God never promised that life would be easy, or go according to our plans, but God did promise that God would be faithful to the covenant, and that suffering and death will not be the final word. And this promise is revealed in the suffering and death of Jesus on the cross.

Vicar Meagan McLaughlin
   The Fourth Sunday in Lent, Year B
   Texts: Numbers 21: 4-9, Psalm 107, Ephesians 2: 1-10, John 3: 14-21

Grace and peace to you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

On Sunday, March 7, 1965, Bloody Sunday, several hundred people began to march from Selma to Montgomery to claim the right to vote and equality under the law for Black Americans. They were attacked that day with tear gas and billy-clubs, and several people died, but they did not give up, because they believed that, eventually, the discrimination and violence they faced would end. They trusted that God would ultimately see them through.

Last Sunday, fifty years later, members of Mount Olive joined people of all ethnicities and faiths all over the country to remember that day. We marched to celebrate how far we have come. We marched to remind ourselves that we still have a long ways to go. We hear in the news this week of police officers shot in Ferguson, and messages of hate from an Oklahoma fraternity, and we know we have a long ways to go. On Sunday, we sang and prayed to the God we believe will ultimately see us through, knowing we aren’t there, yet.

The Israelites journey from Egypt to the Promised Land had been really long, and, like the march to Montgomery, not exactly easy. They had been walking in the desert for literally years, and nearly starved before God provided Manna for them, and when some of them were taken captive by the Canaanites, they had to fight to defeat them. And they still weren’t there yet. Their walk continued, and after all that time, they were getting really sick of eating only Manna.

When things are going well for us—financial success, career success, health, family, friends—it is easy for us to see these things as signs of God’s faithfulness to us without even realizing it. And when challenges arise, we are almost wired to see it as a vacuum of God’s care, evidence that God is not providing for us, or that maybe we or someone around us aren’t doing the right things.

At the very least, poor health or loss of a job or the death of a loved one feels like an interruption to “what is supposed to be happening” in our lives. There is never a good time, is there? We are not supposed to be going to doctor’s appointment after doctor’s appointment, having tests, and waiting for results. We are not supposed to be living through a loved one’s last days, or planning a funeral, or grieving. We aren’t supposed to be without a job, working on resumes or interviews, and struggling financially, unless of course, that’s what WE had planned.

So often, we move along in our routines, things happening more or less as anticipated, until we find ourselves expecting that this is how life should be. Work gets done, bills paid, vacations taken, decisions made, perhaps with some bumps along the way, but more or less predictable. And when things happen to make life difficult, our first response is typically to complain, as the Israelites did. The food is not good or hot or fast enough. The internet keeps cutting out on us, right in the middle of that e-mail we’re sending. We have to wait too long in traffic, or the doctor’s office, or the grocery store.

The Israelites were sick of Manna, and they complained, and they soon found themselves facing something much bigger than bad food. Poisonous snakes came into the camp, and many of them died. Suddenly the food didn’t matter, and they realized how foolish they had been, thinking that God owed them anything. They realized their sin, and told Moses to ask God to have mercy on them. And in the minds of the Israelites, mercy meant removing the snakes that were biting them.

God didn’t remove the snakes, but God did show mercy. Interestingly enough, the proof of God’s mercy looked just like the thing the Israelites feared most—the snakes. By looking at the bronze serpent raised in their camp, the Israelites saw that their God was bigger than a few poisonous reptiles. God assured them that God was with them, even in the midst of the snakes. The snakes remained, but the people lived, in spite of that. A source of pain and fear and death for the Israelites was transformed into a symbol of God’s faithfulness and triumph over death.

Often, the big challenges in our lives—unemployment, illness, death—are not removed either. These things are not interruptions to the life we are supposed to live, although they can certainly feel that way. Nor are they, as the Israelites felt, punishment from God for sin, although at times, if we are honest, it can feel like that, too. The truth is, the challenges of life are all a part of human experience, and our life is meant to be lived in their midst. Sometimes these challenges are of our own making, or someone else’s, and they are truly the results of choices made, natural consequences of our sin. And sometimes, difficult things just happen. Life is not always easy, and it is certainly not what we might think of as fair. But either way, the struggles and pain we experience does not mean that God has abandoned us.

God never promised that life would be easy, or go according to our plans, but God did promise that God would be faithful to the covenant and always be with us, no matter what happens. God did promise that suffering and death will not be the final word. And the proof of that for us as Christians is revealed in another symbol of pain and humiliation and death—the suffering and death of Jesus on the cross. As we make our way through Lent, we remember not only the reality of Jesus’ death, but that because of the resurrection, the cross, like the bronze snake, is transformed into evidence that God has power over everything, even death.

Our encounter with the cross of Jesus does not take away the challenges of our lives, but it transforms them—it transforms us. When we are finished with our complaining, our questioning, our blaming, God is still right there with us, and the cross of Jesus is proof of that promise. The cross reminds us that the little things in life—long lines, or spotty internet service, or cold food—are not really that important. And the big things, the real pains and struggles of life, are not too much for God to handle.

We are created by God to live this life as it comes, knowing God is with us. God created us to bring good and beauty into this world, and we can trust God to make it possible for us to do that, even when things seem so dark that we don’t see how we can possibly make a difference. The Israelites, and centuries later, the marchers in Selma, lived out that trust in every step they took. We, too, are called to march on, carrying the light of faith in the darkness.

When we in our humanity fail, as we are bound to, the cross reminds us that God is still there, giving us the courage and the strength to face the ways we have caused or contributed to the struggles of this world. We look to the cross, acknowledge our sin, and ask God for forgiveness and help. And we are renewed for the journey.

And when we are in pain, the cross is a symbol of the promise that even death is not the final word. We have a God who answers prayer, if not in the ways we might expect. God has promised to be with us even in the darkness, to lead us through to the light when we can’t see the way.

God will not break the covenant, no matter how we stumble. From the Israelites in the desert, to the marchers in Selma in 1965, to each of us today, God loves, forgives, and strengthens us. Nothing is too much for God to handle. And every time we see the cross, we are reminded of the lengths God will go to keep that promise.

Thanks be to God!

God’s words – God’s Word – speaks into existence good and beautiful and life; this is counter to the world’s wisdom, but in Christ Jesus we are invited to trust the path of God’s words as our heart’s joy.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
   The Third Sunday in Lent, year B
   texts:  Exodus 20:1-17; Psalm 19; John 2:13-22

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

In the beginning, God spoke, and it was good.

God’s words were uttered into darkness and chaos and from them came light and order and beauty and life.  This is what God does with words.  God creates.  God creates good.  God creates joy.  God creates life.

Exodus says: “Then God spoke all these words.”  The God who made all things, who called Abraham and Sarah and their family, who rescued them from slavery in Egypt, this God now speaks words to the people at Mount Sinai.  In Hebrew the Ten Commandments are “The Ten Words”.

If God creates good with words, creates joy with words, creates life and beauty and light with words, why do we fear God’s law, God’s words?  Why is our theology so thick with language about how the law kills, cuts, destroys?  Why are God’s words our enemy?

We sang with the psalmist that “the statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart.”  When was the last time you heard the law of God and your heart rejoiced?

Mount Sinai is a moment of grace and promise for God’s people.

The Hebrews knew God desired a relationship with them, sought out their ancestors.  Centuries of slavery and hardship in Egypt must have felt like abandonment.  Has the true God forgotten us?  Then came Moses, and rescue from Egypt, and even with hardships along the way, the people arrive at Sinai in hope of a new life in a land promised to be their home.

To these people, in that place, with this hope, God speaks a word of covenant promise.  God has already fulfilled the divine part of the covenant: “I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt,” they are told.  I am the one who has saved you, who is with you.

Now, God says, as my people, loved and saved, here’s the good path, your way of life.  God’s not threatening to withhold grace: they’ve already received life and freedom.  As always, God’s words are creating good, and beauty, and light, and life.

Seeing this giving of the law as grace and hope for Israel could set aside our ancient fear.

Our fear of God, seeing God as bringer of judgment and criticism, while we cringe.  Our fear of God’s law, seeing the law as forbidding, harsh, judgmental.  Afraid of God, of God’s words, we find ourselves enemies of the law, enemies of God.

Consider these people at Sinai, still learning about the Creator God who has just saved them from oppression and slavery, who now gives them direction for life.

In a world where people use violence, and kill to get their way, this God says, “that’s not a path of life.  You won’t kill if you are my people.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where people betray those closest to them and aren’t faithful, this God says, “that’s not a path of life.  You won’t commit adultery if you are my people.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where old people feel like burdens and fear not being able to care for themselves, this God says, “Honor your father and mother, that’s the path of life.  If you are my people, you will take care of your elders.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where it’s hard to know whom to trust, where people lie to get what they want, this God says, “Don’t witness falsely about each other.  That’s not a path of life.  Tell the truth and be honest, if you are my people.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where people don’t know God, don’t believe in God, assume God is the cause of all suffering, this God says, “I have saved you, so get to know me.  Don’t worship other things, only me; take time to rest as I do.  That’s the path of life for my people.”  What a grace for them, to be given the promise, the command, of a relationship with the eternal God.

God speaks and good things are made.  God speaks what is good, and beauty, and light, and life.  Just as it brought joy to the hearts of Israel – as it did the times they understood instead of the ones they resented, as we do – this confidence in God’s words can bring our hearts joy, too.

Especially when we remember what God’s Word has become for us.

God’s Word, the Word that creates good and beauty and light and life, took on our human flesh, became one of us.

All of God’s Word – creation and law and grace, everything God speaks – is now incorporated – embodied – in Jesus.  His life and presence is the Word of God in the world.  His voice is the Word of God.  His actions are the Word of God.

But he also is one of us.  Jesus not only is the entire speech of God in the world, as a human being he can carry our part of the conversation with God as well.  Speak for us to God when we are afraid, when we hide, when we can’t see God’s Word as good.  Jesus teaches us to speak with God freely, without fear.

Jesus holds the conversation between God and humanity in his own person.  He teaches us in our own words that God’s good word for us and the world is still good, and beauty, and light, and life.  In Christ Jesus we are reconciled to God, Paul has told us, because both we and God are brought together.  Christ is God’s temple, as John tells us today, where we meet God.

At the cross God’s Word absorbs all our bad words, all our breaking of the law, and destroys death’s power over us.  God’s Word creates good even in dying, and fully joins us to the life of the Triune God forever.  There is no need for us to be enemies anymore.  In Christ Jesus there is no way we can be enemies with God.

Look at God’s law, then, and rejoice: here’s the path to life.

In Christ we see God’s path – love of God and love of neighbor – as the only way we want to live.  We understand God’s forgiveness in Christ not as avoiding punishment but as putting our feet right, our hearts right, our eyes right, our heads right, on the path God’s Word shows is life.

God’s law, Christ reveals, is the instructions for how we’re designed to live in happiness and love, the operating manual for humanity to live in joy and hope.  It’s the wisdom to how we can live in a world of peace for all, the answer to the suffering of this planet.  If we lived according to the Ten Words, adding to them Jesus’ deepening in the Sermon on the Mount and Luther’s expansion of them into positive actions toward God and neighbor, this world would be an astonishingly good place to live in.  That’s our heart’s joy.

Today God still speaks and it’s still good.

God’s words are uttered into the darkness and chaos and evil of this world and from them come light and order and beauty and life.  This is what God does with words.  God creates.  God creates good.  God creates joy.  God creates life.  God creates a path that is good, and beauty, and light, and life, for all people.

When we understand that, we can really start to sing our psalm.  We become people living in the heady world of joy in God’s goodness.

We can sing “the teaching of the LORD is perfect and revives the soul.  The statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart.  The commandment of the LORD is clear and gives light to the eyes.”

We can sing it because we know now it’s true.  Because we know now this is the path of joy we’ve been looking for our whole lives.

And because God spoke this Word.  And when God speaks, it is good.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

God’s words – God’s Word – speaks into existence good and beautiful and life; this is counter to the world’s wisdom, but in Christ Jesus we are invited to trust the path of God’s words as our heart’s joy.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
   The Third Sunday in Lent, year B
   texts:  Exodus 20:1-17; Psalm 19; John 2:13-22

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

In the beginning, God spoke, and it was good.

God’s words were uttered into darkness and chaos and from them came light and order and beauty and life.  This is what God does with words.  God creates.  God creates good.  God creates joy.  God creates life.

Exodus says: “Then God spoke all these words.”  The God who made all things, who called Abraham and Sarah and their family, who rescued them from slavery in Egypt, this God now speaks words to the people at Mount Sinai.  In Hebrew the Ten Commandments are “The Ten Words”.

If God creates good with words, creates joy with words, creates life and beauty and light with words, why do we fear God’s law, God’s words?  Why is our theology so thick with language about how the law kills, cuts, destroys?  Why are God’s words our enemy?

We sang with the psalmist that “the statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart.”  When was the last time you heard the law of God and your heart rejoiced?

Mount Sinai is a moment of grace and promise for God’s people.

The Hebrews knew God desired a relationship with them, sought out their ancestors.  Centuries of slavery and hardship in Egypt must have felt like abandonment.  Has the true God forgotten us?  Then came Moses, and rescue from Egypt, and even with hardships along the way, the people arrive at Sinai in hope of a new life in a land promised to be their home.

To these people, in that place, with this hope, God speaks a word of covenant promise.  God has already fulfilled the divine part of the covenant: “I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt,” they are told.  I am the one who has saved you, who is with you.

Now, God says, as my people, loved and saved, here’s the good path, your way of life.  God’s not threatening to withhold grace: they’ve already received life and freedom.  As always, God’s words are creating good, and beauty, and light, and life.

Seeing this giving of the law as grace and hope for Israel could set aside our ancient fear.

Our fear of God, seeing God as bringer of judgment and criticism, while we cringe.  Our fear of God’s law, seeing the law as forbidding, harsh, judgmental.  Afraid of God, of God’s words, we find ourselves enemies of the law, enemies of God.

Consider these people at Sinai, still learning about the Creator God who has just saved them from oppression and slavery, who now gives them direction for life.

In a world where people use violence, and kill to get their way, this God says, “that’s not a path of life.  You won’t kill if you are my people.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where people betray those closest to them and aren’t faithful, this God says, “that’s not a path of life.  You won’t commit adultery if you are my people.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where old people feel like burdens and fear not being able to care for themselves, this God says, “Honor your father and mother, that’s the path of life.  If you are my people, you will take care of your elders.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where it’s hard to know whom to trust, where people lie to get what they want, this God says, “Don’t witness falsely about each other.  That’s not a path of life.  Tell the truth and be honest, if you are my people.”  What a grace for them.

In a world where people don’t know God, don’t believe in God, assume God is the cause of all suffering, this God says, “I have saved you, so get to know me.  Don’t worship other things, only me; take time to rest as I do.  That’s the path of life for my people.”  What a grace for them, to be given the promise, the command, of a relationship with the eternal God.

God speaks and good things are made.  God speaks what is good, and beauty, and light, and life.  Just as it brought joy to the hearts of Israel – as it did the times they understood instead of the ones they resented, as we do – this confidence in God’s words can bring our hearts joy, too.

Especially when we remember what God’s Word has become for us.

God’s Word, the Word that creates good and beauty and light and life, took on our human flesh, became one of us.

All of God’s Word – creation and law and grace, everything God speaks – is now incorporated – embodied – in Jesus.  His life and presence is the Word of God in the world.  His voice is the Word of God.  His actions are the Word of God.

But he also is one of us.  Jesus not only is the entire speech of God in the world, as a human being he can carry our part of the conversation with God as well.  Speak for us to God when we are afraid, when we hide, when we can’t see God’s Word as good.  Jesus teaches us to speak with God freely, without fear.

Jesus holds the conversation between God and humanity in his own person.  He teaches us in our own words that God’s good word for us and the world is still good, and beauty, and light, and life.  In Christ Jesus we are reconciled to God, Paul has told us, because both we and God are brought together.  Christ is God’s temple, as John tells us today, where we meet God.

At the cross God’s Word absorbs all our bad words, all our breaking of the law, and destroys death’s power over us.  God’s Word creates good even in dying, and fully joins us to the life of the Triune God forever.  There is no need for us to be enemies anymore.  In Christ Jesus there is no way we can be enemies with God.

Look at God’s law, then, and rejoice: here’s the path to life.

In Christ we see God’s path – love of God and love of neighbor – as the only way we want to live.  We understand God’s forgiveness in Christ not as avoiding punishment but as putting our feet right, our hearts right, our eyes right, our heads right, on the path God’s Word shows is life.

God’s law, Christ reveals, is the instructions for how we’re designed to live in happiness and love, the operating manual for humanity to live in joy and hope.  It’s the wisdom to how we can live in a world of peace for all, the answer to the suffering of this planet.  If we lived according to the Ten Words, adding to them Jesus’ deepening in the Sermon on the Mount and Luther’s expansion of them into positive actions toward God and neighbor, this world would be an astonishingly good place to live in.  That’s our heart’s joy.

Today God still speaks and it’s still good.

God’s words are uttered into the darkness and chaos and evil of this world and from them come light and order and beauty and life.  This is what God does with words.  God creates.  God creates good.  God creates joy.  God creates life.  God creates a path that is good, and beauty, and light, and life, for all people.

When we understand that, we can really start to sing our psalm.  We become people living in the heady world of joy in God’s goodness.

We can sing “the teaching of the LORD is perfect and revives the soul.  The statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart.  The commandment of the LORD is clear and gives light to the eyes.”

We can sing it because we know now it’s true.  Because we know now this is the path of joy we’ve been looking for our whole lives.

And because God spoke this Word.  And when God speaks, it is good.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The path of Jesus is a path that does involve loss and sacrifice, but so does the world’s path; the difference is that the path of Christ is the path of life and joy now and in the world to come.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
   The Second Sunday in Lent, year B
   texts:  Mark 8:31-38; Romans 4:13-25; Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16

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

“For I am convinced that there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God.”

Are we?  As convinced as Paul in Romans 8?  As Abraham in Romans 4 today?

Abraham was “fully convinced that God was able to do what God had promised,” Paul says, he never wavered.  In truth, Abraham did waver a bit, about trusting the child would come, about trusting God to keep him safe in a foreign land.  Paul exaggerates to make a point.

He’s right about “convinced,” though.  Abraham ultimately trusted God would do what God promised to do.  He and Sarah left home and went where God said.  They eventually trusted a child would come, trusted God’s promise.  They are models of faith for Paul.

But the issue is more one of God’s faithfulness than our faith.  No strength of faith helps us if God doesn’t keep promises.  No solid conviction is worth anything if we can lose God’s love.  Our question is whether we are convinced of God’s ability to keep promises, keep covenant, when it can be hard to see in the midst of the difficulties of life.

Peter today struggles to understand how Jesus can save if he’s dead. 

It’s not a question of his faith.  He believes in Jesus.  But he doesn’t believe this is the right path for God’s Messiah, a path he can trust for salvation.  He followed Jesus because he spoke of God’s eternal life, because he loved Peter and the poor people Peter knew.  Because he brought God’s life into a world of death.

But how can God bring the promised salvation if Jesus suffers and dies?  It makes no sense.  There must have been many wandering days for Sarah and Abraham where it didn’t make sense, either, that God could keep such promises.

Yet they followed.  So did Peter, if not always fully convinced.  So how convinced do we need to be of God’s faithfulness and love to follow as they did?

Jesus invites us to follow him.  To trust in his faithfulness.

We worry about “deny yourself and take up your cross,” get stuck in “lose your life” and what that means.  It’s simple: Jesus says, “Follow me and I will give you life.”  Then he adds, “but when you follow you will lose some things, maybe everything, along the way.”  It’s like God’s call to Abraham and Sarah to leave all comfort and head into a life of wilderness wandering, trusting only in God’s promised blessing.

Jesus promises God’s path leads to abundant, full life now and in the coming world.  He’s also totally honest about the costs.  This is the path to life and love with God, yes.  But it also means losing everything that keeps us from life and love with God.  Things we value.  Things we don’t want to lose.  Things we don’t have the wisdom to see are a problem.  Jesus does see, though, and tells us up front they’ll have to go.

Our self-reliance.  Our self-pity.  Our pride.  Our biases and prejudices against others.  Our need to win.  Our need to be right.  Our trust in material wealth, and desire for that.  Our desire for pleasure even if it harms others in its pursuit.  Our hope for a life free of pain.  Our fear of death.  Our self-centeredness, selfishness.

All these things are going to have to be dropped, Jesus says.  You’ll sometimes feel like you’re dying.  You might even in fact die.  It’s a lot to ask.

But Jesus said, “Follow me,” and many followed, then and since.  They heard “follow me!” as hopeful cry, not dismal threat.  They willingly dumped all their baggage at the fork and took Jesus’ path.

That’s the crossroads before us.  How convinced must we be to trust Jesus and follow his path?

Well, what about the other path, the way of the world Jesus mentions?

Are we convinced the world can keep its promises?  It seems fair to ask this of the other fork in the road.  There we’re promised lots of good things: happiness, youth, fulfillment.  Wealth, abundance, avoidance of death.  No suffering.  If we buy the right things, ignore the people who can’t help us, put ourselves first, focus on getting all we want, all we ever could hope for, we’ll be happy.

Hardly anyone ever gets all those things the world promises, though.  Most don’t.  We know this.

The world never tells us what it will cost, either, even for those who think they get what they want.  It never explains that tragedies happen to even the richest in the world, that self-centered, selfish people might gain everything but have no one who wants to love the person they are, that a life built on caring only for ourselves at the expense of the rest becomes so empty and devoid of meaning despair is the only option.  That we can chase the American dream or whatever dream is out there and the more we get the more we will never have enough.  The world never tells us this.  The world just says, “this is the fun path, the rewarding path.”

Every path we choose involves sacrifice and loss, it’s just a question of what we’re giving up.  At least Jesus tells us his cost.  So we need to know which path can really give life.

Against the reality of the world’s failure to keep promises, we have 2,000 years of believers witnessing that Jesus’ path is the path of life.

We have witnesses who tell us God is always faithful.  Who took the path of self-denial and sacrificial love, the path that at the crossroads looked like the harder one, and found abundant life all along the way.

They say: this path might look like you’re letting go of a lot, and you are.  It might look like you’re being changed into something different, and you are.  But this path, from the very first step, is a path of joy and hope, they say.  Walking in trust with the Lord of life, you live without fear.

The same storms and sufferings hit both paths, they tell us, but on Jesus’ path we have help to handle them.  The same problems and fears assail people on both paths, but living in the life and grace of the Triune God takes all the bite and sting out of them.

These saints, these witnesses – think of those who showed you this, some who now are beyond this path – they have told us, shown us, this is a path of life where we have companionship and love and grace with each other, where God fills our lives and the world with hope no matter what happens.

We shouldn’t get so frightened by Jesus’ words that we’re going to be losing things that we miss all his words and the words of the saints that describe what we’re gaining.

And that’s only in this life.  Just wait till you see what’s at the end.

Jesus’ sacrificial path is the more life-filled and rich path in this life, we have evidence this is true.

What convinces us of God’s faithfulness is the end of each path.  The world’s path always ends in death.  No wealth in the world changes that; we all are dying.  People hope science will find solutions, but we know everyone dies, no exceptions.

Of course that means Jesus’ path also leads to death.  Except there’s one small difference.  In willingly suffering death, Jesus destroyed its ultimate power, and rose to new life.  Not only is Jesus’ path more abundant in this life, because of the resurrection it’s the path that leads through death into eternal life with God.

God raised Jesus from the dead.  God is able to do anything to keep promises.  This we know.

I am convinced that there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God.

Not the present nor the future.  Not heights nor depths.  Not life or even death.  Nothing can separate us, our brother Paul says.  How convinced are we?

Most days I am.  But on the days when I struggle with my conviction, you, my sisters and brothers, hold me up in faith.  It’s what we do as a community, why Jesus put us together.  Between us we’ve got more than enough conviction to go around.  If we all find ourselves struggling a bit with our faith, we’ve also got those whose footsteps we follow, dear to us, or to the Church, whose faith now is fully lived in the presence of God.  Their witness reinspires us and gives us hope.

Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.  There’s nothing to fear in this path that lies before us.  Jesus is our leader, our guide, even in death.  We walk it together, hand-in-hand, encouraging each other every step of the way, finding the joy of the path, until we reach journey’s end, our hope and our life.

Don’t be afraid.  God will do what God has promised.  I’m convinced of that.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The path of Jesus is a path that does involve loss and sacrifice, but so does the world’s path; the difference is that the path of Christ is the path of life and joy now and in the world to come.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
   The Second Sunday in Lent, year B
   texts:  Mark 8:31-38; Romans 4:13-25; Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16

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

“For I am convinced that there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God.”

Are we?  As convinced as Paul in Romans 8?  As Abraham in Romans 4 today?

Abraham was “fully convinced that God was able to do what God had promised,” Paul says, he never wavered.  In truth, Abraham did waver a bit, about trusting the child would come, about trusting God to keep him safe in a foreign land.  Paul exaggerates to make a point.

He’s right about “convinced,” though.  Abraham ultimately trusted God would do what God promised to do.  He and Sarah left home and went where God said.  They eventually trusted a child would come, trusted God’s promise.  They are models of faith for Paul.

But the issue is more one of God’s faithfulness than our faith.  No strength of faith helps us if God doesn’t keep promises.  No solid conviction is worth anything if we can lose God’s love.  Our question is whether we are convinced of God’s ability to keep promises, keep covenant, when it can be hard to see in the midst of the difficulties of life.

Peter today struggles to understand how Jesus can save if he’s dead. 

It’s not a question of his faith.  He believes in Jesus.  But he doesn’t believe this is the right path for God’s Messiah, a path he can trust for salvation.  He followed Jesus because he spoke of God’s eternal life, because he loved Peter and the poor people Peter knew.  Because he brought God’s life into a world of death.

But how can God bring the promised salvation if Jesus suffers and dies?  It makes no sense.  There must have been many wandering days for Sarah and Abraham where it didn’t make sense, either, that God could keep such promises.

Yet they followed.  So did Peter, if not always fully convinced.  So how convinced do we need to be of God’s faithfulness and love to follow as they did?

Jesus invites us to follow him.  To trust in his faithfulness.

We worry about “deny yourself and take up your cross,” get stuck in “lose your life” and what that means.  It’s simple: Jesus says, “Follow me and I will give you life.”  Then he adds, “but when you follow you will lose some things, maybe everything, along the way.”  It’s like God’s call to Abraham and Sarah to leave all comfort and head into a life of wilderness wandering, trusting only in God’s promised blessing.

Jesus promises God’s path leads to abundant, full life now and in the coming world.  He’s also totally honest about the costs.  This is the path to life and love with God, yes.  But it also means losing everything that keeps us from life and love with God.  Things we value.  Things we don’t want to lose.  Things we don’t have the wisdom to see are a problem.  Jesus does see, though, and tells us up front they’ll have to go.

Our self-reliance.  Our self-pity.  Our pride.  Our biases and prejudices against others.  Our need to win.  Our need to be right.  Our trust in material wealth, and desire for that.  Our desire for pleasure even if it harms others in its pursuit.  Our hope for a life free of pain.  Our fear of death.  Our self-centeredness, selfishness.

All these things are going to have to be dropped, Jesus says.  You’ll sometimes feel like you’re dying.  You might even in fact die.  It’s a lot to ask.

But Jesus said, “Follow me,” and many followed, then and since.  They heard “follow me!” as hopeful cry, not dismal threat.  They willingly dumped all their baggage at the fork and took Jesus’ path.

That’s the crossroads before us.  How convinced must we be to trust Jesus and follow his path?

Well, what about the other path, the way of the world Jesus mentions?

Are we convinced the world can keep its promises?  It seems fair to ask this of the other fork in the road.  There we’re promised lots of good things: happiness, youth, fulfillment.  Wealth, abundance, avoidance of death.  No suffering.  If we buy the right things, ignore the people who can’t help us, put ourselves first, focus on getting all we want, all we ever could hope for, we’ll be happy.

Hardly anyone ever gets all those things the world promises, though.  Most don’t.  We know this.

The world never tells us what it will cost, either, even for those who think they get what they want.  It never explains that tragedies happen to even the richest in the world, that self-centered, selfish people might gain everything but have no one who wants to love the person they are, that a life built on caring only for ourselves at the expense of the rest becomes so empty and devoid of meaning despair is the only option.  That we can chase the American dream or whatever dream is out there and the more we get the more we will never have enough.  The world never tells us this.  The world just says, “this is the fun path, the rewarding path.”

Every path we choose involves sacrifice and loss, it’s just a question of what we’re giving up.  At least Jesus tells us his cost.  So we need to know which path can really give life.

Against the reality of the world’s failure to keep promises, we have 2,000 years of believers witnessing that Jesus’ path is the path of life.

We have witnesses who tell us God is always faithful.  Who took the path of self-denial and sacrificial love, the path that at the crossroads looked like the harder one, and found abundant life all along the way.

They say: this path might look like you’re letting go of a lot, and you are.  It might look like you’re being changed into something different, and you are.  But this path, from the very first step, is a path of joy and hope, they say.  Walking in trust with the Lord of life, you live without fear.

The same storms and sufferings hit both paths, they tell us, but on Jesus’ path we have help to handle them.  The same problems and fears assail people on both paths, but living in the life and grace of the Triune God takes all the bite and sting out of them.

These saints, these witnesses – think of those who showed you this, some who now are beyond this path – they have told us, shown us, this is a path of life where we have companionship and love and grace with each other, where God fills our lives and the world with hope no matter what happens.

We shouldn’t get so frightened by Jesus’ words that we’re going to be losing things that we miss all his words and the words of the saints that describe what we’re gaining.

And that’s only in this life.  Just wait till you see what’s at the end.

Jesus’ sacrificial path is the more life-filled and rich path in this life, we have evidence this is true.

What convinces us of God’s faithfulness is the end of each path.  The world’s path always ends in death.  No wealth in the world changes that; we all are dying.  People hope science will find solutions, but we know everyone dies, no exceptions.

Of course that means Jesus’ path also leads to death.  Except there’s one small difference.  In willingly suffering death, Jesus destroyed its ultimate power, and rose to new life.  Not only is Jesus’ path more abundant in this life, because of the resurrection it’s the path that leads through death into eternal life with God.

God raised Jesus from the dead.  God is able to do anything to keep promises.  This we know.

I am convinced that there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God.

Not the present nor the future.  Not heights nor depths.  Not life or even death.  Nothing can separate us, our brother Paul says.  How convinced are we?

Most days I am.  But on the days when I struggle with my conviction, you, my sisters and brothers, hold me up in faith.  It’s what we do as a community, why Jesus put us together.  Between us we’ve got more than enough conviction to go around.  If we all find ourselves struggling a bit with our faith, we’ve also got those whose footsteps we follow, dear to us, or to the Church, whose faith now is fully lived in the presence of God.  Their witness reinspires us and gives us hope.

Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.  There’s nothing to fear in this path that lies before us.  Jesus is our leader, our guide, even in death.  We walk it together, hand-in-hand, encouraging each other every step of the way, finding the joy of the path, until we reach journey’s end, our hope and our life.

Don’t be afraid.  God will do what God has promised.  I’m convinced of that.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen