March 22 - Lent 4

Light Saves
John 3:14-21
Lent 4 – March 22, 2009

When I was a kid growing up in northwestern Pennsylvania, I was lucky enough to live down the road from my cousins. My brother & sisters and I always loved to go down the hill to their house in the summer and play with them. Some of our favorite games were games like Flashlight Tag, which is like Hide & Seek, but the person who was it had to tag you with light from the flashlight; Another favorite was Kick the Can – another variation on the Hide & Seek game, where a coffee can or paint can was home base, and to be safe, you had to get to the can & kick it. We loved to play these games in the summer outside in the dark & because we lived out in the country, it was plenty dark – no street lights or anything. We had a great time running & hiding from each other – darkness offers great places to hide! It's much harder to be caught if you stay out of the light.

That's pretty much what the gospel of John is talking about to us this morning. Jesus is talking here to Nicodemus who was a religious leader, and interestingly enough, he came to talk to Jesus at night, in the dark. And Jesus says to him, “people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light & do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed” (vv 19-20). In other words, he says, people choose darkness over light, because darkness gives us great places to hide! It's harder to get caught when you stay out of the light. And our reasons for not wanting to get caught are much more serious than any child's game.

We may not think of our deeds as evil – evil is such a strong word with such a negative connotation – we don't want to apply it to ourselves; but the reality is, all of us have some things we don't want brought into the light. The service for Night Prayer in our hymnal has a prayer of confession that starts like this: “I confess that I have sinned against you this day. Some of my sin I know – the thoughts and words and deeds of which I am ashamed - ...” (p. 321). All of us have them, these thoughts and words and deeds of which we are ashamed, and precisely because we are ashamed of them, those are exactly the things we want to keep out of sight, hidden in the dark, locked away from view, because we do not want to be exposed. We don't want anyone else to see our secret selves, the parts of us that we know don't measure up. And so we play our own version of Hide & Seek in the dark, always keeping trying to keep out of the light, always trying desperately not to get caught.

We do that because we're afraid of what will happen if we get caught – John's gospel says that we don't want to be exposed & I think that's because we think that exposure will come with judgment and condemnation. We think that if Jesus saw us how we truly are, the way we sometimes see ourselves, he'd reject us and punish us for our evil deeds. It's a scary thing to think about coming out into the light, because the light doesn't offer us any place to hide.

But I learned a few things about light from playing those games so many years ago. One is that you can't stay in the dark forever, because sooner or later, hiding in the dark gets old. It gets cold & lonely out there in the dark & eventually you find yourself wanting to be “home”. And in order to get home, you've gotta take a risk and come out into the light, because that's where home is.

And another thing I learned about the light happened the time my cousin Karen twisted her ankle running around while we were playing Kick the Can out in the dark. While she was in the dark, all she knew was that she was hurting – she couldn't be sure of exactly what was wrong. If she wanted to discover what was really wrong, she had to come to the light. If she wanted to get help, she had to leave the darkness; the only place she could find healing was in the light. And when you're hurt and come home to the light, you don't worry about being caught. The rules of the game change when you need help.

Changing the rules is exactly what God did by sending the only Son. Because God knew that we were alone and hurting out there in the dark. God knew that the only place we could find hope and healing for what is wrong with us, for the sin that stalks us in the dark, is in Jesus, the light of the world. And God knew that we were afraid to come into the light.

And so God sent Jesus to be lifted up, raised up on the cross, light for all the world to see, and God yelled, “Ollie, ollie, oxen free” - at least that's what we used to yell to let everyone know that you didn't have to worry about being caught anymore, it was safe to come on home.

“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him!”

The old rules don't apply anymore. We don't have to be afraid of judgment and condemnation and exposure. Jesus knows what we are doing out there in the dark, and he loves us anyway. He calls us to come into the light so that there we can receive the hope and healing he offers. There in Christ's light, there is forgiveness and an invitation to live a new life, not based in fear or guilt, but instead rooted in God's deep and abiding love for each of us, the love God revealed on a cross. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish, but may have eternal life.” Eternal life starts now, when we come out of the darkness and into the light of Christ's love. God is calling, “Ollie ollie oxen free!” It's safe to come home. Come live in the light. Amen.

March 15 - Lent 3

Empty Traditions or Real Relationship?
John 2:13-22
Lent 3 – March 15, 2009

My favorite Lutheran joke goes something like this:
Q: How many Lutherans does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Change?!? What do you mean, change???

Now tell that joke to anyone who's been a Lutheran for even a little while, and you're bound to get at least a chuckle out of 'em. As Homer Simpson says, it's funny because it's true. We laugh at it because we recognize ourselves in it. Lutherans have a hard time with change.

No one likes change. You see that everywhere. Lately I've seen it on even on Facebook, where people are distressed about the change to the format. And you certainly find it in just aboutother churches find it in any church you go to, but Lutherans seem to have this dislike of change almost down to an art. There's a part of us that is almost proud of our resistance to change, which is ironic, considering our heritage, remembering the fact that our entire denomination came about because of someone who wanted to make some changes. (And we see where that got him – it got him kicked out of the church!)

But despite our Reformation roots, we tend to resent change. We have carefully-cultivated traditions, interwoven with our cherished memories of what church should be like, and we don't like it when anyone tries to mess with that. We struggle with relatively minor things, like when we change the musical setting of our liturgy, or use a new shape of palm for Palm Sunday, or change from wafers to bread. There's a strong urge inside of us to cling to the routines and rituals of the past, and there's a reason for that. These things have meaning for us. We get emotionally attached to those traditions, because in an unstable, ever-changing world, we at least want things inside the church to stay the same! Change is just downright hard. It makes us uneasy. Change upends us.

It's no wonder that the people in the gospel story today got all up in arms when Jesus came to the temple. Because here he comes, this young whippersnapper, near the beginning of one of the most important religious festivals of the year, the Passover. Jesus comes, and no sooner has he set foot in the place & he is literally upending the whole shebang! He enters the temple, and there “he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables.” This wasn't anything unusual – Jews came from all over the world at Passover to worship & to make sacrifices. They needed pure, unblemished animals to offer – and who wants to haul a sheep or a cow with them from Egypt or Greece? And they had to pay their temple tax. They sure couldn't do it with Roman money – they had to change it over into temple coins. These people selling animals and exchanging money were performing a service. People couldn't worship correctly without these things. And yet when Jesus sees all this, he makes a whip & drives out the animals with their people. He takes the money changers' cash boxes and dumps them out. He turns over tables, yelling at the dove sellers to get out of there, yelling at everyone to stop making his Father's house a marketplace! It's mass pandemonium in the temple that day, utter chaos as animals and people go scattering every which way, as coins clang and roll in every direction with the money changers chasing after them, no doubt.

In one fell swoop, Jesus has stopped everything. There will be no worship that day. In the span of a few minutes, Jesus has upended their life-long, unquestioned rituals. No wonder they ask him for a sign. “What gives you the right?” “How dare you?!” Jesus is messing with everything they have ever known, all that they consider good and right and meaningful. Jesus is forcing them to change & they don't like it one bit!

Perhaps that's why Jesus did it. He sees that their worship life has become a matter of routine. The system of sacrifice, which began as a way for people to remember God's covenant with them and be renewed in that relationship, that system is now just business as usual. It's checking things off a list. But more than that, these routines, these traditions, have become almost more important that the one they seek to serve in the 1st place! God is doing a new thing right in front of their eyes, in Jesus, but most everyone is so caught up in the old way of doing things, in their cherished traditions and patterns of worship that they can't see it! So maybe that's why Jesus had to come and cause such a commotion – to get their attention, to make them think about what they were doing & why – because their hallowed traditions had become barriers to true worship, barriers to a real, authentic relationship with God.

This story comes to us this Lent for a reason. Maybe Jesus is trying to get our attention too. Maybe he is inviting us to examine our own traditions, the traditions of our personal lives and the traditions of the church, and to really think about which things we do are still helping us to have a real relationship with God, the things that are helping us grow as followers of Jesus, the things that invite other people to enter more deeply into a life of discipleship - and which ones get in the way of that relationship, that are obstacles to what God wants to be doing in us and through us. What new things might God be doing among us that we just can't see yet? And what are we afraid of?

Change is always hard. Usually we won't do it until we are forced to. But you know, if we refuse to change that burned-out light bulb because we don't want to change, we end up sitting in the dark. A burned-out light bulb doesn't do anybody any good. But the good news is, Jesus came bringing light into our darkness. He is the light of the world, so when he calls us to change, we don't have to be afraid. Sometimes we may look at what he is doing here in this place in & in our lives and feel like he is just flipping over tables and causing chaos. But he does it to shake us up, to wake us up, to open our eyes to the new thing God is doing. And it's always so our relationship with him can be deeper and more trusting, based not on things that can and will and must change, like a church building or a particular style of worship or the programs of the past, but based on the One who never changes – Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever, who lived and died so that we might be part of the new thing God is doing and whose love for us will never change. Thanks be to God. Amen.

March 5, 2009 - Community Mid-Week Lent Worship

Journey of Lent, Journey of Faith
Psalm 77 & Romans 8:31-39
Community Mid-Week Lent – March 5, 2009

Lent is a journey. Christians of all flavors seem to talk about Lent this way, as if we are going on a trip. And so we spend the 6 weeks of Lent following Jesus as he heads to the cross, trying to model our lives after his example. Lent is a time when we focus on our relationship with God and try to draw nearer to God.

But the journey of faith has its ups and downs, and there are some times when it seems no matter how hard we try to draw near to God, God remains far away. That's certainly how the words of Psalm 77 sound to me. For 10 verses, we hear the lament of a person who is in the middle of the muck and mire of life, stuck in some sort of crisis. And so the Psalmist cries aloud to God, yelling at the top of his lungs to get God's attention. He's looking for the Lord. He thinks and meditates and prays, but his soul refuses to be comforted. This poor guy is so stressed out, so anxious about whatever is going on, that he can't sleep. He spends his nights searching his soul, thinking about the past, wondering what has gone wrong. He can't even find the words to say what's going on inside of him.

But the crux of the problem is that his cries and his prayers seem to go unheard. God doesn't answer. God seems far away. And it leaves our writer full of questions: “Will the Lord spurn forever & never again be favorable? Has his steadfast love ceased forever? Are his promises at an end for all time? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has he in anger shut up his compassion?” To put it another way: Doesn't God love me anymore? Has God forgotten all about me? Where is God???

I imagine these types of questions are familiar to most of us. We've all gone through hard times in our lives, times when we're overwhelmed, when we lie in bed at night with our thoughts racing with regrets for the past and fear about the future, times when we try to pray but can't find the words, times when we seek the Lord but feel like God can't be found. And we wonder where God is, why God doesn't do something! We feel alone and abandoned, hurt and confused, and filled with questions.

It's quite a contrast to what we hear from the apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans tonight: “If God is for us, who is against us? ...Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril or sword?... I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

How wonderful it is that the Bible gives us these stories that come from two completely opposite ends of the faith spectrum! It's great for us who are on this journey of faith to look at fellow travelers who've been down this road before us and know that we aren't alone in our experiences. Sometimes we will claim the utter confidence of Paul, knowing that nothing can separate us from God, and other days, our hearts will echo the Psalmist, wondering if God has forgotten all about us. And it's okay when we have those days – that is the witness of Psalm 77 for us; we don't have to stuff those feelings inside and pretend everything's okay. We can bring it all to God and lay our feelings, our questions, our doubts on the table. God can handle it.

But once we've done that, the Psalm encourages us not to stop there. He says, “I will call to mind the deeds of the LORD; I will remember your wonders of old. I will meditate on all your work, and muse on your mighty deeds...” Even in the middle of his questions and doubts, he remembers what God has done for him and for God's people throughout all of history. This is the God who works wonders! This is the God who redeems God's people! This is the God who has power over the earth and the sea.

This is the God who leads God's people through the chaos of the mighty waters, leading them through the sea – not around it, not over it, but through it, leading them safely to the other side, yet God's footprints were unseen. That is the mystery of this journey of Lent, our journey of faith. We spend this time trying to draw nearer to God, looking for God's footprints, footprints that we can't always see. But as we hear the stories of the faith, as we remember our God who works wonders and does mighty deeds, we find the God who has been with us all along, and will never leave us alone.

"For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Amen.

Lent 2 - March 8, 2009

Jesus Says: “Follow Me & Do It MY Way”
Mark 8:31-38

I think if Americans had a theme song, it would probably be something like “My Way” by Frank Sinatra. There's just something so quintessentially American about those lyrics:

I planned each charted course
Each careful step along the byway
And more, much more than this,
I did it my way.

Yes, there were times, I'm sure you knew
When I bit off more than I could chew
But through it all, when there was doubt
I ate it up, and spit it out
I faced it all
And I stood tall

And did it my way.

Yes, this could be our anthem, we Americans who are so proud of doing things our own way, defiant of anything that would stand in our way. We want to do things ourselves, in the way we want to do them. We don't want to hear what any naysayers might think; we don't want to get a second opinion. We'll face it all, and we'll stand tall, and do it our way. This independent-mindedness is something we admire & celebrate – we pride ourselves on it, and we applaud it in others.

And yet, it's exactly this attitude that Jesus warns against in today's gospel reading from Mark. Because the way we understand it, my way means claiming our rights to live our lives the way we want to. My way means looking out for number 1 above all else. My way means looking for the safe and easy and profitable way through life. My way tends to be the selfish way.

And here we have Jesus coming on to the scene and saying something completely different. “If you want to follow me, you gotta do it my way,” he says. Being a disciple, a follower of Jesus, means doing it his way. And Jesus' way is not the safe way. Jesus' way is not the easy way. Jesus' way is not the profitable way. Jesus' way is the hard way.

His way is the way of self-denial, and I'm not just talking about denying yourself some tangible, material thing. It's about denying yourself, because Jesus' way is the way of putting aside our self-seeking selfish behavior. His way is the way of reining in our instinct toward self-preservation. His way is the way that calls us to leave behind our self-interest, our self-centeredness, our pursuit of utter self-gratification. Following Jesus his way means begin willing to follow where he leads despite the cost, despite the things we may have to give up, despite having to give up “my way” for Jesus' way.

And let's make no mistake, following Jesus is costly. For those early followers, the ones Jesus is talking to in the crowd, choosing to follow him often meant giving up their family and friends and their position in society, because being a Christian meant leaving your old life behind. If your family or friends didn't decide to follow Jesus too, they'd shut you out.

And if that's not enough to ask, well, the 12 disciples who were in Jesus' inner circle make it clear that following Jesus means risking it all, even your life. For them, following Jesus meant giving up their homes and their jobs and traveling treacherous roads to every place in the known world to spread the good news of God that Jesus revealed. For almost all of them, following Jesus' way meant literally giving up their lives, being captured and killed for the sake of the gospel, for proclaiming a new way that opposed the accepted order of things.

It's easy to ask why. Why would they do such things? Why would they decide to follow Jesus his way? Why would they put their own way aside and follow after this one who asked so much of them? We hear Jesus say, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me,” and we wonder who would want to be his follower. It's not an obvious choice, is it?

But we know that they did! They were willing to follow Jesus, even if it meant denying themselves, even if it meant picking up the cross, even if it meant losing their lives for Jesus' sake and the sake of the gospel. Because Jesus' words rang true to them. They heard him say, “those who want to save their life will lose it,” and something deep inside of them knew that Jesus was telling the truth. They knew that what the world had to offer, the promises that came with doing it “my way” didn't remotely compare with what Jesus promised to those that choose to follow and do it his way. They were willing to take up his challenge, willing to put it all on the line for him and the sake of the gospel because they believed him when he said, “those who love their life for my sake... will save it.”

It's the witness of Jesus followers throughout the generations. Doing it my way, pursuing the things of this world, living only for ourselves & what we think will make us happy, looking for the safe or easy or profitable way through life always leaves us empty. In the end, we lose our true selves, the selves Jesus challenges us to be. But when we risk losing our lives for his sake, we discover true life, abundant life, rich life, life in all its fullness.

Jesus stands before us today & everyday, inviting us to become followers. He calls us to his way, and the only reason we can even begin to follow is because it truly is his way. For Jesus' hard way is the way he traveled first. It was the way of great suffering and rejection and death. And he chose that way, denying himself and knowing that it would mean taking up his cross. Jesus took the hard way of complete commitment, knowing what it would cost. And he did it for us – for you and for you and for me and for everyone. Jesus lost his life so that he might save ours. He did it his way. May we answer the call to follow so that in the end, when we reach the final curtain, as the song goes, we can to Jesus for certain, “I did it your way.”

Amen.

March 1 - Lent 1

This sermon started by with a reading of the children's book, Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak. The sermon will probably make a bit more sense if you check the book out 1st.

God Never Leaves Us Alone in the Wilderness

Mark 1:9-15
Lent 1 – March 1, 2009

As I was reading our gospel story for today, I got to thinking about this book, and I was wondering if Jesus ever felt like Max. True, their stories are very different. Jesus wasn't getting himself into all kinds of mischief and driving his parents crazy. Mark's story doesn't open that way at all! Instead of being called “WILD THING”, Jesus hears God's words of love and affirmation when he comes up out of the water at his baptism: “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well-pleased.”

“You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well-pleased.” But then before Jesus can do anything, the Spirit immediately drives him out into the wilderness, still dripping wet from the river, God's words still ringing in his ears. And his head must have been spinning when he got there, trying to figure out what had just happened, how he had gone from being called God's beloved son to being dumped in the wilderness in the blink of an eye. I wonder if it it seemed like a punishment for some unknown misdeed, if Jesus felt like Max did when he was sent to bed without any supper.

But there Jesus was, where the wild things are, for 40 days. Forty days of testing and temptation. Forty days with no one but Satan and the wild beasts for company, and Satan always coming at him from every angle, trying to tempt him into sin. Forty days out in the wilderness, a place of nothingness, a place of emptiness and unsettledness, a place of loneliness and isolation.
I wonder how Jesus felt out there in the wilderness. Because Jesus was as human as we are, and we know that wilderness times are hard times. Sometimes they just come out of the blue and leave us with our heads spinning, wondering what just happened. Wilderness times can come right on the heels of something really good, and then everything changes and we feel like the rug has been pulled out from under us.

We can find ourselves driven into the wilderness by so many things – a lost job, a miscarriage, an accident, a broken relationship, a death. But whatever drives us there, wilderness times make us wonder why we're here, questioning if this wilderness is punishment for mischief of one kind or another. Wilderness times leave us feeling lonely and wanting to be where Someone loves us best of all.

I imagine that even Jesus felt that way sometimes during those 40 days. But the good news from Mark's gospel today is that even if Jesus felt lonely, he was never truly alone. Because even as Satan tempted him and wild beasts surrounded him, God sent angels to wait on Jesus. God sent angels to watch out for him and take care of him. God sent angels to remind Jesus that even in the wilderness, he was never really alone.

And lest we think that Jesus got special treatment just because he's God's beloved son, let me remind you that he's not the only one. All through the Bible we hear stories of people who found themselves out in the wilderness, confused and hurting and questioning what God was doing. Moses fled to the wilderness in fear for his life. Elijah did too. The people of Israel wandered in the wilderness for 40 years before they got to enter the promised land. But none of these people, and they're just a small example, were alone in the wilderness. Out there in the wilderness, they each had a powerful encounter with God! Moses saw a burning bush; Elijah heard God speaking in that still, small voice, and the Israelites were led and fed by God each and every step of the way, every day of those 40 years. In the Bible, the wilderness is a place of testing, yes, but God never abandons anyone out there. It is there in the wilderness, when all of the distractions of life are stripped away, that people get ready for work God has for them to do next. It it there that they learn to rely more fully on God. It is there that they come face to face with the living God who loves them best of all. And so, when his time in the wilderness ends, Jesus comes out, proclaiming the good news of this God who never leaves us alone.

The 40 days of Lent can be a good reminder to us that as hard as they may be, wilderness times are never wasted. For there in our loneliness, in our longing to be where someone loves us best of all, God comes to meet us. From our place with the wild things, from far away across the world, we smell the good things that God has made for us to eat. And we don't have to sail back over a year and in and out of weeks and through a day to get there. It's as close as this table. God has supper is waiting for us. Come out of the wilderness. Come and eat.
Amen.

February 25, 2009 - Ash Wednesday

Looks Can Be Deceiving
Isaiah 58:1-12
Ash Wednesday – February 25, 2009

Looks can be deceiving.

We see that today in the Old Testament reading from the book of Isaiah. The people of Israel remind me of Eddie Haskell of Leave It To Beaver fame. You know who I'm talking about, right? Even if you've never seen the show, you probably know a little bit about Eddie Haskell. On the surface, he seemed like a wonderful kid. He was always well-groomed, always polite, always used his best manners whenever adults were around. But looks can be deceiving – and whenever no grown-ups were around, Eddie showed his true colors, didn't he - cooking up schemes and picking on Beaver. Looks can be deceiving.

Well, the people Isaiah is talking to today are kind of like that. From all outward appearances, they have their religious lives in order. They seem like they have it together. God describes them to the prophet near the beginning of our lesson, and this is what God says in verse 2: “...day after day they seek me and delight to know my ways... they delight to draw near to God.” Like Eddie Haskell, when they come into the presence of God, the ultimate “grown-up”, they are all good manners and politeness. They give God what they think God wants to see. And so they fast on all the assigned fast days, and they humble themselves, walking around with their heads down, dressed in sackcloth and ashes. When it comes to pleasing God, they think they have the rituals down pat.

But looks can be deceiving, and as we read from Isaiah, it becomes increasingly obvious that God is not fooled. God's people want to do the right things; I think they're sincere in that. And they think they are pleasing God, yet as this chapter opens God commands the prophet to “shout out! Do not hold back! Lift up your voice like a trumpet! Announce to my people their rebellion, to the house of Jacob their sins.” All is not well between the people of Israel and the God they claim to seek. Looks can be deceiving, but God sees through all of their religious play-acting and calls them on it. On the surface, they are doing all the right things, but their hearts are not in the right place. While they are fasting from food, they are being gluttons of their own self-interest. They put their own needs and wants above others. On their so-called holy days of repentance, of turning back to God, they quarrel and fight and strike each other. They think they are giving God what God wants, but religious rituals alone do not make them righteous. God is not pleased.

Looks can be deceiving, but the truth is, the only people who are deceived are ourselves. Just like the people in Isaiah's time, here we are in church on Ash Wednesday, one of the traditional fasting days of the whole church. We come here as good faithful people to observe the traditions of our faith, to start our Lenten journey off on the right foot. Probably many of us have even decided to give something up for Lent, or to add some good, worthwhile activity in, a sign of our repentance, a recognition of what Jesus has done for us. To look at us, any outside observer would think that we are pleasing God, that have our religious ducks in a row. But as much as we'd like to believe that we've got our spiritual lives under control, when we hear this reading from Isaiah, we know in our hearts that we have just been deceiving ourselves. Because when we hear passages like this, we come face to face with the reality that we are not who we should be. We know that we are not who God created us to be, not who God expects us to be. We hear this litany about the kind of fast God really desires from us, and we know that we are not living up to God's standards.

Listen again to these words from verses 6 & 7:

Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?

If you're anything like me, this is quite a step up from your typical Lenten discipline. I gave up chocolate one year in college. This year I'm giving up the Internet at night-time. I'm hoping I will use at least some of that reclaimed time to spend with God, but it kind of pales in comparison with what God says here, doesn't it? The fast God wants us to observe is much bigger, more all-encompassing than that. It's hard for me to imagine sharing my bread with the hungry. Bring the homeless poor into my house?! It's a little too up close & personal. But God wants us to get personally involved with the troubles and hurts of this world. God wants us to get our hands dirty. God wants us to take risks, to make sacrifices that are truly sacrifices. God wants us to stop putting on a show here in church and go out into the world to live out the gospel. And the truth is, we Eddie Haskells are not up to this call!

But realizing this is one of the gifts of Ash Wednesday. Here on Ash Wednesday, we realize that our Christian walk is not about putting on a show for God or the world. It's about coming face to face with who we really are, and Ash Wednesday holds up a mirror so we can see ourselves as we truly are. It pushes us to move past our Eddie Haskell masks and our self-deception so we can be open and honest with God and each other about the fact that we don't measure up. We don't have it all together. As the Psalmist says in Psalm 51, we were born guilty. We are sinners from birth (vs. 5). But as they say in recovery circles, admitting you have a problem is the first step. That's what Ash Wednesday helps us to do.

But that's not where it ends. We are sinners, yes, but at the same time, we are beloved, cherished children of God, and our relationship with God is made right through the power of God's grace, God's free, unlimited, boundless love for each of us. And God loves us too much to ever leave us the way God found us. God does have high expectations for us. God does intend for us to stop putting on a religious show and actually live as God's hands and feet in the world, loving our neighbors as ourselves in concrete actions, not just words. But this is not a punishment; it's not a way for us to earn a reward. It's a chance for us to love others as God first loved us. It's an opportunity to grow towards becoming the people God created us to be.

This road God calls us too may look too hard at times, but then again, looks can be deceiving. God never leaves us to do meet God's expectations on our own. God is the one who opens our eyes to the looks that would deceive us. God is the one who inspires us to return to God with our whole hearts. God is the one who gives us strength to turn back each day, to drop our Eddie Haskell masks and be real with God. And when we do that, when we try to live our lives in line with God's challenging call, we find that the LORD is already there, guiding us continually, satisfying our needs in parched places. When we cry for help, we hear God say, “Here I am!” When we travel God's road, God's light breaks forth into our lives, shining on us and through us into the world, offering life and hope and healing, for on this road, God is with us every step of the way. God's road is the road to true life. Thanks be to God. Amen.

February 28, 2009 - Transfiguration Sunday

Jesus Leads Disciples to the “Real” World
Mark 9:2-9
Transfiguration Sunday – February 22, 2009

I think I was in my mid-20s when I had my first literal mountaintop experience. I mean when I actually climbed, myself, to the top of a mountain and looked out over the world before my eyes; took in the sky and the clouds and the trees in the valleys below; breathed in the fresh clean air; soaked in the silence, listening just to the sounds of the birds and the breeze. It was awe-inspiring. It was spirit-renewing. It was good to be there, for there in that place, my breath was taken away, the world opened up and there on the mountaintop, I saw things I had never seen before, could never see from any other place.

Yes, it was good to be there, & so I think I can understand these words that come tumbling out of Peter's mouth up there on the high mountain apart with Jesus by themselves, when suddenly Jesus is transfigured, changed somehow before the very eyes of this inner circle of disciples, just Peter, and James, and John. I understand Peter's reaction when Jesus' clothes became dazzling white, whiter than even Clorox bleach could make them, understand his response, when out of nowhere, Moses and Elijah, “the law & the prophets” so to speak, appear on this mountain & talk with Jesus - their very presence a sign of the coming Messiah. It makes sense to me that Peter would blurt out, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here.” It is good for us to be here in this holy place with you. It is good for us to have this time away from the crushing crowds and the demands of every-day life. “It is good for us to be here,” Peter says. “Let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” He's not talking anything too fancy, just some little huts, some booths, some lean-tos. It is good for us to be here – so let's stay a while! Peter, in his terror, in his awe, wants to revel in this experience, to prolong this holy moment. Let's hold on to it, savor it, make it last as long as we can. It is good for us to be here!

Now if you've ever had a mountaintop experience, you recognize Peter's response, because it's just normal to want to hold on to those mountaintop experiences. And I'm not just talking about the ones that take place on a physical mountain; I'm talking those times when God takes our breath away, when God's glory is revealed to us in new & unexpected ways, when we know we are standing on holy ground. Those moments when somehow we are lifted up out of the burdens and demands of our everyday lives and into the presence of something, some One beyond ourselves, when we feel connected with God in ways we almost can't imagine or understand. When that type of moment comes along, we chime right in with Peter: “It is good for us to be here! Let's stay for awhile!” Because just like Peter, we we want to hold on to our spiritual highs, we want to make them last as long as possible. That's kind of how I felt after I climbed that first mountain years ago, and pretty much every mountain since. It is good to be here. Let me stay a while! Who wants to go back to the real world?

But what I've learned from my hiking days is that you can't stay on the mountaintop. It's not a place that you can live. And so, no sooner are those words out of Peter's mouth than a cloud comes & overshadows them - and a voice comes from the cloud, the voice of God, reaffirming what Jesus heard at his baptism, way back in Mark, Chapter 1, only this time, the disciples hear it too. This time, God's message is for them... “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!” And not just listen, as in “hear,” but listen as “obey.” Listen to what Jesus has to say, follow the way that he lives, watch what he does & imitate it.

And just like that, the mountaintop experience is over. Elijah & Moses disappear, and it's just Jesus, regular old Jesus, leading them back down the mountain. Because as glorious as Jesus' transfiguration was, it couldn't last, not then, because Jesus has more work to do, and that work can only be done back down at the bottom of the mountain, down there in the real world. So that is where Jesus leads them, to the “real” world, back to the crowd where the other disciples have gotten into an argument with the scribes; back to the real world where those same 12 disciples, including James & John & Peter will squabble & compete with each other about who will be the greatest among them; back to the real world where there are real people who are hurting and suffering and crying out for someone to heal them, to save them. That is where the road leads for Jesus – to the real world that is broken and unable to fix itself.

It's why we hear this story as we end the season of Epiphany and turn towards Lent. Because this is the turning point. Just before our story this morning, Jesus began to teach his disciples that he must suffer and die, and once they come down off the mountain, that's where his road will lead. It will take him to Jerusalem and the cross, and there is no turning back. This story from Mark reminds that as much as we might like to stay, mountaintops are sending places, not ending places. It was that way for Moses and Elijah, who both fled to the mountains when they were in trouble – and there they met God, who encouraged them, and then sent them back down the mountain to do God's work. It was that way for Peter and James and John on this day. And it was that way for Jesus, who came down from this mountain to the valley of the real world. Because it was on another mountain, Mount Calvary, where Jesus would find true glory, as he hung on the cross and died for that real world. But even that was not an ending place - because in 3 days, he rose again!

The road that Jesus followed was never an easy one. But it is the road that leads to true life, and as we listen to him, we hear him calling us to follow him down this same road, down from our mountaintops and back to the real world, where people are still hurting and suffering and looking for someone to heal them, to save them. Jesus is calling us, now that he has risen from the dead, to share what we have seen & heard and experienced up on the mountaintop, to introduce our broken world to the one who walked the road to the cross for all of us, and who walks with us still, wherever the road may lead.

Thanks be to God! Amen.

February 15, 2009

Jesus' Touch Brings New Life
Mark 1:40-45
Epiphany 6 – February 15, 2009

Jose Ramirez was 20 years old in 1968. He had a large, close-knit family, he was in love with his high school sweetheart, Magdalena. But for some time, Jose had been having strange symptoms. His hands and arms were losing all feeling. He had a fever that came and went. He had sores on his arms and legs. This had been going on for a while, but no one could tell him what was wrong. His parents took him from doctor to doctor, and even once took him across the border into Mexico to see a healer, who took one look at him and told him he had a “disease of the Bible.” That didn't make any sense to Jose, until finally he went to a doctor who diagnosed him with Hansen's disease – modern day leprosy. In no time at all, health officials whisked Jose away from his family & friends in Laredo, Texas, & shipped him off to quarantine in a leprosarium in Carville, Louisiana. He made the long trip there in the back of a hearse, because as those health officials said, “Ambulances are for the living; hearses are for the dead.”

Hearses are for the dead – and with a diagnosis of leprosy, just like that, Jose Ramirez found himself one of the living dead, cut off from everyone & everything that mattered to him, because the powers that be feared his disease would spread if he was not removed.

People who had leprosy in Jesus' day were among the living dead too. Leprosy could be any of a number of different skin diseases, not just what modern science classifies as leprosy. Leprosy was feared, because it was contagious, and there was no known treatment, no cure. For the safety of the community, anyone who was diagnosed with leprosy was, like Jose, forced to leave that community. There was no hearse to drive you out of town, but you had to leave your house & family and go live out of bounds, out beyond the borders of the town. You couldn't work or earn a living, so you had to rely on the kindness and generosity of others. There was no hiding the fact that you were a leper, either, because lepers had to wear torn clothing & cover their mouths & cry out “Unclean, unclean!” whenever someone approached, a warning that you were approaching a member of the living dead. Having leprosy was not just a physical disease. As if the physical symptoms were not enough, on top of that, you had to deal with the anguish of being alone in your suffering, of being cut off from everyone that you loved, being isolated from all that might offer mental or emotional support. There was little hope left for a person who had leprosy, no hope of human dignity, no hope of companionship, no hope of a future, because they had become untouchable, the living dead.

Nowadays, we don't worry too much about leprosy. This story seems kind of far removed from us. We can't quite imagine making whole groups of people live away from the rest of the town. But while we may not have huge issues with leprosy, although it is still a big issue in places like India, we still lepers walking among us, people we treat like the living dead. They are the ones we try to push to the outside borders of our lives, the ones we fear to touch, to be in relationship with, out of an almost unnamed, unrecognized fear that if we dare to reach out, if we dare to make contact, we will catch whatever they have – their disease, their pain, their hurt. When someone is diagnosed with HIV/AIDS or cancer or mental illness, if we are able, we keep our distance. We conveniently forget our elderly homebound or the homeless or the hungry. We push them to the outer edges of our lives, forgetting that they are people just like us who desperately long for human contact, for a sign that they are still here, that someone still cares. And we have all felt at least a little bit like a leper at some times in our lives. Maybe it was only during junior high, but we all know what it is to be an outsider, to feel cut off from the people who are important to us, to feel that we are somehow untouchable, unlovable, invisible. We all know what it is to long for a loving touch, a sign that we matter, that we are still here. Even if only for a fleeting moment, we have felt isolated and alone as Jose Ramirez felt in the hearse on the way to Carville. We have felt the desperation that the leper in Mark's gospel felt, the desperation that led him to Jesus, daring to approach him, begging and kneeling before him, saying, “If you choose, you can make me clean,” hoping against hope that this man he has heard about, the one who has been healing the sick and casting out demons, might be able to do something for him to, might be able to bring him back from the living dead, to make him feel human again. “If you are willing, you can make me clean.” “If you are willing...” he says to Jesus.

Now Jesus was a busy man, at the beginning of his mission, ready to go into the towns of Galilee and preach the good news of God's love to all who would listen. Jesus could have chosen to ignore this leper, to pretend he wasn't there and go on about his merry way. But face to face with this man, Mark tells us that Jesus was moved with pity. And even then, Jesus could have healed him just with a word, as he had healed others with the power of his word. Touching the man with leprosy would make Jesus himself ritually unclean, unable to enter the town himself, unable to carry out his identified ministry until he was able to go through the purification rituals. But Jesus was moved with pity, moved with compassion, moved with love for the man before him, and “he stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, 'I do choose. Be made clean!'” He saw the living dead before him, the man who society said was untouchable, and he did the unthinkable – he reached out his hand, and touched him. And with that touch, the man's leprosy left him, immediately (one of Mark's favorite words!). Jesus takes the leper's uncleanness on himself, and leaves the leper clean – a leper no more! And this is not just a physical healing, but a promise of wholeness, of life restored! No longer does this man have to be among the living dead. Jesus' touch brings him back to life!

Isn't that what Jesus always does? The good news for us this morning is that even when we sometimes wonder to ourselves if Jesus is willing to make us clean, if he will choose to heal us and make us whole, Jesus sees us as we are, unclean & untouchable as we may be, and he is moved with pity. He is moved with compassion, and he is willing to stretch out his hand and give us new life. I'm not saying that he always heals our physical hurts the way we would define healing – if that was the case, no one would have cancer or diabetes or arthritis – but in his touch, there is always the promise of new life, of life restored, life lived in connection with him and with each other. Jesus wants us to have wholeness of life, abundant life, and that goes beyond physical healing. And because Jesus is willing to touch us, to cross all of the boundaries that separate us, we can reach out with that same love to others, sharing the good news that Jesus is more than a miracle man, but one who has the power to restore us to true life. Thanks be to God!