Note from Pastor Mark;

Dear Friends, My daily blog has been anything but lately. I may rename it ‘Pastor Mark’s Occasional Devotional Blog’! In any event, my wife Linda has been coping with pneumonia for the last month or so and that has been my priority. We took some time away so she could rest and she is slowly getting better. Thanks to all of you who have offered your prayers and concern.

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Colossians 1

 “…we have not ceased praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you may lead lives worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, as you bear fruit in every good work and as you grow in the knowledge of God.”

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 Someone asked me a while back why a layperson always prays the Prayer of the Church during our worship. It’s a good question. Is it because we are trying to include laity in the leading of worship? Well, that’s a part of it but it is not the main reason. In order to answer the question we need to ask about the nature of the Prayer of the Church itself. What is going on in this prayer that would make it more than appropriate for a layperson to take the lead?

The prayer begins by expressing those concerns that are central for us in these words,; “Let us pray for the whole people of God in Christ Jesus and for all people according to their needs.” Our prayer, like our Christian life, is concerned for both Church and world. Each of the petitions of the prayer go on to highlight the specifics of those concerns.

The answer to the question above, therefore, is simple. The Prayer of the Church is appropriately led by a layperson (it is also often called the Prayer of the People) because this prayer reflects the commitments of the congregation and it’s ministry. Just as when you bring before God those things that are important to you, the things that matter to you, in the same way the Prayer of the Church brings before God and the community those concerns which animate our ministry. 

In His earthly ministry, our Lord Jesus Christ perfectly integrated His prayers and His work. Words and deeds were one action. His words and deeds led to the Cross and our salvation. Our prayers and work are not like His. At the same time, we are the body of Christ, a people set apart to both pray for and serve the world. The Spirit of Christ is at work in and among the words and deeds of His people and in the power of that Spirit we are encouraged to make our concerns known and do to something about them.

In this respect, therefore, the person leading the Prayer of the Church during our worship always represents an unspoken question; “Who among us is attending to these things we pray for?’

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“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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“Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To the exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappado’cia, Asia, and Bithyn’ia, 
chosen and destined by God the Father…”.

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To be Christian is to be chosen. This is the language 1 Peter puts forward in the face of our belief that we are choosers. He uses other words equally as disturbing as they put us in the passive role; destined, called, sent, saved.

What about being free to choose, being responsible, having some role, having a say in something that so dramatically effects my life? I want a will that’s free to choose.

But there it is; “…chosen and destined by God the Father…”. And it is not only Peter who says it, Paul says it (in fact, using the term ‘elected’), John says it, Jeremiah says it, it’s all over the place in the Bible. What are we to make of it, we who believe we are free?

For the Christian freedom results precisely from our being chosen. The knowledge that we are chosen by God means that we are now free to serve the neighbor and the world and we are free from self-service and the religion projects of self-salvation.

When we can rejoice in our salvation by using words like destined, called, sent, saved, when we can pick up the vocabulary of faith in such a way that our freedom claims give way to the heart of the Gospel; then we may rejoice in that freedom that is truly defining of Christian faith and life; the freedom of God that chooses, by grace alone, to love sinners.

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“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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“He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; for in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities–all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”

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Jesus has lots of spinoffs –  words, expressions and titles which amplify the one name; grace, justification by faith, forgiveness, Mediator of a new covenant, the Vine, Lord, Lamb of God, Savior, Redeemer, and many more. They all say something important about Jesus, something to which the Bible bears witness. But what is truly non-negotiable when speaking of Jesus? Can we reduce what He means to any one or even a combination of some of these? I would say no. What is non-negotiable is the all-inclusive name of Jesus itself.

For example, you can squeeze an idea like ‘love’ out of Jesus until you don’t need Jesus any longer. You can find love mentioned in some other context, in some other religion, and conclude that the idea of love is what is central, that those who speak of love are speaking of the same thing. The same can be said of grace, faith, hope and so forth. To this way of thinking, religions are like a variety of fruits in a bowl, each can be squeezed for it’s essence and you end up with more or less the same thing.

But this is precisely what we must not do as Christians. The name of Jesus must never be discarded as secondary, go unheard or unsaid. Even to speak of God and the Holy Spirit are not adequate in giving expression to the heart of the Christian witness. Apart from the name of Jesus – and the entire Biblical witness to what he said and did –  these other two names become ciphers and may be filled with any available content. 

The name of Jesus is also non-negotiable because to speak of Jesus is bring into focus the center of everything. This is precisely what Paul is putting forward in the letter to the Colossians. The maturing of faith understands ‘everything’ in an expansive sense. First, everything in my life, then everything in the Church. From there everything means everything in the entire human community, then everything in the whole world until we see the name of Jesus reflecting that which underlies the cosmos and all reality.  It is in the light of this awareness that the New Testament falls all over itself as the words, titles and expressions describing Jesus like a great waterfall cascade over the precipice of meaning in the attempt to speak in the widest, grandest, most inclusive terms of the name that is above every name.

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“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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 “But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.”

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Years ago I sat with a couple who were preparing for marriage. The young woman ran through a lengthy list of all the reasons she could think of as to why she loved her fiance. He was generous, hard-working, handsome, thoughtful, funny, and so forth. When it was time for the young man to speak he said,” I don’t need a reason to love her. I just love her.” He was not far from the Kingdom!

When we examine the Bible it does not provide us with God’s reasons for loving. Nowhere is there an assessment of humanity from God’s vantage point where He lists our numerous virtues as reason for loving us. If anything, the Bible is a collection of evidence that suggests there is not much lovable about us. Our generous self-assessments are not reflected in the mirror of heaven. This is hard for us to take, to be sure. There must be something in me that God values, something I can do or be, some potential, at least, that God sees in me.

The key verse that says it all is this one, “But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” There is no expression of worth or value here that motivated God to spend Himself for us. Jesus gave Himself for the unlovely, unlovable and ungodly – for us. 

Human love examines the attractive attributes of the other to look for something WORTH loving. The agape’ love of God seeks no such validation. God loves. Period. Such love is a stunning reversal of our way. Doubtless God is deeply concerned with us and all our works and all our ways, but they do not serve as the basis for His love. In Christ, God loves us for no other reason than He chooses to do so. That is His glory, and our hope.

“May the peace of god that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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“The kingdom of God is in your midst.”

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In the first century Rome ruled the world of the Jews and Christians. Their kingdom stretched as far as their influence was felt. And the primary way it was felt was through the collection of taxes. If the rule or reign of Rome could collect taxes it meant that they had successfully imposed military and political power. Their power could be felt. It actually did something.

The kingdom of God was never an abstraction for our Lord Jesus nor was it only a future hope. When Jesus spoke of God’s kingdom He was not teaching geography, He was speaking of kingdom in the same sense that He would have spoken of the rule and influence of Rome. He was speaking of the presence of God’s rule, God’s influence here and now. When Jesus began preaching He did not say, ‘Some day the kingdom of God will be among you.’ What he did say was, “The kingdom of God is in your midst”, or “The kingdom is within you.” God’s rule, God’s influence can be felt. But how?

One way we speak of God’s rule, the way God influences life, is through the terms “Law and Gospel”. In the legal structures of every human community, the rule of God, God’s influence is felt as these structures serve to expose sin and restrain evil. We are creatures created to live within boundaries. God uses the structures of law to remind us, often against our will, that we are creatures and not gods. When we defy law, and therefore our creaturely limits and obligations, we encounter God’s rule as judgment.

At the same time God’s rule, God’s influence is felt through the gracious word of the Cross where God deals with the problem of sin finally and completely on His terms for us. In the speaking of the absolution and the events of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, God’s rule, God’s influence actually comes upon us as grace, forgiveness and freedom, turning us from lawbreakers into lovers, turning us back into the world to live under the influence of God’s love, mercy and grace in the here and now, even as we await the final fulfillment of his kingdom at the end of time. 

“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lamp stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.”

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On a recent trip to the mid-west, I found myself among thousands of travelers in O’hare airport in Chicago. There is no better place, I am sure, to have a sense of one’s utter insignificance! Crowds of anonymous people come and go with studied indifference to those around them. 

At the same time, should you happen to strike up a conversation with someone even for a few minutes, you suddenly become part of their history, their story. Something that is said may stay with you. You might pass it along to someone else. Or, you might have made a business connection. I heard once of a couple who met in an airport who later were married.

The season of Epiphany, which we are in now, is that time in the church year when special emphasis is placed on the light of Christ shining in the darkness. That’s another way of saying that God is not anonymous. In Jesus, who we call the Messiah, God has become part of His own history and ours. And when someone becomes part of your story, it is not an abstraction. It makes an impact, a difference.

Many historical figures have made their impact on the wider world. The war tactics of Alexander, picked up by the Romans, continue to define military operations up to the present. The writings of the Roman orator, Cicero, were one of the most important influences on the development of  the European and American systems of governance. Four lads from Liverpool catalyzed the adolescent hysteria of a generation, which has never fully calmed down.

When you were baptized, your history and God’s history were joined in the intimacy of the Spirit. Adoption is one word we use for it. In conformity with the entire trajectory of the biblical witness to Emmanuel, God took the initiative to enter the numbing anonymity of a sinful world and a sinful life – yours. In baptism God entered your story, to claim you as His own by His grace, to be God with and for you, to make you a living member of His body, the Church.  But what difference does it make? If living by grace does not in some real, tangible sense become our way of life then are not our claims to life with God nothing but a religious abstraction, a vague, internal ‘spirituality’ which makes no real difference in our lives?

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“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

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An old parable tells of a man who was offered one wish by the gods. They would grant him anything. The man thought for a moment and replied, “I wish that all laughter would be on my side.” The gods were so pleased with his response they gave him everything else to boot.

What the man was asking was that he would never be the object of laughter, that he would never be the butt of the joke.

St. Paul, in one sense is saying, if you are part of the Gospel you will appear as foolish, you are going to be the butt of the joke. But what is it about the Cross, the word of the Gospel that seems to be foolishness? And why, at the same time, can this same cross be called the “power and wisdom of God”?

The simple fact is that Jesus failed to meet our standards of what it means to be God, to be a savior. In fact, it was the accusation of blasphemy that lead to his crucifixion. This one who carried no obvious credentials of divinity, claimed to be God. What a fool! Away with him!, they cried. Not much has changed.

Just consider the current crop of messiah figures in our culture; they ALL must carry the credentials of success with the message that following them, emulating them will lead you to success also. All of our redeemers are supposed to bring off redemption at little cost to themselves and at no cost to us.

Jesus, the one we call our Lord, did not come as some kind of Superman, dying on a kryptonite cross only to emerge from the phone booth of the empty tomb, ready to grant every wish. His cross exposes us at that place where God’s grace and human sin intersect. The craziness of the Christian Gospel says to us, the power and wisdom of our would-be redeemers is a lie. To see and to know the weakness, humiliation and rejection of the Crucified Jesus is to be brought into the very heart of God’s truth. To trust Jesus is not to organize Him into our way of life, our definitions of salvation. To entrust one’s self to Jesus is be shaped by the One for whom wisdom and success is serving, and power is expressed in a faith active in love.

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“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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…”who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”

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The holy trinity of American evangelicalism were Moody, Finney and Sunday. You can Google them and learn more if you wish. These three were the original purveyors of mass revivalism, mass evangelism and “Big Box” tents, the forerunners of “Big Box” churches. The actual peak of this form of evangelism was in the decade prior to World war I. Well over a thousand itinerant evangelists plowed the country, while hundreds of others, in established communities, developed that unique American version of showmanship religion which made the ministries in neighborhood and country churches seem dull in comparison. Sheep stealing was rampant as these free-will purveyors railed against established churches and their meaningless sacraments. During the height of it’s lather, from about 1910 to 1913, church membership in America actually declined slightly. Go figure.

For many people, confrontational revivalism (the gospel at gunpoint, as one called it) is assumed to be the default way in which the church does evangelism. Give people a choice; heaven or hell, which will it be? Everyone must make a decision. First, accept Jesus as savior, then you must make Him Lord of your life. Salvation and this life are in some strange way unrelated, separated. Salvation becomes adherence to an ideology. The Christian life becomes a morality project, a striving after perfection.

What we have going on here, it seems to me, is the religious equivalent of a sales pitch for a consumer decision about a product, rather than the proclamation of the decision God has made about sinners. And it is no accident that what has characterized these ministries from the 19th century up to the present is a reliance on the end justifies the means. All that matters is closing the deal. No method or gimmick is too outrageous, provided we can bring people to the point of decision. Then, once the decision has been made, the job is to keep the whip of spiritual growth on their backs so that Jesus will really become their Lord.

But since when does the manipulation of a sales pitch play a part in the open and free proclamation of God’s grace? The only possible way to find any of this in the New testament is to ‘cherry pick’ verses and bend them out of all shape and context.

The New Testament witness does not separate the saving work of Christ, His will to save from His will to be Lord. His Lordship and salvation are inseparable because He is the one who has done the deciding and He is the one whose life now defines the life of the Christian and Christian community. The only will that is free to do any choosing where God is concerned is God’s will. For us to claim such freedom is not the key to salvation, it is blasphemy. For it is claiming something for ourselves that belongs to God alone. 

Evangelism, therefore, is being brought by God’s grace – through Word and sacrament – to be with those whose great need is God’s concern. To trust God, to believe the Gospel, is not a consequence of my decision, it is the form God’s decision takes for me.

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“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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“[13] He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son,  [14] in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

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Martin Luther wrote in his Large Catechism, “A god is that to which we look for all good and in which we find refuge in every time of need.”

The term ‘god’ refers to that upon which your life is ordered, directed, controlled. The term ‘god’ points you to whatever it is in your life that has the last word. When understood in this way it is apparent that gods are all over the place. So, when people say that they believe or trust in god, it might be of interest to ask them to tell you about the god they believe in. You might be surprised at what you hear!

When the early Christian community got it’s wheels rolling it began to speak of God in three terms; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They did so because of what had happened to them in Jesus the Christ. Not only did they know Him as teacher and miracle worker, they also knew Him as the righteous sufferer who had been raised from the dead.

The idea of the righteous sufferer being raised from death was already present in Judaism. But this is not how the early Christians experienced the Resurrection. For, if Jesus had been raised under those terms, it would simply have been His private business. But when the early Christians proclaimed the Resurrection of Jesus, the righteous one, it included everyone. It was proclaimed as a cosmic event. In the Resurrection of Jesus they were let in on the final meaning of the universe. The ultimate meaning of the history of the universe comes only at the end of all things when the last word on the meaning of every event and every person is spoken.

The early Christians recognized that the end of all things, the last word, had suddenly appeared in the midst of the unfinished business of history. By abandoning Himself utterly to the death, to powerlessness in the name of the Father, Jesus was raised from powerlessness and now life was proclaimed to be stronger than death. When the early Church, then, called God Father and Son, they were at least in part, referring to this mysterious intimacy between Jesus and the Father by which this God defeated the powers of death and meaningless. Death no longer has the last word. Life has the last word.

The Holy Spirit, then, becomes a way of speaking about how this life of God continually breaks open the powerless, meaningless future which appears to be dominated by death. It is not the death-dealing demonic spirits that dominate the future, it is the Holy Spirit of God who has the last word.

When we are baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, therefore, God gives us His promise that we are now being transferred from the reign of death into the reign of life. The question as to whether or not the last word in your life and the tragic life of the universe will be gracious or not is answered in the affirmative.  Baptism is God’s promise that in the midst of all life’s inconsistencies and ambiguity, you may entrust yourself to this God who has given you His name; that you may “look to Him for all good,… and find refuge in every time of need.”

“May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

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