Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost
September 23, 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.

“[The disciples] did not understand what Jesus was saying but were afraid to ask him.” Why? Jesus was their teacher. He was always asking questions; surely, he’d welcome theirs. Why didn’t they just ask?

Rather than seeking understanding, they started arguing about who was the greatest.

Those two parts of their story might seem disconnected. First, they didn’t get what Jesus was saying; then later, they started arguing. But I imagine one thing led to the other.

Think about how vulnerable we feel when we don’t understand something. It’s really uncomfortable. We don’t want to be seen as uninformed, confused, clueless. So, we remain silent. Or, we try to make ourselves look good and, maybe even, tear other people down.

I imagine that’s what happened with the disciples. They didn’t get what was Jesus was saying, felt vulnerable and didn’t like it. So, they started squabbling and posturing and positioning themselves.

They’d fit right in with 21^st century talk radio and cable news channels. They’d find themselves right at home in so many of our conversations.

With all the challenges facing our world today, we so often feel driven to prove ourselves and our arguments, to defend ourselves and attack others. We stand our ground, draw lines in the sand and demonize those on the other side. Or, we just want to put our heads in the sand and hide from it all.

Yet, Jesus calls us to enter into the unknown and uncertainty, into struggle and suffering. He calls us to welcome and listen to those on the margins – like the vulnerable child he took into arms. Those on the margins more naturally question how things work and why. And, it seems Jesus wants us to learn from them.

Sometimes we act as if following Jesus is all about finding assurance and answers; but actually, it is an invitation into a life of vulnerability and searching. We are called to wrestle with our faith so that it will grow stronger. We’re called to ask hard questions about the way things are so that we can help bring about God’s justice and righteousness. We’re called to seek and wonder.

There is good reason to stand together and say what we believe, using the ancient creeds. But, I often wonder if it would also be good to stand and share our questions together:

We wonder about the world.

How is God at work in it?

How can we better care for it?

We wonder about Jesus.

What do the stories of his life, death and resurrection mean for our lives, for the life of the world?

How can we more fully follow him?

We do get to do some searching and seeking together when we pray the Psalms in worship.

The Psalms are full of questions and laments and wonder.

Why do you tarry Lord?

Why do the innocent suffer while the wicked prosper?

Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you disquieted within me?

What are humans that you are mindful of us, O God?

The Psalms help us to honor and pray our questions. The Psalms are just a few of these gifts we are given as Jesus leads us on this journey into the unknown.

Jesus also assures us that we are God’s beloved children and so free to ask hard questions of God. We don’t have to try to be pious and upbeat all the time; we can join in the laments and soul searching that we find in the Psalms and throughout scripture.

Jesus also gives us companions on this journey of seeking and searching.

Here at Good Shepherd, you can find these companions in lots of ways. The twice-monthly Pew to Pulpit gatherings are all focused around the questions that arise for people during worship. Pew to Pulpit is on a September hiatus; but it will be back in October and I encourage you to check it out. The conversations there are so powerful. People share deep struggles and doubts as well as laughter and musings.

Our Youth Forum participants and Confirmation students also ask really great questions. Last week in confirmation it was so exciting to see them wrestling with the two different creation stories and how evolution fits into it all. If you want to learn from great question askers, come and be a part of Youth Forum or Confirmation Class.

We also tackle big topics at Adult Forum and the Thursday morning Bible Study. This week at Bible Study we asked, “how can we keep praying when it feels like God doesn’t answer.” We shared our struggles and what we’ve learned along the way.

Our Social Justice Subcommittee helps us to consider hard questions about why things are so unjust and what following Jesus asks of us. It helps us to hear the stories of those who are on the margins, those who show us what Jesus is like. As we welcome these vulnerable people, we welcome Jesus.

All the committees and Council ask how can we most fully live out our mission? Those who serve in other ways are always considering how and why we do what we do together.

I give thanks for all the questions we ask together here at Good Shepherd. I pray that they help us to follow Jesus out in the world as vulnerable, open seekers. The world needs us to do this.

The challenges we face these days require curiosity and humility. We need to be asking better questions of each other and of God. As we gather together here, Jesus gives us what we need to question, seek, wonder and follow him on the way.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer and then I’ll end our time with a prayer by Macrina Wiederkehr:

“It seems to me Lord
That we search much too desperately for answers,
When a good question holds as much grace as an answer.
Jesus, you are the Great Questioner.
Keep our questions alive,
That we may always be seekers rather than settlers.
Guard us well from the sin of settling in
With our answers hugged to our breasts.
Make of us a wondering, far-sighted, questioning, restless people
And give us the feet of pilgrims on this journey unfinished. Amen.”

Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
September 16, 2018
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Marion Pruitt-Jefferson

First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-9a; Psalm 116:1-9; Second Reading: James 3:1-12; Gospel: Mark 8:27-38

I am having some serious trouble with the Jesus we see in this week’s gospel lesson. In a world filled with so much suffering and sorrow – so much hatred and fear, I want to hear about a Savior who offers comfort and hope. I want to see a loving Jesus who embraces children, who cures the sick, and who feeds the hungry. I want a righteous Jesus who brings justice oppressed, who sets the captive free, and who confronts the powers of evil. But I don’t get to choose the Jesus I want – instead, today, you and I get a Jesus who challenges his disciples and us, with a very hard lesson: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

This very hard teaching of Jesus – about self-denial and cross carrying – all starts with a simple question: Who do you say that I am? Not surprisingly it’s Peter who jumps in with at least seems to be the right answer: You are the Messiah. Which is followed by Jesus’ very strange reaction, when he sternly orders them not to tell anyone about him. That’s one of the themes of Mark’s gospel – Jesus repeatedly telling his disciples not to tell anyone about him. People who study this stuff call that the “Messianic Secret” and entire books have been written about what it might mean. I can’t say for sure, but I wonder if it’s possible that the reason Jesus doesn’t want his disciples telling people that he’s the Messiah is because they, along with every other 1^st century Jew, seriously misunderstood what being the Messiah truly meant to be.

Of course, they THINK they understand – Peter especially. Which is why Peter’s declaration “You are the Messiah” is actually more a wrong answer than it is right one. What Peter and the Jewish people expected was a Messiah with royal blood – a descendent of David, who would rise up, and using the power of the sword, defeat the Roman overlords and restore the Jewish nation and Davidic Kingdom to its original glory. What they got in Jesus was a Messiah who avoided the centers of power, and instead chose to operate on the margins of society. A Messiah who did not identify himself with people of influence and wealth, but chose to identify himself with those who were considered to be outcasts and “sinners” – the sick, the weak, the widow, the orphan, the poor. A Messiah who did not come bearing the wrath of God to inflict punishment, but one who came in gentleness and peace. A Messiah whose followers were not battle hardened warriors, but instead included tax collectors, uneducated fishermen, and even women. What they got in Jesus was a Messiah whose throne was the cross, and whose victory was accomplished not by the power of the sword, but through suffering and dying for his friends.

With that vision of Messiahship in front of him, it’s no wonder that Peter leapt to his feet and shouted NO Lord! You can’t suffer and die. That can’t happen to you. You are the Messiah – You’re going to restore Israel to her glory days. You’re the one who’s going to Make Israel Great Again!

But Jesus vehemently rejects that pathway to power. Jesus did not come into the world to fulfill the nationalistic agenda of Israel, or any other nation – but to inaugurate God’s vision for the human community which encompasses all people – and all creation.

Jesus’ first sermon in the gospel of Mark is only one sentence and it goes like this: The time is fulfilled, the reign of God has come near, repent and believe in the good news. In that one sentence, Jesus announces a completely new vision of God’s agenda for the world. The reign of God which Jesus proclaims transcends all nations – it has no borders, no boundaries, no walls with which to exclude the poor, or the refugee or the migrant. The reign of God does not rest on the power and might of the industrial military complex, but rests on the power of the cross – the power of suffering love. The reign of God is not sustained by economics of corporate capitalism and the fear of scarcity, but by the overflowing abundance God’s good creation, where all are fed, housed, clothed and cared for.

We do not yet live fully under the gracious reign of God. But When Jesus asks us to deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow him – I believe that he is asking us to live as though we do. To hold that vision before our eyes, and make the priorities of the reign of God our priorities. To let go of our misplaced trust in the power sword and flag and national identity, and instead to place our trust in the expansive, generous, welcoming, vision of the reign of God that includes all people from every race and nation and creed.

To deny yourself and follow Jesus means being willing to go where Jesus goes – to people and places we may not choose for ourselves. To the margins of society, to the prisons, the homeless shelters, the half-way houses and detention centers. To food pantries and soup kitchens. To nursing homes, hospitals and care facilities. To schools and neighborhoods that are under served and under resourced. Because that is where the crucified Lord leads.

When we gather here each week, we come not to worship a God of our own making, but the God made known to us is the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ – a God whose ways in this world are not our ways – whose thoughts are not our thoughts. We worship a God whose power is revealed in suffering love which overcomes all the powers of death. We worship a God who is always more than we can imagine, more than we can hope for, or desire. We worship the God of the cross, who, through Jesus death and resurrection lavishly pours out upon us the gift of true life – life which never dies. A God who continually invites us to come to this table, where together, under the sign of the cross, we receive a small morsel of bread and taste of wine – Jesus body and blood given for us – a great and wondrous feast that fills us with all of the love and strength we need to follow Jesus from this place in to a world marked by suffering and despair. A world longing to receive from our lips a word of hope and promise, and from our hands, the care they need.

The hymn we are going to sing at the end of the service has long been a favorite of mine. I’m pretty sure that it’s the only hymn in our worship book that includes the word “adventure.” As we follow Jesus into the world today, may the words of this song be on our lips and in our hearts:

Dear Lord Jesus, guide my way; faithful let me day by day follow where your steps are leading, find adventure, joys exceeding.

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost
September 9, 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. Amen.

This is a really troubling story. It raises all sorts of questions. Why does Jesus, the very face of God’s compassion, refuse to heal this woman’s daughter? Why does he call her a dog, saying it isn’t fair to take what’s intended for the children of Israel and throw it to the dogs?

The children of Israel are indeed God’s chosen people, but shouldn’t Jesus help other people too? The Syro-phoenicians were ancient enemies of Israel, but doesn’t Jesus tell us to turn the other cheek? And why does to call her a dog? That seems a bit extreme.

The woman persists, saying, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” Jesus responds, “For saying that, you may go – the demon has left your daughter.”

So, Jesus relents and heals her daughter because she has a good comeback?

Many interpreters feel this encounter helped Jesus to see that his mission was for all people – even Israel’s enemies. And maybe that’s what happened. We don’t know; we can’t really know for sure.

One thing we can see in this story is the power of persistent faith.

• The Syrophoenician woman seeks Jesus out even when he’s trying to escape notice.
• She kneels at his feet and pleads with him.
• She doesn’t give up but stays engaged – giving a strong, thoughtful, humble response back to Jesus.
• Jesus is moved by her response and heals her daughter.

This story reveals a God who’s influenced by our persistence. What this woman did and said made a difference to Jesus. Our persistence, our willingness to engage matters to God; we see that throughout scripture. Our willingness to ask questions and struggle with faith and prayer are important.

Yet that kind of persistence doesn’t come easily. When we’ve prayed, worked, questioned, hoped and pleaded, yet don’t see any change, it’s so easy to give up and think that God doesn’t really hear, that God doesn’t really care.

Thankfully, God doesn’t just sit around hoping we will be persistent. God is much more persistent than we will ever be.

God persists in loving, challenging, forgiving and healing us again and again. And God cannot be stopped from doing this. Even when we put Jesus to death on a cross, he rose again. Nothing, not even death, can prevent God from loving us all and working to heal us all.

God’s persistent, dogged, determined love for us gives us strength to persist in praying and working for healing and change.

I give thanks for the ways that persistence has brought important change in our church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Our church is stronger, more inclusive, and more able to witness to our welcoming God now that we ordain women and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and gender non-conforming people with gifts for public ministry. This change happened as the Holy Spirit worked through the faithful persistence of women, LGBTQ folks and their advocates.

And now, kids: Listen up, I’m going to talk about you. Today I especially give thanks for children who have persisted in asking to be fed at Christ’s table.

When I was first a pastor in Northern Minnesota, the children of the congregation received communion when they were in fifth grade, after a First Communion class. I loved teaching that class. I loved the way First Communion was an important milestone for the kids.

But then one Sunday, a new family was in worship with their four-year old son. I preached about how Jesus meets us in the bread and wine at the table. Apparently, the little boy was taking it all in. When it came time for communion, he came to the rail with his parents and held out his hands expectantly. I gave him a really special blessing and a big smile but no bread – he was too young. He burst into tears. He started crying, “I want Jesus”, really loudly, over and over. His parents had to pry him away from the rail and drag him away. He continued to repeat, “I want Jesus”, as they carried him down the very long aisle and out the back of the church.

Similar things happened again and again in that congregation and have happened throughout the ELCA. The cries of children longing to be fed at Christ’s table have caused our church to reconsider our policies and practices around communion.

Our current guidelines now say that yes, we want children to learn about communion and what it means for them, but we don’t have to wait to start teaching them and sharing the meal with them. Infants and very young children can be given communion and can receive age appropriate teaching about communion as they develop. That is our practice now at Good Shepherd.

Having children at the table, having children serve us communion as they will today is helpful for the whole church. It shows us that these gifts are sheer grace, they aren’t given to us because we understand rightly or believe rightly or live rightly. They are gifts of grace. We can never fully understand what God has done for us in Christ Jesus and how Jesus meets us at the table. But we are welcomed into a community in which we grow and learn and receive together.

God persists in working through the church to provide a space of welcome, a space where encounters of healing and change and grace can happen.

We are welcomed here even when we struggle to believe, even we despair, even when we feel anything but persistent.

We are welcomed and healed around the table of God’s love and mercy. And then, we are sent out from the table to let others know that they too have a place of welcome in God’s heart. We are sent to make bigger tables where all people can be fed and healed. We can persist in this work because our persistent God is always at work at the healing of the world.

Thanks be to God.

Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost
September 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.

Sometimes I wonder what Jesus would have to say about social media. Certainly, it can be a good tool. I should probably use it more for the sake of ministry and I know I often miss important things that people share there. (Which is to say: If you post something on Facebook and want your pastor to know about it, please tell me some other way, too!)

Social media can be very helpful. Yet, I join many in wondering whether it keeps us on the surface of our lives, too focused on how we appear to others. We show the world all the attractive, humorous, appealing highlights of our lives and not the vast messy remainder of how things really are. Then we compare our actual lives to other people’s highlight reels and our mental health suffers. Some people are able to be more honest on social media, and for that I’m grateful. Yet, we so often carefully curate our online presence to project a certain image about ourselves – the witty social critic, the happy parent, the righteous prophet, the gentle soul.

Concern for how we look to others is not new to social media. And our public persona is often very differ- ent from how we really live. I used to think it was funny how my mom would be yelling at me one second, and then answer the phone all sweetness and light. Now I do the same thing. My Christmas cards often make things appear much rosier than they really are. Congregations look so energized on Rally Day and New Member Sunday, less so in the middle of Lent with lots of soup suppers to organize. Luther College on first-year move-in day is very different than Luther in late February.

Of course, there are good reasons to try to put your best forward – to represent yourself, your family, your institution well. It isn’t all bad to consider how you look to others.

In fact, God often instructed the people of Israel to consider how they appeared to other nations in order to bear witness to God’s goodness and holiness. In our first reading today, Moses told the people,“You must observe [the commandments of the Lord] diligently, for this will show your wisdom and discernment to the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and discerning people!’  For what other great nation has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is whenever we call to him?^”

Many Israelites took this charge quite seriously; the Pharisees certainly did. They observed the law very carefully so that they could be a witness to other nations and give glory to God.

In Jesus’ time, when Israel was living under the occupation of the Roman Empire, the Pharisees felt strict adherence to the law and the traditions was even more essential – it was a way to show that they were resisting Rome’s oppression. So, when some scribes and Pharisees saw Jesus’ disciples not washing their hands, they worried that it would look like they were giving in to the power of Rome.

These religious leaders knew that appearances can really matter. They had some legitimate concerns.

Yet Jesus had a deeper concern. Jesus could see that these leaders had become so focused on the externals of faithfulness that they neglected to examine their own hearts. And while there can be good reasons to think about appearances, Jesus is more concerned about what is within us.

All the focus on the externals was leading the scribes and Pharisees to put up internal walls between themselves and others – between the quote, “clean” and the “unclean”. Their faith practices weren’t drawing them closer to God and their neighbors, weren’t reflecting the holiness of God, but were means of
excluding people they considered dirty or contaminated.

Though these leaders tried to present a squeaky-clean image, Jesus could see the evil in their own hearts.

Jesus can see the evil and ugliness and judgement within our hearts as well.

We also focus too much on externals and put up walls. We have different ways of judging and separating ourselves from others; we’re quite proficient in doing that, with lots of help from social media. We pay much more attention to what others are doing wrong than to the sin within us. We neglect to examine our own hearts. The good news is that Jesus sees all this and yet he does not turn away.

He sees right through our highly edited versions of ourselves, knows what lurks in our hearts, yet loves us still.

Jesus also shows us what truly matters through his own life. He crosses boundaries, eats with social outcasts, and touches those considered unclean. He loves, serves and gives his life for all people – tax collectors and sinners, lepers and demon-possessed people, scribes and Pharisees, you and me. There are no barriers that can stop Jesus from seeing you, loving you, forgiving you.

This good news exerts a claim on our lives, a call to follow his ways.

Following Jesus means that, like him, we cross boundaries to serve others, that we live out an inclusive love and welcome, that we care especially for those the world has cast aside. Following Jesus is not about outside appearances but about a heart cleansed and a life shaped by the radical, self-giving love of Jesus.

Today, at the table, Jesus meets you to give of his very self. Here Jesus promises that you are known, loved and forgiven, and calls you to follow.

Let’s join in silent prayer.

Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost
August 26, 2018
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

First Reading:  Proverbs 9:1-6; Psalm 34: 9-14; Second Reading: Ephesians 5:15-20; Gospel: John 6: 51-58

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

Jesus as the bread of life is a beautiful, powerful metaphor, but does anyone else feel they’ve had their fill of it? This is the fourth Sunday that we’ve heard about this. If we were strictly following the lectionary, the assigned pattern of scripture readings, this would be our fifth Sunday hearing about Jesus as the bread of life. We got to cut one Sunday out by having the kids lead us in the Global Church Sunday – another benefit of that wonderful day.

Today, more bread isn’t the only thing that seems a little much, a little excessive. Jesus says some really strange things. He says, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” And twice he talks about, “those who eat my flesh and drink my blood.” If you heard these words without any context, you’d have to assume Jesus was talking about cannibalism. They are really unappetizing words. I prefer more palatable teachings about love and service and being kind. I’d rather avoid talk about flesh eating followers.

No wonder Jesus’ first hearers disputed among themselves, asking, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat? How can this be?”

If we spend a lot of time around the church, we sometimes forget how strange Jesus’ words are until we put ourselves in the place of someone who hasn’t domesticated or spiritualized them.

If we hear these words, as if for the first time, we realize that Jesus is making some pretty radical claims.  Jesus is saying the God of the universe has come, in the flesh, so that we can consume God.

And that’s pretty intense. Do we really want a God who is that close, that intimately involved in our lives?

This isn’t a God who’s just icing on the top of a good life – a light, fluffy, unobtrusive God. This is a God who wants to get under our skin, burrow within us, and seep into every nook and cranny of our beings.

This is not a God who stays at a safe distance sending down teachings, ideas and motivation. This a God who wants to get into every aspect of our lives. It almost sounds like God wants to consume us, to claim us, and change us from the inside out.

That’s not the kind of God we’d likely choose off a menu. We’d often prefer a kind of comfort food God – warm, fuzzy, not too demanding. A God who wants to be consumed and to consume us is not all that appealing.

And yet, the good news of Jesus is that God doesn’t wait until we desire or accept or believe or understand any of this. God just comes to us in Jesus. And Jesus gives his very self to feed us with what we most need.

God knows that on our own, we don’t choose what we really need. We consume so many empty calories; we seek fulfillment in all sorts of things that leave us wanting. So, Jesus helps us to see how hungry and thirsty we are and awakens our yearning for God.

God knows that we are so often consumed by things that drain our life – consumed by worries, fears, anger, stress. So, Jesus helps us identify what’s eating at us and sets us free from it. Jesus draws us into God’s all-consuming love and abundance.

God knows that our patterns of consumption keep us focused inwards on our wants and pleasures. So, Jesus comes to turn us outward, towards our neighbor, so that our lives will nurture others.

Jesus gives himself so that we might have what we really need.

Jesus does this in all the ways he has promised. He is present when two or three are gathered in his name.

When we meet in Jesus’ name we become more than we are as individual parts – we become Christ’s body for each other and the world.

Through this beautiful, broken, beloved body of Christ, God challenges us, gets under our skin, disturbs us and, at the same time, loves, feeds, blesses and transforms us. There are many, many times that the body of Christ – in the whole church and in this congregation – is not what we’d prefer. But, it is just what we need to receive abundant life and to be a life-giving presence in the world.

Jesus, the Word made flesh, also meets us as we hear and reflect on the words of scripture, as we sing, make music, pray, and share in silence. In all these ways Jesus frees and feeds us.

And Jesus comes to us in the bread and wine saying, “This is my body, this is my blood – given for you.” He doesn’t wait to see if we believe this or feel something about this. Jesus simply meets us where we are in a way that we can touch, smell, taste and see – in a way that can get into us.

Jesus also meets us out in the world, in the creation that feeds us, and in those the world considers least and the last; for he promises that how we treat those in need is how we treat him.

Jesus is present in, with and among us giving us what we need, even if it’s not always what we’d choose.

Through Jesus’ presence, God gets under our skin. God transforms us from the inside out.

Let’s take a moment of silent prayer.