Sermon: Having a shepherd in a deserted place

Pentecost 9B

July 22, 2018

Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

INTRODUCTION

            Always on the 4^th Sunday of the Easter season, we have what is called, “Good Shepherd Sunday.” We read the 23^rd Psalm, and other texts about how Jesus is a good shepherd. Well today is sometimes jokingly called “Bad Shepherd Sunday.” In Jeremiah, we hear about the string of bad kings (aka bad shepherds) who have scattered the flock of Israel, and caused them to go into exile. He prophesizes about a future king, who will not scatter the flock, but will bring them in. In Psalm 23, we remember that God is and always has been our own true shepherd. And then in Mark’s story, Jesus looks at the people in need and sees in them a people who are suffering, who are like sheep without a shepherd, who need someone to care for them. And, of course, he steps in to be that shepherd, not only for the scores of people who follow him around begging for healing, but also for the disciples, who have already begun to take some of the ministry mantel.

            As we listen to these shepherd texts, it would do us well to think about what makes a good shepherd, as compared to a bad one. Jeremiah lays it out well for us, in the chapter immediately preceding the one we are about to hear from: a good shepherd (or king) rules with justice and righteousness, which seen and expressed in the treatment of the alien, the orphan and the widow. A bad shepherd is one who seeks his own fortune, and who expands his wealth on the backs of the poor, and such rulers will be held accountable. In the previous chapter, Jeremiah calls out the rulers of the day for breaking of God’s covenant, and assures them that God will lift up a true shepherd. Psalm 23 begins to tell us what that true shepherd will look like, and of course the passage from Mark shows us how Jesus fills that role for us.

            As you listen, notice what makes a good shepherd, and recall when God has been that shepherd for you in those times of life when you needed what the good shepherd has to offer.

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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

            Seven years ago, almost exactly, I sat before the joint council of these congregations as a part of the call process. This was the council’s opportunity to ask me questions to discern if I would be a good fit here. I don’t remember every question that was asked, but there are a few I do remember. One of them was, “Describe your prayer life.” What a wonderful question to ask your potential pastor! I loved that I was asked this… and I also hated it, because my prayer life is something I have always struggled with. I don’t mean that I don’t pray – I most certainly do pray! What I mean is that, especially as an extrovert, I find it terribly difficult to sit down, be quiet, and just be with God. My mind wanders, I keep thinking about my to-do list, I get distracted… and that’s just what happens when I actually find the time to sit down and be still! Sometimes the hardest part of all is committing to take that time in the first place, to set aside all distractions, and to not only talk to God, but also to listen to what God has to say to us. All the best intentions quickly get brushed aside by needy children, or wanting to actually spend time with my husband, or getting chores done, or getting a few more blessed minutes of sleep.

            And then along comes Jesus. Along comes Jesus, saying, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourself and rest a while.” There are times in my life when I hear this as good news, as a gift, as an assurance that it is okay, Johanna, to take a break! I think we all need to receive that gift sometimes, right? We are so prone to work ourselves to the bone, to over-commit, to keep busy every second of the day, either by necessity, or because we enjoy everything we are doing and don’t want to miss out. And when I can hear this as a gift, it is, truly, a gift.

            But there are other times when the possibility of being in a deserted place all by myself to rest a while is anything but gift. In fact, for this extrovert, it can be torturous. Because normally, I am a willing participant in the rat race of life, running around doing this and that, making sure my kids are signed up for any number of enriching activities, wanting to serve in this or that volunteer capacity, not to mention being a full time pastor, full time wife, and full time parent of two full time toddlers! Those are all good things, that bring me much life and fulfillment!

            But here’s the flip side: as long as I’m keeping very busy, I don’t ever have a moment alone with my thoughts… and those moments alone can be challenging. You know the moments – the ones when all of the contrary voices start to creep in, telling you all your worst fears, dragging you down. Or, the ones that make you realize, finally, that something you have gotten used to doing is not, in fact, what is in your best interest, but you are too afraid to change it. When we’re in a deserted place all by ourselves, talking to God, that’s when we start to recognize the work we have to do on our own hearts – that we know we have to do, but we also know is going to be so hard and maybe even painful, and it is easier to just keep moving and ignore it, than it is to finally face it.

Oh, friends, those deserted places… they can be tough spots. They were for Jesus, too. Do you remember another time in Mark that he talks about a deserted place? Back at the beginning, after Jesus was baptized, he was driven out by the Spirit into the wilderness, into a deserted place, and there he was tempted by the devil himself. Deserted places are not always a respite. As necessary as they are, sometimes they are precisely the place from which we want to escape.

So this week, I actually find more comfort in this other thing Jesus does: “[Jesus] had compassion on them,” Mark says, “because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he taught them many things.”

            I love that word, compassion. Oh man, what the world needs now is more compassion, right? Everywhere we look we see self-absorbed, self-serving behavior that disregards or actively harms the other. The world is full of bad shepherds! Yet our God is a compassionate God… who calls us to be the same.

So then, what is compassion, and how is it enacted? Look at what that word actually means. Com-passion means, “to suffer with.” It’s beyond caring for someone; it is a willingness to suffer with another, to hear and to know their plight – sort of how our compassionate God became one of us to know our pains and sorrows. And so if Jesus sees one in need – and I’m going to count myself as one in need, as well as all of you, because Lord knows we all have a need! – if Jesus sees us in need and has compassion, he must also see whatever it is we are suffering from. He sees the suffering, and walks alongside us in it. He suffers-with us. That is the work of a very good shepherd. And so, we also know, that we can look for him there: in our suffering, walking alongside us. That is where we can find Jesus.

            Here I am brought back once again to that deserted place. Maybe there’s a reason Jesus mentions that part first: because it is those deserted places, away from the rush of the world, that force us, finally, to face some hard truths and acknowledge where we are broken, where we need healing, where we are, indeed, suffering. This is so important because, I don’t know about you, but I’m sometimes not exactly sure what I’m suffering from. I mean, I know I’m suffering, but I misidentify it. I think it is one thing, but really, it is really something else entirely. Or, I think it is a person causing my suffering, when really their actions are just bringing something up in me, which is really what is driving me crazy. And part of me doesn’t even want to know what the real suffering is, because if I name it, that means I also have to face it and claim it… and sometimes, I really don’t want to.

            And yet it is here, in these very dark valleys, these places where we are suffering, that Jesus walks with us, suffers-with us, has compassion for us. When we can face our suffering, our brokenness, the places where we most need healing, we can also turn to see the very face of Christ right there along with us, being the good shepherd.

            I love that after Mark identifies the broken people as “like sheep without a shepherd,” he says that Jesus had compassion on them… and then taught them many things. They had much to learn! I, too, have a lot to learn, friends. I have a lot to learn about prayer, about myself and the struggles of my heart, and about the needs of my neighbor. I have a lot to learn about how to make space in my life to learn those things – by going to a deserted place with Jesus, or for an extrovert like me, perhaps by talking to a trusted and faithful friend. I have a lot to learn about trusting that God will always, every time, take all that is broken in me, in us, and turn it into new life – maybe in a way I didn’t expect, maybe in exactly in the way I had hoped, but whatever way, exactly the right way.

            I have a lot to learn, and I know you do, too. Let us then follow our good shepherd to a deserted place, to breathe in the Spirit, and rest in the knowledge of God-with-us, and the promise of new life.

            Let us pray… Good Shepherd, we are like sheep without a shepherd, and we crave your presence, your guidance, and your wisdom. Lead us along right paths for your name’s sake, help us to find a quiet, deserted place, and assure us that you are there with us in our suffering, guiding us toward new life. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

19 months of laughter

July 14, 2018

Dear Isaac Karl,

I was just gone for a week, at camp with some kids from church, and when I came back, it seemed you had grown a month older! You are such a big boy, impressing us more every day. Your latest endearing skill is that you have started singing along with songs. Grace sometimes gets upset, declaring, “That’s my song!” But she doesn’t own all the songs, and you are claiming some for your own! Usually it is just a few words here or there, and all of the long notes (not yet on pitch). You love to sing How Far I’ll Go from Moana (Grace’s favorite movie, and so also yours). I’ve caught a recording of the two of you singing it after bedtime together… so cute. You like Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and today you were singing Ring Around the Rosie. (You’re very good at, “all fall DOWN!”)

Check out that air!

You are very pleased with your newfound and ever improving ability to communicate. You delight in having successfully communicated your need. If your words don’t work, you will simply push us toward what you want, interrupting whatever we are doing, and very adamantly making sure we are located such to provide for you what you want (which is usually a bar or goldfish crackers).

 You are quite good on your feet, and I gotta tell you kid, no one runs as cutely as you do: quick little steps, like a ballerina tiptoeing across a stage, grin on your face, and arms up and flailing and bouncing about. I won’t tell any of you friends, but I call you “Twinkle Toes” when you come running like this. You are So. Stinking. Adorable.

Cracking himself up, typical!

One very frustrating thing about you is that you love to eat, but will not eat anything I make for you, except peanut butter and jelly (only open faced), applesauce, or occasionally pancakes. For you, it must come out of a package for you to eat it. And so, what I can consistently get you to eat at home is: goldfish crackers, breakfast bars, fruit twists, yoghurt, applesauce, peanut butter, pancakes, and sometimes berries. Someday I hope you will appreciate what effort I put into making you good, healthy food!

Things you love: balls of all sorts, cars and other rolling vehicles of all sorts, books, climbing

stairs (at the playground you climb the stairs, walk over to the slide, and then turn around and come back down the stairs, then repeat), riding your Y bike (you are getting very good and very brave!), building and especially knocking over block towers, climbing on mommy and daddy, shoes (putting on shoes is your favorite part of the day, and sometimes you even sleep in them), wearing your red hat, and keeping up with sister. Speaking of which, you have been really interested in the potty recently, because we’ve spent so much time working on it with Grace. So you eagerly tell us you want to potty, insist that we take down your

Eating something Mom didn't make...

pants and put you on the potty, you sit there a while, smiling, then you point to the toilet paper, carefully wipe with it when we give it to you (we’ll explain later that this isn’t necessary for you as it is for Grace!), put the paper in the toilet, flush, move stool over to sink, and wash hands. You are SO proud of yourself for doing so well with the potty. Now if only you would actually GO in the potty!

Things you don’t love: water and sand. Too bad, because these are Grace’s current favorites. But you want nothing to do with either, except, thankfully, for baths. You are quite content to stand on the sidelines and take everything in, without getting wet at all.

You are a happy kid, by and large, and amazingly adaptable, chill, and go-with-the-flow. Though

Racing matchbox cars at Museum of Play

you are still learning how to be patient when you can’t get your way right away, you don’t complain about much. You approach things with caution, checking them out bit by bit, but once you’ve decided it is okay, you are fearless. You love to sit back and take things in for a while before jumping in, but you will, eventually jump in. You laugh – a lot! – and adore everyone in your family. You love being held, but you also love to be on the go. You are so kind, always willing to share, and you love bringing Grace her toys. If we ask you to give something you have to Grace, you almost always immediately hand over whatever you have to her. You love her so – and she, in turn, adores you! You two are best friends. We hope you always will be.

You are, in short, a delightful little guy, and we are loving seeing your beautiful personality blossom and grow more each day. We love you so much, Isaac Karl!

                                                                                                Love,

                                                                                                Your mama

Sermon: Jesus tackles rejection (July 8, 2018)

Pentecost 7B

July 8, 2018

1 Corinthians 12:2-10

Mark 6:1-13

INTRODUCTION

            The first five chapters of Mark have been a sort of, Discipleship: 101 course. We’ve learned what the kingdom of God looks like, we’ve seen the importance of having faith, not fear, we’ve watched Jesus heal people, and cross boundaries to get to them. It’s been a tough course, but a fulfilling one. Today’s part of the story delivers two more lessons: first, a lesson in rejection, as Jesus is rejected by those in his hometown. Second, the disciples are sent out, two-by-two, for a hands-on learning opportunity, an internship of sorts, and to risk rejection themselves.

            The past weeks I have been pairing the Gospel reading with an Old Testament reading, but this week, I chose the epistle instead: this wonderful text from 2 Corinthians about God’s power being made perfect in weakness. It seemed like the appropriate choice to get us ready to hear the Gospel story in which Jesus is rejected by his own people, and then is unable to perform any miracles, and then Jesus uses that experience to give a pep talk to his disciples before sending them out into a den of wolves, telling them specifically what to do if they should fail in their mission. I’m sure they feel weak and powerless – so hearing the God’s power is made perfect in weakness is good news!

            Today’s texts are about vulnerability, about failing and falling, about rejection – and they speak to our constant efforts to avoid having to endure any of these things! As you listen, remember some times when you have fallen, when things haven’t gone as you hoped and worked for, when you have been rejected, criticized, or wounded. Listen for what God’s Word has to say to us in these inevitable moments.

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2018 ELCA Youth Gathering

            As you may have heard, last week was the ELCA’s National Youth Gathering, an event that happens every three years, and draws 31,000 youth and adult leaders from Lutheran churches across the country into one city for a week of worship, service, dynamic speakers, fellowship, and inspiration. Many youth cite this as an event that changes their lives, helps them to understand what it means to be a Christian, and makes them feel closer to Jesus. We didn’t send anyone this year, unfortunately, but I did thoroughly enjoy reading the Facebook posts from my colleagues who were there, and various articles and interviews about the event all week. One in particular that really struck me was about how the youth were moved by the speakers they had at mass gatherings. The article said, “It was the first time many of our youth heard people of faith speak openly about taboo topics such as substance abuse, eating disorders, racism, gender identity, rape, and cutting. The honesty and inspiration in these well-crafted monologues moved many in our group to tears of recognition, seeing their own struggles reflected in other teens and adults brave enough to share their stories.”

            What a concept – and what a gift! – for faith-talk and God-talk to be relevant to our daily struggles! We are sometimes tempted, I think, to keep our church life separate from our “real” life, and the various challenges we face. We don’t want to talk in church about uncomfortable topics, like politics, or money, or sex, or immigration, or racism, or anything controversial because we come to church to feel better, and those things are too fraught with negative feelings and disagreement. We want to “all get along,” leave feeling better than we came, and not stir any pots. And we really would rather not have to examine our hearts too deeply in the presence of others, and thus risk revealing to anyone the real pain and fear and doubt that we feel about issues that we would rather not talk or even hear about anywhere, and certainly not in public.

            And yet, it is into these painful realities that we need the good news of the gospel to be spoken most of all! This is the brokenness Jesus came to heal, to which God can offer us grace and guidance. And so, we absolutely should be talking about these things in the context of our faith, yes, even at church!

            And that is precisely why Jesus doesn’t shy away from difficult topics. 2000 years later, we may miss a lot of what made this story of a miracle-working carpenter so radical, radical enough to get the man killed. It was a different time and culture, we miss the nuance of the original language, and there is a certain amount of familiarity causing us to miss how remarkable this story is. That is part of my job – to help you see just what a political, controversial, and sometimes downright uncomfortable figure Jesus was!

            Take today, for example, where Jesus tackles a big trigger for pain and vulnerability: the fear of rejection. In the first half of our Gospel reading, we see Jesus experience rejection, and in his hometown no less! “We know this guy,” they say, “and we know he’s no better than any of us. Who does he think he is, anyway?” I think we’ve all been there, on one side of that conversation or the other. The crowd’s reaction speaks to the ways humans make judgments about people when we think we know how they ought to be. That person must be uneducated, we think, or poor, or a ne’er-do-well, or a terrorist, or a racist, or elitist, or… you get the idea. We dismiss one another based on what we think we know about them. It’s very human: people did it to Jesus, and they do it today. And in seeing this interaction with Jesus, I hope we can recognize: “Maybe I do that to others… but also, it really stinks when someone does that to me.”

            How many of you here have ever felt judged or rejected based on who you voted for, what you do for a living, where you live, or how you look? How many of you have felt like what you have to offer, your particular gifts, have been rejected or unappreciated – by a work place, by your peers, by your family? It doesn’t feel very good, does it? It’s not very good for the self-esteem, is it? I have felt that way, like I am seen only for my very worst qualities and none of my best, and it has taken me months or even years to overcome the damage to my self-esteem. Can anyone relate?

Does it help to know that Jesus also endured that feeling?

Jesus, after he was rejected by his hometown, goes on to use his experience to prepare the disciples for the same thing. You see, after several months of observing Jesus in his ministry, Jesus is now sending out the disciples to do their own ministry. He gives them many instructions, about packing light and relying on the hospitality of strangers, but what I notice especially this week is this bit about shaking the dust off of their feet. I used to see this as an insulting gesture, but it’s not – it’s a Jewish ritual symbolizing separation from anything that would defile you, make you unclean.

Today we don’t really think about defilement in the same way. I don’t think menstruation, for example, or touching or eating a pig, or what have you can defile me. But you know what can? Fear. Fear of rejection, yes, but also fear of outsiders, fear of difference, fear of change. Fear of failure. Fear that what people are saying about me when they reject me or my gifts might actually be true. Fear that I am worthless, or insufficient, or worse yet, that my insufficiency is not only harmful to me, but is actually hurting someone else I love – like you, or my children, or my marriage. All of these fears – they defile me: they make me unclean and unable to serve God as I’m called to do. They cause me not to act my best. They make me believe that God made a mistake with me, that I am not lovable, not worthwhile, not the beautiful child of God created in God’s image that I know, deep down, that I am.

I’m not proud of these fears. And I also know I am not alone in them. I know other people feel them, I know we as a church community feel or at least have felt them, and I know that our country feels them. I can see those fears play out in the way we treat one another, the ways we insist that our way is the only way, and that other people are deplorables, or snowflakes, or bleeding hearts, or racist, or just plain ignorant. I can see our country’s fear of loss and insecurity play out in our unwillingness to welcome the stranger (can you imagine today, in this climate, if travelers were told to rely upon the hospitality of strangers?). These sorts of treatments of each other do not come out of love, nor out of trust in a loving God. They come out of fear. They are defiling.

It is not a comfortable situation, to live in such fear, nor to be confronted with it. We all have been there. Oh, we may try to shake the dust off of our feet and move on, but sometimes it clings to us and gets tracked all over the floor of the house, staining the carpet. Or, we may find some satisfaction in leaving the dust there, thinking that layer of dirt will protect us from the things that we fear. It can be so hard to shake off the dust of our rejections and failures, our mistakes and regrets. And that dust can indeed become like a thorn in our flesh, getting into our wounds, and aching and irritating us every step of our lives of faith.

And yet, look at this good news buried at the end of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians: Paul has asked three times for God to take away that discouraging irritant that he so wants to shake, but rather than take it away, God says to Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” Paul goes on to say he will boast in his weakness, in all those things that he might have perceived as things to avoid talking about, things to hide from the world – because it is in these things, these real human experiences that we all share, that God’s power is made truly known.

I am rarely impressed by someone who has it all together. What truly inspires me is someone who is riddled with flaws and weaknesses, and yet still manages to shine God’s love and grace into the world – not despite their flaws, and their mistakes, but because of them. Like those speakers at the ELCA Youth Gathering who shared candidly with 31,000 people about the ways they had faced the real issues that teenagers face in their daily lives, allowing the youth and adults alike to recognize that God is there with us, even in our failures and rejections. Like Jesus, using his own experience of rejection in his hometown to inform the disciples how to face similar challenges. Like so many faithful saints that I have met in this congregation and beyond it, who have shared the ways that God’s grace shined brightly through the darkest times of life.

“I will boast all the more gladly of my weakness,” Paul writes, “so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.” Spoken as someone who has seen and believed how the weakest position of all, what should have been seen as an utter failure – death on a cross as a common, political prisoner – came to be used as the means to offer all of us eternal life. Do we dare believe that God can do that with our failures, mistakes and rejections? Do we dare hope that God could use these deaths, these struggles, these embarrassing times of our lives that we don’t want anyone else to know about – do we dare hope that God could use them to shine God’s grace into the world? Do we dare trust that God is using every struggle we face to better equip us as beckons of the hope of Christ?

The real question is… how can we dare not believe, and hope and trust in that?

Let us pray… God of power, we fear that we may be crushed under weakness, failures and rejections, yet you have shown us how you use weakness to reveal your power. Help us to trust in that promise, to shake the dust off of our feet, and lift our eyes to you to see how you would have us reflect your grace into this broken world. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.