Dead but Not Defeated - Good Friday 2020

Good Friday 2020

            There is really not much more to say after this reading we’ve just heard, (the Passion of Christ According to John, chapters 18 & 19), save this:

            Today we are separated, kept apart by a virus pandemic. Many of our life experiences and rituals have been affected, especially those experiences and rituals surrounding death.

            We are no longer able to visit our aged or infirm loved ones as they near death if they are in a hospital or nursing home. Although some arrangements may be made for the next of kin in some of these places, it is only in the very final stages of dying, often too late to communicate our presence and our love with certainty that our loved one is aware that they are not alone in that moment.

            Today we are denied what are normal mourning rituals as well. Funeral are verboten, and even graveside services are limited in size and scope. We are not able to give or receive the comfort and support that is so important at times like these.

            As Jesus hung on the cross, most of his loved ones were hidden away in the upper room, his followers scattered for fear of their lives. Jesus died alone, forsaken on the cross. He shares our experience of isolation in that moment. And yet, he gives us hope.

            That hope first comes in the awareness that we are not alone in our grief or in our dying. As Jesus took on flesh to join us in our humanity, Jesus dies alone and forsaken so that we might know we never will be; we are accompanied through every moment of our lives and our death by a God who loves us so fiercely, that he is there with us, suffering alongside us, comforting us with the promise that this is not all there is.

            While our story today is one of death and sorrow, we cannot forget that the resurrection looms just around the corner. We can’t go there yet, it’s important for us to linger in the shadows of the reality of the cross for a time, but for those living on this side of the cross, Jesus’ own death brings promise.

            Jesus dies on the cross but is not defeated, and neither are we. Jesus will go on to glory showing us the way to everlasting life. Jesus demonstrates that this suffering and loss will not be the end of us, and it will not go on forever, but instead will give way to the new life that is ours through the love and steadfast mercy of a God who will welcome us all home.

            While living through loss without the blessing of final goodbyes and without the essential and comforting rituals we have come to expect, we are reminded that these losses will not have the last word; one day we will come together in our mourning and in our celebrations, in our sorrow and in our joy.

            The good news is that in wherever we are along that journey, we are never alone.

Amen.

Our Story - Sermon for March 29, 2020

John 11:1-45 – The Death of Lazarus

            Our story is one of ongoing resurrection. Not just this story, the biblical telling of the raising of Lazarus, but our story.

We are reminded every day that the grave is real, it is oh so real, but at the same time, God shines light into all the dark places we inhabit and declares that death will have no power over us. With confidence we can declare, using the words of Job, “I know my redeemer lives.” And in Jesus, we see that life bearing fruit in our lives and leading us to ongoing resurrection.

 Yes, the grave is real, but we know that our redeemer lives! And because of Jesus, and because he lives, death will never have the last word in any of our stories. Because of Jesus, we are wrapped in resurrection reality.

            The story of the raising of Lazarus brings this message home to us in a new way at a crucial time in our lives. Today we worship, not gathered in person sharing the same space, breathing the same air, hand to hand and shoulder to shoulder as we prefer to do and need to do, because death is real. And the threat of coronavirus is real.

Instead, churches around the world are closed today, and people like us are worshiping virtually, worshiping at home, worshiping in private.

            Today we are faced with a crisis like none we’ve ever faced before, and like none that we ever wish to face again.

Around the world and in our own community there is fear and anxiety. With many people “sheltering in place” and many others putting their own lives at risk caring for those who are ill, our lives have been turned upside down. Some of us have been laid off from work; others have had to close businesses; some have lost jobs; children are home from school and educational institutions, business corporations, stores, restaurants and of course, even churches, have had to figure out new ways of doing what they can, and determining what work goes undone. Even parks and playgrounds have gone silent.

            Our senior citizens are doing their best to stay sheltered and many of them wonder how safe they really are from this coronavirus. Those living in retirement centers, Assisted Living or nursing homes are separated from their families or any other visitors. In most places, even pastors are not allowed to visit their members, visit the sick, or in many cases, even accompany the dying.  The headline, “Die From Coronavirus, You Die Alone” breaks our hearts and instills deep fear within us.

            Many around the world mourn their dead in isolation, without the ritual we expect and need at the time of loss. Without the warm embrace and shared tears of our friends and neighbors, we are left to bury our dead without the mutual comfort of community surrounding us and holding us up. My own aunt passed away a couple of weeks ago and my sister and I could not participate in her funeral due to the restrictions in place. It brought home to me just how necessary are such gatherings, and how much this virus is changing our most important life passages, from birth to death, from graduations to weddings.

            In times like these so many people rise to the occasion. We’ve seen many examples of people responding with grace and generosity. Last week a skeleton crew from our church served about 80 dinners in a drive-thru take-out assembly line community meal and we were not alone as feeding programs creatively and safely served the hungry poor. Meals on Wheels and food banks have made adjustments and found ways to serve people in need. School districts around the country are providing food for their at-risk children and families. Teachers are forming caravans to drive thru neighborhoods bringing a little cheer through loving waves at the children from their now empty classrooms, whom they love and miss. Individuals are volunteering to make grocery store and pharmacy runs for seniors who are sheltering in place.

            At the same time, we’ve seen the senseless hoarding of supplies creating shortages and denying those same supplies to those who truly need them. We’ve seen the birth of new predatory scams and the blatant disregard of safety measures and resistance to safety precautions spreading the virus and risking our vulnerable neighbors and ourselves.

            Indeed, the grave is real, yet still, I know that my redeemer lives!

            Indeed, our story is one of ongoing resurrection.

            Mary and Martha each greet the Lord with the words – the accusation – we can even imagine these words coming in angry, staccato bursts as he approaches them, after delaying his arrival until well after their brother, Lazarus has died. “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died!” There is heartbreak in those words, and Jesus feels it.

            Despite her grief, Martha goes on, “But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” Did Martha have in her mind the possibility that her brother could be raised from the dead? It would seem not, for when Jesus responds, “your brother will rise again,” Martha, in her Jewishness, refers to the expected resurrection of the dead on the last day.

But Jesus has something else in mind, and as he reassures her that he is the resurrection and the life, he asks her for her faith in this, and she illustrates her complete trust in him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”

After Mary delivers those same words in truth and agony, and after Jesus witnesses the grieving of the community, and as he contemplated the place where Lazarus was laid – in the tomb, Jesus wept. There is something comforting about knowing that Jesus, too, wept at loss, and grief, fear, and sorrow. This Jesus is so human – so relatable. This Jesus feels and bears our pain and sorrow in love.

Jesus’ tears legitimize our own. Lament is a powerful human experience and it connects us with God. Rather than being a sign of faith that is too weak, our lament expresses our deepest need, and our helplessness over loss and death of all kinds. The work of grief is natural, and it is necessary – even Jesus, in his humanity experienced it. Shedding his own tears, Jesus takes our grief and anger, frustration and longing onto himself. By so doing, he blesses it.

At the same time, Jesus gives us hope, in fact is our hope. And to illustrate the hope that he bestows on us all, Jesus does the impossible. He raises Lazarus from the dead.

Unlike other instances of Jesus raising the dead, Lazarus is well and truly dead. There can be no question for a man who died, whose body has been ritually cleaned and prepared for burial, and then had spent four days in the sealed up tomb, that he is really dead – that already, the stench of dead clings to him.

Yet with the power of his command and in great love and mercy, Jesus commands him to sit up and step from the tomb, and the miracle happens. Lazarus, still bound with the strips of cloth that wrap the dead still binding him, steps from the darkness of the tomb to the bright light of resurrection.

Raising Lazarus doesn’t change the past, doesn’t deny that death comes to all of us, but it creates a new future. While it doesn’t erase the pain of grief and the loss, it changes the finality with which we once viewed it and the power we once gave it. As death once came for Lazarus, it will come again. But because of the life to which Jesus restored Lazarus for all our sakes, we can truly say, “I know the grave is real, but death will give way to life – because Jesus makes it so.”

Through the cross and his own resurrection, Jesus assures us of life now. We can live in hope and assurance of God’s love because we know that our redeemer lives

Our story is one of ongoing resurrection. Each day we are faced with death. The reality of death from old age or disease. The death of dreams when things beyond our control close doors in our lives, steal away our security for the future, change our plans and cancel our rights of passage. Yet we know that none of these losses are ultimate. None will have the last word. Because Jesus lives, and because his Spirit works in and around and among us, we will see new opportunities and we receive the assurance that God is with us still and will see us through this crisis and all the sorrow, worry and fear it brings.

Jesus restores life. That’s what he does. Faith in him allows Martha to trust that whatever the future holds, there would be resurrection. Little could she know exactly what that looks like.

Regardless of what losses you suffer now, what worries you have for the future, what struggle you are experiencing, the truth is that God’s love and mercy are steadfast and true. They never end. With Martha, we can declare our faith in this truth.

When we walk through the darkest valley, we fear no evil, for God is with us. His light shines on us. The cross casts it’s shadow over us, but it is the resurrection that beckons to us, because, while the grave is real, it has no power to hold us. It will not overcome us. It is not forever.

Resurrection is our story, it is our song, it is our everlasting hope, because we know that our redeemer lives – and in him we live – today, tomorrow, and forever.

Amen.

           

Freedom, Truth, and Luther

 Jeremiah 31:31-34; Romans 3:19-28; John 8:31-36

There is a television program called “This is Us” which has become quite popular in the past couple of years, but until recently I had never watched any of its episodes. Lately, however, curiosity has had me watching the first couple of seasons through a streaming app. This week I watched an episode in which one of the characters talks about the first time he got glasses with corrective lenses in them.

Before he could get the glasses of course, came the exam with what he calls the “Better Machine.”

Anyone who has had optical refraction is familiar with that machine. (Refraction is what they call it when they check to see how much – or how little correction your eyes might need to attain your best possible vision).

So, the “best machine” is the one where the doctor or optical technician flicks through combinations of varying strengths of lenses on a machine that you look through to read the chart on the wall. As lenses are changed, the patient is asked over and over, “Which is better, one or two?” click, click, “now which is better – one or two?” click, click, “two or one?”

The patient goes through a series of trial lenses in this way, while the world goes from blurry to clear and back to blurry again, until you finally arrive at the combination that provides the best correction you can attain to see the world.

I remember walking out of the optician’s office with my first pair of glasses when I was in fourth or fifth grade. I was amazed that the grassy lawn contained millions of individual blades of grass – and was not just the sea of green I had become accustomed to seeing. That’s what I remember most of that first step out into a vision-corrected world – individual blades of grass.

Today we commemorate Reformation Sunday, when we remember with gratitude the work of Martin Luther and the rest of the reformers, who gave us a clearer vision of God’s grace through their work with the Scriptures. We celebrate how, through the Reformation, our faith came to contain millions of beautiful blades of grass as we see God’s presence throughout our world, no longer a simple one-or-two-dimensional sea of green.

Luther and his friends never intended to split the church, or to create a new denomination in the Christian faith. They simply wished to share with the masses what they, through the power of the Holy Spirit, had come to understand more clearly; that what God has done in Jesus Christ, on the cross, is to pour our grace sufficient for new life for us all.

They wanted to devise better ways to teach the faithful that God’s unmerited, perfect grace is already accomplished for us all. They were, in a lot of ways, like the “better machine.”

They kept writing, studying, arguing and debating with each so that they could best understand and then convey the truth of Christ’s Word that is life-giving and not oppressive, as Jesus himself is life-giving and liberating.

In so doing, they looked through a variety of lenses and asked the question over and over, “which is clearer, one or two? two or one”? As they worked, their vision went from blurry to clear, back to blurry again, and then clearer than ever before, through reading Scriptures like those ones we just read.

Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you keep on living in my truth, you are really, truly my disciples; and you will know the Truth, and the Truth will make you free.”

The disciples answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone.”

Somehow, I don’t think the disciple are on the same page as Jesus.

·         Jesus is speaking of spiritual truth; of eternal truth; of divine truth. This is the truth that will outlive every human-constructed world or cultural reality. He is speaking of truth and freedom as infinite possibilities that are known only through him – through God’s almighty grace.

·         They are relying on the finite history and stories of the path trod by their ancestors.

·         Jesus is the embodiment of God’s love and mercy to all the fallen world, but despite having recently declared that they believe he is the Messiah, they still identify themselves through their traditional Jewish heritage, where their identity is found in Abraham, the father of the faith. The trouble is, in this way they give their association with Abraham priority over their relationship with Jesus.

·         Jesus challenges them to own their new identity as Christ-followers, saved now by God’s grace apart from any Law that has bound them in the past, but they worry that he is equating them with slaves.

·         They associate freedom with the physical removal of the shackles of enslavement in Egypt, while Jesus is talking about a much more profound and lasting liberation, where the heart itself is set free from that which binds it so that it can grow in the new, unalienable life that God gives us.

As Lutherans commemorate the Reformation, we remember that freedom was a crucial element in faith for Luther and the other Reformers. The big question they were driven to answer was, where and how are truth, freedom, and new life to be found? What is the truth about our salvation? What is necessary for eternal life?

Those questions burned for those who live in the Middle Ages of Luther’s world. There was an urgency to such understanding that is lost to those of us living in the 21^st century.

          Their world was dark and dangerous, with death from plague, starvation, disease and poverty literally just around the corner in a way that we comfortable Americans cannot fathom; life was beyond hard.

          The desperate hope and desire of the people therefore, was that the life that awaited them when they departed this mortal coil would be better than the one they traveled in this life.  They were desperate to know that they and the loved ones who had passed on before them would not languish in a continual cycle of suffering, but that they had believed correctly or done enough or lived a sufficiently good life to be assured that they were heaven-bound. They desperately needed the assurance that God would judge them worthy of a sweet eternal life after this world of infernal suffering.

As the reformers studied and debated the Scriptures together, the core belief that God’s Word of forgiveness and grace won through the cross of Christ alone as the ultimate power to save us, became their battle cry against the forces of darkness.

They were convinced that this essential truth had been lost in the medieval pietistic teachings and indulgences of the church of their time. Determined to share the Word that only belief in Jesus Christ could save, that only God’s grace could save, and that on the cross, God’s determination of salvation was accomplished for the whole world, they turned to passage like the ones we read today.

This Word of God has the authority to grant perfect vision to all people by conveying to us the truth and light of God’s steadfast love and mercy for all God’s creation.

The world today may be different from that of the reformers of over 500 years ago. Faith is no longer deemed as essential to life as it used to be. The conviction that our salvation comes from God alone has been lost to the masses – even the need for salvation by Christ is questioned by so many people around us.

The thing that hasn’t changed is that there is still vast suffering in the world. The past week has exemplified this truth: children senselessly die and people are maimed in car accidents, bombs sent through mail terrorize us, faithful worshipers and first responders are gunned down in a worship place – a synagogue; millions of children suffer the evil and pain of starvation in a war-torn land, and gang violence drives thousands from their homes to seek the refuge which just a few of them will receive in time. There are times when the dimness of our vision may be fueled by our despair and hopelessness.

Yet, here we gather today, by the will of the Holy Spirit. Together we confess the faith of our baptism, the same faith that four young people will affirm during the Rite of Confirmation.

We are so much like the disciples – while we may not locate our identity in Abraham any longer, our faith and our trust in Jesus’ words still need to be clarified so that our vision of God’s grace might be renewed, and we might be freed to live in the light of Christ.

The lenses our world offers us can blur our vision. But God restores it. As Lutherans we confess that we are at the same time sinner (by our response to the temptations and pull of the world) and saint (by the sweet gift of God’s grace).

We are not saved by our own understanding but by the mercy of a God who loves us so much that despite our blurry understanding, despite our indistinct vision of grace, despite our frequent blindness, God forgives us and renews us over and over again for the sake of Jesus Christ.

Jesus makes it possible for us to grasp the new life we are given at baptism – the new life our confirmands claim as their own this day.

And so today and every day, let us offer our thanks and praise to God for the “better machine” of our faith – for the corrective lenses that give us not perfect faith or perfect life – only God can to that – but the best vision of which we are capable, until that day when God perfectly restores our vision and our understanding with the fine heavenly vision given all the saints in light. Amen.