some more proclamation

yesterday's sermon. i kind of liked it. one of those sermons where i figured it would either work really well, or just totally bomb. i think it worked.

it is memorial day in DC. weird.
i will tell you all about that tomorrow. this will be good enough for today.



May 25, 2008
Second Sunday After Pentecost
Matthew 6:24-34 (Isaiah 49:8-16)

Grace to you and Peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen

God suffers because…
This is what I became aware of last year as I entered into my prophets class. God suffers. God suffers with, because, and for. These are powerful ideas. Isaiah gives us the gut wrenching cries of God suffering because.

Listen again to the Isaiah passage:
“But Zion said, ‘The Lord has forsaken me, my Lord has forgotten me.’
Can a woman forget her nursing child, or show now compassion for the child of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me.”
Zion, the people of Israel, cry out that God has abandoned them. Listen to God’s response:
“Can a woman forget her nursing child, or show no compassion for the child of her womb?”

God has been rejected by God’s children. The beloved child has turned from the mother that nurtured it. This is not the child running from the abusive parent. This is the child that was raised in a loving home. A home that had boundaries, but also there was love and goodness. This child ran away. God suffers the loss of the child and desperately wants this child to return.

This is not the first time God has experienced this loss.
Nor would it be the last.

Remember the Flood?
Remember Sarah and Abraham trying to have a child?
Remember Esau and Jacob fighting over their blessings?

These were all times when humans did not trust that God would take care of them. They did not trust that God would do what God said.

Back to Isaiah.
The Lord says, “I will not forget you.”

Later in Isaiah, the Lord will say, “Here am I, Here am I,” to a nation that did not call on my name.” This is what my wonderful professor Fretheim says about this:
“Here God recalls how the divine eagerness for intimacy is ignored. God stands and offers himself in a cry that, in view of the invitation having been rejected, is almost heart-rending: “here am I, Here am I.” My heart fills with pain for God when I read this interpretation of Isaiah. Those words, “divine eagerness.” What a powerful image of God. Eager to be with us. Eager to love us. Eager to know us. Then rejected. Over and over again.

Imagine. Imagine being rejected by your loved ones. Desperately wanting a relationship. This is God’s relationship with humans. This is God’s constant relation with creation since the beginning.

Again listen to Prof. Fretheim’s description of God’s rejection:
“God is like a person who has been rejected not only by his spouse but by his children as well. God suffers the effects of the broken relationship at multiple levels of intimacy. The wounds of God are manifold.”

Eventually, God’s grief becomes so much that God sends Jesus into the world. God loves the world so much that Christ must come to heal the broken relationship.

Listen now, to Christ in today’s Gospel:
“No one can serve two masters’ for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”

Serving two masters is turning away from God. It is turning to a different parent for support. It is turning to a different spouse for love. Christ is reminding the community that heard the Sermon on the Mount that they cannot turn away from God.

As in Isaiah, Christ uses parental images to talk about God. God is the heavenly Father that provides. Matthew writes: “Indeed, your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.” Matthew is referring to clothing and food. God will take care of all these needs. God knows these needs. Just as God knew these needs in Isaiah’s time.

God still knows our needs. God knows that we need food, clothing and shelter. God knows that we worry about today and tomorrow. That is why we are commanded to pray for daily bread. A few verses before this in Matthew, Jesus teaches the Lord’s prayer.

When we pray for daily bread we are praying for today. We are kept in the present and pray for the present’s needs. We do not know what our needs for tomorrow will be. God knows. God will take care of tomorrow. Christ knows that we struggle to maintain our relationship with God. That is why Christ tells us to serve one master. That is why Christ tells us to focus on today.

When we focus on tomorrow, we begin to lose trust that God will provide.
Ask yourself if God has provided for today.
Now, thank God for that.

We can begin to move back into relationship with God. Remember the Lord’s Prayer? Daily bread, forgiveness, praising God, keeping us from temptation, all the basics are covered. This prayer helps restore us to right relation with God. The relationship we turn away from time and time again.

God is waiting for us. God desperately wants to be in relationship. God is divinely eager to be in relationship with you, dearly beloved. This is why Christ was sent to die for you and me. We can trust that as many times as we turn away, Christ will be holding us. Christ will be there. God will be grieving, but there is still the relationship kept alive in Christ. It cannot be broken completely.

All of this because God grieved for so many years. God grieved and could not let go of the relationship with humanity.
Take hope that God’s grief is out of deep love for you. God loves you so much that God gave his only son. God cares so deeply that God gives you all good things you need daily. You do not need to worry about tomorrow, for God will worry about that for you. And know that when relationships in your earthly families are strained, God understands. God knows strained family relationships. God will hear your pain and have compassion.
Take heart in this line from a modern American Prophet, Johnny Cash.
Feeling unknown and you’re all alone
Flesh and Bone, by the telephone
Lift up the receiver
I’ll make you a believer
I will deliver, you know I’m a forgiver.

God is eager to deliver and to forgive. Johnny still can preach. Let God care for you! Trust and don’t worry about tomorrow. Amen

proof

okay. when i moved to DC last fall, i was stunned. my poor little midwestern self couldn't quite handle the aggressive nature of the city. i had never seen such scary drivers. when i go home to mn, i don't get honked at once...and i will be home for a WEEK!

read the article...

area drivers hold spot among the nation's rudest

DC is 5th in the nation for crabby drivers.
minneapolis ranks as one of the most courteous.

no wonder i had so many issues.
i had to learn...well, you know what i had to learn.

a funny song.

The Lutheran Song

unfortunately i can't embed the video on this site...
but it is a cute little song. about all the funny lutherans. it made me giggle. i like a good giggle song.

so go to youtube and watch. you will giggle.

settling

i was beginning to feel settled in DC. i have not left DC since january. when i thought about it earlier this week, i realized i had not been out of the beltway in that time (well, except for a monthly meeting in vienna, va, but, you know). i had begun to wonder if i was becoming a "washingtonian." was i becoming a more aggressive, more assertive, more impatient person? would i find minnesota home still? would i know how to dress when i got home (don't laugh at that one, it has been a drama for me this year.)?

i flew home a week ago. it was good for me to have a wee bit of time off. i went to my lovely friends' house. greeted with open arms. immediately got to play in their garden. i realized, i was home. and that their home felt like the closest thing to a home i have at the moment. i have house sat for them, babysat and dogsat. clearly spent a bit of time there. plus, about half of my stuff is stored there.

the week went on.

a whirlwind of visits to the seminary, social work practicum interviews, and extraordinary lutheran retreating. topped off with time at my aunt and uncle's house. always a place to chill out and just relax.

i am down to three months in DC. it is closure time. i am now in the phase when an intern begins to look to the next place. and...i feel homeless. i have spent the week wandering. i am now going back to a place that was beginning to feel comfortable, but as i sit in the airport, it does not seem to beckon me like a home. i also know that i may have to say good-bye to my beloved minneapolis in a year as i look forward to a first call.

how did the israelites do it? wandering. looking. for how long? 40 years? it is rather uncomfortable emotionally and mentally. sigh.

and then there are those who wander everyday for many years, without God leading the way with clouds and fire.

i guess i should suck it up a little.

but, it is awfully uncomfortable being in the wandering space. hmmmm.

aren't they cute?

"i could do that all day long" or was it "you can do that all day long"?

either way...

this is what a little boy said when he received his blessing at the communion rail. the little one is about 4. he also said a robust "amen" when he got his wafer. now, if that isn't trusting God's promises, I don't know what is. i laughed and said that he had made my day. it was a great bit of proclamation to hear out of a little one.


about an hour before...

i had been with three middle school boys, a lovely lay leader and a lot of cookies. there was an attempt at reading the intro to the Gospel of John. you know, "in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was in God, and...blah blah blah.

i did my best attempt at reminding them of gnosticism and what not...i think i am wearing out my davinci code metaphors. then...the smart alecky kid says, "well, how can Jesus be in God?"

for starters, i knew that he was thinking that this was an obnoxious question. but, i love turning his outrageous questions into legitimate ones. however...you can imagine where this one led...

i spent 40 minutes trying to explain the doctrine of the trinity to middle schoolers. homoousious, perichoretic dance and all.

i will spare you the gorey details....

i will say that the metaphor that was used was this:

God the Father = Sumo Wrestler
God the Son = Chuck Norris
God the Holy Spirit = the Butler that attends to their needs

there were drawings too.

i prefaced the whole conversation with, "this is weird. the trinity is weird. it doesn't make much sense and you just have to go with it. the theologians that worked on this were a little odd." of course....i had to keep reminding them of this as the boys kept saying to me..."that is really weird!"

sigh. the trinity. it will outsmart all of us. of course, we could ask chuck norris to explain....hmmmm, i wonder....