Monthly Archives: August 2010

Pleasing Sacrifices

Posted on by
Reply

This is the sermon I prepared for Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., for the Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, August 29, 2010.

+ + +

Readings

Proverbs 25:6–7
Psalm 112 (antiphon v. 4)
Hebrews 13:1–8, 15–16
Luke 14:1, 7–14

+ + +

Prayer

Receive into Your hands, O Father, the sacrifice of our lives. We offer ourselves to You in the name of Your Son, Jesus Christ, and pray that you would receive us into the community of Your Holy Spirit. Amen.

+ + +

Message

It’s not the last word from the book of Hebrews,
but after a string of weeks,
today we have heard the last verses
in our extended reading of this sermonic letter.

At the end of the reading, we heard,
“Through [Jesus Christ], then,
let us continually offer a sacrifice of praise to God,
that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name.
Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have,
for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” (Hebrews 13:15–16, NRSV)

When we hear that word—sacrifice—
we might find our imaginations
turning to flashes of images
we half remember from strange, old movies
flickering on the TV screen late at night,
disturbing scenes where the heroine
is captured, bound, laid out on a stone,
and the evil captor stands triumphant over her,
a knife glinting in the flickering torchlight.

Through those images, our memories and imaginations
do not lead us very far astray
in bringing life to this antique word—sacrifice.

As the verses, which our lectionary omits,
remind us in almost graphic detail,
“The bodies of those animals
whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest
as a sacrifice for sin are burned outside the camp.
Therefore Jesus also suffered outside the city gate
in order to sanctify the people by his own blood.” (Hebrews 13:11–12, NRSV)

That’s a reminder to us
that sacrifice and salvation are God’s bloody business.
We can easily forget that the cross is not neat and clean.
It has borne the bruised and bloodied body of Jesus Christ,
Son of the Father,
the Lamb who dies to take away the sin of the world.

This is the ultimate sacrifice,
the one in which the Father
offers up his only Son to the powers of sin, death, and the devil.
And through this worthy sacrifice—
through his own Son’s death—
the Father makes good what had gone bad,
he makes right what had gone horribly wrong,
he gives birth to life eternal from death’s dark womb.

No other victim would have worked to make this ultimate sacrifice
for you and me and all people, all creation.
Jesus Christ is the perfect and spotless Lamb,
and at the same time the pure and worthy high priest
who wields the knife and offers the sacrifice once and for all.

And so Hebrews reminds us,
“Therefore Jesus also suffered outside the city gate
in order to sanctify the people by his own blood.” (Hebrews 13:12, NRSV)

He is the fitting sacrifice.
His blood alone—by the power of the Holy Spirit—
is able to sanctify his people,
to cleanse us from our sin,
to make us ritually pure,
to make us worthy to come into the presence of his Father.

That’s why John’s Revelation tells us
that those multitudes gathered around the throne
“…have washed their robes and made them white
in the blood of the Lamb.” (Revelation 7:14b, NRSV)

That’s why we sing these words as we prepare each week
to eat the flesh and to drink the blood of our Lord:
“Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, have mercy upon us.”

Through the sacrifice of his Son on the cross,
our Father reclaims us as his people,
and makes us holy, worthy to come to the Table
to be restored, renewed, and refreshed
by the gift of that same Son
through the work of their Holy Spirit.

And because this gift makes us worthy,
we are joined by the Holy Spirit
to our Lord Jesus Christ in his praise of the Father.
As Hebrews tells us,
“Through [Jesus Christ], then,
let us continually offer a sacrifice of praise to God,
that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name.” (Hebrews 13:15, NRSV)

What does this “sacrifice of praise” sound like?
It is our prayer and nothing less.
It is our offerings of praise and thanksgiving,
our pleas for mercy and forgiveness,
our intercessions for grace and healing.

And our prayers are not mere words.
Just as our Lord is the Word made flesh in Man and Meal,
so too are our prayers enfleshed in us.
We are spirited people embodied,
and so when we pray,
we embody our prayers in words,
we accompany them with gestures,
we assume postures of devotion.

Our “sacrifice of praise” comes to God
wrapped up in us as creatures of flesh and blood,
embodied in us as brothers and sisters of our Lord,
spoken by lips “that confess his name,”
calling upon him alone as our Lord and God.

But just as the sacrifice of our Lord
required the offering of the Word made flesh,
our sacrifices of praise
require to offer both word and deed.
Our Father desires us to act as well as to speak.

As the writer of Hebrews reminds us,
“Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have,
for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” (Hebrews 13:16, NRSV)

It is clear.
We have heard what our Lord said
and we have seen what he did.
And so we know that our “sacrifice of praise”
will rise to God our Father
both upon the sweet sounds of our words
and upon the pleasant scent of our deeds.
As we have prayed together in Vespers this past Lent,
“Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.”

It is clear what sounds sweet to our Father’s ears,
what aromas are pleasing in his nose:
“…do good and [] share what you have….” (Hebrews 13:16, NRSV)
Or, as the prophet Micah tells God’s people:
“He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the LORD require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?” (Micah 6:8, NRSV)
That is what God deems to be the good.

And to share what we have,
what he has given us to tend on his behalf,
is no more complicated than to hear and to do
what we have prayed with the Psalmist today:
“It is well with those who deal generously and lend,
who conduct their affairs with justice.
They have distributed freely,
they have given to the poor….” (Psalm 112: 5,9)

And so, when we offer continual sacrifices of praise
to God in his name—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—
and we do good and share what we have received from our God,
then we can come to the end of this day,
the end of this life,
and rest in the sure confidence
that “such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” Amen. (Hebrews 13:16, NRSV)

Most Holy Father…

Posted on by
Reply

Introduction

Bishop Carol Hendrix invited me to introduce a hymn, “My Life Flows On in Endless Song,” and to lead the 2010 Lutheran CORE Convocation in prayer to begin its session on Friday, Aug. 27, 2010, the session in which the delegates voted to establish the North American Lutheran Church.

Prayer

Most holy Father, You have brought us in safety to this new day. We praise You for this gift and we ask You to grant us times of work, of prayer, and of rest. By Your Holy Spirit, lead us along paths of obedience to Your will, that all we say and do may bring You glory and may lead others to know that our Lord is Jesus Christ. In His name we pray. Amen.

In the Meantime: The Holy Cross

Posted on by
Reply

Introduction

This article is the September 2010 installment of my monthly message in the parish newsletter for Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb.

Message

The Holy Cross

One of the handy features on the ELCA’s Web site is a “Find a Congregation” page. A little searching there led me to know that within the ELCA, “First” is the name of 424 congregations, “St. Paul” 561, “St. John” 617, and “Trinity” 720.

But what about Holy Cross? It’s quite a bit more rare than those more common names. Our congregation shares its name with 50 other ELCA congregations across the United States. So, for some reason, ours is an unusual choice, even more unusual than including “American” in the name, which 65 congregations do.

One of the nice things about many congregations’ names is that our liturgical calendar has a festival celebrating the saint or name for God: St. Paul—Jan. 25; St. John—Dec. 27, Trinity—the Sunday after Pentecost.

Holy Cross has its own festival too. It falls each year on Sept. 14, which comes on a Tuesday this month.

To give us a chance to come together in worship to celebrate the gift of salvation that the Father has given us through his Son’s death on the Holy Cross and to praise him for the ministry he has given us by the power of their Holy Spirit, we will hold a special service. Here are the details:

Holy Cross Day at Holy Cross Church
Vespers
7:00 p.m., Tuesday, Sept. 14, 2010

If you have a cross in your home, please bring it with you when you come to worship. We will have a procession, bring our crosses to the chancel, and place them on the altar. Then we will pray for God to bless them, so that we are reminded daily by those crosses of his gifts.

Welcome to the Table

Each year when we step over from the summer to the fall, we offer classes for our congregation’s children entering fifth grade to come together with their parents and guardians and to prepare to receive their first Holy

Communion. This year we held that class on Sunday, Aug. 29. Once the youth have spent this time exploring the gifts that our Lord gives through the bread of heaven—his body—and the cup of salvation—his blood—we welcome them to join us at the Table.

This is a time of blessing, both for them and for us. They enter into the fellowship we enjoy because our Father invites the baptized to share in the Communion his Son established, so that we may depart together in ministry empowered by their Holy Spirit.

It never hurts to ask again the question we all learn from Martin Luther’s Small Catechism:

What is the sacrament of the Altar?
It is the true body and blood
of our Lord Jesus Christ
under the bread and wine,
instituted by Christ himself
for us Christians to eat and to drink.

Mission of the Church

Sometimes little signs remind us of big changes. If you’ve had a chance to stop by our church building, you may have smelled wet paint and new carpet. They are surely signs that some freshening is underway in the offices.
But they also signify that our congregation is traveling along its path in its search for a new pastor. What a time for prayerful expectation and expectant prayer! Pray for the Call Committee and the Council in their deliberations, for pastors seeking calls, and for our whole congregation, that we may be open to the Holy Spirit and may follow God’s lead in preparing for the next step in Holy Cross Lutheran Church’s journey to carry out the Church’s mission.

This can be a time of wonder, perhaps apprehension, but it can also be a time to adopt the attitude that Mary, the mother of our Lord, shared with us when she said to the angel Gabriel, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” (Luke 1:38, NRSV)

Blessings!

Question Box: Abortion and Responsibility

Posted on by
Reply

Introduction

Holy Cross Lutheran Church offers individuals the chance to ask questions about the Church, faith, theology, and the Bible by putting their queries into a Question Box. A question and answer appears in each month’s newsletter. This is the September 2010 installment.

Question

The ELCA has a provision in its employee health plan that pays for abortions. If a person believes that abortion is against God’s will (making it a sin), but he or she still supports the ELCA financially, will God hold us accountable for supporting that sin when employees choose to use that provision of the health care plan?

Answer

Few social issues over the last four decades so clearly polarize the American people as abortion. To give us a common foundation for looking at the issues this question raises, let’s outline a few basic items before we get to the deeper questions.

+ The ELCA Board of Pensions offers health insurance to pastors and other church employees.
+ The plan summary makes no specific mention of procedures involving abortion.
+ The plan pays for procedures deemed “medically necessary.”

In 1991, the ELCA Churchwide Assembly adopted a social statement, Abortion. It’s available on the ELCA’s Web site. In this document, two sections, in particular, are worth noting:

This church recognizes that there can be sound reasons for ending a pregnancy through induced abortion. The following provides guidance for those considering such a decision. We recognize that conscientious decisions need to be made in relation to difficult circumstances that vary greatly. What is determined to be a morally responsible decision in one situation may not be in another.

In reflecting ethically on what should be done in the case of an unintended pregnancy, consideration should be given to the status and condition of the life in the womb. We also need to consider the conditions under which the pregnancy occurred and the implications of the pregnancy for the woman’s life.

An abortion is morally responsible in those cases in which continuation of a pregnancy presents a clear threat to the physical life of the woman.

A woman should not be morally obligated to carry the resulting pregnancy to term if the pregnancy occurs when both parties do not participate willingly in sexual intercourse. This is especially true in cases of rape and incest. This can also be the case in some situations in which women are so dominated and oppressed that they have no choice regarding sexual intercourse and little access to contraceptives. Some conceptions occur under dehumanizing conditions that are contrary to God’s purposes.

There are circumstances of extreme fetal abnormality, which will result in severe suffering and very early death of an infant. In such cases, after competent medical consultations, the parent(s) may responsibly choose to terminate the pregnancy. Whether they choose to continue or to end such pregnancies, this church supports the parent(s) with compassion, recognizing the struggle involved in the decision.…

The position of this church is that, in cases where the life of the mother is threatened, where pregnancy results from rape or incest, or where the embryo or fetus has lethal abnormalities incompatible with life, abortion prior to viability should not be prohibited by law or by lack of public funding of abortions for low-income women. On the other hand, this church supports legislation that prohibits abortions that are performed after the fetus is determined to be viable, except when the mother’s life is threatened or when lethal abnormalities indicate the prospective newborn will die very soon.

Beyond these situations, this church neither supports nor opposes laws prohibiting abortion.

While this is the official position of the ELCA, the statement notes that ELCA members hold various positions. In addition, throughout the Church today and across history, many maintain that taking a life through abortion is a sin because every innocent human has received life as a gift from God.

So, when one asks whether one sins by supporting—even indirectly or financially—a practice one believes to be a sin, then the answer is “yes.” This has nothing to do with abortion, but everything to do with how we can commit sinful acts both as individuals and as a community. When one believes God’s Word says that one is committing a sin, he clearly calls us to stop.

Rescue! Deliver!

Posted on by
Reply

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 August 2010 meeting. The Psalm is the one appointed for the seventh Sunday after Pentecost. The council read it in choirs—men and women.

Invocation

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

Reading

Psalm 82

1God has taken his place in the divine council;
in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.

2“How long will you judge unjustly
and show partiality to the wicked?

3Give justice to the weak and the orphan;
maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute.

4Rescue the weak and the needy;
deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”

5They have neither knowledge nor understanding,
they walk around in darkness;
all the foundations of the earth are shaken.

6I say, “You are gods,
children of the Most High, all of you;

7nevertheless, you shall die like mortals,
and fall like any prince.”

8Rise up, O God, judge the earth;
for all the nations belong to you!

Devotion

It’s really easy to feel overwhelmed. We might start out with enthusiasm…serving every few months at Warren’s Table, bringing a bag of groceries for the food pantry each month, maybe buying a few pairs of mittens, getting sponsors for the annual CROP Hunger Walk.

But then we start to read about the devastation that still plagues Haiti seven months after the earthquake. Floods have killed hundreds in Pakistan. Drug wars in Mexico catch innocent families in the crossfire. Local ministries need volunteers and funds. Church-related ministries seek support and people to lend a hand.
We want the world to be a just place. We desire for people who are weak and destitute to have what they need to live at least simply—if not entirely comfortably. But the needs are so great. It seems that, no matter what we do, how much we give, the demand for help outstrips our supply of assistance.

So it feels harsh to hear God taking the seat of judgment and looking at us, his people, and saying, “How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked?” It stings to know that we have not done all that God desires of us to “rescue the weak and the needy; [and to] deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”

Even so, we can’t help but hear God when he reminds us that we are all “children of the Most High.” That means we don’t need to rely only on our own power to do his will. We can rescue all who need support and deliver all who need help because God gives us the strength. We can do what he desires because he is our God, a God of power and might, and “all nations belong to [him].”

Discussion

+ What thoughts and feelings do you have when you hear the Psalmist talk about God as a judge?
+ How do we judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked?
+ What could we, as a congregation, do differently?
+ What should we change about how we carry out our ministries, so that we promote “justice to the weak and the needy?”
+ What can we do to remind one another that we are “children of the Most High?”

Prayer

Lord God our Judge, look with leniency upon us, and when you see that we fall short of your desires for us, remember that your Son, Jesus Christ, clothes us with his righteousness. Look, then, at how we appear in the light of that Light, and strengthen us, by your grace, to rescue all in need and to deliver them; through Jesus Christ your Son and our Lord. Amen.

The Third Word

Posted on by
Reply

This is the sermon I prepared for Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost, August 22, 2010.

+ + +

Readings

Isaiah 58:9b–14
Psalm 103:1–8 (antiphon v. 4)
Hebrews 12:18–29
Luke 13:10–17

+ + +

Prayer

Father in heaven, by your Spirit turn us to you and fill us with a desire to worship you and to keep your day holy; through your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

+ + +

Message

A few months ago,
I was using Google to research
the Beatrice Ministerial Association.
I don’t remember what I was trying to find.

But in the course of the search,
I uncovered an old article from Boxoffice magazine
from sometime in the 1940s, I believe.

Written from a pro-movie theatre position,
the article chronicles the efforts
by Beatrice business owners and ministers
to prevent the repeal of this town’s Blue Laws.

Blue Laws have a long history in this country
as a means for enforcing public morality.
They’ve traditionally prevented citizens from engaging
in an array of activities on Sundays:
shopping, purchasing liquor, hunting, watching movies, and buying cars.

According to the article,
the American Legion was leading an effort
to repeal Beatrice’s Blue Law forbidding
the screening of movies on Sundays.

The issue had been the subject
of a special election ending in a tie vote,
leading to court appeals over disputed ballots
and questions about a voter’s residency
and whether ballots given to ten railroad men
had received the proper official signatures.
According to the article,
local business men opposed the repeal
as an effort to block the Fox and Rivoli movie theatre chain
from opening a new theatre in town.

In the meantime, F.H. Hollingworth,
who owned the Rialto theatre here in Beatrice,
was making a lot of money
at his other theatre in Wymore,
which had no Blue Law forbidding movies on Sundays.

The article stated,
“Arrayed with the business men
is the Beatrice Ministerial association,
the most militantly potent crusading pastoral organization in Nebraska.”

I never found a follow-up article
to discover how the appeal turned out.
But today the theatres in Beatrice have Sunday show times,
so I guess, in the end, the Blue Law was repealed.

That’s a bit of a rambling detour through some local history.
But I think it helps,
because it gives us a sense
of how mixed up we can become
in asking and answering questions
about how we honor the Sabbath, the day of rest,
Sunday, the Lord’s Day.
It shows that we easily can confuse money and morality,
commerce and church,
politics and piety.

Here’s another bit of older history.
When God brought Moses to Mount Sinai,
he gave Moses the Decalogue, the Ten Words, the Ten Commandments.
The Third Word goes like this:
“Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy.
Six days you shall labor and do all your work.
But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God;
you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter,
you male or female slave, your livestock,
or the alien resident in your towns.
For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that is in them,
but rested the seventh day;
therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day
and consecrated it.” (Exodus 20:8–11)

And like good Lutherans, we might ask,
“What does this mean for us?”
In the Small Catechism, Luther writes a response:

We are to fear and love God
so that we do not neglect his Word
and the preaching of it,
but regard it as holy
and gladly hear and learn it. (i>Small Catechism, I)

Luther’s explanation leans a little bit
toward understanding the Sabbath
as a day dedicated to worship—
and it is.
Sunday, for Christians, is the day
we hear and respond to God’s call to come together,
to gather in his triune name,
to raise our voices in praise,
to hear his Word,
to confess our faith,
to lift up our prayers,
to give our offerings,
to share in his Holy Meal,
to depart for service—refreshed and restored.

This is the core, the center of our life on this day.
This is what God calls us to do,
what he inspires us to embrace as our way of life,
what he expects us to give him as our joyful sacrifice.

But the Third Word also tells us
that the Sabbath is God’s gift for us
as much as it is a time for us to give our lives to God.
The Sabbath is a day of rest,
blessed and consecrated by the Lord,
given to us as a free and undeserved gift.

This helps us to understand
what happened when Jesus got into a dispute
with the leader of the synagogue
over the Blue Law of their day:
“Do not work on the Sabbath.
Healing is a work.
Therefore don’t perform healings on the Sabbath.”

The leader had his logic down pat.
But our Lord saw the confusion
that had arisen in the wake of this approach.
The Blue Laws would allow
a farmer to lead his ox to water for a drink,
meeting its need for life,
but then they forbade the healing of a woman,
preventing her from receiving what she needed for life.

Basically, Jesus made the observation,
“If God’s people could work for six days
and then rest on the seventh as a gift from his almighty hand,
could not this woman receive a Sabbath rest through God’s gift of healing,
after working her way through eighteen years of life
under the load of a crippling possession by a spirit?”

That’s why,
“When Jesus saw her,
he called her over and said,
‘Woman, you are set free from your ailment.’
When he laid his hands upon her,
immediately she stood up straight
and began praising God,” (Luke 13:12–13, NRSV)
worshiping on the Sabbath.

And again, “What does this mean for us?”
How can we live by faith?
How can hear with clarity God’s Word for us?
How may we distinguish with wisdom and humility
between the courses of action that honor the Sabbath—
and therefore God himself—
and paths that wind their ways away from God
and lead us down the road to honoring other gods?

It’s a challenge to know—to anticipate—
all of the circumstances and the details
that can arise when we seek to obey God’s law,
to live in ways that honor him and his Sabbath.

But here are some questions to guide us.

First question.
When I arise on the Sabbath,
and look ahead at my day,
can I, in all honesty, ask myself,
“Do my choices say clearly to others,
‘God is my Lord; I have dedicated this day to him?’”
And then, can I answer,
“Yes. As completely as I can, as fully as I am able,
I will spend the time God has given me this day
in such a way that others who see me
will know that Jesus Christ is the Lord of my life.”
In a nutshell, ask yourself,
“Does my day say Jesus is Lord?”

Second question.
When I reach this day’s end,
and prepare to go to bed,
can I look back on the day’s happenings,
and say, in all honesty,
“Thank you, God, for this Sabbath day.
I have appreciated your generosity.
You have restored and renewed me through this gift of rest.
It has helped me to embrace your grace.
And now I give back to you”?
In a nutshell, ask yourself,
“Have I rested in the grace of God?”

That his how we honor the Sabbath and keep it holy.
And when we do,
then we will live the way the prophet Isaiah
calls across the centuries for us to follow:
“If you refrain from trampling the sabbath,
from pursuing your own interests on my holy day;
if you call the sabbath a delight
and the holy day of the LORD honorable;
if you honor it, not going your own ways,
serving your own interests,
or pursuing your own affairs;
then you shall take delight in the LORD….” (Isaiah 58:13–14a, NRSV)

And now, on this Sabbath, our LORD calls us to his Holy Table,
to honor him on his day and to rest with him in the delight of his blessed Meal. Amen.

Blade and Oil and Stone

Posted on by
Reply

The Lincoln Chapter of Benedictine Oblates has launched a Facebook page: Nebraska Oblates.

Here is my offering for the page’s new discussion section.

Blade and Oil and Stone

“Are you hastening toward your heavenly home? Then with Christ’s help, keep this little rule that we have written for beginners” (The Rule of St. Benedict, 73:8).

I remember my dad teaching me was how to sharpen a knife. Use a little oil—not too much—on the sharpening stone and hold the knife at just the right angle—not that steep—and move the blade in even, rhythmic motions—one side and then the other—across the stone. Don’t try to force a new edge on the blade all at once. The secret to a sharp blade is taking your time and removing almost imperceptible nicks slowly and deliberately.

In many ways, I’ve found that living by the spirit of the Rule of St. Benedict is like sharpening a knife. I can gradually see my “edge” emerging when I trust the oil of the Holy Spirit and the stone of the Rule and the hand of Jesus Christ to hone me, to work away my rough and jagged edges, so that I can become a sharper knife. In that way, God may use me to his glory in all things.

David M. Frye, OblSB
Ut in omnibus glorificetur Deus

Spiritual Balance

Posted on by
Reply

I posted the following comment in response to a message by Bishop David deFreese, Nebraska Synod, ELCA (Be Wise):

Several years ago I spent a weekend at the Benedictine Mission House in Schuyler on a retreat entitled, “Experience the Life of a Monk for a Weekend.” That’s exactly what the weekend was! And what I experienced was how peaceful and whole lives can be, not when they are cloistered, but when they strive for spiritual balance. The monks spoke about how they embrace the ancient saying of St. Benedict, “ora et labora,” meaning “prayer and work.” When the bell rang, telling them it was time to pray the Daily Office, then they would set aside the tools of their labor, and walk to the oratory for prayer. When it was time to work, they would immerse themselves in that labor. And when it was time to rest, they would commend their lives to God and relax.

This weekend changed my life! It has helped me seek and maintain balance in my ministry, and to know when I have gotten off-kilter, when a part of my life is out of balance with the rest of my life.

If you are looking for a tiny resource to help guide you in seeking and maintaining spiritual balance in your life, I’d recommend “The Rule of St. Benedict.” This way may seem daunting, but as St. Benedict writes, “What is not possible to us by nature, let us ask the Lord to supply by the help of his grace” (RB, Prologue 41).

Blessings,
Pastor David Frye

Interpreting the Present Time

Posted on by
Reply

This is the sermon I prepared for Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., for the Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost, August 15, 2010.

+ + +

Readings

Jeremiah 23:23–29
Psalm 82 (antiphon v.8)
Hebrews 11:29–12:2
Luke 12:49–56

+ + +

Prayer

Lord Jesus, restore in us the vision granted by your Holy Spirit, so that we may see the way of discipleship and the pitfalls along that path. Amen.

+ + +

Message

He asked a simple question almost twenty years ago.
It’s been repeated, parroted, parodied, and rubbed down to its nub:
“Can we all just get along?”

Rodney King asked that question,
not rhetorically, but as a plea,
begging the people of Los Angeles
to stop their rioting.
They’d taken to the streets to protest
the acquital of officers tried for beating King in the course of a traffic arrest,
acts captured on surveillance video.

“Can we all just get along?”
It’s a simple question we often ask ourselves.
We want the answer to be as simple as the question.
“Yes. God, I hope so.”

And there may be times when we do get along,
moments when it seems as if our world,
or perhaps just our little corner of it,
might suffer from an outbreak of peace.

But most of the time,
despite our desire for an answer of “yes,”
the tragic and true answer is the opposite: “No.”

We can’t get along.
We don’t get along as a nation, as a people.
Pick pretty much any issue
and you can draw the line almost right down the middle.
Half of us are in favor of “it,”
and half of us are opposed to “it.”

And the divisions seem not to be between factions and coalitions
lukewarmly committed to their positions.
We appear to be polarized in our divisions—
cut in two, bisected—
with little hope of finding any common middle ground.

Here are a few specifics that serve as a sad litany
of the issues that we use nationally to divide ourselves:
+ Abortion
+ Same-sex marriage
+ Immigration
+ Health care reform
+ Assisted suicide
+ Entitlement reform
+ Social security and the generations
+ Privacy in the digital age
+ Terrorism
+ Nuclear disarmament
+ National debt.

And it’s no surprise that within the whole Church
and within our little corner of it here in the ELCA,
we find ourselves marked by equally deep divisions.
And we can add to the list:
+ Benevolence: local or global?
+ Worship: modern and casual or historic and liturgical?
+ Mission: accompaniment or evangelization?
+ Salvation: for all faiths or through Christ alone?
+ Morality: personal choice or traditional standard?

“Can we all just get along?”
It’s hard to see how we can make any progress
in the face of such a long and dauntingly troublesome list.

And it doesn’t get any easier when we turn our attention
to the word that Jesus shares with us in today’s Gospel.
In fact, the trouble deepens,
because he looks at the symptoms and diagnoses our divisions,
saying the cause is more profound
than one faction squaring off against another
for thoroughly mundane and human reasons.

Jesus says, “I came to bring fire to the earth,
and how I wish it were already kindled!” (Luke 12:49, NRSV)
He is the catalyst that spurs our reactions,
the spark that lights the fires.
It’s his baptism, his sacrificial death on the cross,
that touches off the great conflagrations in our midst.

He says, “Do you think that I came to bring peace to the earth?
No, I tell you, but rather division!” (Luke 12:51, NRSV)
This sounds so scary, so harsh, almost cruel.
But there it is, the Word of God.
So what do we make of it?
How can we find a handhold of hope in the midst of a treacherous time?

First of all, we follow our Lord’s advice.
He reminds us that we daily use our common sense
and our experience to read the signs in the skies.
We know that when the clouds build tall and grey in the west,
that a storm will approach and the rains will come.
We know that when the winds blow hard from the south,
that the heat and humidity will bear down upon us.

So, likewise, when we see division breaking us apart,
we can trust the wisdom he has shared with us.
The divisions come into our midst, here and now,
because of his baptism, his trial by fire,
when he came and suffered and died and was raised,
defeating death and holding out the promise of life.

The cross stands empty in our past and in our Father’s as well.
It’s a signpost along the path taken by his Son,
a milestone in his personal history.
But the fullness of the Spirit’s gift of the kingdom of God lies ahead of us;
it beckons to us from the future.

And right now, in this moment, we stand between cross and kingdom,
between the defeat of death and the triumph of life.
And that’s why we live with these deep divisions,
because none is more profound than the absolute divide between death and life.

We know this is the diagnosis of our division,
because it is the Word of our Lord,
it is the testimony of Scripture,
it is the confession of our faith,
it is the witness of God’s Church.

And here in the diagnosis we find our comfort,
strange as that may seem.
When Jesus says, “You hypocrites!
You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky,
but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?” (Luke 12:56, NRSV),
we reply, “But we do know, or at least we can know.”

We do know because we live with Christ’s cross in our history.
We may choose to act as if we don’t know why our lives are plagued by conflict,
but that’s only because we find false comfort
when we delude ourselves into believing we control our own lives.
But in reality, Jesus is Lord,
Lord of the dead and of the living,
Master of your life and of mine.

And as our Lord and Master,
he promises that he lives in our midst,
he tells us that we know division in our lives as a mark of his work,
he assures us that our struggles echo and emulate
his struggle against the power of death.

For now, in these difficult days, we live in the meantime, in a mean time.
Here and now, we live with division and conflict.
This is how we interpret our present moment, this day made by God.
But as surely as the cross stands empty behind us,
the kingdom stands glorious before us.
God’s kingdom will come, his will shall be done,
on earth as it is in heaven. That’s his promise and our prayer.

And on that day when we inherit the kingdom,
then we will come to a place of peace,
where division gives way to unity,
where discord surrenders to harmony,
where death is swallowed up by life.

And on that day, all of our conflicts will pass away,
and the answer to that simple question—
“Can we all just get along?”—
will be simple, “Yes, by God’s grace.” Amen.

By Faith

Posted on by
Reply

This is the sermon I prepared for Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., for the Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost, August 8, 2010.

+ + +

Readings

Genesis 15:1–6
Psalm 33:12–22 (antiphon v.22)
Hebrews 11:1–3, 8–16
Luke 12:32–40

+ + +

Prayer

Gracious Father, by your Holy Spirit refresh our faith in your Son, Jesus Christ, that our hearts may rest in you. Amen.

+ + +

Message

“You must be ready,
for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.” (Luke 12:40, NRSV)
This is a word from the Lord,
a part of his whole Word that he spoke to his disciples.

Later in his ministry our Lord named those disciples as his apostles.
He and his Father poured out the Holy Spirit upon them.
Then these apostles proclaimed that Word,
and by God’s grace increased the faithful in the Church.
And all the while, no one knew when the Son of Man would come.

For many decades life in the Church meant danger.
The state made practicing the faith illegal.
Making the decision to be baptized was risky and life-changing.
Martyrdom more than a natural death was a real prospect.

And then, the currents of culture flowed in another direction.
The Roman Emperor Constantine decided
that the Christian faith would no longer be hounded, but embraced.
Confessing Jesus Christ as Lord was no longer an act of treason,
but a socially acceptable mark of participation in society.
The Church had arrived.
It grew comfortable, settled, and rooted.
But all the while, no one could know when the Son of Man would come.

This history goes on, page after page, volume upon volume.
The fortunes of the Church go up and they go down.
Congregations come and go, flourish and decline.
Controversies spark into flame and burn themselves out,
sometimes by exhaustion more than by resolution.
And the whole time, no one can know for sure when the Son of Man will come.

It’s a long story,
and here we stand,
a blank page before us,
volumes behind us.
We have no idea how many pages are left,
how many more chapters are yet to be written before the end.
But now the pen lies in our hands.
And all the while, we do not know when the Son of Man will come again.

Even so, even though we don’t know when he will come,
we do know that he will come,
and we know as well that he says to us: “You must be ready.”

A batter stands at the plate,
his eye on the pitcher,
and waits for the ball.
To stand a good chance of succeeding
three out of ten times,
a batter must be ready.

It’s much harder to be ready
when our attention is distracted.
I think that’s why Jesus had counseled his disciples
to keep themselves free of burdens.
If the Father gives us the kingdom,
then we don’t need great piles of possessions
as protection and insurance.
We can be dressed for action, with our lamps lit.
We can be ready and alert for his Son’s arrival.

To picture how we ought to live—
poised and attentive—
envision a dog sitting by the window,
nose pressed against the glass,
his breath fogging and fading the pane,
as he waits, patiently and doggedly,
for his master to return home.
And then, when he sees the car coming down the driveway,
he barks and leaps up and goes to the door, his tail wagging.

Such an attitude may be instinctive for dogs,
but for us, when it comes to waiting for our Lord and Master,
the attitude comes not from instinct but from grace.

Hopeful and watching waiting
for the Son of Man to return is an act of faith,
a gift of the Spirit poured out upon us from God our Father.

And so, as Hebrews proclaims so powerfully,
“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for,
the conviction of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1, NRSV)

By this gift of faith,
Abraham and Sarah, our forebears,
left their homeland and journeyed to a place they had not seen.
They trusted God to keep his promise of land.

And in their old age,
they again trusted God to be true to his word
to give them a son,
and through that son descendents “as many as the stars of heaven
and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.” (Hebrews 11:12b, NRSV)

Abraham lived by faith as a stranger and foreigner,
not knowing where God would lead him to go.
And by the same faith the apostles lived with little and traveled light,
freeing them to witness to the Lord.
And as they did, they did not know when he would return.

With that exact same faith,
countless martyrs and myriads of Christians
have labored for the Lord over the centuries,
all the while trusting that the Son of Man would return some day.
And now, you and I, heirs of this history,
live each day by the same gift of faith.

Do we trust that the Father has given us the kingdom?
We can, by faith.
Do we let go of our possessions,
not only giving freely but also holding loosely,
so we are free to live with hearts in the Lord and not in the loot?
We can, by faith.

Are we dressed for action, with our lamps lit?
Are we alert and watchful, waiting for the Lord to return?
We can be, by faith.

And by faith,
we can stand together
before the Table of the Son of Man,
and we can pray, with conviction,
“Come, Lord Jesus,”
and mean it with all our heart and mind and soul and strength,
and be ready for the coming of the Son of Man,
because today, thank God, may be the day. Amen.