Sermon - Sunday, June 30, 2024

Do not Fear, Only Believe

The Gospel of Mark likes sandwiches – the literary kind – like the healing

stories in today’s Gospel. Mark interrupts the story about Jairus seeking

healing for his daughter in order to tell the story about the bleeding woman –

before returning to the story of Jairus’ daughter. In putting the stories

together in this way, the one story helps interpret the other.

This past week, in reading these “sandwiched” stories, I was touched by the

story of Jairus, the father who went to extreme measures in seeking health

and healing for his little girl. In those days, it was common for children to die

of disease due to the lack of medicine and vaccines. Furthermore, she was a

girl – who were traditionally less valued than boys in that culture. But clearly,

Jairus loved his little girl.

He sounds absolutely beside himself as he falls at Jesus’ feet – not something

that synagogue leaders normally would do – and begs over and over for Jesus

to “lay hands on her so that she may be made well, and live.” Like the

bleeding woman’s touch, Jairus’ words are both a profession of faith and an

act of desperation from a person who was willing to do anything for the gift

of healing.

If you have ever sat with a mother or a father when their child is deathly

sick– or been that mother or father or as one who cared for the child – you

know that that there may be nothing worse than to have to face the death of

your child. It doesn’t even matter how old the child is – they are still your

child, the one you have tried to protect and to raise and to shelter from every

storm.

Jairus may have been standing on the beach, waiting – for when Jesus’ boat

came in, Jairus lost no time in placing himself in front of Jesus’ feet -

blocking his way. He was on a mission - must have been relieved when Jesus

agreed to come to his home to heal his daughter.

But just as they were headed toward’s Jairus’ home, Jesus stopped – because,

he said, someone touched him -and Jairus had to wait again. We don’t hear

from Jairus – but even the disciples were incredulous. Of course, someone –

lots of someones touched him. They were surrounded by people. But Jesus

wouldn’t budge until he found out who touched him. For he knew that

healing power had left his body. He was right – a woman – a nobody – an

unclean woman – came forward to confess. And she told the WHOLE

story… while Jairus waited.

Again, we don’t know how Jairus was feeling as he was waiting for Jesus.

After his first words, he doesn’t speak again and we don’t return to Jairus’

story until after Jesus proclaims the bleeding woman as his daughter – and

effectively reinstates her into the community – inviting the community to

receive her into their midst with peace, with shalom, which means that she

was to be welcomed. She belonged again. And she– this formerly bleeding

woman –had been waiting a long time – 12 years of waiting – which maybe

not coincidentally - is the same as the age of Jairus’ daughter.

Waiting. Sometimes waiting is pure agony. I remember waiting for word

from Mary and Arch, the parents of my college roommate Sharon.

Apparently, before she attempted to ride an unbroken horse, Sharon had

reasoned with a friend, “what’s the worst that could happen? I might get

bucked off – that’s happened before - no big deal!” But this time, it was a big

deal. When she was bucked off, her head hit a bolt in the stable right at her

temple. Her body was perfectly fine – except for that one bruise. She went

into a coma. When we heard the news, we waited and we prayed and then we

got anxious and wished there was something, anything that we could do.

What do you do when you wait? Do you fidget and worry and wonder what

will happen and imagine the worst? Do you try to keep “busy” and think of

anything other than the thing you are waiting for? And of course, you pray.

You pray and pray and wish for the right words to make healing happen.

While he was waiting, I would guess that Jairus had been praying – praying

for his daughter but maybe also praying for Jesus to hurry up so that they

would not be too late. But Jesus was not going to be hurried. And he was not

going to hurry this new daughter of his – Jesus wanted to hear the whole truth

– and to restore her to the community.

But there is a cost to waiting. While they are witing, messengers arrive to tell

Jairus that his daughter has died – so don’t bother the rabbi anymore. It’s hard

to imagine how devastated he must have felt -- as if he had the winning

lottery ticket and, on his way to redeem it, it blew out of his hand and

someone else won the jackpot.

Jairus doesn’t speak after his first lines but Jesus knows his heart. Jesus says

to him, “Do not fear, only believe.” I was struck that Jesus did not tell him

not to be angry or frustrated or grief-stricken -- I think I would be all of

those. But Jesus told him, “do not fear.”

At least in the Gospel of Mark, fear seems to be the opposite of faith. When

the hemorrhaging woman, confident in her belief that just touching the robe

of Jesus would be enough to heal her, does so – despite the taboo of an

“unclean” person touching another, Jesus commends her for her faith.

And this is not the only time Jesus contrasts fear and faith. When Jesus calms

the raging water on the Sea of Galilee, he says to his disciples, “Why are you

afraid? Have you still no faith? Again, after walking on the water, he tells the

disciples not to be afraid. Later, the disciples are afraid when they hear Jesus

talk about his death and resurrection. The religious leaders are afraid of what

Jesus will do. And finally, when they see the empty tomb, the women are

afraid and run away. In each of these cases, fear is the opposite of believing

in Jesus, of having and keeping faith with Jesus. Jesus also tells Jairus, “Do

not fear, only believe.”

Fear is a very basic, elemental raw emotion located right on our brain stem

that tells us to respond one of three ways: fight, flight or freeze. This is a

good response if you are encountering a lion in the early years of civilization

when you had to decide instantly your course of action. Can you fight it? Can

you outrun it? Or is your best bet to freeze in place and try to blend in with

the tree or grass or whatever is nearby? Quick gut reactions from fear may

have saved the species. But because fear is reactive and a gut reaction, it

doesn’t give the option of being open to new possibilities.

On the other hand, faith opens us up to possibilities that we had never

imagined before. As Brene Brown once said, “Faith is a place of mystery,

where we find the courage to believe in what we cannot see and the strength

to let go of our fear of uncertainty.” 1  

Jesus is inviting Jairus – and later the disciples - to do just that: “Do not fear

only believe.” This kind of faith requires trust – trust in God, trust in Jesus

despite the what things may seem and despite what your gut may be telling

you. Jairus must have resisted the temptation to fight or run away or freeze

because he took Jesus to his house, endured the mocking laughter of the

people, and brought Jesus to his daughter’s room- even though the

messengers and everyone at his house said it was too late. But it was not too

late for Jesus. Instead, Jairus’ waiting – patiently or not - and embracing faith

and not fear paid off. Jesus lifted up his daughter into new life.

Both Jairus’ daughter and the woman Jesus claimed as “daughter” were

healed and restored to life. But not every person is healed, not every story

has this kind of “happy ending.” And it is not for lack of waiting and

watching, hoping and praying.

My friend Sharon, after spending several weeks in and out of consciousness,

developed a blood clot and died. I was devastated. She was far too young and

too full of promise to die. I was pretty angry with God. On top of that, – I had

some survivor’s guilt. I came out of a head injury – why shouldn’t she? Were

not my prayers for her as powerful as the prayers others had prayed for me?

Why was I healed - and she was not?

This question unsettled me… until I visited Sharon’s mother Mary. I knew

that Mary grieved the loss of her daughter Sharon deeply. And yet, she

seemed very much at peace. So, I asked her how she had managed to come to

peace with Sharon’s death. Mary smiled and said, “It became clear to her

father and me that Sharon would never be able to fully recover. She would

never be able to live outside of a care center and her creativity and her

intellect were deeply damaged. We were willing to live with that. We were

making plans to sell the home that we built in Missouri and move back to

Minneapolis to care for her. Sharon didn’t understand everything – but she

understood that she was not herself – and she was miserable. She did not

want that life. I miss her deeply, and yet, for her sake, I am glad that God

took her home.”

Mary was able to embrace Psalm 30 which says, “Weeping may linger for the

night, but joy comes with the morning.” The promise of resurrection life for

Sharon was what helped Mary through the long night of grief.

It was then that I learned – again – that healing and wholeness are not always

what we think that they should be. God’s ways are not our ways for God sees

beyond our selfish desires. I wanted Sharon to be healed – because I wanted

my friend back. But Jesus knew her heart and He cares for the whole person

as we are – not as we wish to be.

Brothers and sisters, friends in Christ, Jesus cares for you and those that you

love too. So when you come to a time in which you are forced to wait, may

you watch and wait with hope and faith, trusting in God. As Jesus said to

Jairus, so Jesus says to you and to me, “Do not fear. Only believe.” For God

is faithful. Amen.

Faith-Lilac Way Lutheran + June 30, 2024+ Pastor Pamela Stalheim Lane

1 Brene Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection

Sunday, June 23, 2024

Sermon:  Holding onto the Man in the Boat

In the summer of 2022, I took Clinical Pastoral Education, CPE for short, which is basically an introduction to chaplaincy, or rather, what amounts to an immersion crash course in pastoral care in a hospital setting.  After only a few weeks of visiting patients I was assigned to visit a woman named Linda, a cancer patient.  One of the staff chaplains came in and explained that this was an error, because Linda was her patient.  “However,” she said, why don’t you go visit her anyway, and then come and tell me about it.”   “Okay,” I agreed.

I went to her room, knocked on the open door, announced politely that I was from Chaplaincy services, and was warmly invited inside.  Linda was a beautiful young woman, probably in her mid-forties.  The smile on her face could not conceal the fact that she was experiencing some poorly controlled pain.  There was a nurse in the room, taking her vitals and giving her some medications, and I hoped that included some pain meds.  But as the nurse was leaving, Linda asked when she was due for her next dose of pain medication, and winced when the nurse indicated that it wasn’t due for several hours.  I sat down in a chair beside her bed and introduced myself, and asked her, what, if anything, I could do for her. 

Linda sat up, wincing, pulled out a brochure, opened to a page titled “Forgiveness” and pointed to it, and asked, “Can you tell me, how do you forgive someone who has already died?”  This was certainly not what I expected her to say

To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t sure I really understood the question.  I explained to her that forgiving someone who has died is the same as forgiving someone who is still alive—that it’s more than just saying the words, “I forgive you” for whatever they did that hurt.  Forgiveness involves letting go of the anger, the resentment, the frustration, and the pain and the hurt that whatever the person said or did, or maybe what they didn’t say or do, that upset you, disappointed you, caused you harm, or damaged your relationship.  And I told her that you can do this at any time, even after the person is gone—and even if the person never said he, or she, was sorry, or asked to be forgiven.  She looked at me in silence.

                “Who is it you need to forgive,” I asked.  “My mother,” Linda responded.  “She died a few years ago.”  She looked down at the brochure in her hands.  “I’m sorry,” I said, and I put my hand on her shoulder.  “Would it help to talk about it?”  She nodded. 

Linda explained that her mother had always made her feel inadequate—like she was never good enough, never perfect enough, even as child growing up.  She never felt like she measured up in anything, in any sense.  Her mother expected her to be perfect, and she wasn’t; she couldn’t be.  And her mother never apologized for expecting and demanding the impossible.  They were never as close as she wanted them to be.  Her feelings of inadequacy had created a wall between them.  And Linda was still holding onto the pain, the anger, the resentment. 

We talked for a little while, and then she changed the subject. “I’m trying to hold on to the man in the boat.”  I didn’t expect that either, but I knew from the way she said it, that she was talking about Jesus.  “That sounds like a good idea,” I said.  “Holding on to Jesus is always the right thing to do.” 

I could see her medication was wearing off, and her pain was getting worse.  So, I offered to lead her through some guided meditation that I found helpful when I was in pain, if she wanted to try it.  She did.   I had her lie back and imagine she was lying in her favorite place, wherever that may be.  Linda was a MN girl, so naturally she was lying in the grass near a lake, listening to the waves hit the shore.  I had her breathe in and out, deeply, several times, establishing a rhythm, focusing on the feeling of the grass beneath her, the sun on her face, the breeze blowing over her, the sounds of the lake.  Then I had her imagine a warm ball of light descend upon her head, and into her body, warming and relaxing each part of her body as it traveled slowly down from her head to her toes, melting away the tension and the pain, and then taking it away as it slowly moved back up to her head and out of her body, but left behind a small, warm glow that represents the soothing presence of the Holy Spirit.  A few more deep breaths, and she was instructed to open her eyes slowly and come back to the room.  Linda opened her eyes and indicated that she felt much better, that the pain was more tolerable.  I asked if I might say a prayer over her.  She nodded, so I prayed, and left the room. 

The chaplain came to see me when I returned to learn about my visit with Linda.  She asked whether I felt we had made a connection.  I told her about the visit, and told her that, yes, I felt like we had connected.  The chaplain smiled, and told me that I should continue to visit her.  Then she showed me how to assign a patient to myself, so that no one else would be assigned to visit her.  Then the chaplain told me that Linda was at a crossroads:  she was deciding whether to choose to undergo one last round of treatments and continue fighting what was likely a losing battle, or to go into hospice. 

After that, I be began visiting Linda twice each week.  We always began with guided meditation, and then we would talk.  We talked about her mother, and her son.  We talked about memories, and how, according to research, every time we recall a memory, we re-create it.  Each time we remember it, depending on how we interpret it, or feel about it, we can make it better or worse than the actual event.  We talked about how forgiving someone is good for us, because holding onto the pain, anger and resentment is unhealthy, and how it becomes a heavier and heavier weight that we bear—and how it can overwhelm us, even sink our boat and drag us down to the bottom of the lake.  We talked about how holding on to anger can cause it to fester and result in increased emotional and physical pain, and can interfere with other relationships.  We talked about giving her mother the benefit of the doubt, assuming that she always did the best she could at the time, and how mothers protect their children, and never let them know all the things they are struggling with, that might explain what is going on.  We talked about happier memories, and about good things she learned or inherited from her mother, and about how good a mother she was to her son, and always made sure he knew he was more than good enough.  We even talked a little about my mother, whom I had buried only the previous summer.

And we talked about the boat, and the man in the boat.  Linda never referred to Jesus in any other terms.  For her, Jesus was always the man in the boat—the man she needed to hold on to with all her might, and never let go, no matter what.  We never once talked about her cancer, or hospice or continued treatments or dying or even fear of dying.  Linda was focused solely on forgiveness and holding on to the man in the boat tossed by the storm.  Her faith and her tenacity were inspirational. 

Linda knew she was in a boat, in a storm, but she wasn’t alone.  Jesus was in the boat with her.  All she had to do was hold tight to that man in the boat, and the storm would pass, and whatever happened, life would continue, if she just held on to the man in the boat.  And she knew that, if she could just let go of the weight of pain and anger, if she could just forgive her mother, then she could hold on to the man in that boat with both hands.   

I visited Linda four or five times, and she was always happy to see me, always full of complicated questions about forgiveness and love.  Then one day, I went to her room and found it filled with nurses and orderlies, all bustling around the room, removing tubes and IVs and disconnecting her from monitoring equipment, and giving her what sounded like discharge instructions.  As always, Linda welcomed me, this time with more cheer and exuberance than ever before.  I though perhaps I should offer to come back later, but Linda never gave me the chance.

“Oh, Karen!  Hi!  I’m so glad you came.  I was afraid I wouldn’t get the chance to see you again.”  Linda was being transferred.  A room had opened up in a wonderful hospice across town, and she had taken it.  She would be leaving very soon.  She summoned me to her bedside and gave me a big hug, then introduced me to her husband, who was standing across the room by the window, trying to stay out of the way, as “the chaplain I told you about.”

Then she said, “I need you to say a prayer for me.”  I told her, I’d be happy to do that.  She explained, “I want you to say a prayer to let my mother know I’ve forgiven her.  And I want it to be you that does it, because you are the one who made it possible.  You helped me to forgive her.  And don’t worry, I can do the meditation by myself now.  All I have to do is close my eyes and I can hear your voice, guiding me.”  Then she took my hands, looked me straight in the eyes, and said, “I know this won’t be the last time I see you.  In fact, I’ll be first in line to greet you when you get there.  I’m holding on to the man in the boat.”  And then she gave me another huge hug.  So, I prayed for her, just as she had asked me to, that God might let her mother know she was loved and forgiven, and that Jesus would stay by her side, hold tight to her, and bring her to the place he had prepared especially for her.  Then I gave her one last hug, and said good-bye, promising I would remember her, too. 

Linda was still holding on to the man in the boat…with both hands now. 

For Linda, the storm wasn’t the cancer.  She had accepted that her fight with cancer was a losing battle.  She had already surrendered before I met her.  Jesus had already calmed the storm, and she was seeing clearly.  The dilemma for Linda, was baggage.  She knew that in Jesus was life—abundant and eternal life.  Wherever the boat docked, if she was still holding on to Jesus, life would go on, eternally.  But she was carrying baggage that she was having trouble leaving behind.  She had held on to that hurt, that anger, that resentment for so long, it had become part of her, part of her identity.  She had a death grip on that weight, and had to pry herself free, in order to hold on to Jesus, hold on to life.  She wanted Jesus to have his hands free to steer the boat.  She knew that if the boat sank, that baggage would drag her to the bottom of the lake, away from Jesus.  She knew that she couldn’t hold on to both Jesus and that baggage.  She knew that the boat was approaching a threshold, a narrow threshold that she couldn’t get through unless she set that baggage aside.  She knew it and she was determined not to let that baggage separate her from Jesus, from life on the other side of that storm.  So, she let it go.  I didn’t really help her do it.  That was Jesus.  That was her faith.  I was just a sounding board.  I was purely privileged to ride in that boat with Linda and Jesus for a few days while she figured out how to let go of something that she no longer wanted or needed—something that had been keeping her from living fully and abundantly for decades.

My dear friends, we are all, each and every one of us, floating in our own little boat on the lake.  And like Linda, none of us are alone in our boat.  Jesus is in that boat with us.   Now and then a storm comes up on that lake, and we have to hold on to Jesus, trusting him to get us safely through the storm.  If we’re smart, we let Jesus steer the boat, and we just hold on to him until the weather clears, until the lightning and thunder and the rain stop, until the wind and the waves subside.  But if we fill that boat up with enough worldly baggage, there won’t be enough room for Jesus.  We need Jesus in that boat.  And we need to hold on to him with both hands, and let everything else go.  We can’t hold on to any baggage in this world, and still hold on to Jesus with both hands, with all our might. 

For each one of us, there will eventually come a final storm that carries our boat to a distant shore, never to return.  There is no baggage allowed on that voyage.  And we can’t steer our own boat through that storm, because only Jesus knows the way to through that storm to that distant shore.  All we can do is hold on to Jesus—hold on to that man in the boat with both hands and all of our might, because as long as we stick with Jesus, there is life on the other side of that storm.  Because Jesus is life, the way the truth and the life, and that life is the light of the world, the light of all mankind.  So, no matter what happens, hold on to the man in the boat.  Hold on to Jesus with both hands, and never let go.  Because where Jesus is, there is life, abundant life, eternal life.  

Sunday, June 16, 2024

Sermon 6/16/2024              Scattering Seeds of the Kingdom Mark 4:26-34

Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.”

He also said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.”

With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.

 We heard two parables describing the Kingdom today, both about seeds.  Seeds…  As you have probably guessed, I know a lot about seeds, collecting them, storing them and of course, planting them.  And I have a lot of experience with keeping vigil during the sprouting process.  Right now, I have ___ flats of different types of seeds germinating in my greenhouse, and I check on them repeatedly every day, to see what is sprouting, and what isn’t; to make sure the soil doesn’t dry out; opening the windows or the doors if the greenhouse gets too hot, closing them as needed to keep the wind from drying them out, or from blowing in unwanted seeds from my yard, or from the empty field across the street…   Germination is mostly waiting and watching, not always patiently, and trying various means of improving germination.

Some seeds need a cold period to germinate, some even require several freeze-thaw cycles over several years, while others need heat, and still others need fairly steady temperatures in a narrow range.  Some need repeated freeze-thaw cycles.  Some need to be scarified—meaning, I need to make cuts in the seed coat in order for the seed to open and let the tiny plant out of its protective wrapper.  Some seeds need sunlight to stimulate germination and must be sown on the surface, while others are hindered by light, and need to be covered by dirt—but almost never planted deeper than the seed is thick, or it won’t be able to reach the sunlight in time, and will die, even if it does sprout.  Since I like to grow wild, native plants that aren’t ordinarily grown by gardeners, sometimes the seeds I purchase are labeled with “?” because the germination requirements are completely unknown.   Some seeds have specific soil requirements—pH, moisture, drainage, composition.  Some germinate within a week or two, while others may take several months, even if the conditions are perfect, which they never are for everything in my simple greenhouse. 

My greenhouse doesn’t have sprinklers or heat or A/C or grow lights.  I don’t have a winter cold frame for the seeds that sprout in the cold, so I have to move a few trays at a time to the refrigerator in my garage for a week or two, then switch them out.  My family loves that, since we keep food on the top shelves, and I put my trays of dirt on the bottom.  And of course, I have to keep them moist, taking them out to water them occasionally.  So, I put a layer of paper towels under them to try to keep the shelves from getting muddy.    (Happy Father’s Day, Kevin.  Thanks for being so patient and tolerant. You’re a saint.)

Sometimes, in trying to keep the seeds from drying out, mushrooms start popping up in the flats, and then I need to examine each flat and remove the fungi on a daily basis.  And no matter how hard I try, I almost always get unwanted plants popping up in my flats.  Sometimes they are weed seeds that blow in, or from the grass and weeds that grow uncontrolled inside the greenhouse, since it isn’t permanent, and doesn’t sit on a cement slab.  Sometimes, no matter how careful I am when I collect seeds, I get contaminating seeds as well, and sometimes, as I plant the seeds, some of the really tiny ones get stuck to my hands, and then fall off onto other flats.  Sometimes the wind (or the watering hose), blows or sprays some of the seeds from one tray onto other nearby trays, so they get mixed up.  Sometimes I forget to label a tray, or label one incorrectly.  And no matter what I use to label them—no matter how permanent the marker is supposed to be—after a couple months of watering them daily, or several times a day when it gets really hot and dry, the label wears off.  And if I am moving flats in and out of the frig, then I can’t identify seeds by location, because that may have changed. 

In spite of everything I have learned from books, from experience and from trial and error, I never really know what I’m going to have to transplant into my gardens in the fall.  Some flats will be crowded, practically bursting with plants—far more than I need or have space for, while others will have very few, and some may not yield anything at all.  After all, there are tons of variables, and I have very little control over most of them.  I can never be sure why any flat yields what it does, and whether it had anything to do with how I treated it, or not.  Like the person in the parable, I sleep and rise, water and pray, keeping vigil, but I’m really not in control of the process.  That’s up to the seeds, the soil, the weather, and God, the Ultimate Gardener.

The second parable likens the Kingdom of God to a mustard seed that grows into a gigantic bush.  Now, first of all, let’s be honest, mustard is not a tree or a bush, but an herb.  It is not woody, or long-lived.  It is, at best, a biennial—a two-year plant.  My Bible translation software suggests we translate it as vegetable, which is much more accurate than bush.  We have at least a dozen species of mustard in MN, only two of which are native to North America.  The rest came from Europe or Asia.  We know that mustard usually doesn’t get big enough to be called a shrub, or big enough to be suitable as a nesting site for birds.  However, I looked up mustard plants on minnesotawildflowers.info,  and one of these foreign mustard plants—black mustard, grows up to 8 ft. tall, even here.  This same mustard plant also grows wild in Israel, and there it gets much larger than this—12 feet tall or more.  In Israel, it grows in large clusters, and can form a huge, tangled mass of plants the size of an SUV or even an RV.  I’ve seen pictures.  And it’s true that the seeds are tiny, only 1-2 mm long. 

So, what are we to make of these parables, these comparisons of the Kingdom of God with scattering seeds, sleeping and rising and keeping vigil, watching and waiting for them to germinate, to grow and yield a crop or to create a suitable site for birds to build nests? 

First of all, I think that these parables point to signs we are to watch for—signs by which we can recognize the Kingdom when it appears in our midst.  Both of these parables describe God’s incredibly generous providence—a tremendous crop ready for harvest, habitat suitable for housing, for resting, a place of safety where offspring can be raised and fed and nurtured—not just for people, but for all creation.  This makes sense, since the Kingdom of God is a place where God’s will is done, here, on earth—a place where God’s desire that all life, human and animal and vegetable, is provided for and given an opportunity to thrive and flourish.  That’s more than providence—that requires justice and mercy and nurturing by humans acting as good stewards and guardians of creation and as good neighbors to one another—in short, a divine miracle. 

Second, the parables suggest, by the very nature of the plants described, that the Kingdom is not fully present, not permanent, but temporary, transient.  These are crops that live a single season, maybe two.  These are plants sown by scattering the seeds willy-nilly, with wild abandon, and entrusted to God, put at the mercy of the elements of sun, wind, rain, animals and insects, totally out of our control.  Seeds that take root produce a single crop at times and places of God’s choosing.  They may or may not self-sow and produce a second generation in the same place.  These seeds are small, scattered by the wind, birds and animals.  So, the Kingdom may crop up in unexpected places, near or far, seldom lasting long in any one place.  That shouldn’t surprise us.  After all, the human world is still riddled with sin, greed, hatred, fear, injustice, war and disease.  We just aren’t good at doing God’s will and living as good stewards and good disciples of Jesus for prolonged periods of time.  But we do manage, for short periods, once in a while, sometimes even in places where the Kingdom is most desperately needed and least expected to show up. 

I think the more interesting, and more important thing these parables have to say about us, especially the first parable, is what they tell us about our role, our duty, our opportunity to help bring God’s Kingdom to reality on earth, if only temporarily.  We are gardeners, and our job is to sow seeds—not just wheat seeds or corn seeds or mustard seeds, but seeds of faith, seeds of hope, seeds of love and generosity and compassion, seeds of justice, seeds of mercy, seeds of tolerance and forgiveness and seeds of human rights and liberty, seeds of reconciliation, conservation and restoration.  We aren’t supposed to be judicious and stingy about how many seeds we scatter, or where we scatter them.  We may prepare the soil, as best we can, but we sow these seeds even on soil that is hard, dry, untilled and unfertilized, overgrown with weeds, desert or swampland, full sun or full shade.  We are to scatter seeds even on hardened hearts, poisoned and bitter with hatred and fear and selfishness, hearts of all people of all ages and persuasions and ideologies.  We release both the seeds and the fate of these seeds to the care of the Holy Spirit, who is free to blow them elsewhere like the wind, or to breathe life into them, so that they germinate, grow and establish God’s Kingdom for a season, bearing whatever fruit they can.  And we then help reap and rejoice in the harvest, however big or small.  We watch and we wait, vigilantly searching for signs that the Kingdom is at hand.  And when we see those signs, we run like the wind, and we join in, employing our hands and feet and voices and gifts to do God’s Kingdom work, to extend it as far as possible, and to sustain it as long as possible.  When it appears, no matter how fleetingly, we celebrate it and point to it and exclaim, “Look!  There is the Kingdom come!  There is Christ in the midst of us, right now!  There is the Holy Spirit moving among us!  There is God’s love and mercy in action!  There is abundant grace.  Thanks be to God!”

We are called to continue scattering seed, watching, waiting, hoping, praying and trusting in God, our Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer, to keep showing up, where and when the Kingdom is most desperately needed, and least expected, bringing life and salvation, liberty and justice.  And we are called to go on laboring, fueled by the belief that one day, God’s Kingdom will come in full, and blossom into something lasting that will transform and restore all of creation. 

Sunday, June 9, 2024

Then Jesus went home.  That’s how our Gospel reading begins. After hearing from the Gospel of John throughout the Easter season we are back in the Gospel of Mark – which moves fast. It’s chapter 3 and Jesus has already been proclaimed the Messiah, baptized and prevailed over temptation; Jesus has healed those with physical and mental health conditions, preached to crowds with authority, sparred with the Scribes and Pharisees over the meaning of scripture and called his disciples, including Judas, who Mark reveals will betray Jesus.

 That’s a lot. And so, perhaps it is not surprising that he goes home. Going home – there is something comforting about “going home.” As

poet Robert Frost wrote, “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.”  But…. home is not always as welcoming as we might imagine it will be.

 Jesus goes home – but the crowd follows and so many people – people who are hurting, people who are seeking God, people with all kinds of needs are jam packed inside this house so tightly that there is no room to even raise your hand to your mouth – sounds like a rock concert.

 But not everyone is there to hear the music. Mary and the rest of Jesus family are not sitting with Jesus – instead they are listening to the authorities and “people.”  And the rumors they hear are not good. “People” are telling them Jesus is acting like a madman. Naturally, his family is concerned.

 The Gospel of Mark often inserts one story inside another – the fancy term for this is “intercalating” – which basically means intertwining two seemingly unrelated stories – but which, when seen together – help to shine a light and explain one another. So, we take a pause from the family scene in which Mary and the rest of the family are seeking an intervention for Jesus and listen to Jesus’ words to the scribes and Pharisees who have called Jesus, “Beelzebul” which means, literally,
“Lord of the flies” and declare that Jesus is Satan – and it is by Satan’s power that Jesus is casting out demons.

 So, setting aside the family crisis for a moment, let us look at what Jesus is saying. Jesus is speaking to the scribes who are trying to silence him. But Jesus will not be silenced. Instead, Jesus refutes their accusation by speaking in parables, saying, a kingdom, a house – divided against itself – cannot stand – and neither can Satan, the forces of evil. So clearly, Jesus, in casting out demons, is the one binding up Satan, the strong man, so that Satan’s house will fail.

 And then, still speaking in parables and apocalyptically, Jesus accuses the scribes of committing the unforgiveable sin, blaspheming against the Holy Spirit. These are scary words – which Mark does not explain but it basically means that those who identify Jesus as Satan cannot receive forgiveness because if they identify Jesus as Satan, the evil one, they would not be willing to receive forgiveness from Jesus.1 

 Jesus is busy doing his Father’s business – and will not be delayed.  So, when his family comes – notice that they are outside the house, not inside listening to Jesus’ words, they call on Jesus to come out. This is not just an invitation – hey Jesus, we miss you and want to hear about your ministry. No, this is an intervention based on false evidence. In calling Jesus out, they are calling Jesus to stop doing what he is doing – and instead obey the commandment to honor your father and your mother.  But, instead of simply obeying his mother, as they probably assumed that he would, Jesus obeys his Father God. For this is his calling, this is his mission.  

 Jesus then redefines what it means to be “home” and who is his “family.”  Looking at the people who are surrounding him, pressing in against him, yearning for wholeness, healing who are eager to hear the Good News of God, these, Jesus says, are his family. Jesus claims as family not only his biological mother and brother but also, Jesus says, “Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”

 Whenever you do the will of God, you are acting as Jesus’ brother or sister or mother. So, the question then becomes, how do we act as Jesus’ brother? What choices do we make in our lives to act like Jesus’ sister?

 When I worked at Augustana Lutheran downtown, I worked with a lot of inner city kids who we bussed into Sunday school. Worship was afterwards and sometimes the kids wanted to stay for worship. I was thrilled. I thought that that is exactly were kids belonged on Sunday morning. Except, that their parents were not there. So… they sat with me.

 I don’t know why the kids liked to stay – perhaps they were hungry for the word of God. Perhaps it was better than the alternative of going home. Or maybe they just wanted to stay for the really delicious treats after worship. But whatever the reason, it was my job to manage these previously unchurched kids who were sitting with me. Augustana was an old Swedish congregation with very traditional church values of silence in worship when you were not singing. So, it was a challenge to maintain all of these kids in one or two or three pews all by myself and with the help of my boyfriend.

 As you can imagine, we got a lot of looks whenever the kids got a little noisy or rambunctious – and the people giving the looks weren’t smiling. When some of the church elders started to complain to the pastor and to me, I knew that I had to do something different. But also believed that God was calling these kids to hear God’s word. They belonged in church.

 So, I asked a few people, primarily couples, if they would “adopt” one of the kids as their “Pew Partner.” They agreed. I especially remember Liz and Ken who agreed to take a child.  I gave them “Bobby” – who was one of the biggest instigators of “trouble” in the pew. He was a very wiggly, loud and somewhat naughty boy who was known to write in the hymnals and do other troublesome things. But when he met Liz and Ken, they invited him to sit between them. They mentored him and cared for him and suddenly, he became a stellar example to all of the kids – and probably some of the adults too.

 When someone from the church came and said to me, “I think Bobbie has written graffiti on the church, Liz happened to be standing there and she was quick to say, “Well it couldn’t have been our little “Bobby.”  Bobby had an advocate. And the person backed down.

Liz and Ken made a huge difference in Bobby’s life. And it was just by sitting in church with him, being a mentor to him and treating him as a child of God. This too is what it means to follow God’s will.

 The question becomes, who is God calling you to befriend? How is God calling you to care for the person at your grocery store or a person at the care center who has no friends or the neighbor down the street? How can we do God’s will? That is a question for you – and for me.

 Let us pray: Holy Spirit, open our hearts and our lives to follow God’s will and God’s way. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

ITheologian C. Cliften Black acknowledges that Mark does not explain the unforgivable sin but, his “take” is that:  “Identifying as diabolical the one endowed with God’s holy spirit (Mark1:8, 10) is a peculiar blasphemy, beyond the pale of remission, because one thereby drives oneself away from the true agent of forgiveness.” https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-10-2/commentary-on-mark-320-35-5

Sunday, June 2, 2024

Living into God’s Promises

Awe and wonder.  This is what I feel when I read Psalm 139. This Psalm – which is a poem and the lyrics of many a song – expresses the deep and abiding and unique relationship God has and desires with you and with me and with each one of us. It is a Psalm that speaks to people regardless of your age or situation. Howard Thurman, the great and prolific African American poet, pastor and theologian prayed this psalm, as a prayer, every day of his adult life.  It is a Psalm that we will be singing or chanting or reading every Sunday in June. This is a Psalm to bookmark – in your Bible or on your phone.

So what is it that makes this Psalm so enduring?

 First of all, this is a prayer to God written in the first person. So when you read it or sing it you can claim this Psalm, this song, this poem as your own prayer to God.  

 It begins by acknowledging that God knows you. God knows you from the inside out. God knows ALL about you. There is no place to hide. God’s gaze reaches across the entire universe from the highest heavens to the depths of hell. Darkness is not dark to God. God sees it all. 

God knew you and saw you even when you were in your mother’s womb. For God created you.

This is a Psalm that I learned as a child through a beautifully illustrated storybook that my mother read to me and to my children called, The Runaway Bunny, by Margaret Wise Brown. Maybe some of you have read it too.  In this story, a little bunny threatens to run away from home. But his mother says, “If you run away, I will run after you. For you are my little bunny.”  The little bunny counters by imagining himself as shape- shifting into something else: “You yourself created my inmost parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

“If you run after me,” said the little bunny, “I will become a fish in a trout stream and I will swim away from you.”

But his mother says, “If you become a fish in a trout stream, then I will become a fisherman and I will fish for you.”  Not to be deterred, little bunny then tells his mother he is going to a rock on a mountain, a bird in the sky, a sailboat, and then…a little boy, so that he can swim, fly, or run away from her. 

But the bunny’s mother counters that if he does that, she will become a mountain climber, a tree to nest in, the wind upon the sea, and… if he becomes a little boy, she will become his mother, “to catch you in my arms and hug you.” In the end, the little bunny agrees that he will just be a little bunny and the mother rabbit will be his loving mother.

The Runaway bunny is a sweet story for children of any age.  But it would be a mistake to identify Psalm 139 as a childish Psalm. For as we grow and as we age, like Howard Thurman, we can read this psalm as our prayer too. For when you say this Psalm as a prayer, you are speaking to God saying: “I will thank you because I am marvelously made.”

 This can be hard for us – to say to admit because our culture has a very narrow view of what kind of body is “marvelously made.” We idolize beautiful, thin, athletic and youthful bodies. No matter what our age, it is tempting for us to want to change something about our bodies – we want to lose weight or gain muscle or change something.  And, yet, at the same time, we often neglect to take care of our bodies as a gift from God. Like the runaway bunny, we can become so busy running and doing and comparing ourselves to others, that we forget that God made our bodies beautiful and vulnerable and for relationship with God and with one another.

However, when we read this Psalm as a devotion, as a prayer to God, admitting to God and ourselves that we are “marvelously made” by God who knows us and loves us and who has created us to be mortal… and that this too is good.

 In his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul compares our bodies to “clay jars.” We are marvelously made – AND we are mortal, like a clay jar that is not meant to last forever.  Clay jars were the biblical version of disposable containers. Marble statues were meant to last forever; clay jars are were not. And yet, clay jars, like our containers today, are essential for daily life. We need a container, a vessel to hold the water that we drink and the food that we eat and for so many other essentials. 

 And so, Paul reminds us both that we should not be too proud of ourselves and think, like the little bunny, that we don’t need anyone else nor should we despise our bodies, even though they are vulnerable and subject to becoming broken and cracked like a clay jar. For Paul reminds us that God has given us a great treasure to hold within our vulnerable and mortal bodies.   

Paul also acknowledges that life is not always easy and that by being Christian, we will not be protected from the sufferings that are in this world. However, while “we may be afflicted in every way – we will not be crushed; and while goodness knows we may be perplexed at times and wonder how on earth God is going to prevail over the challenges that we and or the world is facing at this time and although people around us may throw up their hands – we are not to despair. And, even if we are persecuted, we will not be forsaken for God has promised to be with us. And, even if our church attendance dwindles and our community seems distracted by all sorts of other things – we as God’s people will not be destroyed. And although we do not understand how it can be true, God has got this.

 For it is the same God who made heaven and earth and who made your body that, as Paul writes, “shone in our hearts” to reveal to us the mystery of Jesus Christ as the one who died for us so that we, though mortal, may live forever with Christ Jesus.

 In baptism, which Victoria, also known as Tori, will be receiving today, we are adopted into God’s family and made brothers and sisters with Jesus Christ.  Theologically, we proclaim that the power of sin over us has been drowned in the waters of baptism and that we have died with Jesus Christ and that we are reborn as children of God. The treasure that we are given is the gift of promise of Jesus to live in us and to walk with us – forever.  God already knows us – and loves us. But in baptism, we are joined with Jesus Christ in his death so that we may be heirs to the promise of new life in and with Jesus Christ. 

 This is why Paul writes that the life of Jesus may be “made visible in our bodies”(2 Cor. 4: 11). For we ask Jesus to lead and guide us in our living and in our choices so that we can be reflections of the way of Jesus. Paul then writes, “death is at work in us but life in you.” 2 Cor. 4: 12 How can this be? Death is at work in us – we are still mortal – but, by proclaiming Jesus as Lord, we are passing on to others God’s gift of new and renewed life.

 Today, as we witness the baptism of Victoria, we are also reminded of our own baptism and that gift that we too have received from God, the promise of life with God now and forever. And so, brothers and sisters, friends in Christ, it is our challenge, our task, regardless of what else is happening in the world around us, to hold fast to the promises of Jesus which are given FOR YOU.

 One of the ways that Howard Thurman did this – despite the challenges that he experienced as an African American in a time of racial civil unrest– was by meditating and writing his own poetry on Psalm 139. 

Here is one of his poem prayers: Dear God: Search me and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts. And see if there be any wicked way in me. And lead me in the way everlasting… I will fly in the greatness of God, as the marsh-hen flies, filling all the space between the marsh and the skies. By so many roots as the marsh grass sends in the sod, behold, I will lay me a hold on the greatness of God.2

 Like Howard Thurman and Paul and all the saints who have gone before us, may you too lean into the promises of God, and dare to pray for the presence of God to be the Lord to search and keep you today, tomorrow and always. Thanks be to God. Amen.

 Faith-Lilac Way Lutheran Church + June 2, 2024 + Pastor Pam Stalheim Lane

 1 Margaret Wise Brown, The Runaway Bunny.

2 Thurman, Howard, “Prayers (1962-06-01),” The Howard Thurman Digital Archive, accessed May 30, 2024, https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/items/show/168.

Sunday, May 26, 2024

Sermon:               Where Have All the Prophets Gone?                       Isaiah 6: 1-6        5/26/2024

The preaching text for today is the call story of the prophet Isaiah.  In this story, Isaiah stands in the outer chambers of God’s heavenly court.  From there he can see God’s robe flowing down from his throne, the air is filled with smoke and the sound of angels singing God’s praises.  Isaiah is terrified, for no one can look upon God and live, so he cries out, “Woe is me, for I have seen the Lord!”  Then, Isaiah says the strangest thing.  “I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips.” 

There is a formula to the call of a prophet.  First, the prophet has an encounter with either God or a messenger from God.  Then the prophet is commissioned to speak God word or do God’s will, to which the prophet almost always objects, claiming unworthiness.  Then the prophet receives reassurance, and there is usually some sort of ritual act that takes place symbolizing the prophet’s role.  So, for instance, when Moses is called, he objects, saying that he is slow of speech.  This is often interpreted as meaning he has some sort of speech impediment, such as the tendency to stutter.  God responds by offering to send Moses’s brother, Aaron, along with him to speak for Moses.  Once Moses stops objecting, then God gives him a staff with which to perform miracles.

Isaiah also objects, with an excuse about his inability, or rather, his unworthiness to speak for God.  Isaiah says he has a filthy mouth.  Then he goes on to say that his people all have filthy mouths, as if to say, “I have a dirty mouth, but then, that should come as no surprise, because all of my people have dirty mouths.  How can I serve you, speak your word, with a dirty, profane mouth?”  He doesn’t just point out his unworthiness, but throws the whole Jewish people under the bus. 

Then comes the shocking part.  How does God reassure Isaiah?  How does he remove the obstacle of Isaiah’s filthy mouth?  He sends an angel, who by the way, is a terrifying sight in itself, to pick up a set of tongs, pluck a burning coal out of the blazing fire that is filling the room with smoke, and touch it to Isaiah’s lips and purify his mouth!  Youch!  Ezekiel is just told to eat a book of God’s words, which he can then simply regurgitate to his people.  And the book tastes sweet.  But not poor Isaiah.  He gets his lips scorched.  It makes me wonder…does he flinch?  Does he lean in and kiss the coal, press his lips against it, or does the angel just jab it into his face, the way you might thrust a branding iron against a cow’s hip? 

Isaiah doesn’t cry out in pain or shock, like you might expect, so obviously, this is only a vision.  Isaiah isn’t really in heaven, looking upon the throne of God.  There is no fiery coal burning his lips, making them sterile.  This isn’t a physical experience, but a spiritual one, more like a dream than like Moses’ real burning bush on the very real mountainside.  But still, what a terrifying image!  You’d think that having a burning coal pressed to your lips would be enough to snap you back to reality, to wake you from a dream in a state of terror.  But it doesn’t.  Instead, Isaiah hears the angel pronounce him clean, forgiven, sinless, purified—his objection obliterated.  Then he hears God’s voice, saying, “Whom shall I send?  Who will go?”  And Isaiah volunteers.

What? After having his lips seared, Isaiah volunteers?  God doesn’t even address him directly.  The text makes it clear he can’t see God’s face, because that would be fatal.  He isn’t even in the same room.   I really makes me wonder how God speaks those words.  What is the tone God uses?  I get the feeling that God says it the way an annoyed judge might say, in an angry and possibly threatening tone, to an attorney who’s been making all sorts of ridiculous, baseless objections in a trial, that have been overruled, “Do you have any more objections?”  I imagine Isaiah’s “Send me,” is less a volunteering and more of a surrender, “No, Sir, Your Majesty.  I’m good.  I got the point.  I’ll do it.”  I wonder if Isaiah is surprised to hear those words come from his own, burning lips?  Would this be your reaction?

In the next few verses, God tells Isaiah that he must prophecy to his people, but not expect them to understand.  His people will not see or hear, or accept his message.  but will harden their hearts, until the cities are destroyed and deserted, and the people taken into captivity.  To top it all off, God will order Isaiah to walk around barefoot and unclothed, preaching, for three whole years.  It’s not clear whether he is even permitted to wear a loincloth!  I wonder if Isaiah knew what he was getting into. I bet he wished he’d asked for a few more details before accepting this call.  Would you volunteer for this job? This wasn’t a high paying position.  There were no benefits: no retirement accounts, no medical or dental insurance, and no vacation time.

The sad truth is that this is what being a prophet was like in the Old Testament.  It was a thankless job, with few, if any perks.  And having a dirty mouth probably came in handy.  Regardless of how hardened a people’s hearts may have been, a prophet’s job, at the outset, was to get the people’s attention, shock them with harsh and terrifying language and bizarre prophetic acts that would, in today’s world, land a person in a rubber room in a psych ward pretty fast.  The main goal was, of course, to get the people to repent, to change their ways, to establish and maintain justice.  Although prophets were occasionally priests, most of them were just ordinary people with extraordinary courage and the gift of vision, and poetry.  They were almost never among the wealthy, the powerful or the political elite.  Amos raised cattle and sycamore trees.  Ezra was a scribe.  Some were women. Some were appointed as advisors to Kings because of their gifts of wisdom and vision.

The job of a prophet was to speak truth, ugly, unpleasant truth, to power.  To call out and expose injustice in a very public way, and demand change—and to do it all poetically.  A prophet was never popular, like Jesus or John the Baptists, although they probably did draw crowds.  But the attention they received from the one’s they were sent to, the rich, powerful, elite—the ruling class—was not that of adoration and welcome, but contempt, anger, threats of violence.  This was a difficult and dangerous job that required total faith and commitment of mind, body and soul.  There was no turning back, and no softening the blow.  The language and the prophecies only escalated in their harshness and the consequences for ignoring the message, for failing to respond with repentance and change of heart and policies, became ever more violent.  Isaiah would not only witness the destruction of the temple and the city, but was ordered by God to go into exile in Babylon with his people, to help them remember who and whose they were and resist become willing participants in an oppressive empire, and to comfort them, reassure them of God’s love and forgiveness, inspiring hope for a future they couldn’t see.

The violence that the Biblical prophets threatened came to them in the form of prophetic visions of the future.  The prophets received these visions, and then had to interpret them.  They did so through their understanding of God and the world.  They believed that God was absolutely in control, and that nothing could happen to the people of Israel, God’s chosen people, unless God ordained it.  So when they saw destruction and death, exile and captivity, they understood that to mean that this was God’s judgment and that God, himself, would carry out the sentence through an agent of God’s choosing.  They attributed the horror as a product of God’s righteous wrath, for there was no arguing that the behaviors and policies that they addressed were clear and flagrant violations of covenant law.  Israel was understood to be God’s child, and according to biblical wisdom, a misbehaving child required discipline, punishment:  spare the rod and spoil the child. 

But I don’t see it that way.  I have knowledge about God that the Old Testament people didn’t have.  I interpret these scriptures through the lens of Christ, the revelation of the character of God in the person of Jesus.  Our God, Israel’s God, is a God of Love, a God who loves the entire cosmos, all people, so much that he chose to come and live among them in flesh and blood, and to lay down his life to ransom them with his own flesh and blood, in order to redeem them and save them from themselves and their proclivity to sin.  My God would never mete out violent punishment on children he loves so much. 

As I see it, the prophets were an expression of God’s love.  They were sent to warn the people that they were headed down a path toward self-destruction, and to convince them in any way possible, to change course, while disaster could still be averted.  God began sending these prophets to Israel and Judea 200 years ahead of their demise—long enough to change their ways and avert the impending disasters, if they had only listened.  People have agency.  Our decisions and our actions have consequences, for us, and for the land and the nations in which we live.  If only the people in power had listened…it didn’t have to happen that way.  God never wanted or intended their destruction, their suffering.  But they didn’t want to hear it.  The wealthy were profiting at the expense of the peasants and the paupers.  They wouldn’t, couldn’t relinquish their wealth and power.

I was told, as a teen, that there are no more prophets—that Jesus was the final word from God, and that there would never be another.  But I didn’t believe it, and don’t believe it now.  Our God, who desires relationship with us so much that he became flesh and dwelt among us, and sent his Spirit to inhabit us and work in us, would never stop trying to communicate with us, trying to prevent our self-destruction. I believe there have always been prophets, and there always will be—we just don’t recognize them or name them as such.  I think Martin Luther was prophet who spoke truth to the corrupt power of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, but we call him a reformer.  They don’t all use the same tactics as the Old Testament prophets, but they still speak unwelcome and unflattering truth to power, and risk their lives doing so.  Some succeed, others die trying.  I could name others:  Ghandi, Nelson Mandella, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcom X, Deitrich Bonhoeffer, Alexei Navalny, just to name a few.  Today we call them protestors, rebels, activists, agitators, among other things.  We seldom recognize them until it’s too late. 

Are there other prophets in our midst today—people who forecast gloom and doom unless we change our ways, people who speak out in poetry, like Wendell Berry?  Musicians or rappers who sharply criticize the status quo? Reporters who reveal truths and atrocities hidden from our view, and call for change?  Environmentalists and Nature Conservationists documenting societies crimes against nature?  Who is speaking truth to power and wealth, and calling for change in order to avert certain disaster approaching from the horizon?  Who should we be listening to?  What will be the consequences if fail to respond to their pleas for repentance, if we don’t change our attitudes, our actions, our laws and policies?  What will it take to avert the disasters they foresee? 

Pentecost Sunday, May 19, 2024

Come Holy Spirit

May 19, 2024       Pentecost Sunday at Faith-Lilac Way Lutheran       Pastor Pam Stalheim Lane

 Come Holy Spirit. Fill the hearts of your faithful

 This is the beginning of the prayer for the gift of the Holy Spirit. But be careful what you ask for. The Holy Spirit – as we heard in the reading from Acts – can come with a violent rush of wind. On a hot summer day, we bless the breeze that comes off the lake or the trees. But a rush of wind can easily get out of control – think hurricanes and tornados. The word for “Wind” is “Pnuema” – which also means Spirit.  So the Spirit blew in with a violent rush. Are you ready for that? 

 Maybe? Maybe not. But maybe the Holy Spirit doesn’t want to wait. So… Come Holy Spirit. Fill the hearts of your faithful until there is no room for anything else. Come Holy Spirit.

 Come Holy Spirit and fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in us the fire of your love.

 The Wind/ Spirit is not all that came that day. Fire came too – a fire that did not consume. But it still burned hot – with the fire of God’s love. And with that Wind/Spirit and the fire of God’s love came the WORD. But this time, the WORD did not simply become flesh and move into the neighborhood” as the message Bible translates the first verse of John’s Gospel. Instead, the Holy Spirit became like a Google language translator making people able to hear the Word of God in their own language. Somehow, miraculously, “all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues.”

 Learning a new language is not easy. When I went to Germany, I decided it would be good to learn a few words so I could say something to the people there. I wasn’t very diligent in my studies – but another member of my group spoke quite well so I didn’t worry too much about it. But when we were in Wittenberg, we got split up on a bus. I was wanting to connect with the locals and so I tried to say a couple of words in German to the older lady sitting next to me. I found out later that I was speaking to her in a mix of bad German, Spanish, and English and did it all with a Norwegian accent.  But it didn’t seem to phase her. She was so insistent about telling me something about the church, Christ chapel. But I didn’t understand her. I found out later that it was closing in half an hour for construction work and wouldn’t be open the rest of the week. She tried – and I missed it. I guess we will just have to go back! 

 For those of you who have tried a foreign language, you know that it is not easy – unless perhaps you grew up bilingual or learned the second language as a child. But in the book of Acts, these were adults speaking a foreign language fluently – and proclaiming God’s word. Just the ability to speak the language was a miracle. But the Holy Spirit wasn’t done. Instead the Holy Spirit was kindling a fire of understanding by having people speak in the native tongue of all the people there – so that no one was left out; everyone could understand. The news of the Good News of Jesus came – not in translation – but in the ordinary words of the people who were there regardless of the language that they spoke, whether they were male or female, whether they were old or young, and regardless of where they were from.

 Come Holy Spirit…Send forth your Spirit and we shall be created, and you shall renew the face of the earth.

 How would the Holy Spirit renew the face of the earth today? Would the Holy Spirit come with wind and fire and disrupt the warring nations? Would the Holy Spirit inspire leaders to speak in the tongue of the one they called “enemy”? Would the Holy Spirit mend the rifts and division in our nation, in our community, in families and neighbors?  How would the Holy Spirit transform and renew you? Would the Holy Spirit fill you with the Holy Spirit’s ability to speak the language of the one that you consider, “other?” Would you even want that? If not, be careful what you pray for.

 O God, who by the light of the Holy Spirit did instruct the hearts of the faithful; grant that by that same Spirit, we may be truly wise and ever enjoy his consolations.  

 Let us pray that God will work through us so that we move beyond the artificial divisions and distinctions that we apply when we call someone “other.” Let us embrace the way of the Holy Spirit which is to show no partiality. Instead, the way of God is to enable the Holy Spirit to reach and bless all people – by empowering you and me to share the Good News of God’s love.  

 Come Holy Spirit, Come – whether we are ready or not. Amen.

Sunday, May 12, 2024

Psalm 23

May 12, 2024 + Faith-Lilac Way Lutheran Church +Pastor Pam Stalheim Lane

 Please turn to the Psalm 23 insert in your bulletin. These beautiful pictures were created by our own Gary Feyen. They are written in the King James version, which may be the most poetic rendition of this Psalm that has ever been translated into English. But it is not always the easiest to apply to our daily lives. Some of you may have memorized this – or another version of the 23rd Psalm – and that is good. If you haven’t, I would suggest that you do – or memorize one of the many songs based on the 23rd Psalm that we are going to be singing today. Because, today I’m going to make the case that while Psalm 23 is often heard as a comforting word at funerals, it was written for the living and is still relevant to our everyday lives.

 So let’s begin with the first line – the first picture in your handout. The Lord is my shepherd. This is a statement of faith by the Psalmist who is claiming that the Lord – GOD – is not just a shepherd taking care of the whole world, but the Lord, God – who is King of heaven and earth – is MY GOD, is MY Shepherd.  The Lord is MY Shepherd. 

 The Psalmist does not have an exclusive claim. These words are meant to be read or rather proclaimed out loud by ALL people.  So, I invite you to claim this relationship and say: The Lord is MY Shepherd. (Say it with me and I really want to hear you claim it as your own so let me hear MY really loudly.) The Lord is MY Shepherd. This is a proclamation of faith.

 It is also a reminder to ourselves that we, like sheep, are vulnerable at times. And, that we can’t be as independent and as self-sufficient as we often would like to believe we are. No one pulls themselves up by their own bootstraps even if they are bound and determined that they can do it by themselves. Imagine a little girl maybe about 2years old who gets her boots stuck in the mud. She tries to pull herself out – but as she tries to lift up one foot, the other gets stuck even further down in the mud. So then she tries to pull that foot out and the other foot goes down deeper. Pretty soon she is up to her knees and she cries out “Daddy! Help ME!”  And of course, her Daddy comes and gets her out of the mud – which is now all over her. Clearly, that little girl needed help - but she’s not the only one.  We all NEED a Daddy or a Mommy to take us out of the mud and muck of life - a helper - also known as shepherd -  one who will love us, care for us, and always be with us – no matter what.

 What we need to do is trust. Trust in the Lord God. This isn’t hard to do when times are good. We can give thanks to God for the blessings and trust that God sent them. Maybe we even think we deserve them. But… when our luck runs out, our situation turns grim, we are betrayed by a job or a spouse or a friend or we make a mistake and betray someone else or something else unexpectedly bad happens - and we find ourselves alone and the pantry bare… in those times it is harder to say, “I shall not want” or “I lack nothing”.

 Remember the Israelites, when they were in the wilderness? They had to trust that God would send enough fresh manna every day. They were warned – don’t try to save any. Don’t hoard it. But to some, this seemed too good to be true. Maybe they thought: what would it hurt to save a little – just in case. But…when they didn’t trust God to do what God promised to do, and they took just a little extra and stored it… they woke up to find foul smelling maggot filled manna stinking up their house.  They learned – the hard way – that they had to trust the Lord to do as he said. As the proverb says, “Trust in the Lord with all of your heart” – all of the time.

 Take a look at the second picture full of greens and blues – God has given to us green pastures – good food and opportunities and still fresh waters with good fishing.  This is what God has provided.

 Unfortunately, we haven’t always taken good care of the gifts God has entrusted to us. Some of the water – like in Michigan and in Lake Elmo and other places – is contaminated by lead or other chemicals. In poor neighborhoods, the fresh vegetables sold in the grocery store don’t look like the kind we enjoy from Byerly’s or Cub Food.

 And yet… even when we as a people mess up our lives and the beautiful world that God created for us, God is still with us, caring for us. Take a look at the next picture, verse 3: The good Shepherd refreshes my soul, and leads me on the right path.  If the Good Shepherd was like an ordinary person, he would be furious. But he’s not. Instead, he continues to refresh, renew and guide us – “for his name’s sake.” In other words, this is who God is, it is God’s character to care for you, no matter what.

 This is why, as it says in the next picture, verse 4, that “yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for thou art with me.” This is the promise of Jesus to you. “I will be with you always.” As it says in Romans, “there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Nothing.

 There are lots of shadows in our world. And at times, the forces of evil seem overwhelming – for example: Russia’s war to take over Ukraine, the Palestinian people caught between the rifles of Hamas and the big guns in Israel, the dictators in so many parts of the world killing or expelling people from their land, forcing them to become refuges in a foreign land. The list goes on… Our world can be a dangerous place where it is hard to trust anyone.

 Yet it is precisely for a time such as this that you need to have verse 5 memorized. Pick your translation. But have this verse in your memory banks  –when – not if – really hard challenges come to you:  “Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear NO evil, for you, God are with me.” God will be with you. No matter what comes.  This assurance of God’s presence with us would be enough – indeed, more than we could dare to ask for. But God gives us more.

 God plans a party – a banquet  - a feast - and invites you and all your enemies. But neither knives nor guns are not drawn, not even forked tongues. Instead, somehow, by God’s grace, all are blessed.  And your cup overflows.

 Again, this would be more than enough. This is enough for you to sing Halleluia! But there is more. Turn to the last picture, verse 6. Surely goodness and mercy/ love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

 In this verse, the Hebrew word “Hesed” is translated as “mercy” in the King James version but the New Revised Version translates the word as “love.” Neither one is wrong. In truth, God’s character encompasses both of these qualities. And, in both of these translations, God’s goodness and love and mercy are described as things that will “follow” you. However, another translation of that verb is: “pursue”. God not only embodies goodness, love and mercy, but God loves you so much that God will pursue you all the days of your life.

 God still gives you freedom. You can say no to God and God’s way. But God still loves you and not only wants to give you mercy. but continues to seek you to grant you grace. This is why you can trust that you have a place in the house of the Lord – forever.

 Brothers and sisters, friends in Christ, this is why I want you to memorize Psalm 23 – and return to it often, because the words of this Psalm can be your words and your prayer. Friends in Christ, may you find God’s pursuit of you to be a blessing and may the words of the Psalm resonate in your heart and in your life.

Sunday, May 5, 2024

Sermon:               1 John 5:1-6 and John 15:9-17    Love According to the Gospel of John

 I love the Gospel of John.  It’s so different from the other three—so full of great stories that stick with you.  And the farewell discourse, the three chapters of Jesus’ final instructions to the disciples before he is arrested and crucified, just makes me feel all warm inside, like I’m curled up in a warm, fuzzy blanket with a cup of hot cocoa, sitting in front of a warm fire.   It’s just so full of love.  And most of the book of First John seems full of echoes of that love.  The unfortunate result, however, is that when I read these scriptures, my head fills up with old Sunday School songs and campfire songs about love that were inspired by these and other, similar texts.  I just keep hearing them, playing in my head, over and over.  Simple, wonderful love songs about God.  It made me wonder, does it do that to you, too?  What songs did you learn that come to mind when you hear these scriptures?  I had at least four different songs in my head, starting with this one:  (sing along if you know it.) “Love, love, love!  That’s what it’s all about.  Since God loves us we love each other, mother, father, sister, brother.  Everybody sing and shout!  ‘Cause that’s what it’s all about. It’s about love, love, love…  Or maybe this one comes to mind:  Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God….  Or this one:  And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes they’ll know we are Christians by our love.    How about this one:  This is my commandment that you love one another that your joy may be full…that your joy may be full…   Are you starting to feel are warm and fuzzy inside yet? 

Yeah…but the problem with this, besides that having all these sweet little songs about love playing in my head is really distracting and makes it hard to concentrate on writing a sermon…is that that’s really not the sort of love these scriptures are talking about.  The love John is talking about isn’t the sort of sappy, sweet, sentimental, mushy, gushy, warm fuzzy sort of lovey-dovey feeling we tend to think of when we hear the word love.  It’s not really an emotional feeling at all.  Feelings can’t just be commanded.   We can hug each other on command.  We might even be able to say the words, “I love you.” on command.  But it’s pretty hard to summon a genuine emotional outpouring of love and affection for someone just because Jesus says, “love one another,” unless the other you’re supposed to love is a close friend or family member. 

Love, in the Gospels, isn’t really an emotion at all.  It’s more of a decision, a choice, a promise.  It’s the way we are supposed to respond to God’s love for us.  Love is the hallmark of the beloved community—but it doesn’t remain locked up inside the community, reserved for community members alone.  Love is who we are and who we choose to be, this day and every day.   Love is characterized by generosity and forgiveness, mercy and compassion, relentless hope and determined optimism, and above all, a constant resistance to our knee-jerk reflex responses to enemies and strangers and our fear of otherness. 

Love demands a cost.  Love demands action on behalf of someone else.  Love is a way of living and being and interacting with the world, and it isn’t automatic or easy.  It isn’t safe, either.  It’s the way of the Good Samaritan.  Love requires forgiveness, patience, tolerance and unselfishness.  Love means putting others first, and making sacrifices.  Love seeks justice and freedom for others.  Love never turns a blind eye or a deaf ear to another’s pain and suffering.  Love recognizes the innate value and belovedness of every living thing, and treats everyone with respect and dignity and compassion, no matter the circumstances.

First John says, “the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments.”  The prophets said that too.  John says that God’s commandments are not burdensome.  John can say that because Jesus simplified the laws, distilling them down to two seemingly simple rules:  Love God above all else, with all your being, and love your neighbor as you love yourself.  The prophets all said, repeatedly in various ways, that the obedience to God’s commandments to love others is the most perfect and most appropriate expression of worship.  In fact, the prophets said that no matter how frequently and arduously we worship and sing God’s praises, our worship is empty, like a lie, unless it is accompanied by acts of love and justice toward our neighbors.  The prophets knew that words are cheap, unless they are followed up with real, concrete actions.  Jesus, himself, said that whatever we do to /for others:  feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, housing the homeless, caring for the sick, visiting the imprisoned, we do to/for him—confirming that obeying the commandment to love our neighbors proves that we love God. 

Love is the way of Jesus…and we know where the way of love led him.  Sometimes love means taking up the cross and following in his Christ’s footsteps up the hill to Golgotha, if need be, for the sake of others.   Love is the most profound and sometimes, the most difficult and dangerous thing we are called to do as disciples of Christ.   Fortunately, we aren’t all called to extreme discipleship like Martin Luther King, Jr., Ita Ford, Sophia Scholl and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. 

For my final project in the Gospel of John course, I had to create some form of artwork based on a portion of the text, which, of course, had to be accompanied by a long paper explaining it.  The art form I chose was, of course, poetry—surprise, surprise.   I’d like to leave you with this excerpt from that poem, entitled, “Do You Love Me?”

For Christ, love is not emotion or attraction

It’s the foundation, the basis, of all interaction.

It’s an attitude of deliberate deference to grace.

Love finds God’s image in each human face.

It’s a choice, a commitment, a lifestyle, a creed.

Love acts on behalf of all others in need.

Love provides aid to the weak and the helpless.

Love is, above all, inherently selfless.

Love demands naught, withholds naught, but graciously gives.

It’s the ethic that defines how disciples must live.

Love acts without weighing or counting the cost.

Love is dangerous.  For Peter, it leads to the cross…

 By the grace of God, may we all develop the strength, the courage and the capacity to love and worship God by loving others in concrete and meaningful ways as true disciples of Christ.  Amen.

Sunday, April 28, 2024

Beloved

April 28, 2024 + Faith-Lilac Way + Pastor Pam Stalheim Lane

Hon. Darl’n. Sweetie. I’m not sure if it is as true now as it used to be, but in the past if you went a small-town diner in the south the waitress might call you “Hon” or “Darl’n.” Or maybe, when you were a child, someone called you “princess” or “champ” or maybe you referred to a little one or a pet with an endearing word? It may have just been a habit in the South, but when said by someone who knows you, and who loves you, these little words are meant to express love and care and are meant to show that you are loved.

 In our Gospel, using metaphor, Jesus says, “I am the Vine” and “You are the Branches.” Jesus knows you and loves you…and calls you “Branches.” It’s not an endearment that often comes to mind. I mean, what comes to mind when you think about vines and branches? I think about an interwoven tangled mess in which one vine overlaps another – and all are dependent upon the one vine that is rooted in the soil.  So when Jesus says, “I AM the Vine.” You Are the Branches, Jesus is describing our relationship. We are dependent upon Jesus for life and for our very being and Jesus depends upon you and me to go out and bear the fruit that God has given us to bear.

 This is why John calls you “Beloved. You are loved by God.  This is the relationship that was claimed for you when you were baptized. You are God’s Beloved child and because of this love which God so freely gives to us through Jesus Christ, we can love others.

And this is what John calls us to do. John writes, “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God.” This is the life to which you are called. Or as Henri Nouwen writes, “You are invited to live the life of the Beloved.”

This sounds lovely. When I think of the life of the beloved living in community with one another, I think of a community in which people are accepting instead of judging, serving one another instead of demanding what’s theirs; listening to one another instead of shouting down or talking over the other. But how do we do that in our world that is so messed up?  I’ll admit it can be overwhelming to hear the news of wars raging around the world, the horrible way that people are treated and the lack of civility displayed by leaders especially in social media. It is tempting to just shut it all off and ignore the problems of everyone else.

 But when John writes, “Beloved, let us love one another,” I don’t think that he or Jesus is calling us to love only those in this room, and of this room only those who agree with you on everything. You’ll find that group gets really small… really fast. It reminds me of the story of a pastor who, with his wife, broke away from his church because he declared that they were all heretics – and then, looking at his wife, he said, “I’m not sure about you either.”

 When we start isolating ourselves from the problems of the world and community around us, the circle gets small fast. This is not what John had in mind when he wrote, “Beloved, let us love one another.”  And yet, during the pandemic, to keep people healthy, a lot of people ended up isolated. But, as we discovered, isolation isn’t healthy either. 

 Almost a year ago, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy declared a national epidemic of loneliness and isolation. He wrote, “Our epidemic of loneliness and isolation has been an underappreciated public health crisis that has harmed individual and societal health. Our relationships are a source of healing and well-being hiding in plain sight – one that can help us live healthier, more fulfilled, and more productive lives.”1

 It turns out that loneliness is a problem for children, youth, and adults of all ages and this is not a problem that is happening in some far-off country. This is a problem that is happening in Robbinsdale, Crystal, New Hope, Plymouth, Maple Grove, Brooklyn Center, Brooklyn Park, Osseo, Big Lake, Wayzata, Minneapolis, Golden Valley, or wherever else that you live. This crisis is local. This crisis may be your crisis – but even if it is not – it is your neighbor’s crisis. 

 Nick Tangen, the Minneapolis Area Synod Director of Faith Practices, Neighboring Practices writes that this report ought to “light a fire in the bellies of churches across the country [because]… For generations churches and faith communities of all traditions have been beacons of social connection in the neighborhoods where they gather. It is faith communities who have so often gathered neighbors at the table for a shared meal, celebrated community with block parties, and connected children and youth with summer programming and outdoor ministry. This is an epidemic we are built to address.” 2

 So how do we address this problem that is hiding in plain sight?

Perhaps the first step is to be honest about who we are. We are a community of imperfect people who make mistakes, and this is why we take time to confess our shortcomings, our sins and take time to receive forgiveness and reconciliation. We know that God loves and forgives – every time. No matter what it is that we have said or done. God loves you and forgives you.

I also want this place to be a place where we can be honest about who we are because we know that God loves us whether we are feeling like our best selves or whether we are hurting.

Unfortunately, churches have a reputation of being judging rather than accepting. But we want to change that reputation. God is the judge. We are called to love one another and to make this place a place where all people are welcome, a place where anyone can belong. So come as you are. If you want to wear shorts and sandals – wear shorts and sandals. If you like to dress up – dress up. But don’t do it for me or for other people here. Wear what you want. Be who you are. For that is the person God made you to be.  Again, “You are invited to live the life of the Beloved.”

But if you are wondering Luther’s catechism question, “What does that mean?” or if you are wondering what concrete steps could I take to address the issue of loneliness in myself or in my community, then I have a few ideas to share.

The first comes from the Surgeon General himself. In an interview by professor and religious author Kate Bowler, Dr. Vivek Murthy shared some ideas that his department is challenging people to do. He calls it the 5 by 5 challenge – do 5 actions over the next 5 days. There are only three actions: Express gratitude to someone; or extend support to someone or by ask for help of someone. Those three things – mix them up however you want –but he believes that if you do those three things Express gratitude to someone; or extend support to someone or by ask for help of someone for five days you will not only feel less lonely yourself but that you will help others to feel less lonely.3 Those actions seem pretty simple, right? They also seem very much in line with loving others as Christ loves us.

We as the church know how to do these things – express gratitude, serve the neighbor and invite the neighbor, the other, to help. I would also add, invite someone to share in fellowship with you. For example, invite someone to come to roast a hotdog or share a s’more at the Gathering this summer. Invite someone to Treats and talk or to catch a beverage after church or after work. And then – something that we can do that not everyone does – Pray. Pray for the courage to love your neighbor and then pray for your neighbor too. These are a few of the ways that we can live as the beloved community. Again, as Nouwen says, “You are invited to live the life of the Beloved.” I look forward to living into this beloved community with you and learning with you the unique ways that the Holy Spirit is calling you and us to do this Holy work. Amen.

 1 https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2023/05/03/new-surgeon-general-advisory-raises-alarm-about-devastating-impact-epidemic-loneliness-isolation-united-states.html

2 Nick Tangen, https://nicholastangen.com/facing-an-epidemic-of-loneliness-in-our-neighborhoods/

3 https://katebowler.com/podcasts/made-to-belong/

Sunday, April 21, 2024

To Serve and Preserve:  A matter of context.

Context matters.  That’s one of those lessons we’re taught in high school English and literature classes.  If you quote a sentence or phrase without considering the context in which it was used, then the intended meaning of that phrase can become skewed, altered, even reversed, or lost completely.  Context is important.  Always.  The surrounding literary content or dialogue is necessary for understanding the meaning or intent of what is spoken or read.  Even changing the position of a phrase within the correct context can sometimes alter- change the way we hear it, and what we think it means.  Context is important.  Always.

Context matters in scripture too.  In my ethics class, my professor told us over and over and over again, that no portion of scripture can be interpreted on its own but must be understood within the context of the entirety of scripture as a congruent whole.  So far as he was concerned, the Bible is not a collection of random books and stories bound together randomly, so that we can study them individually, apart from the whole.  But rather, ethically, and theologically, every piece of scripture, whether a single verse or an entire book, must be interpreted as a part of the greater whole.  

And yet…that’s not what we generally do, even in worship.  We follow a lectionary that suggests small sections from several different parts of scripture, that someone has decided should be read and interpreted together.  But each one is taken out of context.  And sometimes that context matters a very great deal.

For instance, we occasionally read the creation story from genesis 1, and this year we will read a portion of the Genesis 2 creation story, but we never get that in full, and never get both creation stories at the same time.  And there’s a problem with that.  You see, the first creation story ends at verse 3 of Genesis 2, immediately followed by a second creation story.  These stories arose at different times in Israel’s history.  But when the book of Genesis was divided into chapters and verses, someone deliberately decided to make Genesis 1 bleed over into Genesis 2 so that these two creation stories would be read together, because they need to be read together to interpret them properly.  I’m curious, how many of you knew there is a second creation story?

Genesis 1 is beautifully poetic, almost songlike, with the repetitive refrain “and there was evening, and there was morning” for each day.   According to theologian William Brown, Genesis 1 is also a mathematical marvel.  It’s surely the most familiar Biblical creation story.  God creates by simply speaking, and the earth responds, doing all the work.  The order it gives for the creation of the plants and animals is almost scientifically correct, which, of course, I find appealing.  It states that humans are created in the image and likeness of God, and then gives us dominion over everything.  In Genesis 1, God tells us to rule and subdue creation.  Reading Genesis 1, out of context, might allow us to conclude that God created the world just for us, for human use, and gave us permission to dominate and abuse it, to rule or Lord over it like sovereign dictators and tyrants.  And, given the condition of the planet today, and the rate at which plants and animals are going extinct, it seems that this is what we humans have done for the 2000 years since Jesus died and rose again.

But if we don’t stop at the end of Genesis 1, or even at Genesis 2 verse 3, but continue right on into the second, older creation story of Genesis 2, we get a quite different perspective.  We see God as a worker of clay.

In Genesis 2, we learn that humans were formed from the dirt.  In the Hebrew, the relationship between humankind and the soil is much more obvious.  The root of the words is the same.  God formed the adam from the adamah.  In English, we might demonstrate this by saying that we are earthlings formed from the earth, or humans formed from the humus.  Then God plants a garden in Eden and places the human into the garden to care for it.  The NRSV translates the verbs in verse 15 as tend and till, but another, equally valid (and preferable) translation is “to serve and preserve it.”  Compare this to rule and subdue.   Next God creates the land animals, also from the soil, brings them to life, presumably in the very same way, by giving them the breath of life, and offers them to the human as helpers, partners to assist the human in serving and preserving creation.  God invites the human to name them, to bond with them, to form a relationship, a partnership with each of them.  These creatures are not creatures to subdue or to enslave, but fellow creatures, neighbors in the garden—the garden that is a metaphor for the whole earth and all its plant and animal inhabitants.  This second creation story is trying to tell us that we are part of creation, not above it; that we are all connected and interdependent; that what is good for these creatures is good for us; that all of them have a niche to fill, and a role to play;  that they are all as important as we are, and that our ability to survive and thrive is dependent on our ability to serve and preserve the garden and all that live in it. 

Humans are not separate from creation, nor are we above creation.  We are stewards, caretakers, servants given the sacred task of preserving the garden and providing for all its inhabitants. 

Now consider the Gospel reading from John 1.  Everything that was created was created through Jesus, through the entire Triune God.  And what does Jesus teach us?  Jesus tells us that to be the greatest of all requires that we be servants to all.  It means loving our neighbors as much as we love ourselves, and even putting them first.  That includes our fellow creatures and the plants in the garden.  And in John 3:16-17, Jesus tells us that God so loved all of the cosmos, all of creation, so much that he sent Jesus to save it, all of it. Jesus told us to love others as he loves, to serve others as he served us. 

Being made in the image of God doesn’t mean we are different or better than the rest.  It doesn’t mean we are ontologically different or ontologically special.  It doesn’t mean we somehow look like God.  An image is a representation of something else.  Being created in the image and likeness of God means that we are supposed to rule on God’s behalf, to serve and preserve creation as God’s representatives on earth, to manage and maintain the earth according to God’s will and desire.  It means we have a special purpose—to serve and preserve the garden that is earth so that all creation may continue to thrive.  We are the earth-keepers, made from the earth for the purpose of serving and preserving the earth, keeping it healthy and fertile and habitable. 

But we failed because we didn’t interpret Genesis 1 in its full context.  We never considered that the older creation story of Genesis 2 might shed light on Genesis 1, and serve as a corrective for a newer, more mathematical, and more poetic story.  We didn’t consider how the Gospels might affect the way we interpret and understand the creation stories.  Genesis 2 was set aside as a story about the origin of marriage and replaced with Genesis 1, because it gave us Lordship over the planet. 

But now we know better.  What will you do with this new understanding?  Will you choose to embrace it, or discard it?  Will you share it with others?  Will you embrace the role of servant and protecter of the earth?  Will you let it transform you and the way you interact with nature, and change the impact you have on this earth? 

Sunday, April 14, 2024

See the Scars – Hear the Witness

Awe and wonder. Those words can’t even begin to describe how incredibly spine tingly awesome it was to watch the solar eclipse as the moon started to move across the face of the sun. As the moon progressed, it started to get cooler outside - I pulled on my sweatshirt even though I had been in shirtsleeves just moments before. As I and a group of witnesses watched and waited, wearing our safety glasses and peering through telescopes  - a community of sorts formed. Students from the local community college were taking advantage of the crowd to sell home-made cookies as a service project. Locals as well as folks from St. Louis, Chicago, Roseville and other places, traded stories and telescope views.  And then, as the sky got darker, we watched as the horizon –all 360 degrees -- started to turn the pink and orange colors of a sunset – even though the sun was still high in the sky. The birds began to sing their night song. The street lights came on. Our eyes were all glued to the sky as the sunlight began to fade and the moon moved to cover the sun. And then… at precisely 2:04 PM local time, a shout erupted as the moon covered the sun – except for the outside corona. People were on their feet cheering. I had tears in my eyes and my heart was full of praise of God.  It was wonder – FULL. We were witnesses of this beautiful event.

 Jesus could have made a spectacular reentry - with a robe of stars and the sun and moon tucked under each arm. He could have arranged to emerge from an eclipse. That would have been flashy. But instead… Jesus shows up and shows the disciples his scars.

That’s not all Jesus does. Jesus also eats a fish, proving to the disciples that he is not a ghost, does an amazing Bibles study that opens their minds to understand the scriptures, promises the gift of repentance and forgiveness of sins and then declares them to be witnesses.  There is a lot going on in this passage. But what caught my attention this time was that Jesus begins by showing his scars. Jesus doesn’t come back from the dead healed with perfect child-like skin as if he had been to a plastic surgeon. He doesn’t make a flashy entrance. Instead, he comes back and shows his disciples his scars.

Scars tell a story.  Jesus’ scars remind the disciples –and us -- that Jesus was really crucified, was really dead, was really put in a tomb.  The scars are still there. And yet… Jesus is alive. You are my witnesses.

I remember when my kids were little, we stayed overnight at a friend’s house on a New Year’s Eve. In the morning, all the kids went outside to go sledding. They were having a good time. I wasn’t worried at all. Until… one of the older kids rushed in and said, “Your son went over the embankment.” Aghast, I went to put my boots on. But before I could get out the door, in walked my son, his face was full of blood and bleeding profusely.  The other mom – a nurse by trade - gave me some towels and said, “You don’t know where the cut is, so start from the bottom up.”  So, I did. I started at his chin and began sopping up the blood. And as I worked my way up his face, not finding the cut, I found myself praying “thank you God…thank you God”… as I worked up past the lips and nose and then the eyes… I kept praying “thank you God”.  Finally, I reached the hairline… and there was a very small but deep gash. We did take a trip to the emergency room for stiches. It is now only a slight scar – which at times I can see if I look for it. When I see it, I’m reminded that I’m a witness of God’s healing hand.

Do you have a scar? Do you have a story? I do. I’m reminded about it every time I look at my knee. I remember that day I ran across the street without looking for traffic. I also remember, with gratitude, that while the scar is large, I received the gift of healing for my head and my leg and my life.  I’m a witness of God’s healing and God’s grace.

Scars can heal but there is always a story. In fact, I think that no one gets through this life without scars of one kind or another. Sometimes they are the result of what, in retrospect, seems like a stupid thing – like my neglecting to look both ways before crossing a street.  At other times, like my son, they are the result of an accident. No one was to blame.  And sometimes, like for Jesus, the scars tell the story of what someone did to you.  Those are the wounds that can be most painful.

We are a people scarred by life, but, regardless of the source of the pain and the scars, the good news is that Jesus can heal your wounds – regardless of what the wound may be. It’s not magic. It may take time. But Jesus is more than able to heal our wounds.

One of the ways that Jesus heals us is, as he says in today’s Gospel, through repentance and the forgiveness of sins. This is especially true for the wounds that you have received – and inflicted on others  -- by the things that you have done and for the good and right things you have not done. For all of these hurts, Jesus offers repentance and forgiveness. This is Christ’s free gift for you.

After we receive this gift of forgiveness, we are empowered and set free to forgive others who may have hurt us. This is not something that happens automatically or easily. But when we receive the gift of love and forgiveness, it opens our hearts and our lives to share that gift with others. 

Renewed by God’s gift of love and inspired we are able to be a witness to God’s love and then to act as Jesus’ hands and feet, caring for others and loving others, just as we have been loved.

Brothers and sisters, friends in Christ, who are forgiven, renewed and healed, Jesus calls you as a witness to proclaim God’s love and faithfulness. You are a witness of what God has done for you – and for the whole world.  And, because of YOUR witness, others can not only hear the Good News of Jesus but experience it too.  Thanks be to God!

 Faith-Lilac Way  +  April 14, 2024  + Pastor Pam Stalheim Lane