Three powerful lessons await us this coming Sunday from the Epiphany Four lectionary.
Our Epistle for Sunday invites us to focus on the cross and consider the many surprising and unlikely ways that God is with us. “The message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (1 Corinthians: 18-31)
In 2 Corinthians chapter 8 we hear about the Macedonian offering. Paul is taking an offering to support the hungry and beleaguered Christian community in Jerusalem. The church in Macedonia was one of the most impoverished churches in as the Christian movement. Paul contrasts their poverty with their generosity. Here is Paul describing the offering:
Stephanie, the homeless evangelist of Bainbridge Avenue in the Bronx, died alone on a subway car. During the first week of Advent Janet and I sat in the quiet sanctuary for the memorial service, watching the flickering first candle on the wreath. Around us were many of Stephanie’s companions in her life’s sometimes tortured journey.
As I watched the Sunday School children “singing” “Go Tell It On the Mountain” through sign language I was remembering such moments when my own children and grandchildren participated. I remember sitting in the audience in Hyde Park and craning my neck to see my granddaughter Ruth as she emerged onto the stage with other “Chinese” dancers for her moment in Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker.” My joyful expectation was met with her radiant smile, the confident movement of her lithe body in the dance, her abandonment to the music. As she made her triumphal exit she craned her own neck to see who was with her and our eyes met. She rewarded me with a smile for the ages.
“Stir up your power, Lord Christ, and come.” (Prayer for Advent I)
“O that you would tear open the heavens and come down!” (Isaiah 64:1)
A memory from several years ago animates my heart and the mission we share at St. Luke’s this Advent: A crash language course in the narthex. Tell me how you say “In the Name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit in Arabic.” Pastor Khader El Yateem whispers something unintelligible. I take out a pen and ask him to repeat it slowly. The incense is swirling to the heavens. The opening hymn, “Love Divine, all love’s excelling,” has begun. The kids wearing the Church Reeboks are lifting up the cross and torches to lead the procession. I scrawl on the back of the bulletin, in wobbly English, a transliteration: “Bism’el ab; wal eben; waroah el qudus; el elah; eluahied; Amin.”
“It is indeed right, our duty and our joy, that we should at all times and in all places give thanks and praise to you, almighty and merciful God, through our Savior Jesus Christ.” (Evangelical Lutheran Worship, p. 130) These words from the Great Thanksgiving Eucharistic prayer give us a wonderful summary of the life of a Christian steward. Duty and Joy.
A pandemic wreaking havoc across the land. Social unrest leading to fires and violence in the streets. A politically divided people, seemingly on the verge of fracture. New information technologies bringing radical changes to mass communication, causing people to question what is true.
Some Lutheran Dimensions of Faith:
1. Vocation is sacred. Being a student, a friend, one’s job, an adult member of a congregation, are all vocations. The “priesthood of all believers” strengthens the fundamental dignity of the rhythms of our lives as our arena to praise God and love our neighbor. To help “flesh out” the vocation of church membership I stressed five tangible things when I taught confirmation:
1. Regular worship and reception of the sacrament.
2. A regular money offering.
3. A piece of ministry all their own (taking an elderly neighbor shopping, teaching Sunday School, etc.)
4. Some form of continued growth in the word (at home, Bible class, etc.)
5. Daily prayer for the ministry of the church and those in need.
In the Gospel for Reformation Sunday in John, chapter 8 Jesus says to us: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
Those who are grasped by the truth of the Gospel have the freedom to be for the world, to serve the neighbor. That, finally, is the power of the reformation. What began as a crisis in pastoral care, in a concern that we not seek to escape from a confrontation with our mortality and a life apart from God (which we call sin), is a powerful word to us: the Gospel sets us free for truth, for service, for living for others. That alone authentically renews and reforms the church. St. Luke’s future will not come through schemes for survival, but from the truth that we are set free to serve in an always renewing and reforming mission.
“On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was passing along between Samaria and Galilee. And as he entered a village, he was met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance, who lifted up their voices…” Lepers who stood at a distance. That is the heartbreaking thing about leprosy. It is a disease which not only attacks the body, but also isolates the soul. A leper is extremely contagious.