Category: Faith

Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?” Jesus answered, “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.” Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet.” Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” Jesus said to him, “One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean. And you are clean, though not all of you.” For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, “Not all of you are clean.” After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.

When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’ I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

John 13:1-17, 31b-35

My sermon from Maundy Thursday (April 6, 2023) on John 13:1-17, 31b-35.

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Earlier today I did something I don’t usually do: I went to a podiatrist. I have an ongoing issue that isn’t serious but does require some monthly treatments. As I was leaving last months’ visit, the receptionist at the doctor’s office wondered if I could come in next on April 6. That date sounded familiar to me but I didn’t have anything written down on my calendar. I made the appointment, went about my life, and it was only a few days later when I realized what I had done. On a night when feet are all over our reading from the gospel according to John, I was going to spend that morning having one of my poked and prodded by a doctor. The visit was… fine and I spent the rest of the day with only a tiny bit of pain while I prepared the sanctuary for worship. The discomfort from this morning’s treatment lingers but I am grateful I live in a place where access to medical care – using my wife’s health insurance – is readily accessible. By taking care of what holds me up, I’m able to pray, preach, wash, and serve. My feet working the way they do is not the limit of what ministry looks like since Jesus chooses all kinds of people with all kinds of bodies and with all kinds of abilities to further the kingdom of God. But I do think, though, that Jesus wants us to pay attention to what holds us up because that’s how we get through whatever comes next. 

Now one of the details that brings this idea out is something I hadn’t really noticed before. In the past, my attention has been focused on either Jesus’ actions or Peter’s reaction. Jesus, in the middle of a dinner, stood up, took off his outer robe, tied a towel around his waist, and then poured water into a basin. We can almost imagine the disciples sort of wondering what exactly Jesus was up to. The more Jesus went through the motions, the more the disciples could tell what he was doing because, right before dinner, their feet had already been washed. The streets in ancient Jerusalem were a bit of a mess since mechanical street sweepers, indoor plumbing, and regular garbage collection wasn’t a real thing. Apartments within the city were small and cramped which meant people spent most of their lives outside. Everything that ended up on the street would end up on people’s feet. And it was considered a basic act of hospitality to help guests leave what’s outside – outside when they entered someone’s home. People could wash their feet by themselves but it was considered more respectful to have someone in your household do that for every guest who walked through your doors. This gross task required a person to physically kneel at someone else’s feet which could be a problem in a world with clear definitions of who was, and who wasn’t, your social better. If a teacher, leader, influencer, or someone with a lot of money suddenly found themselves washing the feet of a student, a woman, someone enslaved or who was poor – the shame for both the washer and the washee would reverberate throughout their social circles. To avoid such a social faux pas, only the lowest of the lows in the household would wash people’s feet. The person who knelt before was supposed to be someone who you would never kneel to. Jesus, though, did exactly that which is why Peter’s reaction is completely understandable. Peter cried out because Jesus, who could literally walk on water, was acting as if he was nothing. Jesus gave up the honor he was given to spread water on the feet of those who were beneath him. That, on its own, was pretty shocking but that wasn’t the only reason Peter tried to change what Jesus was doing into a kind of baptism. Jesus wasn’t simply degrading himself; he also was implying that those following Jesus were worth more than Jesus himself. Jesus’ actions changed Peter from merely being a disciple into something more. Jesus took on the identity of the poor, the enslaved, the women, and the ones who were always at the bottom of the heap – to raise his disciples up and act like they were more than him. If Jesus had simply told the disciples to wash each other’s feet, Peter would have had no problem since they were all on the same social level. But on the night when he was handed over to the Roman authorities, Jesus showed these disciples that they would be more than they could ever imagine themselves to be. 

So with all that going on, you’d expect for the other disciples to speak up. Yet we have no idea what Andrew, Thomas, Philip, or even Judas thought when Jesus knelt at their feet. It’s possible each one behaved like Peter, completely freaking out when their teacher served them. But there’s enough space within the story to imagine that they didn’t. Maybe some were completely grossed out since they didn’t want their feet touched while they were eating. Maybe some of them sort of understood what Jesus was getting or weren’t really paying attention since they had a secret that was about to be revealed. We often make Jesus and Peter the foreground of this story but the other disciples, including Judas, were right there too. The feet washing, the feeding, and the blessing also included them because Jesus knew what was about to come next. After the washing, Judas would leave and their sense of community would come undone. Every one of their thoughts, expectations, and dreams about the future would soon be nailed to a Cross. The disciples believed they knew what held them up but that was going to completely fall apart. Jesus wanted the disciples – every disciple – to know that something else, something more, would bring them through. It wasn’t their faithfulness or strength or wealth or all the social accolades in the world that would lead them through what was going to come next. Rather, through it all, the One who claimed them as His own, would be there – because they, through baptism and faith, would be part of the body of Christ, forever. They were already more than who they could ever imagine themselves to be because the God of the universe chose them to serve and kneel at the feet of their friends. Through the love they shared with one another, they would be carried through. And when every Cross came their way, Jesus would be there to show them what love will do. 

Amen.

Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother Lazarus was ill. So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” But when Jesus heard it, he said, “This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, after having heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.” The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?” Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world. But those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not in them.” After saying this, he told them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.” The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.” Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep. Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead. For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.” Thomas, who was called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.” When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?” Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”
Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.

John 11:1-45

My sermon from the Fifth Sunday in Lent (March 26, 2023) on John 11:1-45.

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Two verses. Two verses are all John used to narrate one of the most dramatic moments in his book. Jesus, while standing outside Lazarus’ tomb, commanded him to come out – and he did. We would expect such a miraculous event to be described with a bit more detail since this kind of thing doesn’t happen every day. Yet what John gave us was a few of Jesus’ words and this mental picture of Lazarus wrapped in cloth. If we were the ones describing this moment, we’d probably flesh it out so that even Lazarus’ footsteps coming out of the tomb could be heard. But John, who is very good at adding the details needed to heighten the emotional and theological importance of any scene, spent his energy writing about everything that came before and after this moment. When we listen to this story, it’s reasonable for us to imagine the good news being tied to what Lazarus experienced since we’ve often wanted our loved ones to experience the same thing too. And yet, for John, the miracle that feels like it should be everything is only a tiny portion to what the gospel – the good news of Jesus Christ – is all about.

Now during the season of Lent, I’ve invited us to try and summarize our experience of the gospel into 50 words or less. We’ve been talking about it for five weeks and it still feels like a big ask. The word “gospel,” aka good news, was originally tied to the proclamations made in the ancient world by emperors, kings, and queens. But it became associated with Jesus either during, or immediately, after his public ministry. Paul, who wrote several letters to a variety of early Christian communities scattered around the Mediterranean Sea, summarized this gospel in his first letter to the Christian community in the ancient Greek town of Corinth. He wrote: the gospel is that “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas [aka Peter], then to the twelve.” For Paul, Jesus’ story revealed God’s story while also showed how people are included in what God was up to. The good news wasn’t only about what Jesus did but also how he showed up to people who were busy living their lives. We see this same idea in John’s own summary of the gospel, way back in chapter 3, when he wrote: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” Bishop Craig Satterlee, while reflecting on John 3:16, made his own draft of the gospel to be that: God became human in Jesus and gave himself to the world, to be with us in everything, even the most horrible death; to draw the world to life God intends; and, by God’s Spirit, to free and empower us to live God’s abundant life now, because God loves us. These 3 examples might not be exactly how we would describe the gospel yet they reveal how Jesus showing up in our lives is part of what this good news is all about.

And that idea, I think, is why John took 37 verses to bring us, and Jesus, to Lazarus’ tomb. Jesus, at the end of chapter 10, is many miles away on the other side of the Jordan river, preaching and teaching to those who came to see him. While there, he received a message from Martha and Mary that Lazarus was sick. And we get the sense that Jesus and this family knew each other very well. Their relationship was so close that Mary and Martha knew how to send a message to this wandering preacher who didn’t stay in any one place for very long. When Jesus heard their message, he did something that I still struggle to understand. He waited, choosing to stay where he was for two days. It’s possible he had things or people around him he needed to take care of. Yet his hesitation also seems to match our own experiences of God since our prayers aren’t always answered as quickly as we wished. By the time Jesus met up with Lazarus’ family, Martha’s words became the ones we’ve said many times over. She, in her grief and through faith, wonders where Jesus has been. She doesn’t try to hide her emotions; nor is she anything other than who she is. She is fully herself and, in response, Jesus accepts her. He doesn’t dismiss her grief; or belittle her faith or hide what he’s going to do. Instead, he listens and then invites Martha to notice what God has already been doing. In their short back-and-forth, we see that Martha, like many of us, imagines – or at least acts – as if the good news only pertains to the future after we live our life. The news we see and hold onto applies to that moment when we meet God at the edge of forever, assuming our goodness will be accepted and held true. If the gospel was only about what comes next, then Jesus’ words identifying himself as “the resurrection” makes sense. But then he chose to keep going, pointing out how he was meant for the living of our lives too. The gospel isn’t only about our past or our future. This good news speaks into this moment because God is already invested in our lives.

So what exactly does this living look like? Well, it sometimes resembles what we will be doing [at our 10:30 am worship] [in just a few minutes] when we proclaim that God isn’t done forming us into the community we’re meant to be. We will welcome and celebrate the change that is coming to us as God baptizes Avery – a child who is already known and loved. With a little water, a dab of oil, and the light of a burning candle, she will hear how the promises of God belong to her forever. The creator of the universe will listen to her; care for her; and will value her even when others don’t. She will never be alone and we will be given the responsibility to model what this commitment from God actually looks like. While she lives her life, we will cry together, mourn together, celebrate together, talk back to God together, and become who we’re meant to be. Through it all, we will be led by God, who, in Jesus, showed us what life can be. The gospel for John, I think, isn’t about all the amazing things Jesus could do. Rather, it was how Jesus, who could do the impossible, chose to live and love and be with the rest of us – forever.

Avery’s summary of the gospel, like ours, will be shaped and formed through the life she lives. It will ebb, flow, change, and grow with this Jesus who will be with her through all things. No one word or phrase or even a fifty word summary can truly contain the fullness of what this good news can be. Yet the promise given to Martha while she was busy living her life is the same promise Jesus gives to Avery – and to us. We are seen. We are known. We are meant to bring the good news of Jesus into every aspect of our lives. And I hope and pray that Avery will, throughout her life, experience a little bit of what the gospel has meant to my life: specifically that the God who holds everything together isn’t done with anyone.

Amen.

As [Jesus] walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “[Neither this man nor his parents sinned. In order that God’s works might be revealed in him, ] we must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” When he had said this, he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva and spread the mud on the man’s eyes, saying to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). Then he went and washed and came back able to see.

The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar began to ask, “Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?” Some were saying, “It is he.” Others were saying, “No, but it is someone like him.” He kept saying, “I am the man.” But they kept asking him, “Then how were your eyes opened?” He answered, “The man called Jesus made mud, spread it on my eyes, and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ Then I went and washed and received my sight.” They said to him, “Where is he?” He said, “I do not know.”

They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. Now it was a sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. Then the Pharisees also began to ask him how he had received his sight. He said to them, “He put mud on my eyes. Then I washed, and now I see.” Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not observe the sabbath.” But others said, “How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?” And they were divided. So they said again to the blind man, “What do you say about him? It was your eyes he opened.” He said, “He is a prophet.” The [Jewish leaders] did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight and asked them, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?” His parents answered, “We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but we do not know how it is that now he sees, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself.” His parents said this because they were afraid of the [Jewish leaders]; for [they]had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. Therefore his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.” So for the second time they called the man who had been blind, and they said to him, “Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner.” He answered, “I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.” They said to him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?” He answered them, “I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?” Then they reviled him, saying, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.” The man answered, “Here is an astonishing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.” They answered him, “You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?” And they drove him out.

Jesus heard that they had driven him out, and when he found him, he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” He answered, “And who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him.” Jesus said to him, “You have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he.” He said, “Lord, I believe.” And he worshiped him.

Jesus said, “I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind.” Some of the Pharisees near him heard this and said to him, “Surely we are not blind, are we?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains.

John 9:1-41

My sermon from the Fourth Sunday in Lent (March 19, 2023) on John 9:1-41.

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Over the last few weeks, I’ve invited all of us to pay attention to our personal experience of the gospel. God’s good news is good news that makes a real difference in our lives. Yet that also makes the gospel a bit hard to describe since what’s good news to you might not be good news to the person sitting next to you. When I talk about the gospel, I use those moments in my life when God felt very real to me as examples for what this good news is all about. Those moments tend to be pretty scary, filled with grief and worry. God shows up to me when the boundary between life and death becomes a bit too blurred and the only thing I can do is rely on the God who is always with me. But this experience might not be your experience since God also comes to us through joy. The joy from God surrounds you, inspires you, and carries you through all the stuff life brings. And while my fifty word summary of the good news might not be as upbeat as the one you would write, both, I think, are necessary for us to flesh out what God is doing in our world. When we create the space needed to share all of our stories, we discover how God’s story is big enough to contain them all. And one way we notice this is by letting the story of God as recorded in our Bible show us how the good news will transform us into something more. 

Now there are many different metaphors we could use to describe what the Bible is all about. The one I use the most often comes from Martin Luther who described the Bible as the manager of Christ for us. Bishop Craig Satterlee, who I quoted last week, recently described the Bible as “the written record of God’s initiative and activity in human history and the world.” It is, in essence, a collection of God’s family’s story which, for Christians, is always rooted in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. One mental image we could use to hold together this collection of stories is to imagine it as a pond filled with water and then Jesus, as a rock, is dropped in its center. The ripples made by Jesus’ presence in the world radiate outward through time and space, thus shaping what these stories mean to us. When we read the Bible in a devotional, worshipful, or prayerful way, we look for the presence of Jesus. And while that isn’t always an easy thing to do, one way we start this process is by listening to the passage and asking: what’s the good news?  

Now I’ll admit I was ready to share with all of you my point of view about what the good news is in our long reading from John chapter 9. But when I sat down to write this part of the sermon, I read another sermon by a retired ELCA pastor that made me realize his experience of the gospel in this story is a bit more relevant than my own. Duane Steele was ordained in 1978 and he served for 32 years at Gladesboro Evangelical Lutheran Church in Hillsville, Virginia. He had a long and faithful ministry that has continued by subbing in for other preachers when they go on vacation. Pastor Steele has a very personal connection to the story of the man born blind because he, as well, has been blind his entire life. Instead of letting my own story be the lens through which Jesus’ story comes to life, I’m going to create some space to let Pastor Steele’s story reveal his experience of the gospel by quoting him at length.

I know what it’s like to live in the shadow of powerful labels… because I myself have been totally blind all my life. My earliest memories of going to church include the awkward whispers of neighbors who quietly asked my family if there might be any hope that I would be able to see someday. I wasn’t ashamed of being blind, but I did feel humiliated by the attitudes of people who were whispering about me as though I weren’t really there. Many people are so afraid of the dark, they simply can’t get past the word “blind” to see a real person beyond the label.

When Jesus and his disciples first encountered the man in John 9, the disciples assumed the man’s blindness was some kind of punishment for sin — and unfortunately, this attitude still exists today, even in our churches, where disability and sin are still being linked together in weird ways…. Jesus [though] clearly rejected this idea in John 9:3, saying, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” Some preachers interpret this to mean the man was born blind so that Jesus could come along and perform a miracle for all to see, but this interpretation robs the man of his humanity, reducing him to a mere prop in the story. Even the use of the word “healing” to describe this miracle implies that there was originally something “wrong” or “broken” about this man’s blindness, which seems quite the opposite of what Jesus was saying…Jesus made it clear that blindness does not prevent [anyone] from doing God’s will.

The neighbors assumed the man in John 9 had spent his life as a beggar, merely surviving instead of living out a real vocation. Jesus changed all that by giving the man not only eyesight but also a sense of mission. After performing a fairly common ancient medical procedure with saliva and mud, Jesus directed the man to wash in the Pool of Siloam, which we are told means “Sent.”

My Grandma Steele sent me to my own “Pool of Siloam,” which took the form of the New York Institute for the Education of the Blind, a school in the Bronx that provided the best education blind children of the 1950s and ’60s could receive. There, in addition to learning the usual academic subjects, I also became proficient in braille, I studied in a conservatory-level music program, and I made many lifelong friendships. Nowadays, most blind kids go to public school and hopefully learn similar skills while being part of diverse communities in their own neighborhoods. For us, “healing” happens when the people around us learn to heal their ignorance about us, when they learn to truly love and welcome us, when they realize that what we think and say and do matters.

The man in John 9 emerged from the Pool of Siloam with a sense of mission and self-worth that shocked his neighbors. They could not believe he was the same person, so they dragged him off to be examined by the local religious authorities.

The man in John 9 was [eventually] driven out of his community as punishment for his testimony, and when Jesus heard about this, he welcomed him as one of the many disciples who were spreading the Good News…In the Kingdom of God, we wear no labels other than our identity as the children of God… John 9 reminds us there is no blind or sighted, no “disabled” or “normal” — ALL of God’s children are called to live lives of discipleship in various ways…Our secular culture teaches us to compete or conform, but God calls us to a different way: working together, needing each other, [and] being the body of Christ.

For Pastor Steele, the good news in this story is the Jesus who chose, welcomed, and provided a sense of self-worth, love, value, and mission to the one the rest of us cast aside. Our good news might not be exactly like Pastor Steele’s good news yet his experience is meant for you too. You, as you are, are not an afterthought in the kingdom of God because you have been called to share, proclaim, and show what God’s love can do. As we wonder what our own fifty word summary of the gospel might be, it’s perfectly fine to lean on the words and stories in our Bible that help us discover how we are part of God’s story too. And we realize how this good news is more than simply words, we begin to participate in this gospel that challenges, upends, welcomes, includes, and transforms all our lives. 

Amen. 

⁵ So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ⁶ Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.

⁷ A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” ⁸ (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) ⁹ The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) ¹⁰ Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” ¹¹ The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? ¹² Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?” ¹³ Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, ¹⁴ but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” ¹⁵ The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”
¹⁶ Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” ¹⁷ The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband,’ ¹⁸ for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!” ¹⁹ The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. ²⁰ Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” ²¹ Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. ²² You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. ²³ But the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. ²⁴ God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” ²⁵ The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” ²⁶ Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.”

²⁷ Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you want?” or, “Why are you speaking with her?” ²⁸ Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, ²⁹ “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” ³⁰ They left the city and were on their way to him.

³¹ Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” ³² But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” ³³ So the disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to eat?” ³⁴ Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. ³⁵ Do you not say, ‘Four months more, then comes the harvest’? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. ³⁶ The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. ³⁷ For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ ³⁸ I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”

³⁹ Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I have ever done.” ⁴⁰ So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. ⁴¹ And many more believed because of his word. ⁴² They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”

John 4:5-42 (NRSVue)

My sermon from the Third Sunday in Lent (March 12, 2023) on John 4:5-42

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So we’re halfway through my sermon series on the word “gospel.” At its simplest, gospel is an ancient Greek word meaning “good news” and was typically used when an emperor, king, or queen wanted to make some kind of proclamation. During Jesus’ own ministry, or at least very quickly after it, that word became associated with Jesus himself. Near the end of the first century, four books about Jesus’ life and death were labeled by the early church as “the gospel according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John.” This good news speaks into every aspect of our wonderful, messy, and very human story in ways we don’t always notice or see. Yet it might seem a bit silly for us to try and summarize what that good news is since entire books in our Bible barely scratch the surface of what it all means. At this point, it might be helpful to share a couple examples of what these summaries might look like. And in fact, last week, we heard John’s own take of what the gospel is when Jesus said: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” Those 52 words are awesome but, based on the verbs alone, there’s a lot to unpack. Our version might use similar language like what Bishop Craig Satterlee of the North/West Lower Michigan Synod did when he crafted his first draft of the gospel in 50 words or less. He wrote: God became human in Jesus and gave himself to the world, to be with us in everything, even the most horrible death; to draw the world to life God intends; and, by God’s Spirit, to free and empower us to live God’s abundant life now, because God loves us. That sounds fairly but it also feels a little stilted – missing that emotion about why this is good news for us. The good news of Jesus Christ is for everyone but that doesn’t mean the gospel is generic. The good news is good news – and today’s story from the gospel according to John might help us notice where in our own stories, the words for this good news might be found.

Now Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well is actually the longest one-on-one conversation Jesus had with anyone in the gospels. We know, from his sermon on the mount and his farewell message to his friends at the Last Supper, that Jesus could be a bit of a talker. Yet his one-on-one interactions were typically short. Jesus, after visiting Jerusalem during the first year of his public ministry, headed back to Galilee and cut through the land of the Samaritans. Geographically, this makes sense because Samaria was between those two locations. Yet for centuries, Jews and Samaritans had done everything they could to avoid running into each other. Even though they shared similar beliefs about God, they didn’t get along very well so the usual journey from Jewish Galilee to Jewish Jerusalem went around the Samaritans. Jesus, though, led his disciples into a land they wanted to avoid. And once there, they stopped at a water well that was first established by Jacob, one of Abraham’s grandsons. The disciples went off to find some food, leaving Jesus all by himself when an unnamed Samaritan woman stopped by. 

If the setup for this scene sounds a bit cheeky, that’s because it is. In Jesus’ time, wells were the stereotypical places where romantic relationships were formed, such as when Jacob met his first wife Rachel. Wells were also places where the Bible introduces to us important women like Rebekah and Zipporah. Jesus’ presence at a well with an unknown woman is meant to make our eyes get a little kooky since romance could be in the air. But this time, in the words of Professor Jennifer Garcia Bashaw, instead of meeting a “blushing soon-to-be bride,” we meet “a wedding-weary woman.” Christian preachers have, for centuries, treated this unnamed woman as some kind of hyper-sexualized harlot – a titillating sinner who excites us. We define her as someone who is morally suspect because of her rather lengthy martial history. And the fact we don’t know her name invites us to turn her into a fantasy that shames her – which says more about us than it does about her. Yet it’s interesting how Jesus doesn’t do what we do. He doesn’t shame her or belittle her or really say anything about her marital relations. All he does is notice her and how she, unlike him, is prepared to actually be there. I imagine when she first spotted him that she did all she could to avoid him. But Jesus refused to let their cultural, religious, ethnic, and gender identities keep them apart. Unprompted, he initiated contact by demanding a drink of water without even saying please. She could have ignored him or, since he was a strange man, engaged in some small talk as a way to keep Jesus away. She, though, chose to engage with him – even making a joke comparing him to Jacob who created and fell in love at a well. Her words could have focused on their differences but she, in her own way, named what united them together. Jacob was, after all, “our ancestor” – which other Jews and Samaritans might not have agreed with. Jesus could have pushed back about what she said, affirming his own distinctive religious and cultural identity. Yet he, instead, used her words as a kind of foundational moment to reveal who this good news is for. 

By the time we get to Jesus’ statement about her husband, we’ve already started to notice how her marital status wasn’t what defined her. Her past is, most likely, not her fault. Because, as a woman, she was not in a position to “initiate divorce” and it’s possible she had been widowed or pushed aside by the many different men in her life. She might have even felt expendable but, in Jesus, she was indispensable. When she finally felt comfortable enough to reveal to this stranger her own thoughts about faith, God, and who the Messiah might be; Jesus said “I am (he.)” Our translation of this passage while, understandable, obscures what Jesus actually said. Rather than a rather mundane “I am he,” the actual Greek words match what God said when Moses asked for God’s name. Throughout the gospel of John, the “I am” statements usually come in two forms: either when it makes up the bulk of Jesus’ side of the conversation or when he connects it to things like “I am the bread of life.” But it’s here, while chatting with a Samaritan woman, that Jesus makes this specific “I am” claim as the Messiah which he doesn’t do with anyone else. He entrusted to this very unlikely person the truth about how he was and, in the process, revealed to her the truth of who she could become. 

It’s very easy, I think, to let the gospel be generic since we’re not sure if we really are the best ones to share what  this Jesus thing is all about. We’re grateful to be part of Jesus’ family yet when it comes to the gospel, we assume that someone else – who is a bit more faithful, a bit more charismatic, or maybe with a more interesting story – should be the one to share this good news with others. A generic sounding gospel feels a bit more safe since it can’t be contaminated by those, like us, whose faith isn’t always that strong. But Jesus, as we see in today’s story, didn’t choose just anyone to receive the good news: He chose you. You, right now, are necessary for what God is doing in this world. And during those moments when you, like the woman at the well, feel valued, loved, included, and seen rather than shamed – that’s when Jesus made himself real to you. Those are the moments in our lives that help us find the words and phrases that show how this good news is good for you. And we don’t need to be afraid to let the gospel include parts of our real story because Jesus has already included you in His. 

Amen. 

Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. ² He came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with that person.” ³ Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” ⁴ Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” ⁵ Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. ⁶ What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷ Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ ⁸ The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” ⁹ Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” ¹⁰ Jesus answered him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?

¹¹ “Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen, yet you do not receive our testimony. ¹² If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? ¹³ No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. ¹⁴ And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵ that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

¹⁶ “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
¹⁷ “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him.

John 3:1-17 (NRSVue)

My sermon from the Second Sunday in Lent (March 5, 2023) on John 3:1-17.

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A few weeks ago, I participated in a meeting at my local high school that was really a conversation trying to create some action items the group could work on for the future. We were going to do some structured brainstorming around a complicated topic that impacts students, parents, teachers, and administrators. For this meeting to work, we needed a few ground rules to help keep the conversation focused and on track. So after re-introducing ourselves to one another, we talked about how we respectfully talk with each other. The rules we agreed to were mostly common sense like choosing to stay engaged by not staring at our phones when someone else was speaking. Yet a few rules had to be specific to the conversation we were having since participants were invited to share their own personal stories with all its wonder, joy, tears, and sorrow. These stories might make us laugh or cry or get really defensive since they could challenge what we believe about ourselves and our world. But the one ground rule that jumped out at me the most was how some of the stories we share might not include any closure that the rest of us could grab onto. Instead of listening to an experience with a well defined beginning, middle, and end, participants in that conversation might reveal something that’s still ongoing and might never end. These stories, especially those full of grief, worry, anxiety, insecurity, and discrimination, don’t always have an ending wrapped up with a neat little bow. The person sharing the story might stop speaking but that doesn’t mean that their story is over. We needed to expect and accept that the conversation created by the stories we shared wouldn’t actually end once our time together came to a close. And instead of seeking a kind of closure that we believe will give us peace, we should keep ourselves open to the new life this conversation might bring. 

Now today’s reading from the gospel according to John takes place at the beginning of John’s version of Jesus’ story. Jesus, after being pushed by his mother, turned water into wine at a private wedding before heading to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. While in the city, Jesus became a bit of a public nuisance after nearly starting a riot when he drove out of the Temple the businesses helping people, especially travelers from far away, to perform the sacrifices the Bible asked them to do. Jesus’ act of driving the money changers and the animals out of the Temple increased his visibility among the leaders within the city. This is probably why Nicodemus, a local religious and political leader, came to see Jesus. He was curious – but also needed to be cautious. Nicodemus came to Jesus in the middle of the night, making sure no one else would see him. We get this sense that Nicodemus arrived unannounced, as if he walked into Jesus’ room without even knocking on the door. And once he was there, Nicodemus immediately began to speak, offering a kind of introductory statement that helps us see who Nicodemus imagined Jesus to be. He called him a Rabbi, a teacher, which might have been Nicodemus’ way of connecting Jesus to a known religious group within Judaism – the Pharisees. We also learn that Jesus was doing more in Jerusalem at the start of his public ministry than simply starting riots. Nicodemus had seen or heard how Jesus had begun to show what it means when the kingdom of God was near. To me, Nicodemus was very sincere in this moment even if we don’t know, fully, why he was with Jesus in the first place. Yet within his introductory words to Jesus, I hear a question that we are still asking today. Nicodemus wanted to know who Jesus was and why he mattered, which is a sensible question to ask Jesus at the start of his public ministry. Yet we, 2000 years after the Resurrection, wonder the same thing. We call him the Son of God, part of the Trinity, our Savior – but what that actually means is difficult to describe and even harder to live out. Being faithful isn’t always easy and asking who Jesus is – is a very faithful question especially during those times when a life without faith or a life with an inconsequential faith seems to work for plenty of folks around us. At the beginning of Jesus’ story, Nicodemus wondered if what he saw and heard about Jesus might be true and we often have the same question too. 

Now Jesus could have answered Nicodemus’ question right away with the answer we view THE answer to every Jesus question. He could have simply begun with John 3:16 as the good news meant for Nicodemus and the world. But it’s interesting that Jesus chooses to handle the entire conversation differently. He doesn’t rattle off a list of things Nicodemus should believe in nor does he give him a checklist of what is needed to earn eternal life. Jesus doesn’t begin his response by identifying himself as the Son of God or by pointing to himself as God on earth. Rather, Jesus looks at Nicodemus with compassion and offers a series of words to keep their conversation going. These words and phrases, while foundational to our Christian proclamation and to what we teach and share, are a bit weird, containing layers of meaning that would take a lifetime to unpack. Yet these weird words work because Nicodemus stayed engaged – asking questions that we, in his place, would ask too. The back and forth between the two includes references to Nicodemus’ own life and the sacred words that shaped who he was in the world. Jesus, way before his words in John 3:16, took the time to engage and form a relationship with this one who came to visit him in the dark. And after 3:16, he kept speaking – revealing how the good news was meant not only for the world but for Nicodemus too. 

We would expect that after such an encounter with Jesus, we would receive some kind of closure when it comes to Nicodemus’ story. He would either reject Jesus, accept Jesus, or sort of fade away into the background, never to be heard from again. Yet Nicodemus’ story with Jesus is a bit complicated because we never hear his response to Jesus after he heard words that would eventually be plastered on bumper stickers, flags, t-shirts, and faded yard signs all over northern New Jersey 2000 years later. Their time together in the middle of the night came to an end but that didn’t bring any closure to their story. Instead, Jesus’ relationship with Nicodemus continued and we see Nicodemus two more times in the gospel according to John. For a brief moment in chapter 7, Nicodemus stands up for Jesus when other leaders tried to condemn him without a trial. And then, twelve chapters later and after Jesus died on the Cross, we watch as Nicodemus partners with Joseph of Arimathea to reverently bury Jesus in the tomb. In the years between his first meeting with Jesus in Jerusalem and that final moment in the tomb, we never hear Nicodemus’ full faith story. We never hear him confess Jesus as Savior or Lord or the Messiah. And there’s no real sense that he considered himself a follower of Jesus even though he was there when everyone else had feld. There’s no closure to Nicodemus’ faith story. The only thing we seem to see is that his connection to Jesus never seems to end. And that, maybe, is a bit of what the good news is all about. Jesus didn’t give up on Nicodemus and he, through baptism and in faith, promises to never give up on you. The good news of Jesus Christ is big enough to speak into every aspect of your wonderful, messy, and very human story. And this news isn’t meant to bring closure to our story because its purpose is to open us to God and what God is doing in our lives and in our world. As we sit with the gospel and ponder how to put our experience into words, know that one of the ground rules for this gospel is that it isn’t only for us. The good news of Jesus is for everyone – and it often weaves through our lives in ways not everyone can see. Through grace, mercy, patience, and love, Jesus continues to reach out while leading us into a new kind of life that keeps us open to all. 

Amen.

Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!” When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, “Get up and do not be afraid.” And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone. As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”

Matthew 17:1-9

My sermon from Transfiguration Sunday (February 19, 2023) on Matthew 17:1-9.

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One of the amazing things about our Bible is that it’s a really big story – but one that holds a million other stories within it. As Lutheran Christians, we proclaim the Bible to be like manger on Christmas Eve. Within these words, we meet Jesus and see God’s commitment to the world God loves. This story was given to us through writings that were pulled together over a 1400 year period by people living in and with the Spirit of God. None of that living was easy yet God’s faithfulness endured. We, in the year 2023, have been living with the Bible in its current form for roughly 1700 years. So that means we’re pretty comfortable hearing about Jesus’ birth and seeing how His story continued through the Cross. When it comes to Jesus’ story, we know what comes next. But that gift to us wasn’t initially given to those who first met Jesus while he traveled through ancient Palestine, Israel, and Syria almost 2000 years ago. John, James, Peter, and everyone else didn’t have the end of Jesus’ story to help them understand what their current experience of Jesus was all about. He was simply a prophet, a rabbi, a teacher, a miracle worker, the Messiah, and a divine presence that gave hope to those who were in need. Jesus had many layers but when their story got hard or scary or really confusing, the disciples didn’t have the entirety of Jesus’ story to fall back on. They had to figure things out while they were living through it which created a million little stories showcasing their interactions with God. They didn’t know how the bigger story was impacting all their little stories of love, life, struggle, and hope. All they had was this Jesus who chose to spend a lot of time living with and in the stories that made up their lives. 

Now I know we can’t really forget that we are living on the other side of the Cross, the Resurrection, and the Ascension. Jesus’ story, for us, will always be framed by what came next. We can, however, choose to not let that One story warp our expectations for the disciples since they didn’t even know what they didn’t know. To them, each little moment with Jesus was part of a bigger story they couldn’t fully see. And while that big story mattered, their smaller stories with Jesus mattered too. 

This balancing of a big story with little stories is something I tend to struggle with especially when I’m watching a tv show, a play, or a musical. I focus on the plot, the narrative, and each character as they bring to life a big story full of all kinds of drama and meaning. My view is limited to whatever script is unfolding before me. Yet there is, at the same time, more happening on the screen than meets the eye since this big story is being told by actors who have their own stories too. I was recently reminded of this while listening to a podcast hosted by the actor Jeff Hiller who plays the character Joel in the critically acclaimed HBO show Somebody Somewhere. The show centers around people living through grief and loss while spending the middle part of life living in Manhattan – Kansas. And while Joel isn’t the main character of the show, he doesn’t fit any usual stereotype since he’s a 40-something gay man sustained by his faith in small town America. The Holywood Reporter described Joel as kind of “an anxious wreck, but also a steadfast leader. He’s so generous, you might mistake him for a pushover, but strong enough to protect his own heart and the hearts of the people (or the recently adopted dog) he loves. He’s a total dork, but one so earnest in his total dorkiness that he comes back around to being kind of cool, in the way that anyone so completely themselves feels kind of cool.” Joel is the perfect character of the big story the show is trying to tell yet he comes to life because an actor named Jeff Hiller makes him who he is. Now Jeff is the kind of actor who’s bio is full of an incredible number of off-off-off-off-off-off Broadway shows, guest appearances, commercials, and everything else it takes to be a working actor in NYC who can actually afford their own health insurance. For over 20 years, Jeff has lived through the grind of auditions, rejections, worry, anxiety, and joys that come with living their life as a comedian and an actor. A few years ago, before Jeff became a series regular on their first critically acclaimed show, they launched with a friend a podcast about what it takes to simply make it to the middle. Their show is about how difficult, exciting, and life giving things can still be even when you’re not the star of your own show. On a recent episode, a guest named Ryan Haddad, pointed out how Jeff’s story and Joel’s story both mattered to one another. Joel was a big hit, with a big story to tell, but one that came into fruition because of the years and years it took Jeff to get to this “mountain of a show.” Without Jeff’s stories, Joel’s big story couldn’t really get to where it needed to be. And when we only notice that big story, we miss the little stories that show how life can be. 

The story of Transfiguration, when James, John, and Peter experienced Jesus as if he was lit up like the Las Vegas Strip – is a manifestation of Jesus’ big story that we often long for and adore. He is, for a brief moment, everything we imagine divine power to be and I can’t tell you how many times over the past six weeks my personal prayer life has seeked out this kind of Jesus since too many people have been going through way too much. I want this over the top Jesus to show up, right now, and reveal what God’s love can do. And yet what God’s love chose to do is to make that love real in stories that, from the outside, appear way too small. To me, the power of the Transfiguration is not Jesus’ transformation but the words he offered to those who were bent over, covering their faces, and who felt confused, worried, and scared. These disciples weren’t always the most faithful of Jesus’ followers, often arguing about which one of them was the greatest and who had no problem arguing with Jesus about how his story was supposed to turn out. They, along with the other disciples, weren’t always keen about who Jesus invited into their midst. And when it looked like the end of Jesus’ story had come, they, along with others, let him face the Cross on his own. Yet these imperfect people, with their own stories of hurt, pain, love, and laughter, were the ones Jesus spoke. He reached out to them and simply told them to not be afraid. This wasn’t, I think, Jesus trying to deny what they were feeling nor was he telling them to be more than what they were. Instead, Jesus wanted them to see how God was doing what God always did: coming down from the mountain to live in every one of the stories that made them who they were. Jesus wouldn’t stay lit up like a Christmas tree but would make the time to live in our stories while we lived in His. Jesus’ promise to us is not that we’ll never go through life without fear, doubts, questions, or never feel as if God is too far away. Rather what Jesus wants you to know is that because of baptism, faith, and God’s faithfulness to you – Jesus will always be there to say “get up and do not be afraid.” Your story is already wrapped up in the bigger story of what God’s love is already doing in the world. And while we might focus on the big story by keeping our eyes on God’s plan or purpose or direction for our world, I often lean on God’s promises because those are big enough to hold every story that makes us who we are. We might not be able to fully see how this big story will finally turn out but we can trust that your story and God’s story will never be torn apart. 

Amen.

Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

Matthew 3:13-17

My sermon from Baptism of our Lord Sunday (January 15, 2023) on Matthew 3:13-17.

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So it’s been over a month since we last hung out with John the Baptist. And we heard the opening part of today’s story way back on December 4th. That, to me, feels like a long time ago since many different things have happened over these last six weeks. For some of us, this new calendar year has gone exactly the way we wanted while others are experiencing incredible heartbreak and sorrow. It’s not easy to put ourselves back into a Biblical moment we heard three weeks before Christmas. But here we are, in the middle of the third chapter of the gospel according to Matthew, sitting with a person dressed in camel skins. John’s preaching, teaching, and wisdom invited all kinds of people to leave the safety of their homes and villages so that they could hear God’s word in a place where no one person was ever in control. John offered a compassionate word to all who came to see him yet he was very suspicious of the religious leaders who tagged along. By the time Jesus arrived, John had baptized dozens or hundreds or maybe even thousands of people in the Jordan River. Their names were never recorded so we don’t know who they were. Yet they all shared the same experience of hearing John’s voice and then entering into the water before heading home to make room for all the others who were on their way. When Jesus arrived, he was like all the other people who had come before him. But once John saw him – we get this unique moment that’s only found in this version of the baptismal story. John saw Jesus and tried his very best to keep him out of the water. Which is why Jesus, the Son of God, did something he didn’t have to do; he pushed past John’s objections and chose to enter the water too. 

Now in order to understand where John was coming from, we need to realize that he wasn’t doing what we do around the font. We call both of these experiences baptisms but they’re not the same thing. And the truth is we don’t fully know what John imagined these baptisms to be since nothing in his own voice has come down to us. To get a better sense of what these baptisms might have meant to those around John, we need to take a look at what cleansing rituals looked like within the wider culture. The Rev. Diane G. Chen, in her commentary on this passage, described a little of what these rituals were like. For one, the “Jewish ritual [of] cleansing by immersion in a mikveh, or ritual bath, was practiced as a form of purification [in] the time of John and Jesus.” When one became spiritually unclean – by doing or experiencing something that interrupted the life-giving nature of their relationship with God – a cleansing served as a physical and emotional and spiritual way of strengthening that bond. This cleansing was available whenever it was needed and some Jewish groups, like the Essenes, made this washing a defining characteristic of their community. Some scholars have even wondered if John was an Essene since he made this practice a hallmark of his ministry. We also have evidence, a little after John’s life, of gentiles participating in a ritual cleaning when they converted to Judaism. This invites us to wonder if John thought that what he was doing was initiating people into what God was already doing in the world. And to fully discover what God was up to, the individual who came to the water was encouraged to repent, confessing to those around them of all the ways they got in God’s way through their own selfishness and greed. Admitting that we’re not who we’re supposed to be is never easy and that was especially problematic in the world Jesus lived in. Many of the communities who lived around the Mediterranean Sea, especially the Romans and Greeks, were seeped in a culture defined by honor and shame. Their worth and identity and value was wrapped up in what other people thought of them. A person was expected to amass honor by meeting the cultural expectations of their community. They were to think the right thoughts; marry the right person; and be just the right amount of kind and humble and tough and strong and violent while knowing exactly what their place was in the world. Honor was tied into the hierarchy of their reality and it was shameful to be anything other than what the right kind of people thought they were supposed to be. Going out into the wilderness to see John didn’t really fit into that structure of the world because it required everyone to admit, in public, that they weren’t who others said they were. Visiting John wasn’t showing others that you contained enough self-awareness to be honest about your limitations as a human being. Instead, it showed the people who defined your self-worth something terrifying: that the honor they gave you was misplaced because you confessed your faults.  

That’s why, I think, John’s objections to Jesus make sense. John knew his own need for God and he worked hard to change the lives of those living with so much honor and shame. Rather than letting others determine who they were, John invited everyone to lean into what made them human in the first place. Their identity and their very being was rooted in what all people bear within them – the image of God. John, I believe, saw his work in the wilderness as a way to strengthen who get to be. So when Jesus came to see him, John told him to stay away from the water because he didn’t need to become anything other than what he was. Yet Jesus chose to affirm the difficult work of helping each other reframe what our lives are meant to be about. Instead of chasing after the opinions of others, he wanted everyone to see themselves as God saw them. This, of course, is terrifying because it means we need to admit all the ways we fail to love God, our neighbors, and ourselves. And we often find it easier – or at least more pragmatic – to let what others say about us become the limit of who we imagine ourselves to be. There are times when these words are meant with the best of intentions, such as we saw when John tried to keep Jesus out of the water since he didn’t need to be changed. But God’s work in the world isn’t only about what we do; it’s also tied to who we’re connected to. The righteousness Jesus mentioned in a very cryptic saying after listening to John’s objections wasn’t about our desire to become a morally good person. It was, for Jesus, a comment about who we’re connected to since righteousness is always related to what we’re seeking and what we believe this life is all about. When John told Jesus to stay out of the water, he did that while surrounded by a crowd of people seeking God. And since God was right there with them, Jesus chose to enter the water to show how God was already seeking them. God chose to lean into our relationship because it’s through our connection with Jesus that we see and hear and discover what living with our God is all about. This journey isn’t always easy and we will, at times, ask the world to provide us with our sense of worth. Yet who you are and who you get to be isn’t defined by what other people say about you. Jesus entered into the water with John to show how God will always choose you. And while the baptism practiced by John isn’t the baptism we do here at church, both tell a wider story of who our God is. God believes that you and your neighbor and every stranger has value and that this God, in Jesus, will live and die and rise to show just how much you matter to God. 

Amen.