Pastor's Message

Sunday of August 27, 2017

8/28/2017

Readings: Romans 12:1-8, Matthew 16:13-20

To the Israelites, the Messiah was a big deal. Things in their world were, in a word, wrong. For generations they had ceased to be a nation, they were without their identity as “God’s people.” The longed for Messiah was going to come and change all that. He would come and restore things to God’s vision for God’s people--make things right again.
So when Jesus asks, “who do people say that I am?” it is a loaded question. And Simon Peter’s answer, “you are the messiah, the son of the living God!”, sounds like a challenge to Caesar. It is a title that he has been waited for, for generations, but it is a dangerous claim to make in Rome. It is one that has political connotations that go against everything Rome has set up.
What did Peter mean when he said “Messiah?” That’s hard to know for sure. But what do we mean by that title today? Did Jesus come to rally his people against the other nations?

Jesus is the messiah who came to deliver the whole of humanity, the whole of creation. He came to reconcile all things back to God. He is the Word of God itself, incarnate, for not just a specific people but for everyone. He is the redeemer of all God’s creation.
When we say that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, one of the things we mean is that he is God’s self-disclosure of who God is. Jesus came in love, God is a God of love. Jesus came eating with tax collectors and sinners, God is a forgiving God. Jesus associated with Samaritans and Canaanites, God is an inclusive God. Jesus succumbed to death on a cross. God is selfless in God’s love for us. Jesus Rose from the dead. God is a victorious God, a living God. And Jesus came to bring all things back to relationship with himself.
You are included in that relationship. Holy Baptism is our entrance into this mysterious union, with God, with Christ, with the whole community of faith.
In baptism we are symbolically drowned, symbolically washed, but truly made alive in faith, made clean by sheer gift of God in Christ Jesus.
The washing, the death and resurrection of baptism, unites us with Christ’s death and resurrection. In baptism, the Holy Spirit bonds us in love to God and to Jesus Christ. It inseparably bonds us with the very love of God, to God and Jesus Christ, and consequently, to one another, making us all members of Christ’s body. One body, and individually members of one another, members of Christ’s body.
The confession of Jesus Christ as messiah, as the son of the living God, is the rock on which we stand--it is the foundation on which the church is built.
Jesus Christ and his promises of forgiveness and new life that we find attached to the water of baptism. This is our tangible experience of God’s love and forgiveness in Christ.
Likewise we come to the table of our Lord. We meet him in the meal, his body in the bread and his blood in the wine. We taste and are filled with the forgiveness and everlasting life offered by Jesus. We are joined, again, with him and his love for all of creation.

What kind of Messiah is Jesus? He came to reconcile all things back to God. He is the Word of God itself, incarnate, for you; and the rock on which the church, his body is built. Through your baptism, in the eating of the holy meal, you are forgiven, made new, and joined to this savior, and to his mission of love and redemption for you, and for all creation.
Jesus loves you, and you belong to him. He has come to make the world right, bringing all things back to himself. He is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, and you are his church.

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Sunday of August 20

8/21/2017

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Reading: Isaiah 56:1, 6-8

The good news of Jesus Christ is a word that is very much needed today. It is a word that stands up against the hate, intolerance, bigotry, supremacy, that is so characteristic of our human condition and it names these things for what they are: sin. In small ways, and in larger ways, we all end up participating in the cycle of hate that is so counter to Jesus’ message of love. We participate willingly, sometimes. And unknowingly often. Many of the things we do, many of the laws and rules we make, encourage the suppression of some for the gain, comfort, or preference of others.
And we can’t avoid this entirely--we live as broken people in a broken world. There will be hurt. There will be suffering.
But the Holy Spirit gathers the church in many ways and places around the world. God gathers the church as an act of defiance against the divisions we as humans put in place.
Christ’s love is for all, and even in our brokenness he gathers his church for the sake of all the world, for the sake of all. Jesus Christ is the unquenchable light in the darkness, he is eternal life, he is God’s salvation. In Jesus Christ is reconciliation and wholeness for the world.

Today’s words from Isaiah:
“Thus says the Lord: Keep Justice. And do righteousness."
(alt. translation) "Maintain Justice. Do what is right.”

Jesus summed up for us righteousness and justice, that is, the law and the prophetic witness, “do to others as you would have them do to you.” The two parts of the great commandment are to love God with all you have, and love your neighbor as yourself, “do to others as you would have them do to you.” In other words:
Look out for one another.

The good news of Jesus Christ is not just something that passively frees a person and gets them a ticket into heaven. It is a word that changes everything. It challenges us to look at every other person and see what God sees: a beloved sinner, for whom Christ died on the cross. And the same Holy Spirit who raised Christ from the dead, empowers you to see as God sees, to live and love as Christ’s light in the darkness. The same Holy Spirit who raised Christ from the dead empowers you, his church, to keep justice, and do righteousness.

And that means looking out for one another. That means standing up to hateful words, actions, ideologies. That means recognizing the incalculable value that every person on this planet has in God’s eyes.

Maintaining Justice and doing righteousness means continuing to be unified in the only thing that can truly unify people--Jesus Christ. There is no law, no person, no nation, no set of values, that can bring all people together. Except Christ. The Holy Spirit alone has the power to unite, in Christ. And brought together in Christ, hate is defeated. Love triumphs. The darkness is revealed and is turned into light.

United with Christ, sin is exposed, forgiven, and it is even transformed into light for the sake of the world.
Only God, in Christ Jesus, has the power to transforms our fears and failings into life for the world. And this is the promise of God, and the work of the Holy Spirit, in God’s people gathered around the Word today.

Jesus Christ, the salvation of God, the righteousness of God has come. He is here. We do not go alone into the darkness of the world, for Christ, the light, goes with us. He is here, his body is gathered around the word of God. He is here, promising forgiveness, reconciliation, and renewed and everlasting life for us, and for the world.

Thus says the Lord, who gathers the outcasts and foreigners,
Who gathers the poor, and the despised, who gathers people of every sexual orientation, every skin color, every political allegiance, and every national origin...
who gathers all to himself:

Jesus Christ, the salvation and righteousness of God,
has come,

here,

for you.

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Sunday of August 13

8/14/2017

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Readings: 1 Kings 19:9-18, Romans 10:5-15, Matthew 14:22-33

Today is all about the Holy Spirit. The sermon in church was a bit of a Bible study, but here's what it all comes down to:

Faith comes through the Holy Spirit. And in faith we seek our Lord, we call upon him.
With ears of faith, we hear God in the silence, as Elijah did.
With hearts of faith we confess Jesus as Lord and can call upon him in our struggles, like Peter sinking like a rock in the sea.
With hearts full of faith we proclaim Jesus and we foster the healing and reconciliation which is in Christ for you and for all the world.

In light of the events at Charlottesville this weekend, it must be stated that God's message is one of love. Unity and peace are found only in Christ, though his kingdom which celebrates all diversity. Christ's kingdom is rest for the weary, acceptance for the unloved, justice for the oppressed. It is not gained through intimidation, fear, or violence. It is true that the church has not always seen this. But we must repent of our participation in systems that lead to violence and hate of any group. That is not how Jesus Christ implements his Kingdom. The Holy Spirit works in the world to bring Christ in love and peace, gaining a unity that can only manifest itself from a center in Jesus Christ; in Jesus Christ who stands profoundly with those who are targets of hate, who are valued less than others, or who are left to struggle on their own by others who have means to help.

The Holy Spirit, alive in Christ’s church, moving in and through your actions and your words, bears Jesus. It bears Christ and his gospel of love in the world--through your actions!
The things you do for your neighbor:
standing up for the forgotten,
welcoming the stranger,
smiling upon the unloved...
They are your, loud and clear, confessions of Christ as Lord. They are God’s Kingdom coming near.

Your loving actions are proclamation, much louder and more effective than mere words uttered behind stained glass windows.
These bear Christ to the world through power of the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit (again I'll say, nothing less than the Holy Spirit) empowers you to stand up to and reject fear, hatred, and intolerance; and the Holy Spirit empowers you to work for healing, reconciliation, and understanding.

Wherever you go to seek God, whether it’s in the loud rushing wind and raging fire, or in the still small voice, the silence, know that God is with you. God is with you in trials, and God is with you in good times. Be fed by Christ’s presence and know that God goes with you in the world to be Christ’s light, and to flavor the earth with the salt of Christ's Kingdom.

The Holy Spirit, grant us faith to call upon Christ in all things, to confess him and proclaim him in word and deed, to the glory of God the Father.

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Sunday of August 6

8/7/2017

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Readings: Isaiah 55:1-5, Psalm 145, Matthew 14:13-21

God our creator is also our sustainer. God provides the world daily bread. God didn’t simply make everything in seven days and stop. God continues to be involved and provides abundantly for the world.
And that’s just what Jesus did when he helped his disciples feed 5000+.
Jesus is bread for the world. The Bread of Life.
He, himself is abundant nourishment, for the body and the soul.
When Isaiah shouts, “listen carefully to me and eat what is good!” “incline your ear, and come to me!” He is speaking for God in Jesus Christ. “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your labor for that which does not satisfy?”
Look to God, look to Christ: the true provider of daily bread, and daily needs for body and soul.

Economics is all about abundance and scarcity. With more supply, the price goes down; and price increases as the supply diminishes.
In our world, we hear messages of scarcity all the time. Actually, it drives the economy really well if you can convince someone they need something that might not be there again tomorrow.
We put a lot of resources and effort into protecting and accumulating our goods because we never know how long we may have access to them. We live in fear of not having enough, of missing out.
We live in a world that tells us to accumulate, protect, and be frugal with our resources because it’s difficult to get enough. Not everybody has enough, resources are scarce. But God says differently.
“You open wide your hand and satisfy the need of every living thing!” We pray this after our offering, every week. Do you believe it? It is true. God provides in abundance. God is a generous God.

Isaiah announces, calls, like a vendor at the fair--or a baseball game. He makes the audacious call to come and buy wine and milk without money, without price. Buy without price?!
Even Jesus’ disciples urge Jesus to let the crowds go and buy food. But Jesus tells his disciples: no, you give them what they need. Give to them without price!
Through Christ, our generosity springs out of love for God and neighbor and strikes a stark contrast to the message of scarcity that is so ingrained in our capitalist economic upbringing.
Without money, without price, Jesus fed 5000 men, besides women and children. And all ate and were filled. With leftovers! Bread of life in abundance.
In God’s kingdom there is enough. And I assure you that the kingdom is here. Jesus feeds us with himself, in bread and wine without cost, through living waters of eternal life. Then he feeds and nourishes the world through us: through our generosity, our love, our gifts of money, time, and our trades. Through our daily acts of love in our family, our friendships.
Jesus is bread. He give us life. He fills us in body and spirit. He fills the world, body and spirit, through his love.
Hear God’s promise that in Christ there is enough, hear and be nourished by the one who came so that the world might have abundant life, eternal life, through him.
Go and share the good news of God’s abundance and abundant love. Share it abundantly in your speech and in your generosity.

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Sunday of August 27, 2017

Readings: Romans 12:1-8, Matthew 16:13-20

Sunday of August 20

Reading: Isaiah 56:1, 6-8

Sunday of August 13

Readings: 1 Kings 19:9-18, Romans 10:5-15, Matthew 14:22-33

Sunday of August 6

Readings: Isaiah 55:1-5, Psalm 145, Matthew 14:13-21

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