sermon – Page 14

Who Acted?

September 8, 2024 By Pr. Joseph Crippen

To be saved is to act as a neighbor, because you are forever bound up and embraced by the non-negotiable love of God.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 23 B
Texts: James 2:1-10, 14-17; Mark 7:24-37; Isaiah 35:4-7a; Psalm 146; and using Luke 10:25-37

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

“What do I have to do to be saved?” a lawyer once asked Jesus.

Since this was a religious lawyer, an expert in God’s law, Jesus said, “you tell me.” “Love God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself,” the lawyer replied. “Great,” Jesus said. “Do that and live.”

“And who is my neighbor?” the lawyer asked.

Now, this isn’t our Gospel today. But James’ words kept calling me into Jesus’ Samaritan story. See, Jesus tells a story as an answer and completely reverses the lawyer’s question. He tells of a man beaten and left for dead, of a priest and a Levite who walk by on the other side of the road, and of a Samaritan, one the nearly dead man would have looked down on, regarded as lesser, even as enemy, who binds his wounds, and gets him to a safe place.

And then Jesus asks the only question he thinks matters: “Who acted as a neighbor?”

And James chimes in with a hearty, “Amen, brother.”

James sees the partiality, the prejudice, his people are living with, judging others by their looks, clothes, wealth, status, and treating those who impress them with care and consideration. Those who don’t are ignored, treated as lesser.

And James can’t understand how people who claim faith in Christ Jesus could act that way. You’re doing well, he says, if you keep Christ’s law, “love your neighbor as yourself.” But when you pick and choose who gets to be your neighbor, you’re breaking that law.

For James, it’s clear: if you say you trust in Christ Jesus, and you don’t act in a changed way, a way of divine love, there’s no point. If your faith doesn’t make you into Christ, loving as Christ, serving as Christ, he doesn’t think it’s worth anything other than a quick burial.

Here’s where we clutch our Lutheran pearls to our chest and sink down in a faint.

Isn’t James mixing works with grace? we ask. If being saved means loving your neighbor, acting as a neighbor, what about God’s free grace? Aren’t we just throwing that away?

It’s time we stop that nonsense once and for all. It is the clear witness of Scripture, of Christ Jesus himself, that you and all people are beloved of God now and always. The Triune God revealed that love in person in Christ Jesus, taught it, showed it, carried it to the cross and broke death with it. God’s love for you, for me, for all people is non-negotiable. Always.

But we have it on the authority of God-with-us, Jesus himself, that being saved is more than the reality of God’s love. The Triune God’s non-negotiable love is the truth of the universe, the reality behind all things, the foundation, the air, the atmosphere of a saved life, a saved world.

But a life that is saved, according to Jesus himself, is a life lived in love of God and love of neighbor. When you love your neighbor you know salvation, or healing, as the word also means in Greek. When you act as a neighbor, that is, act as the God who loves you, you know what it is to be healed and whole.

“Who acted as a neighbor?” Jesus asks. “That one knows salvation.”

And James adds, “and that one knows no distinctions.”

This is the challenge of the saved, healed life: to end all our distinctions between people and see as God sees, love as God loves. To see beyond wealth and nice clothes. To give more than words to someone who is hungry and actually feed them. To love enemies and pray for them. To see God’s face in all people. To make no distinctions between whom you will care for and whom you won’t, because God doesn’t, and the question is never “who is my neighbor?”, but always “who acted as a neighbor?”

And if you think it’s hard, you have company. Even Jesus struggled with this. Luke and John tell a different story, but in Matthew and Mark, Jesus seems to have to learn this. This woman who insists on having Jesus see her and her daughter is one of the most important persons in the history of the Church, according to Matthew and Mark. She’s the wedge who forever cracks open the Son of God to expand the mission to all God’s people, not just the Jewish people.

And here’s the true grace in all this:

We belong to the one who “does everything well,” as the people marvel about Jesus, “who even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.” Jesus is the longed for coming the psalmist and Isaiah promise today: “God will come and save you, open the eyes of the blind, and the ears of the deaf, and heal the limbs that are lame.”

Now do you understand? The Triune God in Christ heals you, saves you, by making you into God’s love in the world. God opens your blinded eyes to see all of God’s children in need as your concern. God unplugs your deaf ears to hear all the cries of God’s children, even the ones you don’t like, so you can act as neighbor. God cures your paralysis, your lameness, and gets you up off your couch and empowers you to go into the world as God’s love and do something. Do something. Be a neighbor.

So, “be strong, do not fear,” Isaiah says.

This is the heart of God’s grace. The non-negotiable love God has for you and for all people is also the power that heals you to be a neighbor and bring God’s love wherever you go.

And when you act as a neighbor, as God’s love, the same love that holds you and surrounds you and feeds you and gives you breath, you will know what the Triune God means by saving you.

And then, Isaiah says, look out. That’s when water breaks forth in deserts, when people start leaping for joy, singing like they’ve never sung before. That’s when God’s dreamed-for healing of this world really starts to happen.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

Armor

August 25, 2024 By Vicar at Mount Olive

In this weary world, we often struggle against powers and cosmic evils that wish to take us away from eternal, abundant life. The full armor of God helps us remember we are not alone in our struggles.

Vicar Natalie Wussler
The Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 21 B
Texts: Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18; Psalm 34:15-22; Ephesians 6:10-20; John 6:56-69

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The beginning of my senior year of college felt a lot like the flaming arrows that Paul talks about today. Riddle with anxiety, I was constantly barraged by the questions of where my life was going the next year, and while I had a perfectly canned answer, I truly had no idea where I was going and found it hard to believe I would attain the same level of success my peers would. My self esteem was at an all-time low. Compounded on that, my junior year left me with some pretty traumatic scars that I had not yet healed from. Some days I barely wanted to get out of bed. I was confused, broken, and often I felt utterly alone.

I don’t remember exactly why I started doing this, but I began reading our Ephesians passage before I got out of bed in the morning and before I went to sleep at night. I made a point to not even let my feet touch the floor until I had read Ephesians 6, because I wanted to clothe myself in the armor of God before I did anything else that day. It wasn’t overnight, but gradually the pain and the anxiety subsided. I connected with dear friends that reminded whose I am. My path started to become clearer. Getting out of bed didn’t feel like a battle between the world and me. I started feeling like myself again and was more confident to face the day knowing that I wore the armor of God.

When I saw that this text was in the lectionary this week, I got excited to preach on the armor of God because of how personally meaningful it is to me. But I do understand that talking about armor and battle in church is a tenuous topic. It’s passages like Ephesians 6 that people used to write songs like “Onward Christian Soldier” which likens the church to an aggressive army instead of a community attempting to love God, each other, and the neighbor well. This kind of text has been used by Christians to justify doing horrific things, some of which we talked about last week. We see Christian nationalists today using this passage as permission to arm up and create violent chaos in our country. But, beloved, even though Paul’s address to the Ephesians sounds a lot more like something out of the Lord of the Rings or Henry V, if you dig a little deeper, it has truth and good news. I invite you to stick around with me and find out.

But, we’ve got to talk about the bad news first. There are powers and evils in this world that want to keep you and I away from eternal, abundant life. Paul says this is what we struggle against. It’s larger and loftier than one person or even a group of people. Our struggle is not with flesh, but with powers. Powers that seek to divide and oppress. They’re things that we encounter everyday. Greed, misogyny, homophobia, selfishness, racism, and sinfulness of all kinds. The prospect of resisting these cosmic evils might feel hopeless. But Paul responds “stand in God’s strength.” You are not helpless against these powers, no. You have a full set of armor to protect you.

You have the belt of God’s truth, which holds you together.

The breastplate of righteousness to protect your heart from all the cosmic evil in the world.

You can lace your sandals to ready yourself to proclaim the gospel–the present evils have already lost, Christ is victorious.

The helmet of salvation, reminding you of your baptism and your unconditional welcome into God’s family.

And finally the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God delivering both law and gospel. A word that can both cut and heal.

This is the full armor of God. They are the tools that equip you to do God’s work in an overwhelmed world. It unites people of faith, it does not divide. It responds in God’s love, not with the world’s hate and fear. It’s a protective agent so that you and I have the ability to withstand our world’s proclivity for violence and oppression, and do it with the Holy Spirit’s guidance. The full armor of God gives us fortitude against sinfulness that keeps us separated from the Triune God and from our neighbor. It helps us with one voice denounce the systemic evils that keep God’s beloved children in oppression and we do all this knowing that it is not with our own strength, but by the strength of God.

Once dressed in this armor, Paul has this directive: Pray. Do it unceasingly. This is a deep kind of prayer, an abiding kind of prayer. A God in you and you in God kind of prayer that Jesus talks about in our gospel reading today. It is a total dependence on the One who has saved us and continues to save us, every moment of every day.

Beloved, you are not alone, you have never been alone, you will never be alone.

Yes, the weight and the pain of this wild world might feel like they are on your shoulders, but you do not have to face it by yourself. The same is true of our neighbors.

Paul asks us to pray for all the saints, including him, a prisoner of the Roman empire, fully dependent on God. This armor was never meant just for our own protection. Our neighbors far and near are experiencing the same cosmic evil as us. They need to know that the armor of God is for them too. We can go out and be God’s armor for people. Whether it’s being a helpful hand to a stranger, a random act of kindness, or advocating for the liberation of all people, we can take our armor to enter into this hurting world speaking love and justice to all. Paul’s directive to pray shifts our focus from our own protection to the empowerment of all God’s beloved children in a weary world that desperately needs to hear good news.

Friends, hear the words of the ambassador in chains: speak truth, guard your heart with righteousness, have faith in the Triune God, renew your mind and remember your baptismal promises, ground yourself in the gospel, for yourself and for your neighbor. But most of all pray, and do it abiding deeply in the God who abides in you so that all may experience the protection and empowerment of the armor of God.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

And

August 18, 2024 By Pr. Joseph Crippen

The gift of the Triune God in Christ is abundant, eternal life here and now, and life to come after we die, and all need to be brought into this abundant grace.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 20 B
Text: John 6:51-58

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

“I came that you may have life, and have it abundantly.”

That’s Jesus’ whole reason for coming, he says in John 10: that his sheep may have abundant life. Later (20:31), the Evangelist says that’s why John’s whole Gospel was written. So that you might come to trust that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and through trusting that you might have life in his name.

Life, abundant, in Christ’s name. It’s a life transformed by the love of God, a life lived in relationship with God, a life lived loving God and loving neighbor. That’s what it means for Jesus to save. Today he calls that life “eternal life.” He also calls it life in God’s reign. And it’s clearly a life all who trust in Christ can experience right now.

You know this because of one tiny word in today’s Gospel: “And.”

“And” changes everything.

For the second time in this discourse, Jesus says what he gives those who trust in him, who eat of his body and blood: they “have eternal life,” he says, “and I will raise them up on the last day.”

They have eternal life. It’s reality here and now for those who trust in Christ. “And” – there’s a second gift: life in a world to come after we die. We can live in God’s reality right now, the eternity of God’s existence, the reign of God, the abundance of God. And when we die we know we have a resurrection life. These are two gifts of God in Christ.

But Christians have too often omitted the “and,” combining the two gifts into just one, life after death. Every time we do that, devastation follows.

Because if you’re only hoping in Christ for resurrection after you die, faith is very individualistic.

If “Jesus saves” only means Jesus forgives you and raises you to life after death, the only thing that matters is are you going to heaven or not. If you love other people, you might care whether they’re going to heaven, too. But you wouldn’t have to. Even with our Lutheran insistence on the full and free grace of God, making Jesus’ salvation transactional like this is deeply individualistic. The only thing that matters is your final destination. Not your neighbor’s pain. Not the world’s suffering.

And it also means you aren’t challenged by Jesus’ teaching. You don’t need to change your heart, check your biases, confront your prejudice. You can do what you want and paste the name of Jesus on it, if you think the only thing Jesus cares about is heaven, and you think you’ve got a ticket.

All because you took away the word “and.”

This helps explain right wing Christian Nationalism in our country.

We despair at the evil proclaimed by these Christians who care nothing for the suffering of the poor, the refugee, the oppressed. Who resent children being given free breakfast and lunch at school. Who seek to control the bodies of other people, who absolutely reject and abhor anyone not like them, including those who understand their gender differently, or choose to love someone these Christians can’t tolerate. We wonder, how can Christians do this, believe this? How are we so close to creating a fascist dictatorship in this country and with of it driven by people who bear the name Christian?

Well, if the only thing that matters is that you are saved, and if saved only means life after death, then you don’t have to worry about anything else. That’s how Christians killed millions in the Crusades and countless wars over time. That’s why we had the Inquisition. That’s why people were burned at the stake because of their beliefs. It’s all because of missing the word “and” and assuming there’s only one thing about salvation that matters.

Of course, to believe that you have to ignore literally everything Jesus ever taught. His whole ministry was an invitation into the first gift, into the reign of God, into the eternal life of God lived here, into the abundance of life that following Christ is.

And Jesus teaches us that this abundant life, this eternal life now, cannot be abundant and eternal if anyone is excluded.

This is Jesus’ heart, and unless we’re prepared to delete the bulk of the Gospels and most of the New Testament, we need to take it seriously.

Love your neighbor, love even your enemy. That’s abundant life. Feed those who hunger, clothe those who are naked, find homes for those without. That’s eternal life. Care for those who are sick, welcome the stranger and alien. That’s life in God’s reign. See the face of God in every other person. That’s what Jesus came to invite you and me to live and know. Right now. And it’s abundant, eternal life.

But you can’t know God’s full eternity in your life right now if others are still suffering and oppressed. You can’t know God’s full abundance if others are still destitute and starving. That’s what Jesus the Christ says, and you and I know in our hearts it’s true. Until everyone, every child of God, knows this eternal abundance and can rejoice in it, none of us fully have it.

By all means cherish Jesus’ promise after the “and.”

You will have resurrection in Christ Jesus as God’s free gift: when you die you’ll be raised to new life.

Just cherish the “and” even more. Lean into the first gift, that the Triune God most deeply wants all God’s children to have life and have it abundantly now. To know the joy of God’s eternal love and life in their hearts and souls right now. To be fed and cared for and safe, all living in God’s dream of justice.

When we see the fullness of what Jesus means to do when he saves us, everything matters, everyone matters. And when we start living that way in the world, with our neighbors, with our enemies, when we all become part of that eternal abundance, this world will one day fully rejoice in this gift and grace. All of it.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

Enough is Enough

August 4, 2024 By Vicar at Mount Olive

We often can’t help but worry “Will there be enough?” but Jesus is enough, and all we need to do is trust that enough is enough.

Vicar Lauren Mildahl
The Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 18 B
Texts: Exodus 16:2-4, 9-15; Psalm 78:23-29; Ephesians 4:1-16; John 6:16-35

Beloved friends, grace to you and peace in the name of the Father, and of the ☩ Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Now what?

We’re standing in the wilderness. Just weeks ago, God did something amazing! God freed us from slavery in Egypt! God sent the plagues and parted the water and made the bitter water sweet and just days ago we were singing and laughing.

And now it’s today. And we’re hungry and tired and still have a long way to go. Maybe it would be better if we had just died.

Now what?

We’re standing on the shore of Galilee. Just yesterday, God did something amazing! God fed us! Five thousand people, out of just five small loaves and two fish. Jesus turned the smallest of gifts into the greatest of blessings. And then, miraculously, crossed the sea without a boat.

And now it’s today. And we’re hungry again and Jesus is nowhere to be seen.

Now what?

We’re sitting in our pews. Just last Sunday, God did something amazing! And we ate our fill and we sang. I mean, we usually sing, but last week, we sang. As if we really wanted to make sure that Bach and Schutz and Handel heard us. As if we really wanted to make sure that David heard us. And the Spirit showed up and last week we were fed and filled.

And now it’s today. And we’re hungry again. And maybe, just a tiny bit, worried.

Now what?

And sure the Holy Spirit showed up last week, and sure Jesus promised that if we trust we’ll never be hungry, and sure God is able to accomplish more, far more, abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine…

But will that be enough?

It’s amazing how quickly that question comes to us. Amazing how quickly that full, fed feeling begins to slip away. Emptiness starts to creep in. And the hunger returns. It doesn’t matter how amazingly God has shown up or how recently–weeks ago, last Sunday, yesterday–it doesn’t take long and we’re looking around thinking “Now what?” Sure there was enough yesterday. There might even be enough today. But what about tomorrow? Will there be enough?

Enough food? Enough money? Enough time? Enough talent?

Will there be enough health? Enough work? Enough rain? Enough votes?

Will there be enough leaders? Enough friends? Enough music? Enough church?

Will we be enough? Will I be enough? The fear sets in. And the hunger.

That feeling of lack – of craving…something. That feeling that prompted the crowd to jump in the boats and go looking for Jesus across the Sea. To ask with desperation when they had found him: “What must we do to perform the works of God?”

There must be something we can do – something we maybe should have already done. Because we are afraid and hungry, but maybe, maybe if we just try harder, be better, do more? Maybe if we work a little bit harder, stockpile a little bit more, then there would be enough. Maybe then, we wouldn’t be hungry.

“What must we do?” the crowd asked, “to perform the works of God?”

And Jesus’s answer? Trust.

That’s it. “This is the work of God, that you trust in the one whom God has sent.”

You don’t have to do anything. It’s not about what you do, it never was.

“I am enough,” Jesus is saying. And enough is enough.

So, trust. Trust that I know what you need, and I’ll give it.

Trust that my grace is sufficient for you.

Trust that there really is enough.

And that enough is enough. For today. Enough really is enough.

This is the lesson that God has been trying to teach us since the manna in the wilderness. “I am going to rain bread from heaven for you, and each day the people shall go out and gather enough for that day.” “So,” the Psalmist picks up the story, “mortals ate the bread of angels; God provided for them food enough.” God, who is above all and through all and in all, who came as Christ to fill all things, gave them enough to fill them. And enough is enough. “So the people ate,” the Psalmist sings, “and were well filled, for God gave them what they craved.”

So why is it so hard to trust? And why does that hunger keep coming back when Jesus said we’d never be hungry?

And as I was thinking about that this week, I kept thinking about this scene from an episode of Seinfeld. Kramer and George are sitting in the diner and Kramer asks, “Do you ever yearn?” and George replies, confused “Yearn? Do I yearn?” and he takes a second to think about it and says, “Well, not recently…I’ve craved. I crave all the time – constant craving. But I haven’t yearned.”

And Kramer gives him this look of pity and says “Look at you – You’re wasting your life.”

And I keep thinking about that scene because it encapsulates so well what Jesus is getting at here. Jesus is talking about two different types of hunger: physical and spiritual, and two different kinds of longing: craving and yearning.

Craving is fleeting. It’s a longing for something physical and it can be satiated, but never for very long. You can crave a snack or a cigarette or a touch. We often crave things that are comforting in the moment, but that we suspect in the long run might not be good for us. But craving is also part of being human. And God cares about our cravings – sending the literal bread – giving us “what we crave.”

But yearning is something else entirely. It’s prolonged. It’s a longing that is earnest and sincere, often for something that can’t be touched or tasted. You yearn for love or for purpose, or for closure, for acceptance,…or for God. And when yearning meets its object, it isn’t just filled, it’s fulfilled. It’s transcendent and holy in a way that satisfying a craving never is.

And when Jesus meets the crowd that went looking for him in Capernaum, he’s asking the same question that Kramer asked George. “You are craving the food that perishes,” he tells them. “But what are you yearning for?” Are you listening to your deepest longings, are you searching for what you really need? The craving will come back, but your yearning, that can be fulfilled. If you trust.

Jesus cared about their cravings, of course he did, he just fed all five thousand of them, but he wants to dig deeper, to their yearning. Because he knew that they were craving the bread– but that they were yearning for life.

“I am the Bread of Life” he says. And I am what you’re yearning for. You’ve found me. I’m here to give you life and give it abundantly. I am here to fill all things because I am enough and here’s the best news of all– you are enough too.

Even with your hunger – all your cravings and yearnings. You are enough. Enough for God to live a human life for. Enough for God to die a painful and humiliating death for. Enough for God to go to every length to save you and gather you in and give you life.

You are enough. Which isn’t to say you are finished. You’re still growing and becoming and being built up, as Paul says to the Ephesians, to the full stature of Christ. You are learning everyday how to live that life in Jesus, to live a life worthy of your calling. You are being equipped everyday for the work of ministry, for the work of caring for one another. So that you can be God’s hands and you can rain down blessings, providing for each other, meeting everyone’s needs–satisfying every kind of hunger.

Not because you have to perform the works of God. But because you trust. You trust that in God there is enough. You are enough.

And I’ll say it again until you feel it in your bones. You are enough. And enough is enough.

In the name of the Father, and of the ☩ Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Abundantly More

July 28, 2024 By Pr. Joseph Crippen

God is able to do, by the power at work in you, abundantly far more than we can ask or imagine: what if you learned to trust and expect that?

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Tenth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 17 B
Texts: Ephesians 3:14-21; John 6:1-15

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

“I pray that God may . . . strengthen you in your inner being with power through God’s Spirit,

and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend . . . the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ, . . . that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

That’s Paul’s prayer for you. For all God’s children. What if that could truly happen?

But it’s hard to be filled with God’s fullness, to know Christ’s love dwelling in your heart, when you’re starving to death.

Paul’s hope is much easier to find if you have a full stomach, shelter over your head, clothing and other necessities, and a life of justice and freedom. If we proclaim the love of God in Christ in our words only, we’re not going to reach people. The letter of James says “If [one of God’s children] is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,” and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that?” (James 2:15-16)

So, Jesus made sure that the thousands who’d come to see him got dinner that night. Christ comes to offer life and hope, to proclaim God’s reign. But if you’re hungry or oppressed or afraid or attacked or marginalized, how can you trust God’s love with those desperate needs unmet? This is a simple story of Jesus seeing a great physical need and suspending his teaching and calling to make sure that physical need is taken care of.

So, if we are bearing God’s love in the world, we start with caring for our neighbor’s needs.

People need food, shelter, a living wage. Wars need to be stopped. Justice needs to happen. Real needs need to be addressed before any other good news can get through.

But Philip shares our concerns today: we don’t have enough money to feed these people, he says. Likewise, the problems of hunger and homelessness, injustice and discrimination, hatred and violence are so great, we fear our resources aren’t going to make a dent.

But Jesus operates with a power and abundance Philip doesn’t yet know. And Paul promises that God, by the power at work in us, “is able to do abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.” We despair at the intractability and overwhelming nature of the world’s problems, but Paul says we haven’t even begun to imagine what God actually can do through the power of Christ’s love at work in us.

So let’s try imagining. Let’s definitely ask. And let’s learn to trust that the same power that multiplied bread and fish and that broke the power of death will be at work in us to accomplish even more than we can dream in this broken, suffering world, and bring real life.

But it’s also hard to imagine, to dream, to ask to be a part of God’s mission, when your heart is starving to death.

Just as lots of things contribute to physical hunger and suffering, lots of things keep our hearts from being open to Christ entering and living within us, so we can know God’s fullness and love. Our stubborn pride or deep-rooted shame. Our inability to honestly look at our biases and prejudices. Our fear and anxiety. Our struggle to confess and seek reconciliation with each other. Our easy hate and anger toward others we disagree with. So many things starve our hearts to death.

And isn’t that the problem with our country? Yes, all the physical needs need to be dealt with. But what prevents that happening is hearts filled with fear and hate and anxiety and selfishness, spirits warped and crushed. Our nation has a heart and spirit problem, and until those are healed and transformed, we’ll continue with our polarized, unjust society, our oppressive structures and ways, our destructive path.

So, if we’re going to bear God’s love in the world, God must first open and heal our hearts.

Help us unclench from what we’re clinging to, pick out the seeds of fear and anxiety from our hearts, and pull the thorns of hatred. The Spirit needs to help us be open to our own failings and biases and prejudices, our struggles to be honest about who and how we are.

If God’s going to transform the world, this has to go beyond those of us in this room today. But right now, in this moment, in this room, we at least need God to start on us. On you. On me. Start to heal our hearts and spirits so we’re ready for God’s fullness to live in us, ready to know and comprehend the deep and abiding love of God in Christ for all of us and all God’s children. Then we’ll be ready to bear Christ in the world.

“God, by the power at work within us, is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.”

That’s Paul’s promise.

There are enough resources on this planet for all to be fed and sheltered and cared for. God’s abundance knows no limits except those we place on it. There’s enough love of God in Christ for every child of this planet, including you, for every creature, every thing in creation to be filled with God’s fullness. God’s abundant love knows no limits except those we try to place on it.

Thousands of people suddenly had all they needed to eat. Millions of people have been transformed by the love of God dwelling in them. God can do abundantly far more than all you can ask or imagine.

What if you trusted that?

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen