that is just BARELY big enough for a thread to pass through!

Jesus knew that the danger for people with wealth was not the wealth itself.  It was assuming this would work just like every other part of their lives had worked… they would rely on “I” to get it done.  After all he’d paid people, pressured people, charmed people, conned people, and bullied people to make other seemingly impossible things happen before… Why should getting into the Kingdom of God be any different?  But it was different and Jesus told him so.  It really was impossible for his idolatrous “I” to get that very real camel through the eye of that VERY small needle… BUT… but… but… it is NOT impossible for the big “G” God to do it… and THAT is the point.  

The Kingdom of God is not something WE can buy, force, beg, borrow, or bully our way into with the unholy trinity of ME, MYSELF, or I. The ONLY way you and I and everyone else in all of creation can get through to the Kingdom of God, is if God, in God’s mysterious, loving, generous, grace filled way, reaches the divine hand through that terribly tiny eye of that very minuscule needle, grabs hold of us by the wrists on the other side, and then pulls us through!  I can’t do it.  You can’t do it.  All the money of this rich man PLUS Bezos, Zuckerberg, Gates and Buffet's money can’t do it!  

BUT… the Good News is, that God in Christ WANTS to do it FOR us, no strings attached.  That’s the promise we have in Baptism.  Now, God won't pull you into the Kingdom if you don’t want to go that way.  God will let you try as many times as you’d like to get in on your own merit, money, or power.  But in the end, the only way in is by way of a gift from God, and the only part we can play is to graciously receive it. 

For the man in this story he thought “I can get in on my wealth” but that’s not the only thing people focused on “I” try to use to make it in on their own.  Some say “I have guns and that will be my salvation.”  Nope.  Some say “I have the right prayer and that will get me in.”  Nope.  Others say “I’ve been really good and that will get me in.”  Nope again.  Money, Stuff, Weapons, Bravado, Cons, Lies, Connections, Good Deeds, Friends, Family, Smarts and Strength have ALL been used to help convince Me, Myself, and I to falsely believe “I” can make this happen. 

“I” paired with anything else, will neither get us into the Kingdom of God any more that "I" can get a camel through a needle.  For “I” it is impossible.  But God is ready, willing, and maybe most importantly, ABLE to pull us through as a gift.  How long we let “I” get in the way of receiving that gift is up to us, but the promise is that God's gift is already ours so may we all invite our "I" to get out of the way so that we can simply and graciously receive what God is giving us all.  Amen. 

A Fire Swamp of Lessons

Genesis 2:18-24

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner.” So out of the ground the Lord God formed every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every animal of the field; but for the man there was not found a helper as his partner.

So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then he took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman, for out of Man this one was taken.” Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh.

Mark 10:2-16

Some Pharisees came, and to test him they asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her.” But Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote this commandment for you. But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.

When Wesley and Buttercup entered the Fire Swamp, they knew that they faced three well known dangers… Fire spurts, lightning sand, and R.O.U.Ss… Rodents of Unusual Size.  They were certain, however, that True Love would see them through. Today’s lessons are a Fire Swamp of dangers for those in pulpit or pew.  BUT, just like Wesley and Buttercup, I do believe that TRUE LOVE will see us through these lessons!  So into the Fire Swamp we go!  

The first danger is the Fire Spurt of Genesis.  Right off we run into the word “man”.  Except in Hebrew it’s not “man” as in a gender.  It’s A-dam.  As in the Hebrew word for Earth Person.  The A-dam did not have a gender, but what the A-dam did have, was loneliness!  That means God made a mistake!  “It is not good that the A-dam should be alone,” God admitted doing something "not good" and in doing that, modeled for us what to do when we get something wrong.  God doesn’t clutch the Divine pearls or point fingers… God just fixes the mistake and God fixed THIS mistake with Relationship!  Completely equal in “flesh and bone” relationship.  In Hebrew, both Earth People are the exact same.  The English has settled on “rib” for a translation but a better one is “side”… implying that the A-dam was basically split in two!  The baggage of ribs, genders, sexuality and all the rest was read into the story later.  God’s intention though, was to create humanity as an equal, relational, whole.  THAT is still what God intends for all of humanity.  

The next danger of this fire swamp is the lightning sand of the Pharisees.  The Pharisees didn’t care what Jesus thought about Divorce.  They knew that if he answered one way he’d be attacked by one group and if he answered the other way he’d be attacked by a different group.  Either way, someone would do the Pharisee’s dirty work and get rid of this pesky Jesus guy, sinking him forever in the lightning sand of hot-button political issues.  Jesus knew what they were doing and chose NOT to play.  “It is your hardness of heart” that has you asking this question!  He says.  It is you trying to take RELATIONSHIP… God’s fix for humanity… and twist it into a way to divide, conquer, and subjugate the other that has hardened your hearts!   

Then the disciples pulled Jesus aside and we encounter the last hazard of this Fire Swamp.  The G.O.U.Ss… the Gospel of Unusual Severity.  This part really sounds bad.  But we need to understand that in Jesus’ day women had no legal status.  Without a man connected to them as a father, brother, son, or husband they would be literally homeless and destitute.  For a man to FORCE that fate on a woman was what Jesus was forbidding.  He was NOT saying people should stay in abusive marriages of any sort.  He was NOT saying that people should stay in a relationship when, for whatever reason, it no longer brings healing and wholeness to one another as God created relationships to do in the beginning.

What Jesus WAS saying is that, in your current, very broken culture, it’s just NOT okay to throw a human being out to their death on a whim!  We know that’s what Jesus meant, because the divorce part is linked to the kid part of this lesson.  In Jesus’ time, the only ones with less legal status than women were children.  These two bits of scripture together are Jesus, calling the Pharisees, the Disciples, and all the people throughout the ages who have twisted God's intention for relationship, to cut it the heck out!   

RELATIONSHIP is a Divine gift meant to move us toward wholeness and abundant life.  To be what God intended it to be, it must be as God first created it... without any asterisks for gender, age, or sexuality.  It must be relationship equally  shared by ALL… neither Greek nor Jew, slave nor free, male or female are less or more than the other, for ALL in Christ and, like I said at the beginning, the way we return to God's intention for relationship is with TRUE LOVE.  It’s the sort of love that does what is in the other’s best interest.  It is a love that lifts up the other.  It is a love that gives the other what they need to be who God is calling them to be.  It is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.  It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  It is the kind of love that God calls us to put into action BOTH as relationships grow AND equally so when they come apart.  

May all of us lean into our good, healthy, equal and loving relationships knowing they are God’s Divine remedy for us.  May we grow the good relationships and part from the harmful or broken ones, BOTH with True Love… always giving the other what we can so they might have abundant life.  True love… in every case... it really is the Way.  Amen. 

Happenings in Watering Hole, Montana

Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29

The rabble among them had a strong craving; and the Israelites also wept again, and said, “If only we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we used to eat in Egypt for nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic; but now our strength is dried up, and there is nothing at all but this manna to look at.” Moses heard the people weeping throughout their families, all at the entrances of their tents. Then the Lord became very angry, and Moses was displeased. So Moses said to the Lord, “Why have you treated your servant so badly? Why have I not found favor in your sight, that you lay the burden of all this people on me? Did I conceive all this people? Did I give birth to them, that you should say to me, ‘Carry them in your bosom, as a nurse carries a sucking child,’ to the land that you promised on oath to their ancestors? Where am I to get meat to give to all this people? For they come weeping to me and say, ‘Give us meat to eat!’ I am not able to carry all this people alone, for they are too heavy for me. If this is the way you are going to treat me, put me to death at once—if I have found favor in your sight—and do not let me see my misery.”

So the Lord said to Moses, “Gather for me seventy of the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people and officers over them; bring them to the tent of meeting, and have them take their place there with you.

So Moses went out and told the people the words of the Lord; and he gathered seventy elders of the people, and placed them all around the tent. Then the Lord came down in the cloud and spoke to him, and took some of the spirit that was on him and put it on the seventy elders; and when the spirit rested upon them, they prophesied. But they did not do so again. Two men remained in the camp, one named Eldad, and the other named Medad, and the spirit rested on them; they were among those registered, but they had not gone out to the tent, and so they prophesied in the camp. And a young man ran and told Moses, “Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.” And Joshua son of Nun, the assistant of Moses, one of his chosen men, said, “My lord Moses, stop them!” But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit on them!”

Drive past a lot of prairie and not much else for an hour on Montana Rt. 254 and you’ll run into the town of Watering Hole.  The sign says there are 305 souls in town, but that was optimistic back in ’53.  More recent additions to the town sign let you know that this is the home to Michelle “Me” Larson, State hurdles champion.  People said she never hit a hurdle because she practiced with barbed wire fences.  Beside that sign was one for Elle Knutson, three time state spelling bee champion.  The town got its name from the muddy spot behind the old Anderson place that fills with an inch or so of water during the thaw.  Downtown consists of the diner, the feed mill, and Frontier Norwegian Lutheran Church founded in 1867.  Frontier Lutheran has never been in danger of being a megachurch and lately, attendance was nearing an all time low.  One Sunday last winter the pastor, who serves Frontier and four other parishes spread over a hundred miles, preached to a congregation made up of only her black lab Lazarus. 

Worries about membership came to a head at the annual meeting when Miss. Esther Tomlinson stood up to speak.  There was a rumor that she had been a member since 1867, but no one dared ask to confirm it.  Founding member or not, Miss. Tomlinson carried a significant amount of weight at Frontier Lutheran, which was evident from the groan the pew gave as she stood up.  

The congregation listened intently.  Not because it was Miss. Esther but because the diner didn’t open until noon.  “What is needed,” Miss. Esther wheezed, “is a couple of good, new, Norwegian members” and she proposed right then and there to give the council and the pastor that very task.  With the diner now open, the vote was quick and without discussion.  It wasn’t that they thought she had a good idea.  They just wanted to get to lunch before the meat loaf special sold out. 

When the council next met, the pastor began with prayer and gave her report.  Three funerals last month and another on Thursday.  Over 800 miles driven, serving the sprawling parish and seeing people in the hospital in Miles City.  She also reported that she had not yet found any new members.  Palmer Knutson, the council president, reminded the pastor they had to be NORWEGIAN members, and besides, they weren’t quite to that item on the agenda.  But once the annual lutefisk and lefsa supper was sorted, attention turned to the next item on the agenda… new “Norwegian” members.  After a painful silence, the pastor prayed, since no one had any other ideas.  “Dear God, we ask that you send us the folks we need to make this place a vital and sustainable church.”  Neils Anderson leaned over and whispered, “Norwegian members” and the pastor added, “And Lord make them Norwegians. Amen” and the meeting adjourned to the diner meetings in Watering Hole always do.  

The last thing the council or the pastor expected that night was that God would be listening to their request, much less giving them exactly what they needed!  But, that night the Spirit moved.  The two men on the receiving end of the Spirit’s movement described the sensation later as something close to getting caught on an electric fence with wet pants.

However it felt.  The Holy Spirit was working and those two set out with a purpose and intensity normally reserved for the opening day of deer season.  One of the guys was “Me’s” dad.  The other one was Elle’s dad.  Neither were on the council and both only showed up to church at the “holly” or “lily” times of the year, but now they were MOVING.  The kindest people called their new drive a work of the Holy Spirit.  Others  suspected a different kind of spirit.  But whatever the spirit they were working on, they were making things happen at Frontier Norwegian Lutheran Church.  A fellowship breakfast shared with the Episcopal church the next town over.  A new food pantry.  Retired folks organized to deliver meals-on-wheels… the church was suddenly alive!  

Elle’s Dad and Me’s Dad were doing ministry!  They were pouring gas on fires lit by the Holy Spirit!  THAT, however, was NOT what Miss. Esther Tomlinson had in mind.  So the very next Sunday at announcement time, she rose from her seat, much to the relief of the pew, and voiced her displeasure.  The young pastor could see the new light in the eyes of her congregation beginning to fade.  Without even thinking, she stood up and told Miss. Esther she really didn’t mind what El’s dad and Me’s dad were doing.  She didn’t care that they weren’t doing things with the council’s blessing.  In fact, she said, I wish God would zap you and all the rest of this congregation in the pants and get the lot of you moving like they are!  They’re not working against us!  They’re working FOR us and for God!  Maybe God didn’t give you exactly what you had in mind, Miss. Esther, but God gave us all just what we needed!  

That very Un-Scandinavian display of emotion pretty much exhausted the pastor and the whole congregation and everyone sat back down in exhausted silence.  Then, after a pause, Miss. Esther sat down too and the groan from her pew ALMOST covered up her final comment…”Well, at least they’re Norwegians!”  Amen.

Gospel In Reverse

Mark 9:30-37

They went on from there and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.” But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.

Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest. He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

Today we’re throwing this Gospel lesson into reverse and backing into this sermon.  Backing in, you first get Jesus telling the disciples that when they welcome “one such child” they welcome both Jesus and the One who sent him.  In Jesus’ day, children had no status.  They were property at best.  They could be bought, sold and traded… and were.  But here, in this lesson, Jesus wasn’t pointing only to people below the age of adulthood… Jesus was pointing to anyone who was thought of, or treated by those in power as, less than legal, less than important, less than human. 

 

Backing into this lesson challenges us to ask, who in our day, is considered to be, or is treated as, less than legal, as if their life didn’t matter, as if they were less than human?  Who are the weak, vulnerable, and desperate today who are being demonized, terrorized and brutalized by those in power?  We know who they are.  They’re the ones who don’t make a living wage.  The ones used as political footballs. The ones displaced by the consequences of climate change.  The ones desperate to escape our perpetual wars but are told they aren’t wanted here.  Jesus says,“Whoever welcomes one of THESE in my name, welcomes me.”  In them, Jesus tells us, we welcome Jesus himself.

Now, if you keep backing into this lesson, you’ll back right into Jesus asking the disciples, “WHAT were you arguing about on the way?”  Jesus asked like he didn’t know. Jesus knew.  My mom always asked, “whose shoes are these in the middle of the floor?”  They were size 13!  Mom knew!  Jesus knew too.  Jesus KNEW they were arguing about who was first and who was last… who was a winner and who was a looser.  Jesus KNEW.  And THAT’S why he lifted up that child to make his point.  It’s about welcoming the least, the lost and the last… not the full, the found and the first, that is welcoming Christ.  

But WHY were they were arguing about that?  To figure that out you’ve got to keep backing up and eventually you back right into the heart of it… They were arguing because they were afraid.  When people puff themselves up and argue about who is greater and who is not, you can bet THAT is a person living deeply in fear.  Jesus told the disciples what was going to happen but they didn’t understand… they couldn’t understand… they were AFRAID!

Afraid they were loosing control.  Afraid they'd been wrong about Jesus.  Afraid he wouldn’t raise an army, kick out the Romans and become their king.  Afraid that with every step toward Jerusalem they were becoming more like that child… not in control, not on top, and not someone who mattered.  They were afraid that everything Jesus was saying was true!  That the Jesus way of living WASN’T living on the top of the world looking down, but from the very bottom.

What Jesus was saying then WAS true… and it’s still true now… the path to a fulfilling, purpose-filled life begins at the bottom.  It begins by nailing our preferences, privileges and priorities to the cross and letting them die.  The truth is that the tighter we hold on to the things the world says are important, the less able we are to open our hands enough to receive the gift of abundant life God is giving us.  The one prerequisite for resurrection is death.  Easter only happens after Good Friday.  Really living means loosening our grip, our need to control, our need to hold on to what is known and what’s safe… It means letting go of everything the world tells us is important… allowing all that we have, all that we know, all that we are, to fall through our fingers so that all that we are can finally fall into the hands of God to be remolded, reshaped and reformed into the new creation God is calling us to be. 

But HOW?  How do we do that?  The answer is that we do it like a child.  Children don’t study and philosophize about walking… they just take a step, fall down, get up and try again until one day... they’re walking!  They start with nothing other than a parent’s outstretched arms and are transformed into walkers along the way.  Jesus is telling us that’s how it goes with life as well.  We take just one small step toward our Divine Parent’s outstretched arms… letting one bit of the world's way of being fall through our fingers and into God's care and then another.  These aren't just mental steps, but physical steps too and yes, every step we take is certain to be just as uncoordinated and uncertain as a child’s first steps.  But like a child they need to be steps away from a crawling life... away from fear, selfishness and greed and toward toward a walking life of compassion, love, and generosity.

  

We all really are CHILDREN of God, as shaky and unsure as any child learning to walk.  But we are also children of GOD. Children of a Divinely loving Parent whose outstretched arms are ALWAYS reaching out to us with the biggest possible smile, encouraging us each day to take one more step toward becoming the abundantly living creation our Divinely loving Parent KNOWS we are each meant to be.   Amen.

God's Preferences

 Isaiah 35:4-7a

Say to those who are of a fearful heart, “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you.”

Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. 

For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes.

When we see wars and Covid and hurricanes and wildfires and along with all of that, so much pointless, unnecessary pain and death, it’s easy to read this bit from Isaiah and focus only on the fear, the blindness, the broken bodies and the burning landscapes.  In doing that we can easily forget that is not God’s preference for creation.   

But God’s preference is NOT that people be afraid.  God’s preference is NOT for wilderness and dry land, whether that’s literal as it was for the people of Israel, or a figurative wilderness of hope in a pandemic, a desert of food and shelter, or the burning of injustice.  God’s preference is NOT that fear, scarcity, anxiety, worry, and dread be how we live these lives we’ve been given.    

God also has a preference for our wellbeing and that is for wholeness in body, mind, and spirit.  God’s preference is for us to leap like deer, have unstopped ears, be able to express ourselves freely… to be able to sing!  And not only to  sing the blues, but to sing for joy as well!  

God’s preference for us is that we NOT struggle with the burning sands of life either.  Those deserts of endless, irritating sand that grind away in our human gears… never quite grinding us to a stop but never letting our mental or physical or spiritual well being run completely smoothly either.  God’s preference is for justice to flow like cool streams washing away that sand.  God’s preference is for pools of still waters… refreshing us, healing us, giving us peace.  

God’s preference is also NOT for people to go without really living in this life… just “getting-by” isn’t it!  God’s preference is for abundant life… not excessive life, but an abundant, eternal life NOW.  NOT just suffering through this life with only the promise of “eternal life” in the sweet by and by!  That’s not Good News!

“But Father O’Karas” you say, “this preference of God’s can’t be for everyone can it?  Surely Not for THOSE people!” And to that I’d say, it not only CAN be for everyone… it IS for everyone, and don’t call me Shirley!  From the daughters of Syrophoenician Gentile women clear over to grown up Jewish men.  And that, my friends, is literally everyone!  

Now you may have noticed that the world does not currently seem to be operating fully according to God’s preferences and THAT, I would say, is excellent noticing!  It most certainly is not!  But if God is God and the world isn’t working as God prefers, God will certainly get God’s way, right?  Absolutely!  But how… and when?  The “how”, both in Isaiah and in the Gospels, happens with the presence of the Divine.  In Isaiah, it happens when “God comes… when God is here”!  In the Gospels it happens in the presence of Jesus, no matter where he goes or who is around him.  In every case it is the presence of the Divine that changes the world from what it is, into what God prefers it to be.  The “when” part is harder.  The “when” is like a train pulling into the station.  God, the engine, is here but the world in tow has not yet come to a full and complete stop so all of creation has clearly not yet gotten  onboard.  

So if it’s God’s presence that creates God’s preferences for creation and not our work, what is our part in all this?  I think our part in all this is first to constantly remind one another of of God’s preferences for creation.  The desert, wilderness, the jackals, the sand, and the world as it currently is, is very loud, and that noise makes those promises hard to remember.  So we need to hear God’s preferences over and over so they aren’t forever drown out by all that noise.  And I think we’re called to do THIS… to come together… physically when it’s possible… because when we are together we ARE the Body of Christ… and somehow, mystically, our presence as the Body of Christ can and does change the world. 

Now I know, and the Apostle Paul knew, and Jesus knew and I’m certain God knows, that while we are fully the Body of Christ, we are also fully human and we will certainly fall short of the glory of God in what we do.  And yet, the Holy Spirit keeps calling us to remind each other of God’s preferences and to do all we can for our neighbors and the world.  And as we do that, the angels will be rooting for us, shouting, “Be strong!  Do not fear!” and reminding us always that our God will come, our God’s will, will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.  Amen.