15th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) - September 22, 2019

15th Sunday after Pentecost
Year C
October 8, 2019
Luke 16:1-13

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus talks about money often. We don’t get many of those texts in our
lectionary. But we get this one today – a bizarre, and frankly confusing, parable, often called the parable of the dishonest manager. Matthew Skinner, a professor at Luther Seminary and commentator on the podcast Sermon Brainwave, says that he loves the parable, precisely because “no one understands it… That’s what makes it fun.” It is one of the most difficult parables to figure out, so it becomes a jigsaw puzzle in order to try to understand what Jesus is trying to tell us. To be clear, I like a good theological or scriptural puzzle. It is why I focused on Biblical studies in both undergrad and seminary. It is why I ask so many questions of texts. I’ve done a lot of that recently while wrestling with texts and in my preaching. I like taking apart texts and putting them back together. For me, that process is indeed fun. But this one, at least for me, is not as “fun.” Interpreting this text is hard. Really hard. Even among scholars there are dozens of theories and no clear answers. So if upon hearing the parable, you’re left scratching your head, know that you aren’t alone. It is a parable that, as a friend of mine has said, is a way of God reminding us to use our brains.

Part of the issue with interpreting this text is that, so often, we like to make parables into allegories. We want to assign different characters in the story to figures from our faith. A character in the story is “supposed” to represent God, another Jesus, and another us. It can work relatively well (and be a good and well-grounded interpretation) for some parables: the parable of the lost coin, for instance, allegorically speaking, the woman could represent God or Jesus and the lost coin could represent us. Last week, we imagined God as the woman who searches through dust bunnies and dress pockets to find what was lost. Great. A wonderful vision. In this text however, it isn’t that simple. Many interpretations, for instance, place Jesus as the dishonest manager; as Jesus is the one who forgives our debts and reconciles us to God (who in this case would be the master). But there are problems. Can you imagine Jesus, the one who went to the cross, saying that he isn’t “strong enough to dig”? And if Grace and reconciliation with God are free, why is the debt reduction only partial – just 20-50%? All of that to say, allegories are not the only (nor always the best) way of interpreting Jesus’ parables.

Jesus parables do however help us to enter in, to imagine the Kingdom of God that has broken into the world in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection – a kingdom that continues to break into this world. They help us reimagine this world as it is becoming this world that God intended for us. I wonder, if to help us get there, Jesus tells a story that helps us see the breaking in of the Kingdom of God – by saying something about this world as it is. I wonder if this parable points us to one example – an imperfect example – of the liberation that is breaking into the world through Jesus.

Louis Le Breton [Public domain]
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mammon.jpg

I’m going to start at the end of the passage. We’ll start where it is actually clear, to hopefully clarify
other pieces of the parable. Here’s the punchline. “No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.” (Luke 6:13, NRSV). The word used in today’s passage isn’t “wealth” it is Mammon. Usually, I’m a fan of the NRSV (which is the bible translation we use in worship). But those of you who know older translations of the Bible may remember this final verse differently, “No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon” (Luke 16:13). Mammon is wealth or money personified. It is money as an idol, an object of our worship. It is money plus power – the power that money can hold over us.

Martin Luther, in the Large Catechism, has this to say about Mammon: “There are some who think that they have God and everything they need when they have money and property; they trust in them and boast in them so stubbornly and securely that they care for no one else. They, too, have a god — mammon by name, that is, money and property — on which they set their whole heart. This is the most common idol on earth. Those who have money and property feel secure, happy, and fearless, as if they were sitting in the midst of paradise.”  Then, there are some, Luther continues, “who have nothing [that] doubt and despair as if they knew of no god at all. We will find very few who are cheerful, who do not fret and complain, if they do not have mammon. This desire for wealth clings and sticks to our nature all the way to the grave.”  Mammon, Luther argues, is a god that holds power over us – a false god, but a god nonetheless. Wealth, Mammon, is something we – as human beings – put our trust in – often above putting trust in God. If we have enough money, we have security. Then, the tendency is to hoard that which creates security for ourselves; we like to feel safe. And we can convince ourselves that we do it on our own. We don’t need God. We don’t need others. We buy into the myth that we are “self-made” people. Therefore, we cannot serve God and mammon. Mammon turns us inward. God turns us outward.[1]

This year, as I’m wrestling with this passage, I’m wondering if the dishonest manager falls into the trap of trusting (or hoping in) mammon over other things. The manager is working in an unjust system. While charging interest is technically prohibited by Jewish law, the rich often found ways around that particular law by charging various fees or hidden interest charges. In other words, the rich got rich by cheating those who were beneath them - the poor and the less powerful. While technically their actions were legal, their wealth was built on the backs of those beneath them. They put so much trust or love in money that they care for no one else. They’re self-made people, after all. They rest secure in their wealth. The source of the unfaithfulness of both the manager and his master is their greed, their love of money. They cannot be faithful to God nor to neighbor as long as they put their love and trust in money. Their actions, while legal, cause great harm to those indebted to them. As with so much in our world, legal doesn’t make it right.

The manager, upon finding himself soon without a job, suddenly will be without the *things* that provide for his security – his wages and a roof over his head. So then, he frees some people from a significant portion of their debt in order to have some people on “his side.” He does a good thing for the wrong reasons. You might be thinking, “Good? He is hurting his master; he is chipping into his profits.” But we need to remember the good news that the Gospel of Luke proclaims. Luke frames the work of Jesus as liberation and the work of the Kingdom of God as turning the world upside down (pulling the lowly up and bringing the mighty down). Forgiving of debts is exactly the kind of work that Jesus would call “good” – even if it comes at the expense of the powerful. The manager does this for the wrong reasons: his own security. He’s desperate. On the verge of losing everything, he needs a plan B. So he turns outward to save himself. His love of money (and fear of losing his place, his privilege, his status) keeps him from genuine relationship with the neighbor – both in his job and as he is losing his job. I don’t think that we’re supposed to read this story and come out thinking that the manager is a “good guy.” Yet at the end of the day, while the manager isn’t interested in justice, the poor find *some* liberation through the actions of the manager. They are relieved (of at least some) of their debt.

Here’s where I think we hit on one (of many) possible points in this text: if a dishonest manager can do a good thing for the wrong reasons, how much more can a person of faith do of a good thing for the right reasons? Or even more, if a dishonest manager can do a good thing for the wrong reasons, how much more can our God, the one who is truly faithful, do good things for the right reasons?

We too live in an unjust economic system. Too often we, as a society, put trust in money to the point where we neglect to think about others. The master and the manager aren’t evil people; they’re part of a larger system built on the accumulation of wealth. It is a system that worships Mammon. Today, the richest 1% of the world owns half of the world’s wealth, and they are on target to own 2/3rds of the world’s wealth in the next ten years. Specifically, in the US, the top .1% of American households hold the same amount of wealth as the bottom 90%. 44 million Americans struggle under the weight of student debt under a system in which the cost of college education has risen 200% (even accounting for inflation) since 1980. About 40 million Americans live beneath the poverty line. Our faith calls us to examine not just our lives and our individual actions but to examine the society in which we live. If we’re proclaiming that Jesus is bringing about the Kingdom of God in this world, turning it upside down, we need to look at the world as it is, we need to see the injustice, we need to see what needs to be turned upside down. Our gospel text invites us into looking at the world as it is for what it is. If the Kingdom of God, as the Magnificat states, brings down the powerful and lifts up the lowly, we need to see what, in this world as it is, props up the powerful and holds down the lowly. Money and economics are a big part of that. What drives this world in which we live? Who is it built for? Who is it built on or at the expense of? Who thrives (and why)? Who struggles (and why)?

If a dishonest manager can do a good thing for the wrong reasons, what is the response of a God who is faithful? We have a liberating God that seeks to free people from that which holds them down. God takes our debts – whether financial, moral, or otherwise – and forgives them – not by 20% or 50% but in their entirety. How much more does a faithful God do than a dishonest manager? A God that is strong enough to die on the cross; A God that is willing to do anything – search through dust bunnies, wander the wilderness, even beg – to bring God’s people into relationship with Godself. If a dishonest manager can do a good thing for the wrong reason, what is the response of a person of faith – one who has already received that forgiveness from God – to the injustices of the world as it is? If our God is the God made known in Jesus, not Mammon, how much more can we do? Because our debts are forgiven, we get to free others from their debts. Putting our trust in the faithful God, serving that God, we get to practice forgiveness – moral, financial, and otherwise – and we get to work for the release of others from their debts. Liberation in this world is not just possible, but the call of those who have been entrusted with true riches – the love and grace of God through Christ. And in that, we get to see glimpses of the Kingdom of God in this world here and now.

Amen.

[1] Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert, eds., The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, Accordance electronic ed. (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000), 387.

14th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) - September 15, 2019

Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Year C
September 15, 2019
Luke 15:1-10

Our Gospel text today is likely familiar to most of us. As I get older and I’ve reencountered this text – seemingly a million times, I find myself questioning the text (and myself) a bit more. Would I really abandon 99 sheep do go find one lost one? The way Jesus tells the story and asks the question, it sounds like the answer is an obvious yes. However, well, sheep aren’t known as the smartest creatures on the planet. If I leave the 99 to find the one, what will the 99 do? Unlike my beloved Ginger pup, sheep are not likely to just stand there and anxiously await my return. (And, the text doesn’t say what happens to the 99 – just that the shepherd threw the sheep over his shoulders, rejoices. When he goes home, he celebrates with his family and friends). So said another way, if I go to look for the one lost sheep, how many more lost sheep would I return to? A “smart” and logical shepherd would take his losses and protect the 99.

And how in the world, does a shepherd, know that one sheep is missing in a crowd of 100 sheep? There’s a reason, I don’t typically count how many of you all join us on a given weekend. First, I’m leading worship. But in a crowd, I easily lose track of my count. Oh, no, I think I counted Bonnie twice. Did I get Avery in my count? She kinda pops in and out of my view. (I’m very grateful to our wonderful ushers who do get a good count of who is here each week!) Then, how did the sheep get lost in the first place? Again, sheep aren’t known as the smartest creatures, did it just wander off? Did someone or something chase it off? There’s a cartoon, that I love, that goes around social media periodically from David Hayward, known as the Naked Pastor (I think I even shared it a few months back on my own FB page). In the cartoon, Jesus is walking back to his flock with the lost sheep, painted with beautiful rainbow stripes. One of the 99 responds, “Woah! Woah! Woah! Hold it right there! He wasn’t lost. We kicked him out.” A coin… How does it get lost? It only gets lost if I misplace it. It doesn’t jump out of my purse or my coin jar and make its way under my couch.

Recently, I read a book, One Coin Found: How God’s Love Stretches to the Margins, written by the Rev. Emmy Kegler.  This book changed how I interact with and hear today’s Gospel reading. Pastor Emmy is an ELCA pastor in Minneapolis, MN, a young adult, and a part of the LGBTQIA+ community. Just a brief statement about the book, in general, it is a powerful read; Pastor Emmy has this way of weaving in her story and the Gospel of Jesus that has been such a part of her life in moving and empowering ways. Her writing immediately pulled me in, almost as if she was talking directly to me. The book, as indicated by the title, draws from and centers itself on the Gospel readings for this Sunday – what many call the “lost” chapter of the Bible. We get the parable of the lost sheep, followed by the parable of the lost coin, followed by the parable of the lost (or prodigal) son – which was left out of today’s gospel reading. It is her story of being found and the God who found her and loved her for who she is.

Pastor Emmy writes:
“This story is for us. We are the prodigal son. But too we are lost and hungry sheep. We have gone unfed, walked without rest, been chased by wolves, and our friends and leaders did not see our pain…We too are lost and dusty coins. We have gone unnoticed, rusted from others’ indifference, misspent and misused, and our friends and leaders did not see our neglect” (Kegler, 8).

Her point is: we all likely have been like the lost sheep or a dusty coin from time to time. Whether we find ourselves away from the fold because we wondered off, whether we find ourselves away from the fold because we were hungering for something and went off looking for whatever might satisfy that hunger, whether we find ourselves away from the fold because a predator chased us out and we fled in fear, in self-preservation, whether we find ourselves away from the fold because the very people that were supposed to love and nurture us kicked us out, deeming us unworthy. Whether we find ourselves lost after years of feeling invisible, unappreciated, used. This story is for us.

Pastor Emmy continues:
 “But God, in big and little ways has donned a shepherd’s cloak and come running after us. God, in big and little ways, has clambered over rocks and climbed down cliffs. God has found us, hungrier and more hurt and terrified, and cradled us close to say: no matter why you left of where you went, you are mine… But God, in big and little ways, has picked up a woman’s broom and swept every corner of creation. God, in big and little ways, has tucked up her skirts and flattened herself on the floor, dug through dust bunnies and checked every dress pocket. God has found us, dustier and without any luster, and held us up to the light to say: No matter how you rolled away or what corner you were dropped in, you are mine” (Kegler, 8)

This is the good news of the passage today. What the parables actually describe isn’t “repentance.” The sheep don’t realize that they’re lost and turn around and return to the fold. The coin doesn’t jump back where the woman keeps her coins. No. Instead, the parables describe the unrelenting, stubborn act of a God who is not willing to give up on even one of God’s beloved children. So, contrary to logic and good sense, God goes after the one lost sheep, and does whatever it takes to bring that one sheep back. If God returns, carrying the lost sheep home, and finds that another has run off, God will search for that one too. God’s love, God’s mercy, God’s grace keeps searching for each person who is lost. God goes to the darkest, dirtiest, most dangerous places, searching and searching to bring people home. In Jesus, we meet a God that is absolutely committed to doing whatever it takes – even experience death on a cross – to have relationship and reconciliation with each and every one of us – and each and every one of God’s beloved children.

Today, God says to each one of us who were lost – you are mine. Nothing, not the things that make you who you are – your relationship status, your sexuality, your gender orientation, the color of your skin –, nor the things that the society around do to try to convince you that you don’t belong or are less than others, nor the voices inside that may try to tell you that you aren’t enough, not your mistakes, not your wanderings – none of these things can separate you from the love of God that we’ve found in Christ Jesus. God loves you – as you are – because of who God is. This God is one that we have met in Jesus, the one who risks even death on a cross for the world that God so loves. And today, the Gospel is that in the best and the worst times of life, God will keep searching for you.

We are found. We are found by the love of God. This love is for you. This love is for me. This love is for all people. Our God is one that knows you (and knows me) better than we can know ourselves – knows our joys and our hurts, our successes and our failures, what we choose to show the world about ourselves, and the things that we keep deep inside. This is a God that knows our sin. And this is a God that loves us anyway. Fully, completely, unconditionally. God cherishes you and treasures you.  It is a love that says: you are worthy of being found. We don’t earn it. But yet this is a love that is close, that does not abandon us, but searches for us, walks beside us, envelops us, carries us. It is a love that we can place our trust in. It is a love that invites us to see ourselves as God sees us – as beloved children of God; and a love that invites us to see all the people (in their wonderful diversity) around us as God sees them – as beloved children of God. It is a love that invites us to live into the people God intends us to be: loved people who love other people. We have a God, who in the words of my beloved Hebrew Bible seminary prof, God’s answer to God’s people is always a loud and resounding yes. An affirmation of both who we are (as we are) and whose we are.

It is a love that invites us into an imperfect yet holy community that forms the body of Christ in this world. A community that, at its best, reminds us and shows us that we are beloved (even when we struggle to see that ourselves). It is a community that, at its best, reminds us that we are not alone. It is a community that, at its best, rejoices along with Jesus, and welcomes people into the fold – exactly as they are. It is a community that comes around the font and the table – receiving God’s gifts and hearing God’s word of forgiveness, splashing in the water that unites us with Christ’s death and resurrection, feasting on the bread and wine, the body and blood of Christ – together. And it is a community that, at its best, lives out the love and forgiveness that we first received from God.

This story is for us. But this story is for others too – others who are wandering, who are hungering, who have fled, who have been kicked out, who have been told that they’re unworthy, who have gone unnoticed – by society, by the church, or perhaps even by us. Who might be lost – in this community, in society, in the wider church? Who might need to hear the Gospel that they are loved, they are redeemed, as they are? Who might need to hear God’s resounding yes for them? Because we are found, we get to find others. Because we are loved, we get to share that love with others. Walter Brueggemann puts it this way, “hope in God’s promises is not passive but demandingly active… Hope is not optimism or a wish or a good idea. It is a way of living differently in the world.”  It is about living into the world that we know God intends for us. It is a call to see others as God sees us – as broken yet beloved children of God. It is a call to pick up the rocks, to sweep away the dust – hatred, homophobia, transphobia, racism, sexism, poverty, – whatever harms our neighbors and pushes them away. Today, we live into the hope of God’s promises, trusting that we are found by the Grace and love of God through Jesus, by being part of God’s search party and finding others, and rejoicing with God when we are all found.

Amen



Kegler, Emmy. One Coin Found: How God's Love Stretches to the Margins. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2019.
Brueggemann, Walter. "The Company of the Unafraid: Ten ways God's peculiar hope keeps fear from overpowering us." Sojourners. July 2019. https://sojo.net/magazine/july-2019/company-unafraid.

13th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) - September 8, 2019

Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Year C
September 8, 2019
Luke 14:25-33

There are some Gospel texts that are super uncomfortable. Ya know, the ones that end and we say “the Gospel of our Lord” and “praise to you, O Christ” - and in our heads and hearts we’re thinking “The… Gospel… of our… Lord?” and “Praise to… you... um. O Christ?” And today’s Gospel lesson is certainly one of those texts. “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.” “The... Gospel... of our Lord.” “Praise… to you… O Christ?”

To those of you who are joining us as our guests today or who are joining us again after a summer break, I’ll admit that it isn’t the easiest text to come back to. To those of you who’ve been with us recently, we’ve had a lot of these texts lately. Sometimes we want a word of comfort. And we get this - a command to hate the ones closest to us - instead today. I know how tricky this text is; this happened to be the Gospel text for the Sunday of my first sermon at my internship site. It is super uncomfortable. I love my folks. I love my family. As I admitted in that first sermon on internship: I have a really hard time getting past Jesus telling me that, to be a good disciple, that I have to hate my Mom and my Dad. I have a hard time getting past that to the rest of the passage.

There are two approaches to dealing with these kinds of texts. One is to explain it away. “Jesus didn’t really mean that we should hate our parents. He’s using hyperbole.” Another is to dig in - into both the text and the discomfort - and figure out what the text is saying to Luke’s audience and to us. The problem with the first option is that it allows us to stay firmly within our comfort zones. Sometimes texts are intended to make us uncomfortable. Sometimes Jesus intends to make us uncomfortable. So when we explain it away, we often miss the point of the text. And the Gospel of Luke is really good at pushing us outside of our comfort zones. When Jesus pushes us outside of our comfort zones, our instinct is to walk, run, crawl as fast as we can back to what makes us comfortable. The temptation is to soften Jesus’ words so that we’re never really challenged.

My hope today is to take the second option. To sit in the discomfort a bit to try to see what Jesus might be telling us today. To be challenged by the Gospel. Because the Gospel both unsettles us and frees us. Often in preaching circles, we talk about how the Gospel - the Good news of Jesus Christ - afflicts the comfortable and comforts the afflicted. And today, in this particular Gospel reading, we get much more of the afflicting of the comfortable. So today is an invitation to sit in the uncomfortable for just a bit. Sometimes to hear the Gospel - the good news not just for me but for all people - we need to be shaken out of our places of comfort. These words were and are challenging.

For Luke, that good news is that Jesus comes to bring about the Kingdom of God in this world. And this is a Kingdom of God that is drastically changing this world. As Jesus talks about banquets (as a metaphor for the table of the Kingdom of God) in our Gospel reading from last week, Jesus makes it clear that the places of honor in the Kingdom of God belong to the people that we least expect. The table is for everyone, but especially the poor, the outsiders, the sinners, the strangers, and foreigners. The people that we might least expect to be around the table, not only are welcome there, but hold a place of honor. Throughout the Gospel of Luke, Jesus proclaims this Kingdom of God that turns the world upside down. Those currently with power and privilege will be brought down and the lowly will be lifted up.

As I said to those in the Adult Forum on Luke back in November, Luke’s lens on Jesus is one of social justice. It is a lens that says that we cannot be whole until all of us are whole. The ways of this world as it is, the ways of this empire are harmful and death dealing, especially to the most vulnerable around us. The Kingdom of God is one that brings wholeness and healing to the people and the places that need it most - so that we all can finally live in a world that God intended from the very beginning - one where everyone is in right relationship with God, with the fellow human being, and with all creation. This is indeed Good News. But it doesn’t sound like Good News for everybody. For those with power, for those who typically sit in places of honor, for those who have privilege, it sounds like very bad news.

And today, the Gospel can sound like very bad news. To dig further, I’m actually going to start at the end of the passage: “so therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all of your possessions.” And, in the context of this passage (and the Gospel of Luke), I think Jesus is talking more than about just material possessions. These are the things that we hold dear - particularly the things that can get in the way of following Jesus. I have a hunch that Jesus is talking about those things that we hold onto to that keep us tied to this world as it is, those things that lure us into the ways of this world rather than the ways of the Kingdom of God. Of course that can include material possessions, but includes so much more than that.

In Jesus’ world, following Jesus often meant leaving family behind. The first disciples left their nets (and all their familial commitments) to follow Jesus. In the community of the Gospel of Luke, becoming a Christ believer often meant separation from family and a rupture of family ties. Following Jesus meant risking alienation from the people closest to them. Families did not want their loved ones to follow Jesus. And in this time in Christian history, do you really blame them? There’s a martyrdom text from the early 3rd century, the martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicitas, in which we meet a jailed Perpetua. Several times, Perpetua’s father begs her to renounce her faith because he knew that the cost of following Jesus would be her own death.

Families knew that following Christ - this messiah who died on a cross - meant possibly meeting a similar fate. Because preaching about the Kingdom of God - this kingdom that brings down the powerful and lifts up the lowly - is a threat to those who hold power and who hold those places of honor. Jesus doesn’t end up on the cross because he was a nice guy; he was crucified because the message of the Kingdom ran against the message of the Empire, ran against the message of those with power. Who wants to be the one brought down? That kind of message needed, in their minds, needed to be extinguished - so that they can preserve their own place in the world. Thus family - mothers and fathers, spouse and children, brothers and sisters - could become roadblocks to following Jesus and roadblocks to living out the kingdom of God. This good news seems anything but good. They miss that, to quote one commentator this week, that “The way of discipleship is the way of life, real life, life that does not deny the reality of death but instead overcomes it through the power of resurrection. And that is good news that the world needs to hear” (Kathryn M. Schifferdecker, “Choose Life, https://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=5376). So while I don’t believe that Jesus calls his followers to literally hate their families, I do think Jesus is pointing to the risks of being a disciple. I do think that Jesus is calling his followers to turn away from anything that might hold them back from living out their call to be kingdom builders, their call to live out the freedom they’ve been given through Jesus.

While families or other relationships can still hold us back from living out our call to be kingdom

builders, I’m not sure that in today’s world that is as relevant. For the most part, family and friends are thrilled when those they love start going to church. That being said, there are things in this world that hold us back and keep us from living out that freedom that we’ve already been given. What are the things or the systems that we hold onto that get in the way of living into the Kingdom of God? What are the things that keep us from being Kingdom builders? Do we hold onto our stuff, our money - trusting in material possessions for safety and security above placing that trust in God? Do we hold onto our prejudices that divide us from our neighbors? Do we hold onto American individualism that tries to ignore our interconnectedness? Do we hold onto our place in the world, in our communities, because we don’t want to be the ones who are brought down? Do we hold onto our fear - fear of change, fear of those different from us, fear of loss? This answer could be different for each one of us.

But whatever holds us back, the good news today is that Jesus comes to free us from those things as well. Because as long as we’re holding onto power, privilege, prejudices, we aren’t living out the Kingdom. But these things keep us stuck in the ways and the narratives of this world. We’ve already been given salvation. We’ve already been made right with God. These things keep us from being in right relationship with our fellow human and with creation. But because we have the promise that we are made right with God, we are free to turn out to our fellow human and to the stranger. Thus, Today Jesus calls us to give up those things that we hold onto, to be freed from those things we hold onto; this is a call to live into the freedom that God has given us through Christ. And that is the Gospel of our Lord.

Amen.

Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) - Sept 1, 2019

12th Sunday after Pentecost
Year C
Sept. 1, 2019
Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16

Our readings each week come from the Revised Common Lectionary, released in 1994. The readings for today were planned since the Lectionary was released in 1994. I *may* sometimes adjust the beginning and ends of readings, but the readings are, for the most part, given. On the whole, I am thankful for the lectionary. As with any lectionary, there are pluses and minuses. Sometimes the readings may feel distant and maybe at times irrelevant in our current context. Sometimes something happens in our world, and I yearn for one of the readings to speak directly to it. Yet there are other times where the readings hit so close to what is going on in our world. There are these times when one or more of the readings force me (sometimes kicking and screaming) to take an honest look at myself and at the world as it is that I currently live in.

Our second reading from Hebrews this morning gives us a vision for what it looks like to live as people claimed by the gospel, as people who are living out citizenship in the Kingdom of God. It is about living the abundant life that we have already been given through Jesus Christ. It is an invitation to live the life we’ve been given. These few verses serve to create a vision for what it means to be the body of Christ. And, if I’m honest, it is a tough invitation this morning. This is how the author (whose identity is unfortunately lost to history) begins the conclusion to the letter to their community.

“Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured.” (Heb. 13:1-3)

These themes are themes found throughout the scriptures. There are fewer things that the Bible talks about more than these themes, summed up so succinctly in today’s second reading.

“Let mutual love continue.” Let philadelphia continue. Let brotherly/familial love continue. This is love within the particular community. The kind of love shown within these walls to one another. That kind of love that is there in the good times, in the bad times. That kind of love that sees each other as integral parts of the body of Christ and the mission we share - even in conflict. That can be hard. But because we have existing relationships, it is easier to see each other as beloved children of God. We can more easily see each other’s humanity. We live and grow as community together. And even in disagreements, we affirm each other’s humanity and place in this family. The author of Hebrews assumes that philadelphia is happening and is encouraging that to continue. It is that kind of love that strengthens the bonds of the community and pulls us together as the body of Christ. This love is what feeds and strengthens us for what comes next in the letter.

“Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it.” The word for hospitality here is philoxenia - the love of strangers (it is the opposite of xenophobia). The love of foreigners. The love of immigrants. The love of the ones that don’t look like us or sound like us. The love of the ones that don’t worship like us. The love of those outside the boundaries of the community, outside the boundaries of citizenship, outside the boundaries of the law. The love of the enemy. The love of the one who stands as a threat to us and to everything we hold dear. The author of the letter to the Hebrews turns out - not to neighbor - but to the stranger, the migrant, the foreigner. It is a call to break down the boundaries built by xenophobia and move from xenophobia to philoxenia - to move from fear to love. To see those most foriegn to us as worthy of love and worthy of hospitality. To see those we too easily perceive as a threat as having a place at the table.

By showing hospitality to strangers, we do take a risk. We risk serving someone who *could* in theory be a threat to us. But by showing hospitality to strangers, we also risk entertaining angels. We risk serving messengers of God in our midst.

The author then moves to those in prison and being tortured. This is one of those times where the Greek is so much stronger than the NRSV translation. Here’s how I’d translate verse three: “Remember the ones chained/those in prison as if you were chained with them. Remember those being tortured as if you yourself were also being tortured in your body.” As if you were were chained with them, as if you were being tortured in your own body. The author calls us to look into the suffering of our fellow person as if we were the ones suffering ourselves.

A video surfaced this week of a woman who went into labor while in jail at the end of July 2018. She repeatedly told guards that she was having contractions. She told them when her water broke. Medical care was not provided. She ended up laboring and giving birth alone in a cell. Only after the baby was delivered did someone finally enter the cell. It was terrifying. You could see the fear and the suffering on her face. Now, I *know* better, but I ventured into the comment section of the article. Most of the commenters were sympathetic to the woman. However, some (more than I’d like) said things like “well, if she hadn’t committed a crime, she wouldn’t have been in this situation. It is her own fault.” As if committing a crime strips the woman of her humanity. She did it to herself. That kind of reaction serves to give permission and space to look away from her suffering.

We hear similar arguments against so many people in chains, behind bars, in cages. If they didn’t cross the border, they wouldn’t be in cages (side note: seeking asylum is legal and one has to be on US soil to do it). If they didn’t commit a crime, they wouldn’t have encountered the police. If they worked hard, pulled themselves up by their bootstraps, they’d have enough food and enough to survive. Sometimes we do not see the suffering - we’re often a bit removed from it. But As people, we find all sorts of ways to blame people for their own suffering, while giving ourselves permission to look away from the depths of human suffering. They’re illegal. They’re in prison. They’ve committed a crime. They’re drug addicts. They didn’t “plan” enough. They deserve what comes to them. They did it to themselves. If they’re to blame, we’re off the hook. And we can look away.

Hebrews this morning invites us, for the sake of love - that love that we’ve received from Jesus, to not only look at the suffering, to see our fellow human being in chains, but to be in solidarity with them, feeling their suffering and their pain as if it were our own. Who is Jesus inviting us to see today? Whose suffering are we invited to see today? We’re invited to look into the cages. We’re invited into the prison cell. We’re invited into the disaster area, the areas hit by hurricanes, by flooding, by drought - maybe the farms of Nebraska or the Bahamas or Puerto Rico. We’re invited to look beyond the fences, the chains, the bars, the walls (and whatever else binds a person - literal and metaphoric) and see the real live human being - the beloved child of God beyond it. Running contrary to the individualism that has become such a part of American culture, Hebrews points us to the ways that we as humanity are deeply interconnected. The truth of today’s passage is: when one part of humanity suffers, we all suffer. When one part of the Body of Christ hurts, we all hurt. We cannot be whole until we all are whole. Don’t look away. Feel what they feel in your own body. Do something to free them from that which holds them captive.

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus takes what we find in Hebrews a step farther. Not only by showing hospitality to strangers, to those imprisoned, to those being tortured do we risk entertaining a messenger of God, by showing this kind of hospitality we show hospitality to Jesus himself. Jesus says, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger/foreigner (xenos) and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me... Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” (Matthew 25:34-36, 40). He goes on to say that the converse is true: what you don’t do to one of the least of these, you do not do to him. Jesus places himself firmly with the members of his family that are suffering.

Why do we do this? We are empowered for this work because we have a God that does this. We have a God that risked everything to become human. The God that seemed so distant, far off, crosses the border between divinity and humanity (a border that seemed so permanent), making Godself known in Jesus. We have a God, in Jesus, that not only looked into suffering, but lived it, suffered it in his own body. We have a God in Jesus that was a refugee, fleeing violence as a child that threatened to end his life. We have a God in Jesus that lived by the hospitality shown to strangers. We have a God in Jesus who was imprisoned, who was tortured, who was crucified. We have a God that doesn’t look away - from our suffering, from the suffering of humanity. We have a God that sees and feels the suffering of God’s beloved children. We have a God in Jesus that stands in solidarity, and remains present with the suffering because God has been there too. We have a God in Jesus that risks suffering to free from suffering, to free us from that which holds us captive. This is Good News.

Today, in Hebrews we are invited to live out that Good News. We are invited to participate in the Kingdom of God that is breaking in - not for our own sake, but for the sake of our fellow human. Because Jesus has freed us, has suffered for us, has died and risen again for us, we are empowered to look at suffering, to feel the suffering of others, to work together as a body of Christ to relieve their suffering. We live out our freedom that we’ve found in Christ by freeing others.

Amen

11th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) - August 25, 2019

11th Sunday after Pentecost
Year C
August 25, 2019
Luke 13:10-17, Isaiah 58:9b-14

Running through the first reading from Isaiah and our Gospel reading from Luke this morning, is Sabbath and what it means to keep the Sabbath and keep it holy. In the tradition of Martin Luther, this week, I found myself asking, “What is this?” or “What does this mean?” For Luther, when talking about Sabbath in the Small Catechism, he writes “We are to fear and love God, so that we do not despise God’s Word of preaching, but instead keep that Word holy and gladly hear and learn it.” As much as I love Luther, and have gained so much from the Small Catechism over the years, I find that his answer to “What is this?” falls a bit short - at least in in so far as we’re digging into today’s passage. There’s nothing “wrong” with Luther’s definition of Sabbath. It fits well when we think about church or bible study, but I think that today’s passages are dealing with a different aspect of what it means to observe the sabbath. In other words, Luther’s definition in the Small Catechism gives us a piece of what it means to observe Sabbath, but we’re dealing with something else today. Afterall, Jesus was in the synagogue teaching and people were there to encounter God’s Word (perhaps not quite in the way they would expect). Yet this question of observing sabbath remains. So again, I ask, “what is this?” “What does this mean?”

As most of you all know by now, my background is in Biblical studies, so that’s the logical place for me to start. In the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, we get not one - but two - different listings of the Ten Commandments. One in Exodus. One in Deuteronomy. And they’re slightly different.

Exodus 20, when talking about the Sabbath says this:

“Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it.” (Exodus 20:8-11)

My guess is that this is what most of us were taught when we were taught the Ten Commandments. At least this is the version I learned. And it fits really well with Luther’s answer to “what is this?” when talking about Sabbath. It connects Sabbath rest to the first creation story: We rest on the Seventh Day because God rested. It is a day to dwell in relationship with our God, the one who created us. It is a day to the Lord your God.

But this is only half of the story of Sabbath. When Deuteronomy talks about Sabbath, it says this:

“Observe the sabbath day and keep it holy, as the LORD your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work—you, or your son or your daughter, or your male or female slave, or your ox or your donkey, or any of your livestock, or the resident alien in your towns, so that your male and female slave may rest as well as you. Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the sabbath day.” (Deuteronomy 5:12-15)

Out of the two “versions” recording the Ten Commandments, this one, scholars believe is the more ancient of the two. Here, remembering the Sabbath is about Liberation; it is grounded in God’s liberating work, bringing the Hebrew people out of the land of Egypt, claiming them as God’s people. This mode of keeping the sabbath connects us intimately with our neighbor. Because God brought you out of slavery, because God brought you liberation, you give others rest and freedom. It is a weekly reminder of their independence and their freedom, a weekly reminder of God’s work of liberation for them and for others.

Looking at Deuteronomy and Exodus together, the Sabbath commandment orients us both to God and to neighbor. These two views of Sabbath are intimately connected. “If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday… If you refrain from trampling the sabbath, from pursuing your own interests on my holy day; if you call the sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honorable… then you shall take delight in the Lord.” These two go hand in hand. We don’t live in the light of God without offering food to the hungry and satisfying the needs of the afflicted. We don’t honor God without honoring the neighbor, made in the image of that God. We don’t love God without loving the alien and the stranger, made in the image of that God. This morning, Isaiah connects these two parts of Sabbath so beautifully.

In an article for the Christian Century this week, Shai Held puts it this way, “Both of Isaiah’s requirements—social reform and sabbath observance—thus share a common religious and ethical vision: a society worthy of receiving God’s light is one that recognizes the inestimable worth of every human being, even and especially the vulnerable and downtrodden. It is a tall order, and one shudders to think how far we fall from it. But we are not free to desist from the spiritual and political work God places before us: to serve God and to embrace human beings are two tasks that are eternally and inextricably intertwined.” This is what it means to keep the sabbath and make it holy: to serve God, to worship God, and to embrace and liberate our fellow human being. These go together.
(Shai Held, https://www.christiancentury.org/blog-post/sundays-coming/dignity-and-rest-isaiah-589b-14).

This intermingling of serving God and embracing human beings is what Jesus draws on today. It was a seemingly normal Sabbath day, which had begun Friday at sundown. Jesus is in the middle of teaching. He is interrupted by the sight of this woman that was bent over. He stops preaching. He interrupts the flow of the service. He sees her in ways that likely no one has in many years. He sees her worth; he sees her as a beloved daughter of Abraham. He calls to the woman. “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” And when Jesus is confronted by the leader of the synagogue, he doubles down, “And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?” The call to observe Sabbath is deeply intertwined with setting this woman free from that which has held her captive for so long.

From the beginning of the Gospel of Luke, Jesus tells us that this is his mission. Describing his own mission, Jesus says, “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” (Luke 4:18-19). And for this woman, Jesus liberates on the Sabbath - the day in which they gather in remembrance of God’s liberation. Jesus doesn’t abolish Sabbath law, but Jesus acts faithfully on the Sabbath, enacting God’s liberation that they gather to commemorate. In other words, Jesus lives out the Sabbath command, as he tells this woman that she is set free.

In Jesus’ death and resurrection, Jesus sets us free. As we gather for worship each Sunday - the commemoration of Jesus’ resurrection, as we gather around font and table, Jesus sees each one of us - really sees us fully as we are -, Jesus calls us worthy, and Jesus says to each one of us “you are set free.” Wherever we are, wherever we’ve come from, whoever we are, “you are set free.” Free from sin. Free from our turned-in-on-self selves. Free from death. Free from the powers of this world that may try to keep us down. Free from the need to make ourselves worthy before God. We are free. That is the good news today. Jesus came to liberate us, and that liberation belongs to us. It cannot be taken away.

As people set free by the grace and love of God through Jesus Christ, we get to free others. We don't

have to, we get to. Who among us still needs to be set free? Who in our society and in our world still needs to be set free? Where do we see oppression still keeping our neighbor from living in freedom? Where do we see the weight of racism, of sexism, of homophobia, of xenophobia (or any other phobia or ism) weighing down our siblings, others made in the image of God? Today, we hear a call to live out that sabbath command that links serving God with liberating those around us. With the help of God, we get to loose the bonds of injustice and set the neighbor free. In freeing others, we live out the liberation that we’ve already found and experienced. Because Christ has freed us, we can imagine and live into a new kind of world - that Kingdom of God that is continually breaking in - a world where everyone finds liberation, freedom, and healing.

Amen.

8th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) - August 4, 2019

8th Sunday after Pentecost
Year C
August 4th, 2019
Luke 12:13-21

The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible labels today’s parable as the “Parable of the Rich
Fool.” As I read the parable again and again this week, it struck me as an odd title for the parable. What the rich man does makes - at least to some extent - makes good sense. One might call it “saving for the future.” I have a retirement account. I have a savings account. Life insurance. These things that are supposed to create security and well being into the future. Arguably the rich man does both the responsible thing and the wise thing - at least for himself. Save for a rainy day, you never know what tomorrow will bring.

Beyond saving for our future, a common push in our culture is to have the latest and the greatest and to accumulate stuff and money. Think about how advertising so often works: they work to convince us that what we currently have isn’t enough so we need this other thing in our lives. I recently saw a commercial for a washing machine. It was better than all the other washing machines out there. Why? Because it held enough laundry soap for 40 loads and automatically dispensed it - so you wouldn’t have to. Something that I never even saw as a problem (putting soap into a washing machine) is lifted up as a problem that only this machine can solve. To be clear, there are good reasons for this kind of technology: there are folks for whom putting soap in a washer is a actually a difficult thing. For instance, my Gram, if the top is screwed too tightly on a bottle of detergent can’t get it open again. But that commercial wasn’t directed toward my Gram, it was directed at me. The actor was someone about my own age with seemingly no issues that would make the process of putting soap in a machine a difficult one. The message is: what you already have isn’t good enough - you need this other thing to make your life better. There’s something better out there. Keep up with the Joneses.

I fear that sometimes the parables are over sanitized. This parable is often boiled down to - in the words of Matthew Skinner - “you never see U-Haul trailers behind hearses.”(Skinner, “Poor Fool,” https://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=5368). In other words, that shiny new phone or the latest greatest washer and dryer set won’t follow you into heaven. Or it gets turned into a lesson about spending our time and energy differently. A lesson about spending time with family because life could get cut tragically short. Those both are good lessons to learn, and I do, for instance, value spending time with my loved ones over buying “stuff,” but I think those interpretations of today’s parable aim to keep today’s parable a little too close to our comfort zones. But I think this text today pushes us to wrestle with something… deeper.

This text pushes us to think not just about our stuff, but to think about our deepest fears and insecurities. It is important to note: in this story, the rich man is already rich. This is not a parable aimed at people who don’t have enough, who experience real poverty. This man already has, not only everything he needs, but he has an abundance already. He then produces this crop that is so abundant that it can’t fit into his barns. So what does he do? He builds new barns. While that may seem, at least to me, a bit impractical to build a new barn from the ground up in time to store the harvest - that isn’t too far from what we do. Think about it: when folks accumulate “stuff” that no longer fits in their spaces, we tend to rent storage units or purchase bigger homes and apartments. I know, at times, I’m guilty of this. But what, for the rich man (and perhaps for us too) underlies this?

Pastor Mary Anderson suggests this: “we’re more afraid of scarcity than we are of the devil. The advertising world counts on this fear and constantly plays on it. Before there’s greed, before there’s hoarding of stuff, there’s fear and anxiety about our future. This needs to be named out loud” (Anderson, Sundays and Seasons: Preaching Year C 2016, 215). In other words, the rich man kept the harvest for himself because he was afraid that there’s not enough to go around - and that one day, he’ll find himself without enough. And with that anxiety, he turns inward. Did you catch all the first person pronouns in the passage? “And he thought to himself, ‘what should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’ then he said, ‘I will do this. I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, and be merry.” Anxiety about not having ample goods laid up for many years turns him to think only about himself. It is fear that turns into self-preservation.

If we think about it, fear of insecurity, in general, has this tendency to turn us inward. Greed, as a friend Pastor Marissa Sotos said so well last night, is “the drive to have whatever we believe we can possess that makes us not need God or other people.” Greed can be about hoarding money and resources. Greed can be about accumulating power and privilege. Greed can be about collecting “things” in order to make us feel safe and secure.

So the problem today is not wealth in and of itself, but it is how anxiety about not having enough leads to self-centeredness - and how wealth or greed in particular can push us into buying into the idea that we don’t need God or other people, feeding the myth of the self-made person. It turns us in on ourselves, seeking to put a bubble around ourselves. This rich man misses a really awesome opportunity to serve the neighbor in need. But instead, he hoards crops (which are likely perishable) for himself. Not because he’s evil. Not because he’s a terrible person. But his anxiety and worry about the future has turned him inward, giving him tunnel vision, so he only sees the possibility of not having enough and it puts him into self-preservation mode. And his greed - his hoarding of food for himself - keeps others from having enough. Poverty is real. There are people in his community that don’t have enough, and if he shared the abundant crop, the community could have enough.
Sadly, the Revised Common Lectionary stops a bit short. So all we hear from the Gospel reading is this heavy, law-driven passage. So to get at the “grace” or Good news for today, I’m going to do something I normally don’t do: I’m going to read the next part of the Gospel of Luke, which serves as a sort of commentary on the parable:

“22 He said to his disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear. 23 For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. 24 Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds! 25 And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? 26 If then you are not able to do so small a thing as that, why do you worry about the rest? 27 Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. 28 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you—you of little faith! 29 And do not keep striving for what you are to eat and what you are to drink, and do not keep worrying. 30 For it is the nations of the world that strive after all these things, and your Father knows that you need them. 31 Instead, strive for his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.” (Luke 12:22-31, NRSV).

The Good News today is that this kind of fear is not what God intends for God’s people. This kind of greed is not what God intends for God’s kingdom. We are stewards of what God has created. It isn’t ours; it is all God’s. God intends for there to be enough for everyone. It frees us from the cycle of keeping up with the Joneses and the fear of not having enough. It frees us from the fear of scarcity and insecurity. We’re freed from our turned-in-on-self selves so that we can turn outward - sharing the resources that God has entrusted to our care.

“Instead, strive for his Kingdom, and things will be given to you as well.” Living in this world as it currently is, I’m not giving up my retirement account (and I’m not encouraging that either), but we can strive for the Kingdom. We can look around us and see that as a society, we have enough. We pay athletes millions of dollars to play a game. Americans waste 150,000 tons of food per day. There is enough to go around, if the abundance of resources are shared. No one should, in this country, go hungry. So the parable today encourages us to shift how we think about what we have. It is a shift from thinking in terms of scarcity to seeing the abundance of God’s gifts, sharing the resources entrusted to our care, striving for that Kingdom, so that all have enough.

Amen. 

6th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) - July 21, 2019

6th Sunday after Pentecost
Year C
July 21, 2019
Luke 10:38-42

Encountering a text (especially a familiar text) anew is a difficult task. One that we wrestled with last week with the parable of the Good Samaritan. While we have the gift of having a text in front of us that we can pick up and read anytime, again and again, a piece of me wishes that I could hear these stories like it was the first time I had ever heard them. Those of you who were drawn into the Gospel later in life may remember the first time you’ve heard these texts or maybe today is the first time hearing it. I was a cradle Lutheran; these stories have been part of the waters that I grew up in. Neither is better or worse, but when we hear stories again and again, it is easy to forget or miss the power of them. Or to just take them for granted. They become sanitized. And we can stop listening, really listening to the text, thinking, well, we’ve heard this all before.

One way we can encounter a text in new ways is to put ourselves in the story. Where do you see yourself in this story today? Do you see yourself as Mary, content sitting at the feet of Jesus? Or do you see yourself as Martha, working hard, trying to do everything “right”, being the best host, the best disciple you can be, frustrated and maybe a bit tired? Do you see yourself as a bit of both? Or neither?

Earlier this month, I celebrated my birthday. For the first time in my adult life, I was near friends on my birthday. So I threw myself a bit of a party. I like to host. And I go into full host mode. Those of you who like hosting probably know what I’m talking about. Earlier in the week, I cleaned - like deep cleaned - my apartment top to bottom, making sure that it was not just presentable but at its best for guests. I even vacuumed my couches (which, if I’m honest, usually isn’t a part of my ‘normal’ cleaning routine - at least not as it should be). With the help of a friend who was visiting, I baked my own cake the night before - vanilla with strawberry buttercream icing. The day of, I put the chicken in the crockpot, so it could be shredded. I made the lasagna. Made sure we had bread. And side dishes. And drinks - red and white wine, cocktails, non-alcoholic drinks, soda - diet and regular (just in case). I put out the good napkins and used the good wine glasses. At least, when it comes to hosting, I get Martha. I really do.

When I host, I want my guests to feel welcome. I learned hospitality from the best of the best of them - my Tanzanian friends. These friends who once welcomed this stranger into their homes, gave her plenty of food and drink, who made a place so far from home feel like home. I feel this sense of duty in hospitality. Doing for others what I once experienced myself. I want to be sure that there’s enough to eat - and that it is good food. Enough to drink. Plenty of games and things to do. I want my home to feel like home. So I tend to go over the top with hospitality. Sometimes to the point that I stop experiencing the moment. I fail to experience the sacredness found in relationship and community because I’m too busy “hosting” and ensuring that everything is “perfect.” (I will say that, for my birthday, once everyone arrived, a friend took over the “hosting” so I could just be in the moment - but so often when I host, that’s not the case).

I think for most of us, we have varying degrees of Martha and varying degrees of Mary in us. We tend to use this story to chastize the Marthas and praise the Marys - as if we are all only one or the other (though we may at any given time identify more with one or the other). We hear, “Martha, Martha” as a rebuke or in a tone of disappointment. Perhaps almost like the Brady Bunch’s, “Marsha, Marsha, Marsha” - today, “Martha, Martha, Martha.” We tend to, using this passage make Martha into a caricature. She becomes someone who is frantic, distracted, who is too concerned with the things of this world, not concerned enough with the things of the Kingdom, missing what seems to be right in front of her face. She becomes almost cartoonish, in the words of one commentator this week, too concerned with “silly womanly things” (Brian Peterson, Commentary on Luke 10:38-42).

But the simple truth is: We need Marthas. Think of all the wonderful things this congregation does. Motel ministry. Casserole caravan. Route 66 night. Lenten community meals. Spaghetti dinners. Council and committee meetings. Clean-up days. And so much more. The Marthas in and around us get things done. Hospitality is an important part of discipleship. We just talked about the radical hospitality of the Good Samaritan last week. And that’s important. We need Marys. The Marys in and around us are the ones that remind us that - in the busy-ness of life and of ministry - we are centered by Jesus and centered in the Gospel. They remind us that sometimes we need to take a moment to breathe. To sit and to dwell in that relationship with the one that created us, that forms us, that calls us. And I would imagine that most of us have a bit of both Mary and Martha in us. And this community has plenty of both Marys and Marthas around us. And for that I’m incredibly grateful.
What if Jesus today isn’t rebuking Martha? Greek language *works* differently than English. Just for an example, in English, a double negative reverses the negative. So if I say, “I don’t not want ice cream,” I’m saying “I want ice cream.” In Greek, the double negative intensifies the negative, so “I don’t not want ice cream” becomes “I really don’t want ice cream” (and that’s how translators will translate something along those lines).

Those of us who use and work with the Greek text expect Greek to sometimes *work* a bit differently than English. Yet, sometimes we put our English expectations on the Greek language. We expect, when a name is repeated in this way, it is a gentle way of rebuking and admonishing - perhaps with a gentle shake of the head. It can, in English, indicate a deep disappointment. But when Jesus says, “Martha, Martha,” in Greek, it isn’t a gentle rebuke. There’s a fancy name for the construction (that we don’t need to know and one that I can’t pronounce), but by repeating her name, Jesus, instead of indicating that disappointment, is indicating a deep compassion for her. Jesus sees how frantic she is. Jesus sees her anxiety. Jesus sees her need to be perfect - to have everything “just so.” Jesus sees her frustration. Jesus sees her distraction. In that moment, Jesus sees her. He sees that a thing that can be so life-giving becoming something that is tearing her apart.

And in that moment, Jesus frees her. He frees her from society’s expectations of hospitality. He frees her from the need to be perfect, to get it right. He frees her from her anxiety. In the words of a colleague, Pastor Kari Foss, it is as if Jesus is saying “what you’ve done is enough. Don’t worry about being the perfect hostess or how people perceive you or Mary… Be at peace.” In other words, you are loved exactly as you are. And Jesus invites her into the Kingdom of God that has come near to her in himself. He invites her into relationship. Into sitting with the one who forms her and calls her.

Whether you identify more strongly today with Mary or with Martha, I think we all have anxieties and distractions that can get in the way of dwelling with the one who creates us, who forms us, who calls us. I know I do. It is easy to feel the weight of what we feel like we “should” be doing. We can feel the weight of feeling like we need to be perfect before God, that we need to put the best version of ourselves forward. Doing all the “right things” and being “the right way.” Luther felt this struggle his whole life, feeling like he could never live up to who God called him to be. And early in his life, he literally beat himself up over it.

Today, whether you feel more like Martha or Mary, Jesus sees you as you are - with the joys, the celebrations, the struggles, the distractions, and anxieties that come with you. Today, Jesus invites you into the Gospel - that you can’t work our way into the Kingdom of God. We can’t earn Jesus love. It is a free gift. And nothing can separate you - or any of us - not our anxieties nor our frustrations, not our need to be perfect nor our desire to get it right - from that love we’ve found in Jesus. Today. Jesus reminds us that we are enough. We are loved as we are. Today, Jesus reminds us that we have done enough and are worthy of sitting at his feet. Yes, we’re called to discipleship, but not in an attempt to make us worthy or to earn love, but our call to discipleship is a response to the love that we’ve already been given. Today, Jesus is our host and the Kingdom has come near. And today, Jesus invites us into relationship with him, invites us to dwell deeply with him, and to center ourselves in that love.

Amen.