Lent 2A
March 12, 2017
John 3:1-17
Grace to you and peace from God our
Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
This past
Wednesday at noon, a small group of us met to talk about the 10 commandments,
while the wind was just starting to pick up outside. I commented that I like
storms like this, just as long as I can stay inside where it is safe. Famous
last words! The storm was just beginning. Shortly thereafter, the power went
out at St. Martin. I drove to Bethlehem, where I came across a recently downed
power line, strewn across Plank Rd. The power went out at Bethlehem shortly
after I arrived. I drove home, clinging to my steering wheel, and encountered
powerless stoplights, and debris everywhere. A huge tree in my neighborhood had
toppled. We later learned, of course, that winds had reached 81 MPH, causing
hundreds of trees and poles to fall, 12-foot waves on Lake Ontario, widespread
power outages, and even a freight train to derail. Schools closed and a state
of emergency was declared.
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| Local home |
“The wind
blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it but do not know where it
comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
This week’s windstorm certainly made me hear these enigmatic words from Jesus
differently! How naïve I was to say I like storms like this as long as I am
where it is safe, then only hours later drive through what looked like a
war zone. Looking later at pictures of trees with roots in the air, a train off
its tracks, and crushed houses, I couldn’t help but think that while the breath
of God can bring comfort, safety and delight to those who live in the darkness
of night, it can also wreak plenty of havoc.
“So it is
with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” Is this how the Spirit moves also in
us, then? Not only in our physical world, moving with the power to topple trees
and rip apart roofs – but also in our hearts, moving with the power to topple
old ways of being and rip apart wrongly-held ideas?
I like
thinking of the Holy Spirit as Comforter and Protector, and she certainly is
that when that is what is needed. But we mustn’t overlook what Jesus tells
Nicodemus at their nighttime meeting: that the Spirit blows where and how it
chooses, without our knowing what exactly is going on.
Jesus offers
this strange observation right after explaining to Nicodemus the need to be
born again, or born from above, or born of water and the Spirit. So, it follows
that these two concepts must be related. Very strictly speaking, when we hear “born
of water and the Spirit,” we think of what? Baptism! Well, unless you’re
Nicodemus, in which case you think it means crawling back into your mother’s
womb. But most if not all of us, 2000 years later, assume he means baptism. And
in fact there is a “born again” segment of Christianity that takes that
interpretation very seriously, believing that until you have had an experience in
which you deeply and profoundly experience Christ and are then baptized, you
are not a true Christian.
Lutherans, on the other hand, more
frequently (though not exclusively) baptize babies and children. We do this
because we believe that faith is a gift graciously given at baptism that we
then spend the rest of our lives living and growing into. We do not see baptism
as something that needs to be done again – once you are baptized, you are
baptized for life.
So how, then, do we understand Jesus’
statement that we are to be born again?
I have, on occasion, been asked if I
am “born again.” The best Lutheran answer to this question is, “Yes, I’m born
again and again and again, new each day!” That’s what Luther explains in the
Small Catechism: he says that each day, the sinful person inside us is drowned
in the waters of baptism, “and on the other hand that daily a new person is to
come forth and rise up to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.”
Every day, he says, we should remember our baptism and the gifts it brings.
Every day, we are reborn. Every day we are born into new life.
Or we might say, every day, we are
born of the Spirit, which also means that we are daily invited to discern where
and how the Spirit might be calling us into the new life Jesus promises – and
take a good hard look at how that Holy Wind is shaking up our world, the way we
see it, and the way we are to be in it.
It’s such a nice, faithful thing to
say: “Where is the Spirit calling you?” Until you look around Rochester after
an epic wind storm and see what sort of damage a strong wind can really do in
your life. Because I think sometimes the Holy Spirit does do a bit of damage in
her effort to show us the way, tearing down the ways we view our world that may
be narrow-minded, or self-serving, or that look down on some people, or that
simply neglect the people who most need help. Sometimes the Holy Wind whips
through our hearts and our lives, and when we wake up in the morning we look
around and suddenly see the world differently. Sometimes that little bit of
damage, which may be devastating in the moment, was actually just what we
needed to refocus our attention.
Whatever mysterious ways the Spirit
works, our job is to listen, to watch, and to respond. That is the work of an
effort currently underway in the larger church to engage in transformational
ministry. Transformational ministry helps us learn to listen – to God, to each
other, and to the needs of the world – and, having heard what each is telling
us, to discern how God might be motivating us to respond. Back in December,
there was a workshop with some exercises to help individuals and congregations
engage in this special kind of listening and responding – there will be another
one in May that I hope you will consider attending! We had a group of folks
from each church attend, and they came back energized and interested. We met
last week to discuss how we might start that important listening process, and
we had this idea: to use the image of a tree growing and sprouting leaves to
help people express where the Spirit’s wind is blowing in their lives. Lent is
the perfect time to do this, because the word “Lent” actually means “spring” –
the time of new growth and new life. And transformational ministry is also
focused on bringing new growth and new life to a congregation.
So here’s how the tree will work: we
have a tree set up, branches bare just like the trees we see out our window.
Then you can pick up two different colors of leaves – light and dark green. On
the light ones, we want you to write ways that you are already serving your
community outside of this congregation. This will show how you are already
participating in bringing life to this world, where your heart already lies, where
you are already devoted. For the darker green leaves, you are invited to think
about what issues you are really passionate about, whether or not you are
already involved in them. Maybe you have discerned the Spirit moving through
your heart and making you more aware of the challenges facing refugees, or
perhaps your concern is the low graduation rate in city schools. Maybe it is
people with disabilities, or veterans, or mental illness. In the wake of a rise
in anti-Semitism, including recent desecration of a Jewish cemetery and a bomb
threat to the Jewish Community Center here in Rochester, maybe your concern is
suddenly in interfaith relations. That’s the thing about the Spirit’s blowing,
you see – we don’t know where it comes from or where it goes, and we don’t know
what new concerns or passions it might bring up, depending on what is going on
in the world around us.
Take some time if you need it, to
discern what concerns the Spirit is revealing to you in this time and place, as
she blows through your heart, knocking things over and showing things anew. The
tree will be up throughout Lent, this time we look forward to and anticipate
celebrating how God gave his only Son so that all who believed in him would not
perish but have eternal life. In the season of Easter, as we dwell in
thanksgiving in the new life we have in Christ, we will look at some of the
ways the Spirit has moved in you, and consider together how that same Spirit is
moving us to be the Church for the community and the world right now.
The Spirit blows as it choses, and we
don’t know where or how, but still, let us listen, so that we would know what
God is telling us today. Let us listen, so that even damage done might be
opportunity for a new perspective. Let us listen, so that we might be
transformed.
Let us pray… Holy and unpredictable God, you blow through our lives in ways we
wouldn’t have chosen, but which are, indeed, holy. Give us courage to listen to
your urgings, to take what you have given us and turn it into an opportunity to
share your love with the world your Son came to save. In the name of the Father
and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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