Sermon for January 29th

The reading

Luke 6:1-16

One Sabbath while Jesus was going through the grain fields, his disciples plucked some heads of grain, rubbed them in their hands, and ate them.  But some of the Pharisees said, "Why are you doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?" Jesus answered, "Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry?  He entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and gave some to his companions?" Then he said to them, "The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath." On another Sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught, and there was a man there whose right hand was withered. The scribes and the Pharisees watched him to see whether he would cure on the Sabbath, so that they might find an accusation against him.  Even though he knew what they were thinking, he said to the man who had the withered hand, "Come and stand here." He got up and stood there.  Then Jesus said to them, "I ask you, is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save life or to destroy it?"  After looking around at all of them, he said to him, "Stretch out your hand." He did so, and his hand was restored.  But they were filled with fury and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus. Now during those days he went out to the mountain to pray; and he spent the night in prayer to God.  And when day came, he called his disciples and chose twelve of them, whom he also named apostles: Simon, whom he named Peter, and his brother Andrew, and James, and John, and Philip, and Bartholomew,  and Matthew, and Thomas, and James son of Alphaeus, and Simon, who was called the Zealot,  and Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.

The message

I grew up going to church.  My mother would bring my brother and I to worship every Sunday, we went to religious education on Wednesday afternoons, did our sacraments, read the bible, said our prayers and were raised to follow and respect the 10 commandments, to not steal, lie or hurt others.  The one we never heard much about was honoring the Sabbath.  It did not mean a day of rest or of not working, it pretty much meant Sunday was church in the morning and then just a regular day.  The only rules I can remember even like keeping the Sabbath were my mom’s insistence that you do not do laundry on your birthday, Christmas Day, Good Friday, Easter Sunday or Thanksgiving. Even today, If I happen to mention “im just doing some laundry” on one of those days, my mom will tell me “you can’t do that”.   

 

As I prepared for this morning, I wondered does anyone here at our church care about Sabbath observation.  I work through most Sundays, I barely blink when someone says “ I can’t be at church Sunday, I have to go into work”, I do not view it as a sin and most of the time simply say, “sorry we’ll miss you”, “you can read my sermon online if you feel so inclined”, “is there anything you want us to pray about” or “see you next week”.

I spent most of this week, thinking I knew what was going on in this reading.  It was a simple and very clear example of a human and love focused Jesus confronting those letter of the law type religious leaders, who were only concerned with keeping the rules.  The easiest, traditional view of these stories imply that the Pharisees are only concerned with obeying the law and that they did not care about people who are hungry or the man suffering with the withered hand. 

On Saturday morning, I happened across an article that warned pastors preparing for today’s reading, wait a minute, not so fast.    The author of the article is Wesley Allen, a professor of preaching at Perkins Seminary. What first caught my attention is that he opened the article by just going out and saying what I thought when I first saw today’s reading, “barely anyone in our communities care about keeping the Sabbath rest”.  Allen goes on to remind the reader that these debates with the Pharisees about the Sabbath were vital to the life of Jesus community at the time. This conversation was a very big deal. The Sabbath mattered then and it does now.    

There were several different groups of religious leaders at Jesus time, each with their own good and bad beliefs and practices.  The Pharisees were the most similar to our church today, sort of the liberal protestant group of their time.  Allen writes  As other Jewish authorities insisted that people needed  priests and the temple to mediate between them and God, the Pharisees democratized religious experience, the Pharisees offered to people modes and means of devotional practice that could be followed anywhere by anyone without direct oversight or mediation by religious leaders. This means that we can assume the challenges which the Gospel writers present them as having to Jesus’ actions are sincere concerns about the welfare of the people and the shared ritual practices available to them.

This leads to 2 conclusions:   

1: that this was a debate within Jewish traditions where Jesus and the Pharisees both saw the Sabbath as important but had different ways of expressing and practicing it and 

2, that doing good on the Sabbath was allowed under the law, that works of healing and care for others were not prohibited.  

 I wanted to share two stories about these conclusions.    

One of the churches that share our space with us, the South Indian Seventh Day Adventist congregation, do keep the Sabbath on Friday evening to Saturday evening (the time established in the Old Testament and still kept today by the Jewish people) I stopped in to join them for their Christmas celebration (which they are sort of not supposed to have).  I ended up in a relatively aggressive debate with their pastor and another visiting Seventh Day Adventist minister about the Sabbath (most of the churches that share the space with us and I get into it from time to time).   Our churches see things differently. In the SDA tradition, keeping the Old Testament Sabbath is at the heart of their understanding, a time of pause for rest and reflection on God’s love.  For us, the Sabbath is now on Sunday. The early church moved it to differentiate them from Judaism and because the Sabbath marks the day that Christ rose from the dead, the central event of our faith that we gather around each worship. After 20 minutes or so, we all had about enough and I sarcastically or jokingly said “well I guess none of us are converting the other today” and we realized, something else was happening.  This conversation was a chance to learn, listen, hear each other, and challenge assumptions.   We listened, we learned and we are able to simply leave it at we see things differently.  (It’s not a surprise that different religious groups see things differently and its actually sort of healthy to talk with people who don’t agree with us)       

I grew up in Brooklyn right next to Borough Park, an area with one of the world’s largest Orthodox Jewish communities. If I found myself walking through the area on the Sabbath or a Holy Day, I would often get ran down and stopped on the street with a simple question “are you Jewish”. I would say “no” and then I knew what was next.  I would be asked to turn on some lights in a meeting room, turn on or off a stove, light a few cigarettes, transfer money from one place to another, or do some other task that was defined as work which Orthodox Jewish people were prohibited to do on the Sabbath.  I always had two thoughts; first, this is ridiculous and silly and second, I had respect for people who study scripture, shape, adjust and consider rules with new ways of living and keep these traditions as their people have for many generations.       

We need more time like this, time to listen to each other and time to ask what does remaining faithful to Christian practices mean and look like for us today.  We Also need more Sabbath, time set aside to focus on God and remember we are loved.  This was a long, rough week and I spent a lot of time thinking, I need a break, I need some time off, I need help.   Wednesday night, I got an email, which at first was an annoying something else to do. I had enough sense to wait until I had a few minutes and actually read it.   The message was really beautiful and important, something that really helped me get through the week and remember what church is for.  This is what we can and should be doing for others.     

Sermon for January 22

The reading

First I wanted to start with a quick note.  For many people the last verse of this reading is familiar as “do not be afraid, from now on you will be fishers of men”.  For many centuries, that is how this verse was translated.  Over the past 40 or 50 years a lot of research into the language (Koine Greek) and social context of the New Testament.  It was discovered that during New Testament times, the Greek word for a group of men, a mixed group of men and women or even a group of 100 women and 1 man was the same (all used the male word).   As Jesus gave his first disciples their first mission, he meant that they would be fishers of all people, that they would tell the good news to everyone.  More recent bible translations like the New Revised Standard (which we usually hear at worship) have updated the verse to reflect this more clearly.

Luke 5:1-11

Once while Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God,  he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.  When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, "Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch." Simon answered, "Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets."  When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, "Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!"  For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken;  and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, "Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people."  When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.

The message

Today’s sermon is one that I have shared 3 or 4 times during my ministry.  I only have 2 fishing stories and I have not been fishing since the last time this reading came up so I do not have anything new to add.   As I prepared for today, I realized that the first few times around, I focused too much on the stories and made being fishers of people seem  obvious and easy.  

First I wanted to share my two and only 2 fishing stories (bear with me if they are repeats). The first time was about 20 years ago, My family and I saw a sign that read something like “NY C Parks Department offers free fishing lessons, all equipment needed will be provided”.  We decided to go and when we arrived, we were given a soda can with a piece of string, a hook and a plastic spoon (to catch worms for bait)   The lesson was throw this string in the water and roll it up with the can when you get  fish.  We did not catch any fish that morning (we honestly got bored in about 20 minutes and called it quits).

My second trip was a few years later. I heard a friend at church talking about fishing and I said “fishing is so boring, why do people bother” and then I told the sad tale of my only fishing trip.  The man I was talking to has spent most of his life on the water, in the Navy, driving commercial boats and then in the shipping insurance industry.  He laughed at my experiences and then offered to take me out on his boat to show me how fishing was done.  We went out on his boat and he had 15 or 20 fishing rods to pick from, all sorts of different hooks, baits and shiny stuff and a vast knowledge of the area we went out to.  We had a great trip and caught 4 or 5 fish that morning. 

I have always compared these 2 stories and mentioned that Jesus making his disciples fishers of people was like my second story, he gave them everything they needed to do the work, to share the Gospel with joy and confidence.   

I wanted to focus less on the stories and say more about how Jesus equips us to be fishers of people (an area that we are all very weak in).  It starts with trust in God’s promises. Jesus tells  his disciples to cast their nets in an area where they failed to catch anything in all night.  They listen and trust Jesus advice. They witness God’s power in nets filled to the point of breaking, they know that with God, all things are possible.  Is also means being present with people. Jesus is on the boat with them, sitting with them as they cast their nets and celebrating the catch with them.   

Jesus equips his followers, the 1^st century fisherman and us all these years later, by showing us to trust in God’s promises and to be present with each other.   The promises to us are much bigger and much different than a net of fish.  Jesus promises us that our sins are forgiven, that God’s kingdom has room for all people,  that good will overcome evil, grace, love and compassion will overcome all of the things that separate, hurt or scare us.    

Sermon for January 15

The reading 

Luke 4:14-30

 Then Jesus, filled with the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee, and a report about him spread through all the surrounding country.  He began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by everyone. When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:  "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free,  to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."  And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."  All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, "Is not this Joseph's son?"  

Jesus said to them, "Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, "Doctor, cure yourself!' And you will say, "Do here also in your hometown the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.' "  And he said, "Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet's hometown.  But the truth is, there were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a severe famine over all the land;  yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon.  There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian."  When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage.  They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff.  But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.

The message  (I had no prepared manuscript today so I tried to write what I said, not sure how accurate it is though)

My first sermon was at Redeemer St John’s Lutheran Church in Brooklyn. It was over the Summer after my first year at seminary.  This congregation was the first Lutheran Church I attended after I left the Roman Catholic Church and the community was incredibly welcoming and supportive.  I was excited to do my first sermon there. Despite many pastors and professors warning us “you can’t say it all”, that exactly what I wanted to do.  This would be the most amazing, interesting and educational 8 minutes anyone there ever sat through.  I wanted to cover everything I learned during my first year at Seminary and teach good Lutheran theology (again all of it).    I was up till late making each word perfect and profound.  As it turns out, when you try to say it all, it just ends up as a confusing mess that’s hard to follow, packed with unknown theological terms and not exactly amazing to sit through.    After the sermon, people were nice, saying “great job”, more meaning “its great that you did the first one than great I understood that”.   One person did grab me after church and said “I need to talk to you about your sermon”.  I figured okay, someone is going to be honest.  What he said next surprised me, he told me “I did some terrible things in the past, things I knew God could not forgive, after hearing your sermon, I think God does forgive me”. I resisted the urge to say “you got that from what I just said” and simply listened.  At first, it was verification that I was amazing but after I thought about it, I realized that it was the Holy Spirit at work through us and sometimes even despite us, that God’s word works.    

This week, we heard Jesus first Sermon.  In Luke it is a little out of order.  To set the tone for the entire Gospel, Luke starts Jesus public ministry with this message that the kingdom of God is for all people.    It happens right after Jesus is Baptized and overcomes temptation  by Satan in the wilderness.  Of course, since the crowd in the synagogue knew of Jesus teachings, power and miracles, he must have already started his work. At first, Jesus declares that he is the fulfillment of the promises in the prophet Isaiah, that he is the long expected Messiah.   People respond with joy, excitement and amazement.  Instead of being happy with this, Jesus realizes that this reaction means the people do not get it.  Jesus goes on to talk about God’s saving work amongst the non-Jewish people, about God’s care for all people.  After this, the crowd tries to kill Jesus, he just gave away their kingdom to outsiders.  I knew the Holy Spirit was at work when someone heard the message of God’s forgiveness. Jesus knew the Holy Spirit at work when people were confronted with God’s vision for the world and realized just how different it was.    

Tomorrow,   we celebrate the work and memory of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the only pastor to have a Federal holiday.   Like Jesus almost 2000 years before him, Martin Luther King also  taught that God’s kingdom has room for everyone. that the rich and poor, uneducated or scholar, black, white, Asian, Hispanic or anything else were loved by God and saved by God’s grace.  

Sermon for January 8th

The reading

Luke 3:1-22

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah,

“The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord,
    make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled,
    and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight,
    and the rough ways made smooth;  and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”

John said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

And the crowds asked him, “What then should we do?” In reply he said to them, “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, “Teacher, what should we do?” He said to them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.”Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”

As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah. John answered all of them by saying, “I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people. But Herod the ruler, who had been rebuked by him because of Herodias, his brother’s wife, and because of all the evil things that Herod had done, added to them all by shutting up John in prison.

Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.

The message

A preacher was finishing a sermon on temperance and the evils of alcohol.  He ended his sermon by declaring with great emphasis “if I had all the beer in the world, I would take it down and pour it into the river and if I had all the wine in the world, I would take it down and pour it into the river and if I had all the whiskey in the world, I would take it down and pour it into the river”.  At this time, the pastor sat down, satisfied that he got his point across and the worship leader stood up, smiled and announced “please join us as we sing hymn 423, shall we gather at the River”.

On a more serious note, rivers have always been a significant part of human civilization and social and religious life. Many of the great ancient societies thrived along rivers, the Mesopotamians along the Tigris and Euphrates, the Egyptians along the Nile as well as various cultures and great societies along the Amazon. India and Hinduism had the Ganges and the Israelites had the Jordan. Even here in New York, our city was built on trade along the Hudson River.  Rivers provided a source of water, transportation, trade, irrigation for crops and good soil to develop life sustaining agriculture on.   

This morning, about 30 years after the first Christmas, we find John the Baptist at the river.  He is preaching repentance.  John does not simply mean performing the external rituals and sacrifices for the atonement of sins, but he is talking about a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, John is demanding changes in how people think, see the world, and act towards others.  John is also proclaiming the fulfillment of prophesy, that Christ our savior is born, the long awaited Messiah is here, the kingdom of God has arrived.   John develops a large following, Many people come to the river to be baptized, to experience relevant faith and actual  joy in their relationship with God.  To put it mildly, John is anti-establishment, anti-the ways things are and anti- religious people just going through the motions and thinking they are holy.      John is regarded as a prophet, as a powerful and holy man but this bothers other powerful and holy men.  Eventually John is arrested and shut up through the removal of his head.

Before John’s arrest and death, he baptizes Jesus. This is Epiphany; this is one of those moments when the world starts to figure out just who exactly it was born on Christmas, that this child is God with us.  In Matthew’s Gospel, we see Epiphany in the 3 kings or Magi and the gifts they bring, here we see it in the Holy Spirit descending on Jesus and God declaring “You are my son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased”. 

John’s baptism and the baptism we receive are similar; both are for the forgiveness of sins.  For John, it was a work, a decision inspired by God, a symbol of change and call to reform. For us, baptism is even greater, it is God’s gift, a moment when we are killed to sin and given new life, we are joined to Christ’s death and resurrection (an event still about 3 years away during John’s life).   Immediately after Jesus' Baptism, he goes to face temptation in the wilderness where he endures extreme attempts  by Satan to draw him away from God.  His baptism is the source of strength to endure 

This act of Baptism, done by John at the river and done for many of us at the start of our lives is in many ways is a just like a river.  Baptism flows and follows us through our lives. To come back to my opening joke, we can pour our sins, grief, doubts and anxieties into baptism, and they will be washed away, they will not bother us anymore.  Like the role of rivers in ancient and developing civilizations, Baptism is the center of our faith, the foundation it’s built around and its source of energy and strength.   Luther had the spiritual practice of facing doubts, struggles and trials with the simple words “remember you are Baptized”.