God’s plan of salvation and healing is working; we just need to go back to see what that plan really is, and how we are called to be a part of it.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The First Sunday of Advent, year B
Texts: Isaiah 64:1-9; Mark 13:24-37; 1 Corinthians 1:3-9

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

1,700 years before Jesus was born, God started a plan of salvation.

Calling Abraham and Sarah, God began a path to bring this earth back into relationship with God. Three thousand, seven hundred years ago. That’s a long time.

Roughly 1,200 years later, the third prophet writing in the book of Isaiah impatiently cried, “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down!” After the exile, in a destroyed homeland, the prophet wondered if God’s plan would ever happen. Two thousand, six hundred years ago. That’s a long time.

600 years later, a baby was born to a poor couple in Palestine. That baby grew up, gathered followers, taught of God’s love and God’s reign, was killed on a cross, and rose from the dead. His Church grew out of the sending of the Holy Spirit. God’s salvation spread. Two thousand years ago. That’s a long time.

But the world’s still a mess. Optimism about the planet’s future, let alone humanity, is dim. We’re destroying the climate, risking that this earth will be uninhabitable for our children; millions suffer from hunger and poverty; war rages endlessly; there is prejudice and abuse between genders and between races; our politics are toxic and impotent. Isaiah today speaks perfectly for today, and also for the seventeenth century, when a German used Isaiah’s cry in a great Advent hymn: “O Savior, rend the heavens wide; come down, come down with mighty stride.” (LBW no. 38)

It’s nearly 4,000 years since God began this, 2,000 since God came in person. How long will this take? When will we see signs of the world improving? Ors that hymn sings, “When will our hearts behold your dawn?”

Given the world’s situation, maybe we’ve misunderstood God’s plan. Or maybe God isn’t actually doing it.

But if God is who we believe God to be, the Triune God who made all things, who in Christ Jesus died and rose from the dead, whose love for the world is proven in that death and resurrection, whose Spirit moves and breathes and fills all people, if this God is true, then the second thing can’t be. God will keep all promises.

So that means we’ve misunderstood God’s plan.

This year, Advent could be a season to practice waiting for God on God’s terms, waiting for what God has actually promised to do, waiting for the healing that God’s Scriptures actually say God cares about. Rather than complaining that God isn’t doing anything, we could learn to watch and wait for what God is actually doing.

So what is God doing?

Sometimes our frustration at the world’s state leads us to assume God’s plan doesn’t involve anything more than rescuing us. Christians sometimes act as if God’s salvation is an evacuation plan from a condemned world, and the Church is a lifeboat off a sinking ship, and salvation is rescuing Christians from this life. The Church has taught that too long.

But that’s not what the Scriptures say. It’s not even what Jesus, God’s Son, says. But when he rose from the dead, the early believers saw a new thing. In Christ’s resurrection, they realized God’s healing extended after death. That was a great joy; for us, too. God promises in Christ that we will have life after we die. The problem is, for at least a millennium now the Church has too often acted as if that’s all God plans to do.

But the Bible is clear that God’s whole plan was restoring the creation, and all creatures, including human beings, back into relationship with God and each other. That’s what Jesus taught and lived. That’s what the prophets called for. That’s what God’s law revealed.

We know this, too. Our anxiety at a broken world wouldn’t exist if all we cared about was getting to heaven when we die. We care about so much more because we’ve read the Scriptures. We’ve heard God’s dreams. We’ve dreamed them ourselves. All the promises of restoring the creation, of all people living in peace and harmony, of all having enough, we’ve read and longed for.

But we need to learn how God will accomplish this plan. Because it’s not going to be by power and might.

The problem with crying out “tear open the heavens” is that it doesn’t take seriously how the Scriptures say God will accomplish this restoration and healing. That is, through us.

That’s the witness of Scripture over and over: we are called to learn love of God and neighbor. We are called to care for those who are poor so there are no more who are poor. We are given charge of this earth, to care for it, nurture it.

And at the height of God’s plan, coming among us as one of us, what did the Christ do? Say, “I’ve got this, I’ll fix everything”? No. He taught people about God’s love, about caring for this creation, about loving each other. He anointed followers, made us literally “Christ”, to keep this work going.

God’s vision of salvation can’t happen through God’s action alone or it’s not salvation as God desires. God’s way is the only way: through us.

You see, if God dreams of all creatures living together in a non-violent world, God can’t accomplish that with violence and rending the heavens.

How will God get the people of the world to live and embrace non-violence? By killing them? By urging them to kill each other? It’s utter nonsense.

God put this into the first declaration of the law: you shall not kill. Generations have ignored it, parsed it, pretended it wasn’t clear. But it’s core to God.

So Jesus let himself be killed rather than kill his enemies. The eternal Son of God, joining our human flesh, taught peacemaking and non-violence, and when we decided we wanted none of it and killed him, Jesus showed us God’s answer, and invited us to do the same.

There is no power that can force non-violence. Only God’s way will work. But it’s going to take a long time.

If God dreams of humanity living in love of God and neighbor, God can’t accomplish that with power and wrath.

The Bible’s consistent witness is that God’s entire expectation of us is summed up in loving God and loving our neighbor.

How will God’s coming in power and wrath make that happen? We look at how humans don’t love God or each other and despair. But what do we want God to do? Destroy the unloving? Force them – force us – to love?

So the Triune God faced the cross. The only way to show us what love really is is to love us with what love really is. Self-giving, vulnerable, letting go of everything. No other way could break our hearts so they’d also learn to love.

Only God’s way will work. But it’s going to take a long time.

If God dreams of a restored creation, God can’t accomplish that by destroying the world.

Christians who focus only on life after death don’t need to care about this planet, about this environment. It’s disposable.

But the Scriptures flow with God’s love for this creation, God’s sadness at our pollution and destruction. They burst with promises that God will restore all things.

How will God coming with fire and destruction do that? Hoping that God will break it all apart and take us to heaven makes no sense. God loves this creation, and desires only good for it. It can provide in abundance for all God’s creatures.

So God asks us to care for it, tend it, love it.

Only God’s way will work. But it, too, is going to take a long time.

Advent teaches us what we wait for, and what we do while we wait.

We do our jobs, Jesus says today. Follow Christ. Be Christ. Love God and love neighbor. Tend the garden, the earth. Feed those who are hungry. Shelter those who have none. Dismantle systems and structures that oppress. Tell the truth in love and seek the healing of our country, and of all nations. It’s all there. Jesus’ parable today just tells us to be at our work. The rest of the Scriptures tell us what that work is.

Through that work in us, God will keep doing this salvation. And today Paul promises Christ will give us the spiritual gifts and strength we need to do what we are asked to do.

We already knew this truth about God’s plan. In fact, we’ve sung it many times, in another Advent hymn we love.

Ambrose, bishop of Milan in the fourth century, wrote a plea for Christ to come, a hymn Martin Luther loved and translated. “Savior of the nations, come; virgin’s son, make here your home.”

But they sang of this different coming. They didn’t sing of God ripping open the skies or destroying or using power and might. The hymn’s climax reveals the paradox and hope at the center of God’s long-term plan:

Now your manger, shining bright
hallows night with newborn light.
Night cannot this light subdue;
let our faith shine ever new.    (ELW no. 263)

No sensible person could see a manger hold anything like an unquenchable light. Or the hope of the healing of the world. But in that manger is the heart of God’s plan. It’s still unfolding in us, and eventually, God’s light will break all darkness and death.

It’s going to take a long time. But Christ has shown us there’s no stopping a love like this, no quenching a light like this, no matter how long it takes.

So we wait, we work, we hope. Because God is already here, and everything already is being healed.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

Paul tells us that “God loves a cheerful giver.” Are we going to hear those words as a burdensome requirement that adds to our anxieties about giving – or can we find in them freedom from our fears?

Vicar Jessica Christy
The Day of Thanksgiving, year A
Texts: Deuteronomy 8:7-18; 2 Corinthians 9:6-15

We have so much guilt about giving. What we do or don’t decide to share with those in need has seemingly endless power to trouble our conscience. In our unjust, broken world, it’s hard to know the best way to use the resources that God has entrusted to us. We worry if we’re sharing enough, when we have been blessed with so much and the world’s need is so great. Or we might worry that we’re giving too much away, when we’re not sure how we’re going to make ends meet for ourselves. We fret about giving to the right people and causes, not wanting to be unwise about how we allocate our money, time, and talents. And we’re anxious if we’re giving for the right reasons, if we’re truly acting out of love or if we’re motivated by social pressure, or self-interest, or remorse. We all want to do the right thing with our resources, but that’s a tall order in our world, so many of us live with the guilty suspicion – or perhaps the guilty certainty – that we’re somehow falling short. That’s why stewardship conversations are always so awkward. It’s hard for us to even talk to each other about our giving habits, and that very discomfort reveals our fear that we’re not getting it right.

And then, just add to that stack of anxieties, Paul says that giving is supposed to be cheerful. He’s trying to collect money for the poor of Jerusalem, and he tells the church in Corinth that God loves a cheerful giver. It’s one of those verses that sometimes sticks in my throat, because it feels like it’s asking so much of us. Not only do we need to be generous, responsible, informed, and altruistic with our resources – on top of everything, we’re supposed to be happy about it all. And as every person knows, being told that we should cheer up does nothing to alleviate our stress; often, it just makes us feel more overwhelmed. The weight of our responsibility to the world is so heavy. And it’s hard to hear that we should be happy to carry that weight. God loves a cheerful giver? Why can’t God just love that we’re trying to figure it out?

But there is grace in these words, once we stop listening to our anxieties and start listening to the Spirit. This verse about cheerful giving can be misread as pure law, but what Paul is giving us is gospel. When he says that God loves a cheerful giver, he’s not talking about requirements, or what we need to do to deserve God’s love. He’s reminding us of our freedom in Christ. He says, “Each of you must give as you have made up your mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” We might instead translate that word “cheerful” as “joyful” or “free.” Paul tells the people of Corinth: listen, only you know what God is asking of your life. Only you know your full situation. Only you know your heart. And so, he says, be free. Be free to respond as the spirit moves you, and don’t let me, or anyone else, guilt you into pretending to be someone you are not. God isn’t looking for our guilt. God is looking to rejoice with us, and to bless us, and to free us from all that troubles our hearts.

So Paul gives us a vision of how far that freedom can take us. He says that we can use our liberty to find far greater riches and far greater joy than what the systems of our world can offer us. He promises that those who are moved to give will discover far more abundance than they had to begin with: “The point is this: the one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, but the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.” Once again, this is not an order or a threat, but an invitation to participate in God’s reign. The kingdom of God is already here, transforming our world now, but we can only see that when we choose to be a part of it. When we freely plant whatever gifts God has entrusted to us, we harvest clearer vision about how the Spirit is moving in the world. We harvest deeper relationships with God and with our neighbors. We harvest freedom from our anxieties. We harvest the joy of taking part of part of something eternal, and life-giving, and good. We harvest hope. This is the purpose for which God has made such abundance possible in our lives. We are given our blessings so we might give them away. God has made enough for everyone; no one needs to be hungry, homeless, or lonely. Paul writes, “God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in every good work.” God’s abundance is for abundant sharing, abundant community, abundant life. God loves our cheerful giving because it means that we have discovered the joy of living in the promises of God’s reign.

That’s all good for Paul to say, but it’s hard for us to believe in the power of this abundance when we are so conditioned to believe in scarcity. We instinctively hold tight to the things that we deem “ours.” Our natural pose is defensiveness. But Moses tells us we can be free of all that fear because nothing that we have is truly ours. In the book of Deuteronomy, the people of Israel are on the eve of crossing over into the Promised Land after a generation of wandering in the wilderness. Moses describes the land that they’re about to enter with that beautiful list of the earth’s bounty: grains and fruits, abundant fresh water, and even the minerals that God placed in the Earth. With all these marvels at their fingertips, life is at last going to be good. They’re going to live in freedom, and eat their fill, and praise God for their many blessings. But then Moses gives them a warning: when they get comfortable, they’re going to be tempted to forget how they got here. So he tells them, Take care that you do not forget the Lord your God. When your have food, and homes, and riches, be careful that you do not forget God and exalt yourself. Do not say, “My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth,” but remember the Lord your God, for it is God who gives you the power to get wealth.

Those are tough words for us. We live in a culture that teaches us to proudly proclaim, “My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth.” Our nation loves to believe that whatever we have is ours, and ours alone, because are the ones who earned it. It is deeply instilled in us from childhood that a fundamental goal of life is to work hard to build up the pile of what is ours. All of us know what it means to work hard for what we have, and there is nothing wrong with being proud of what our labor has accomplished. But we lose sight of God when we think that we are in any way self-sufficient. We did not make our bodies, we did not choose the circumstances of our birth, and we certainly did not create the riches of this planet. It is hard for us to confess our lack of independence, but once we embrace how deeply we rely on God, we realize that we don’t need to cling so tightly to what we have won in this life. We can begin to let God transform our reluctant, fearful hearts into something freer and more loving. We can stop building higher walls to protect what is ours, and start building longer tables to share it with our neighbors. Paul writes that giving our resources away “not only supplies the needs of the saints but also overflows with many thanksgivings to God.” Free and joyful giving is an act of thanks-giving, and it opens us to the fullness of God’s sustaining love.

After worship, many of us will go to our homes to share a meal with loved ones. At its best, the joy of the meal is not in the excess of food, but in the chance to gather together, serving one another and being served in our turn. It’s a celebration of our ability to care for each other using the gifts that God has given us. Our vision of God’s reign is like that festive meal, but with a table at which everyone is welcome, and a feast that never ends. It’s a feast where grace triumphs over guilt, love triumphs over need, and abundance triumphs over fear. There is such abundance in this world, and whenever we share it abundantly, we are sharing the loving reign of God.

Thanks be to God for this indescribable gift!

Amen.

God loves us beyond measure, beyond death: in that love we are free to live the abundant life of love in caring for what God cares for and healing the world.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
Christ the King, the Last Sunday after Pentecost, Lectionary 34, year A
Texts: Matthew 25:31-46; Ezekiel 34:11-24

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

It was Christmas break in my first year of college, and, out with friends, I was anxious about the time.

It was nearly 11:00 p.m., so I hurried home.

Now, in high school the curfew dance with my mother was long-standing. The rules were clear, the expected times never in doubt. My arrival, well, was not always in keeping with expectations. My mother had all sorts of techniques in this dance. She was brilliant with sarcasm: “I didn’t realize your girlfriend moved to Sioux Falls.” Or, “I didn’t hear the storm, but it must have knocked down all the phone lines.” And then came the judgment.

But the pinnacle was one night when I was over two hours late and certain that this time I’d won. The house was dark, not a creature stirring. I didn’t realize my trial was scheduled for breakfast. My father was the attorney, but my mother mastered the legal principle that you never ask a question you don’t already know the answer to. “So, what time did you get home?” Confident, but offering humility, I said, “I think I was about ten minutes late, sorry.” “You sure you don’t want to rethink your answer?” Of course: she’d woken up, looked at the clock, and went back to sleep the sleep of the just.

But here’s what was strange about that December night I was home from college. I no longer had a curfew. I’d asked my mother and she said, “You’re an adult. You probably stay out late at college. But I worry about you lying in a ditch, so call if it’ll be after 1 or 2, so I can sleep.” At about ten I started thinking about getting home, so she wouldn’t worry. I had complete freedom to do what I wanted. But what I wanted was for her to not have to fret.

It’s all a question of motivation, isn’t it?

As parents, we learn that fear and threats don’t motivate good behavior.

Children don’t respond as well to threats as to love. Most of us don’t react well to anger and wrath and accusation. When I finally grasped that what I didn’t want was to hurt my parents, that it was their love for me that mattered, it was a revelation.

So why do we think threats are how God means to make us good? True, there’s a lot of wrath and anger in Scripture. Today we’ve got Jesus’ parable with a serious judgment at the end, and Ezekiel hurling God’s anger at selfish, greedy, polluting sheep who harm the other sheep. If you want to find anger from God in the Bible, you can.

But God’s a better parent than we ever could be. Anger’s never the last word.

God knows what will draw us into love of God and neighbor.

From Genesis to Revelation, anger, wrath, threats aren’t God’s last word. God cannot let go of us, because God loves us. So Ezekiel, after promising judgment between sheep and sheep, ends promising that a new David, a divine Shepherd, will feed and care for the whole flock. Even the ones who were judged. At the end of Jesus’ parable, remember it is the king himself who dies on the cross. God in Christ enters human suffering, with the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick, and the imprisoned. Where people are in pain, that’s where God will be. Even if it means going into hell for us.

This is the last word of the Scriptures, God’s love for us that reaches its height at the cross and resurrection. Yes, God gets angry at us. But God’s bottom line is always that we are beloved, cherished, worth dying for.

And God sees astonishing love in us, Christ in us. At the cross God means to love us into the people God already sees. To motivate us through undying love to become Christ ourselves, loving God and neighbor with everything we have.

When we persist in seeing God’s law as our enemy instead of as God’s promise of life, we reveal our immaturity.

When we insist on playing the judgment game, when we continue to resent being asked to do anything, we’re still children.

Martin Luther gave us a great gift: he saw God’s grace and mercy overriding all judgment. We are loved and healed by God without our earning it. But Luther only got us half-way there. We’re still stuck on seeing God’s law as harsh, and God as threatening judge.

We know we’re loved in Christ, forgiven. But we still believe the lie that God’s law is unattainable, an undoable thing, that we can’t live as God asks.

So we ignore Jesus’ obvious point in these parables and, instead of living in love as Christ taught, we worry about the parables’ judgment. It’s my old curfew game: fearing punishment, instead of living in love.

But when we realize that the Triune God’s love for us, completely unearned, is real and cannot be taken away from us, we grow up into the people God already sees in us. We see God’s law as gift, because it comes from the God who loves us. We see blessing and joy in God’s rules, because they mean safety for us and for others, abundance for us and for others, grace for us and for others.

When we quit playing judgment-avoidance, we see a simple truth: we see where we can serve the God who loves us and wants the best for all people.

There’s a huge gift in these three parables we’ve just heard: all the characters are at the end, and there’s no more time to act. But we are not at the end, we’re in the middle.

The bridegroom is still coming, the master and king haven’t returned. So we know exactly what we can do: the action of these parables. And we know exactly what the bridegroom, master, and king does: dies on the cross for us and for the world. There is literally no reason for us to be afraid of God. We know all we need to know about God. This is a gift!

Every one of these servants today wanted to serve their king; some didn’t have any more time. All the bridesmaids wanted to be in the wedding party; some didn’t have any more time. The only one in these parables who didn’t want to serve was the third slave last week. And notice: he plays the judgment game, acting in fear of his master.

Likewise, I don’t know a single person here who doesn’t desire to serve Christ faithfully, to be Christ. Well, we still have time. And we know what to do!

Keep our lamps lighted with God’s oil of love so people can see the coming of the Christ who loves them and brings justice and righteousness to the whole world. We can do this.

Use God’s wealth together, and serve God’s beloved, all who are in need. Transform the world with the abundance God has entrusted to us. We can do this.

And see Christ in people who are hungry, or thirsty, in strangers and aliens, in those with no clothes or homes, in those who are sick (especially those without insurance), and folks who imprisoned (especially those wrongfully or unfairly incarcerated in our unjust system). We can do this.

If we want, we can react to these parables with fear and guilt.

We can fear God’s wrath, get discouraged at how harsh Jesus sounds. But if we do, we’ve stepped away from Scripture. If you want to feel wretched about what a failure you are, you can. But God’s Word doesn’t agree with you.

Because you are beloved to the Triune God, beyond measure, beyond death. Nothing can separate you from God’s love, a love that goes into the outer darkness, the weeping and gnashing of teeth, even the fires of hell.

God sees in you an astonishing potential to heal this world, to bless others’ lives. God sees Christ in you, sees Christ in us together.

Together we can light our lamps so Christ is seen and justice flows, together we can learn to use God’s wealth for the sake of the world, together we can care for Christ in all who are in need.

There is no greater motivation than that we are loved, no greater joy than knowing what we can do, no greater hope than hearing that in our love in this world we are serving Christ.

Maybe it’s time we rejoiced in this and grew up into the people God already sees in us.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen