Monthly Archives: October 2009

Called to Serve Others

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Introduction

One of the opportunities I have as the interim pastor at Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., is to prepare a short column for a feature called “The Pastor’s Pen,” appearing in the Beatrice Daily Sun on Thursday, Oct. 15, 2009.

Scripture

“For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45, NRSV)

Meditiation

Jesus shares these words with his disciples to quell an argument among them over who should receive the trappings of glory in the kingdom of God. He clarifies their confusion between Jesus’ calling to serve others and their own desire to wear crowns of status. The path of obedience to Jesus does not take the disciples, or us, to the high places of power. Instead, we follow him into the low places of poverty.

When the Church has lived its finest moments, it gets this right. It sees God’s people in need and responds. It acts, not because it brings recognition and accolades to the Church or its members, but simply because the people who need help are God’s children and he calls the Church to serve.

Beatrice bears the marks of the Church’s faithful response to God’s call. The ministry of Mosaic, growing from its roots in Sterling and the founding of Martin Luther Homes in 1925, touches the lives of people with developmental disabilities. In similar ways, institutions like Beatrice Community Hospital and Parkview Center trace their roots to charitable work by Lutherans and Mennonites to create institutions for healing. The ecumenical work of Warren’s Community Table, hosted by Christ Church Episcopal, provides food to hungry people every Tuesday. No doubt each congregation, each parish, responds to God’s call by reaching out to people in need.

These are just a few examples of the work of the Church to follow its Lord in service. The work is good and worthy. But in the end, is the Church’s service any different from the support offered by other community groups? A hot meal is just a hot meal. The real difference arises when someone asks, “Why bother? Why do you offer this act of service?” Then Christians can say, “We do this because our Lord calls us to serve. And we can serve without fear. There are no limits to what we can give, how we can sacrifice. We might even sacrifice our lives in serving. If it comes to that, then our final act of service is a witness to our Lord’s sacrifice. He has given his life for you and for all people. By this gift, we all may come to eternal life in him.”

In this way, each outstretched hand, each caring touch, each hot meal on a cold day, each of the uncountable acts of service becomes a little sermon, telling how Jesus Christ “came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom” for you and for me.

Fear and Faith

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Introduction

The Congregation Council at Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., where I am serving as interim pastor, opens its monthly meetings with devotions. These are the thoughts for the October 2009 meeting. The Psalm for the upcoming Sunday is the reading.

Reading

Because you have made the LORD your refuge,
the Most High your dwelling place,
no evil shall befall you,
no scourge come near your tent.

For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways.
On their hands they will bear you up,
so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.
You will tread on the lion and the adder,
and the young lion and the serpent you will trample under foot.

Those who love me, I will deliver;
I will protect those who know my name.
When they call to me, I will answer them;
I will be with them in trouble,
I will rescue them and honor them.
With long life I will satisfy them,
and show them my salvation. (Psalm 91:9-16, NRSV)

Meditation

One of the most beloved hymns begins with the phrase, “Have no fear, little flock.” Fear is one of our natural, even instinctual human reactions to things we do not know, cannot see clearly, or may believe are threats to us. When it comes to dangers, fear makes sense, because it protects us from harm. But when we meditate on fear in our relationship with God, it becomes clear that fear and faith occupy opposing ends of that relationship. Basically, fear arises in the absence of faith; perfect faith banishes fear.

This helps us to hear the Psalmist’s words as a hymn to the power of God. He knows our fears, sympathizes with the threats we feel from evil, scourges, and the powers of wild beasts, both literal and figurative. He responds to those fears with his loving assurance of deliverance, protection, answers to prayers, presence in trouble, rescue from danger, blessings of long life, and the gift of salvation.

It’s helpful to recall that when Jesus was tempted by the devil in the wilderness, the devil quoted the verses on God’s guardian angels as justification for Jesus throwing himself off of the temple tower. Jesus would not be tempted to test God, but instead, lives by faith, giving him freedom from the fear that would have come in trusting the devil. In our lives, though, we can trust that God sends his messengers, his angels, to guard us from danger and to bear us up in the midst of the adversity of the sharp rocks of our daily lives.

Discussion

  • What do we fear as individuals? What do we fear as a congregation?
  • Where do you turn for assurance? What strengthens your faith?
  • What can we, as leaders, do to help God lead our congregation from fear to faith?

Prayer

LORD Most High, we ask you to protect us from the dangers that surround us. When we are tempted to fear these threats and to doubt your care for us, strengthen our faith in you, that we may trust you to deliver us and show us your salvation. Grant this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever. Amen.

Loved, Yet Lacking

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Introduction

This is the sermon I preached at Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., on Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 10-11, 2009, the weekend of the Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost.

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Readings

Amos 5:6-7, 10-15
Psalm 90:12-17
Hebrews 4:12-16
Mark 10:17-31

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Prayer

Long ago, O God, you spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets. Now in these last days, make us listen as you speak to us by your Son. Amen. (based on Hebrews 1:1-2, NRSV)

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Message

If you saw Jesus and his disciples
heading towards you on the sidewalk,
and you ran up to him
and dropped to your knees,
what one question would you ask?

Maybe, like the disciples,
you might ask what Jesus means
by that one parable about the seeds and the soil.
Or perhaps you might ask
if he is really serious
about cross-bearing as a mark of discipleship.

More contemporary questions
might seem reasonable too.
What’s the right direction for our church to take?
What does this passage of Scripture mean?
What’s the moral response to abortion?
What is our responsibility to care for poor people?
Should we look to government funding for social programs?
Is capital punishment ever warranted?

And then, again, the same question
might come to mind
that falls from the lips
of the rich young man in today’s Gospel:
“What must I do to inherit eternal life?”

That might cross our minds,
but it’s a little odd,
in our time, to ask this question.
For the most part,
we make our way through our days,
watching them blend into weeks
and blur into years,
as if this life is all we have,
like the here and now is all there is.

Just think about how we spend our time,
where we focus our energies,
on what possessions we gather around us.

We work to earn money
to keep a roof over our heads,
but we also go into debt
to fill the space under those roofs
with so many things
that storage becomes an issue.

Why we do this is a complicated question.
But if we look at ourselves
in the mirror of God’s law
and ask what really motivates us
to accumulate, to acquire, to amass so much stuff,
so much more than we can use,
more even than we can remember that we have,
I have a hunch we might
finally admit to God and to one another
that we are motivated by fear.

We use possessions to hide from that fear,
to help us create and maintain an illusion.
We want to believe we control our lives,
but in truth,
what we fear is death.

We end up using our things
and the little momentary twinge of pleasure
we get when we grab onto the next new item
as a kind of drug,
a blockade, a mask,
to hide us, to protect us from the reality
that there is no escape from death.

Whether it comes soon,
or not for a long time,
in the end, each of us
will reach the moment
when we take the last breath of air,
feel the last touch of a loved one’s hand,
gaze for the last time upon another’s face.

This is the reality of our lives.
The story that we each live
will reach its conclusion, its end,
with a simple sentence.
He died. She died.

We cannot avoid or hide or evade this end.
It is our lot in life.
The story of my life and yours as well
will be punctuated, in the end,
by a period, a full stop.

And yet, as Christians,
we believe, we trust,
that there is more to be said,
more to add to the story
after that last sentence.

And so, maybe, we would fall on our knees before Jesus
and ask, along with the rich young man,
“What must I do to inherit eternal life?”

We know the commandments,
God’s desires for our lives,
for us to live according to his will,
and not to murder, commit adultery,
steal, bear false witness, and defraud.
We know that he desires for us
to honor father and mother,
to keep his name holy,
and to rest on the Sabbath.

These are his commands.
They tell us what we ought to do and ought not to do.
When God speaks this way,
we hear his Word as the law.
But his commands also tell us how it shall be.
When we live fully under God’s will,
then it shall be that we will,
fully and gladly and obediently
do and don’t do exactly what the commands say.
This is God’s Word, his command as gospel.

Perhaps we could join the rich young man in saying,
“Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.”
Or maybe, we would need to say,
“Teacher, I have kept these commands most of the time.”
Or perhaps, “Teacher, sometimes I have tried to keep these commands.”

But no matter how we reply to Jesus,
his reaction to us
is just the same as his response to the rich young man.
He looks at us and he loves us.

This we need not doubt.
This is the gospel, the good news,
in one short sentence.
He loves us.
He loves you and he loves me.

Despite our sins and our shortcomings,
even though we hide behind our piles of possessions,
even though we quail in the face of our fears,
despite our doubts and our lack of faith,
Jesus looks at us and loves us.

But he also says to us
just what he says to the rich young man.

“You lack one thing;
go, sell what you own,
and give the money to the poor,
and you will have treasure in heaven;
then come, follow me.” (Mark 10:21, NRSV)

But, “I’m not rich,” we might say.
I really don’t have a lot of stuff,
barely enough to make sure
we can keep that roof secure,
put healthy food on the table,
clothe ourselves for each season’s weather.

It’s possible that Jesus’ saying
only applies to the rich.
But would we want to say
that he means for his command
to apply only to the young,
or perhaps just to men?

Maybe. But it seems to me
that because Jesus raises
the commandments in the conversation,
he means to bring to mind
the great and first commandment:
Because God is the Lord and our God,
we shall have no other gods ahead of him.

And so, whatever we cling to,
whatever we grasp and hold close to ourselves
that is other than him,
this is what makes us rich in our own eyes.
This is what stands between us
and faithful obedience to his commands
to go and to be freed of those things
so that we can embrace
the treasure of heaven
and then follow Jesus.

But it’s hard, too hard, we say.
We need to keep something, just in case,
don’t we?
I ask myself that question.
And the answer is that my hands are not empty.

This is what makes the plight of the rich young man
so poignant, so personal.
This is why we can feel
crushing disappointment
drape across our shoulders
as we arise from before Jesus’ feet
and feel tempted, as that young man was,
to give in to “shock[] and [to go] away grieving,
for [we] ha[ve] many possessions.” (Mark 10:22, NRSV)

But this is why Jesus also says to his disciples and to us,

“For mortals, it is impossible,
but not for God;
for God all things are possible.” (Mark 10:27, NRSV)

We cannot earn eternal life.
Instead we inherit it as a gift.
We cannot make our own way to heaven.
Rather we follow our Lord who leads the way.

This is the only way we will inherit eternal life,
the only way we shall know freedom from things,
the only way for us to celebrate the joy of living
according to God’s commands,
the only way we may trust in the hope of heaven.

In the midst of our plenty,
we may be lacking that one thing,
but we can trust that Jesus loves us,
in spite of our many possessions.

For us, this is impossible.
But for God, all of this and more is possible.
And so we can go, sell, and give,
and then have, come, and follow. Amen.