What Is This? - Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

What Is This?
Epiphany 4B
January 31, 2021
Grace, Waseca, MN
Mark 1.21-28

 Like many teenagers, I did some babysitting, mostly for the “O’Brien girls” across the street from our house. One night, to occupy the time after they were asleep and before the parents came home, I read a book, The Exorcist. The Exorcist is about the demonic possession of an 11-year-old girl and two Catholic priests who try to cast out the evil spirit. Now, I don’t know what possessed me (pardon the pun) to read such a book alone and late at night, but I guess I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Perhaps it was a fascination with “otherworldly” things. I would I would indulge that fascination more than in a decade later as a young adult, reading such things as The Search for Bridey Murphy and This Present Darkness.

 In Mark’s Gospel, Jesus’ first official ministerial act after calling the disciples is to confront the powers that stand against God by casting out an unclean spirit. In the Gospels, these are also known as evil spirits or demons. My guess is that this hardly seems relevant to many of you. For those of us with Western mindsets, we tend to minimize such things as demons, equating them with mental illness. And it’s probably true that much of what was “diagnosed” as demonic was mental illness. Even so, it is interesting that while 80% of Americans believe in angels, only 45% believe in demons, regardless of our fascination for books such as The Exorcist, et al.

 As a psychology major in college, I might have said the same things, had it not been for the dreams. They didn’t happen a lot, but when the dreams came, they were vivid and horrifying. I tried to yell and cast out the demon in the name of Jesus, but couldn’t. I tried to turn back the devil by reciting the Lord’s Prayer, but I couldn’t speak. Somewhere along the way and after entering seminary I did what I failed to do in Confirmation: I memorized parts of the Small Catechism, including Luther’s Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer. They go something like this:

 I give thanks to you, heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ your dear Son, that you have protected me through the night from all danger and harm. And I ask that you would preserve and keep me this day also from all sin and evil, that in all my thoughts, words, and deeds I would serve and please you. Into your hands I commend my body and soul and all that is mine. Let your holy angels have charge concerning me and the wicked on have no power over me. Amen.

 I give thanks to you, heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ your dear Son, that you have so graciously protected me this day. I ask that you would forgive me all my sins and all the wrong I have done and by your great mercy defend me from all perils and dangers of the night. Into your hands I commend my body and soul and all that is mine. Let your holy angels have charge concerning and the wicked one no power over me. Amen.

 I also began reciting them first thing in the morning and last thing at night. At some point I realized that since then, I have not had one single dream where I’ve been assaulted by the powers of darkness.

 Now, I’m not superstitious (except that I play sports so I’m kind of superstitious) and don’t think of these prayers as a magic talisman, but they calm me. They remind me to put my trust in God, who through Jesus Christ on the cross defeated the powers of darkness that stand against God. A story about Martin Luther helps. Legend has it that Luther had these heroic bouts with the devil and one night threw an inkpot at him, splattering against a wall. (You can still see it in Germany. I think they might touch it up now and then for the tourists as it fades.) Luther came to realize that, because of Jesus, wherever the devil was, God was even closer. That story brings a great comfort to me as well.

 We have a lot of “unclean spirits” in this world that threaten to overwhelm us and aren’t difficult to name: substance abuse, violence, racism, hunger, divisiveness, unhealthy conflict, etc. They are serious and not to be taken lightly, but neither are we without hope or recourse. We are reminded in the baptismal liturgy that we renounce the powers of this world that stand against God and as baptized children of God we affirm that God is working in the world to heal it.

 Today following worship we’ll have our annual meeting, an opportunity to look back over the past year and see where God has been working in, with and through you in this congregation. It’s also a chance to get a peek at what God might be up to in this coming year, one of great possibilities as you call your next senior pastor. But it’s more than financials, budgets and reports, as important as those are. It is also a chance to name the spirits present among us, clean and unclean, where the Holy Spirit is calling us to go and those spirits that stand against God’s purposes in the world. In doing so, we do what God has called us to do: claim the presence of Christ crucified and risen, who brings life out of death. Thanks be to God! Amen.

To view the video of this sermon, please click here.

Clearly, Dearly, and Nearly - Sermon for the Second Sunday after Epiphany

Clearly, Dearly, and Nearly
Epiphany 2B
January 17, 2021
Grace, Waseca, MN
John 1.43-51; 1 Samuel 3.1-20; Psalm 139; 1 Corinthians 6.12-20

“As Samuel grew up, the Lord was with him and let none of his words fall to the ground”
Do you not know that the body is a temple of the Holy Spirit? 
“Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” 
“Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;”

Near the end of 2020, a question was posed to me that I thought deeply about: “How have you grown spiritually this past year?” Now, I’m all for spiritual growth and the term is one I’ve tossed around quite freely. Yet, the question stopped me in my tracks. What does spiritual growth mean and how would I know if I’ve grown spiritually? How would I measure it? Is there some kind of spiritual door frame that one can stand up against and mark off progress like you do for your height? Is spiritual growth like good (or bad) art: you know it when you see it?

Would it be that we were like the young boy, Samuel, who hears God’s voice clearly and unambiguously! Would it be that we were the Apostle Paul who knows that he contains within himself the Holy Spirit! Would it be that we were like the disciples Philip and Nathanael who come and see Jesus doing amazing things! Would it be that we were like the Psalmist who has such an intimate relationship with the Creator God! And what does it mean in our "Godspell" Prayer of the Day to know Jesus more clearly, love him more dearly, and to follow him more nearly, day by day?

I posed my questions in a colleague meeting and Outreach Team meeting this week with a robust conversation. One thought that came out is that spiritual growth means doing more in the marks of discipleship, practices that help us grow in faith: in other words, more praying, more worshiping, more Bible reading, more serving, more giving, and paying more attention to relationships. Another thought had to do with seeing more fruit of the Spirit that Paul talks about in Galatians: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. These sounded like great answers, but the analytical in me kept asking: how do you measure?

I began to wonder if this is a case where asking the question is more important than any answer. And I also wondered if this is a case when doing less may be more important than doing more, that in fact doing less may actually be doing more.

Then I thought back to a conversation I had with my spiritual director recently where I was reflecting that we’d been at this well over four years since my sabbatical in 2016. Without prompting, she said, “You’ve grown a lot in those four years.” Wait. What? Skeptical, I pushed her to explain. “You’ve been willing to do the necessary inner work.” She went on to explain the things she saw in me that I wasn’t able to see in myself.

But my conversations with my spiritual director, colleagues, and team members says two things: First, others may see growth in you that you don’t see (and vice versa). Second, the care and feeding of our inner life comes before our outer life. In another place Jesus says, “Behold, the Kingdom of God is within you.” Perhaps we should be talking about nurturing our spirits instead of growing them, to cultivate an inner space where that can happen.

My brothers and sisters, I’m aware that my ruminations may provoke feelings of guilt or shame, but that is not my intention. Remember that you are a beloved child of God on a life-long journey of exploration. God wants you to be the very best possible version of who God created you to be and invites you into continuing this never-ending living, loving relationship that began in your baptism. Listen to God’s voice through those closest to you and be God’s voice to those you love. Explore the presence of God within to know the one who died so you might live, to know him more clearly, love him more dearly, and follow more nearly, day by day. Amen.

To watch the video of this sermon click here.

The First Word - Sermon for the Second Sunday of Christmas

The First Word
Christmas 2B
January 3, 2021
Grace, Waseca, MN
John 1.1-5, 9-14, 16-18

As an undergraduate at Gustavus Adolphus College, I belonged to a fraternity, Epsilon Pi Alpha, also known as the “Eppies.” Although I might have thought twice about it once I learned what the initiation involved. But, that’s another story for another day. Perhaps because of that and my refusal to be involved in the hazing, I wasn’t taken seriously by the leadership. Fast forward to my senior year when a discussion arose about our yearly picture. The day scheduled by the yearbook folk was going to leave a lot of members out and this caused no small amount of consternation.

After a while, I calmly raised my hand and when finally acknowledged simply said, “Why don’t we take two pictures, one for the yearbook and one for us?” The stunned silence spoke volumes of my place in the frat. Apparently, my unwillingness to go along with their brutality marked me as incompetent, but this simple but elegant solution opened their eyes to see me in a new way.

Apparently, Jesus had a similar problem, which the Gospel writer John takes pains to correct. “He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him.”  Here we have John’s version of the Christmas story, stripped of all the familiar elements. Yet what John’s Gospel lacks in shepherds, mangers, swaddling cloths, wisemen, and angels he makes up for in poetic majesty. Boiled down he wants us to know something important: “You think Christmas came with Jesus’ birth? Guess again; it was long before that.”

We tend to think that Jesus was God’s answer to the problem of sin; there is truth in that thought. Because of Jesus’ birth, life, death and resurrection, we are reconciled to God and have life through him. But, as theologian Rob Bell reminds us, Jesus is so much more than a solution to sin. Jesus was the Logos that was present before creation and through whom God created everything there is. Another theologian, Richard Rohr, points out that all creation is infused with the divine presence.

My guess is most of you have packed up your Christmas things, not even waiting to the official end of the Christmas season, January 5, probably because you’ve had them up since Thanksgiving. I’m pretty sure you’re not alone; the stores have had Valentine’s Day stuff out since the day after. (By the way, did you know that the early church didn’t even start celebrating Christmas until 300 years after Jesus’ death, even though they celebrated the resurrection almost immediately?) (And why is it that Christmas gets just a lousy 12 days? Even Advent is longer.)

Both Bell and Rohr point to something John’s Gospel takes seriously: Christmas isn’t just about what happened 2,000 years ago in Bethlehem and even not just at the beginning of time. God takes an intimate relationship with us so seriously that God has baked relationships into creation. God is not the same as creation, but God is fully present to everything God has made. Richard Rohr again: “God loves things by becoming them” and “the problem [of sin] was solved from the beginning.” There arose a saying in the early church: “The finite is capable of bearing the infinite.” And so with Martin Luther, we know we can find God in the waters of baptism, the bread and wine of Holy Communion, the Word of Scripture, and Christ’s Body, the community of believers.

Yet there’s more, because God always gives more. Another, more recent poet, Elizabeth Barret Browning says it this way: “Earth is crammed with heaven, and every bush is aflame with the glory of God. But only those who see take off their shoes; the rest just pick the berries.” So, my brothers and sisters in Christ, can we daily take off our shoes and see God in, with and through all creation? Maybe, as a reminder, you can wake up each day and say, “Merry Christmas!” For the Word is in the world, full of grace and truth, bringing light and life to all, and creation sings the Father’s song. Amen.

For the worship service video, click here.