Caught, Clothes, Courage (A Sermon on 1sr Thessalonians 5)

 

God’s grace, peace and mercy be with you. … My sermon is entitled Caught, Clothes and Courage, and my focus is our Epistle (1^st Thessalonians 5:1-11). Let us pray. Heavenly Father, the psalmist wrote, “I rejoiced when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’” Now that our feet are within your gates, we rejoice to hear your Word. As we listen, may your Spirit enlighten our minds and move our hearts to love deeply as Jesus loved. This we pray to you, Most Holy Trinity. Amen.

“Stay safe.” We heard that expression many times since April 2020, when Covid took many people’s lives. We took many precautions to keep ourselves safe. People wore masks and got injections. We kept our distance and our hands to ourselves. If we got Covid, we stayed home and rested. After we recovered, we isolated. We took precautions to “stay safe.”

In other areas, we take precautions to keep our families and ourselves safe. In addition to hygiene, we are faithful to necessary prescriptions and supplements, diet and exercise. We hear that we should take self-defense lessons or firearms classes. In addition to insurance and smoke detectors, companies encourage us to install surveillance systems, burglar alarms or fireproof safes. Municipalities frequently issue emergency alerts to our cell phones. Actors and athletes advise us to invest in gold. We want to keep our families, ourselves, our communities, properties and investments safe.

No matter how many precautions we take, the element of surprise catches us like a thief in the night. On October 8, 1871, the most devastating forest fire in American history swept through northeast Wisconsin, claiming 1200+ lives. On May 31, 1889, the Johnstown Flood killed 2,200 Pennsylvanians. On September 1, 1923, earthquakes led to fires and explosions that killed 143,000 Japanese. The Indian Ocean Tsunami of December 2004 took the lives of 225,000 people. On September 11, 2001, none of us felt safe. The Great Depression, the closing of the steel mills in the 70’s, and the pyramid schemes of Bernie Madoff robbed us not only of money, but a way of living. Everyone caught unaware. Stay safe?

Two thousand years ago, Paul of Tarsus wrote to the Thessalonians, “For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.” (1 Thess 5:2) This does not tell us when Jesus will come, but rather how. “Thief in the night” is something Jesus spoke about in the Gospels. It stresses suddenness and unexpectedness as well as unknown timing, and has a sense of threat for the unprepared.[1]

Paul frequently used the term – “the day” – which he adopted from the Old Testament tradition of “Day of the Lord.” This “day” denotes the completion of the Kingdom of God and the end of all attacks upon it. It is a “day of punishment” (Isa 10:3), and a day of the Lord’s wrath (Eze 7:19). The entire concept in the Old Testament is dark and foreboding.[2] On the other hand, the New Testament idea is saturated with elements of hope, joy and victory. It is the Day of Christ, the day of His coming in the glory of His Father, which we will hear in next Sunday’s Gospel (Mt. 25:31ff.). So, Paul saw “the day” as the moment Christ brings the final redemption and judgment to earth. The irony of this verse is that Paul uses the phrase “you know” or “You are fully aware” and yet the timing is unknown.

Friends, you are aware that Christ will come again, just as you are aware that your life could change or end in an instant. Some time may pass before that happens, but you know that it will happen. Knowing this, I leave you with a question to ponder before I move to my next point. As you look back on the first time that you became aware that your life could change or end in an instant, what did you learn about living as a Christian in the world right now?

Clothes. When you see me show up at church, the hospital or a funeral home, guaranteed I will be wearing black slacks, a clergy shirt and a sports jacket if not a suit. If you showed up at my home, you would see me in a pair of worn jeans, a flannel shirt, or a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. We all have different clothes for various activities. We have work clothes and workout clothes, night clothes and day clothes. And when we lived in Chicagoland, we would go to Walmart after church and see people dressed in loungewear standing in line with others dressed in their Sunday-go-to-meeting-clothes.

Paul’s words in vv 6-7 reminded Christians in Thessalonica that they were to be different than others in that Greek city. Just as your clothing differs between night and day, Christian thought and morality must differ from the secularists in the world. Paul urged his readers to prepare and to be ready, and so he used the analogy to be ready for the Parousia, the Day Christ returns.

When Paul wrote, “since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation,” he meant that daytime people (Christians) must be ready to battle the enemy. The armor imagery, which Paul also uses in Ephesians 6:14-17 is directly from Isaiah 59. Now, we all know that certain clothing is needed for certain tasks. Unless you are Happy Gilmore, you don’t show up at a golf tournament in a hockey sweater. Christians must be dressed and ready for the time Christ returns.

Armor, however, is not enough. What protects a believer is the hope of salvation. If you have no hope or no trust that God will make things right one day, then your faith is fragile and you can be overwhelmed by problems and injustices of the present. Hope protects against that. Paul’s converts needed hope and faith fulfilled by love not only for Christ, but also for one another; and for that to occur, they had to accept an identity that made them look more like Jesus Christ. As believers, we grow in our identity with Christ, beginning with our Baptism.

As we grow in our identity with Christ, Paul reminds us that God has not destined us to suffer wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ (v. 9). God provides believers with the necessary equipment – the means of grace through Baptism and Lord’s Supper – so that we will obtain the final gift of salvation.

For Paul, hope was not an emotion or a sunny outlook, nor was it reducible to information about the future. Hope is the God-given habit of mind that produces joy amid suffering. It is characterized by patience, providing confidence that God has conquered death through Christ. In other words, hope looks forward to a glorious future, but also offers a changed life in the present. Knowing God reframes how we know reality. Hope brings a new way of life, one that is lived in light of our final end.[3]

Paul makes it clear that Jesus Christ died for us so that we might live for him (v. 10). As believers, we benefit from Christ’s death for his death is for all of us, that is, it is vicarious. Paul made this clear to the Thessalonians, and reworded it more clearly in Romans: “If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. To this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.” (14:8-9).

Now, before moving to my next point, let me ask you some questions. Are you pleased with yourself? Is your spouse and are your family members pleased with you? Is God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – pleased with you? My friends, even though we begin each Divine Worship by confessing our sins and receiving absolution, know this: God is pleased with you. God delights in you. You may not go through every moment of every day saying to yourself, “God is pleased with me.” But the fact that God is responsible for creating you, and sent his Son to suffer, die and rise to life again, is a constant reminder that He is pleased with you. You may not feel the love of the Holy Spirit being poured into your heart every second, but it happens here every week when you hear God’s Word and receive God’s Sacraments. This is no gimmick, but each time you put on your day clothes, tell yourself that God is pleased with you.

Courage. Knowing that, I turn to my third point, Courage. The word courage comes from the root word for heart. So, when Paul writes, “encourage one another and build one another up” (v. 11), he knows that his converts were already doing that, or else he would not have added, “just as you are doing.”

He already saw that Christian men and women checked in with one another. They made an active effort to go over and ask each other, “How are you doing?” The Thessalonian Christian was under fire from unbelievers, but it was not dysfunctional. So, building on what he already knew, Paul encouraged them to be mutual encouragers. As Christians, we do not build up ourselves. We build up each other. Encouragement is an action done in relationship with one another. It is a group-building, team building, community-building exercise. It is why we begin each Worship Service by exchanging the Sign of Peace. From there it continues throughout our Liturgy – our work of worship.

From here, we can mutually encourage one another wherever and whenever we see one another. It’s why we send emails when someone is sick or has passed. It’s why we officially recognize what a member has done for the congregation. It’s why we thank veterans and first-responders. You can think of many other places where we encourage each other to be faithful to Jesus Christ – at home, at work and school, in the neighborhood and gathering places galore. As an active pastor, one of my exercises was to visit those men and women from our congregation who could not be with us on Sunday. Many of them have passed, but the time I spent (and spend) with them encourages me. They were (and are) deeply grateful to receive God’s Word and Sacrament. They tell me that with joyful tears.

Friends, next week, we celebrate Thanksgiving. For us, it is a true Christian holiday, and the first person to recognize the need to proclaim Thanksgiving as a day devoted to God was President George Washington. On November 3, 1789, Washington set November 26 as a day that we would unite to most humbly offer our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions.[4] Despite our differences and divisions, let us see this week as a time to encourage each other to offer God our prayers and seek our pardon. Let us no longer say, “Stay safe,” but rather, “Stay faithful!” and when we do, may the peace of God that surpasses all understanding, keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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[1] See Mt 24:43; Lk 12:38-39; 2 Pt 3:10: Rev 3:3; 16:15.

[2] See Isa 2:12; 13:6,9; 34:8; Ezek 13:5; 30:3; Joel 1:15; 2:11; Amos 5:18; Zeph 1:14; Zech 14:1.

[3] Nathan Eubank, First and Second Thessalonians. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic (2019), p. 122.

[4] Thanksgiving Proclamation, 3 October 1789, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/05-04-02-0091

Day of the Lord

 

Last Sunday was the first day of Eastern Standard Time. Next Spring, we will go back to Eastern Daylight Time. We move our clocks one hour ahead in the Spring, and one hour back in the Fall. We spring ahead, and fall back.

We have 10 hours of daylight and 14 hours of darkness. Did you know that there are some places that always have 12 hours or daylight and 12 hours of night? The countries of Ecuador, Uganda and Malaysia have equal amounts of day and night.

I mention that because our first reading (Amos 5:18-24) tells us that the Day of the Lord is darkness. It was meant to scare people into living right and obeying God. When it is really dark outside and you do not have electric lights or even a candle, sounds may scare you.

As Christians, the Day of the Lord is light. The Day of the Lord is when Jesus will return and raise believers to new and everlasting life. So, the Day of the Lord is not something that should frighten us. The Day of the Lord gives us hope, and inspires us to live what Jesus taught us.

So, while you will have less daylight to play outdoors between now and spring, you have the true Light in your hearts. The Holy Spirit has poured into your heart the love of God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

You remember that you have God’s love in your heart as you wait for Jesus’ return. We all prepare ourselves daily by remembering our baptism, reciting our prayers, reading the Bible and eating and drinking Christ’s Body and Blood. So, until Jesus returns, that’s all folks.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, from whom all fatherhood in heaven and earth is named: Bless all children, and give their fathers and mothers the spirit of wisdom and love, so that the homes in which they grow up may be to them an image of Your Kingdom, and the care of their parents a likeness of Your love. We pray in the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Colombo, Culture, Christian Living

 

God’s grace, peace and mercy be with you. … My sermon is entitled Thessalonians Three C’s: Colombo, Culture and Christian Living, and my focus is our Epistle (1^st Thessalonians 4:13-18). Let us pray. Heavenly Father, the psalmist wrote, “I rejoiced when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’” Now that our feet are within your gates, we rejoice to hear your Word. As we listen, may your Spirit enlighten our minds and move our hearts to love deeply as Jesus loved. This we pray to you, Most Holy Trinity. Amen.

One TV series that I could watch again and again is Colombo. It starred Peter Falk as Lieutenant Colombo, a homicide detective with the LAPD, and originally ran from 1971-1978 on NBC, and 1989-2003 on ABC. Colombo wore a rumpled beige raincoat, smoked cigars, drove an old Peugeot, and often asked a final question with the famous catchphrase, “Just one more thing.”

I mention that catchphrase because for the 23^rd Sunday after Pentecost the lectionary ends with verse 12. Today, we resume the Letter beginning at verse 13. Paul introduces a new topic not wishing his audience to be ignorant or uninformed, and like Colombo, repeats his own catchphrase: “I do not want you to be unaware.”[1]

                Are You Aware?

Like Colombo, Paul’s “Just one more thing” is the parousia, a Greek word meaning coming or presence. A parousia can refer to anyone, such as a dignitary or family member. Here, the Parousia refers to the Second Coming of Christ. The Parousia speaks to the times and ways Christ has been, is, and will be present to us. Bernard of Clairvaux wrote of the Threefold Advents of Christ in these words: “In his first coming our Lord came in our flesh and in our weakness; in this middle coming he comes in spirit and in power; in the final coming he will be seen in glory and majesty.” Christ became present to humanity by taking on our flesh, our body (see Hebrews 10:5); He continues to be present with us through the Holy Spirit and most exultantly in the Eucharist; and He will be present again when He comes to judge the world. So, it is good for us to be aware of Christ’s threefold presence to us.

Aware of this, how did the Thessalonians respond? To shorten our speculation about their behavior, let me rephrase the question. Knowing that Christ was, will be, and is present to us, how do we respond? Are we filled with excitement and anticipation? Do we liken it to someone special coming to visit us?

When we were kids, and learned that company was coming, my mother would clean the house, prepare a meal, set the table, and dress up. My dad wore dress slacks, a collared shirt and polished shoes. When our guests arrived, we didn’t wait for them to knock on the door, we went outside and opened the car doors for them, greeted them in the driveway, and escorted them into the house. If you’ve done that, you have an understanding of how the ancients greeted their guests.

When a dignitary would visit the city, a greeting or welcoming committee went outside the city gate to meet and escort the person. Cicero wrote of Julius Caesar’s victory tour through Italy, “Just imagine what a royal welcome he is receiving from the towns, what honors are paid to him.” He wrote of Augustus, “the municipalities are showing the boy remarkable favor. … Wonderful apantesis and encouragement.” The word apantesis refers to the actions of a welcoming committee as it went forth from the city to escort the dignity into the city for his official visit. During that visit, the dignitary dealt not only with the honorable citizens, but with the dishonorable as well.

John Chrysostom noticed these nuances, and in his sermon on 1^st Thessalonians, wrote, “For when a king drives into a city, those who are in honor go out to meet him; but the condemned await the judge within. And upon the coming of an affectionate father, his children indeed, and those who are worthy to be his children, are taken out in a chariot, that they may see and kiss him; but those of the domestics who have offended remain within.”

So, how do you respond to the awareness that the real King is here, and is waiting to see you? It’s a good question to ponder during the month that we remember the dead and observe the end of the church year. That also allows me to move on from Colombo to Culture.

When I say culture, I mean the customs of a particular nation or people. The Latin word is cultura, an agricultural term for tilling and preparing the soil. Before I planted my garden on virgin soil, I plowed the earth at least twice. After that I disced it, and finally tilled it several times before planting. Throughout the year, I compost discarded vegetation and add aged manure to enrich the soil. This promotes crop growth.

As Americans, we see many different ethnic cultures, and blend some of those into our lifestyle. Generations ago, we did not know about Mexican, Korean, Brazilian or Indian cuisine. Likewise, Paul’s audience, Gentiles not Jews, did not know about the culture of Paul. He was Jewish, and observed all the practices of Jews.

Gentiles who had not been exposed to Judaism found the whole idea of resurrection more than a little strange. The Greeks were used to the notion of immortality, but not a person coming back from the dead in new and improved body. They believed that a person survived death and went into the underworld. Coins would be placed on the eyes to pay the boatman (Charon) to carry the person down and across the river Styx, and avoid obstacles on the way that would steal the body.

There are stories about contacts with the dead. Odysseus went to Hades to consult a dead seer. This resembles Saul contacting Samuel through the Medium of En-dor (1 Sam 28:6-25). Such stories were to give information about the fate of the dead because there was concern about what happened to them after death. Others held birthday parties for the deceased which included a straw into the grave so the deceased could imbibe.

Given that few Gentiles had been exposed to Jewish-Christian teachings on the resurrection, Paul took great pains to counter their inconsolable grief with assurance that the afterlife is a positive image like a large family reunion. John Chrysostom wrote, “If you seek [the deceased Christian], seek him where the King is, where the army of angels is; not in the grave, not in the earth (Homily on 2 Cor 1:6).

This teaching was necessary because Paul either ran out of time or failed to teach this while he was in Thessalonica. So, when some Christians had died unexpectedly, questions arose about the afterlife. In a couple of words, Paul instructed the Thessalonians to stop grieving. Paul was not talking about the emotional states that people experience when a loved one dies, but the pervasive Greek view that there is no hope.

                Do You Have Hope?

Pagans had no hope of a positive afterlife, but Christians did (and do). That is why Paul wrote that “you turned to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come” (1 Thes 1:10). And why later in this letter, he wrote, “For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ” (5:9). He expanded upon this in writing to the Romans (1:18-32). Folks, there is a difference between true Christian believers and unbelievers.

Verse 14 is basically a primitive Christian confession. It shows that what follows from believing that Jesus died and rose has a consequence about the fate of the Christian dead. When Jesus returns at the final Parousia, He will bring back or raise up only deceased Christians to a new and glorious state. That’s not my opinion, that is what Scripture tells us. Here, and in 1^st Cor 15, Paul operates with a concept of the resurrection of the righteous, not the unbelievers. He wrote about Christ as the first fruits and those in Christ as the latter fruits of the resurrection. For Paul, the resurrection of the believer means full conformity to the image of Christ, which is something those outside of Christ will not receive when he returns. In other words, when Christ comes again, He will then raise your body and soul to be with Him, the Father and the Holy Spirit.

Verse 15 provides the reason we believers can be confident about the resurrection of deceased Christians, namely that Jesus himself spoke of this and affirmed this truth. The living will have no advantage over the deceased when Jesus returns, and vice-versa. All believers will be on the same cloud.

It was easy then and it is easy today to get caught up in anxiety or questions regarding the end of the world. The Thessalonians became so consumed with worrying about when the Parousia was going to come that they stopped caring about daily life and the things that really matter. That is why St. Paul wrote his Second Letter to the Thessalonians. He admonished them for their inaction, telling them that those who do not work should not eat. It was St. Paul’s way of trying to snap them out of their obsession with the Parousia and get them to re-focus their attention on the work of the Gospel.

If you have ever been coached or ever coached, you have heard the command, “Focus!” Focus not on what will happen in a year or ten, a hundred or a thousand. The Good News is that Jesus Christ has risen from the dead, and he will prepare a place for you. He will receive you. It’s His promise. Our “job” here and now is to focus on living the Good News. Live the Ten Commandments. Believe the Creeds. Pray the words Jesus spoke. Love people. At least ask them how they are doing. Focus![2]

It’s important to know that Paul was writing to Christians living in a Greek or Gentile world, and that they were heavily influenced by the surrounding culture. So, when Paul wrote – “Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord” – he was well aware of Cicero’s report of Julius Caesar’s victory tour through Italy in 49 A.D. It read, “Just imagine what a royal welcome he is receiving from the towns, what honors are paid to him.”

Paul co-opted the imperial rhetoric and applied it to Jesus. His opposition to Caesar and adherence to Jesus were all part of one package: Jesus was Lord; Caesar was not. The imperial cult suggested that a human being (emperor) was divine and walking around on the earth bringing peace and security. Hence, Paul’s letter and his teaching in this age were considered subversive.

Enough about Colombo and Culture. Let’s talk about Christian Living. November is an interesting month for us. We recover from a hectic Halloween by remembering all the saints who have gone before us starting with the first Christian martyrs up to those faithful witnesses who have influenced our lives today. Last Sunday, we remembered those who died. We now prepare for Thanksgiving and start thinking about Christmas and the New Year. But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves.

Retailers may want us to focus on what’s ahead. Our readings call us to focus on the here and now. Christian living is all about the here and now because while we acknowledge that Christ will come again, He is here and now. The five foolish virgins in our Gospel (Mt 25:1-13) lost focus, and when they finally returned with enough oil, they found the door locked. The lord would not open the door for them, and so they missed the fun.

Among the four teachings that we should recall daily in addition to the Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, the Creeds are the Sacraments: Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Christian living requires us to remember daily that we were baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ who will one day raise our mortal bodies so that we share in His new creation. (Think of your Baptism when you bathe or shower.)

Now, reading Paul’s words to the Thessalonians might give you the impression that he should have been more pastoral and less dogmatic when it comes to advising Christians not to grieve, but telling people the truth about what we believe is pastoral. As Christians, we don’t want to sugarcoat what happens after we die. In short, we are dead. Our bodies are in the ground, and we are waiting for the Day of the Lord, the day when Christ returns and raises our bodies into a new and glorious state. That’s what we believe and teach, and it’s why we remember our Baptism daily. Baptism is a reminder that God loves you deeply.

                          God is Pleased with You

In closing, have you ever considered that right now God is pleased with you? Most of the time that does not cross our minds. But considering the truth that the Son of God, who suffered and died for you, is returning to raise up your body is a reminder that He loves you and is pleased with you. And so, my friends, from now until the Day Christ returns, bear in mind that Christians live joyfully because the Spirit of the Risen Lord dwells in you even on your worst days. Copy that, and just one more thing, when you do, may the peace of God that surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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[1] See also 1 Cor 10:1; 12:1; Rom 11:25.

[2] Focus was a favorite phrase from my first music teacher, Pat Mancini, from whom I took trumpet lessons as a kid. If you want to read how the trumpet worked its way into Paul’s Epistle, you can read my footnotes. Read Isa 27:13; Joel 2:1; Zech 9:14. See also 1 Cor 15:52; Ps 24:7-10.

 

Carefree Highway

God’s grace, peace and mercy be with you. My sermon today is entitled Highways, Wildernesses and Waiting, and my focus is Isaiah (35:1-10). Let us pray. Heavenly Father, the psalmist wrote, “I rejoiced when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’” Now that we are within your gates, we rejoice to hear your Word. As we listen, may your Spirit enlighten our minds and move our hearts to love deeply as Jesus loved. This we pray to you, Most Holy Trinity. Amen.

Highways. People must love movies, TV shows and songs about highways and roads because there are hundreds of them. There were seven Hope and Crosby’s “Road” movies, and several remakes of Mad Max. Audiences still enjoy Route 66 and Highway to Heaven. More than entertaining us, highways get us places and tell stories about people.

When I was a student at Potter Township Elementary School in the 1960s, the Lothrop and Larson families moved from Potter to Monaca because their homes were located right where the I-376 interchange is located between the Beaver Valley Mall and the Shell Cracker plant. I am sure that you have memories to share how a highway changed life for you, and in a moment, I will touch upon the highway built by God, which has made all the difference in the world for all of us.

In secular terms, a highway is any public or private road or other public way on land. It is used for major roads but also includes other public roads and public tracks. Highways connect cities and towns, and are maintained by counties, states and countries. Highways were originally the main roads that ran through towns and villages. The Romans get the credit for building a system of highways, but we find its use long before Rome came to exist.

We find highway is used frequently in Isaiah, we find earlier uses of the word in Judges and Numbers. “In the days of Shamgar, son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were abandoned, and travelers kept to the byways” (Judges 5:6). When Moses and the Hebrew people were in the Wilderness of Kadesh, his messengers went to the King of Edom. “Please let us pass through your land. We will not pass through field or vineyard, or drink water from a well. We will go along the King’s Highway. We will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left until we have passed through your territory” (Numbers 20:17).

In Isaiah, the highway is sometimes translated as a causeway or raised road. It runs through the desert, which is transformed into an attractive landscape. We are not told where it goes, only who can and cannot be on it. No unclean person can be on this road. The prophet tells us that the unclean disqualified themselves by failure to use the means of grace. Those walking in grace availed themselves to grace. Whoever walks on this highway, even the simple and the fool, shall not stray.

Later, John the Baptist referred to such a highway leading to the Lord in his preaching. Referring to himself as a voice crying out in the wilderness, he said to the people, “Prepare the Lord's highway.” Luke elaborated on John’s prophesying by writing, “Make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough places shall become level ways, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God” (3:4-6).

In Mark, we find Bartimaeus, the blind beggar, sitting by the highway side begging as Jesus and his disciples were leaving Jericho (10:46ff.). In Luke, we hear in the Parable of the Great Banquet the master instructing his servant, “Go out to the highways and hedges and compel people to come in, that my house may be filled. For I tell you none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet.” (14:23-24). And in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus taught, “You can enter God's Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose that way” (Matthew 7:13).

I suggest that the next time you drive on any highway to recall this. God does not want us winding our way through a mountainous desert on a pothole-filled, two-lane road where drug lords rule. He wants us to come to him with pleasant companions on a four-lane highway through a garden spot where each new view is more charming than the last. This is what God promises to those who will abandon their trust in humanity and hurl themselves on him.[1]

We exit the highway and enter the wilderness. Throughout my years, I have travelled to some wild places. Driving through western Utah and Nevada, across New Mexico and west Texas, I wondered why anyone would live here? Travelling through the Holy Land and the Badlands, I wondered the same question. Even a couple of trips into the bush in Ecuador and Venezuela left me wondering the same. Then I realized after looking up the etymology of the word that I own a piece of the wilderness. The wilderness is a wild, uninhabited, or uncultivated place. The word in Old English is wild-deor, meaning wild animal or wild deer. I can see the wild deer emerge from the steep banks behind my house.

The word wilderness appears 400 times in the Bible, and in every book. From Genesis when Joseph’s brothers throw him into a cistern in the wilderness to the mention of Mary fleeing into the wilderness in the Book of Revelation, wilderness has played a significant part in God’s plan of salvation. After feeding thousands, Jesus reminded the people that their ancestors ate bread in the wilderness (John 6:49). John the Baptist lived and preached in the wilderness, and following his baptism by John the Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. The wilderness is spoken of in Acts by Stephen and Paul (chs 7 and 13).

The wilderness is a physical place, but it can also be a symbolic place. You may be isolated from others. That is your wilderness. You may be constantly exposed to evil. That is your wilderness. Then again, as the Prophet Hosea reminds us, the wilderness may be a place where God calls you and speaks tenderly to your heart (2:14). That wilderness attracts you and you should go there to experience intimacy with God.

The desert wilderness is where the early roots of Christian monasticism are found. Christian hermits and ascetics, who lived primarily in the desert of Egypt, beginning around the Year 270. Anthony the Great heard a Sunday sermon stating that perfection could be achieved by selling all of one's possessions, giving the proceeds to the poor, and following Jesus. He followed the advice and made the further step of moving deep into the desert to seek complete solitude. Anthony and other Christians lived in the desert wilderness during the Diocletian Persecution, the last great formal persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire, beginning in 303 AD. Only ten years later, Christianity was made legal in Egypt by Diocletian's successor Constantine I. I am not suggesting you leave everything behind and move to the desert, but you should find a place, even in your own home, where you can be alone with God.

Personally, even though I spend the first hours of the morning praying, reading, studying and working on my sermons, I love the time outside where I hear nothing but the songs of birds and feel the breeze of the wind. Now, let me segue to my third point, Waiting.

Advent is a time of waiting. Sometimes, we wait longer than other times. Advent always has four Sunday, but this year, our Advent Season is a full four weeks. Today, we mark the midpoint of Advent by lighting the pink candle of the Advent wreathe, but much more importantly, by observing Gaudete Sunday. Today’s pink color is an ancient symbol expressing joy. So, we wait with joy in our hearts for the Christmas Season to begin and for the Second Coming of Christ.

While we wait, we do all the things necessary for the birth of any child. We stay busy, and as we engage in activities as a mother, father, sibling or grandparent, we also ponder thoughts, feel emotions, pray and work. When the moment of new life finally arrives, we behold the child.

Behold. Behold is not a word we us very often. It means to see or observe, and we favor those words over the archaic behold. It is used quite often in the Bible, almost 2000 times. In our study of Isaiah several weeks ago, the word behold is used three times in two verses in chapter 62. My study led me to the musings of John Oswalt, one of America’s leading scholars on Isaiah. He wrote about how we all find ourselves in a situation where we are completely abandoned and rejected and then, unaccountably welcomed and taken in. If you have ever felt that you should read Isaiah 62.

When Oswalt was in college, he admired a pretty, witty, popular girl in his speech class. The professor assigned each student a partner, and the assignment was to assess the personality of another class member through what we project while speaking. They were to share their observations with each other privately. Well, you guessed it, Oswalt was partnered with the girl he admired.

Upon learning this Oswalt wrote, “I can hardly describe the terror I felt. I knew that she was going to fillet me like a fish. I knew that when she finished with me, I would be able to slither out under the door of the room without opening it.” Then, he said, “To my surprise yet today, she singled out trait after trait of mine that she found attractive and compelling. She handled areas that needed improvement with tact and insight. In fact, when I left the room, I could have floated out the window. She had found some things in me that were valuable. I have never forgotten that gift.”

Oswalt’s point is that is what God does to each one of us. God says that he sees worth and value in you. In You! God wants to be with us because he likes us and that we are important to him. This is so because of who God is. “Because God is the kind of person he is, he is able to see all things in us that lie buried beneath layers of sin and shame. He is able to see possibilities where nothing, but failure would be perceived by anyone else. But even more than that, he can uncover those hidden things, to let loose those possibilities, because he has taken all the failure, the sin, and the shame into himself. He can not only show us what there is but set it free. He can give each of us on a cosmic and eternal level the kind of gift that girl gave me so many years ago in speech class.”[2]

Behold, the child of God this Christmas. See in that child one who will uncover hidden things in you; one who will let loose possibilities in you. See in that child one who takes all your failures, your sins, and your shame into himself. Behold, the child of God. Behold, the Son of God! My friends, as you wait for Christ’s Second Coming and Christmas, behold the wonder of God within you, and when you do, may the peace of God keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, Amen.

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[1] John N. Oswalt, Isaiah: The New Application Commentary: From biblical text … to contemporary life. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan (2003), p. 393.

[2] Ibid., pp. 656-657.

Lift Your Eyes

 

When you need help, who do you call? Ghostbusters? Some people think they don’t need help from anybody, but everyone eventually needs help from somebody. When I need help finding a contractor, I ask my friends to suggest someone. When I need help with my tractor, I call my cousin, Justin. When I need help making dinner, I look up a recipe. When I need help writing a sermon or a children’s message, I look at my Bible study guides.

I mention that because our Psalm (121) reads, “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.” Did you know that Psalm 121 is the basis of poems, hymns, songs and even a movie? The Sound of Music features Psalm 121. I was 8 years old when the movie was first shown. We saw it at the ABC Drive-In Theater. If you have not seen the movie, you should ask your parents to show it to you.

In the movie, the Von Trapp family escapes the Nazis by going up into the hills of Austria and crossing the border into Switzerland. Before the family makes its way, the Mother Abbess encourages the family by saying, “Remember: ‘I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help.’”

My point is that when you need help, you can ask your family and friends, but remember that your help comes from the Lord. God is never asleep, and as you go out and return home, He is always at your right hand to protect you and keep you from evil.

Remember the many ways God helps you, and when your family members and friends need help, you can help them best by turning to Psalm 121 and to God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

With that, we pray. Heavenly Father, from whom all fatherhood in heaven and earth is named: Bless these and all children, and give their fathers and mothers the spirit of wisdom and love, so that the homes in which they grow up may be to them an image of Your Kingdom, and the care of their parents a likeness of Your love. We pray in the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

Engage through Prayer: A Sermon on Luke 18

 

God’s grace, peace and mercy be with you. My sermon today is entitled Three Ps of Engaged Christians: Parable, Passage and Prayer, and my focus is our Gospel (Luke 18:1-8). Let us pray. Heavenly Father, the psalmist wrote, “I rejoiced when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’” Now that we are within your gates, we rejoice to hear your Word. As we listen, may your Spirit enlighten our minds and move our hearts to love deeply as Jesus loved. This we pray to you, Most Holy Trinity. Amen.

I have spoken about the definition of a parable previously, but it bears repeating. Simply defined, a parable is a short story that teaches a moral or spiritual lesson. It comes to us from the Latin, parabola, and the Greek, parabole, which meant ‘a throwing beside.’ Its origin is from the term para, meaning alongside, and bole, a throwing, casting, beam or ray.

The geometrically gifted understand that a parabolic curve refers to a comparison between fixed points and a straight line. The St. Louis Arch and your satellite dish are parabolic curves. Jesus, however, did not teach math or build arches. Rather, he compared real life situations to teach a lesson about God.

Parables were part of Jewish tradition. The Hebrew term for a parable was mashal. We find mashal in the allegories, proverbs, riddles and taunts of Judges, Samuel, Proverbs, Prophets and the intertestamental Book of Enoch. We are familiar with Nathan’s powerful story to David of the rich man who stole and slaughtered the poor man’s prized lamb. It transformed David to a humble, contrite sinner. So, we see that Jesus did not invent parables, but like his ancestors, used them to win people over to his views.

Jesus spoke parables to proclaim the gracious advent, disturbing presence and challenging implications of the Kingdom of God. At times, he opened with, “The kingdom of heaven is like…” or “To what shall I compare?” Often, he concluded with a question. “Which of these three … proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” Today’s parable asks, “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

While Jesus’ questions did not pressure listeners to choose any one direction, they confronted them with the necessity to make a choice that determined their future. No doubt, his listeners who viewed matters one way now discovered a better way. Discovering a better way resulted in conversion, reconciliation and changed behavior. Once they experienced conversion and reconciliation, his followers transformed society and changed the world. As I conclude my first point on parables, I repeat that last sentence. Once they experienced conversion and reconciliation, his followers transformed society and changed the world.

From parable to passage, my second point. I repeated the last sentence because repetition is effective pedagogy. We learned our catechism by repeating answers to questions. As Luther employed repetition, so did Luke. He emphasized continued prayer in this passage, and humble prayer in the next. The conclusion of the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector reads, “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

We also find a parallel between today’s passage and chapter 11, where Jesus said, “Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him.’” In both, the main character is the petitioned, not the petitioner. The petitioned represents God, who listens and answers, but the attention goes to the petitioner, who asks, seeks and knocks. In other words, do not be afraid to bother God. Do not give up on prayer.

Jesus encouraged his disciples to pray earnestly to the end. Luke recorded that when Jesus was in the Mount of Olives, he was in agony but prayed more earnestly. In Acts, when Peter was in prison, the church prayed earnestly to God for him. Like the widow seeking justice, the disciples’ goal, even amid difficulties, was never give up before the Son of Man returns.

Jesus then described the judge as unrighteous, unaccountable to God and inconsiderate towards people. The listeners understood that this man was not a religious figure, but a secular judge who ruled through the authority of the occupying power, a widespread practice in the Ancient Middle East. Think Pontius Pilate. In many cases, people sought justice in these courts because the judicial process was quicker and smoother. We find an indication of this practice in chapter 12. Jesus said, “As you go with your accuser before the magistrate, make an effort to settle with him on the way, lest he drag you to the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer put you in prison. I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny.”

The oppressed widow symbolized the helpless and defenseless. She knew she had right on her side, appealed for vindication and expected swift justice. As a favor to her oppressor, a rich and influential man, the judge delayed her hearing.

The judge did not decide according to the exhortations to give widows their rights according to the Law and Prophets. There, we read, “You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child.” In another, we read, “Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring justice to the fatherless, and the widow’s cause does not come to them.” And “I will be a swift witness against … those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and fatherless, [and] those who thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the Lord.”

Yet, the unrighteous, exasperated judge yielded to the widow’s relentless pursuit of justice. He could do nothing to appease her short of giving her a swift hearing based on Roman law. He did so because he was tired of having his reputation sullied and his name ridiculed among his peers because this poor, defenseless widow never gave up seeking justice.

If the unjust judge does right by the widow for whom he does not care – a case in which the chances for a positive outcome are very slim – how much more will God respond to the unceasing cry of his elect, since, in contrast to the judge, he listens favorably to them. The unjust judge did not care for the widow and hardly wanted to listen to her. Our righteous, loving God has a lively interest in his elect and is always prepared to listen to them.

God is always prepared to listen; however, as I mentioned earlier, Jesus often concluded parables with a question. Here, he asked, “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” Will he find disciples actively engaged in prayer?

Will he find disciples actively engaged in prayer? That, folks, leads me to my third point, prayer. Prayer is the necessary foundation of our work as church and individuals. It is communal and personal. We pray in our sanctuaries and rooms. To paraphrase one holy person, prayer is God looking at me, and me looking at God. It is from the heart, but it is also vocal. We speak the Lord’s Prayer as Jesus taught it to his disciples.

Prayer involves reading Scripture. Daily, my wife and I read aloud the Psalms. Prayer involves thought and imagination, gifts Jesus employed as he formed parables. Praying over Nathan’s story to David may reduce me to a humble, contrite sinner. Pondering Jesus’ closing question in the Parable of the Good Samaritan may leave me wondering if I show mercy to diverse neighbors. Meditating on the Parable of the Prodigal may challenge the depth of my love for father and brother, mother and sister. So, friends, you see why my last point is prayer. When the Son of Man returns, will he find faith in me? Will he find me praying earnestly to the end – like Peter in prison or Jesus in the Mount of Olives?

Jesus based this parable on trust and confidence in God’s help and assistance. He could be so straightforward in his assurance that God hears the cry of his people because he took seriously the action of God in his own life and ministry. He saw it in Israel’s history and the world around him.

We do not live in that history and world. We live in a country with a different history and a different world. Therefore, we pray over this parable to relate it to our daily lives. When I pray over the passage, many questions rise to the surface but let me focus only on a few.

First, who are today’s widows? Who are God’s elect who cry out to him day and night seeking justice? Whose voices are the exploited and oppressed?

Second, Jesus promises that God will give justice to his elect. If I – created in the image and likeness of God, baptized in the name of the Father, Son and Spirit, a redeemed sinner and child of God – If I am to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect, how do I extend mercy to those who seek justice? If the unjust judge who neither feared God nor respected man knew how to extend justice to the poor, exploited and oppressed widow, to whom do I extend justice?

I asked myself, “Who are the exploited?” Recalling my work at World Neighbors, an international organization that solved hunger, I saw the immensity of poverty in rural Asia, Africa and Latin America. As a fundraiser for a homeless service provider in Berkeley, California, I met many homeless vets and people with mental health disorders. As a program manager for Pittsburgh’s Jubilee Kitchen, I interviewed dozens of women exploited by pushers and pimps. I could list scores of exploited and oppressed people who cry out to God seeking justice, but only the unborn do not have a voice.

According to the World Health Organization, every year in the world there are an estimated 40-50 million abortions. This corresponds to approximately 125,000 abortions per day. In the US, there are over 3,000 abortions per day. Twenty-two percent of all pregnancies in the USA (excluding miscarriages) end in abortion.[1] Lutherans for Life, Priests for Life, Operation Rescue, Guttmacher Institute, the CDC and others publish pages of statistics and stories on their websites. Read them. Think about the 125 babies aborted during the length of our worship service, or the 31 during the length of this sermon. Ask yourself if these exploited and oppressed elect of God cried out when aborted because of the primary reason: they were inconvenient to the parents.

I concluded my first point by saying that once people heard Jesus’ parables, they experienced conversion and reconciliation, transformed society and changed the world. “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” Will he find that Lutherans Engage the World is a reality or simply a magazine?

Friends, these exploited and oppressed people created in the image of God have no voice and yet cry out for justice. As men and women who experienced conversion and reconciliation, our prayers and actions can transform society and change the world. As we approach our local elections, seriously consider not only people, but also political parties and policies that ignore or respond to those who cry out to God. Let your vote express justice and mercy for those who cry out to God yet have no voice.

Beyond the ballot box, pray and protest the inhumane slaughter of the innocents, and tax-payer funding of agencies that abort unborn persons. Do this, and know that when the Son of Man returns, he will find you engaged in prayer and in the practice of your faith. When He returns, may the peace of God that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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[1] See https://www.worldometers.info/abortions/