September 2, 2012

“Have You Washed Today?” 09.02.2012 Sermon

By Bishop Craig Schweitzer

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 & James 1:17-27 • September 2, 2012

Click here to hear an audio recording of this sermon.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ. Amen.

It’s always easy to pick on the Pharisees when they come up in our scripture readings, isn’t it. How about a few Pharisee jokes in the style of redneck comedian Jeff Foxworthy to get us started.

You might be a Pharisee if you’ve ever shouted, “Amen!” more than 51 times during a single sermon…about somebody else’s sin.

You might be a Pharisee if you think the world would be a better place…if everyone were just like you.

You might be a Pharisee if you’re sure nobody…has ever had to forgive you.

You might be a Pharisee if you go to church…to prove you’re good.

You might be a Pharisee if you leave worship today…thinking that you didn’t get anything from it because you didn’t like the singing or how Holy Communion was served.

It’s easy to laugh a little at the first two. For most of us the last three might actually sting a little. When we see and hear the Pharisees gathering around Jesus, it’s easy to pick on them and think, “Wow, these guys are sure full of themselves, aren’t they?”

But let’s not too quickly forget the words that we heard from the book of James today and ask ourselves if we are “like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like.” (Verse 23-24)

We need to back up for just a minute. For the past several weeks our worship has centered on Jesus being the “bread of life” and the “bread come down from heaven” as we’ve walked through the dense and complex sixth chapter of the gospel of John. This week we return to the gospel of Mark. By this point in Mark, Jesus has been busy – feeding five thousand, walking on water, healing the sick. Today’s encounter is between Jesus and a few Pharisees. And these are not just any ordinary old Pharisees. These Pharisees are from Jerusalem. They are the cream of the crop. The best of the best. Not only highly regarded within the Temple, but across nearly every facet of Jewish life. People knew who these guys were and looked to them for insight and direction and understanding regarding every aspect of life – spiritual and secular. They’re questioning Jesus on deep seated traditions in the community. Traditions that go much further than simply keeping Jewish law. Jesus quickly cuts to the chase and quotes the prophet Isaiah, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.”

Jesus’ challenge to the Pharisees and the crowds that are gathered is to say that these traditions are human creations, not from God.

Lutheran theologian Frederick Buechner imagines our life in Christ a little like a young child learning to play the piano. Buechner thought, “The child holds her hands just as she’s been told…she has memorized the piece of music perfectly. She has hit all the proper notes with deadly accuracy. But her heart is not in it, only her fingers. What she’s playing is a sort of music, but nothing that will start voices singing or feet tapping.”

When it comes to our faith and our life in Christ, I want to ask you a question: Are our hearts in it or only our fingers? That’s what I hear Jesus asking you and me today.

Are we majoring in the minor things? We worship God with our words and the physical presence of our bodies sitting in beautiful sanctuaries like this one and ignore that God is part of our lives as soon as we walk out the door – never giving the words, “Go in peace. Serve the Lord.” a chance to be implanted on our hearts before we leave and run off to chase the next thing we have to check off of our to do list.

I think that might be why I’ve been struggling with this gospel reading in Mark this week. As one of your pastors, I won’t stand before you and yell at you for having feelings or thinking thoughts or doing things that you know are wrong. I can’t formulate some sort of personalized strategic plan for you that will bring about a radical change in your financial wealth or emotional well being. I can’t shower you with enough guilt that may actually cause you to behave differently for a few seconds after you leave worship today.

You see, Jesus is not only attacking the Pharisees and the traditions they are trying to protect. In fact, his direct criticism is to the human being. Eleven times in the seventh chapter of Mark, the Greek word anthrōpos is used, which translates as “human being” or “person”.

Duke Divinity School New Testament Professor Joel Marcus says that, “The basic problem Christians should be concerned about is not how or what one should eat but the internal corruption of the anthrōpos. It is this malignancy that chokes the life out of tradition, turns it into an enemy of God, contorts it into a way of excusing injustice, and blinds those afflicted by it to their own culpability for the evils that trouble the world.” [Joel Marcus, Mark 1-8 (Anchor Bible 27; New York; Doubleday, 2000), 460-461]

Brothers and sisters in Christ – in the middle of all the evil that we face in this world. In the middle of all the things that come out of us that defile us. You see, I will never stop reminding you that you have a God who loves you and claims you as his own. I will never stop praying that you live your life in the promise of resurrection, with joy and thanksgiving that God has freed you from sin and death in your baptism. I will never stop celebrating Holy Communion with you and hope that in our celebration of the sacrament you are fed and strengthened and then feel called to be a blessing to your neighbor in all that you say and do. I will never stop believing that our God comes to every one of us, broken anthrōpos that we are, and says to each one of us, I love you. I forgive you. You are mine. This God lives in us today and in all the days to come.

I invite us to take a minute right now and wash together. Using the words for confession and forgiveness that are printed in your bulletin or on the screen behind me, let’s wash together and be made clean. We do not live out our life in Christ by just washing our hands. Our hearts need washing too. Please stand as you are able.

PRAYER OF CONFESSION

God of Light, we admit that we are much faster at talking, and too slow at listening. We are quick to engage in power-pleasing acts, but hesitant to hear your simple words of hope, of justice, of renewal. We do not notice how our casual speech can cause great harm and pain to those around us. Forgive us, God of majesty and mercy, and let your grace refresh us like a gentle rains. Pour your hope into our empty souls until it overflows to all we have damaged. Call us to new life through the words and witness of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, in whose name we lift our prayers to you.

Silence for reflection and confession.

ASSURANCE OF FORGIVENESS

Did you hear the voice of the God speaking to you – whispering words of hope, of grace, of forgiveness into your heart and into your soul? This is the good news that is for us! In the name of Jesus Christ your sins are forgiven!

Click here and check out this video from the 2012 ELCA National Youth Gathering. I couldn’t help reflect upon it as I walked through this week’s text.

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August 21, 2012

“Thank You Jesus” Sermon 08.19.2012

By Bishop Craig Schweitzer

John 6:51-58 • August 19, 2012

Click here to hear an audio recording of this sermon.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ. Amen.

This past week in the devotional, Christ in Our Home that’s published by Augsburg Fortress, the publishing entity of the ELCA there was a story about a man named Will. Will glanced at the clock in the upper corner of his computer screen. It was much later than he thought. He had been online for hours, reading news sites, blogs, and email, and updating his social network pages. It was hard to pull away from the screen. “This is foolish,” he thought. “Why am I wasting time this way?” He thought about his life and his loneliness after his recent divorce. “I’m looking for a connection,” he realized, “a relationship.” He looked at the computer screen and sighed, “This is too easy. It’s superficial, a poor substitute.”

Will’s story is a quest for a quick on-line connection or easy relationship that has little to do with the rest of his life. No thought about all that life is revealing to him beyond the din of his computer screen.

Or maybe you’ve seen this advertisement recently on television in the middle of the seemingly never ending array of political ads that are consuming the advertising world right now.

Following this link to the video on YouTube – http://youtu.be/TUGmcb3mhLM

The young girl thinks her parents are crazy and don’t have any friends, no real relationships or adventure in their life. When in reality the opposite is probably true. The ad is supposed to be humorous, but as a parent it is revealing to me in other ways too.

I think these stories are similar to what’s happening in John 6. The 6th chapter in John’s gospel is part of our worship for several weeks this summer. It’s a chapter of scripture that has been read and analyzed and debated for meaning and preached on for centuries. This is a dense and complex section of scripture. For me, it’s also one of the most challenging pieces of scripture, especially given the Roman Catholic tradition that I grew up in and for which I am very thankful. It’s definitely one of the most revealing teachings of Jesus for me.

There are thousands of people following Jesus at the beginning of chapter 6 as he feeds 5,000 or so people with just a few loaves of bread and couple of fish that a young boy was carrying around. It was probably his lunch that day.

But by the time we reach the end of this chapter, we see the result of Jesus’ challenging and revealing teaching as, “many have turned back and no longer went about with him.” The crowds were offended by what they saw and heard and were no longer interested in following Jesus.

I can relate. My own story at times or that of Will or the girl in that television ad or Jesus’ teaching in John 6 speak to us because they often reflect more of who we are than we’re comfortable admitting. You and I seek relationships that bring instant gratification, usually within parameters that we set and control. The crowds before Jesus sought a relationship with him as long as the loaves and fish were free and they could control the way in which they were to receive them.

But the relationship that Jesus offers them, and you and me, is more than a few fish and stale loaves of bread offered at a hillside picnic. More than simply liking someone’s Facebook status from your list of 687 Facebook friends. More than following the instructions from the latest article in People magazine about how to succeed in getting a date with another person.

The relationship that Jesus offers can even been seen as a little offensive in many ways, because it is nothing less than his own flesh and blood. It’s upsetting to the crowds, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” they say. Remember, this teaching from Jesus in John 6 is centuries before Twilight movies about vampires and werewolves were popular. I’d argue that it’s still upsetting and just as offensive today.

I once heard someone say, “When we eat food, it becomes us. When we eat spiritual food, we become it.” Have you ever thought of that as you receive the Sacrament of Holy Communion?

If you and I take the sacrament of Holy Communion seriously, the offense in Holy Communion is not in thinking about eating Jesus’ body and blood in a cannibalistic sort of way. The offense, the good news of life in Christ, is in the lengths that God will go in order to have a relationship with you and me. In verse 56 Jesus says to the crowds, and to you and me today, “Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.” The bread and wine of Holy Communion are not simply symbols for Jesus’ body and blood. The bread and wine that we receive and consume in the sacrament of Holy Communion are Jesus body and blood because this Jesus abides in us. This Jesus lives in us.

Each and every time that you and I receive the sacrament, how do we respond to Jesus offering of his flesh and blood? To Jesus abiding love? To Jesus living in us?

This past week I preached and presided at the funeral of a sister in Christ from our congregation. I believe that she understood and lived life as a child of God fully aware of God’s love for her. Even understood the offensiveness of Jesus abiding in her.

I had many opportunities to experience this kind of love from God in this woman, but I think it was present most significantly every time I served her Holy Communion.

Every time this sister in Christ heard the words “The body of Christ, given for you. The blood of Christ, shed for you.” and received the bread and wine, her response was not, “it’s about time, I sent you an email two weeks ago God” or “God, I’ve been really good lately, I deserve this” or “oh well, it’s just bread and grape juice”. Her response to God’s love for her in the sacrament of Holy Communion was always “Thank you Jesus.”

In our celebration of the sacrament of Holy Communion today and for that matter, every time we celebrate the sacrament, I pray that our response to God’s revealing and even offensive love for us in the life, death, and resurrection of a savior named Jesus is thank you.

Thank you Jesus for walking with us in relationship in all ways and in all days.

Thank you Jesus for filling us in this meal with the Bread of life. Life, that no matter how hard we try, it simply doesn’t exist in technology or possessions or accomplishments of our own in this world.

Thank you Jesus for forgiving our sin and inviting us to this table, to come just as we are.

Thank you Jesus. Amen.

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