Monthly Archives: June 2018
God’s “safe place”…the place He fits in…
Concordia Lutheran Church – Cerritos, Ca , at dawn on Easter Sunday
Devotional Thought of the Day:
16 Don’t you yourselves know that you are God’s sanctuary and that the Spirit of God lives in you? 1 Co 3:16 HCSB
1 How lovely is Your dwelling place, LORD of Hosts. 2 I long and yearn for the courts of the LORD; my heart and flesh cry out for the living God. Psalm 64:1-2 HCSB
37 How does this sanctifying take place? Answer: Just as the Son obtains dominion by purchasing us through his birth, death, and resurrection, etc., so the Holy Spirit effects our sanctification through the following: the communion of saints or Christian church, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. In other words, he first leads us into his holy community, placing us upon the bosom of the church, where he preaches to us and brings us to Christ.
King Solomon once asked if there was ever a place God could fit in.
As I read the readings quoted this moring I thought of Solomon’s words at the dedication of the temple, and as I read that we were God’s sanctuary, I didn’t think about it in view of a huge cathedral’s sanctuary, but the place for someone seeking a home, seeking a place where you “fit in”, where You were loved. To quote the old song from the show “Cheers”, the place where “everybody knows Your name”.
A sanctuary is a place where you are at peace, where you can rest, and be yourself. Where it is safe. Where you are worry free and free to discover who you are, and live as you were meant ot live. Some people mock those described as “millenials” for wanting such a place, for struggling to understand this world and the chaos we have seen it become.
Yet even as the Psalmist desires to be in the dwelling place of God, (something I resonate with a lot, as I struggle with my own sin and the sin of the world) I find it comforting to know God seeks this place as well. That God would look for His safe place, the place where He would be who He knows Himself to be, to create and find every part of His sanctuary. God is far more desirous of that place than we are, and the extreme measures He will go to create that place, to found the place where He fits in, to dwell in the place where everyone knows (and praises) His name.
People reading this may think that I am picturing God as a wimpy needy person, just as they picture the millennials who they berate and mock. The need for a safe place and a call for it by the younger adults of this day is not about them being wimps, it is about their keen sense of the dissonance that sin causes, the brokenness that our hearts and souls cannot tolerate.
And neither should ours.
We, especially those in the church, should be crying out to God, to make His presence know, to help us to understand that He dwells in our midst, that we are the sanctuary we so eagerly seek out. We can, by the power of the Holy Spirit, see those out searching for a place, drawn to Him, pointed there by our words, by our lives. For this church is the place we find ourselves in the heart of Christ, and it is there, as the Spirit dwells in us,.
This is the sanctuary God desires more than anything, for Jesus, died to establish it. This is the community that is called holy, that is set apart to know and love one another, where everyone knows your name, and everyone knows His. This is His masterpiece, this church made not of wood and stone, but of hearts and souls, the place figured in the words of John 1, where it says he came and made His home among us. This is what all creation culminated in, this sanctuary, this safe place God has made to dwell in with us.
Realize my friends, you dwell in Him, and you are His sanctuary. For this is His desire, to have this sanctuary for Himself.
Lord,, help ys to realize that in the Sabbath you rest, and envisioned us finding rest and peace with You. In making us Your Holy People, you created a place where You fit in, where You would rest in peace with those you call by name, who call You by Name and call upon that Name. Help us to do so often so that every burden is lifted, and every praise is sung. AMEN!
Tappert, T. G. (Ed.). (1959). The Book of Concord the confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. (p. 415). Philadelphia: Mühlenberg Press.
Our need for community, a special community.
The church, is always in the midst of a storm… but safe in Him
Devotional Thought of the Day:
42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. 43 And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. 44 And all who believed were together and had all things in common. 45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. Acts 2:42-47 (ESV)
As the Father is called Creator and the Son is called Redeemer, so on account of his work the Holy Spirit must be called Sanctifier, the One who makes holy.
37 How does this sanctifying take place? Answer: Just as the Son obtains dominion by purchasing us through his birth, death, and resurrection, etc., so the Holy Spirit effects our sanctification through the following: the communion of saints or Christian church, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. In other words, he first leads us into his holy community, placing us upon the bosom of the church, where he preaches to us and brings us to Christ.
We often talk about the Body of Christ from a functional or clinical viewpoint. That is, we will talk about it as we try to find people their place in the church, finding out what part they will play, what gifts they have. Or we might use the concept clinically when one person is disrupting the unity of the church, and we appeal to them, reminding them that they are a part of the whole.
I think Luther, in explaining the work of the Holy Spirit, brings the topic up from a view that is not primarily functional. Rather it is experiential, that the Holy Spirit brings us into the special community to reveal to us the dimensions of God’s love and transform us. That transformation is called “sanctification”, which is another way of saying making us holy, setting us apart to a special relationship, to be one with God and all His family.
His family, His holy people, His holy community, His communion.
This is easy to say, but hard to accept, this idea that we are one body, that we are one community (no matter how fractured or impaired) That we are one in Christ, which makes us one, even as Jesus and the Father (and the Spirit ) are one. That we live and move and have our being in Christ, as the Spirit sanctifies us, removing every bit of sin, causing us to live, reflecting the glory of Christ into the darkness of a world that doesn’t know hope.
We are, whether we want to admit it, one, holy, catholic (all of us in all places/times) holy and apostolic church. This isn’t our work, it is what the Holy Spirit has established and drawn us into, even while we are being saved. This isn’t just a theological teaching or a pragmatic tool to use. It is our reality, it is where we together explore the incredible dimensions of God’s love for us, revealed in Christ.
Let us pray, as Jesus prayed, that we all may be one!
Tappert, T. G. (Ed.). (1959). The Book of Concord the confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. (p. 415). Philadelphia: Mühlenberg Press.
Who would deny them grace?
Devotional THoguht of the Day:
44 While Peter was still speaking, the Holy Spirit came down on all those who were listening to his message. 45 The Jewish believers who had come from Joppa with Peter were amazed that God had poured out his gift of the Holy Spirit on the Gentiles also. 46 For they heard them speaking in strange tongues and praising God’s greatness. Peter spoke up: 47 “These people have received the Holy Spirit, just as we also did. Can anyone, then, stop them from being baptized with water?” 48 So he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to stay with them for a few days. Acts 10:44-48 (TEV)
In our ecclesiastical circumscription, there are priests who do not baptize the children of single mothers because they were not conceived in the sanctity of marriage. These are the hypocrites of today, the ones who “clericalize” the Church and prevent God’s people the access to the source of salvation.
20. But what should you do if you are not aware of this need and have no hunger and thirst for the Sacrament?
To such a person no better advice can be given than this: first, he should touch his body to see if he still has flesh and blood. Then he should believe what the Scriptures say of it in Galatians 5 and Romans 7.
Second, he should look around to see whether he is still in the world, and remember that there will be no lack of sin and trouble, as the Scriptures say in John 15–16 and in 1 John 2 and 5.
Third, he will certainly have the devil also around him, who with his lying and murdering day and night will let him have no peace, within or without, as the Scriptures picture him in John 8 and 16; 1 Peter 5; Ephesians 6; and 2 Timothy 2.
As I read the words of Pope Francis this morning, I was, I don’t even know the words to say. Perhaps horrified, but also angry, and in a sense humiliated that there would have been priests (and Protestant pastors) at the time of my birth that would have denied my God’s grace.
My birth mother, (who I met decades later and admire) was not married when I was conceived. She put me up for adoption, but even so, it is scary to think that someone ordained would deny me God’s blessing. Or for that matter, how such a decision would affect the single mother.
Baptism, (and the Lord’s Supper, and Absolution) are sacraments where God pours out His grace upon us. Where He promises and reaffirms the promise that our sin is forgiven, that because of Jesus death, we have been recreated, made clean, redeemed, reconciled to God, delivered, saved.
Where we know that God is with us.
I think this talks about two things.
First, our role as pastors to urge people to receive the sacraments, to not forsake baptism, neither getting baptized or in recalling the promises of it regularly. Also to be frequent at the altar for communion (or if you are a shut-in, ask for the church (your pastor/ priest to bring it too you!) We need to encourage our people to confess their sins, and have confidence that as they do, assuredly God forgives them of their sin and cleanses them from ALL unrighteousness!
We cannot set up barriers to salvation!
But at the same time, we must teach people why these sacraments are so incredible, why we need them so much. I included Luther’s words above about the Lord’s Supper for that reason. He was convinced and so am I, of the spiritual significance of the Lord’s Supper. What the Eucharist gives is the knowledge of God’s love and His presence within us. Not knowledge just as in intellect, but the knowledge that is “on-the-job”. The experience of His blessed presence as we take and eat, as we drink the cup of salvation.
God is with us!
We need to know that, and woe to anyone who would stop, hinder, or simply not make it available to those in need.
Heavenly Father, help those in your church to pint out your promises of love, the mercy and forgiveness you pour out in Your word, and in the sacrament. Help us to do everything we can to encourage people to come near, and know You are with them. AMEN!
A question of the day: Do you think the church can minister to those who have been hurt by it before? How?
Pope Francis. (2013). A Year with Pope Francis: Daily Reflections from His Writings. (A. Rossa, Ed.) (p. 208). New York; Mahwah, NJ; Toronto, ON: Paulist Press; Novalis.
Luther, M. (1991). Luther’s Small Catechism with Explanation. Saint Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing House.
The Bottom Line
Devotional Thought of the Day:
1 When I came to you, my friends, to preach God’s secret truth, I did not use big words and great learning. 2 For while I was with you, I made up my mind to forget everything except Jesus Christ and especially his death on the cross. 1 Corinthians 2:1-2 (TEV)
729 Each day, O my God, I am less sure of myself and more sure of you!
Back in my youth, there was a phrase used that described the attitude of many students in college. It went like this, “If you cannot blind them with your brilliance, baffle them with your bullshit!”
With intent or not, that may have gotten many of us a grade or two better than we deserve. Like most sophomore (from the greek where we get the words wise and fool/moron) we thought we knew everything about everything, and we tried to impress others with those beliefs and impose those beliefs on them.
I don’t think those attitudes have changed all that much, even as I encountered them as an instructor in both computer information systems and in world religions in the last two decades.
As I read St. Josemaria’s words this morning, and I considered all the fake news out there, I remembered the attitude and the bravado and crap that we typed onto papers and presented in class.
And I regret that past, for instead of shuffling data to look good and trying to impress professors and classmates, I could have been learning more about the love of God. The love revealed in the incarnation, in the life and teaching of Jesus the Messiah, in His suffering and death which frees you and I from sin, from the resurrection, which brings us to live in Him. I could have been looking for to the resurrection from the dead, and the life of the world to come.
For that is the bottom line in life. Nothing else truly matters.
We keep it simple, Christ came to save sinners. sinners like me. To save us from ourselves. To save us to himself. AMEN
Lord, help us each day to become less sure of ourselves, and surer of Your love and presence in our lives. AMEN!
Escriva, Josemaria. The Way (Kindle Locations 1711-1712). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Is it worth it?
Devotional Thought of the Day:
3 We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. 4 And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. 5 And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. Romans 5:3-5 (NLT2)
12 Not that I have secured it already, nor yet reached my goal, but I am still pursuing it in the attempt to take hold of the prize for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers, I do not reckon myself as having taken hold of it; I can only say that forgetting all that lies behind me, and straining forward to what lies in front, 14 I am racing towards the finishing-point to win the prize of God’s heavenly call in Christ Jesus. 15 So this is the way in which all of us who are mature should be thinking, and if you are still thinking differently in any way, then God has yet to make this matter clear to you. 16 Meanwhile, let us go forward from the point we have each attained. Philippians 3:12-16 (NJB)
708 The world, the devil, and the flesh are a band of adventurers who take advantage of the weakness of that savage you have within you. In exchange for the poor bauble of pleasure, which is worth nothing, they want you to hand over to them the pure gold and the pearls, the diamonds and the rubies, drenched in the living and redeeming blood of your God—the price and the treasure of your eternity.
There are days when I ask myself the question that is the title of this blog.
The problem is that I ask it at the wrong times, or perhaps with the wrong attitude.
I ask it on rough days when I am weary, broken by the events I endured, the pain and suffering encountered. I ask it with the attitude of trying to find a way out, a way to alleviate the stress that ll of the trauma and drama causes. I ask because, in the moment of the struggle, doubt creeps in and temptations arise.
The answer is that walking with Christ is always worth it, usually, somewhere between my heart, mind, and soul, I know this. Yet I also know Satan and the sinful nature that I still have to fight (see that described in Romans 7). It doesn’t have to be the poor bauble of pleasure, it could even be the illusion that suffering and drama doesn’t exist.
In those times, I need to remember the suffering He endured, and that He thought I was worth it! I have to breathe, allowing the Holy Spirit to quiet and comfort me, allowing the Spirit to work deep within, reminding me of who God is, of where God is.
This is why passing the peace and the Lord’s Supper are such important times in my life, For there I am driven to remember He is with me, that His peace is where I am kept, I just have to remember it. As person after person shakes my hand, or grips me in a bear hug, I am reminded of where I am. As they say, “peace be with you,” I realize that they know this because they have seen it in their own lives, as I tell them. I dwell in His peace.
That message is even more reinforced as I take in my hand body of Christ, and the cup containing His precious blood. What a gift! What a reminder that from the pain of the cross comes my hope, and the joy that is unspeakable.
Is it worth it? This life lived, walking with people who struggling, each carrying his own burden? This carrying of burdens? Of course.
God is with us!
So hang on to this hope, and know He is hanging on to you, as He walks with you.
AMEN.
Escriva, Josemaria. The Way (Kindle Locations 1656-1659). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
The Same Words… found back to back, that help in the dark times of life!
The church, is always in the midst of a storm… but safe in Him
Devotional Thought of the Day:
Why am I so depressed?
Why this turmoil within me?
Put your hope in God, for I will still praise Him,
my Savior and my God. ( Psalm 42:11 AND 43:5 HCSB)
695 In the moments of struggle and tribulation, when perhaps the “good” fill your way with obstacles, lift up your apostolic heart: listen to Jesus as he speaks of the grain of mustard seed and of the leaven, and say to him: Edissere nobis parabolam—“Explain the parable to me.” And you’ll feel the joy of contemplating the victory to come: the birds of the air under the shelter of your apostolate, now only in its beginnings, and the whole of the meal leavened.
As I was reading Psalm 42 this morning, the verse in red and it hit me.
The amount of trauma and conflict (more of the former than the latter) I have had to deal with recently has me somewhat depressed. Okay, more than somewhat. The accumulated weight of trying to guide people to God in at least 10 situations has taken its tole.
So I highlighted the verse, thankful for the reminder that my hope is in something far more stable, far more faithful. and knowing that, even in the midst of this dark time, I can praise Him. Can? I must, for that is the reaction of relief, as I remember He is here, as I remember His promises.
At least I do for a moment, then move on, back into reading the next Psalm, which is a little more positive, a little more upbeat, and yet, it ends with the same exact same words! Okay, I’ve got the message Lord, and paused to let them sink in a little more.
I need to… I really do.
Then I scroll over to my friend’s writing. For I resonate with so much that St. Josemaria Escriva writes, it feels like the words of a wise friend when I read them.
WHich takes the hope, seeping through the darkness, and causes it to shatter the darkness.
Even though I reached on the passage yesterday, I forgot that often how Christ minister’s to us in our brokenness, is how He ministers through us ot others. Knowing how we have died and risen with Him, and find shelter in Him, means that in my death and resurrection Christ’s work will help others find peace and freedom. They will find rest as I minister to them, they will find hope, and by God’s grace, the darkness they encounter will be shattered as well.
including the 10 plus situations where brokenness and darkness seem so… overwhelming.
What kind of God do we have, that can take someone as broken and struggling as I am, and give me the peace to help others who are breaking and broken? What kind of God can help people find refuge and sanctuary through all of us, even as our faith wavers a little? How incredible is that? How amazing?
Only the God who is loving and merciful, the God who is our Savior, who is our God.
As we realize what it means that He is our God, that we have been drawn to Him and made His people, it is time to react… it is time to praise Him and adore Him, and walk with Him!
Amen!
What joy would it bring you to know God will use all things for good for you, even the trauma, the suffering, even the conflict?
Escriva, Josemaria. The Way (Kindle Locations 1620-1625). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
How Ministry Works – A Concordia Sermon based on Mark 4
How Ministry Works
Mark 4:26-34
† I.H.S.†
May the grace, mercy, and peace of God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ sustain you as you mature in trusting God and serve those around you!
Cornfields of Dandelions?
As we look at the kingdom parables in our gospel reading this morning, I imagine you think the Farmer creates a farm like the ones we may be had driven by, where the seeds are planted in nice neat rows.
But the scripture says he throws the seeds, just slings them across the field, so a better illustration would be those beautiful flowers that spread their spores across the fields of my youth.
You know, those lovely things we call dandelions!
The spores fly where ever there wind blows, and overnight your beautiful yard is covered In bright yellow flowers, though some might call them weeds.
That is how the Kingdom of God is, as the seed of the gospel is blown about, and creates life from seemed barren, lifeless, and even dead. Yet that seemingly dead and lifeless seed, like the spores on a dandelion, produces incredible abundant life.
Without any manipulation of the farmer.
Which is why Jesus shared this parable with the disciples, and with us.
We’ve lost control!!!!
The first commandment is, I believe the simplest, and yet the hardest to put into play.
“You shall have no other gods to rival me. 4 ‘You shall not make yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything in heaven above or on earth beneath or in the waters under the earth. 5 ‘You shall not bow down to them or serve them.; Exodus 20:3-5a (NJB)
That bow down part needs to be explained a little. In the culture of the time, it was more than a mark of respect, it was a mark of submission, of recognizing that the other person was responsible for you and had the right to direct your life any way they wished, including ending it. It was the kind of complete submission that occurs to one who has lost a war, or who really trusts the person they bow to, knowing the character of the person that they entrusted themselves to, as they bowed.
TO have a God means to trust them with your life, to run to them in times of trouble and need, and to trust their compassion, to trust them to make things right.
There is a problem with that, and it is not a new one. It is the reason Jesus told this parable.
We like to be in control, we like to know the outcome of our days, and whether the times we endured are worth it. We want to be able to have the right to question God and tell Him how we want the universe ran, or at least our tiny corner of it.
So too in the church, the challenge is to be focused on the gospel, on sharing God’s love as far as we can fling it and trusting the Holy Spirit to provide the result that our Triune God desires.
Except it always doesn’t work quite the way we like, and the Kingdom of God, which we would like to see nicely organized and ordered, in our opinion, seems messy and slow in its growth, and we can’t stand not seeing what is happening. We can’t wait for the blade to explode out of the seed, and the heads of wheat to form, and the plant to mature.
So we might get impatient, and rather than trust God, we trust ourselves. We strive to control and determine how and when growth happens. And in making ourselves God, we fall deep into sin. Believe me, it is easy to do, to become distracted from sharing the reason we have hope in what seems to be a dark and trying life.
It is pretty easy to move from frustration to sin, from impatience with God’s process to trying to take over and play God ourselves.
And yet the seed lies there, about to burst into life, all under the control of God, and not ours.
So how do we learn to trust Him, to look to Him to provide the growth, while still planting the seeds?
Time to find rest in the trees!
The other parable gives us the idea of how to do so, as we realize the seed of the gospel is simply Christ, who was planted in the ground.
This seemingly simple man, in the most remote part of the Roman Empire, dies, killed by his “own” people, those that claimed to follow God. And even as He is planted in the ground, the apostles had no idea of what we think of as Christianity today. They could see nothing but pain. Yet in His being planted, life is formed and created in us. A Billion people have found life in Christ, and in the second service, as a lady is baptized, another finds rest, like the birds that find a home in a mustard tree, safe deeply within from the predators.
It is when we know we are there when we can breathe deeply, and rest, and realize how God cares and provides for us that we learn to trust Him when we learn that He is the Lord of the church when we realize that He is God.
For we find our refuge and our hope in the Death and Resurrection of Jesus, and in the promised God gives us, as we are united to Jesus in our baptism. He cleanses us of all our brokenness and all the times where we’ve tried to play God.
This is what God does, hiding us so completely in His grace that we simply trust Him, that we simply relax and know His love, so incredible that we simply get back to work, throwing out the seed of the gospel, the very love of Jesus.
The gospel that draws people into a relationship deep within Christ, a place where we are revived and renewed, as we dwell in His love! AMEN!
The Church’s Obligation to Welcome the Stranger in Need
Devotional Thought of the Day:
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Away from me, you that are under God’s curse! Away to the eternal fire which has been prepared for the Devil and his angels! 42 I was hungry but you would not feed me, thirsty but you would not give me a drink; 43 I was a stranger but you would not welcome me in your homes, naked but you would not clothe me; I was sick and in prison but you would not take care of me.’ 44 Then they will answer him, ‘When, Lord, did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and we would not help you?’ 45 The King will reply, ‘I tell you, whenever you refused to help one of these least important ones, you refused to help me.’ 46 These, then, will be sent off to eternal punishment, but the righteous will go to eternal life.” Matthew 25:41-46 (TEV)
In short, thievery is the most common craft and the largest guild on earth. If we look at mankind in all its conditions, it is nothing but a vast, wide stable full of great thieves.
229 These men are called gentlemen swindlers or big operators. Far from being picklocks and sneak-thieves who loot a cash box, they sit in office chairs and are called great lords and honorable, good citizens, and yet with a great show of legality they rob and steal.
230 Yes, we might well keep quiet here about various petty thieves in order to launch an attack against the great, powerful arch-thieves who consort with lords and princes and daily plunder not only a city or two, but all Germany. Indeed, what would become of the head and chief protector of all thieves, the Holy See at Rome, and all its retinue, which has plundered and stolen the treasures of the whole world and holds them to this day?
231 This, in short, is the way of the world. Those who can steal and rob openly are safe and free, unmolested by anyone, even claiming honor from men. Meanwhile the little sneak-thieves who have committed one offense must bear disgrace and punishment so as to make the others look respectable and honorable. But the latter should be told that in the eyes of God they are the greatest thieves, and that he will punish them as they deserve. (and then a few paragraphs later)
247 If, when you meet a poor man who must live from hand to mouth, you act as if everyone must live by your favor, you skin and scrape him right down to the bone, and you arrogantly turn him away whom you ought to give aid, he will go away wretched and dejected, and because he can complain to no one else, he will cry to heaven. Beware of this, I repeat, as of the devil himself. Such a man’s sighs and cries will be no joking matter. They will have an effect too heavy for you and all the world to bear, for they will reach God, who watches over poor, sorrowful hearts, and he will not leave them unavenged. But if you despise and defy this, see whom you have brought upon yourself. If you succeed and prosper, before all the world you may call God and me liars
There is a struggle in the church today, one that is neither simple nor easily solved.
It is dealing with the issues of social justice, and how we treat the homeless, the needy, the stranger in our midst, that comes to us, asking for help, crying for a place of refuge.
And far too often the church looks at the situation as if the problem is them How do we solve their problem, how do we help them live within what the laws (federal, state, local) demand of them, at the same time, helping them as we ought to.
The words I encounter in my reading in the Large Catechism, and in the gospel show me the problem isn’t with them, but with us. It is them we look at as if they were the disgrace, yet our lack of love is more disgraceful. It is their cries, unanswered byt the world of the church, that rise up as prayers to God. It is our hearts that need to be confronted, broken, and restored by God’s mercy.
Hear that again, it is those that have, and especially those who are in positions where their actions take what little the needy have to rely on, that are more in need of mercy, God’s mercy, than those who cry out to Him. For if they understood that mercy, it would result in their caring for those whose situations may indeed be shameful, or disgraceful, even such that in desperation they turn to crime.
And then what is to be said for those who vote for those people, or invest in their companies, or work with or for them, or do business with them? DO we not bear a burden for those sins as well, and thereby need God’s mercy?
The other day I was touched by a friend, one who doesn’t have much herself but gives what she has and even buys somethings intentionally to give to the homeless that live between her work and her home. She wondered where the homeless had gone to, for she had a trunk full of food and water for them. What a wondrous thing, someone who understands that while she can’t do much (in the world’s eyes) she can do something! And she hurt because she couldn’t find those she regularly helped.
Jesus tells us we will always have the poor and needy and the alien among us (Stranger in the Greek is Xeno – alien, those not of us,) but that doesn’t negate our responsibility to love them, to assist them, to defend them. For in doing so, we encounter Jesus, and in doing so, we encounter the mercy we ourselves need, as we find forgiveness, and restoration, and the power of Christ in our lives..
Lord, have mercy on us!
Tappert, T. G. (Ed.). (1959).( Explanation of the 7th commandment of the Large Catechism), The Book of Concord the confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. (p. 396). Philadelphia: Mühlenberg Press.
Who Told You? A Sermon on Genesis 3:8-15
Who Told You?
Genesis 3:8-15
† In Jesus Name †
May the Grace of God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ convince you that instead of seeking a hiding place from God, you should seek the refuge you find in Him!
Who Told You?
In today’s first reading, the one from Genesis 3, there is a question that God asks Adam, one that is relevant to ask today.
Who told you?
Specifically, who told you that you were naked, literally that you were exposed, who told you that your sin was visible for all to see? ( who was all anyway?)
How did you find out you had sinned, how did you come across that information?
Where did this guilt come from that drives you to do things that are as unnatural as the sin you are trying to hide?
As I thought about this question, it came to me that you and I need to ask that question today as we have to deal with our own brokenness, with our own sin, and the damage it does to us.
For I think we’ve been taught about sin in such a way that we react to it as Adam did, hiding, getting defensive, shifting blame, all in response to the guilt that convicts us far more cruelly than God would.
So who told you that you were exposed, that your sin was something so horrible that you had to hide?
Who told you to pass the blame?
As Adam was anxiously dealing with the idea that God found him. As God asks Adam who told you that you were naked, did you eat of the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat?” While all that is scrambling his mind, he comes up with an answer.
Not my fault God! It’s her fault, you know, the one YOU gave me. She gave me the fruit, and because she is a blessing from you, I listened to her.
And since then, some men have avoided that problem, simply by not listening to their wives!
Of course, that causes other problems, and is just as sinful!
But who told Adam that the best way to deal with sin was to pass the blame? To hide behind Eve, rather than hiding behind a tree? Who told him that he wasn’t responsible for stopping Eve from falling into sin?
In trying to defend himself, to justify his own sin, Adam finds himself guilty of more than one sin, he finds himself shattering more relationships and allowing sin to get a better and better hold on his soul.
We do this all the time, and so does most of the world. When we fear getting caught when we know the guilt and shame and embarrassment that comes from doing something we know we shouldn’t do or refusing to do something we should.
Who told us to do that? Who told us that we needed to be defensive, that a defense even needed to be given? For that is as much of a lie as the temptation to sin was in the first place.
Yet Adam does it, as will Eve, who will follow the pattern and play the blame game, blaming the snake for deceiving her, for leading her into temptation.
Who told us to hide, to try and escape from God’s notice. Who told us to hide behind others, trying to get them to pay for our sin?
Who told you about Eve’s offspring?
I am not sure where we get this idea to hide from God, but we do it all the time, don’t we?
What we need to hear, is the last verse of the passage, for it tells us how sin is to be dealt with. It is the very first prophecy about Jesus in the Bible, what Luther called the “proto-gospel”.
You see it on the painting on the cover of the bulletin, as the offspring of Eve crushes Satan and all his minions on the cross. Even as the serpent sees Christ die, Satan’s efforts to dominate, to lead people away from God are crushed.
This is what we need to know! That sin, Satan, and death are crushed at the cross of Christ. We have been made free!
Seeking Refuge, not Hiding
There is something that drives us to hide from God, and from others, like our parents, our spouses, our children, even our pastor, when we sin.
It is ironic when we run from God when we hide behind someone else, I think what we are trying to do is to find a place of rest, a place where the effects of our sin are negated, and we think hiding will provide it. We don’t understand there is an option, there always has been.
We can seek refuge in God, instead of seeking a hiding place from Him.
Instead of laying the blame off on others, Christ will willingly, even joyfully remove it.
Seek refuge, not a hiding place.
Which means seek a refuge in God, we allow Him to remove all the guilt and shame, all the anxiety over punishment, all the anxiety of having our sinfulness exposed to the world.
For that was why He was looking for Adam and Eve, and until the cross, why He put them out of the garden. Not as a punishment, but to sustain them until Christ’s death and resurrection would cleanse them from sin, and they and all who trust and depend on God were given refuge, in the death, and the resurrection of Jesus.
For there we find life, and peace that is beyond compare or comprehension. For in Christ we are kept secure, our hearts and minds are in His possession. AMEN!!!
The Church Has No Excuse for Aging…
Devotional Thought of the Day:
1 The people say, “Let’s return to the LORD! He has hurt us, but he will be sure to heal us; he has wounded us, but he will bandage our wounds, won’t he? 2 In two or three days he will revive us, and we will live in his presence. 3 Let us try to know the LORD. He will come to us as surely as the day dawns, as surely as the spring rains fall upon the earth.” Hosea 6:1-3 (TEV)
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is God’s power for salvation n to everyone who believes, first to the Jew, o and also to the Greek. 17 For in it God’s righteousness is revealed from faith to faith, just as it is written: The righteous will live by faith.
18 For God’s wrath is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth, 19 since what can be known about God is evident among them because God has shown it to them. 20 For His invisible attributes, that is, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen since the creation of the world, being understood through what He has made. As a result, people are without excuse. Romans 1:16-20 HCSB
If the Church stays “indoors,” she certainly will age.
The Church is called to come out of herself and to go to the “existential peripheries,” where the mystery of sin, pain, injustice, religious indifference and of all human miseries are found.
In fulfilling its educational role, the Church, eager to employ all suitable aids, is concerned especially about those which are her very own. Foremost among these is catechetical instruction,16 which enlightens and strengthens the faith, nourishes life according to the spirit of Christ, leads to intelligent and active participation in the liturgical mystery17 and gives motivation for apostolic activity.
Romans 1:16 is, for Bible College and Seminary students, repeated often.
I am not ashamed!
But this isn’t a badge of honor, it is not considering the context. It is a call to go out, and help those who have been caught up by sin, those who are in bondage to it, those who are broken by it.
We are to be there for the people without excuse, but therefore, without hope. The word for excuse there is the negative form of the word of the apostle Peter uses when he declares,
15 But have reverence for Christ in your hearts, and honor him as Lord. Be ready at all times to answer anyone who asks you to explain the hope you have in you, 1 Peter 3:15 (TEV)
This world, so full of misery and strife, so full of pain that they have become indifferent to religion cannot realize that they can return to the Lord, That they can return to the Lord who allowed them to deal with the consequences of the sin of the world, including their sin.
They don’t know that God will come to heal them, that they can know Him, not just academically, but in a deep rich way, more deeply that can e described by words, but is celebrated as we take the Body Broken for us, as we share in the blood shed for our sins.
Paul is not ashamed of the gospel because it presents hope to these people who are unaware of that hope even exists, that broken relationships, can be healed, THAT GOD CARES FOR THEM.
This has to be the message of the church. It is not that we are better than them, holier than them that we go out to encounter the world. It is because we found hope for our brokenness, hope that we are being healed, being transformed, a work that isn’t always easily visible, but one that God has promised to do.
If we are not ashamed of this hope, of this ability we are all given to interact and depend on God, then there is no excuse for the church to get old. The is no excuse for us hiding within the doors of our churches, waiting for the pastor to grow our church. We have a world that doesn’t need us to complain about them, but that needs us to give them the hope we have, to help them return to the Lord, to know that anyone can die with Christ and the cross, and be raised to a new life with Him, in Him.
This is the gospel, that God loves us…
Let us not hide that hope within our walls, but let it burst out as fast as the kids run for donuts after service gets out!
Lord have mercy on us all! And help us to spread the news you have!
Pope Francis. (2013). A Year with Pope Francis: Daily Reflections from His Writings. (A. Rossa, Ed.) (p. 192). New York; Mahwah, NJ; Toronto, ON: Paulist Press; Novalis.
Catholic Church. (2011). Declaration on Christian Education: Gravissimum Educationis. In Vatican II Documents. Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana.
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