Discussing Article VIII (What is the Church?) of The Augsburg Confession, a basic statement of the Lutheran understanding of Christian faith, D.J. Lura writes:
"In both the hearing of the Word and the receiving of the Sacraments, the Church experiences Christ as he has commanded. Everything else that happens at church is [in] Luther’s Latin phrase ‘adiaphora,’ which means ‘it isn’t necessary.’"*
And how much of what churches do could be tossed out as unnecessary and, sometimes, even hurtful to the mission Christ has given to us?
Churches often spend so much time either maintaining traditions or carving out "seeker-sensitive" empires that they forget why Christ established His Church in the first place.
Reading the Bible and the confessions of my own tradition remind me of this and incite me to pray and to work toward doing only that which is "mission critical." But we all have so many habits associated with "being Church" that excising the unnecessary and focusing on the essential can be difficult.
Every congregation and every pastor should periodically ask themselves, "Is what I'm doing central to the mission Christ has given to us? Or should we bag it in favor of doing what is central to that mission?"
*Lura, DJ (2011-09-05). 'So What's a Lutheran, Don'tcha Know?' (Kindle Locations 652-654). . Kindle Edition.
Yesterday was the tenth anniversary of the death of George Harrison. Below are links to some past posts on this blog in which Harrison was mentioned or played an important part:
My wife and I watched the second part of Martin Scorcese's documentary about George Harrison, Living in the Material World, last night. It left me feeling sad and empty.
Not just because of the tragic last years of Harrison's life, which included cancer, remission, an attack by a would-be murderer that nearly killed him, and the re-appearance of the cancer that did kill him.
And not just because of the loss of a talented musician, still in his 50s, whose music helped comprise, as some have said, "the soundtrack of my life."
What saddened me was the source of Harrison's well-known spiritual quest. Harrison was more aware than most of us are of the basic human need to know God. But in the church of his upbringing (in this case, a Roman Catholic church), he didn't get to know God.
As a Christian, that saddens, chastens, and angers me. To know that there are people who, usually without being aware of it, come to our churches hungry for God, but never get fed is, to me unspeakably sad.
And tragic!
The great thing about the Church is that it's composed of human beings. Imperfect though each Christian is, she or he is empowered by God to let others know, see, and experience God.
Faith isn't something we attain through recited prayers and creeds, mantras, or beads, though any number of human practices can support us in our faith journeys.
But faith, actual knowledge of, friendship with, and trust in, God is a gift ordinary Christians can give when, by word and deed, they tell others about God-enfleshed, Jesus Christ. God's Holy Spirit works faith in the person who hears the Gospel, the good news about the new life that comes to all who trust what Christ has done for us through His death and resurrection.
...through the Word [about Christ] and administering the sacraments [Holy Baptism and Holy Communion], as through instruments, the Holy Spirit is given and the Holy Spirit produces faith, where and when it pleases God, in those who hear the Gospel. That is to say, it is not on account of our own merits but on account of Christ that justifies [makes right with Himself] those who believe that they are received into favor for Christ's sake... [italics added for emphasis]
In other words, there's nothing we can do to find God. And we don't have to perform any task to know God. We don't even have to do any work--like chanting a mantra--to know God. God makes Himself known in Jesus Christ.
Christ commissions the Church to let others know God through Himself.
The Holy Spirit takes the witness of ordinary Christians--dishwashers, plumbers, teachers, hairdressers, computer programmers, even preachers--and creates faith in those who hear the good news about Jesus.
Earlier I said, "The great thing about the Church is that it's composed of human beings."
Do you know what the horrible thing about the Church?
It's composed of human beings.
Knowledge of God, relationship with God, and trust in God are all free gifts God grants through Christ and spreads around through Christians operating in the power of His Holy Spirit.
But because sin still lives in Christians and will until the day we die, we Christians sometimes hide God's free gifts beneath the veils and thick brick walls of religiosity, pomposity, and authoritarianism.
That, I think, is what victimized George Harrison. It's why he never got to know Jesus Christ, the One Who makes God known. (One passage in Scripture, the witness of one who had known Jesus before His crucifixion and resurrection, says: "No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son [Jesus Christ], Who is close to the Father's heart, Who has made Him known" [John 1:18].)
George Harrison grew up in a church that appeared to him so bent on maintaining its rites and its status that he couldn't see God.
The irony is that in his quest for God through Indian spirituality, he took up rites of religiosity to go looking for God.
Jesus is the One Whose coming into the world we celebrate during Advent and Christmas and Whose return one day to bring His eternal kingdom in its final form that we excitedly anticipate. Jesus is God revealed to all the world. "The Father and I are one," Jesus once said (John 10:30).
It saddens me to realize that churches around the world obscure the views others need to have of God. They bury Christ beneath the rubble of religion and in some cases, legalism ("You've got to do this or that to know God.") and in others, spiritual libertarianism ("Do whatever you want; God just wants you to be happy, no matter how monstrous you may act.").
But when Christians and churches allow themselves to simply and humbly tell others about Christ, serve in His Name, and share the Sacraments Christ instituted, one vulnerable human being in need of God to another, that's when people can see God, know God, and believe in God.
I'm sorry that, for whatever reason, whether because the church of his youth obscured the Gospel about Jesus from his view or because his ears, mind, heart, and will were closed, George Harrison never got to know Jesus.
Not some Life of Brian straw man version of Jesus, easy to dismiss or tear down.
Not the means for clergy or churches to exercise power over fearful or disbelieving people.
But the real Jesus, full of grace and truth. The One Who bore the burden of our sin, death, and futility on the cross. The One Who, by His resurrection, opened the gates of eternity for all who believe in Him.
George Harrison wanted to know God so much. I wish someone had shown him the God revealed definitively to the whole human race in Jesus Christ.
Isn't it a pity that someone didn't do that?
UPDATE, evening, 11/30/12: We didn't know last evening when we watched Scorcese's documentary about Harrison that it was the tenth anniversary of George Harrison's death.
By faith in Christ, I'm one of those children. And that's why, as my wife sang along with O, Holy Night in our car a few days ago, I found my eyes misting and my voice choking in thankfulness for all that God has done for an unworthy sinner like me.
I love Christmas because it reminds me that Christ loves even me!
Advent starts this coming Sunday, December 2. Advent is the season of anticipation of Christmas and anticipation of His return to the earth one day, when He will finally and fully establish His eternal kingdom. It will be a kingdom in which all who have received Christ by faith will reign with God forever.
Why not let down your guard? Make it a point to worship with the imperfect, forgiven fellowship you can find at a church somewhere close to you.
Lay aside your cynicism and defensiveness.
Lay down the sins you've allowed to define you for way too long.
Take hold of the outstretched hand of forgiveness and charity God gives to you in Jesus Christ.
You don't have to fully understand it or be able to explain it.
Just fall into the arms of the God Who loves you and let Him love you.
Let yourself be God's child.
Let Him set you free to be the joyful, grateful child He made you to be.
Political journalists, consultants, officeholders, and candidates are, let's be honest, junkies. They're addicted. They can never get enough of politics, political speculation, or campaigning. The object of life for many of them isn't to govern, but to win. For them, the four years between presidential elections isn't when government policies are debated and enacted, it's just part of the election cycle, akin to a major league baseball or NFL football season.
So, it was no surprise on election night to see the pundits speculating on who the Democratic and Republican Party candidates in 2016 would be. (That's when I turned off the TV and pulled out a book.)
Nor was it surprising to learn that within days of the election, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida) was off to Iowa to lend his help to the state GOP with a fundraiser.
Might it be too much to hope that the majority of this sampling of politically-engaged folks would rather be focused on the governance part of government for awhile, you know, sort of let the Electoral College actually cast their votes in December before beginning the presidential campaign full force?
A person can hope, can't he?
So, what did the bloggers say? You can read a full report here.
What stands out is how far New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has fallen in the eyes of this sampling of conservative bloggers. Based on what I see on Twitter posted by conservative folks, it would seem the right of center bloggers' disdain of Christie is fairly widespread among some Republicans. Christie is no longer the their darling.
They appear to believe that by expressing appreciation for the help that President Obama and his appointees with FEMA gave to New Jersey in the wake of Superstorm Sandy, Governor Christie effectively handed the election to the President. This is viewed as a betrayal by some folks, as though Christie's highest call of duty is to the electoral chances of his party and not to the state or the nation.
Whether Chris Christie is qualified to be president or if his overall record is sufficient to pass muster with Republican Party conservatism are the sorts of questions I don't deal with. I've come to believe that pastors shouldn't do politics.
But Christie's apparent fall from grace among some Republicans is stunning: At the beginning of this presidential cycle, conservatives were urging him to run for president despite his short time as governor. And these same folks lapped up his forceful keynote address at the Republican National Convention this year.
Note: It wasn't a scandal that did Christie in. He hasn't defiled the flag or enagaged in espionage. He hasn't even been done in by a flip-flop.
What has done Christie in among some of his fellow Republicans, at least for the moment, is an expression of appreciation to the President of the United States for helping his state.
Of course, there are folks in every ideological camp who prefer ideological purity (according to the definition du jour of their ideology, of course) to getting things done.
But voters like pragmatism and magnanimity, which is why my guess is that when the voters of New Jersey go to the polls this coming November, even some of those who are very blue Democrats with misgivings about some of the cuts the governor has effected in their state, many will mark their ballots for Chris Christie.
By the way, how predictive is this poll of "right of center bloggers," who have been polled at similar times four years before the next presidential elections regarding their choices for president?
Negatively predictive. In other words, the folks they least preferred have ended up becoming their party's nominee...then losing the elections. John Hawkins explains:
In 2008, the least wanted candidates for bloggers were...John McCain and Ron Paul.
In 2012, the least wanted candidates for bloggers were...Mitt Romney and Ron Paul.
So, going by those results, Chris Christie and Jeb Bush would have to
be considered the early favorites for 2016 based on the fact that
conservative bloggers don’t want either of them as a nominee.
Personally, I'd prefer the candidate, from whatever party, who had to be persuaded at the last minute to run for president. I know, it's not gonna happen. Marco Rubio will soon be joined by an army of Red and Blue would-be presidents tromping around Iowa and New Hampshire. After all, the addicts must get their fixes.
John 18:33-37 Sam Rutigliano, one-time head coach of the Cleveland Browns and a Lutheran Christian, was scheduled to be the main speaker for a Lutheran banquet. Ed Markquart, then the senior pastor of a Lutheran congregation near Seattle, was going to the gathering, but didn’t want to go. Rutigliano would, Markquart was sure, give one of those “jock for Jesus” talks, the ones where athletes or coaches talk about all the victories Jesus has given them.
He was shocked then at the banquet, when Rutigliano spoke about his faith in Christ. As Rutigliano told it, “He and his wife were driving one evening with their two year old daughter in the back seat. Suddenly a car was upon them; there was an accident; their car rolled over; the child was thrown out; and when everything had stopped moving, their little girl was pinned underneath the car.”
Markquart waited for the standard “jock for Jesus” finish. But all Rutigliano said of his daughter was, “She was dead.”
His wife and he grieved, nothing seeming to bring comfort.
Time passed and they became pregnant again, an answer to prayer, it seemed.
The pregnancy was normal and the baby was delivered, stillborn. It was more than Sam Rutigliano and his wife could bear. Sam found himself trying to negotiate with God. “If You will do this, Lord, then I will do that.” Markquart writes that as Rutigliano prayed, “...a quiet voice spoke back to Sam’s inner spirit: ‘No deals, Sam. No deals. No manipulations. I rule over you in all times of your life.'” Even the bad ones.
Rutigliano concluded his speech: “God has called me to be his servant in my turf, the National Football League. He rules over all aspects of my life, when winning or losing, in triumphs and tragedies. How about you? Where is your turf? Does God rule you there in your turf, in your situation? Not just when you’re winning, but when you are losing. Not just during the triumphs but during the tragedies of your life? Does God rule you then?”
With those words, Sam Rutigliano sat down.
Today is Christ the King Sunday. And the question before us is this: Is Jesus Christ our king? Or do we serve other kings, like desire, success, security, popular acceptance, or, one of today’s favorites, tolerance, whose subjects believe in tolerating anyone except those who disagree with them.
Here’s what I’ve learned about the kings people choose to serve other than Jesus Christ: They’re not much good when you face adversities or griefs like the ones Sam Rutigliano experienced.
The king of desire, for example, will leave you to die when you’ve overdosed and let you fend for yourself when you learn that you have a sexually transmitted disease, or are pregnant.
The king of popularity or acceptance by others will give you a happy life so long as you live like a chameleon and go along to get along with the crowd. (Some of you young people know what I’m talking about!)
That king of popular acceptance, in fact, appears to be the king of choice even in our own Evangelical Lutheran Church in America these days.
In obvious deference to being accepted by others, our ELCA has also said in its public documents that authority over Christian proclamation and practice stems not just from Scripture, but also our personal experiences. That contradicts what both the Bible and the Lutheran Confessions teach.
Denominational and synodical officials, say nothing while one of our ELCA congregations plays to the prevailing opinions of Americans people that it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you believe it sincerely. At Ebenezer Church, an ELCA congregation in good standing, the Lord's Prayer or their version of it isn't offered to the God Who “is in heaven.” Instead, they pray to the deity “who is within us” and displace any mention of forgiving our trespasses as we forgive the trespasses of others. The so-called prayer is ended with: “You support us in our power and we act with courage. For you are the dwelling place within us, the empowerment around us and the celebration among us, now and forever. Amen.” The problem, of course, isn't that the words are wrong, but that the theology is more American and more Asian than it is Biblical. ELCA officials not only refuse undertake disciplinary action against this congregation, a high official of the ELCA, an aide to our presiding bishop, recently spoke and worshiped at a conference there, alongside a so-called “high priestess of the goddess Isis.”
In obvious deference to being accepted by others, our ELCA has also said in public documents that sources of authority over Christian sexual morality include not just Scripture, but also our personal experiences. That contradicts what both the Bible and the Lutheran Confessions teach.
The irony is that while our denomination sounds more and more like the rest of the world, the king of popularity has abandoned us. When the going gets tough, the kings of this world always abandon their subjects. But, like Sam Rutigliano, we know a King who “will never leave [us] nor forsake [us],” from whom not even death can separate us.
This morning we gather to worship and celebrate the only King worthy of our allegiance. We worship King Jesus Christ, the Lord of everything! Jesus is different from the other kings people serve.
We see how different in our gospel lesson, John 8:33-37. It’s part of John’s narrative about the trial of Jesus that will culminate in His death on a cross.
Verse 33: “Then Pilate entered the Praetorium again, called [other translations say, “summoned”] Jesus, and said to Him, ‘Are You the King of the Jews?’” Pilate has just come from a consultation with the leaders of the Jewish religion, whose country, Judea, was under the rule of the Roman Empire and of Pilate, the Roman governor. The leaders’ beef with Jesus is that He claimed to be God. They saw this as sacrilegious. But Romans called all sorts of people gods. So, in order to persuade Pilate that Jesus needed to be executed and gotten out of the way, they told Pilate that Jesus claimed to be King of the Jews. That got Pilate’s attention. He didn’t want any trouble from would-be kings. So, he asks Jesus, “Are You the King of the Jews?”
Jesus, this poor carpenter, already bruised and battered from the mistreatment He’s received since His arrest, shows Pilate Who’s really in charge of this interview by asking Pilate a question: “Are you speaking for yourself about this, or did others tell you this concerning Me?”
In essence, Jesus is asking Pilate the same question He asked His own disciples in Matthew 16:15: “Who do you say that I am?” Jesus Himself is unambiguous in identifying Who He is.
Go to John 14:9. Jesus tells Philip: “...He who has seen Me has seen the Father...”
Look at John 10:30 Jesus says, “I and My Father are one.”
Or look at John 8:58. Jesus tells His fellow Jews who want to make Him a king on their own terms: “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.” (I AM--Yahweh--in the Old Testament was the Name by which God identified Himself to Moses at a burning bush some 1500 years earlier.)
Jesus isn’t one of the bitty kings people follow in this world, not the little gods of various worldly religious systems. He is the King of all creation, the One with power over life and death.
As Jesus puts it in John 11:25: “I am the resurrection and the life. [All who believe] in Me, though [they] die...shall live.”
Back in our lesson, Pilate sees himself as too important to deal with the squabbles of a conquered people. He asks Jesus in John 18:35: “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you to me. What have you done?”
But Jesus tells Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.” We must be careful here. In saying that His kingdom is not of this world, Jesus isn’t saying that His kingdom is not for this world.
When Jesus says that His kingdom is not of this world, He’s saying that it’s not from this world. He is, after all, God the Word made flesh.
Jesus is not from the world, but through His death and resurrection He conquers this world and when He returns one day to bring this world to an end, He will bring the new heavens and the new earth for all who believe in Him to reign over with Him.
Jesus goes on to tell Pilate in our Gospel lesson: “If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight...”
Jesus is saying, “If I were an ordinary king, I’d have my own army that would fight for Me. I’d have my own political platform that My followers would fight for in the counsels of government. But My kingdom is bigger than all that. “My kingdom,” Jesus says at the end of verse 36, “is not from here.”
Pilate has seen bands of rebels undertake their little wars on Rome before. He looks at the carpenter standing before him and, probably with sarcasm, asks in verse 37, “Are You a king then?” “You say rightly that I am a king,” Jesus tells Pilate in verse 37. “For this cause [the cause of bringing God’s kingdom into this sinful, dying world] I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth [everyone, in other words, who hasn’t given their allegiance to one of the puny, dying kings of this world] hears My voice.”
This echoes what Jesus says elsewhere: His sheep know His voice and will respond to no other.
Is Jesus the only voice to which you’re listening today? Is Jesus your only King?
If you can answer yes to those questions this morning, you have reason to be grateful and glad!
But let’s be clear: It’s not an easy time to be a follower of Jesus. It’s not politically correct to proclaim, as Jesus has told us, that Jesus is “the way, the truth, and the life,” that Jesus is the only King of the universe, the only way to life with God.
Popular culture is aligned against the followers of Jesus Christ. But this is no time to change kings. This is no time to cave into the culture of the world, of our country, or even of our denomination.
Dietrich Offeldt lived in post-World War II eastern Germany. It was clear that the people were going to trade the terrors of living under Hitler for the terrors of life under Soviet Communism, in which official atheism told the people to have no king but the state. Dietrich Offeldt was a Christian. “Leave East Germany,” his friends told him.
But he refused, explaining later: “Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. He is the ruler of my life, and he can dispose of my life in any way he chooses. I have found that every Christian finds himself or herself in a particular circumstance, a particular time, a particular place in which they live out their discipleship. My circumstance is communism; my time is the Cold War; and my place is East Berlin. I chose to be a disciple here.”
God has given you the task of being a subject of King Jesus in this town, in this time, in this place, and, as a member of a Lutheran congregation, a member of a denomination that grows bolder each day in repudiating the teachings of the Bible and the Lutheran Confessions we say are the bedrock of our faith, that subtly denies the kingship of Jesus in favor of getting along with a pluralistic world.
You and I could choose to avoid trouble with neighbors and friends by keeping our traps shut about Jesus, our king.
If we do that long enough, Jesus will no longer be our king. We’ll be subjects of the dying world’s two favorite kings, Safety and Security, which are only aliases of Satan, ticketed for death along with every other king but the risen Jesus.
Better to take the choice made by Dietrich Offeldt. He chose, he said, “to raise my flag and show my colors, to let those around me know for sure that I am a Christian, that Christ rules my life.”
On this Christ the King Sunday, I ask you (I ask myself): “Whose colors will you fly, those of the kings of the world? Or will you fly those of the King of all kings, the Lord of all lords, the conqueror of sin and death, the One Who is with us always, even to the close of the age, and the One Who promises to one day embrace us with those nail-scarred arms as He welcomes us, scarred ourselves by all we have faithfully endured in this world as we’ve followed Him, into eternity?”
Never be ashamed of Christ the King!
Never be ashamed of the king's book, the Bible!
Let Jesus be your King now and always. Amen
[This was prepared to be shared with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, during worship at both 8:30 and 10:15 this morning.]
Footnotes
[1] The PDF document cited here, by Pastor Mark Chavez, a former ELCA pastor, now general secretary of the North American Lutheran Church, addresses all of the problem areas mentioned above. It's well worth taking the time to read it.
"We already know that unborn babies can stretch and even hiccup in the womb," says a report from The Telegraph, "but new research from the University of Durham concludes that they can also yawn."
This stunning video makes that point.
When "stuff" is our god, the video above, shot at a Walmart where people were trying to take advantage of a cell phone sale, this is what "worship" looks like.
Worshiping false gods is inherently destructive of relationship. When we worship false gods--money, status, ourselves, dope, booze, or whatever, we destroy our relationships with God, others, and the people we were meant to be.
When the one true God of creation calls us, through Jesus Christ, to follow Him, it's a call to love the God we worship AND the neighbor God created. Move closer to Christ and you're less likely to dehumanize, take for granted, hurt, or gossip about the people you encounter.
But there's something more to getting straight about what or who will be the object of our worship.
You see, cell phones and other stuff eventually die.
God is immortal and in Christ, He has conquered sin and death for us in order to give us a life that is the opposite of the frenzy you see here.
From today's installment of Our Daily Bread: "The challenge of riches is living with thankful hearts to God and open hands to others." See here.
Money itself isn't condemned by the Bible. 1 Timothy 6:10, in the Bible's New Testament is often misquoted to claim (or accuse) the Bible of this attitude. (Even by Pink Floyd in the song, Money, on Dark Side of the Moon.) Money is not the root of all evil. The misquoted passage says that, "the loveof money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains."
Jesus does say that it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the eternal kingdom Jesus came to bring to those with faith in Him. He says this to His disciples after telling a rich man to sell everything he has, give it to the poor, and follow Jesus.
But Jesus isn't saying that wealth is intrinsically bad. It just happened that money was this young man's particular idol of choice and it becomes such for lots of people.
The simple truth is that not everyone can handle wealth, no doubt far fewer than actually have wealth. The rich young man who incited Jesus to use His "camel through the eye of a needle" metaphor, was apparently not handling his wealth in a way that had him in sync with God. (Matthew 19:16-26)
Because wealth buys so much in this dying world, it's easy for the wealthy to delude themselves into thinking that they are, in a sense, gods in themselves.
Or, they can develop a material notion about life itself, thinking that anything that can't be bought, sold, touched, or manipulated, isn't real, even God Himself, Who, after all, has been revealed materially only once, in Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Savior.
Yet the Bible is filled with wealthy people who retained their faith and their wealth. Because God came first, they were able to use their wealth in a way that honored and loved God and gave practical expression to their love for others. The list includes Abraham and Sarah, Lydia, Matthew, and Joseph of Arimathea, to name just a few. And the fishermen who followed Jesus--including Peter, Andrew, James, and John--were at the least, members of the upper middle class of their time.
Each came to see their wealth as a gift from God over which they were to exercise good management. The Biblical word for this is stewardship.
In another part of 1 Timothy, on which today's installment of Our Daily Bread, quoted and linked above, is based, the apostle Paul writes:
Thieves must give up stealing; rather let them labor and work honestly
with their own hands, so as to have something to share with the needy (1 Timothy 4:28).
Paul is not saying that everyone who has acquired wealth stole it. He is saying that the thieves who had come to faith in Christ needed to leave their sins behind by learning the true object for acquiring money while we live on earth.
And this is it: We acquire wealth so that we can take care of the needy.
The needy, of course, can include the neediest people of all: those who have never come to know or follow Jesus Christ. Proclaiming the good news that God so loves every person on this planet that He gave His Son Jesus, so that all who will turn from sin (repent) and believe in Jesus (surrender their lives to Him) will have everlasting life is the job of every Christian. Even our money should be marshaled in the effort to help others to fill their need for Christ.
But the needy also include the poor, whether in our own community or around the world.
The needy also include the victims of disaster, wherever they live.
Understanding why God entrusts our wealth to us, no matter how wealthy we may be by world standards, should alter the decisions we make about how we spend our money.
Followers of Jesus Christ, grateful that God has already saved them by His grace through our faith in Jesus, are set free from the temptations of money and can ask themselves each day, "God has given me new and everlasting life through Christ. God gives me my daily bread. In response, how can I use what God has given to me in order to address the needs of others?"
Maybe one day I'll be content with how my life daily answers that question. But I haven't gotten there yet. God is still working on me.
Mark 13:1-8
What I know about birth pangs or labor pains is, as it can only be for any man, second-hand knowledge. Mine comes from having seen my wife, Ann, go through labor with our two kids.
Ann was a champ! But after seeing what she had experienced first with Philip, who was 10-pounds, 9-3/4-ounces when he was born, and then with Sarah, who was 12-pounds, 2-ounces at birth, I could well understand what she told me shortly after Sarah was born. “Mark," she said, "if you want any more kids, you’ll have to have them with your second wife.”
I bring this up because, as New Testament scholar N.T. Wright points out, the key to understanding today’s Gospel lesson, Mark 13:1-8, is its final verse, where Jesus says, “For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be earthquakes in various places, and there will be famines and troubles. These are the beginnings of sorrows.”
Now, the rendering of that last phrase in the New King James Version, the translation of our pew Bibles and in our bulletin, is frankly, not very accurate. A literal rendering of Jesus’ words there from the original Greek in which Mark and all the books of the New Testament are written, arche odinon tauta, would be, the beginning of birthpangs these things are. That’s why the translation of this passage in the New Revised Standard Version, which we use in adult Sunday School class, puts Jesus’ words this way: “This is but the beginning of the birthpangs.”
I spent so much time talking about this phrase and its translation because these few words by Jesus are important!
In the Old Testament, especially in the writings of the prophets, the imagery of labor pains coming before the birth of God’s kingdom in people’s lives was often used. But Jesus uses the image of birth pangs in this passage differently. He’s not talking about the end of the world (He slides into a discussion of that seamlessly later on in Mark, chapter 13) or about the establishment of God’s eternal kingdom, but about the end of the temple in Jerusalem, an event that would happen in 70 AD, about forty years after Jesus spoke these words, when the Romans tore the temple down.
But there’s still a lot for us to learn as followers of Jesus from today’s Gospel lesson. Please turn to it, Mark 13:1-8.
It begins: “Then as He went out of the temple, one of His disciples said to Him, ‘Teacher, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here!’”
“Wow!” the disciple is saying, “isn’t this a great place?” But Jesus seems unimpressed with the temple. Look at verse 2: “And Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone shall be left upon another that shall not be thrown down.”
What a downer! The disciple who pointed to the beauty of the temple probably at least thought that he was making pleasant conversation. Or more probably, he thought that he was displaying pious faith in God by being impressed with the temple.
But Jesus gives the disciple no affirmation, in effect telling him (and us) to never confuse the eternal power of God with buildings, no matter how imposing or pretty.
I have to say that when the call committee here at Saint Matthew showed me the sanctuary at the conclusion of our first interview, I probably didn’t register much delight.
It’s nice, don’t get me wrong. But Ann and I learned a long time ago that God can be worshiped in all sorts of places. The mission congregation with which I worked during my seminary internship met in a Lions' hall. When we arrived on Sunday mornings for worship, we were often met with the smell of stale cigarette smoke and spilled beer. And for twelve-and-a-half years, at the mission church I served before coming to Saint Matthew, we worshiped in a broken-down old school gym.
Corrie ten-Boom found the holiest place of worship in the concentration camp in which she and her sister were incarcerated during World War II was the garbage dump crawling with rats and smelling of human waste and rotting food. It was the only place where she and her sister could go to remember God’s Word, sing hymns, and praise the God they knew through Jesus Christ.
Buildings crumble and fall.
Stained glass cracks.
Only God and those who turn from sin and trust in Christ as their only hope live for eternity.
Jesus was telling the disciples, including us, “Don’t put your trust in buildings, or traditions, or liturgies, or human beings or their works. Don’t even trust yourselves. Put your trust in Christ alone!”
Go back to the lesson, to verse 3. Jesus is now sitting opposite the temple on the Mount of Olives and four of the apostles--Peter, James, John, and Andrew--have a question. Verse 4: “‘Tell us when all these things will be? And what will be the sign when all these things will be fulfilled?’”
Now, you need to notice something here: In answering the four apostles' questions, Jesus never actually answers their questions. As we'll see, Jesus isn't being evasive in not answering them. In fact, Jesus has a more important point to make!
Look at what Jesus says, starting in verse 5: “‘Take heed that no one deceives you. For many will come in My Name, saying, ‘I am He,‘ and will deceive many. But when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be troubled; for such things must happen, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be earthquakes in various places, and there will be famines and troubles.”
Every single thing Jesus describes as signs of the impending destruction of the temple are events that have been going on from the moment Adam and Eve rebelled against God and consigned all of us to our inborn bondage to sin.
Can anyone name a time in human history, ancient or modern, when there weren’t wars and rumors of wars? Neither can I!
Can you think of a time in history when there weren’t disasters, earthquakes, and troubles? Neither can I! And I was a Social Studies major who is a life-long of history.
Ecclesiastes 1:9 says: “..there is nothing new under the sun.” That verse doesn't say that history repeats itself; because, quite simply, history doesn't repeat itself. But that verse reminds us that the world is no more and no less sinful or foreboding today than it was the moment God banished Adam and Eve from the garden.
Different sins become more popular at different times. But the same old sin, death, disasters, calamities, and warring have been going on for centuries.
In light of this fact, Peter, James, John, and Andrew might have said to Jesus, “But, Lord, all these things You describe as signs and events that will happen before the destruction of the temple are things that happen every day, year in and year out, and have always happened!”
And had they actually said that, Jesus could have answered, “Exactly!”
The temple came down at the precise moment when Jesus foresaw that it would fall.
But the disciples and no one else had any need to know when that would happen.
As hard as it is for we human beings to accept, there are some things we cannot know and never will know.
Geneticists, epidemiologists, and actuaries may be able to tell us our likely life expectancies, for example. But only God knows the exact moment He has appointed for the ends of our earthly lives. King David prays to God in Psalm 31:15: "My times are in Your hand..." And Job, in the midst of His pain, tells God: "A person’s days are determined;You have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed" (Job 14:5).
Scientists and climatologists may be able to make accurate projections of the moments most likely to bring the destruction of this planet. But only God knows the time appointed for that to happen. In fact, it seems that only God the Father knows when that moment will come. Jesus, God the Son, said, "...about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father" (Mark 13:32).
So, Jesus doesn’t tell the disciples when the temple will fall or what the signs of its impending destruction will be.
His non-answer told them that they were asking the wrong questions.
What Jesus is telling them and us is that, no matter what painful or difficult things may come to us along life’s way, the future is ultimately in God’s hands. Our call is to trust in Himeven in the midst of uncertainties and our own limitations.
He's also saying that all the painful things that happen in this world, no matter how calamitous are just the labor pains of God's new creation.
That’s why Jesus says in verse 8: “These [things] are [just] the beginnings...” Or, “These are just the labor pains for what’s to follow!”
In fact, the Bible says that our entire life on this earth constitutes the labor pains of the new heaven and the new earth all who believe in Christ will live in and enjoy after this entire universe has fallen down, Christ returns, and the dead who have died believing in Him will rise again.
Romans 8:22 says that “the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains” for that moment when, finally and fully, sin, death, and futility are put under Christ’s feet and the pain and tears of this fallen world will be things of the past.
This should give us hope!
The athlete who keeps her focus firmly on her goal of winning the prize endures all sorts of difficulties--arduous training, endless practice, injuries and physical rehabilitation--in order to attain her goal.
When we live each day in the certainty that God saves from sin and death all who retain their faith in Jesus Christ and have eternity with God as the prize for which they race, they can say with the apostle Paul, “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to revealed to us” when, in the resurrection, we see Christ face to face! (Romans 8:18)
We have to be careful though. Faith isn’t fatalism.
Jesus isn’t telling Christians to sit around, letting life wash over them while waiting for Him to show up with a bunch of angels playing harps. (I personally hate harps, by the way!)
In fact, throughout Mark 13, where Jesus does go on to talk about the end of the world, Jesus tells us what we’re to do as we await the unfolding of God’s plans for our world and for our lives. We’re not supposed to sit, trying our best to look holy.
In Mark 13:5; Jesus says, “Take heed that no one deceives you.” Watch out that you don’t for those who tell you to hope in the things of the world--like money, power, a positive attitude, whatever--taking them as gods instead of Jesus.
In verse 9, Jesus warns Christians to “Watch out” that they not give up on trusting in Him. This applies to we Lutherans today, when our own the synodical officials in some parts of the country (not here in southern Ohio, it should be said) harasses or intimidates pastors and congregations into accepting false beliefs. We need to watch out when our own denomination ascribes the same level of authority to bishops, denominational assemblies, various church traditions, human experience, and science that the Lutheran Confessions claim belongs only to the Word of God found in the Bible.
Then, in verse 23, Jesus tells us to take heed, watch out, for people who point us to false Christs or to false versions of the real Jesus Christ and lead us away from eternal life with God.
And in verse 33, Jesus says to “Take heed, watch, and pray.” We have no idea when the end of the world may come; so we need to pray, as Jesus has taught us, that God will “deliver us from evil,” so that we don’t fall prey to sin and end up an enemy of God when we face judgment in eternity.
Jesus took back our fallen world once and for all when He offered Himself on the cross, the perfect sacrifice for our sins, then rose from the dead, opening up eternity to who trust in Him.
We don’t know what may happen to us or to the world in whatever time passes between this moment and the moment when the risen, ascended Jesus returns to bring judgment and the fullness of His kingdom to all who have believed in Him.
But we do know that there is no safer place we can be in this world (and the next) than in the hands of the God Who holds the future of this world and of eternity itself in His hands.
A new world is being born in this messy world in which we live. The labors of this world can be painful, even deadly. But if we will be patient and hold on tightly to Christ, we’ll have strength for the journey and an eternity of joy with Christ and all who, like us, have trusted in Him. Amen
For Christians, praying for our leaders, no matter what their party, is our duty and joy, in addition to be an expression of patriotism. If you choose, join me in the following prayer at this time. Thanks!
Gracious God, Your Word teaches that You create earthly governments so that Christians who live voluntarily under Your Lordship will be protected from those who have no regard for You and Your will AND to give Your Church an atmosphere of peace within which the Good News of Jesus may be proclaimed by those of us who bear Christ’s Name to those who don’t yet believe in Him.
God, to these ends, bless our President, our Vice President, and the members of Congress of both parties with Your protection and Your wisdom.
Grant similar blessings to those who serve in state and local governments.
And help us to heed Your Word, including the directives of Jesus Himself, by praying for and honoring our leaders, being obedient to our laws, and rendering to You what belongs to You, while rendering to government what belongs to government. In Jesus' Name we pray these things. Amen
It’s easy to give large sums of money to the cause of God when you’re flush with cash. It takes trust to give to God when your stomach’s growling.
It’s easy to take the time to pray when time weighs heavily on our hands. It requires a Holy Spirit-inspired decision to take a break from the rat race of our busy days in order to offer God prayer, praise, and thanksgiving.
You see, God doesn’t want us to be religious; He wants to have a relationship with each one of us.
The crucified and risen Jesus, God in the flesh, grants us a relationship with God as a free gift when we turn away from sin and take His outstretched hand of grace and forgiveness.
But, here's the thing: We can't grab hold of that free gift if we insist on holding onto things that fill our agendas, fill our pockets, fill our cravings, fill our emotions or our senses, but can never fill our souls. Only Christ can do that.
Here's a great tune by Benny Hester from the mid-1980s, To Fill Our Empty Hearts. Hester went on to work as a composer for numerous television shows in network TV. His current web site is here.
Olive Oyl, erstwhile girlfriend of Popeye the Sailor Man, has been missing for decades.
But, after yesterday's announcement that Xi Jinping would become the new leader of Communist China, the mystery was solved after television viewers around the world saw video clips of performances by Xi's wife, Chinese folk singer, Peng Liyuan.
"Despite efforts to conceal her identity," remarked longtime Olive Oyl fan Vince Green, a spinach wholesaler from Hoboken, New Jersey, "that voice is unmistakable! Peng is Olive alright!"
Decide for yourself. Take a look at the clips below and tell me if it isn't obvious that Olive Oyl, that seeming All American girl, defected some time ago.
First, Olive Oyl:
And now, Peng Liyuan (her solo starts at about the 1:12 mark):
UPDATE, November 17: I mentioned this "rumor" over on The Moderate Voice:
By the way, in a separate development, Peng, a Chinese folk singer, has announced that she will soon be recording cover versions of American folk favorites. Among those slated for the collection are: The Times, They’re Never Changing, Wanna Work on Mao’s Farm Some More, and This Land is My Land, This Land is My Land.
I snapped this picture while taking a walk this afternoon.
The tree here is dubbed, The Great White Oak of Logan. It's huge. (At least by the standards of southern Ohio. It's obviously no Redwood!)
After the windstorm this past July, which knocked out our power for the better part of eight days, my wife and I were concerned that the oak, said to be over 600 years old, might have been damaged. The branches of a large tree in a neighboring yard, like thousands of other trees and branches throughout Ohio, did come down during the storm. In some places around the state, the wind during that short storm measured 98-miles per hour. Fallen trees and branches brought power outages throughout the state.
But this old oak seems to have been unscathed.
Leaves fallen, it's now ready for another winter in the seventh-century of its life. It's hard to imagine all that has unfolded under its branches.
[Also see here, for a 360-degree look from beneath the tree. It gives you a good idea of its height. FYI: Logan is about a half-hour drive from Athens.]
[This was the sermon prepared for today's 10:15 worship service with the people and friends of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio. Today was Friend Day at Saint Matthew.]
I once heard a man named Bill Hybels say that every human being, without exception, is looking for the same thing. Hybels called the thing we’re all looking for, “it.”
The ways human beings look for “it” vary.
Some think they can find “it” by living a life in which they stock up pleasure, committing themselves to, in the words of our Declaration of Independence, “the pursuit of happiness.” But “it” can’t be found by that route.
Some people look for “it” by working hard for money or power or knowledge.
Others are sure that the way to “it” is by being a good person, giving to charities, or living a lifestyle of love.
Now, there’s nothing wrong with happiness, knowledge, hard work, giving, success, money, or even love. These are all good things in themselves.
But if we look to them as the means by which we find “it,” we will be disappointed.
And if we aren’t disappointed, then we are settling for much less than we were made for as human beings.
None of us should do that!
So, what is this “it”?
A man named Augustine, who lived in the fourth century, was the preeminent scholar of his day, at a time when scholars were treated like rock stars. Augustine partook of every sinful pleasure the world had to offer.
But it wasn’t enough.
In the summer of 386, deeply unhappy, Augustine threw himself down under a fig tree in desperation. There he sensed a voice, like that of a child, repeating to him over and over, “Pick up and read. Pick up and read.”
The voice was so real to Augustine that, at first, he thought it was that of a real nearby child playing some game. Then he understood that the voice had some other source.
At that time, Augustine was staying with some monks on a retreat where he hoped he could get things together. He wasn’t interested in being a Christian, mind you. His mother was a Christian and he had no interest in becoming a religious kook!
But, weeping under the fig tree, Augustine kept hearing that voice: “Pick up and read. Pick up and read.”
He later said that he could only interpret the repeated phrase to mean that he had to run into the house where he was staying, pick up a Bible from a shelf there, and read the first words he laid eyes on. He followed his instructions.
The first passage he read was in the book of Romans, chapter 13, verses 13 to 14: “Let us walk properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ...”
It was then that Augustine, to that point no believer in God, surrendered his life and will to the God revealed in Jesus Christ.
He later said in a prayer, “Almighty God, You have made us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in You.”
Not by any effort of His own, but solely by the effort of the God Who reached out to him and Who still reaches out to you and me today, Augustine received “it": peace with God.
You may say, “We might as well close up shop right now, preacher. I’m not at war with God. I may not pay much attention to God, but I’m not at war with God.”
Sin is in the human gene pool. We inherit it from our parents and grandparents.
Sin is the condition of enmity toward God and of willfulness to do our own thing that caused me, when I wasn’t yet three years old, to ignore my mother when she told me not to pick up my baby sister and with Mom no more than five steps away, to pick her up and promptly drop her on her head, my very first childhood memory. Nobody had to teach me how to sin; I came equipped with that knowledge!
The condition of sin is a wall between God and us, between God and others.
Even people who have never heard of God have a sense that they were made to experience "it," what we know to be the peace of God, whether they can articulate that or not.
And some people are so desperate for peace with God that they fall for humanly-created religions like Islam, Mormonism, or Scientology.
I want to be honest with you. I don’t always live in the peace of God. I let “it” slip out of my hands.
Usually without realizing it, I go on the warpath against God.
Feelings of bitterness toward those who have hurt me get my attention. Instead of asking God to bless others, I find myself praying that God would “fix them” and make them over in an image more convenient and convivial to me.
The desire to do what I want to do instead of what God wants me to do takes first place in my life.
My sinful self, along with the sin of the world and the sinful things that Satan tempts us all to do, conspire to take over my life and rob me of peace with God.
So I come to God many times a day, to ask God to tear down the wall of sin, to help me live in peace with Him, with others, and with myself, to remember that there is no peace when we’re looking out for ourselves.
How do we have peace with God? First: To have peace with God, we must realize that God loves us and He wants to have everlasting peace with Him, along with a life made new by Him, a life He wants to give to us for all eternity.
When we have bad things come into our lives, as they do in all lives, we’re tempted to think that God has it in for us. A month or so ago, when I learned I had Celiac Disease, two years after I had a heart attack that took out 40% of my heart and one year after I'd learned that my heart was so weak I needed a pacemaker and defibrillator and also had to have a small melanoma cancer removed from my leg, I confess to you that I asked God why He was piling things on.
I'm ashamed of those feelings, frankly, because the Bible teaches us that, in this fallen world, bad things happen to everyone, no exceptions.
But we can have peace with God even in hard times. Romans 5:1 says: “...having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
What does this mean? Just this: The rightful fate for everyone who has sin is death. Another passage of Romans puts it this way: “the wages of sin is death.”
Think of it like this: We are all guilty of sin. If we were tried for our sin, the evidence would be overwhelming. To be justified though, is to have the verdict of “not guilty” declared over our lives.
Anyone who is declared “not guilty” of sin is at peace with God.
It was this “not guilty” verdict that changed Augustine’s life.
God wants us all to experience that.
God loves us and wants us to enjoy peace with Him. That’s why God in the flesh, Jesus, said, “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). God wants to give us:
Peace with God now in this imperfect world
Peace with God forever in a perfect eternity.
Second: To have peace with God, we need to understand, as we mentioned earlier, that, in our natural state of being, we are separated from God. We’re at war with God. Romans 3:23 says: “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”
You and I aren’t machines. God didn’t program us to do whatever He wanted. God gives us the power to make choices in our lives. We can choose to return His love to Him or not.
The problem, of course, is that the condition of sin has us bound so tightly that even if we resolve to return God’s love or to be at peace with God, we can’t make the decision stick.
We’re like kids peering into a shop filled with candy that’s off-limits to us because our hands and feet are manacled, in this case by our sin.
We can’t get to peace with God by our own efforts, no matter how hard we try. As Romans 7:19 says, “For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.” That's why we Lutherans say in the Order for Confession and Forgiveness: "We are in bondage to sin and cannot free ourselves." Even when we want to choose peace with God and obedience to His commands, we are incapable of making that choice.
Third: To have peace with God, we need to know that God intervenes on our behalf. Romans 5:8 says: “...God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
The Old Testament sacrificial law held that an unblemished lamb could represent people on the altar in the temple in Jerusalem. There, the lamb was sacrificed and the repentant believers were spattered with the blood of the lamb. The lamb took the sinners‘ rightful wages, death, and the repentant were forgiven, for that moment.
Fourth: We must receive, by faith, Christ, the One Who has died and risen for us. Romans 10:9 says: “...if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” What an incredible promise!
Because of God's charitable love for us, what the Bible calls "grace," all who turn from sin and believe in Jesus Christ are saved from the condition of sin and its consequence--death and futility.
When you entrust your life to Jesus Christ, you will have forgiveness, life, purpose, and peace with God.
Now, I don’t want to simplify things. Having peace and eternity with God are free gifts God grants to all who turn from sin and trust in Jesus Christ. But they are gifts we find it easy to let go of.
Faith itself, the Bible teaches, isn’t something we can talk ourselves into, but only receive just as we receive any other gift.
And as long as we live in this world, our genetic predisposition to sin will haunt us.
Jesus was and is God in the flesh, perfect and sinless, conceived not by a sinful man and a sinful woman, but by the Holy Spirit. But if Jesus was tempted and tested, we can expect to be tempted and tested too!
Jesus also promises that “the one who endures to the end” in surrender to Him “will be saved.” They will have a peace that only the God Who became one of us, died for us, and then rose from death for all eternity can guarantee.
If you would like to claim that peace for the first time or claim it again this morning, I want to invite you to pray with me right now:
Lord Jesus, I am a sinner in need of the forgiveness only You can give. I believe that You died for my sins. I believe that You rose from the dead to open up eternity to all who will turn from their sins and let You be their God and King. I ask You to come into my life. Rule over me today and forever. Send Your Holy Spirit to me daily so that I can trust and follow You and live in Your peace. In Your Name I pray. Amen
If you're like me, you may find yourself needing to pray that prayer about twenty-five times a day.
That's okay: As Martin Luther said, the problem with some "born-again Christians" is that they're not born again enough. We need to keep coming back to Christ so that our old sinful self can be crucified and the new child of God can keep rising from the ashes of our sin!
But if you prayed that prayer with sincerity, know this: The war is over!
You have the "it" you’ve wanted your whole life: Peace with God!
Amen
[The four points of "the Roman Road," found in many places, and the version of "the sinner's prayer" as presented here, are based on a helpful book that has helped me share my faith many times over the past decade: Steps to Peace with God, published by the publications arm of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, World Wide Publications. I don't know if it's still in print. A link to it at Amazon.com can be found above.] [These passages of Scripture are mentioned in the sermon (most are hyperlinked above): Acts 13:22, Psalm 51:5, Romans 2:14-15, Matthew 22:36-40, Romans 5:1, Romans 6:23, John 3:16, John 1:1-14, Romans 3:23, Romans 7:19, Hebrews 9:24-28, John 1:29, Romans 10:9, 2 Corinthians 5:21, Matthew 1:18, Hebrews 4:15, and Mark 1:12-13]
