We pray for the coming of Jesus into our lives and the world, and in the love of Jesus we are re-made for lives of grace and service, alert not only to Jesus’ coming but also to the needs we are sent to serve.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen, First Sunday of Advent, year C; texts: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36

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

“O come, O come, Emmanuel.”  So we pray each Advent, so we sing today.  “Come, God-with-us.  Come and save us.”  We pray that prayer a lot in our Advent worship.  Hymn after hymn invites the coming of Christ into the world, into our lives.  The Prayers of the Day each week invite our Lord to be stirred up and to come and be with us.  Our readings for each of these four weeks all speak of the coming of Jesus in one way or another.  And so we pray, “Come, Lord Jesus.”  “O come, O come, Emmanuel.  God-with-us.”

We should be careful what we pray for.  We just might get it.

Emmanuel is a name which means “God-with-us.”  This is a name Matthew tells us Jesus will receive.  But in Matthew’s Gospel that promise, that Jesus is God-with-us, isn’t really fulfilled until the ascension, after Jesus has risen from the dead.  Then he says, “Look, I will be with you always, to the end of the age.”  It’s a wonderful promise.  And so we pray, “Come, Lord Jesus.”  “O come, O come, Emmanuel.  God-with-us.”

We should be careful what we pray for.  We just might get it.

Because we might not really be thinking about what is promised in the coming of Jesus, God-with-us, into the world.  Jeremiah speaks of the righteous Branch coming to “execute justice and righteousness in the land.”  That sounds like a really good thing.  Unless you’re the one implicit in the injustice, the one who’s not working for righteousness.  Jesus gives warnings in today’s reading from Luke, warnings of what will happen at the time of his return.  The coming of the Son of Man will result in the end of time, the end of all things, unexpectedly springing forth, like a trap.  He calls us, his followers, to be alert and always ready for his coming.  And so now, do we want to pray, “Come, Lord Jesus”?  “O come, O come, Emmanuel”?

We should be careful what we pray for, after all.  We just might get it.

Advent’s a funny season.

It’s become a season with fewer fans among Lutheran congregations these days.  Many churches take all of December to celebrate Christmas, trying to go along with the cultural beat in the society and in the stores.  There are pastors who argue for moving Advent to November and just realizing that saving Christmas music until December 24 isn’t working in the world.

But that belies an odd understanding, a limited view of what Advent truly is as a season.  The point of Advent is not just preparing for our Christmas song and celebration, and the music and readings of Advent certainly are very different from that focus.

The gift of actually celebrating Advent as we do here and as the Church has long done is that we are able to hear things we normally wouldn’t, and we are given the opportunity to see the fullness of what this season proclaims.  And it’s a little frightening, to tell the truth.

It is true that in part the coming we think we’re praying for and singing about is our yearly celebration of the birth of Jesus.  Advent helps us prepare for our Christmas celebration.

But it has been so much more for the Church in the hundreds of years it’s been observed.  Advent is really about three preparations: preparing to celebrate the birth of Jesus, the Incarnation of God in the world.  And preparing for the coming of our Lord at the end of time.  And as important, preparing for the coming of our Lord into our hearts and lives right now.

Those who would treat these four weeks as simply a warm-up to the Christmas celebration avoid the really terrifying thing about Advent.  The part we may seem to want to avoid: that we believe, and Advent reminds, that our Lord, having come and lived and died and risen from death, will come again.  And the other part we may seem to want to avoid: that we believe, and Advent reminds, that the same crucified and risen Lord has promised to come and be with us now.

These two comings are inextricably linked.  And they have serious implications for our lives.  We should be careful what we pray for.  We just might get it.

It’s possible that most of us don’t really want what we sing and pray for each Advent to really happen.  And it’s not just because we’re frightened about judgment when Jesus returns, though we certainly can be a little wary of that.

It’s more because if we look at what these readings and hymns and prayers are all saying, it is that when the Triune God comes to be with us, we change.  The world changes.  Our hearts change.  Our lives change.  If we just take December to sing our Christmas song we’ll be prepared for our Christmas celebration, if a little tired of the music perhaps.  But we won’t be prepared for the rest of Jesus’ coming.

These other themes of Advent have always been there, and the idea of Christ Jesus coming into our lives now, and preparing us for his coming at the end of the ages has been seen as a good thing by the Church.

We just don’t often see a lot of modern Christianity really talking about or looking forward to or hoping for changes of any kind associated with the coming of God-with-us.  “Come, Lord Jesus, comfort me when I’m blue, when I need you, when I struggle.”  That we hear a lot.  “Help me when I’m in pain.”

But “Come, Lord, and execute justice and righteousness in the land, as you promised in Jeremiah”?  This we don’t hear as often, at least in places like ours where Christians rightly suspect we might be part of the injustice ourselves.

But if we’re afraid of Jesus coming and changing us or the Church, we’re also missing the very center of the joy of the Good News that in Jesus, God is with us.

It is a truth worth noting that if our relationship of faith to the Triune God through the living, risen Lord of life doesn’t affect our hearts and lives enough to radically change us, then it logically doesn’t affect us at all.

In my life the most significant relationships I’ve had or have are the ones with people who deeply affect my heart, my life, my thinking, my reality.  People who don’t have an impact on me don’t have an impact on me.  It’s very simple.

And so it is with faith in Jesus.  If we long for the coming of Jesus into this broken world, the coming of God-with-us to heal the pain that we see and feel, we must recognize that if Jesus is going to do that, things are going to change.

Like an alcoholic who finally has to decide – is the pain of continuing as I am worse than the pain that will come if I try to be healed and find a new way – like that, we each need to decide the same thing.

Is the brokenness and pain of an empty life without God’s daily transforming presence, a life where I search for things that ultimately have no meaning, a life where I focus on myself and perhaps a few close by but not on the good I could do to the world around me, a life where I judge others rather than look into my own heart – is this empty life more painful than the pain and discomfort that will come if God changes my heart and I see things and live things differently?

Are the things I fear to confess to God worth keeping, if the pain they cause and the distance they make between me and God continues, or can I be open to God’s transforming power if the Son of God comes into my heart and life?  These are the kinds of questions we have.

If we spend time with our sisters and brothers in faith who have witnessed for 2,000 years to this new life, we would find they would say there’s no other way we’d really want to live, once we know it.  Life lived in the love of Jesus, they would say – though often complicated and confusing and difficult – is the only life that truly is life.  It’s the secret to the joy of Christian life: life lived in faith, in relationship to the Triune God through our Lord Jesus, is the only life worth living.

I’ve been saying we should be careful what we pray for.  But not if we know what we’re asking.

Our psalmist today is truly our guide to such open and willing prayer for such life with God.  Like the hymn, “O come, Emmanuel,” the psalmist also asks that God’s ways and paths be shown to us.  There is a willingness, a desire for change by God, for direction and guidance.  But there’s also a recognition of our fears: while asking for God’s guidance, the psalmist also asks God three things: remember that you are loving and compassionate, O Lord, don’t think of my sins when you remember me, and lastly, think of your love when you remember me.

It is our sinfulness, our lack of justice, our selfish disregard for the wrongs of this world, it is all the things that Jesus will need to forgive, remove, smooth away that give us the most fear.  We’re afraid that if Jesus comes, he will see us as unprepared, sinful, unready, unworthy.  The psalmist helps us know how to pray with that fear.

And Paul then gives us the answer of almighty God: Jesus will come to us, and yes, change us, but in so doing make us people prepared for his coming at the end of time.  The Lord, Paul says, will make us increase and abound in love for one another (inside our community) and for all (to the rest of the world.)  And even more, he will strengthen our hearts in holiness, Paul says, so that we in fact are blameless when our Lord returns at the end of time.  There will be nothing to fear, for he will make us ready.

And so to that end, with the prayers of the psalmist and Paul in mind, we can now hear Jesus’ encouragement: be alert, and pray.  We’re not staying watchful and alert because we’re afraid of punishment if Jesus returns.  We’re staying watchful because the world is broken and cracked and in need of God’s healing love.  And we want to be ready for our chances to bring that love.

We’re not praying because we selfishly want God to fix all our inconveniences or even all our difficult things.  We’re praying “Come, Lord Jesus” because we want to know in our hearts the joy of God’s love that only Jesus can bring – the joy we know in being forgiven, the peace we know in eating at this altar and leaving filled, the grace we know when God’s love calls us.  And we pray “Come, Lord Jesus” because we want everyone to know that love.

Like ointment on chapped legs on a below-zero day, God’s healing love stings us as it heals us.  It stings like crazy sometimes.  But it always heals us.  And changed by that love, we become the servants of God Jesus hopes for, the alert, watchful ones, who are looking for any chance we can find to bring that healing love to the brokenness of this world.

And so we do pray, “Come, Lord Jesus.  Come, Emmanuel, God-with-us.”

We pray knowing we’re hoping to get what we pray for.  Hoping for God to say, “OK, I’m here.  I’m going to need to remodel you a little, refit you so you can be a loving, gracefilled representative of mine in the world.”  We pray, hoping to hear that, knowing the remodeling might hurt a bit.  Maybe a lot.  But in the long run, it will make us like Jesus.

And then we become God’s answer ourselves, when others pray, “Come, Lord Jesus.”  God says: “you go.  It’s what I made you for.”

And so we pray.  Because, miracle of miracles, God promises to answer our prayer.  Come, Lord Jesus.  Come, God-with-us.  Come, Emmanuel.  Come to us and save us.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

Jesus, the Son of God and King of all creation, rules and saves very differently from the way of the world.  As his disciples we are called to learn from how he uses (or doesn’t use) power, and so follow him with our lives.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen, Christ the King, Sunday 34, year B; text: John 18:33-37

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

There’s a powerful scene in the middle of Shakespeare’s Henry V where, on the eve of battle, King Henry disguises himself and walks amongst his troops, campfire to campfire, trying to sense what they are feeling and thinking.  This play shows Henry a man of the people, a king who shares himself with the commoner.  One could love such a king.

Except in the play and in history, there was a battle the next day, at Agincourt.  And this king waged brutal war to assert his claims of kingship.  He had control of England; he believed France was his by divine right and mandate, and was willing to sacrifice everything to regain authority over those lands.  Regardless of his feeling for the commoner, this king is a king like all others.  Ultimately his rule is defined and supported and extended and upheld by force and violence and threat.

There’s another great scene in history, though Shakespeare never set it.  It involves a minor governor in a vast empire, overseeing a scrap of land at the far eastern reaches of that empire.  And this minor governor is confronting an even more insignificant character, an itinerant preacher and healer who barely owns more than the robes on his back.  Except that this rabbi’s followers are calling him king, and his enemies have arrested him and condemned him to death.  And now the governor, as is his right by his own decree, must decide whether to issue the sentence of death to this so-called king.

As John the Gospel writer tells the story, Pilate, the governor, cannot understand this teacher, Jesus.  When asked if he is a king, Jesus answers “My kingdom is not from this world.  If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over.  But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.”

To Pilate, this is gibberish.  As it would be to any of us if someone started telling us that they were a ruler but their kingdom was not in or of or from this world.  Where, pray tell, would it be?  If Pilate could have heard an exchange between this insignificant man and his followers earlier that evening, at the time of his arrest, he’d have been even more convinced of the man’s delusions.  When one of his followers tried to resist arrest by swinging his sword, this Jesus told him to stop.  “Put your sword back into its place; for all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”  Then he added, “Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me twelve legions of angels?”  (Mt. 26:52-53)  Pilate would have known immediately that the sanity of this one was questionable.  72,000 angels at his beck and call?  With that kind of power, if it even existed, why would he look so bedraggled?  And why would he let these events, this trial and this imminent execution, happen to him?

Indeed, that is a good question.  We know who this Jesus was and is.  We know he was killed, and yet rose again from the dead.  We confess – that is, we say we believe – that this Jesus is Lord and King of the universe.  Son of the Most High God.  But if we do not come to grips with Pilate’s question, and indeed, the world’s question – what kind of king is this? – if we, like so many, believe when we call Christ King and Lord we mean a king and lord like the world is accustomed to know, like Henry V and all the rest, if we hold that view, we deny everything our King and Lord stands for and calls from us.  And we stand the risk of rejecting the salvation he so dearly bought for us.

Finally there is only one thing about this question that is true: there can be no way to look at the lordship of Jesus other than his way.

And his way is clear: he will rule by giving up his life for the sake of his beloved people.  He will set aside power to show us the way of the universe as it really is intended to be.

To follow Jesus in this way isn’t to deny that the Triune God has omnipotent power.  It’s simply taking seriously Jesus’ consistent message to us about how God chooses to deal with the pain of this world, how God chooses to reestablish rule over this disobedient planet.  Luther reminded us that of course we believe and know God is omnipotent and ruler of the universe.  But, he said, we can never know God in that way.  We can only know God in the way God chooses to be revealed to us; we are not capable of more.

And God chooses to be revealed to us in that scruffy rabbi being led to the cross.  That’s God’s self revelation.  To Pilate the governor.  To the Jewish leadership.  To the world.  Regardless of the Triune God’s power, this is God’s answer to the disobedience and wickedness and hate in the world.  To let all that disobedience and hate and wickedness do its worst.  To stand quietly in love and be killed.

Of course, when you kill the Lord of the universe, who created life, death itself is reversed and everything changes.  And this rabbi is now seen as the very Son of God, risen from death, in love.  But even in resurrection, his way, which is now called to be our way, doesn’t change.  Risen from death, Jesus continues to show us that God’s way is not the way of power and domination, but of love, invitation to follow, forgiveness, restoration, and grace.

This is a way that is counter to all our intuition, all our sense of how the world works.  It isn’t merely idle talk that Jesus says his kingdom, his rule, is “not from here.”  His way is as foreign to us as the most remote language or culture we could imagine on this planet.

And it is a matter of life and death that we begin to understand God actually means this.  This is the truth Jesus came to show, the truth he talks about to Pilate.  The true way to life and grace in this world.  “Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice,” Jesus said.

So, how about we all start listening?  Wouldn’t that be a very good idea, considering what we claim about Jesus?

There are two areas we want to consider as we look at Jesus, listen to Jesus, understand Jesus.

First, our reality as members of a free society.  Regardless of which political solutions we prefer – and we can disagree about various possibilities – as followers of this different King, we are committed to peace, justice, and non-violence, with no exceptions.  If the God of the universe rejects violence as a way to achieve the desired end – a just, loving, obedient world – we can do no less.  And if the God of the universe, incarnate among us, rejected power as a means to an end, we can do no less.

We have just completed an election cycle which continued a trend of recent years where the deceit and hateful words have increased to the point of intolerability.  It is time that we who belong to such a king as Jesus hereby resolve that at least each of us will be and act differently toward our fellow citizens and leaders.  We cannot change others, nor is that asked of us.

But as followers of the true King, who rules our hearts with his death-defeating love, at least we can commit that we will not participate in hateful speech toward anyone, and we will not speak lies as far as we are able to speak truth, and we will work toward a culture which cares more about the poor and those on the fringes than one which only cares about who is in power and who won’t be pushed around by whom.

And we must remember that we belong to a free society, but one which has been deeply shaped and built by violence.  We have a national persona that the only way we can accomplish what we hope for on the global stage is by using might and force.  If national politicians even hint that they have a different understanding or approach these days, they find it very difficult to be returned to office.

So as Christians, followers of the true King, we are called to work and pray for ways to solve the world’s problems that involve diplomacy, generosity, and justice, and to be insistent that we not become a terrorist nation ourselves by imposing our will on others destructively and violently while we cloak it in the name of freedom.

This way, by the way, does not dishonor those who serve us in the military.  They are there to defend us in an increasingly dangerous and hate-filled world.  But we make their jobs infinitely harder when we play the aggressor and in fact raise the tensions and contribute to the hate.

The second area is our own personal way of living.  The truth Jesus reveals about God – that God’s way is self-giving love, a way that refuses to dominate or use violence but seeks to transform by invitation to new life, by resurrection from the way of death – this truth is what defines us.

So we become people who refuse to dominate, to manipulate, to achieve what we hope to see in life.  We become people who do not see life as something to be won, but to be lived, to be loved.  As servants of the servant King, we seek a life from Christ that is Christ, a life like his, a love like his.

Too often even Christians have disdained this as too unrealistic.  To that we can only say, maybe so.  But it is the way our Lord has set for us.  It is not for us to decide how realistic it is.  It is the only way, the only truth, Jesus shows us.  Those who live by the sword, Jesus said, will die by it.

And when we consider these two areas, our public life and our private life, we must always remember how different a king Jesus is.  In fact, Jesus is so committed to this way, he will not force us to live by it.  Unlike Henry and all the rest, unlike most of the world, he is willing to risk losing us all, having us all disobey and walk away, for the sake of having even one of us willingly follow and live in the way of justice and peace.  Remembering that Jesus has enough power to dismantle even any modern government, not just ancient Rome, we stand in awe when we realize he still will only rule over us by our choice, by our willingness to follow.

This is our King, the true King of the Universe, and there is no other way than his way.

Risen from death, he calls us to die to the ways of power and rise with him to the way of love.  We may be as confused as Pilate.  We may be tempted to think as people always have that we would use power in ways that wouldn’t end up destructive.  That’s the way the world works, we think, we know.

But that is not the way of life, according to the crucified and risen Lord of Life.  No matter how tempted or confused we might be, we know that much.  Our King rules in a kingdom, a reign, that is not from here.  But it is a rule of life for all people.  And the grace of our King is that we have the love of our King to lead us, invite us, and transform us.  May we all follow his call, and so transform the world with this new way, God’s way.  It’s how our King lived and acted; it’s now what the King has asked of us.  God help us do so.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

We may sometimes feel surrounded by all the signs of the end times Jesus gives us, but we live trusting our access to the Triune God through the work of the Son, holding onto our hope of forgiveness, and encouraging one another to love.  

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen, Time after Pentecost 33, year B; texts: Hebrews 10:11-25; Mark 13:1-8

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

There’s a lot of interest in the end of the world these days.  People see wars and famines, natural disasters, shifts in global climate, and think the end must be near.  As a result, many Christians are buying into a deadly theology of destruction, Christian triumphalism and exclusion, such as that portrayed in the “Left Behind” series, as a way of dealing with fears the end times can inspire.  Some of this reaches into our political life, where these Christians believe that the end times demand that our government become an instrument of God’s plan, even if that means inciting war in the Middle East to bring about the end times, which makes the tension in this week’s news from Israel all the more concerning if such a political view would ever hold sway here.  However, a brief overview of history indicates that throughout the history of the Christian church, such fears and concerns are not a new thing.  Generation after generation seems to see their times as reflecting the approach of the end of the world.  Both Martin Luther and the Apostle Paul believed their own generation might see the end.

That all should give us a little perspective as we consider Jesus’ words in today’s Gospel.  It’s part of a large chapter of warnings and visions of the end times.  The perspective we find comes from two directions.  First, since virtually every generation has felt the anxiety ours seems to feel, perhaps we can set our fears aside a bit: we may be wrong, too.  And second, Jesus consistently asks just one thing of us whenever he talks of the end times: not that we anticipate the end and try to predict it, but simply that we live lives that are always ready.  So even if you’re someone who isn’t terribly anxious about the end times, there is still a call to live and be as a disciple that these readings give to us all.

What’s helpful about the reading from the letter to the Hebrews today is that this section not only gives us a way to calm our fears but also a very simple plan for living as “the Day approaches,” as the letter says.  In fact, the writer to the Hebrews essentially gives us the outline for an old-fashioned three point sermon, offering three simple encouragements for living in such times, regardless of when the end comes.

The three points are built on one of the key arguments of this letter: that Jesus has made a sacrifice once and for all that brings God’s people to perfection, that saves us, and that gives us forgiveness.  Jesus throughout this letter is portrayed as the great high priest, the one who brings us permanently into God’s presence.  There is no longer need for Temple sacrifice, atoning sacrifice, or any sacrifice anymore, because Jesus, our great high priest, in his death and resurrection has made all right with God.  In Jesus, as the writer quotes today, the prophecies of Jeremiah are fulfilled, that God will make a new covenant, a new promise with us, a covenant of forgiveness written on our hearts, a covenant of divine forgetfulness where God remembers our sins no more.

And then the writer says, “since.”  “Therefore, my friends, since” we have this confidence because of Jesus, we can do three things.  And that’s our context today.

First, let us approach God with a true heart and full assurance of faith, our writer says.

Because Jesus has opened the door for us to God, we can walk through it.  We don’t need a high priest to do this for us anymore, because the Son of God has opened this access for all.  So we can confidently approach God in prayer, in life, in all things.

And as we consider whether we might be in the end times, this is good news.  There is now nothing between us and God.  I think we sometimes take this for granted.  But it’s a tremendous gift.

Consider that no matter what happens in your life, in this world, nothing can separate you from God’s love in Jesus, as Paul says in Romans.  Not even wars, or natural disasters, or human evil, or anything that is terrifying.  Not even our own sinfulness.  We now have access to God.  I remember as a child that the thing I needed to know about my parents was not that they could fix everything that happened or could happen.  What I needed to know was that they were there for me, that I could come to them if I was in need.  This is the gift Jesus gives us, that God will always be open to us.

We can pray, knowing that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit hear us and promise to be with us always.  We come here in worship knowing that the way to God is open to us, that here in this place we will be filled with the presence and grace of almighty God because of what the Son of God has done.

So sisters and brothers, since we have this access to God, let us indeed approach God with a true heart and full assurance of faith.

Second, let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for the one who has promised is faithful, our writer says.

You see, not only can we approach the Triune God, we know that God will never abandon us.  Our hope is based on this work of Jesus, that we are made clean and forgiven and have life with God now and in the world to come.  So we can approach God not only because Jesus has opened the way, but we also know what our reception will be.  We know we will be welcomed into loving arms every time.

It’s our hope and promise – a promise made by a faithful God – that we belong to God forever.  As the writer to Hebrews reminds us today, where there is forgiveness of sins, there is no longer any offering for sin.  God will remember our sins no more, and that is assured, a promise.

And no matter how difficult the world gets, no matter if we think it’s the end of all times or not, God will be faithful to this promise.  We don’t have to worry that the door will be closed, or that anything can take us away from our access to God in Jesus.  Our trust is in a faithful God who keeps promises.  And a God who knows all we’ve done and still claims us as beloved, as forgiven, as restored children.

So sisters and brothers, since we have this access to God, approaching God with faith let us hold fast to this confession of our hope, because God will always be faithful.

And third, living in these first two ways, let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, the writer says.

This, then, becomes the center of our life: living connected to God, holding fast to hope, we provoke, irritate, exhort, encourage each other to loving actions.

The legend is that when Luther was asked what he’d do if he knew the world was ending tomorrow, he said he’d plant a tree.  Whether he really said that or not, that would be living as Hebrews suggests.  No matter what time is left, we live encouraging each other and ourselves to be loving.  We live doing good for the sake of God’s ministry to the world.  There is nothing else we need do, or are called to do.

This is consistent with the rest of the message of the Bible, that love of God and love of neighbor are the shape and focus of our lives.  And if it does happen to be the end – as the Day approaches, as Hebrews says, or even just the end of our individual lives – what does it matter?  We’ve got access to God, we’re forgiven by God, and now we’ve got plenty of good to do, plenty of God’s love to share.

We’re commissioned in our baptism to be agents of God’s love in the world.  To give all this Good News we’re talking about, all this perspective, to the rest of the world, so that the “us” we’ve been talking about now includes everyone.  And we can now help each other, remind each other, provoke each other to such love, such good in the world.

So sisters and brothers, since we have this access to God, approaching God with faith, holding fast to our hope, let us indeed consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds.

Here’s the truth: our Lord Jesus teaches us we need not be afraid, whether we’re near the end or not.

We have access to God in Jesus, we can approach God with confidence, holding fast to the hope of God’s love, and encourage each other to love and good deeds.  This is a way of life to live that gives us rich, abundant life.  We belong to a God who will be with us in this life and in the next.

What more do we need to know?  Well, just this, our writer says: it is in this place where God strengthens and fills us as we gather together.  So the way the writer says we encourage and provoke each other is by not neglecting to meet together in this place, this place where we are filled with God’s Word and Meal, and where we support each other.

That’s why we gather here week after week: it is here we are fed, strengthened, empowered, forgiven, loved, encouraged, by God and by each other.  That’s why it is fundamental to our life here that we welcome the stranger and sojourner here, and invite them into our worship life, our gathering, that they might also have assurance and hope.  Here is our life and hope, together, and here we are fed and sent to the rest of the world, until that day when our Lord does return.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

Jesus asks us to give all of ourselves to God and neighbor.  Yet, our gifts often do not live up to this call because often we give out of inspiration or guilt.  Only by receiving faith through the Holy Spirit can we give as the Triune God calls us to give.

Vicar Neal Cannon, Time after Pentecost, Sunday 32, year B; text: I Kings, 17:8-16, Mark 12:38-44, Psalm 146

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

Our readings today are about two widows.  One widow gave her last two coins to the church and one who gave her last bit of bread to Elijah.  Our lessons are about two incredible women, who gave everything they had to God.

A few weeks ago I wrote an article in the Olive Branch about how these sorts of lessons make us aware of our own guiltiness and sin.  They drive us to fall on our knees before God and seek the grace and forgiveness that Jesus Christ offers on the cross.  To respond with grace is the right instinct to have and true to the Gospel.  But after writing this article a question lingered in my mind:  Does Jesus really ask us to give everything like the two widows in our readings?

I have to answer yes because Jesus is clear in Gospel.  Our call is to give everything to God.

Just before our story today, Jesus proclaims the two greatest commandments are to love the LORD your God with ALL your heart and with ALL your soul and with ALL your mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself.  This is tantamount to Jesus saying love God and your neighbor fully.

In the gospel today, Jesus addresses wealthy people who are making a big show of giving large sums of money in church.  And even though their gifts are large, their only giving a small portion of their earnings.  So Jesus lifts up the example of a widow who gives two small copper coins, practically nothing in comparison, and says the widow has given more than the rest of them combined.

Now, just to be clear, through Jesus, we are given grace and forgiveness whether we give 1%, 10%, or 99% of money, and time, and gifts to God.  So our generosity is not a matter of salvation.  But still, it’s clear that the scriptures are always calling us to fully give our hearts to the Triune God and to our neighbor.

And I wonder if we can actually do it.

Sometimes as wealthy Christians in a wealthy nation we give out of guilt.  We give because we feel bad about having more than others.  But that never causes us to give what Jesus is asking us to give.  It causes us to give just enough to feel better about ourselves afterwards.

For example, have you ever walked past a homeless person and then felt guilty about it?  Think about how much that really inspired you to give, and how long that feeling lasted.  If you’re like me, you feel guilty for awhile, and that might inspire you to do something, but not much and afterwards nothing has really changed in your life.  So often we tell ourselves that giving everything we have like the two widows in our stories is impossible.

Yet, we know that all throughout history people have given up everything to follow Jesus.  A few weeks ago we remembered St. Francis of Assisi.  St. Francis was once a rich young man, who is not altogether unlike the rich young man in the gospel.  The main difference between the two was when St. Francis encountered the gospel, he gave away everything he had to the poor and followed Jesus.

Mother Theresa is another who believed that we could give all of ourselves to God.  She once famously said, “By blood, I am Albanian. By citizenship, an Indian. By faith, I am a Catholic nun.  As to my calling, I belong to the world.  As to my heart, I belong entirely to the Heart of Jesus.”

One of my heroes of faith is a man named Shane Claiborne who wrote the book Irresistible Revolution.  Shane is a person who gave up everything to follow God.

One day I heard Shane was going to be in Minnesota, so I went to see him speak.  He had a really great presentation, so afterwards I went to talk to him and I was really excited and said, “Hey Shane, my name is Neal, thanks so much for that talk.  It was really great.”  Shane smiled politely and said the usual courtesy, “thanks for coming.”

And I stood there for a second, and after an awkward pause I said, “Your book really changed my life.”

I thought about this afterward and I realized, “well, that’s not true… my life wasn’t changed.”  I was inspired to write a small check to the Simple Way and then go hear him speak, but my life wasn’t really changed.

Inspiration, like guilt, is only a passing feeling.  And just like guilt, giving out of inspiration doesn’t move us towards giving in the way that Jesus calls us to give.

These heroes of the faith inspire us, but there is a disconnect in our lives where we’re inspired by our heroes, but we really don’t think we can be like them.  And whenever we pause to consider giving all of ourselves to God and neighbor like our heroes of faith, what we end up experiencing is either inspiration or guilt, and ultimately we say that we can’t do it.

Giving is not difficult because we don’t care; I believe we care immensely for our neighbors.  We feel guilty because we do care.  So when I look at our gospel today and reading from I Kings, I wonder what keeps us from being the people we want to be and how the Gospel drives us towards great acts of love?

In I Kings Elijah has just proclaimed that a drought will come over the land because the Israelites are worshipping other gods.  And so the drought comes, and Elijah is affected by this drought along with the people.  In order to survive, God tells Elijah to go to a widow in Zarephath of Sidon and she will give him bread and water.  Now, Sidon is an area in the Middle East that worshipped other gods. This is important because it tells us that the widow is not an Israelite.

So God commands Elijah to go to the widow.  He does but there are two problems. First, the widow doesn’t seem to recognize she’s been called by God to feed Elijah, and second, the widow and her family are dying from the drought.

You can hear the anguish of the woman’s voice when she speaks. “As the LORD your God (notice how she says your God, not my God) lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil in a jug; I am now gathering a couple of sticks, so that I may go home and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it, and die.”

Her pain and fear and anger are palpable.  It’s like she’s asking “Who are Elijah and his God to ask me to give everything when I have nothing?”  Because she knows that if she gives up her last bits of food she will be staring into pure emptiness and death.

Still, Elijah persists in asking for bread, telling the woman that she will not go hungry.  To me this is shocking and incredibly bold because I would be ashamed to ask someone in this situation for food.  But Elijah trusts God, so he persists saying that God has said the meal and oil used to make the bread would not go empty until it rains again.

Then two incredible things happen that I want to lift up.  First, is that it works.  The meal and oil multiply.  But the second amazing thing that happens in this story is that the widow says yes.  She looks at her meager portions, contemplates having nothing, contemplates death for her and her family, and says yes to Elijah and thereby yes to the God of Israel.  She gives everything to him.

What makes this incredible is that we know the widow doesn’t do it out of guilt, because she is the one who is starving.  If anything, Elijah should feel guilty for asking her for bread.  What’s more, we know that this pagan widow had no faith in the God of Israel to begin with, yet by a miracle she was given faith in God’s word, and God’s word did not come back empty.

True, it is a miracle that her rations increased but to me the greater miracle is that this pagan woman in a terrible situation said yes to God.

I think what helps me understand both miracles better is a phrase I learned in seminary, creatio ex nihilo.  This is a Latin phrase and what this means is that God is constantly creating (creatio) something out of nothing (ex nihilo).  There are tons of examples of this all over the Bible.  In Genesis the story of Sarah and Abraham teaches us that God gives Sarah a child in barren womb.  In Exodus, God gives manna and water and quail to his people in the desert.  And in the Gospel, Jesus is raised from death to life.  In all these stories God takes something that looks like nothing and through faith and trust creates something incredible.

And this idea of creatio ex nihilo helps us understand how the saints are able to give everything they have to God.  These people were given faith by God so much that when they face poverty and death and destruction they see emptiness, but they believe, and hope, and trust that God is at work – that God is doing something in empty places.

To have this kind of faith is difficult in America because we are a consumerist culture and we’re told every day to have faith in things, not in God.

In college I was a business communications major, and one of the things we learned is that businesses don’t sell you products anymore.  They try to sell you love and community and freedom because these are things the human heart actually desires.  Next time you turn on the TV during commercials hit the mute button and try to guess what they are actually selling you, or what they are actually wanting you to believe.

For example Best Buy’s logo awhile back (maybe still?) was, “You Happier.”  Think about what that’s telling us.  It’s promising the emptiness in our lives can be filled by cool electronics.  I’m not picking on Best Buy because nearly every company does this these days.  And this message is so pervasive that sometimes without knowing it we believe the message that things do make us happier.

And when we start trusting in things, there is not a lot of room to trust in God.

And its not just things that we trust in, sometimes we trust ideas and politicians and a number of other things.  But as often as not, they let us down.  I don’t know if this past week’s election was good or bad for you, but at the end of the day as Christians we have to claim that the government is not where we put our trust.  Politicians make endless promises, but I think we know that whether they are well intentioned or not, they can’t fulfill them all.

As our Psalm tells us today, “put not your trust in rulers, in mortals in whom there is no help.”

The world makes lots of promises, but the Triune God tells us they are empty promises.

This week Mount Olive is sending out pledge cards in the mail to all its members.  And I hope when we are called to give to Mount Olive, or to the poor, or to the widow, or whatever ways we are called to give, that it is not out of guilt, but out of trust that when God calls us to give of ourselves we trust that the Triune God is at work doing incredible things like turning our emptiness into community and love and freedom and grace and forgiveness.

And I pray that like the widow of Zarephath, the Holy Spirit comes to each of us, so that we may receive this faith and say yes to God and then believe that God is at work in our lives calling us even now to do things that we don’t expect.  Let us say yes to God’s word and respond, not out of inspiration or guilt, but out of the faith we are given by the Holy Spirit.  Let us give our whole heart to Jesus.

Amen.

The Incarnate Son of God is with us now, offering life on this side of the grave, promising to be our life and joy in the bleak ugliness of a world of death, and giving us our song of Alleluia.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen, All Saints Sunday, year B; texts: John 11:(17-31) 32-44; Revelation 21:1-6; Isaiah 25:6-9

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

This is a day when we speak of death like no other except perhaps Easter Day itself.  We gather to worship, as we always do, with those who have died and are at rest in this nave, at the side of our gathering space.  We gather to worship, as we always do, with those saints who have gone before us and surround the throne of God, sharing our praise and our worship.  We gather to worship, and on this day we sing of those saints of times past and of our past, icons of the faith and loved ones who taught us the faith, and we remember that they even now live in the presence of the God whom we have gathered once more to worship this day.  And in this space it’s a beautiful thing: beautiful sights, beautiful music, beautiful words, beautiful smells, beautiful people whose embrace of peace gives us life.  Our celebration of all the saints who from their labors rest is one of the more beautiful liturgies we do every year.

But this is a day when we speak of death like no other except perhaps Easter Day itself.  And on this day we hear Martha of Bethany speak a truth that is not beautiful, it is ugly.  On this day we encounter two sisters who see nothing but grief and sadness, anger and disappointment, not beauty and joy.  Martha’s truth is the reason: “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.”  Nothing can sugarcoat her reality, no words, no song, no beauty.  Her brother sickened, suffered, struggled, and died.  And now he rots, and he smells.  And if the Lord Jesus doesn’t understand that, Martha thinks, well, someone ought to remind him.

This is a day when we speak of death like no other except perhaps Easter Day itself.  So let us not forget what dear Martha said, the truth about this death we all face.  It is ugly.  It smells.  It terrifies us.  It is absence, not presence.  Helplessness, not strength.  There are tears.  It disrupts our lives, causes us to wake at night in a sweat.  Whether it’s the sudden death of a dear brother in Christ from our midst, or the unspeakable tragedy of hundreds dying at the waves of an incomprehensible storm, or the lingering, painful dying of someone we love, or the catastrophe of children lacking enough food to see their fifth birthday or even their first, there is little beautiful about death for us.  We cannot live a day without the presence of death, and to be honest, the fact that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead 2,000 years ago really has no meaning for us today.  Good for him.  Good for Lazarus.  But we stand at gravesides in so many ways in our lives, the people we connect with in this story are these two sisters.  Because they, like us, are on this side of the grave.  They, like us, have faced the ugliness of death.  They, like us, have questions of Jesus, the Son of God.

These two beautiful sisters help us.  And they help us in the way they are different from each other.

Martha, the bold one, the one who is unafraid to speak up about her sister when she’s not helping with the dinner for their guest, Martha reaches the depths of her anger and disappointment in her pain.  She comes out on the road to confront Jesus, her Lord and master, the one in whom she hoped.  She is so angry that her brother died, as we all can be, but she is the more angry because she believes Jesus has caused this death by his indifference.

Her disappointment and wrath are palpable as she goes to meet him, not waiting for him to arrive at their house: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”  Death faced them, their beloved brother suffered, and they had sent word to the only One whom they knew could help.  They’d seen him heal others, this would be easy for him.  But he blew it.  He didn’t care.  He didn’t come.  And now my brother lies dead, and he stinks.  And all this stinks, Jesus.

Mary, the quiet one, the one who sat at Jesus’ feet to listen while her sister banged pots in the kitchen in annoyance with her, Mary reaches the depths of her sadness and disappointment in her pain.  She does not come out to meet Jesus at first.  She remains in the house, overcome by grief.  She weeps in her loss and pain, unable to speak, unable to do anything.  And only when he calls for her does she come out to see him.

Then her sadness spills out, her disappointment: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”  Death faced them, their beloved brother suffered, and they had sent word to the only One whom they knew could help.  They’d seen him heal others, this would be easy for him.  But he didn’t come.  And Lazarus died.  And Mary can only weep.

And for us, our grief and fear at death moves between the anger and sadness of these sisters.  But mostly, we share their disappointment: if Jesus is who we say he is, if he is the Son of God, if he truly loves us and can heal, then how can all this happen?  If the Triune God has created a beautiful world, and given us all we need, and loves us enough to become one of us, then how can any of this be allowed?  Why all this ugliness, this stench, this desolation that seems to pervade the world?

Isaiah says it well, it’s as if there’s a great death-shroud spread over the entire world, and if we sometimes get glimpses of sunshine and light, it’s only when there’s a brief tear in the fabric.

What is so powerful about Martha is her clarity of what she thinks she needs at this point.

Jesus doesn’t defend himself.  He says, “Your brother will rise again.”  And isn’t this the promise we always remember?  There will be a resurrection.  There is life in the world to come.  It’s the promise of Isaiah, and of Revelation today.  It’s the promise of Easter Day, the resurrection of Jesus himself, which promises life for us all after death.  That in the days to come, on the mountain of the Lord, in the new creation, the Lord will make all things new, will wipe away every tear, and death will be no more.  This is the salvation we have waited for, says Isaiah, says us.

Martha wants to hear none of this.  Not now.  She is still on this side of the grave, and has no interest in a future promise, at least not right now.  She says to Jesus, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”  But she seems to suggest that doesn’t do anything for her problem with Jesus.

And perhaps that’s an honesty we would admit if we could.  As much as we believe and hope in the resurrection of the dead on the last day, and so we do, there are times when that hope doesn’t seem sufficient to counter the ugliness of today.  When we, like Martha, aren’t terribly helped by promises such as Isaiah and the Revelation give today.

It’s not that we don’t believe that we will be together in eternal life after we die.  Certainly we do.  Certainly Martha does.  It’s just that right now we’re not there.  We’re grieving, or angry, or disappointed with God.  We’re struggling with senseless tragedies and painful losses of loved ones.  And hope for the future sometimes doesn’t seem like enough.

Yes, yes, that’s beautiful, we say with Martha.  But we’re in the midst of the ugly right now.  What will you do about that, Lord?

And since we’re standing with the sisters, let’s look where they are looking.  Let’s look into the face of Jesus when we ask that question, and see, and open our ears and hear.

Because Jesus’ most important acts in this story happen before he ever gets them to roll the stone from Lazarus’ tomb.  Here are the really important things he does for them and for us:

He stands unafraid of Martha’s anger and disappointment and meets her where she needs to be met.  You have theological questions, Martha?  Let me give you one, he says.  What if you understood that I AM the resurrection and the life, and that you have life in me now and always, even if you die, and if you believe in me you will never die?

He isn’t just talking about resurrection at the end time, because Martha wants more than that.  And he gives her more.  He promises that trusting in him regardless of apparent circumstances, regardless of how ugly things seem, will mean life, even on this side of the grave.  And he asks Martha if she believes this.

But he also stands unafraid of Mary’s paralyzing sadness and disappointment and meets her where she needs to be met.  He doesn’t offer her theological argument, because Mary doesn’t want that.  He stands with her, loves her.  And weeps with her.

And in so doing he puts into action what he was telling Martha: that he will never leave us alone on this side of the grave, and he will grieve with us, and weep at the ugliness and stench of this broken world alongside us.  And that he will bless us and our grief by being present with us in it.  By being resurrection and life in the midst of an ugly, dead world.

And you know what?  As we stand with these sisters, then the question put to Martha in words and to Mary in presence is now put to us: is this enough?  Do you believe?

Do you believe, says the Lord, that I love you enough not to abandon you here in this ugliness?  That not only do I hold your loved ones and all the dead in my arms and raise them to everlasting life, but I come to be with you now, and will never leave you?

Do you believe that I am here in this place as you worship, blessing you with beautiful words, beautiful music, beautiful smells, beautiful sights, beautiful people to embrace you with peace, because that gift of beauty can help you through the ugliness?

Do you believe, says the Lord, that I actually come to you in that bit of bread and wine, that it’s me, your Resurrection and your Life, and that through that meal together you are fed by my life and sustenance and you are sharing that meal even with all those who have gone before you?  That my Word is alive and active in this place and in your lives and will lead and guide you into all truth, truth that frees and gives you life?

Do you believe this? Jesus says to us.  Is it enough? he asks.

John the seer heard these words in his vision, a voice coming from the throne of God himself, words he shares with us today: “See, the home of God is among mortals.  “He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them.”  And the Son of God says to us today, Do you realize that this vision is not just of the future but of the present?  That I am with you always, now, on this side of the grave?  That the home of the Triune God is among you, and God is living with you now?

This is Jesus’ answer to the sisters, and to us: I was here when Lazarus was sick, and died.  And I am here now, with you.  And in every way that matters I will always be with you, because this is where I am home, with you.  And I will hold you and bless you in the midst of all suffering and pain that this ugly world has, until you can see its beauty as I do.

This is a day when we speak of death like no other except perhaps Easter Day itself.  

And we speak truthfully of the ugliness of death, but it does not overwhelm us or destroy us, because of Easter Day itself.  Because this Jesus, our Lord, the Son of God, has destroyed death’s power and is able to keep the promise he made to those sisters and to us, to be with us here, on this side of the grave, until it is our time to go to our own rest.

Because the home of God is among mortals, and it is here we need our tears wiped and our questions answered, here we need the gift of trust and faith in the One who did not stay away but has come to be with us always.  So that it is more true than anything we know that we say, “even at the grave we sing our song: Alleluia.  Alleluia.”  And it is beautiful.  More beautiful than we ever could have imagined.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen