Poinsettias for Good Shepherd’s Sanctuary

Poinsettias For Good Shepherd’s Sanctuary – The Altar Guild has arranged a convenient and economical way for members and friends to provide poinsettias to be placed in the sanctuary for the Christmas Season. Decorah Greenhouses will supply red poinsettias wrapped with gold foil and deliver the plants to be in place the for the Christmas Eve Candlelight Service. The cost per plant is $12.00. To place an order, deliver a check made out to Good Shepherd Lutheran Church with Poinsettia in the memo line to the Church Office no later than Friday morning, December 14. Our Administrative Assistant, Jenny, will accept email or phone orders with payment to follow. If you wish to provide a plant in honor or memory of someone, include that information with your check or send an email message to decorahgoodshepherd@gmail.com. The list of donors will appear in bulletins. All orders will be submitted directly to the Greenhouses by the Church Office.

Sermon for Sunday, December 2, 2018 – “Stand Up and Raise Your Head!”

First Sunday of Advent
December 2, 2018
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus, our hope.

The sounds and images in today’s reading would be jarring anytime. They seem especially out of place in December when we’re longing for comfort and joy.

We don’t expect to be confronted with distress among nations, roaring seas, or people fainting with fear and foreboding.

Well, not in church at least.

We get enough of that stuff on the news and social media. Can’t church be tender and peaceful, especially in December?

We’ll get there. We’ll get tidings of comfort and joy, soon. We’ll get to the story of baby Jesus coming to make God’s love known.

Yet even that story is not just tender and sweet. It’s a story that should be quite jarring, especially to those of us who are comfortable and privileged.

God’s messenger tells a young, unwed mother that she will give birth to God’s child. This child, Jesus, is born to poor migrants who have to seek shelter in a barn. Yet, King Herod gets word that a child has been born who is to be king of the Jews and he is threatened. So, he orders the killing of all babies under age two. Jesus’ family must flee to Egypt and seek asylum there.

Jesus grows up poor under the oppressive Roman Empire. In his teaching and ministry, he rebukes the wealthy and the powerful, and yet he persists in showing God’s love to all people – even Rome’s tax collectors and soldiers. This radical love threatens those in power. They try to stop Jesus from healing, teaching and loving by putting him to death. Yet Jesus cannot be stopped. God raises him from the dead. Love prevails. New life arises. Jesus lives and he comes to us again and again to make God’s love known. Jesus also promises to come finally, at the end of time, to redeem the whole cosmos, to make all things new.

This is great good news – it brings such comfort and joy!

Yet this good news also challenges the status quo and shakes things up in the heavens and the earth.

It wreaks havoc with the powers that be – the forces of evil, oppression, hatred and greed within and around us.

It exposes the lies, the fake news, the half-truths of this world in order that the truth and the power of God’s love for all people may be made known.

The good news of Jesus isn’t just tender and sweet. It brings turmoil within and around us as all that opposes God is confronted.

So, it seems preparing for Christmas also means preparing for some turmoil – and not just the kind that comes from family gatherings.

Contrary to what we often hear these days, Christian faith doesn’t protect us from turmoil. Jesus doesn’t keep us safe amidst trials and tribulations. Instead, he gives us a way of being, a stance to take, so that we can face whatever comes with hope and courage, rather than fear and foreboding.

Jesus says, “Stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” 

Stand up, raise your heads. Remain grounded in a deeper truth and look to God. Don’t be overcome by drunkenness or worries, but lift up your head and pay attention to God’s saving presence that is so near to you.

It seems Jesus wants us to avoid two ditches in responding to turmoil: trying to ignore and avoid it all; or being overcome by it all.

He cautions us to avoid drunkenness and squandering our energy with frivolous living – escapism and false comforts that seek to ignore the realities of the world. Apparently, binging on TV shows and junk food is not the answer. Seeking a peaceful, idyllic holiday while avoiding those who are poor is not the answer.

Jesus’ radical love for each of us and for the whole world makes a claim on us. We are to love as he loved and pay special concern to the poor, the outcast and the stranger, as he did. We are to seek the comfort and joy of others, not just ourselves.

Yet, Jesus also cautions us about getting overwhelmed by worries and foreboding about the state of the world and all the needs around us. This is a very real possibility in these days. Sometimes we do need to turn off the news to tend to our wellbeing. We need to experience comfort and joy our- selves even as we seek it for others. We need to ground ourselves in the deeper truth of God’s promises: love has come, love has won, love will ultimately prevail.

We also need to lift up our heads and pay attention to signs of God at work – glimpses of love happening all around us and through us. And, oh my Good Shepherd, is love happening around us and through us. God is at work through this congregation in powerful ways.

Beloved, we can stand fast and lift up our heads because we are not alone as we face the turmoil of this world. Jesus endured it, even unto death. Jesus rose again and is with us now in his word, in his body and blood, in his body the church. Jesus is with us in all that we face: loving, forgiving, healing and empowering us to do the same. One day, Jesus will come again to make all things new.

May this good news bring you real comfort and joy today and always.

Let’s take a moment for a silent prayer.

Sermon for Sunday, November 18, 2018 – “We’re Fed as We Give”

Twenty-sixth Sunday after Pentecost
November 18, 2018
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day. (Scriptures for the 25th Sunday were used.)

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

Jesus calls our attention to a widow who gives her whole life. That isn’t clear in the English translation, but that’s what the original Greek implies. Jesus isn’t just talking about money, He’s calling our attention to a woman who offers her whole self to God.

We are all called to entrust our lives to God, and this woman does something beautiful and Christ-like by giving of herself so fully. Yet I wonder if it is wise for a widow to give everything to God by way of what had become a corrupt religious institution? Especially because Jesus has just been talking about religious leaders who are devouring widows’ houses, exploiting them. Will she be a victim of those leaders? We never come across this woman again in scripture, and we don’t know how it all went for her. There are so many questions here.

So, today as we think about God’s invitation to trust and give freely, I find the story of a widow in our first lesson much more helpful. It gives us a fuller picture of trusting and giving.

We hear the story of a widow who is literally starving to death at a time of drought. She is gathering sticks to prepare the last of her food so that she and her son can eat a final meal together before they die. Then a stranger comes along and asks her to make him some bread.

Is it wise to share the last of what she has? Is that faithful to her dying son? She doesn’t think so and she says as much. She tells Elijah she has only enough for one last meal for the two of them. She has real concerns and she expresses them.

Notice what happens next.

This stranger, who turns out to be God’s prophet Elijah, doesn’t critique her, he isn’t frustrated that she won’t just blindly give him her last bit of food.

Instead, he promises her that God is about to do something wondrous and that she can take part in it by giving freely of what she has.

He speaks words of promise from God saying, “Do not be afraid, for thus says the Lord the God of Israel: The jar of meal will not be emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that the Lord sends rain on the earth.” 

The widow trusts this promise and gives what she has; she entrusts her life to God.

As she does, she gets to participate in what God is doing and her needs are met. We’re told, “She went and did as Elijah said, so that she as well as he and her household ate for many days. The jar of meal was not emptied, neither did the jug of oil fail.” The widow becomes no longer just a victim of the drought, but rather an agent of God’s work of feeding the prophet Elijah. And she and her son are fed.

The good news of this story and the good news of Jesus is that God is up to wondrous things in this world, and we get to participate. God is at work feeding, healing, loving and transforming the world and God uses us as agents of this work. We don’t have to live as victims, at the mercy of what we lack. No matter how meager or abundant our resources, God can and does work through us. God can and does work through you.

Yet, so often we feel we are lacking when it comes to time, money, energy, power, health, or faith. Our culture tells us that we don’t have enough, that we aren’t enough. We’d better hold on tight to what we have and work like crazy to make sure that we get more and more and more. Only when we have a whole lot can we share what we have.

This isn’t actually a wise way to live – all the great wisdom traditions advise against it. Grasping, hoarding and refusing to share don’t work out well for us or our society. This is a soul-crushing way to live.

We become victims of our fear of scarcity and miss the opportunity to participate in what God is doing around us.

I believe that’s why God asks us to give of our very selves for God’s work of loving the world. As we give, we find that our needs are met as well. We are fed and nourished. We are set free from our fear of scarcity. God asks us to give because it helps us and the world.

Even still, it is hard to give, hard to trust. So, God comes to us as other people who ask for our help, who invite our giving. God comes to us through scripture, speaking words of promise like those given to the widow: “Do not be afraid”, “Do not worry about tomorrow”, “You shall not be in want.”

And most of all, God comes to us in Jesus, the one who gives his very life, all that he has, so that we can experience and be drawn into God’s healing and life-giving work. Jesus comes to us today to say, “This is my body given for you, this is my blood shed for you.” This food will not run out, this meal will not fail – we have all that we need.

We can entrust our lives to God. I can’t wait to see what God will do in and for us all.

Thanks be to God.

Sermon for Sunday, November 11, 2018 – “We Shall Love – That’s a Promise”

Twenty-fifth Sunday after Pentecost
November 11, 2018
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Texts for 24th Sunday after Pentecost: Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.  You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Really? This shall happen? How?

Some days it takes all our heart, soul, mind and strength just to get out of bed and face the day. It takes a lot to even be pleasant to others, especially before coffee. The news of the world is so disheartening. The challenges we face can seem insurmountable. We aren’t sure we can even trust God in these times. So how are we supposed to love God and other people with our whole selves?

I imagine the first people to hear these love commands probably wondered the same thing. How are we supposed to do that?

These commands are given to God’s people as they are wandering in the desert, after God has led them out of slavery in Egypt. God has promised to bring them into a good land flowing with milk and honey. But they, too, have trouble trusting God, much less loving God. They grumble and com- plain. They rebel against Moses, the person God used to set them free. They build a golden calf and worship it.

So, God lets them wander in the wilderness for forty long years. Along the way, God instructs Moses to tell them, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” And, as they are preparing to enter the promised land, Moses says to the people, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.”

These seem like really big asks. The people don’t even say thank you for the manna God sends to feed them in the desert and yet, God expects them to jump in with both feet to love God and other people wholeheartedly? Maybe God should have more realistic expectations: “Be nice, don’t hit, clean up after yourself”. Those seem like more reasonable commands for these difficult people, more reasonable for us.

We, too, are wandering in the wilderness – so much about life these days is uncertain and frightening. We as a species are so often unkind, violence is all around us, we leave mess and destruction in our wake. How can God really expect us to love so wholeheartedly in this wilderness?

And yet, what a relief it would be, what a joy it would be to love with our whole selves – to devote our hearts, minds, and strength to loving God and God’s ways of love. What peace we would know if we could all love our neighbors as much as we love ourselves. What a glorious world this would be.

God longs for us to know the joy of living in the way of love. God longs for us to know a world where love reigns.

And so, God commands us to love. God sets the bar high – love with all you’ve got, with all you are.

But God doesn’t just command love and say, “alright, good luck with that.” God begins by loving us completely, fully, wholeheartedly with all of God’s self.

God also gives us the words of scripture, commands and promises that teach us to love. We are instructed to place these words upon our hearts, the ancient rabbis taught, so that when our hearts break with the pain of the world, God’s word of love will fall into our hearts. Then our hearts will be broken open to more fully love the world rather than shattering into pieces that harm others. So, the pain of the world doesn’t have to prevent us from loving, instead, with God’s word of love, the pain of the world can open us to love more.

Most importantly, God enters into the wilderness with us in Jesus. God, in Jesus, shares all of the pain and struggle of our lives. And Jesus gives of his whole self, his very life, in love for us. When we are loved so deeply, so thoroughly, then loving wholeheartedly becomes a possibility for us – a life- giving and healing possibility.

As author Frederick Buechner writes, ” ‘You shall love the Lord your God’ becomes, in the end, less a command than a promise. You shall love. And the promise is that, yes, on the weary feet of faith and the fragile wings of hope, we will come to love [God] at last, as from the first [God] has loved us—loved us even in the wilderness, especially in the wilderness, because [God] has been in the wilderness with us. [God] has been in the wilderness for us. [God] has been acquainted with our grief. And, loving [God], we will come at last to love each other too.”

Buechner continues, quoting Deuteronomy, “And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart; and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and you shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. And rise we shall, out of the wilderness, every last one of us, even as out of the wilderness Christ rose before us. That is the promise, and the greatest of all promises.”

Beloved, you are loved, God is with you, you will rise again and again from the wilderness to love God and love others.

That is a promise.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.

Sermon for Sunday, November 4, 2018 – “Tending the Tears”

All Saints Sunday
November 4, 2018
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

Our readings today are awash in tears, so fitting for this day when we remember our beloved dead. In these readings we hear that God honors our tears and promises to wipe them away. God shares our tears – Jesus stands at the grave of his friend Lazarus and weeps. And, God promises a future without tears – mourning and crying and pain will be no more, and all peoples will feast at God’s banquet.

That phrase, all peoples, is key. God’s promise of a future without tears is not just for a few – it is for everyone.

The prophet Isaiah stresses that by using the word all four times. God will make “for all peoples a feast of rich food”, and God will “destroy the shroud [of death] cast over all peoples”, “the sheet spread over all nations”, God will “wipe away the tears from all faces.”

In God’s promised future there will be no us and them, no separations, no divisions. We will all be healed together. We will all feast together.

We need this vision to give us hope in all times, and especially in this difficult time for our country.

There is so little hope right now and so much fear – fear about the future, fear about other people and their visions for the future. Fear keeps us apart from one another. It boils over into anger, hatred and violence – into pipe bombs sent in the mail, grocery shoppers killed just for being black, and elders shot down as they worshipped.

How can we live faithfully and hopefully amidst all this fear and anger? How can we be a healing presence in our world?

Perhaps we need to take a cue from our readings today and focus on the tears – pay attention to the pain within us and within other people.

Our own tears and sorrow can give us the gift of vulnerability. They can break down our defenses and open us up. They can soften us.

And we certainly need vulnerability and openness now. Initiatives like the Civil Conversations and the Better Angels Project all tell us the same thing. Rather than stridently, angrily defending our view and attacking others, we need to be vulnerable and open – vulnerable enough to acknowledge what troubles us about our own positions and open to recognizing what is admirable in others’ positions.

Welcoming our own tears and sorrow can give us the gift of vulnerability and openness that we so need.

Paying attention to other people’s tears and sorrow is important as well. This allows us to see our shared humanity and helps to nurture compassion for one another.

So many former Neo-Nazis and white supremacists say that what caused them to change was not outrage or force or punishment, though there certainly should be serious consequences for hate crimes. What does bring change for people who hate is compassion and empathy. One former white supremacist, Christian Picciolini, describes a turning point for him. He was beating up a black man when his eyes locked with the victim’s and he felt a surprising empathy. About the same time, he began to get to know African-American, Jewish, and gay customers at the record store he was running. He was selling white power music but had to sell other types of music to stay in business. His customers knew he was hateful and violent, but they keep coming in and kept initiating meaningful conversation with him. He says, “What it came down to was receiving compassion from the people that I least deserved it [from], when I least deserved it.”

Our compassion and empathy can be deepened by focusing on the tears and pain of others.

Of course, living with compassion, vulnerability and openness is so hard, especially as we face our own personal losses and grief. We can feel so very exposed and raw. It’s tempting to fight back the tears, to defend ourselves from the discomfort, to shut others out or attack them in order to have some illusion of control.

So we need more than a focus on our own and others’ tears. We also need God’s presence, God’s care and God’s promises.

And Beloved, God is so very present with us through Jesus. Jesus knows about deep grief – he stood at his friend Lazarus’ grave and wept. He knows the power of fear – he saw it in Lazarus’ sisters who worried how they would survive in their patriarchal culture without their brother’s support. Jesus knows about anger and divisiveness. Some of the people gathered at the grave were amazed by his love for Lazarus, others sneered, “Why didn’t Jesus prevent Lazarus from dying, he healed the blind man after all.” Soon after Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, this anger boiled over into a plot to kill both Lazarus and Jesus.

Jesus experienced all of this and yet he continued to choose the way of love and vulnerability. He did not defend himself or attack others; he gave himself in love.

And now the risen Jesus is here amidst all the grief, fear and anger you face. He is present to give himself in love to you today. Here at this table, Jesus meets you to tend to your tears, to feed you with his love.

Jesus gives you a foretaste of the feast to come in which all peoples will be gathered at God’s banquet.

God honors your tears and promises to wipe them away. God shares your tears. And God promises you a future without tears where mourning and crying and pain will be no more, and you will feast with all people.

May this tender care and these powerful promises heal you today.

May God help us all to bring healing and love to our tear-filled world.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.