Sarcastic Lutheran

a sermon following the ELCA church wide assembly

Gospel: John 6:56–69

Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.  Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me.  This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever."  He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.
     When many of his disciples heard it, they said, "This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?"  But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, "Does this offend you?  Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?  It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.  But among you there are some who do not believe." For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him.  And he said, "For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father."
     Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.  So Jesus asked the twelve, "Do you also wish to go away?"  Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.  We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God."

In our text for today Jesus is teaching in the synagogue and when he’s done a bunch of his followers say “This teaching is haaaard.” and Jesus is like, O I’m sorry, does this offend you?” and several of them left right there on the spot.  He then asks “Do you also want to leave?” and Peter replies “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life”

As many of you know, my denomination – the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America met in church wide assembly this week.  The highest governing body of the church.  Among the business at hand was deciding on a full communion agreement with the United Methodists, which passed.  And several historic decisions to be made around what this church’s stance is on issues of human sexuality. In the end, we approved a social statement as well as policy changes which now allow congregations to bless and hold publicly accountable those in same sex life long monogamous relationship as well as to call GLBTQ pastors in such relationships to serve as their clergy.  
The debate on the floor between those at the green microphones who support these steps and those at the red microphones who reject these steps was sometimes inspired and sometimes insipid.   Those in support urged the church to be open and loving as Jesus had been.  Those opposed urged the church to heed the Bible.  Both sides were passionate and faithful and I’m proud to say that throughout the debate the assembly paused every 20 minutes to pray together.
As an ELCA pastor serving you,  a community committed to the full inclusion of all GLBTQ brothers and sisters in Christ, I  watched the proceedings with my heart in my throat.  If these policy changes hadn’t been approved I honestly had no idea what I could possible come back to you and say.  Watching people’s comments I would try to fight off thoughts like “man, that guys an idiot” with more or less success.  I watched people say prayerful things, hurtful things, thoughtful things, and idiotic things on both sides of the aisle. Yet there several of my friends were: standing faithfully at the Green microphones.  Standing faithfully to make this church a house of prayer for ALL people.  And I couldn’t help but think…if Jesus was here, he’d be standing in the green line.  And then a young pastor got up to speak at the green microphone and the first thing he said, in a quivering voice was “anyone else frightened to speak?  I’m shaking.  Please pray for me” and the man standing right next to him in at the red microphone reached over and laid his hand on him and prayed while his brother of the opposing view point spoke.  Then I knew that Jesus was really in between the red and green microphones. Not in some sort of neutral “Jesus as Switzerland” sort of way, but in the you must lose your life to gain it sort of way.  Jesus is between the red and the green microphones…between the red and the blue states offering us life and salvation in the Words of eternal life and in the Sacrament of his own body and blood.  Jesus right there between the liberals and conservatives speaking the word that the first shall be last and the last shall be first.  Jesus standing there between those who are harmed and those doing the harming saying forgive as you have been forgiven. 

Part of me is with the disciples who say These teaching are difficult, who can accept them? So when Jesus says Do you too want to leave….I think the only reasonable answer is well yeah.  I do.  cause these teachings are haaaard and I’m very aware of how much these policy changes mean to this community I love but I’m also aware of how painful these policy changes are to a minority in this denomination I love.
So after the vote went the way it did people keep calling and emailing and texting me saying “Are you celebrating?  Aren’t you so happy we won?”  I am, of course.  But I am also deeply aware of the faithful people in the Lutheran church whose hearts are breaking and who now feel as though THEY are the alienated ones.  So how do we celebrate?

To be sure today there are some places to go in the ELCA for super-gay triumphalism…but while celebrating a well won victory is understandable…these are not the words of eternal life. 

To be sure there are some places today in the ELCA where you can hear the words of angry indignation and revolt….but while disappointment is understandable…. these are not the words of eternal life.

To whom shall we go?
Shall we go to partisanship? Shall we go to gurus or celebrities…or both- like Oprah?  Surely Oprah has the words of eternal life.
To whom shall we go?  Fox News?  NPR?  Shall we go to the self-help section of the tattered cover for the words of eternal life?
There are words of eternal life, but they are not our words.  So Let us not go to ourselves because as deeply as we hold our beliefs about inclusion, or social justice, or as deeply as we hold our beliefs about social conservatism or personal morality…we do not have the words of eternal life.  We have our beliefs, our convictions, our understandings of scripture and hear me clearly…these are not to be taken lightly or walked away from.  But they are not the words of eternal life. Jesus, the true Word of God standing between red and green, points us to life and life abundant.  Not the empty satisfaction of being right  because we are the majority or because we are the righteous minority, but counter-intuitively the words of eternal life tell us that we must die.  We must die to self and live to Christ.
At the beginning and the end of these debates Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson reminded us that “WE MEET ONE ANOTHER FINALLY, NOT IN OUR AGREEMENTS OR OUR DISAGREEMENTS, BUT AT THE FOOT OF THE CROSS. WHERE GOD IS FAITHFUL, WHERE CHRIST IS PRESENT WITH US, AND WHERE, BY THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, WE ARE ONE IN CHRIST.

So let’s again look to Christ and not ourselves because in the end there are no winners and losers, there is just what there has always been, the good news of Jesus Christ The Holy One of God.  To whom else shall we go? He has the words of eternal life and offers all the inexplicable gift if his own self, body blood and word. And bid all come and eat.
So today church as we celebrate  …. And there is reason to do so.  Let us pray that the Lord make us one and have mercy on us all and let us recognize that he is already doing  so. amen

Sermon on Phillip and the Ethiopian Eunuch

A sermon for Easter 4b

Text: Acts 8
26Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, "Get up and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza." (This is a wilderness road.)  27So he got up and went. Now there was an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official of the Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, in charge of her entire treasury. He had come to Jerusalem to worship  28and was returning home; seated in his chariot, he was reading the prophet Isaiah.  29Then the Spirit said to Philip, "Go over to this chariot and join it."  30So Philip ran up to it and heard him reading the prophet Isaiah. He asked, "Do you understand what you are reading?"  31He replied, "How can I, unless someone guides me?" And he invited Philip to get in and sit beside him.  32Now the passage of the scripture that he was reading was this:
    "Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter,
    and like a lamb silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth.
  33In his humiliation justice was denied him.
    Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth."
  34The eunuch asked Philip, "About whom, may I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?"  35Then Philip began to speak, and starting with this scripture, he proclaimed to him the good news about Jesus.  36As they were going along the road, they came to some water; and the eunuch said, "Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?"  38He commanded the chariot to stop, and both of them, Philip and the eunuch, went down into the water, and Philip baptized him.  39When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; the eunuch saw him no more, and went on his way rejoicing.  40But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he was passing through the region, he proclaimed the good news to all the towns until he came to Caesarea.

As many of you know, last week Seth and I attended the Rocky Mountain Synod assembly – the legislative body for this region of the Lutheran church.  For more than 10 years my denomination has been talking about human sexuality.  Much like the early church who were convinced that gentiles could only become Christians if they changed into being Jews first (which, for the record, involved a rather unpleasant process), much like our first century brothers and sisters there is a segment of the church today who thinks that if we extend the roof of the tent to include “the gays” then the whole thing will come crashing down around us.  We must “evangelize” them – ie. change them into us before they will fit. Or else the roof can’t hold.  Meanwhile the other side of the church is all about “inclusion”.  We must extend the tent to include the marginalized, the less fortunate the minorities.

    But then we have this story of Phillip and The Ethiopian Eunuch.  A text which I have always heard as being about evangelism. “The conversion of the Ethiopian Eunuch” it was called.    I was always told that the message of this text was that we should tell everyone we meet about Jesus because in doing so we might save them.  We might convert them.  We might change them into being us. 

But today I’m not so sure.  Because if the Eunuch was reading Isaiah as he returned from Jerusalem having gone there to worship – see if he was reading Isaiah then I would bet he was also familiar with Dueteronomy, specifically 23:1 “No one whose testicles are cut off or whose penis is cut off shall be admitted to the assembly of the Lord” Anyone have that one as a memory verse growing up?
This law strictly forbids a Eunuch from entering the assembly of the Lord.  Their transgression of gender binaries and the inability to fit in proper categories made them profane by nature.  They do not fit in the tent.  But the Eunuch went to Jerusalem to worship despite the fact that in all likelihood he would be turned away by the religious establishment.  The Eunuch sought God anyway.

See, when the Spirit guided Phillip to that road in the desert I like to think she guided him to his own conversion.  As he approached the chariot he may have been thinking OK…I’ll just beat him with the scripture stick until he becomes what I am comfortable with.  But when Phillip joined this person who sought to worship God despite his exclusion form the tent, maybe it was Phillip himself who was converted to the faith.  It was perhaps even a mutual conversion.  Maybe because they simply asked each other questions in the desert.  The only imperatives came from the Holy Spirit. Phillip and the Eunuch only asked each other questions.  The only commands came from God and the command was go and join.  Go and join the other.  What we don’t know is if the Spirit also gave the Eunuch a command to invite.  Invite this nice Jewish boy – representative of all that clings to the law and rejects you from God’s house.  Invite him to sit by you.  Go…join…invite…ask questions. Perhaps Phillip in his encounter with this gender transgressive foreigner learned what seeking the Lord looks like.

A couple weeks ago Stuart showed up to liturgy wearing slacks and button down shirt rather than his Grease Monkey jacket and jeans.  Earlier that day He had stood as Godfather and baptismal sponsor for the child of his friends’ ; a straight couple who have known Stuart for a number of years.  Apparently after the baptism there was a little reception back at this couple’s house.  To Stuart’s surprise his friends got all of their guests attention so they could say a few words about why they had chosen Stuart as their child’s godparent.  “We chose you Stuart” they said “because for most of your life you have pursued Christ and Christ’s church even though as a Gay Man all you’ve heard from the church is that ‘there is no love for you here’”.  I heard that story as his friends saying to him “you, Stuart convert us again and again to this faith” 

All many of you have heard is that the tent is simply not big enough unless you change to fit in it.  Change your sexuality, your personality your doubting. Change your addictive patterns, your story, your brokenness. And if you can’t, then just pretend. Yet here you are.  Converting me once again to this faith.

Because how can I know what it means to follow Christ unless I learn it from someone who has done so despite every obstacle possible?  That’s why I am so in awe of those in our community who have heard again and again “there is no love for you here unless you let us change you into who we feel comfortable with you being”.  Not just the queers either.  Also those who have the wrong personality or the wrong socio economic status or the wrong gender or the wrong immigration status or the wrong politics to fit under the tent.
 I think maybe that we can’t actually know what this Jesus following thing is about unless we too have the stranger show us.  This is far more than “inclusion”. Inclusion isn’t the right word at all because it sounds like in our niceness and virtue we are allowing “them” to join us - like we are judging another group of people to be worthy to be a part of this thing.  “inclusion” seems like a small thing.  A charity.  A mercy. But the truth is that We need the equivalent of our Ethiopian Eunuch to show us the faith.  We continually need the stranger, the foreigner, the “other” to show us water in the desert.  We need to hear “Here is water in the desert, so what is to keep me the eunuch from being baptized” or me the queer or me the intersexed, or me the illiterate or me the neurotic or me the over-educated or me the founder of Focus on the Family.  Until we face the difficulty of that question and come up as Phillip did with no answer…until then we just look at the seemingly limited space under the tent and either think it’s our job to change people so they fit or its our job to extend the roof so that they fit.  Either way, it’s misguided because …it’s not our tent.  It’s God’s tent. The wideness of the tent of the Lord should concern us only insofaras it points to the gracious nature of a loving God who became flesh and entered into our humanity.  The wideness of the tent should only concern us insofaras it  points to the great mercy and love of a God who welcomes us all as friends.

The bigness of God’s tent is why we have an open communion table.  When we come to the table we all come as Christ’s guests to his feast. And as much as we’d like to be - we are not the makers of the guest list. We come to the table with those who accept us and those who reject us.  We come to the table with those we love and those we distrust. We come whether or not we feel worthy. Because It is God who has made us worthy in the invitation.  It is God who has torn the curtain of the temple so that there is no longer Jew nor Greek, Slave nor free, Male nor Female gay nor straight.  Liberal nor conservative.

So maybe here in this story of the conversion of Phillip and the Eunuch is some hope for the church.  That under God’s really big tent we might ask questions, invite those who represent the establishment to come and sit by us, to stay in the scriptures, to be converted anew by the strange and the stranger, to see where there is water in the desert, to enter fully into the waters of God’s mercy with the foreigners, with the “not us”. And to go on our way rejoicing having converted each other to this beautiful, dangerous expansive life of faith.

Where are the Queers???

I've been at Luther Seminary for 3 weeks now and have yet to meet an out GLBTQ person.  Um, I know they have to be here somewhere.  It's so weird to be in an environment where it is apparently not safe to be out.  It's making me deeply sad actually. I think I'll start being a little obnoxious about it and find some rainbow flags and pink triangles to sport.
Allie Allie in come free!!!!

It's so troubling to me to be a part of system (the ELCA - my denomination) who has a policy of exclusion that I do not agree with....it actually goes beyond disagreement, I think it is sinful.  I just refuse to leave and will (along with many many other folks) work to change my church. That is a threat, not just a promise.

Lutheran Confessions

I'm taking a 3 week class at Luther Seminary in St. Paul on Lutheran Confessional Writings.  These writings are in the Book of Concord, a 16th century collection of Reformation documents.  Basically when all hell broke loose after Martin Luther dared to speak theological truth to ecclesiastical power, a bunch of theologians worked quite hard at justifying why we are justified by faith alone and not by any effort of our own.  Which of course begs the question- doesn't that make faith a "work"?  Ney say the reformers, faith is a gift given by the Holy Spirit, as the 3rd article of the Creed in Luther's Small Catechism states:  I believe that                     I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ,                     my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Ghost has called me                     by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and                     kept me in the true faith. 
This is my favorite part of the catechism, because as someone who was raised in an almost entirely works based church  -  a bit like a  salvific meritocracy,  I'm inclined to find the idea that I don't have to try and muster up faith in Christ by sheer individual effort, a great comfort. If I am unable on my own to believe in Christ, then I wonder if when I feel that I am lacking in faith, that it is perhaps almost entirely absent, should I then trust that I indeed do have the faith that I do not at that moment percieve I have?  Perhaps the Holy Spirit gives us faith but not the ability to perceive we have it and we are to just have faith that we have faith and not depend on our thoughts and feelings to determine if we have it.  See, this is quite messy isn't it?

Here's been my main issue in this class: lack of humility.  Would it have killed the reformers to hedge even a little bit in the absolute certainty with which they made their proclamations?  In class the other day  we were talking about how we are all simultaneously sinner and saint.  A student then asked "How are we seen by God?"  The professor then answered - it was convoluted, I could not begin to explicate it here, but the thing that struck me was how certain and immediate his answer was.  So we can know the mind of the Almighty?  We can definitively say "Well, here's how God sees this..."  I'm not so sure.  I think there is a limit to rational thought and we best start confessing THAT.  Here's why I believe this lack of humility exists, and it's a bit circular, so stay with me.   We get that God  is bigger than and has more authority than us, so  in matters of theology we cannot rely on "human experience" or "ideas of man" to tell us about who God is, so we claim that the confession we make - the official church doctrines - are "scriptural" and not of human origin, therefore we have no reason to hedge in our absolute certainty in these matters, for they are from God and not from us.   The problem is that these ARE all human ideas and creations...I'll not get into the issue of authority of scripture, but even giving scripture a high authority - the way in which it is used and explained is entirely human.  Even if you believe that "God wrote the Bible", God did not also write a commentary on the Bible, so any interpretation is going to be from human thought and experience.  I think perhaps we ought to be honest about this and not hide behind "scriptural authority" by trying to pawn off our ideas as God's.  Are we so scared of mystery that in our pride we trust our reason to explain every doctrinal and theological minutiae so that in the end it's all explained to our satisfaction, packaged neatly and tied with a bow?
I love the Creeds and the Augsburg Confession, I even trust them, but I'm just not willing to eliminate the possibility that maybe we got something wrong.  These doctrines are our best shot at the truth, not the truth itself.  I guess I'm just more comforted by mystery than certainty. 
So call me a heretic...again.

Young adults...the elusive demographic: just light the candles and they will come

The church is not unlike film and television.  We all are looking for that 18-35 demographic aren't we?  I was at the Rocky Mountain Synod Assembly (big Lutheran business meeting of like 540 pastors and lay leaders) over the past few days and had the chance to hostess a lunchtime conversation about the emerging church (at breakfast I told Mr. SL that I really was hoping at least 8 people would show up because with less than that, it would just be awkward) there were 45 folks who showed up! - many of whom had to sit on the floor.  I was amazed at the interest so I started out by asking folks to say who they were and why they chose this out of 20 so other options for lunch conversations.  Many were just curious about EC, some were there because the tall tattooed lady was leading it and they were frankly curious about me, and many indicated that their churches were looking at starting an alternative worship service or a second campus geared toward the "younger generation".  Here are my 2 reactions to this last group: 1) I am amazed and pleased at how much these "traditional" church folks want to reach those who are not already coming to their churches and that's a good sign that they are not entirely self-centered, which is great.  2) I unfortunately have yet to really see this work, especially if these churches are trying to reach post-moderns.  If you are reading this and you know of exceptions to this statement, please let me know, especially if these churches have managed to bring in post-moderns who are de-churched or un-churched.  I tried to lovingly tell of what I had seen across the country without being too defeatist about the whole thing.  One red flag that goes up for me when a church wants to try and attract young adults is that there is the implication that traditional congregations are normative Christian communities which everyone SHOULD want to be a part of.  I tend to resent the idea that the current manifestation of traditional church (building, pews all in a row, nicy-nice people, hymns, organ, Sunday worship, aurality as the primary sensory experience of the liturgy etc...) is NOT a single cultural expression of Christian community but the normative expression to which all deviations are judged.  My friend Annie spoke up during the conversation and said that people need to try and not see the emerging church as a resource which can be duplicated in your congregations resulting in young adults joining your church, instead folks should see these new communities as the growth of the church in a bigger sense, not simply a way to try and grow your own congregation.  To this she added that established churches should support the people who are native to the  postmodern culture and then walk away.  Pray for the people who are appropriate to and equipped for this culturally specific ministry, see that this is a needed and vital ministry that you are likely NOT equipped or appropriate for but which is in need of resources....give them money, prayer and blessing...tell the kids who grew up in your churches, but who no longer are in Christian community to check it out.  This is so needed.  Now, is that it?  No.  What trad churches can take from the emerging church is to pay attention to the questions that the EC is asking and then ask those same questions in your community.  Please don't try and have your Easter vigil in a Goth club like Church of the Apostles.  Please don't try and have a "Tomb Show" during Lent like Mercy Seat.  That would be just as silly as them trying to start a "Dorothy circle" (sorry - if you're not Lutheran, that may not make sense), or start a quilting circle because it works for your community.  But DO ask "is our worship service culturally appropriate to our context?"  and "does the language we use in our community reflect our core values?" and "are we noticing where God is already at work in our lives and in our neighborhoods, and are we willing to join in that work?"  This is what you can take form the EC: a renewed focus on mission, context and praxis.  But seriously, I have no starter kit with candles, a glue on goatee and an icon for $49.95 which will attract young adults like flies on shit, and if anyone else claims to, please never stop smacking them.