Sermon: Being opened (Sept. 8, 2024)

Pentecost 16B
September 8, 2024 – Rally Day
Isaiah 35:4-7a; James 2:1-17; Mark 7:24-37

INTRODUCTION

In my page in the St. Paul’s newsletter that went out last week, I printed the core values that came out of the visioning work we’ve been doing the past several months. They are also on the back of your bulletin –I’d love to hear your response! One of the values that we considered aspirational (meaning, we do it kind of, but would like to grow in this area) was the one around welcome and inclusivity. 

So I was delighted when I read the readings for today, traditionally the first Sunday of the new church program year, and I saw throughout, this theme of openness and inclusivity, showing no partiality, reaching beyond natural and cultural barriers. What a great set up for our year! We’ll see this explicitly in the words of James. Isaiah and the Psalm talk about opening the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf, and generally eliminating anything that would keep us from being together in relationship with God. 

We also see it in Mark, as Jesus ventures into Gentile territory. Gentiles are people outside of the Jewish community. In Mark’s Gospel, Jesus often takes great effort to venture into these non-Jewish areas, these places populated by those who are “other” to, or even, in some cases, enemies of the Jewish people. So today he takes a journey to Tyre, a place far from his home in Galilee, where he encounters a Syrophoenician woman (so, she is Greek, and descended from people of Syria, and Phoenicia, two historic enemies of Jews). His encounter with this woman changes, or rather, opens up the scope of his ministry, and he continues onto another largely Gentile (non-Jewish) region to continue his ministry with this whole new segment of society. So, today’s story is an important turning point in Jesus’ ministry, from focusing on Jewish people, to opening his mission up to non-Jews.

All of these readings are full of life-giving words for those desperately in need of that news… even as they are challenging words for those of us accustomed to feeling comfortable in our faith and our lives. Notice how they make you feel. Let’s listen.

[READ]

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

Is it just me, or does Jesus seem a little… off, in today’s Gospel reading? I mean, we usually picture him as the very embodiment of compassion, care, and availability, right, but today, he first enters a town and doesn’t want anyone to know it, wants to hide away for a while. And then, when someone comes to him for help, what does he do but insult her! “Can’t help you now,” he says. “Gotta help the children of Israel first. I’m not gonna throw their portion to the dogs!” Did he just… did he just call this woman a dog, and refuse to help her daughter? What?? This is not the Jesus we know and love!

It is one of the more puzzling interactions Jesus has, for sure. Interpreters have spilled much ink trying to figure this one out. Is this just an example of how Mark paints a much more human picture of Jesus? Throughout the Gospel of Mark, we see Jesus exhibit more emotions, as well as more human frailty, even lack of knowledge at times, than we do in the other Gospels. So maybe Mark is saying that Jesus was tired, and a little bit irritable, snarky, and dismissive? I mean, we get that, right? We’ve all been there! But… does Jesus get snarky and dismissive? It opens a complex theological can of worms.

Or maybe, is Jesus testing the woman’s faith? Yeah, standing as the wise teacher who is seeing how bold she will be in her declaration, always with the intention of giving her what she asks, and letting her win the argument. That seems to fit better with our understanding of Jesus – even though I don’t especially like the idea of a God who tests our faith for sport, while our loved one lies in pain!

It’s a tricky one, and it can be very easy to get caught in the weeds of this question – I know I have spent a fair amount of time there. 

But in the end, that’s not the point of the story, and not what really matters to me. What matters more than why Jesus responded to this woman the way he did, is that the woman, who is an ethnic, religious, social “other” from Jesus, has the opportunity to proclaim, even to us, the truth: that Jesus is there for her, too. That her life, and the life of her daughter, matter, and should matter even to this Jewish teacher, even to this God. That she is worthy of God’s care, compassion, and love. This woman boldly proclaims that truth.

We have a complicated relationship with the truth these days, don’t we? There has always been a fair amount of fuzziness around the truth in politics, but it has gone off the rails in the past decade – well past a creative reframing of the facts, and fully into easily verifiable lies. That, along with evidence of foreign interference, and the rise of AI and easily altered visual media, and the result is that the folks trying to keep up at home just don’t know who or what can be trusted anymore. What really is the truth, and what is only some version of the truth, cherry-picked, or conveniently twisted or edited to support one viewpoint or disprove another? In the words of Pontius Pilate, “What is truth?”

Yet here, this woman of Syrophoenician origin, boldly proclaims a very important truth, and one that can absolutely be trusted: that she matters, and that her daughter matters, and that they are worthy of God’s attention and care. 

But even when a truth, like this, is indisputable, that does not always mean it is easy to hear. Jesus seems to receive it readily enough, but for us? We sometimes have a hard time receiving the truth, especially when it rubs up in a bad way against something we believe and hold dear, when it challenges our viewpoint. Once we have decided what is the truth, I think a lot of us tend to close our minds and our hearts to anything that doesn’t fit with what we believe. 

Perhaps that is why I am particularly drawn to what Jesus says in his next interaction with a Gentile, the man who is deaf and mute. Jesus doesn’t just lay hands on this man to heal him. He says to him, “Be opened.” 

“Be opened.” This is message I know I need to hear, and one I think we could all stand to hear and take to heart. Be opened. Be opened to the movement of the Spirit. Be opened to learning something, even something that at first makes you uncomfortable. Be opened to the gifts of others, even others whom you don’t like. Be opened.

I remember once sitting in the office of my college band director. He was leaning back in his chair, with his arms crossed tightly across his chest, when he started to reflect, as he often did. He said, “You know, I’ve been told you should never sit this way, arms crossed, when talking to someone. My teacher used to say, ‘Closed body, closed mind.’ But I don’t know – I think I have an open mind, but I just think it is comfy to sit this way!” Well yeah, it is also comfy to sit in our opinions and never let them be challenged. It is also comfortable to stay right where we feel safe, and know how things work. It is comfortable not to rock the boat, not to speak up when we know something is wrong. But I wouldn’t say any of those things are necessarily open, nor faithful! (That said, I do think my band director had a pretty open mind, and was very faithful, despite his crossed arms!)

Be opened. Be opened to the truth, even uncomfortable truth. Be opened to ideas, even ideas you think would never work. Be opened to the possibility that you might be wrong, and someone else is right. Be opened to change, even if you love where and how things are. Be opened.

I think this is a valuable word for us today, on Rally Day, as we begin a new program year. We have some exciting things on the horizon. In the September newsletter, as I mentioned, I printed the core values that emerged out of the visioning process we’ve been working on. Some are values we already live into effectively, and some are aspirational, things we need to work on. In the coming two weeks, the Keymel committee and the council will start making some decisions about how we will spend the bequest we received earlier this year – keeping in mind how we can use this gift to help us better live into our values, including and especially the more aspirational ones. 

Some of what will happen in these next months is objectively exciting, and will be easily received. Some might require some risk. Some might require some patience, as we work through the inevitable tough spots. All of it requires for us to “be opened” – to listen to one another and our broader community, to be kind and responsive, to entertain the possibility of sitting in a position that might not be as comfortable at first, but one which will absolutely make us grow stronger in mission and in faith. 

All of what will happen in the coming months, I hope, will equip and empower us to boldly proclaim the truth: That ours is a God who loves, who cares, who heals, who brings life, both to those on the inside, and those who are “other,” who are different from us, like the Gentile woman and her daughter, and the deaf, mute man. That ours is a God who never promised that we would be comfortable, but rather, who always invites us to move, to change, and to grow. I hope we will be empowered to proclaim that ours is a God who listens to our needs, who equips us to boldly share our stories of how God has been active in our lives, and who bids that we “be opened” to the possibilities of new life that God places before us. 

And so let us “be opened,” my friends. As we enter into this new, exciting year of ministry, let us be opened and responsive to the ways that God will move within, among, and around us.

Let us pray... Active God, you make the eyes of the blind be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Make it so also with us, dear Lord. Make us bold to listen, to be opened, and to proclaim your truth. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Sermon: To whom shall we go? (August 25, 2024)

 Pentecost 14B
August 25, 2024
John 6:56-69

INTRODUCTION

Today’s texts all share a very prominent theme: that of faithfulness to the one true God, even in the midst of struggles and temptations. They are texts as convicting as they are encouraging. They fill me with hope in the power of faith, and with hopelessness at my inevitable failure always to keep that faith. In other words: they do exactly what the gospel, the living Word of God, sets out to do: comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable.

In the reading from Joshua, Joshua asks the Israelites which god they will serve: Yahweh, or the various false idols they have in their possession. The people give an unequivocal “yes!” to Yahweh. In Ephesians, Paul talks about the devil and the forces of evil that are among us, working their woe, and how we must prepare to defend against them by putting on the armor of God. And in John, you remember we have just come to the end of Jesus’ long Bread of Life discourse. Anyone remember the difficult teaching Jesus offered them last week? The one about how they must eat his flesh and drink his blood in order to abide in him and have eternal life? It’s a difficult teaching all right, one which, as we’ll see, causes many to turn their backs on this compelling teacher. Yet when faced with the decision as to whether to leave Jesus’ side, Peter utters the words now memorialized in our Gospel acclamation: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” 

Faithfulness and commitment. It is a gift and a challenge as old as time. Let us feast upon these stories of faith, as we reflect also on our own journeys that have taken us to the edge of doubt, and back again. Let’s listen.

[READ]

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

This week the kids and I were looking at a book of conversation-starters for families. One of the questions was, “If you could meet anyone in history, who would it be and why?” My immediate answer was, “Jesus, because I wanna see for myself. I wanna know what it was like to watch him in action.”

Well today we get a glimpse of what it was like. Often when Jesus says or does something stunning, the response is, “And they were all amazed!” Not so today. Today, the crowd’s first response is: “This teaching is difficult. Who can accept it?” That’s a very human reaction, isn’t it, especially in today’s world, in which we pride ourselves on our autonomy and good sense: we make our own decisions and believe what we want to believe and do what we want to do. So when we hear this difficult teaching from Jesus, it is natural to think: This is weird, it goes against my logic, I can’t accept it. I can’t understand it, so I will not abide by it. 

And it’s true, it is difficult. But you know… This is not the only of Jesus’ teachings that are difficult. Here are a few other difficult teachings that come to mind: 

• “Go, sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor…; then come, follow me.” Really? ALL of my possessions? But can’t I keep just these few things? They mean so much to me. Can’t I keep something for myself?

• “Then Peter came and said to him, ‘Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?’ Jesus said to him, ‘Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.’” 77?? I sometimes have trouble with one! 77 is a lot, Jesus. What if what they did was really bad, or a repeated offense?

• “If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also.” Wait, I can’t fight back, not even with my words? But what if this person is a real jerk and needs to be set straight? Or what if turning the other cheek just encourages them to continue being mean and hurting others?

You see? Jesus’ teachings are difficult, no two ways about it. They often go against what our culture tells us to do, which makes them even harder. This one about the flesh and blood – it’s hard, too. But the fact is, living the life of a Christian, and walking the way of Christ, is difficult. There’s a wonderful Maya Angelou quote: “I’m trying to be a Christian,” she says. “I’m working at it, and I’m amazed when people walk up to me and say, ‘I’m a Christian.’ I think, Already? Wow!” This faith business is something we need to work at! It’s a process. And it’s difficult. Can we accept it?

Which brings us to the next part of the reaction to Jesus’ bread of life teaching. John tells us that “because of this [teaching], many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.” We’re not talking some folks who just happened to be hanging around. These aren’t your Christmas and Easter Christians. These are Jesus’ disciples, people who had been following him, who had already invested something in him. They were folks who sat on council, who led Bible studies, who set up for coffee hour. And when asked, “Who can accept it?” they decided, “I can’t. This is too much.” And I expect that seeing these faithful people turn around and walk away would make it even harder for others, who might have stayed, to accept this teaching.

In my home synod in CA, we had a bishop some years back who, some time after his term as bishop, became an atheist. He no longer found he had any faith at all. When he died, at his funeral, there was no mention of the resurrection, no word of Christian hope. And that is hard, to see someone you looked up to as a model of faith (a bishop!), suddenly reject that faith. This teaching is difficult. If even Jesus’ disciples struggle to accept it, how can I?

         And then perhaps what is for me the toughest reaction of all: when Jesus turns to the twelve, those followers who were closest to him, and asks them, “Do you also wish to go away?” Whether this was asked as a challenge, or out of sadness, or simply out of fatigue and discouragement, this is the question that gets in my craw. “Do you also wish to go away?” Sometimes I feel like it is directed right at me. This teaching is difficult, Johanna. Do you wish to go away? This life is a hard one to live, Johanna. Wouldn’t it be easier just to go away? How does your faith understand this tragic event, or this difficult time, Johanna? Do you wish to go away?

         Sometimes… the answer is yes. That would be easier, I think, easier than upholding all these difficult teachings. Easier than seeing the evil, brokenness, and sadness in this world and trying to understand it through the lens of what is supposed to be a God of love. Easier than trying to be true to my Christian beliefs in the context of an increasingly pluralistic society. …Do you also sometimes wish to go away?

         When I had just begun my year serving as a missionary in Slovakia, I learned of a horrific tragedy back home, something that shook my very foundations and caused me to lose faith in the God who I believed had called me to Slovakia in the first place. I had already been on somewhat shaky ground with my faith, because the month and a half I had been in Slovakia had not gone very smoothly, but now, this event, made me doubt the existence of God at all – how could a God of love allow this to happen? For days, I lived in fear and darkness. I was scared of everything, and I lived in a fog where nothing could turn my mourning into dancing. In those days, I did wish to go away. Having faith in this God – it was too difficult for me. I could not accept it.

         But then, after experiencing this darkness, after living several days in fear, I had a moment like Peter had in response to Jesus’ question. “Lord, to whom shall we go?” Peter asks. “You have the words of eternal life.” Where else can we possibly go? That October in Slovakia, I, too, was faced with these two possibilities: continue to reject a God who had let something horrible happen to someone I loved, and with that continue to live in darkness; or, cling to the hope that is promised through the resurrection, as difficult to accept as that may be in that moment. And my answer was the same as Peter’s: “What else am I supposed to do? Where else can I go?” Angry, disappointed, and hurting as I was in that moment, I couldn’t imagine living without this God. Without Christ, there are no words of eternal life. There is no hope. Lord, to whom shall we go? Difficult as following you may be, you have the words of eternal life that offer me hope in the midst of my despair.

The teaching is difficult. It can be hard to accept it. It can be even harder to live it, to receive, through no merit of our own, God’s immense grace and love, the forgiveness of sins, the promise of everlasting life… and then, having accepted and embraced that grace, to go out and actually live the life that Christ calls us to: a life that cares more about the poor, the immigrant, the lost and dejected, the broken, the weak, the morbidly obese, the drug-addicted, the imprisoned – to care about all of them at least as much as we do about ourselves. A life that shares the love of Christ with everyone we meet, even people we don’t like, or with whom we disagree, or who did something to hurt us, or who are just really annoying.

But here’s the good news: this teaching is difficult, but we’re not in this alone. Jesus promises us that. And we receive that promise every time we wake up in the morning, every time we splash water on our faces and remember we are baptized. We receive it every time we hear the words of eternal life, every time we are forgiven, and every time we come to this table and feast on the body and blood of Christ, where we receive the strength and nourishment we need to live this life Christ calls us to. This teaching is difficult, but to whom else could we possibly go?

Let us pray… Christ, our Bread of Life, following your teachings is difficult, and sometimes hard to accept. By your strength and patience, help us to follow you anyway, trusting that you do have the words of eternal life that can carry us through all things. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Full service can be viewed HERE.

Sermon: Taste and see! (August 11, 2024)

Pentecost 11B
August 11, 2024 (week 3 of bread discourse)
1 Kings 19:4-8
Psalm 34:1-8
John 6:35, 41-51

INTRODUCTION

This is week three of the bread of life series, so let’s first recall where we are in this discourse. For these few weeks we are working through John 6, which begins with Jesus feeding 5000 people with five loaves and two fish, and continues with explaining what this sign means. Today we get into more of the theology of it, as the crowd continues to be dubious about what Jesus means by calling himself the bread of life.

The Old Testament story paired with this portion of the discourse is about the prophet Elijah, who is also fed miraculously in the wilderness. Here’s the context: Elijah has just killed a bunch of false prophets (prophets of Ba-al), and Queen Jezebel has consequently vowed to have him killed. He is running for his life, and at the beginning of today’s reading, he has just collapsed in exhaustion. And here, in this moment of exhaustion and hopelessness, God provides. The Psalm, which liturgically is always meant to be a reflection on the Old Testament reading, recalls how God meets us in our desolation and delivers us – just like with Elijah, just like with David who wrote this Psalm, and just like with us today.

As you listen to these readings, notice the words of life and sustenance spoken into feelings of despair. God does provide for us all that we need. Let’s listen. 

[READ]

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

Twelve years ago this month, I was undergoing medical testing for what turned out to be breast cancer. I’d had test upon test, and each had led us to something else we needed to check out. In the midst of this mess, I decided I needed something that would bring me life and joy, so I suggested to my music director at the time that I could sing something in worship, in particular a beloved setting of today’s Psalm that I’d learned in seminary – the very same one that Helena will sing for us as the offertory today. The refrain goes, “Taste and see, taste and see, the goodness of the Lord!” I was excited to be able to use music to help me escape for a moment what I was going through.

Well, it seemed like a good idea. But turned out, it wasn’t much of an escape. As I rehearsed it with the music director, the impact of these words suddenly hit me in a way they never had before. “I will bless the Lord at all times, his praise shall always be on my lips… I called the Lord who answered me… from all my troubles I was set free…” As I sang, visions of doctor’s offices and MRI machines came to mind, but so did visions of my family and friends surrounding me, and congregation members who had rallied around me, and memories of boob jokes my doctors and I had enjoyed sharing back and forth, and my steadfast then-boyfriend by my side all along, accompanying me to appointments, and doing all he could to support me through this. “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord!” I sang… 

And friends, as I sang, I completely lost it. First the telltale voice wobble. Then the sound just stopped coming out. And then all the tears started. I stood there in the sanctuary openly weeping over the goodness of the Lord, and the already-and-not-yet of this Psalm in my life at that moment. The organist, herself a breast cancer survivor, and someone with whom I’d had a somewhat rocky relationship, stopped playing and came over to me, unsure what to do with this sobbing young pastor before her. And suddenly I was throwing my arms around her, and continuing to cry into her shoulder. In so many ways, this Psalm was “not-yet” for me. A couple weeks later, I would be officially diagnosed, and undergo surgery. And then another surgery. And then 6 months later, two days after my bridal shower, cancer would show up again and I would have three more surgeries before all was said and done. Plenty of other health and personal challenges would come up along the way as well. So how could I stand there and sing, “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord!”? How could I possibly “bless the Lord at all times,” even in this trying time that threatened to take so much from me? How could I proclaim that the Lord had saved me from all my troubles, when really, my troubles were all just beginning?

And yet… I believed it. I checked in with my heart in the midst of all this, wondering if these tears were sadness, fear, or joy, and I’ve thought about it many times since, and I determined that the tears were, well, all three of those, but definitely mostly joy! Even in that dark moment in my personal story, I truly could taste and see that the Lord is good. 

I guess it is no surprise, then, that not only is this Psalm connected to a narrative in my own life, but its original writing was also imbedded in a narrative. In particular, a part of (the future King) David’s story. You may know that David wrote many of the Psalms. This particular one was written after he was running for his life from a wrathful monarch (not unlike our buddy Elijah!). The jealous King Saul, the first king of Israel, wanted to kill him. Saul’s son and David’s dear friend Jonathan helped David escape Saul’s wrath, making Saul even madder. David had taken refuge among the Philistines, but, you may recall that after David had, as a child, slaughtered their hero, Goliath, he was not on great terms with the Philistines. So, for his own safety, David faked his own insanity, so that they wouldn’t recognize him or perceive him as a threat. (This is the stuff of daytime television!) And it worked! And in gratitude for his safety, David wrote this Psalm. 

My own experience, and this biblical backstory, can help us see this Psalm’s power to guide our piety and devotion. I invite you to walk with me through it.

The Psalm begins with this bold declaration: “I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall always be on my lips.” This sentiment is not so hard to grasp when things are going well, when you’ve already been saved. But how do we do that when we are still in the pit? Well, here’s the thing about the Psalms: sometimes they are reflections back – for David, that was the case. But some are reminders that direct us forward toward a faithful life, even when the burdens of this life would threaten to drag us down. That’s how I experienced it in my own story: not as a memory, but as a desire and a prayer: “I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise will be on my lips. God, I know you can make it so! I know you can bring me to that place! Help me to see reasons to praise, even from this current darkness!” 

To be clear, I’m not suggesting we engage in what is sometimes called “toxic positivity” – an insistence to spin everything into a positive light, no matter what. I’m a firm believer in the importance of expressing all the emotions, even and especially the less nice ones, because if we don’t, they will eventually come out sideways, harming us or people we love. Identifying and expressing those feelings is the only way to process them and move past them. But. There is still a way to praise, even in the midst of those less nice emotions. The Psalmist does not say, “Praise God for everything.” Rather, there is something for which to praise God in everything. In my story, on the cusp of a cancer diagnosis, I could praise God that I had landed in Rochester for my first call, with its excellent medical care. I could praise God for a good-humored doctor who kept me giggling and laughed at my jokes. I could praise God for the immense grace my congregation extended as I sorted out my health just one year into my ministry with them. God’s praise could always be on my lips and in my heart, even as I was facing a deadly disease.

Jumping ahead now to verse 4: “I sought the Lord, who answered me, and delivered me from all my terrors.” For David, this verse reads as a thanksgiving for a specific event from which he was saved. In my story, I had not yet been delivered from the particular terror I faced. But I had been before. So in my reading, my experience of this Psalm in my particular time and place, this verse served as an invitation to remember all the times that I had been delivered, all the times I had sought the Lord and he answered me. And friends, there are many! Many in my personal life, many in the lives of my close family and my ancestors, and many throughout the generations of faith, as far back as David and well beyond. This verse, in short, is a reminder that God is faithful. God answers when we call. God delivers us from troubles. That is God’s M.O., from the story of the Exodus, to Elijah being fed in the desert, to Jesus overcoming the grave, to our own redemption from our troubles. Not always in the way or timing we imagine, but ultimately, every time. We seek the Lord, who answers us, and delivers us from our terrors.

And finally verse 8: “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” In Hebrew, that word “taste” means, “try it and experience it yourself.” And so this, too, is an invitation, urging us to imagine for a moment that this is all true, that God does deliver, that God is good… try it for yourself, and live into that reality. Truly believe it and believe in it. What freedom that faith and trust bring!

I have another poignant memory of this Psalm. It is from my grandfather’s funeral. My mom’s family has a wonderful store of German canons that they sing together, that they learned when they lived and worked in war-torn Germany in the 40s and 50s. They still love to sing them whenever they’re together. My favorite is based on this Psalm: “Ich will den Herrn loben alle zeit. Sein Lob soll immer darin meine Munde sein.” I will bless the Lord at all times, his praise shall always be in my mouth. We decided to sing that particular canon at the very end of Grandpa’s funeral, after the casket had been wheeled out but just before the postlude. We stood in the back and sang as a family, “I will bless the Lord always!” 

I admit that I thought at the time it was a weird choice. Yet, standing there, it was exactly right. We were praising the Lord, not for having lost my grandfather, but for the gift of his life, his long and fruitful years of ministry all over the world, and his love of the Lord. We were praising God for our certainty that Grandpa was now with his savior, basking in the light and life of Jesus like he had wanted all his life. 

And isn’t that exactly what a life of faith looks like? We do praise the Lord at all times, because we are assured that this joy is our ending: that political turmoil, and cancer, and loss and grief, and all the troubles that we face – all of it will end with us basking in Jesus’ enduring light and peace, living in the eternal life we are promised. And so, I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall always be on my lips.

Sing Ich will den Herrn loben…

Let us pray… God of all goodness, when we are lost, or sad, or in despair, you invite us to taste and see your goodness. Grant us the faith to bless you at all times, and to remember always your faithfulness. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

View full service HERE (including several bits that were sung during the sermon...).

Sermon: Our vision through the lens of the bread of life (Aug. 4, 2024)

Pentecost 11B (week 2 of Bread of Life)
August 4, 2024
John 6:24-35

INTRODUCTION

Last week we began what is known as the Bread of Life discourse. Each of Jesus’ discourses in John’s Gospel are explanations of some sign, or miracle, he’s performed, so it’s important for our understanding that we recall what that sign was. Anyone remember what we heard last week? [Jesus feeding the 5000.] I’m sure you remember this story – Jesus and the disciples are all out, far away from town, and everyone gets hungry. One boy shares his lunch, and miraculously everyone ends up with plenty to eat, with 12 baskets left over. It is one of Jesus’ seven signs that we see in John’s Gospel.

The next part of the story happens the next day. Folks have gone to pretty great lengths to track down Jesus, and they find him, and today we will be hearing the beginning of the conversation that ensues. As always in John, conversation with Jesus is characterized by a lack of understanding, because Jesus is always talking from up here, in the heavenly realm, and people respond from down here, in the earthly realm. They totally miss what Jesus is really saying, because they are so stuck down in the world of the flesh. Not that we can really blame them. This is tough stuff Jesus is saying. Jesus is totally blowing their minds here. 

One more quick comment about our first reading: for Jesus’ disciples, this story of being fed in the wilderness has been the defining story about how God provides. It is so foundational, that it is what the crowd refers to in trying to understand who Jesus is. So listen carefully, and then hold onto that story as you listen to what Jesus says about being the bread of life. 

[READ]

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

Our council has been working with our synod’s Director for Evangelical Mission, Pastor Imani Olear, to do some visioning work for our congregation. I wonder how many of you know our existing vision statement? It is to “spread the word of God, build a strong community, and make the world a better place.” As a part of this process, some St. Paul’s leaders have been working on our “Case Statement” – each of us taking a stab at thinking about questions like, “Who are we? Why does St. Paul’s exist? What is our vision for the future? Who does or will benefit from our vision, and how? Why does our community need our particular vision?” I love these kinds of questions, but they are really hard! This sort of introspection does not come easily to everyone. (I should add, by the way, that if you would like to take a stab at a case statement and answer any of these questions, you are encouraged to! They do need to be completed by this Thursday – if you want to do it, or just talk to me about it, let me know and I’ll make it happen.)

As I’ve worked on it, some of the questions have been straightforward, and some have left me feeling a bit like a deer-in-the-headlights (like, “Huh?”). When that happens, I find it helpful to look at questions like this through a particular lens – often, for me, a biblical one. So today I will walk us through looking at our vision statement, through the lens of our Gospel reading.

First: St. Paul’s has a vision to “spread the word of God.” Seen through the lens of the Bread of Life, we have an answer: we believe that the Word (in this case, the words of scripture, but also Jesus himself, the Word made flesh) nourishes us. And by that, I mean, the word of God sustains us, helps us to grow, to be healthy, to have energy for the task before us. The Word doesn’t perish, like breakfast does by lunchtime, but continually sustains us – and we gain more of these benefits when we regularly partake of it, in the form of scripture-based devotion, Bible study, prayer, worship, or whatever else feeds your spiritually. 

As far as our St. Paul’s vision goes, to spread the word of God – if we have a vision of spreading these benefits beyond ourselves, beyond even our congregation – then it goes to follow that we ought to be regularly partaking of it ourselves! How can we give away something we don’t have, after all? How can we share the joy of that vision with others, if we don’t intimately know that joy ourselves? 

As I worked on my case statement, and reflected upon how I see this vision playing out at St. Paul’s, I thought: my vision for St. Paul’s is that every member would, by consuming the Bread of Life with intention, be able to identify and articulate how God is moving in their lives, not only in big important moments, but in mundane moments, too. Because when we can do this, God becomes not some divine being on a cloud somewhere, but a being who continues to be active among us. This awareness gives not only sustenance, but purpose to our lives, and also gives us hope, comfort, support, and courage to do hard things. Consuming the bread of life equips us to be a force for goodness and grace in the world. That is what we can gain by living out our vision, “to spread the word of God.” …

The next part of our vision is to “build a strong community.” I guess I had previously thought of this as the community beyond our walls, but now I’ve started to think of it as being our church community – both those already here, and those who may join us at any given time. And in light of today’s Gospel, it is hard not think about “church community” without thinking about meals. Not just church potlucks, but meals like the one Jesus has just provided for them in which 5000 were fed from five loaves and two fish, or the meal Jesus will later institute, which we celebrate here each Sunday, in which we believe we are physically eating “the bread of God come down from heaven to give life to the world.” 

I’m really interested in that phrase from John, about the “bread from heaven that gives life to the world.” I don’t think Jesus is just talking here about eternal life – because the bread is coming down from heaven, not bringing us up to heaven. No, I think Jesus is referring here to the life that we crave and seek right here on earth, right now. 

So what does that life look like? What does it mean that Jesus “gives life to the world”? I suppose it looks different for different people. But I’d venture to guess that we all find some life and fulfillment in… a sense of belonging. In feeling accepted for being exactly who we are. In being seen and known. In feeling loved. Am I right? That’s the sort of nourishment that endures, that does not perish, and it is worth working toward building! 

Now, we can go about getting those things (love, belonging, etc.) in any number of ways, with varying degrees of success. But my vision for St. Paul’s is that we would be seen as a place in the larger community where anyone can come and belong, where they will hear they are loved by God and by us, where they will find rest for their souls, and receive bread for their spiritual journey – not only through Word and sacrament, but through the relationships they experience here. When the bread of God that comes down from heaven gives life to the world, that place of love and belonging is what I imagine life might look like. That is the strong community we have a vision to build. …

Finally, St. Paul’s has a vision to “make the world a better place.” This seems the most straightforward to most of us, I think. We want to make an impact on the world, making lives physically better for people. We do this through our various donations, both of time and resources. We also do this just by being the Spirit-filled, God-encouraged, loving, hopeful, compassionate people we are made to be – the sort of people the other parts our vision enable us to be, having been nourished and sustained by the Bread of Life, and by our place in a community of love and belonging. We make the world a better place by bringing the light of Christ into a world so often threatened by darkness.

So my question on this part isn’t so much what this part of our vision statement means, but rather, why we do it. What compels us to want to make the world a better place? And here, our Gospel reading can again guide us: we do it because we believe in Jesus. “This is the work of God,” Jesus says, “that you believe in him whom [God] has sent.” We believe that the life-changing power of love, of God’s self-sacrificing love for us, calls, compels, and enables us to do it. 

And so we strive to live into our mission: 

• to partake of and then to share the life-sustaining, nourishing, grace-filled Word of God with a hungry world; 

• to do the hard work of building a community of love and belonging; 

• to get out there and, by the strength and encouragement of God’s Word and God’s people, to make the world a better place than it would have been without us. 

All of this we do because we believe in Christ, who gave everything, even himself, so that we would have this life, so that we would be sustained and nourished – and so that we would know that even when we don’t live into this vision perfectly, that never changes how very much God loves us. 

So eat up, my friends. Eat this Bread of Life, always. For whoever comes to Christ will never be hungry.

Let us pray… Bread of Life, you have a big vision for the world and for us. Help us to live into it by feeding the world with your love, by building a community of belonging, and by making the world a better, more light-filled place. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Full service can be viewed HERE.

Sermon: Feeding each other (July 28, 2024)

 Note: I preached most of this without manuscript, but this is roughly what I said.

Pentecost 10B
July 28, 2024
John 6:1-21

INTRODUCTION

            The past six weeks we have been hearing from Mark’s Gospel. Today we will turn to John’s Gospel for a few weeks, as we “feast” upon the “bread of life” discourse. Today we’ll hear about two “signs” (that’s what John calls Jesus’ miracles) – the feeding of the 5000, and Jesus walking on water. And over the next few weeks we’ll get into the discourse that always follows a sign in John, which will explain why the sign matters. In both of the signs and in today’s other readings, we will see a few characteristics of God become apparent: God is in relationship with us, God is an abundant provider, and God is life.

One other thing to listen for that might not be obvious in this translation: another feature of John’s Gospel is that Jesus identifies himself throughout as I AM. Do you remember where else we have heard that name, “I AM”? Moses at the burning bush – when God tells Moses that God’s name is, “I AM who I AM.” In coming weeks, Jesus will identify himself as, “I am the bread of life.” But he also identifies himself as I AM today, when he approaches the disciples on the boat. The rendering in English is, “It is I,” but the word is the same: he is identifying himself as God. 

            In the following weeks, we will hear a lot of theological explanation, but today’s readings are more about experience. So, enter into that experience as best you can, considering how your different senses would encounter it. Let’s listen.

[READ]

Me with my two campers

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

I just had the pleasure of spending the last week with two of our confirmands, Noah and Nate, at Lake Chautauqua Lutheran Center (LCLC) for confirmation camp. It was a week full of traditional camp activities, but also worship, Bible study, prayer, and singing. If I may boast about them for a moment, the pastors who were there leading Bible study told me that both of our kids were really stars: eager to volunteer for things, to answer questions, and just to engage fully in what they were doing. (Made my pastor heart proud!) Both of them told me, halfway through the week, “I’m definitely coming back next year!” It made me really happy that this same week, we sent a check to LCLC out of the Keymel Estate gift, a part of our tithe, in the amount of $32,000. I got to see firsthand the impact that this gift will have, even on our own kids. 

Normally, I have attended confirmation camp as “faculty,” meaning, I have taught one of the daily morning Bible studies. But this year, for the first time, I went as one of the chaplains. That means that every day of the week, my co-chaplain and I planned and led a short morning prayer service and a full evening worship service. I also led the music for those services, with my trusty ukulele. That is 10 services in one week, my friends! Some were mostly planned or conceived before we got there, but not all of them. And I preached or offered reflections for five of the services. It sounds like a lot (and it was), but there is something about camp worship and camp preaching that is different from normal preaching. It is purer, somehow, and less heady: a dynamic Bible story, a personal story with a meaningful real-life application, perhaps a few corny jokes, and done. Short, sweet, relatable, and to the point. So, I thought that today, with these stories, two of the most dynamic in scripture, I would offer you a camp-style sermon. Hold on, let me get into camp mode… [leave pulpit]

One of the less-than-ideal things about the way most of us consume scripture is that we hear scripture in worship in a sort of piecemeal way, a story at a time, and don’t always get the overall picture of the Jesus story, and especially not the overarching story of salvation history, the way God has acted toward and worked among humanity over the course of existence. But if you take a step back, you will see that this one story about God feeding hungry people is not an anomaly. In fact, the Bible is full of feeding stories. The one we heard a moment ago from 2 Kings was one. The story of the Israelites in the wilderness being fed by manna, bread from heaven, is another one. The Passover, which John mentions in our Gospel today, is yet another one. Looking forward, the last supper, which happens on Passover, is another one. And there are more!

Point is: God is in the business of feeding people who are hungry – hungry in body, yes, but also hungry in spirit. Hungry for justice, or for love, or for connection, or for community. God feeds hungry people, again and again and again. 

But here is something I really appreciate about this feeding story in particular. In this story, God (Jesus) doesn’t act alone. He certainly could have. John tells us that Jesus already knew what he was going to do, and certainly the dude who goes on from here to casually walk across the lake in the middle of a storm to meet his friends on the boat is perfectly capable of feeding the whole crowd singlehandedly. But he doesn’t. Instead, he calls upon the community.

First, he asks the disciples. They have a few feeble ideas. One of them is to bring in a little boy, whose mother had no doubt lovingly packed him a lunch of loaves and fishes for the day. The boy’s generosity inspires others – rather than being greedy, people all join in sharing, passing the baskets all around, until everyone has what they need, and even more. In this remarkable story, not only does God feed the people, but God involves the all-ages community into the effort.

This sort of miracle is what we saw at camp all week. We saw campers take turns cleaning up the dining hall after meals. We saw them cheer each other on as they climbed the climbing wall, and competed in the LCLC Olympics. They offered gentle advice to each other, and comfort, and laughter. They cared for each other. The campers checked in on each other. That camp community that forms over the week is such a beautiful thing to watch.

One of my favorite parts of camp this year, was that we had a little visitor all week: 4-year-old Tony, who was the son of the sailing instructor. He tagged along with his mom all over camp. At the boat house, he shared his own wisdom about the boats he’d grown up around. At the fiesta tent, the central meeting point of camp, he could often be found playing Star Wars games with the boys cabin, felling them using the force or his imaginary light saber. Perhaps my favorite was that Tony would suggest programing for campers or faculty, and it happened! The faculty held an excellent campfire one night, at Tony’s suggestion. 

So throughout the week, we were learning from a 4-year-old, and from 60-something-year-old pastors, and from 12-year-old campers, and teenage counselors. My friends, we were feeding each other all week. We fed each other literally in some cases, but we also fed each other’s spirits, laughing together, crying together, hugging each other, singing together, playing Floor is Lava and Star Wars and Gaga Ball together, praying together. It was a truly beautiful community, one that embodied God’s vision for the Church on earth, one that Jesus brought about and demonstrated that day in a deserted place, when he drew upon the community to feed one another.

On the last day of camp, we heard the story of Jesus walking on water – not the version we heard a moment ago, but the version from Matthew, in which Peter actually gets out of the boat and, purely on faith, walks toward Jesus on the water. At our closing worship, we talked about how after this marvelous week of feeding each other in this cloistered community, we were all getting out of the boat, heading out into rougher waters where it isn’t always as easy to live into that community-of-care that we had developed at camp. But throughout the week, our theme verse was, “When you walk through the waters, God is with you.” And that is true also for us. It can be difficult to feed one another, especially when we encounter a lot of people who drive us bananas, or who don’t share our beliefs, or who hurt us. But God is about feeding people. And we are about being God’s people, a part of God’s mission. And God is with us as we strive to be Christ’s body, God’s people, here in this world that is hungry for the good news of God’s love.

Let us pray… Gracious God, we are hungry, for so many things. Feed us, we pray. And not just that, but help us to feed one another. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Full service can be viewed HERE.

Sermon: Scripture's politics and ours (July 21, 2024)

Pentecost 9B
July 21, 2024
Jeremiah 23:1-6
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

INTRODUCTION

Remember two weeks ago, when Jesus sent out the disciples to heal and share the good news about the kingdom of God? And then last week we had this gory interlude about the beheading of John the Baptist? Well today we come back to the story of the apostles, and now they are returning, but we must also not forget that gory beheading story (as much as we may like to!), because it shows us what bad leadership looks like, and Jesus will show us the opposite. Today’s gospel text is two transitional moments – you’ll notice there are some missing verses, which tell the stories of the feeding of the 5000 and the walking on water. What we will hear is on either side of those stories, and they reveal something about the day-to-day life of Jesus. The reading includes this wonderful line about Jesus seeing the needs of the crowd: “He had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.” Beautiful!

The other texts pick up that shepherd theme. Jeremiah describes the bad shepherds – a frequent metaphor used for kings in Israel and other Ancient Near East cultures, though perhaps also referring here to prophets and priests – and the way such political leaders don’t take care of the people. This is a contrast with who we have come to understand as our shepherd, Jesus. And naturally, we will hear the 23rd Psalm, “The Lord is my shepherd.” And then Ephesians reflects on how it can look when we are indeed all sheep of the same flock, with Christ as our shepherd. 

Hold that image of Christ as the care-taking, self-sacrificing shepherd of the sheep as you listen today. Consider how such a role makes you feel, as one of the sheep. Let’s listen. 

[READ]

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

I’m sure it has everything to do with the particularly volatile political climate we are living in, but every week it seems I find something in the texts that speaks to our political situation. That is one of the cool things about scripture – though these ancient texts were written in and for a particular time and place, we also believe that they are inspired by God, and so they have a timeless quality about them. That’s why we can return to scripture again and again, and hear God speaking to us anew each time.

So, what did I see this time that speaks to our time and place? First of all, in Jeremiah it is obvious that we are not the first nation to struggle with a crisis of leadership. The prophets frequently call out the ways power corrupts, and the ways the rulers, or “shepherds,” of that time did not care for their sheep. Instead, they oppressed and as Jeremiah said, “scattered” the sheep. The details in this passage are lacking, as far as the particular sins of the rulers, but we can gain more from looking at some nearby passages. In her commentary on this passage, biblical scholar Kathryn Schifferdecker writes that “the virtues of justice (mishpat) and righteousness (tzedakah) are recurring themes in these chapters of Jeremiah. They are the qualities of a good king. A ruler who practices mishpat (justice) will ensure that justice is done, that the rich will not oppress the poor and the powerful will be held accountable for their deeds… Rulers who practice tzedakah (righteousness) are upright and virtuous. They refrain from doing evil and they obey God’s commandments, including the commandment to care for the poor and vulnerable, the widow, the orphan, and the foreigner.”

Now, I know our country claims a separation of church and state, and this understanding of a good shepherd, a good ruler, comes out of a religious understanding, so it’s not a perfect parallel… but still, does that not sound like the sort of leader we would want also in a secular political position? One who does not oppress the poor, who is held accountable for their deeds, who is upright and virtuous, who refrains from evil and cares for the vulnerable? They’ve got my vote! 

The community to which Jeremiah is speaking does not have that sort of shepherd. And the result, he says, is that the sheep of Israel have been destroyed and scattered. They are a divided nation, with no one to gather them, to bring them together, to show them the right path. So, God says, these bad shepherds will be punished, and God will lift up a shepherd who will guide them along right pathways, who will be the good shepherd they need.

Now again, I know it isn’t a perfect parallel to our current American times. But it is similar enough that when I then read our Gospel reading, I felt in my bones the impact of this line: “Jesus had compassion on them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd.” Remember, right before this scene, Mark has reminded us that the current shepherd of Galilee, King Herod Antipas, has just beheaded John the Baptist after getting drunk at a party with his rich friends and making a promise to his step-daughter that he wasn’t prepared to keep, all because his wife didn’t like what John had to say and so wanted to have her rival killed. This is the sort of behavior they get from their shepherd. Honestly, I have been similarly disgusted with some of the behavior I have seen from our political leaders.

Right after this (in those missing verses), we will learn that those crowds that rushed to meet Jesus and his disciples in that deserted place were hungry. This, I also get – I am, by the grace of God, not physically hungry or poor, but I know what it is to be hungry for justice, hungry for righteousness, hungry for rest and care and guidance, hungry for relief from too much bad and exhausting news. And so I feel the impact all the more of that line about Jesus’ response: “He had compassion for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd.” 

So where is our shepherd? Where do we get the justice and righteousness expected of a shepherd king? Where do we get compassion and the promise of being filled?

Well first, we should know where we will not get it: we will not get it from the Herods of the world, nor will we get it from the Trumps, or the Bidens, or whoever else may or may not end up in this race. Some earthly rulers do have a remarkable ability to unite, to bring hope and energy and direction to a country, and we can and should pray that our leaders can and will do this for the greater good, with mishpat and tzedakah. But no earthly ruler, however promising, can do this perfectly, and if we expect them to, we will be disappointed. 

Second, of course, we know the one and only shepherd ruler who can do this, and that is Jesus himself. He is the righteous Branch from David, named “the Lord is our righteousness.” He is the shepherd who leads us and guides us and prepares a table for us and restores our souls. He is our peace, who has the power to break down dividing walls and the hostility between peoples. Jesus is our shepherd king.

Problem is, Jesus isn’t on the ticket this November. So the question is, how do we both look to God as our shepherd and trust God in that role, even as we hope to bring about that godly vision, God’s kingdom, here on earth? 

Certainly, we need to raise up leaders who lead in the model of Jesus Christ – not only in politics, but in our schools, and our workplaces, and our community groups, and in our churches. I don’t mean they have to be Christians, though they can be. I believe that a separation of church and state is good for the functioning of our democracy. What I mean is that our leaders embrace those traits I mentioned from Jeremiah: leading with mishpat and tzedakah, justice and righteousness. Leaders who do not oppress the poor, who are held accountable for their deeds, who are upright and virtuous, who refrain from evil and who care for the vulnerable. Those are the leaders we want.

But perhaps even more importantly, is that we embrace those virtues ourselves. After all, now that Christ has ascended into heaven, we are the body of Christ here on earth. We are the ones who are called to serve the poor, feed the hungry, care for the vulnerable. We are the ones who are to live according to God’s law and God’s grace. We are the ones who live and work in our communities to break down dividing walls, to speak thoughtfully but also to listen thoughtfully, to strive toward understanding. We cannot do any of these things perfectly. But we must continue to try, and to confess and ask forgiveness when we fall short, and then to try again. By Christ, we have what we need to do this in and for our communities, working toward the kingdom of God, so that love and compassion will win the day. 

As my closing prayer, I’d like to quote our hymn of the day today, from verses 3 and 4. Let us pray…

We are your body, risen Christ; our hearts, our hands we yield
that through our life and ministry your love may be revealed…
Come, make your church a servant church that walks your servant ways,
whose deeds of love rise up to you, a sacrifice of praise.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Full service can be viewed HERE.

Sermon: When anger and hatred lead to death (July 14, 2024)

Pentecost 8B
July 14, 2024
Mark 6:14-29

INTRODUCTION

Fair warning: some readings today may not be appropriate for children or sensitive audiences. In particular, our Gospel reading. Today we will hear from Mark the gruesome story of the beheading of John the Baptist. It is the only assigned Gospel reading we get in the three-year cycle in which Jesus is not center-stage, is hardly even mentioned but for briefly at the beginning. The context is a tangled web; let me set the scene for you.

First of all, narratively, this is presented as a flashback, sandwiched between the story we heard last week, about Jesus sending out the 12 to spread the Gospel, and their return. Bread. The meat is, Mark tells us that King Herod has heard about how well disciples’ mission was going, and people start speculating about who Jesus might be – Elijah, a prophet, or maybe even John the Baptist resurrected, an idea that unnerves Herod because… and then we find out why.

Now a word about who is who, because they all have similar names. This Herod is not the same one (Herod the Great) from Jesus’ birth story. This is his son, Herod Antipas, who rules over Galilee and is allowed to keep his power just as long as he protects Roman interests. Herod Antipas’s wife is Herodias (see?), who had divorced Antipas’s half-brother Philip to marry Antipas – which was against the law according to Leviticus, and John has publicly called them out on this – so Herodias has it out for John. The daughter referenced (also called Herodias here, but Salome elsewhere, so we’ll go with Salome for clarity): Salome is Herodias’s daughter from a previous marriage. So you see, even the set-up is kind of a mess!

Now a word about Amos (our first reading). Amos was an 8th century BC prophet who prophesied the fall of Jerusalem, and often spoke of the sins of the rich, who “oppress the poor and crush the needy.” In today’s passage, God uses the image of a plumb line, a tool used in construction to measure and align things, to say, “God’s people are not measuring up; they are crooked. It’s too late – things are about to get bad.” Reading that alongside the Herod story, eight centuries later, and looking at our world today, it’s hard not to think, “Yeah, no kidding!”

It’s a tough set of readings. As you listen, let them serve as a mirror, or a way to reflect on the brokenness and sinfulness still in the world. Where is God asking and equipping us to shine God’s light in this darkness? Let’s listen.

[READ]

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

Whenever we Lutherans hear the Gospel read in worship, we respond, as we just did, with “Praise to you, O Christ!” Well, this week’s Gospel makes one wonder if that was quite the right response. No two ways about it: this story is awful, gruesome, disheartening, gory, and it really should have a parental advisory on it. It leaves us wondering: but where is the grace? What about this story is at all life-giving? 

Well, in this case I think the answer is simply: it’s not. This story by itself isn’t life-giving, and embodies no grace. Rather, it is a mirror that shows us the depth of human sinfulness. Such sinfulness is on absurd display, and like it or not, the sheer magnitude of their sin gives us an unsavory glimpse into our own.

For example, look at Herodias, the resentful wife. She has been harboring a smoldering grudge against John the Baptist ever since he exposed her and humiliated her in the public sphere, standing in her way toward power, becoming queen. Though Herod had put John in jail, that wasn’t enough for Herodias. Her hatred had festered so long and infected her heart beyond repair; her resentment had eaten away any decency she may have had, until she was finally given the opportunity to make her hateful, murderous thoughts a reality – and the public, extravagant way she went about it was icing on the cake, because she had endured public shame and now he would, too.

Now, I assume none of us have ever ordered an enemy’s beheading… but we know a thing or two about smoldering grudges, and resentment that eats away at our hearts, that chips away at our decency and make us into people we’d rather not be, and yet we can’t seem to let our grudges and resentments go. Herodias shows us the extent to which such anger and hatred can destroy us and the people around us. 

Or, look at Herod. He’s a bit more complex. Herod actually liked John’s preaching. He knew John was a righteous and holy man, and Mark tells us Herod was greatly perplexed by John’s teachings, and liked to listen to him. He had probably thrown John in jail to protect him from people like his wife. He had no desire to harm John. Yet, he also loved his power and his reputation, and he loved having what he wanted when he wanted it. His heart was divided: he knew what was the right thing to do, but he did not possess the strength of character to do it. We see this struggle in the moment Herodias makes her murderous request for John’s head. Mark tells us Herod is “deeply grieved.” He didn’t want to do it. He knew it was wrong. Yet his reputation was on the line. He had an unhinged wife who would no doubt turn her rage on him. And so, though he knew the right thing to do, he chose the wrong thing.

This also hits a bit close to home, huh? We also find ourselves occupied by questions like, “What will people think?” We try to justify our actions, even if we know they are wrong. “I know I shouldn’t have said that… but she deserved it.” “I shouldn’t laugh at that racist joke, but everyone else is and I don’t want to look like a snob.” “I should call my friend who is sick or grieving, but I wouldn’t know what to say, and it would be awkward, so I’ll just avoid the situation.” The human heart can always find reasons to avoid doing what is right.

There are plenty of other ways this story shows us that, as we prayed this morning, “we are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves.” And like in life, if we stay in this dark place, wallowing in the devastation of this story, we will have a hard time finding our way out. So, let’s zoom out a bit now, and look at the broader context. As I said in my introduction, this story is the meat of a sandwich, in which the bread is Jesus sending the 12 out in pairs to proclaim the gospel, and their return. It shows us just how difficult, even risky, the life of discipleship can be, especially in a world in which earthly rulers do horrible stuff like what we just heard. The world is broken, that’s still a reality. It was broken in the 8th century BC when Amos was prophesying, it was broken when John the Baptist lived and worked and died, and it is still broken today, 2000 years later. Earthly rulers still prioritize power and reputation over doing what is right; they still hold grudges to the point of destroying their political enemies, they still choose themselves over the greater good, even if they know it is wrong. This sandwich Mark gives us in chapter 6 is a tough one to swallow, precisely because it rings so true to life.

So, let’s zoom out even a little more, to a different kind of meal. Directly after Mark places that second slice of bread on this sandwich of death, Jesus and the disciples find themselves in a remote place, where 5000 people have followed Jesus to hear him teach. And they are hungry. The disciples suggest Jesus send them away, because how could they possibly feed all these people? Instead, Jesus takes a measly five loaves of bread and two fish, and with that he feeds this 5000-person crowd, with 12 baskets of food left over. 

When Jesus is back in the picture, you see, he offers them a different kind of feast – one characterized not by earthly desires and power-hungry leaders, not fueled by anger and hatred, but by selfless service and love. Herod serves up a head on a platter; Jesus serves up the bread of life. Herod and his ilk serve up greed and death; Jesus serves up abundance and salvation. 

Mark did not intend for us to read this horrible story about John’s beheading by itself. He includes it in part because it shows us what a world without Jesus in it looks like: It looks like wallowing in anger and hatred to the point of being destroyed from the inside out. It looks like devastating consequences resulting from our selfish justifications for our sin. It looks like the end of the road. But as soon as Jesus comes back on the scene, he first cares for his weary disciples, and he then provides a feast that feeds souls and bodies, with more than enough for all. 

That is what our life with Jesus looks like, my friends. It calls us away from our self-destructive ways, and toward a way of abundance. It confronts us with our sin, yes, but also shows us a different way, a better way. It provides nourishment, love, hope, and life.

Let us pray… God of life, we look to the world to feed our hungry souls, and it so often fails to deliver. But you don’t. Guide us by your Word out of the way of sin, and into the light of your glory. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Full service can be viewed HERE.