Motivation

[This was the message for this evening's Ash Wednesday worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
Tonight’s gospel lesson is Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21. Here, Jesus tells us things like, “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them…” (Matthew 6:1). 

And, “So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets...But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret.” (Matthew 6:2-4) And, “when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others...But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen…” (Matthew 6:5-6). 

And “[w]hen you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do...But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting…” (Matthew 6:16-18)

Now, if we read Jesus’ words superficially, we might think that He’s contradicting something He said to His followers--including you and me--just one chapter earlier. There, Jesus says, “...let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16) In this verse, Jesus is telling us to live our faith in Him and our love for Him out loud, “let-everyone-see-the-good-we-do-in-His-name” loud. 

Yet, in tonight’s lesson, He tells us to: give to help the poor, just don’t announce it to the world; live with a right respect for the God Who saves us by grace through faith in Jesus, just don’t call attention to your righteousness; pray for everyone, just don’t call attention to your praying; fast, just don’t let anyone see what you’re sacrificing. 

So, which is it: Live your faith loudly in the public square or refuse to call attention to your own faithfulness?

The answer, friends, is both. 

We are to live out our faith in Jesus out loud for all the world to see. As Jesus says elsewhere, “Whoever acknowledges me before others, I will also acknowledge before my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 10:32) 

That means living our gratitude to God for saving us from sin and death by the faith in the crucified and risen Jesus Christ that His Holy Spirit and His Word have created within us. 

It means trusting in Christ to love God completely, to love our neighbors as we love ourselves, to love each other in the Church with the same devotion Christ showed for us on the cross, to live each day in the light of Jesus’ resurrection promise. 

And it will mean giving to the poor, praying for others--including our enemies, fasting from--that is avoiding--those things that can get in the way of our relationship with Jesus, and telling others about the good news--the gospel--of new and everlasting life for all who follow Jesus.

But we also are not to live out our faith to call attention to ourselves. When I’m out to dinner and I pray over my meal--and I realize that at the Famous Restaurant in Centerville last night, sitting there in my clerical collar, I forgot to pray--but when I do pray over my meal in a public place, I’m to do it not for any audience around me, but for an audience of One: the God I know in Jesus. When I fast, I'm not to do it so that I can create an impression on others. When I give to the poor, I'm not to do it with an eye to how good it makes me look to the world, only to honor the God Who gives me everything I have.

It all boils down to motivation. 

Do we do the things that Jesus commands--things like love God, love neighbor, make disciples, worship with God’s people every week--to point to Jesus or to point to ourselves? 

Do we do the things that Jesus commends--things like praying, giving to the poor, fasting--to give Jesus control over our lives or just to control what others think of us? 

Listen: You can get the whole world convinced that you are the most wonderful, devoted, loving, faithful follower of Jesus by doing the kinds of play-acting Jesus condemns in tonight’s lesson. You can be known for your generosity, your beautiful-sounding prayers, your notorious fasting from the pleasures of the world. But if your motive in all these and other religious acts is anything other than honoring the God Who saves you through Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, God is not impressed. 

In fact, God will condemn us for using Him to build up our reputations at Christ’s expense. Hebrews 4:13 reminds us, “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.” 

You cannot fool God! That’s why our motivation is so important.

Let’s be honest though. 

None of us acts from purely pristine or holy motives. My sinful nature reminds me that when I pray in a restaurant, others may see me doing it. As long as I live on this earth, the old Adam in me will try to mess up everything. 

Compelled by Jesus’ grace love and empowered by the Holy Spirit, I’ll do something for another person without a thought of how it may look to others...until later, I think, “That’s a really good thing I did.” 

And it happens to preachers too. In the weeks before virtually every Sunday for the past thirty-five-plus years, Ann can tell you, I have agonized over what God wanted me to say in my sermons. Deep inside, I know that I have nothing to say. I offer up desperate, pleading prayers to God to help me discern what I should tell you about His Word for that week. God has always been faithful; He has always given me what I should say, even when I get in God's way while I preach. I always thank God for giving me a sermon. But it takes just one person to tell me, "Good sermon," and I'm thinking to myself, "Wow! I really am good."

So, our motives for doing the things God calls us to do always get clouded by our sinful selves.

But just because the devil, the world, and our sinful selves constantly remind us that our motives aren’t totally pure doesn’t mean that we should refrain from living our faith in Jesus for all the world to see.

Don’t be afraid to live your faith out loud! 

Don’t be afraid tonight to stop at a store or somewhere else with the ashy cross still on your forehead. 

The apostle Peter tells Christians, “...in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.” (1 Peter 3:15)

As we begin Lent on this Ash Wednesday, 2020, I’d like to ask you to consider doing the following things, not as works to earn God's favor, but as ways to open your heart and life to Jesus working and living within you. 

• 1. Ask Jesus to help you follow Him more closely. 
• 2. Ask Jesus to help you live for Him more devotedly and openly.
• 3. Ask Jesus to keep your motives for your acts of devotion focused on Him and not on yourself, to grow closer to Him and not to impress others. 
• 4. Ask Jesus for forgiveness and help when you see your motives turn selfish. 
• 5. As you repent and put yourself in Jesus’ hands, know that you belong to God, not because of anything you do, but totally because of what Jesus Christ did for you on the cross. 
• 6. Ask God to daily remind you that, by grace through faith in Christ, You belong to the God Whose opinion of you is infinitely and eternally more important than what anyone else may think of you! (Even more important than what you think of you.)

At the end of our lesson for tonight, Jesus says, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19-21) 

In this Lenten season, may God plant within each of us a deepened desire to honor Him Who, in Jesus Christ, has given us everlasting life with God, a treasure greater than anything--including the good opinions of others--that this dying universe could ever give us. 

May we repent and trust in Jesus in response to the Word and the Sacraments and may we learn to trust Jesus always. Amen

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

A Strange Way to Live

[This was shared during worship with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, this morning.]

Matthew 5:38-48
I was meeting with a group of fellow pastors when one of them brought up the subject of committed Christians they had known. “Being around people like that,” this pastor said, “always inspires me.” We all agreed. Then, one of our number said something I’ll never forget. “You know,” he said, “every committed Christian I’ve ever known is…sort of strange.” He didn’t mean it as an insult. He meant that the committed Christians he’d known weren’t afraid of being different, weren’t afraid, as Jesus Himself put it, to let their “light so shine before [the world]…that [others]…see [their] good works and give glory to [God] in heaven.” I think my colleague was right: People committed to following Jesus Christ are strange.

And that can be hard.

Australian Graham Stains and his wife, Gladys, became missionaries in India in 1984. There, among other things, they oversaw a leprosy hospital. In January, 1999, Graham and his sons, Philip and Timothy, 10 and 8, traveled to a village called Manoharpur. As Graham had done for 14 straight years, the three went there to provide Bible teaching along with training in health and hygiene. Graham knew that some of the tribal Hindus in the area opposed any Christian teaching. There had been at least sixty attacks on churches in the territory between 1986 and 1998. But felt called to share with them the Gospel of new, everlasting life with God for all who repent for sin and believe in Jesus. He also wanted to serve the people there. It was cold when Graham and the boys arrived. They slept in a station wagon. One night, about 50 people approached the vehicle, “screaming and swinging axes and other weapons.” They beat the missionary and his sons, put straw under their station wagon, and torched it.

If I had been in the position of Gladys Stains, Graham’s widow, I fear that I would have dissolved into a fierce hatred for the people in that region of India. I would, I fear, have become angry with God. Were I in her position, I think I might have looked for revenge. And I likely would have gotten the next plan out of India.

But Gladys responded strangely. She and a daughter, Esther, remained in India, continuing to share the Good News of Jesus and to minister to lepers until 2004, when Esther went to medical school and Gladys left to be near her.

In 2005, Gladys’ strange way of life was recognized when she was given “the Padma Shri award for distinguished service,” India’s equivalent to a knighthood in England. Gladys even said that though she loved and missed her husband and sons, she saw it as an honor to them that God had counted them worthy to give their lives in the cause of sharing the Gospel with those who, as evidenced by their cold-blooded murder of three innocent believers, so clearly needed that Gospel.

For a world that values self-preservation and self-promotion, Gladys’ faith is strange. But in our Gospel lesson for today, Jesus tells us that it’s strange people like these who populate his kingdom and He wants us all to be like them.

Please pull out the Celebrate inserts from today’s bulletin and turn to this morning’s Gospel lesson, Matthew 5:38-48. Here, Jesus continues the Sermon on the Mount. Read the first verses of the passage along with me silently, please:

[Jesus says:] You have heard that it was said, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you. 

Jesus begins here by citing Leviticus, chapter 24. It says, “Anyone who maims another shall suffer the same injury in return; fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; the injury inflicted is the injury to be suffered.”

Let’s be clear about two things at this point.

• First, God in the Old Testament is not commanding the rough justice of revenge. That’s not what “eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth” means. 
• Second, God in the New Testament—Jesus—is not overturning Old Testament law. 

In Old Testament times, someone might steal a loaf of bread, for example, and be sentenced to having their hand removed. Or they might perjure themselves and be executed for it. In other words, punishments exceeded the crimes.

God gave the "eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" command to prevent that from happening. He wanted to ensure that the punishments meted out to people never exceeded the gravity of their wrongs. Revenge is never something human beings are to administer.

Jesus amplifies God’s Old Testament intentions with the commandment He gives to anyone who would follow Him in today's Gospel lesson. Never resist people who do evil to you, Jesus says. Keep doing good even when the world does its worst to you.

• In Jesus’ day, being backhanded across the cheek was the act of an arrogant person who thought himself superior to another. The natural reaction for the victim is to slap back. But Jesus says, “Don’t stoop to seeking revenge. Maintain your dignity, rely on Me, and offer your other cheek as well.” 
• In Jesus’ day, people were even more likely to take others to court than people are today. And in his day, most people owned only two articles of clothing: a cloak and a coat. One served as an outer garment, the other was like underwear. If someone sues you, Jesus says, don’t fight back. Let them take both your garments. Even then, you’ll remain clothed in the grace, love, and dignity of God. 
• In Jesus’ day, Roman soldiers who had something to be carried could, at will, pick an ordinary person from off of the streets and force them to act as a pack mule for one mile. Jesus says that if you’re forced to carry something for a mile, confound those who treat you as a slave and volunteer to serve them for an extra mile. 

Jesus goes on to command us to give to those who beg and to loan to those who wish to borrow.

Folks, this is a strange way to live.

And Jesus makes this way of life sound even stranger in the latter part of our lesson. Look at what He commands in verses 43 and 44:

You have heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy." But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven… 

One question that Jesus' words may bring to our minds is this: Why exactly would anyone want to live the strange lifestyle that Jesus describes here?

Well, it isn’t because, if you hang in there, the world will recognize what a wonderful person you are. For every Gladys Stains, who received a major award from the country where she rendered her service to Jesus Christ, there are millions of believers who are put down, despised, shunned, and forever ignored for being faithful.

One good reason for pursuing the strange life style of loving God with our whole beings and of loving our neighbors as ourselves is that, in fact, those who live any other way aren’t really living.

Author Lois Cheney tells a parable about a man who saw that love was hard and so kept to himself; saw that the striving for high ideals was strenuous and so put his head down and focused on surviving from day to day; saw that serving and giving to others got one embroiled in challenges they wouldn’t otherwise have and so just took care of himself. When the man died, he approached God and said, “Here I am, Lord: undiminished, unmarred, and unsoiled, no worse for the wear. Here’s my life” “Life?” God asked. “What life?”

The strange life of love in which we keep on loving even when others—even others in Christ’s own church—may hate us, is, truly the only real way to live. Every other way of living is a living death: no risks, no challenges, no fulfillment, no God.

But how do we live such a life? Just this past week in an email many of you received, I shared a story of Martin Luther’s. It’s worth repeating. Luther spoke of what happened when the devil tempted him to sin. “When [the devil] comes knocking upon the door of my heart and asks, ‘Who lives here?’ the dear Lord Jesus goes to the door and says, ‘Martin Luther used to live here but he has moved out. Now I live here.’ The devil, seeing the nail prints in His hands, and the pierced side, takes flight immediately.”

The strange and beautiful way of life Jesus commands in today’s lesson—the way of love that refuses to take revenge and stands strong in the power of God—is possible when we let Jesus Christ, the One Who died and rose to give us life—into the center of our lives. You see, Jesus lived the perfect life of love He describes throughout the Sermon on the Mount and if we will let Him into our every decision, our every moment of temptation, our every relationship, He will come to live inside of us and change our lives today and for all eternity.

Some of you have heard me say that there’s a prayer I offer up to God whenever someone vexes me, or is unkind to me, or just annoys me. First of all, I tell God how I’m feeling. Then I make a request. “Lord,” I say, “I find myself incapable of loving this person right now. But I know that you love him or her, just as you love me in spite of how annoying or wrong I can be. You sent your Son to die and rise for them, just like You sent Him for me. So, please God, love this person through me. Grant that they’ll only experience Your love from me.”

You know the strange thing? God has answered that prayer every time I’ve offered it. And, here’s something else: As I’ve let Jesus into those relationships in this way, God often has transformed those relationships and made a way for me to truly come to love as I love myself the very people I once found so impossible to love.

If you’re serious about living the life style of the Sermon on the Mount, there’s only one way for that to happen and that’s to let the Preacher of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus Christ, be the Master of your whole life.

Jesus will take up residence in your life.

He will give you a strange way to live.

But truly, it’s the only way to live!

Share the Light!

[This was shared during worship with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, this morning.]

Isaiah 49:1-7
John 1:29-42
One of the problems people living in 2011 have when we read the Old Testament book of Isaiah is something the literary critics call its richness. Unlike most of the things we read each day, in any given passage of Isaiah, there may be words about more than just one thing. Sometimes, a passage may be about three things at once. It confuses us. Let me explain.

Last Sunday, I mentioned that tucked among the promises Isaiah received from God about ancient Israel’s impending release from slavery to the Babylonian Empire, were promises about the Servant Who would be sent by God to free more than just Israel from humanity’s greatest enemies: sin, death, and futility. The Servant would come to set things right for all who would welcome His rule over their lives, including you and me.

There are four "Servant Songs" in Isaiah. Today’s first lesson is one of them. As we consider this passage, along with our Gospel lesson for today, I want you to keep the image of an hourglass in your mind. It may help us to understand some of that confusing richness we encounter in Isaiah this morning.

When you stand an hourglass on end, it’s wide at the top, tapers to a narrow shape in the middle, then widens out again at the bottom. If we mapped God’s mission to bring humanity new life, from say, the moment He delivered Israel from slavery in Egypt about 1000 years before Isaiah, followed it through Jesus some 600 years after Isaiah, and then to the Church today, our map would look like an hourglass. The top of the hourglass would be the descendants of Abraham, more numerous than the stars in the heavens, before the coming of the Servant. The bottom of the hourglass would be chock-full of those who are spiritual descendants of Abraham through their faith in the Servant foretold by Isaiah.

Both ancient Israel and the Church of Jesus Christ were called to be God’s “light to the nations.” But, in a phrase used by Lutheran theologian Carl Braaten, “the flaming center” of history, the One Whose life is the light of the world, the narrow center of the hourglass, is Jesus Christ.

All the voices that spoke for God before Christ was born pointed ultimately to Him as our only hope for forgiveness and life, the Messiah who would come into our world to set the lives of all who believe in Him aright.

“Long ago,” the preacher in Hebrews said to his fellow Jewish Christians sometime before 70AD, “God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets, but in these last days He has spoken to us by a Son…”

Jesus, the Servant Messiah, Who suffered and died to erase sin and death as powers over our lives and rose again to rend eternity open for all who believe in Him, is God’s ultimate self-expression, His Word of love and power and restoration for fallen people and our fallen universe.

The Church is commissioned to share Christ’s light, to make disciples of Jesus Christ, and to do so by being completely focused on Jesus, the Servant King. The Celebrate introduction to our lesson from Isaiah that Ann read a few moments ago is right as far as it goes. It identifies the Servant as Israel, saying that in the lesson “the Servant Israel speaks for herself.” But that’s only part of the story.

One of my favorite seminary professors, Tryg Skarsten, once recalled looking out onto a harbor at night. A large light, visible for miles, stood high over the harbor to guide ships coming in. Strung out into the harbor for thousands of yards were smaller lights. Each of them, Tryg said, were connected to the larger light from which they derived their power. Ancient Israel was God’s servant, of course, and it was a light to the nations. But it derived its capacity to be God’s servant and its power to be God’s light for the world from the true flaming center of life, “the Light of the world,” Jesus, to Whose coming Isaiah and other prophets pointed.

That’s why contemporary New Testament scholar Christine Roy Yoder writes that Christian readers cannot read our first lesson without seeing Jesus. Please pull out the Celebrate inserts. Read along with me silently:

Listen to me, O coastlands, pay attention, you peoples from far away! The Lord called me before I was born, while I was in my mother’s womb he named me. He made my mouth like a sharp sword, in the shadow of his hand he hid me; he made me a polished arrow, in his quiver he hid me away. 

Jesus, as the Gospel of John tells us, is “the Word of God.” He is God’s Word to you and me. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus tell us that every one of our lives is of infinite value to God. God so loved you—you personally and individually—that He sent Jesus to take your punishment for sin so that all who turn from sin and take Him as the Lord and ruler over their lives, trusting their lives to Him, will have life forever with God.

If you’re anything like me, you don’t mind the message of the salvation Jesus brings, but you may not be so hot to make Him the ruler over your life. Jesus as Lord will sometimes tell us to do things we don't want to do. He'll sometimes tell us not to do things that we want to do. Let’s face it: Jesus can cramp our styles. When Jesus was eight days old, a man named Simeon spotted Him in the temple in Jerusalem, where Joseph and Mary had taken the baby to be presented to God. Simeon declared that Jesus was exactly Who Israel (and he himself) had been waiting for at the top of the hourglass. Simeon quoted verse 6 of our lesson from Isaiah, calling Jesus “a light” for the nations. But then, Simeon told Mary, Jesus’ mother, “This child is destined for the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed…”

Will we take Jesus as our King as well as our Savior or will we oppose Him?

Will we trust or selectively ignore the Word of God in the Bible and the Word of God enfleshed in Jesus?

Those aren’t abstract philosophical questions, but urgent ones on which our eternal destinies hang.

True story: Santosh was a blacksmith in India. He was part of the Dalit, the untouchables, the permanent underclass who are denied access to food, housing, clothing, education, or health care. Along with most of his people, Santosh worshiped his Biskarma (the tools he used in his work), thinking that it was them that gave him life. And Santosh led a miserable life, wasting what little money he had on getting drunk. When he came home, he beat his wife and children, who dreaded his very presence in their home.

One day, two missionaries who saw how troubled he was, invited Santosh to church. Surprisingly, the next Sunday, he took a place in the back of the sanctuary. The music was in his language and in a style he liked. Santosh kept coming back, intrigued by the word about Jesus sandwiched between this music he enjoyed.

Eventually, he gave his life to Christ and wanted to share the Good News about Him with his fellow untouchables. With the missionaries’ help, he got a scholarship to study at a Bible college. The day before he was to leave for college, a large group of villagers confronted Santosh. They threatened to beat him if he didn’t return to the worship of Biskarma and renounced his faith in Christ. Santosh didn't back down, knowing that Jesus had saved him not only from sin and death, but from the meaningless life that had driven him to drink.

After Santosh went to Bible college, the villagers threatened Santosh’s family and they eventually had to be moved to safety with him. Today, Santosh is the pastor of a thriving congregation that bravely (and joyfully) invites other untouchables to come and see and follow Jesus.

In the world and even in the Church, Jesus and His Word are signs that are spoken against. That’s no surprise. That’s because, as Hebrews 4:12, says, “…the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And before Him no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the One to Whom we must render an account.”

Jesus is the Lord Who said that while we are saved by grace, He had not removed a single one of the Ten Commandments. If we show contempt for the commands in God’s Word, we also show contempt for Him Who is God’s Word. We cannot take Jesus as Savior if we don’t also take Him as Lord. We cannot be free of what enslaves us until we surrender to Christ the way Santosh did. 

Now, look at Isaiah 49:6 on the Celebrate insert. These are words from God the Father:

It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.

Israel was not the incubator for the Servant Jesus just for itself. Through Jesus Christ, the truth of God’s love for all humanity and His offer of eternal reconciliation with God, would go global. And that’s where you and I come in.

In our Gospel lesson today, when two disciples of John the Baptist, one of them Andrew, brother of Simon Peter, wanted to learn more about Jesus, Jesus issued a simple invitation, “Come and see.”

Later, a man named Philip told someone named Nathanael that he had found the long-awaited Servant-King. Nathanael was skeptical. Philip didn’t argue. He just said, “Come and see.”

Simon, Philip, you, and I are all at the bottom of the hourglass of God's salvation history. We are the small lights ignited by the cross and empty tomb of Jesus and by the Holy Spirit with whom baptized Christians are filled. Our power for living comes from Jesus. Jesus tells us to “let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven,” words we use in our Baptismal service.

The Servant Jesus came to save a dying world from itself, to save us from ourselves. He invites all to follow Him, be reconciled to God, and live eternally.

This week, this month, this year, be a light that helps others to come and see Jesus. God wants to fill eternity with people who have turned from sin and death and turned to Jesus for life and eternity. You are the lights God wants to use to guide others to the true Light of the nations, Jesus Christ. Jesus wants to fill His kingdom with those who have come and seen and believed in Him.

So, this is my simple plea to you this morning:

• Share Jesus. 
• Share Jesus with words and actions. 
• Share Jesus with honesty, not as self-righteous egotists, but as forgiven sinners grateful for the grace of God. 
• Share Jesus so that all the world will come and see what a wonderful God we have! 
• Share Jesus so that all the world will have peace with God and with themselves today and in eternity.

Amen!

Renewing Rural Life

[This message was shared this evening with the Hocking County Granges as they commemorated Rural Life Sunday in the chapel of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio.]

After I learned that today is Rural Life Sunday for the Hocking County Granges, I decided I need to poke around on the Internet to learn just what that entailed. I did know a little about the Grange. My mother-in-law grew up in Wellston, where her father was deeply involved with the Grange. It was a center for the community’s social life and an advocate for rural and farm interests.

But what, after all, does a city slicker who grew up in Columbus and graduated from a little college on North High Street—you may have heard of Ohio State—know about rural life?

A little bit. During my seminary years, Ann, our then-one year old son (he's now 26), and I lived in Benzie County, Michigan. I don't know whether this is still the case, but back in those days, Benzie County was the smallest Michigan county in population. Year round, 11, 500 people called the place home. But when the snowbirds came back to stay in the cabins on one of the county's 28 named lakes, the population ballooned to 36,000. The biggest town had about 1800 people. (Several years after we lived there, the ABC radio news network reported that Benzie County had finally gotten its first traffic light!) In spite of the loss of many businesses and industries, people still cherished and strove to hold onto living there. We learned while there that there's something special about life in rural communities where people know and look out for one another.

This was underscored during the six years I spent as pastor of Bethlehem Lutheran Church near Okolona, in northwestern Ohio. But I learned even more than that. It was while living at Okolona that my faith in Jesus Christ grew more than at any other comparable period of my faith life. In a very real sense, the people of my first parish taught me how to live as a Christian in the everyday world.

One of my teachers was John Baden. John was deep into his seventies when I met him, long retired from farming, but still in love with rural living. “You know, Pastor,” he told me, “if you’re a farmer, you have to have a lot of faith. You have no control over the sun and rain. You have to trust that God will provide.”

That’s really true of anyone who seeks to build a life in the Hocking County countryside or in small towns like Logan, Gore, McArthur, Rockbridge, or other communities that dot our area. You have to trust that God is going to renew towns and villages and rural areas just as He renews the earth every spring.

In fact, on my prayer list each day is a petition for not just the spiritual renewal of Logan and Hocking County, but also for its economic revival. I’ve come to appreciate the rural life as a life that helps people grow strong in their faith and in their love for neighbor and that allows them to enjoy a life less stressful than that lived by big city dwellers, a life in which it’s easier to see the stars in the nighttime sky and the power of God reaching right into our daily existences.

I want places like the communities of Hocking County to be able to provide the opportunities for making a living that will allow young people to stay in Logan, Gore, McArthur, and Rockbridge. I’m praying and I’m trusting that God will answer these prayers.

But in the meantime, how do we live?

In my exploration on the Internet, I ran across the thoughts of Judy Pressler, one time state chaplain of the Grange in Pennsylvania. Her message was called, “Step Into the Light of Springtime.” I really loved what she wrote. Listen to some of it:

…Spring. That is on everyone’s mind…how hardy those little daffodils, crocus and hyacinths are. They have peeked their heads out of the ground a couple of times already only to get slapped down again with a cold snap and get covered with snow and ice…

They are a good example of [a Scripture verse…Matthew 5:16 [where Jesus says:] ‘Let your light so shine before [others], that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven’…

Now, this is a particularly important verse for we Lutherans. It’s the verse we use every time someone is baptized. We present the baptized person, whether an adult or a child, with those words, urging them to live their faith in Jesus out loud in public. You see, Jesus and the Bible are insistent that our faith in Him is not a private, personal matter. Faith in Christ is a very public matter. We’re to love our neighbor, for example, out where the whole wide world can see it. We’re to tell others the Good News that God so loves them that He sent His only Son Jesus and whoever believes in Him will live with God forever. “A city on a hill,” Jesus once said, “cannot be hid.” Instead, people from miles around can see its light and its life. Similarly, our relationship with Jesus can’t be hidden. Like the daffodils and hyacinth that blossom like crazy in the spring, we’re to let the world know that Jesus is our Lord and our everything.

Jesus will be seen in the way we treat our spouses and our children, in the way we get along with our neighbors, in the courtesy we display for people while driving on Route 33 or at the meat counter in the Kroger store.

The wonderful thing about rural life for the follower of Jesus Christ is that it’s easier to have an impact, easier for others to see how much our Lord means to us.

The difficult thing about rural life for the follower of Jesus is that it’s easier to have an impact, easier for others to see us being hypocritical or, as is true for all of us, how we occasionally fall on our faces and live as something less than Christians.

But even when we fall on our faces, the great thing is that our neighbors will be able to see that, unlike an often cruel and heartless world, the God we know in Jesus Christ forgives us our sins and gives us brand new starts. God brushes us off and tells us He still loves us!

Judy Pressler also writes:

Those beautiful, fragile spring flowers sure do persevere to show off their beauty and bring a bright light after the long dark wintry days.

They won’t stay hidden under a blanket of snow very long! We can take a lesson from them.

Oh sure, we will get enthused with Spring chores: cleaning the windows, fertilizing the lawns, and washing our cars. That may be a first step....getting everything bright and shiny. But there is another step involved. We gotta let our lights and lives shine in ways that will get others curious about Who generates our inner light. We can’t let busyness, pride, gossip, jealousy and all those other “snows” cover our beautiful joy inside. The love in our hearts should melt all those distractions and serve as a beautiful light of hope in the future.

I agree. As we pray and work for the spiritual and economic renewal of our community, we need to let others see the light of Jesus Christ’s love shining brightly in our lives. When others see Jesus shining brightly in our love and service in Christ’s Name, they will be given an indispensable gift: hope.

Last week, a professor of meteorology named Edward Lorenz died. Lorenz was the scientist who came up with what’s known as “chaos theory,” called “the third great scientific revolution of the 20th. Century.” In a nutshell, chaos theory holds that “very small changes…can have very large and unexpected consequences.” The 1972 article in which Lorenz explained his theory was subtitled, “Does the Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings in Brazil Set Off a Tornado in Texas?” Lorenz answered his own question with a resounding, “Yes!” (See here. Subscription necessary.)

And today, what I want to tell you is that as we consider how best to strengthen and renew rural life here in our community, never underestimate the impact of a life faithfully lived for Jesus Christ here and now.

Even the smallest act done in Jesus’ Name can have a positive impact. Mother Teresa had her own version of Lorenz’s theory. She said, “Small things done in great love will change the world.”

You can believe that! Some years ago, I read an exchange of letters between a young woman who had attended a Christian rock concert and a member of the band she saw perform. The young woman revealed that she had never heard of the Christian band until her friend asked her one afternoon to go hear them that night. It just happened that at the moment her friend called, the young woman was planning her own suicide. She was going to take her own life that night. When her friend called, she thought, “I’ll go to this concert and then commit suicide afterward.” At the concert, she and her friend sat in one of the first few rows. Sometime during the evening, the member of the band to whom she wrote her letter looked at her…and smiled. I knew then, she wrote, that I wouldn’t follow through on taking my own life. Isn’t God amazing?, the rock musician wrote. God can take something as small and insignificant as a smile and assure us that He loves us. That one single smile saved a young woman’s life. Small things done in great love can change the world!

Own Jesus’ words as your own personal motto and mission statement, “Let your light so shine before [others], that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” If a butterfly in Brazil can set off a tornado in Texas, imagine the impact on Hocking County when you and I let Jesus Christ be seen in all that we say and do and are! Live and pray, serve and work in Jesus’ Name and the lives of all you know will be bettered not just today, but for all eternity!

The Call to Neighborliness

[Today, I gave this message (and led worship) at Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio. After the service, the congregation met and voted to call me to become their next pastor. So, after seventeen years as pastor of Friendship Lutheran Church in Amelia, Ohio, I'll become Saint Matthew's pastor on November 1. It will be hard to say goodbye to all the wonderful people of Friendship. But both my wife and I feel certain that God is calling us to Saint Matthew and we're looking forward to this new adventure!]

Luke 16:19-31
In the story Jesus tells in today's Gospel lesson, we see a wealthy man who willfully separated himself from the poor, diseased man at his gates. Jesus says that by walling himself off from Lazarus, the wealthy man also walled himself off from God. And from God’s grace. That's because God’s forgiveness and new life cannot penetrate hearts hardened to the needs of neighbors.

The story ends with both Lazarus, who is the poor man, and the rich man, whose name is never given, dead, but experiencing different fates. The wealthy man is in torment in Hades. Meanwhile Lazarus, the one who in this life had craved crumbs from the rich man’s table, who was so helpless that he couldn’t fend off the wild dogs that licked his sores, and whose name means ironically, God helps, enjoys a feast in heaven reclining next to Abraham, the father of Biblical faith.

Anybody who studies Luke, the New Testament book from which Jesus’ parable is taken today, can tell you that Luke loves to underscore Jesus’ teaching that God commands the haves to share with the have-nots. Caring for the poor and the hungry is part of what it means to fulfill God’s command to love our neighbor.

But there are, I think, two big mistakes that people make when interpreting this parable. The first big mistake is to think that Jesus is only talking about caring for the poor here. It’s about much more than that!

At the end of the tour of the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., which presents a history of Adolf Hitler’s campaign to exterminate the Jews of Europe, there’s an amphitheater. There, on a large screen, you can see Holocaust survivors talk about what happened at the ends of their internments in the Nazi camps. One woman featured in the amphitheater video tells of receiving word that the Americans were nearing their camp. She and the other internees had no idea what to expect of these new conquerors. But they were terrified. After all, to their Nazi guards, they had, for years, been nothing but cattle. They were throwaway people. They suspected that they always would be. Fearful, she and the other prisoners huddled in their barracks. Soon, an American captain walked into her barrack. She and the other women there stepped back from him, like animals who expected abuse. “It’s alright,” he explained in their language. “We’ve come to set you free.” They were skeptical. But the captain was insistent. Finally, this young woman, emaciated and filthy from her years of deprivation, decided to trust the captain’s words. She stepped forward. And then he did something unexpected: He opened the door for her. “Nobody had opened a door for me in years,” she remembers. She began to weep.

In Jesus’ parable, He says, literally, that Lazarus had been thrown onto the doorstep of the rich man. We don’t know who threw Lazarus there. But we can guess it wasn’t anyone who wanted to help him. Likely it was somebody tired of seeing him cluttering their streets and their lives. They probably thought that they could not and certainly would not help this nobody. So, like the Jews thrown into Hitler’s death camps, Lazarus became a throwaway person. He was someone no one else wanted.

There are lots of throwaway people, people no one else wants. And not all of them are in death camps. Not all live in places like Darfur or Burma. Some of them are people we live with, work with, go to school with. They may be people we try to avoid every day.

Father Andrew Greeley presents the story of a new girl who came to the seventh grade at a school far from her hometown. Blair had come to live with her aunt and uncle after her parents, brother, and sister were killed in a car accident. Blair had managed to roll out from under the car and was not physically damaged. But the trauma of the event caused her to withdraw into a protective shell when dealing with others. Most of the seventh grade girls thought she was weird. Some of them laughed when she misspelled a word or left her book at home or did anything that they considered “uncool.” They, of course, considered themselves to be really cool. But, Katie, one of the “cool” girls felt sorry for Blair and befriended her. She told her friends that they should be ashamed of themselves for the way they were treating Blair. “After all,” she said, “how would you feel if your family all died in an accident?"

At its deepest level, Jesus’ parable calls you and me to treat others with simple neighborliness. This is what Katie did for Blair. This is what the American captain did when he opened the barracks door for the Holocaust internee. It’s what the rich man in Jesus’ parable could have done for Lazarus.

Simple neighborliness is what Jesus calls all of us who are blessed to be God’s children to give to life’s throwaway people. We must avoid the mistake of thinking that Jesus is only talking about giving money to the poor here. He’s talking, in part, about being neighborly to all who have needs, including the poor.

I love what Pastor Brian Stoffregen says about this parable. Everybody expresses concern about the poor and needy and we should. But shouldn't we also talk about helping those who are "rich and needy"? And, how about those who are middle class and needy? The fact is that everybody in this sanctuary this morning and everybody we know has needs which God may be calling us to fill. Neighborliness does that!

But there's a second big mistake people make in translating Jesus’ parable to their everyday lives. This one does involve money and the poor. The second big mistake is for us to think that Jesus is only telling wealthy people to share their money or possessions with others. We can say to ourselves, “This parable doesn’t apply to me. I'm not Bill Gates!”

But the fact is that Christian neighborliness does call all of us to share what we have with the poor. Often, we’ll be able to do this through our offerings to the hunger relief efforts of the Lutheran Church. Or through contributions of food to local food banks. But sometimes, we’ll be confronted with needy people who, like Lazarus in Jesus’ parable, are right in front of us.

Last year, my wife, my mother-in-law, our son, and I visited Cleveland to see the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It was a beautiful Labor Day morning as we walked to the Hall from our hotel. The streets were fairly deserted. On the way, we encountered a woman. “Do you have change for a ten?” I thought I heard her ask. It wasn’t Christian of me, but I was relieved. I never carry more than a few bucks and I knew that all I had was a five. I wouldn’t have to stop and fork over any cash. "Sorry," I said, "I can't help you."

"Wait a minute," the woman told us, "I'm no bum, I'm a nurse." The phrase was repeated three times as though part of a well-rehearsed routine. "My car broke down and I need to get to work. Buses don't run as often today and I need to get a taxi." I was ready to move on. But my wife asked the woman how much she needed. "Ten dollars." My wife opened her purse and handed the woman the money. As we walked on, my wife explained, "She may well have taken me. But if so, she'll have to answer for it. I don't want to have to answer for not giving to somebody who might really have a need." (She's the real theologian in the family.)

The needs of Lazarus would have been obvious to the rich man in Jesus’ parable had he looked up from his sumptuous dinner and beyond his gates long enough.

If we take the time, we too can see needs right here in Logan and in Hocking County, needs that God might want to use us to fill.

The New Testament tells us that “every good and perfect gift” comes from God. When we give to those in need, we tell God thanks for all His gifts. Most especially, we express thanks for the gift of Jesus Christ, God-in-the-flesh, Whose death and resurrection give all with faith in Him life forever with God. That's a lot for which to be thankful!

Jesus’ call to simple neighborliness does call us to care for the needy.

Sometimes their neediness is financial.

Sometimes it’s spiritual.

Sometimes it’s nothing more than the need we all have of listening ears, compassionate hearts, or strong shoulders.

From what I’ve learned about Saint Matthew Lutheran Church over the past few months, I know that this sermon, in some ways, falls into the category of “preaching to the choir.” This already is a neighborly church. You care about each other. I was moved to hear about your prayers for young Sarah, facing leukemia, as well as for her family last Sunday. And I know that you care about the community. I was interested, for example, to see in the online version of The Logan Daily News the other day that you hosted a flower show here. I see that you care enough about your neighbors to broadcast the worship service each week. Caring Christians show that kind of hospitality and neighborliness!

In the Gospel of Saint Matthew, Jesus says, “Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.”

If you call me to be your pastor, I want to work with you to build on Saint Matthew’s past in order to grow, spiritually and numerically, in the future. That growth won’t happen overnight. But I believe that if we take the lesson of Jesus’ parable to heart and ask God to show us how, in new times with new challenges, we can let Christ’s light shine in us, good things will happen.

We can build on Saint Matthew’s tradition of simple, Christian neighborliness and see not only more people in this sanctuary for worship, but also more people who can affirm that, as Lazarus’ very name testifies, God helps!

One day, when you and I sit at the great heavenly banquet that all of God’s people will enjoy with Abraham and all who have trusted God, I want to be able look back in gratitude on our time together here at Saint Matthew, thankful that we took God’s blessings and shared them with our neighbors and let our lives show others how wonderful the God we know through Jesus Christ truly is!

I want to work with you, worship with you, witness with you, learn with you, teach with you, laugh with you, cry with you, and serve with you so that this community will see and experience the light of Christ blazing in our souls and have their lives changed forever. Amen!