Download worship folder for Sunday, July 21, 2024.
Presiding and Preaching: The Rev. Beth Gaede
Readings and prayers: Sue Browender, lector; Kathy Thurston, assisting minister
Organist: Cantor David Cherwien
Download next Sunday’s readings for this Tuesday’s noon Bible study.
By office
Like Herod, the good news might perplex us, but it also attracts us–and we are called to live into the fullness of God’s shalom by speaking peace and justice.
Vicar Lauren Mildahl
The Eighth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 15 B
Texts: Mark 6:14-29; Amos 7:7-15; Psalm 85:8-13; Ephesians 1:3-14
God’s beloved, grace to you and peace in the name of the Father, and of the ☩ Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
There’s not much good news in our gospel for today, is there?
I mean, it’s a good story. It has all the elements: scandal, power, seduction, revenge, tragedy, death. The kind of story that gets told and retold, for sure. Painted and repainted. Adapted and re-adapted. It’s a good story – but is there any good news here for us today?
Because it sure seems like bad news. It sure seems like the power of the world wins. John the Baptizer was sent to prepare the way for the reign of God, but when the reign of God comes head-to-head against the reign of Herod, all it takes is one pleasing dance, and one foolish promise, and then there’s one head on a platter.
What’s good about that?
For me, there’s only a glimmer of good news and it’s in this one line that Mark includes: “When Herod heard John the Baptizer, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he liked to listen to him.”
He liked to listen, even though he was “greatly perplexed.”
The Greek word for perplexed is ἀπορέω, which means to be at a loss – literally “to be wayless” – and translators go lots of different ways with it: “thoroughly baffled,” one version says, “miserable with guilt,” “greatly confused,” “much troubled.”
And I don’t want to defend or acquit Herod, but I have to confess that I sympathize with him a little bit. How often have I felt wayless, baffled, miserable with guilt, confused and troubled when I’ve heard the word of God? The Psalmist says, “Let me hear what the Lord God is saying, for you speak peace to your faithful people…” but it doesn’t always feel like peace to me. Especially when that word exposes the ways I’ve chosen the reign of Lauren, rather than the reign of God.
But maybe that’s the point.
Because, after all, Herod was supposed to feel troubled by the word from God that John was bringing to him: “For John had been telling Herod, ‘It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.’” Commentators often say that the problem with this relationship was that it was considered incestuous and that’s why it was not lawful. But if you know the full story, you can see that the problem is bigger than that.
The law exists to promote life, and this unlawful act brought a lot of death.
Not only John’s, as we heard, but countless others died later because of this marriage. It started a war! Herod and Herodias divorced their spouses in order to marry and this so angered Herod’s ex-father-in-law that he joined up with Herodias’ ex-husband, and they declared war and marched on Galilee. An untold number of soldiers and bystanders died in this conflict. And it didn’t turn out great for Herod and Herodias either, who both died in exile when they had lost the favor of the Roman Emperor. Death, violence, separation, all born from breaches of the law: from coveting, adultery, and lust.
And John tried to warn them. God sent John to speak the words that Herod needed to hear, to offer Herod and Herodias an alternative path, to “speak the peace” that might have been.
That’s what prophets always do, really.
It’s certainly what the prophet Amos was doing. Over seven hundred years before John was sent to Herod, God took Amos from following his flock, and said to him, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’ And so Amos begged them: “Seek God and live! [Amos 5:4]” He begged them to choose another path so they could experience the thriving, abundant life in God’s peace!
Because if they didn’t, Amos had harsh truths to share about where that path would lead: that God would “spare them no longer;” that ”the high places of Isaac would be made desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel laid waste,” and that God would “rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.” And when the priest Amaziah heard these harsh words, he felt perplexed, baffled, confused and troubled; protesting: “The land is not able to bear” these words.
These words didn’t feel like God “speaking peace” to God’s people.
But what was hard for Herod and for Amaziah to understand, what is hard for us to remember, is that speaking peace doesn’t just mean saying nice, comforting, calming things. Speaking peace isn’t just the absence of conflict. Speaking peace is speaking shalom, speaking deep wellness and wholeness within and without and between.
And shalom doesn’t just appear.
Which means that speaking peace means speaking the conditions that are necessary for peace. It means speaking justice. Amos sees the people “selling the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals…trampling the head of the poor into the dust of the earth and pushing the afflicted out of the way.” There can’t be peace in these conditions, not when injustice is perpetuated, not when the poor are suffering, not when the powerless are exploited.
No justice, no peace, Amos warns.
This is what speaking peace looks like, it looks like Amos trying desperately to draw the people back to true peace that is available in the reign of God, but to get there, they have to live justly. To live in such a way that everyone has what they need. That everyone is loved just the way they are. That everyone’s tender wounds are transformed into sacred scars. That’s what it’s like in the reign of God. And if they seek the reign of God, they will find it.
And I think that’s why Herod, even though he was troubled, baffled, confused, and perplexed, he still liked to listen to John.
Because shalom is wonderful. Even Herod could recognize that. He liked the idea of it. He recognized the goodness of the world that John the Baptizer was proclaiming.
And we all like to listen when God speaks peace.
Because there is something deeply appealing about the shalom of the reign of God. It’s what draws us to this room week in and week out. We long to listen to words like the ones Paul offers to the Ephesians: “With all wisdom and insight God has made known to us the mystery of God’s will…to gather up all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth.” We like to listen to words like that.
But it isn’t enough just to listen.
“Repent!” John said. “Repent! for the reign of God is near!” That’s the next step after listening, and it’s the step Herod never gets to. He is too afraid for his own status, clinging too tightly to his sense of power and control, and he’s too reluctant to challenge the injustices that benefit him. He wants peace, but won’t help create it. And, in the end, that’s why John died.
Herod chose violence, but that still didn’t bring him peace.
Because when he hears about Jesus – he thinks it’s John the Baptizer, the man he knew for sure was dead, come back to haunt him. Herod can’t experience the love of God-With-Us or the joy of God’s shalom in the flesh. And he can’t have peace because he is hounded by the memory of his own cruelty and cowardice, haunted by injustice: No justice. No peace. Given the chance to seek God and live, Herod chose death instead.
We are all still processing the aftermath of the shooting at the Trump rally last night.
Many of us are perplexed and baffled and confused and troubled. We mourn those who died and pray for healing for those who were injured. And we fear for the fallout, because we can be sure that this act of violence won’t bring peace, even if the shooter, whoever they were, even if they liked to listen, liked the idea of peace, but chose death instead.
Let us choose life.
We are all called to speak God’s peace. There is no ordination, no roster for prophets – we are all prophets, plucked from our flocks. We are called to speak peace in Christ and to speak the justice that is its prerequisite. Not only to speak it, but to bring it into existence by loving God and loving our neighbors, and making sure that everyone, no matter who they vote for, that everyone is gathered into the fullness of the Holy Spirit.
It won’t be comfortable. We will have to repent again and again. And it might even be dangerous, speaking truth to power often is. But it’s worth it. For the good news. The good news might perplex us but it also attracts us, like gravity pulling us to our God who loves us so much and wants to gather us into the fullness of shalom.
Earlier in the book of Amos, the prophet says: “The lion has roared; who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken; who can but prophesy?”
Speak peace this week, beloveds. Speak justice.
We need it today more than ever. Who can but prophesy? The good news is just so good.
In the name of the Father, and of the ☩ Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Download worship folder for Sunday, July 14, 2024.
Presiding: The Rev. Art Halbardier
Preaching: Vicar Lauren Mildahl
Readings and prayers: Carolyn Heider, lector; George Heider, assisting minister
Organist: Cantor David Cherwien
Download next Sunday’s readings for this Tuesday’s noon Bible study.
You and I are called to follow Christ, proclaim God’s love with our lives, and we help each other both hear that call and live it.
Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 14 B
Texts: Mark 6:1-13; Ezekiel 2:1-5; 2 Corinthians 12:2-10
Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
As recruiting pitches go, these stories are pretty bad.
If God’s Word today means to call us to serve God, follow the path of Christ, and proclaim God’s love with our lives, these stories are pretty counterproductive to that goal.
Ezekiel is called to speak God’s Word to people God calls “impudent, stubborn, and rebellious.” There’s a good chance, God says, they won’t listen. Paul today says his service to Christ is filled with “weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, calamities.” Seriously, he was stoned nearly to death for proclaiming Christ. And Jesus, with a near total rejection in his hometown that limited his divine abilities, sends out followers in pairs to do the same job, clearly instructing them what to do if they’re also rejected.
It’s important not to oversell a recruiting pitch. But you and I could be excused for walking away from today’s readings thinking, “thanks, but no thanks. Not the job for me.”
But we could also say we’ve not heard a call as clearly as these.
When was the last time you heard God’s actual voice calling to you, as Ezekiel did? Paul met Christ on the road to Damascus, who set him on his way. And these initial twelve were sent out by Jesus himself, God-with-us. Maybe they faced hardship and rejection, but at least they heard their calls clearly.
Those of us who’ve been Christian our whole lives, and maybe even those who came to faith later, likely say in this age that our sense of faith isn’t attached to God’s direct voice calling. Most of us don’t get visions. We rarely claim to hear God’s actual voice, and these days that might lead you to seek medical care rather than the road of discipleship.
So are these readings at all meaningful to us today? Since most of us don’t share a call story like these, and most haven’t had major setbacks and persecution because of our discipleship, maybe we’re off the hook.
But God is supposed to speak to us through Scripture, to lead us to faith and life in Christ. So don’t climb off that hook just yet.
Maybe it’s a question of how we listen for God’s call.
What are you looking for? What do you need to feel God has called you to follow Christ and proclaim Christ to the world in word and deed?
Now, this may actually distract from that question. But my call to ordained ministry was nothing like these calls today. In high school I thought medical school might be a path. But then I considered what I was good at and loved to do. I wanted to help people, and had gifts for that. But I felt I’d struggle if, as a doctor, I couldn’t save someone. I loved my church and serving in the liturgy, and the whole community of faith. I found theology exciting. I was good at public speaking. So simply on practical terms, I decided I should be a pastor. It wasn’t until years later I could say with confidence it was a call from God.
Here’s why that’s distracting: we’re not talking about career calls today. My call to Word and Sacrament ministry is no different from calls any of you have received that led you to a certain career path or life choice. All jobs, paid or not, are holy vocations, Luther taught us.
What God’s Word today is asking is much more important: how am I called, as Joseph, to be Christ in the world, beyond my paid job? And how are you called that way?
But I shared that story for the process.
I didn’t expect nor receive a vision. I didn’t think I’d hear God’s voice speak aloud. It was just practical.
And maybe that’s how we could think about our life in Christ God might seek in us, since most of us won’t have a dramatic experience like so many in Scripture.
What do you see in yourself? Are you good at some things that others aren’t? Are there things you understand and care about more than other things? Are your passions drawn to certain problems in the world? Do you have wealth you could share? Some way that you might weigh your wealth against the needs of the world, as Paul talked about last week? Do you have time that you could give to something? What if you put all this information together, along with anything else you can think of? What do you then hear from God?
Theologian Frederick Buechner describes it this way: “The kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work (a) that you need most to do and (b) that the world most needs to have done. … The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.”[1] The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.
So each of us has some listening to do.
And let’s at least address the poor recruiting pitch.
It’s true that if you live as Christ you might get pushback from others, feel threatened, have to let go of things you’ve clung to tightly. Jesus never said that we’d have it easy. He talked about sacrificial love. He modeled vulnerability to others, even those who are evil. He called us to love our enemies and pray for them. If you and I listen, and hear, and then follow, sure, there will be hard consequences.
But since when is this an easy world to live in? We’ve got setbacks and challenges of all kinds. Not being Christ in the world doesn’t change that. Playing it safe with our wealth or time, holding onto prejudices and biases, ignoring the pain of our neighbors, doesn’t ensure a safe and happy life.
But the witness of people of Christ through the ages is there is a joy and peace and hope that comes with following, even in adversity. A sense you are part of God’s healing love that leads you through all circumstances. Following Christ might be hard, but living in this world is hard. And in following, the joy of the Spirit lives in you and fills you with peace from God and hope for the world.
And remember: we’re in this together.
We help each other listen, and see gifts and abilities in each other. We don’t serve Christ alone. None of us has all the answers we need, all the resources, all the patience, all the endurance and strength, all the vision. But in this grace of our community, together we can be a wonder of Christ’s healing in this world.
So listen for where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet. And let’s each help each other listen, because God is calling. Together, we’ll also help each other live into that calling, until God’s hope for the world’s healing comes to be.
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
[1] Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking: A Seeker’s ABC, Harper and Row, 1973, pp. 118-119.
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