A Sermon Illustration from my Life

I remember once going to visit my uncle in the hospital in Sioux Falls, after he had heart bypass surgery.  It was early in January, and since I was a pastor in a small town in northeastern South Dakota, and since it was in that little lull you get right after Christmas and New Years, I decided go go and keep watch with other members of the family.

My uncle had never married.  But my aunt Margret came, and I think my mother's other brother as well.  They lived nearby, so they came and waited as well.

I knew that my aunt and uncle were proud of my vocation.  They had come and visited me one summer, and stayed in the parsonage.  They came to Sunday worship too.  I still remember that my sermon was on the text from 2nd Samuel about David and Bathsheba and the death of their son, and my uncle was impressed that (whatever I said) I did not sneak around the text.

So I was sitting with my aunt, and I was telling her about how Christmas services had gone.  I told my aunt about my Christmas Day sermon, that I had told a story about going to the farm one Christmas when I was a very little girl.  It was the farm where my aunt and my mom and her sisters grew up.  My mom was the middle one.  Margret was her older sister.  Her younger sister was still living on the farm when I was small.  So I told my aunt about the time when when visited the farm and I was afraid that Santa Claus would not find us.  My mom's younger sister slept in the bed with me, and she reassured me that everything would be all right, that Santa would find me.

It was a sermon illustration from my life.

My aunt thought it was a good story.

Then she asked me a question.  "Have you ever told a story about me in one of your sermons?"

I thought about it.  I thought that I should.  But I couldn't think of anything.

My aunt has always been such a faithful presence in my life.  I remember her colorful china dishes, which she used every day.  She wasn't a gourmet cook, but she was a good no-nonsense cook.  She used to work for General Mills, so she knew her way around the Betty Crocker cookbook.

She always wanted to be a teacher.  She was good at talking to children.  When I was in high school, she took me to the University of Minnesota with her one day, just to walk around the campus and sit in on the classes with her.  

I remember she got involved in visiting shut-ins at her church.  It made her feel good to talk to people who were hurting or lonely, and to befriend them.  She had a pastor's heart.

But when she asked me if I had ever used a story about her as a sermon illustration, I couldn't think of anything.  She was just there, always, a constant presence.  I couldn't think of a single particular thing.  Just that she was always there.

I didn't answer her question then, and I don't think I ever did.

But actually she did become a sermon illustration once.

When I was in college, I got involved in a pretty intense religious group.  They were the kind of people that thought they were right, and that everyone else was wrong.  I was "on fire for the Lord," and sadly, that meant that I was pretty judgmental for awhile.  I questioned everyone else's faith, including my Aunt's.  In fact, I even wrote my aunt and uncle a letter, and although I don't remember exactly what I wrote, I think I wrote some pretty terrible things.

My aunt wrote me back.  And this I remember:

She forgave me.

She loved me anyway.

That was a sermon illustration.

And Aunt Margret, I want you to know this -- your whole life was a sermon illustration for me.

Sermon for Pentecost 15: Shining in the Gift of Forgiveness

Matthew 18:21-35

            May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer.

            Just the other day, I was doing some over-due straightening in my office and I came across an old notebook, from before my time. 

            It was the two words on the cover that got me:  “Experience Grace”, they read.

            I didn’t know what was inside the large notebook, but those two words got me thinking – that’s the point, isn’t it? 

            It is to experience Grace, ourselves, and for others to experience Grace through us. 

            Where, When, in whom do you “experience Grace”?

            I’m thinking about these two words today in part because of the parable before us, the parable which we often call “The unforgiving Servant.”   

            And to me, reading the parable, it’s pretty clear that this servant did NOT experience Grace.

             Or at least that’s what it seems like.  This story is troubling in so many ways. 

            The behavior of the servant is shocking and cruel, especially after his master forgives him so much.    

            And it might not be clear from our translation just how much the servant is forgiven.  What did we just hear?   

            The servant owed the master 10,000 talents.  That seems like a large amount of money – but do you know how much one talent is worth? 

            One talent is about 15 year’s worth of wages for a common laborer.  Think about that.

            And what the slave initially says to the master is, “be patient with me, and I will pay everything back.” 

            And, let’s be honest here, there’s no hope that he will be able to do that.  Unless he wins the lottery, which they didn’t have at Jesus’ time. 

            So he asks for patience, and he gets something much more – his master forgives him the whole enormous debt. 

            He gets grace. 

            But it seems like he doesn’t really “get it”.

            Because after receiving this incredible news, this unbelievable blessing, that his whole unpayable debt is gone and he is free – he goes out and shakes down the first servant who owes him one hundred denarius (and one denarius was about a day’s wage

             He even has the other servant thrown in prison. 

            It’s impossible to know what was going through this servant’s mind. 

            Could he still be trying to pay back that impossible debt, even though it’s gone?

             Or could he be thinking that now that he’s free and clear, now is the time for him to get a little ahead.  Or something else entirely?

             This servant has been given Grace --  which is extravagant forgiveness – but he somehow doesn’t get it.

            Where – or when  -- or how have you experienced Grace?

            I think that this story is also troubling because what the servant should do in this case is so obvious – it’s so clear – that it doesn’t seem possible that anyone would react this way. 

            How could anyone be forgiven millions of dollars in debt – and not be transformed by this experience? 

            Of course, you receive forgiveness, and you pass that forgiveness along.

            But in truth, we know, that this parable is a story.  It tells us the truth, but we also know that forgiveness is not always so easy or obvious, that some offenses are not just a hundred denarius.    

            I will always remember one Sunday morning in my first congregation. 

           

            I remember that the gospel reading was on Forgiveness – and I had, sometime during the week, decided that I was going to preach on one of the other lessons, because (for some reason) I didn’t want to preach on forgiveness. 

            I don’t even remember why I thought that. 

            And there I was, with my fine sermon in front of me, and I got up in the pulpit and in front of me sat a mom whose young son had been beaten up for $2.00. 

            Two bucks he had to buy treats for the 4^th of July. 

            His leg had been broken in 3 places and he had to spend the rest of the summer in a cast.  And the other boys – there were 2 or three – none of them had called to even say “I’m sorry.” 

            All of this happened in rural South Dakota.   Should she forgive them?  What would you do? 

            So forgiveness is not so easy to practice.  Is it?  It’s complicated and messy, and even though we know we have been forgiven, it is not automatic.

            But this parable does tell us some truths about forgiveness.  And the first truth this parable tells us is that forgiveness is a gift.  And that the gift of forgiveness  -- of grace – from God is a gift almost unfathomable in its depth and breadth and height ….

             Wait – not “almost”  according to the parable,

            it’s like being forgiven millions of dollars, it’s a gap that can never ever be closed. 

            Do we even think this way? 

            That there is a uncloseable gap between God and us – and that Jesus has closed it by his death and resurrection.  And there’s no way we can pay it back. 

            Don’t even try.   Don’t even try.

            There’s no way we can pay it back.  But you know what – we can pay it forward.   Forgiven people – forgive people.

             Loved people – serve people.

             That’s another truth of the parable – that the King who forgives the slave – expects that slave to pay it forward – expects the slave who has experienced grace – to help other people to experience it too.

            When, where, in whom have you experienced -- Grace? 

            A number of years ago I was visiting at the hospital. 

            Somehow I had gotten my car into a small space, and when I tried to leave the parking ramp, the space was even smaller than I remembered.

             So I was having some difficulty trying to get out.  And as I was moving inch by inch I happened to bump another car.  While I had my head on the steering wheel in despair, I saw that the driver was in that car. 

            He actually helped me get out of the jam, and afterwards we exchanged numbers and I said that I would pay for any damage to his car. 

            But after a couple of weeks, I realized that he never called me.  “I think he forgave you,” was one opinion.

            When where, in whom have you experienced – Grace?

            Have you received a smile in return for a harsh word, an unexpected gift, a hand up when you were down?  Have you seen something beautiful in the darkness? 

            Have you been welcomed when you never thought you would be?  Have you been forgiven when you did not deserve it?   

            Have you come to the table and had the bread of life put into your hands, your open hands, and heard the words, “The body of Christ is given for YOU?” 

            When, where, in whom – have you experienced Grace?

            Because Forgiveness is a gift that we have been given – but like every other gift from heaven – it is a gift meant to be shared. 

           

            And again, this is stewardship –stewardship of forgiveness – (because it was never ours to begin with) -- to take that grace we have experienced and to pass it along – to the weary and the hard-hearted, to the down and out and the up and coming, to the young and the old, to everyone who needs it.  70 X 7….

            It is not easy – O brothers and sisters – it is not easy – it’s not any easier than loosening our grip on our pocketbook –and we will fail a lot just like we fail at everything else that we practice. 

            But God picks us up and keeps pouring that Grace into our hearts, every single day.  

            So that the world – so that our neighbors – so that we – may experience Grace.

            AMEN

           

           

           

           

           

Communion

I held two small first communion classes for a few students from the church.  It had been awhile since I organized a class like this, so I felt a little rusty.  The book that I used to use (and that I loved) had gone out of print.  I cobbled together some resources and we talked about baptism and sacraments and words along with things that you can touch.  We drew pictures and watched a scene from the movie "Holes", and read a couple of stories about meals in the Bible.  We talked a little bit about the Passover, and we ended up talking about trusting God, that God comes to us in this meal.

It was not everything but it was something.

Holy Communion is a meal with many names, I said.  There is more than one meaning to it.  It is life and forgiveness, communion with God, bread for the journey, and even more.  Someday you will know.

We made tiny individual cups at a place called the Potter's Wheel.  We did not bake bread.  I made note to include bread-making the next time I have a first communion class.

And then on Sunday at church two of the three young people were invited to put out their hands and eat the bread and drink the wine.

Then, today, I sat down with two women from my congregation and we talked about taking communion to shut-ins and people in the hospital.  We want to put together a workshop so that a few people from the church can engage in this ministry along with me.  One of the two women talked about how it was important to know who can receive and who can't receive communion.  Her words brought back a memory.

I came with communion to a woman in hospice care.  Her daughter and her daughter's best friend were there.  So were other members of her family.  Her husband was there too.  He had been pretty open with me about his questions about the Christian faith and about his exploration of other spiritual traditions.  So, when we all gathered around in a circle to begin the communion service, I did not know what he would do.

I was surprised when he joined the circle and decided to have communion with us.

It was a long while later that I found out two things:  he was getting remarried, and he was re-commiting to the Christian faith.  He was becoming Catholic, in fact.

What was it that drew him back?

It was the Mass.  Holy Communion.  That's what he said.  There was something about taking communion.  What was it?  Was it life or forgiveness?  Was it bread for the journey?  Communion with God?  Or even more than that?  A foretaste of the feast to come -- all of us sitting in a circle, hands outstretched, the borders between life and death erased?

Someday you will know.

In the meantime, take and eat.

It is Holy Communion.

It is everything, in your hand.

Ministry of Reconciliation

It is probably in my top five favorite scripture passages in the whole Bible.  We are reading it this Sunday, the fourth Sunday in Lent.  It comes up every three years.  It is from 2nd Corinthians.

"So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!"

It is the middle of Lent, but this verse makes me feel like it is Easter:  the eighth day of creation.  It is the middle of Lent, but I want to go to the tomb and mistake Jesus for the gardener, planting seeds of the new creation.

It is probably in my top five favorite scripture passages in the whole Bible, but I'm not preaching on 2nd Corinthians this Sunday.  Instead, I'm preaching on Luke.  The prodigal son.  Again.

You would think I would run out of things to say about the Prodigal Son, or his older brother, or his father.  You would think that I would be chafing at the bit to preach on one of my top five favorite scripture passages in the Bible instead.

But the story gets me every time.

Every time I read I see a new detail that I never saw before.  (The older brother mentioned prostitutes in his speech to his father.  Who said anything about prostitutes?)  (Why does the story say the younger son 'came to himself' instead of 'repented'?  Is it possible that the younger son didn't repent after all?)  (What about that father?  Is he loving, or is he just a soft touch for his younger son?)

For some reason, tonight I can't help reading this story in the light of one of my top five favorite Bible passages.  It's the next verse, right after the one that I quoted, "All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself in Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation."

The Ministry of Reconciliation.

So right now, when I think of this story from Luke, this story about a family, I'm not thinking about a particular verse, or a particular detail, or even a particular character in the story.  But I'm thinking about a scene.  The younger son is inside, at the feast.  The older son is outside, with the father.  You can hear the music in the background as the father pleads with his son, whom he loves.   Then I think of the scene earlier, when the father runs to the younger son, who may or may not really be repentant, who might be home for a few weeks and then take the money and run again.  Or, he might truly be transformed by the father's love.  It could go either way.

The Ministry of Reconciliation.

I love this passage from 2nd Corinthians, where Paul tells us that God has given us the ministry of reconciliation.

And then I read the parable of the prodigal son, and I realize how messy and risky reconciliation is.  Many things could go wrong.  You could get hurt, taken advantage of.  You could be disrespected, rejected.  You're not in it for the prestige, or because the pay is good.

So I am haunted by the end of the parable of the prodigal son, because it ends with estrangement, not reconciliation, with one son outside, and the other son inside.  They do not know yet that they are brothers.

Who will tell them?  Who will tell us?

It is messy work, and risky, but God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, all of us:  the winners and the losers, the repentant and unrepentant, the refugees and the homeless and the rich and the successful, the workaholics and the con artists.

Who will tell them?  Who will tell us?

A Culture of Grace

Names are important, I believe.  When I first learned, in junior high Latin class, that my name was also that of a Roman goddess (the goddess of the moon and the hunt, I was told), it had a positive effect on my self-esteem.  At least temporarily.  Some people are named on purpose, after parents and beloved grandparents, after screen stars and presidents.  Perhaps there are hopes involved.  Perhaps this child will be like grandpa Joe, or grandma Ellen; perhaps this child will be President someday, or swing a bat, or sing arias.

Names are important, I believe.  I love the name of my church:  Grace.  In fact, I think it is fair to say that I came here, at least in part, because they were a church named "Grace."   There were other reasons, of course:  they have an amazing pre-school, for one thing.  They love to study and said that they were hungry to learn more about God and faith.  They worship in different varieties.  They actually began a homeless ministry in their county.

And their name is "Grace".  Names are important.  When they were doing strategic planning, they had the name of their church listed as one of their strengths.  Because I believe that grace is the heart and the root of our faith, it is the one thing that we most have to share with the world, but it is somehow notoriously difficult to get ahold of.

What is grace?  What does it look like?  What would it be like to actually practice grace, the grace of God?

I have been thinking about this lately, because I am thinking about culture and strategy, strategy and culture.  Pretty soon, we will start developing a strategy:  where do we want to go, and how do we want to get there?  What will be the steps along the way?  And I can't shake the idea that the name of my congregation is "Grace", and that this name is a strength.  But what does it look like?  And what does it tell us?

Maybe the question before strategy is this one:  who are we, and who do we  WANT to be?  Are we gracious?  Do we want to grow in grace, and in graciousness?  What does that even look like?  Is it just 'being nice'?  Is it biting your tongue and remaining silent?

What does grace look like, in a community of faith?

I can't help thinking about something Nadia Bolz-Weber said, about her church, "House of All Sinners and Saints."  She says to every group who wants to join, that there will be a point where the church, or someone in the church, will hurt them, or disappoint them.  Or, there will be a point when you will be the one who hurts or disappoints someone else.  At that point, she says, please do not walk away and leave.  Because if you do, you will miss the grace of God, the power of forgiveness and reconciliation.

That's what she said, or something like it.  And I thought -- this is true, but it is so hard.  There are times when it is true, we need to walk away.  But there are other times, times when someone has disappointed us, or we have disappointed someone else.  There are times when we have hurt one another, but instead of turning away, we have said:  "I'm sorry."  "I forgive you."

And that is Grace.

It is:  I don't agree with you, but you are my sister, and I love you.
It is:  You have hurt me, but I forgive you, and I still want to serve God together.
It is:  I have screwed up and failed and crashed and burned, and you have given me another chance.

Is that who we are?  Is that who we want to be?

Names are important.

I believe.

For the Fun of It

Tuesday night, I held the second of a short series of Lectio Divina meetings at church.  I pulled the chairs into a circle, put the small candle out and prepared for whoever might show up.

There were four of us in total, practicing silence and listening and imagination.  We read Sunday's gospel reading.

I knew I was the preacher on Sunday, and one thing I didn't want to do is use the time to do sermon preparation.  I wanted this to be listening for its own sake, not with an end in mind.

But it's harder than it looks.  It's hard to put down the schedule that says I need this many insights for my preaching on Sunday.  I caught myself arguing with myself, a little about a word or a phrase:  why are you listening to that? one of the voices in my ear said.  That's not what you are going to preach about on Sunday.

But I couldn't help it, I kept staring at the word 'love' in Jesus' question to Simon, about the creditor who forgave two of his debtors.  "Which of them will love him more?" Jesus asked.

And I thought:  "What's love got to do with it?  I don't associate the word 'love' with relationships that have to do with money and owing."  For the first time it struck me as an odd question.  "Which of them will love him more?"

You are not going to preach about that, the voice in my head told me.

I thought it was interesting anyway.  As we prayed and listened along, the images I saw were of oil, of an unwelcome guest crashing a party, a man with his arms crossed, his lips pursed.  And what's love got to do with it?  Even if our mortgage company tore up all of our bills, and declared us free and clear, I'm not sure what I would call what I would feel 'love.'

So the next morning I was doing some of my sermon preparation, re-reading the story, taking down notes, examining the scripture and myself.  And, I'll admit it:  I digressed.  It wasn't the direction I was heading for my sermon, but I just had to look up some words in my Greek New Testament.  First the word Love.  What kind of love was it, anyway?  I looked up the word love, and then, just for the fun of it, I looked up the word that meant the creditor 'forgave' or 'cancelled' the debts.  Because, as it turned out, it's a different word than the one normally used for forgiveness.  It has the word 'gift' in it.

Later on, I checked the end of the story, when Jesus said to the woman, "Your sins are forgiven", and discovered that we were back to the more common word for forgiveness, which has to do with release, being set free.  I didn't look it up because I needed to know for my sermon, but just for the fun of it.

For the fun of it.

It's a pragmatic world, and in that world, we think of Scripture often as a tool, a means to an end, whether the end is writing a sermon or 'help in living your life.'

But maybe we're not supposed to use the Holy Scripture so much as be in relationship:  argue, ask questions, wonder, imagine, dig in.

For the fun of it.

I realize that many people don't experience reading the Bible as in any way 'fun.'  Maybe it's all of those thin pages, big words, sort of disturbing stories, or proof texts.  Maybe the burden of understanding it, or even trying to make use of it, makes it even harder.  Maybe we need to invent better tools to get at the fun of it, or just to talk more about the fun of reading the scriptures 'just because.' For the joy of it.

For  the joy of discovering more about the uninvited guests who crash parties, the widows who weep after funeral biers, children who share loaves and fish, Pharisees who stand around with pursed lips and meet with Jesus in the dark.  For the fun of discovering more about the one who comes to parties at Pharisees' houses and lets fallen women blubber all over his feet, and says "Your sins are forgiven."

So no, none of this is getting into my sermon on Sunday, at least not on purpose.  Listening for its own sake:  not with an end in mind.  Like spending a lazy afternoon with my husband, or visiting my dad in the nursing home and singing songs with him, memorizing his face.

For the love of it.

Blaspheming the Holy Spirit

It's the unforgivable sin, according to the gospel reading from Mark last Sunday.

I remember reading the gospel at the early service last Sunday, out on the lawn, and when I got to this part, I saw one man near the front row, raise his eyebrows.  I'm not sure if he raised his eyebrows at the part about "blaspheming the Holy Spirit", or about "the unforgivable sin", or if it was a combination of the two, but my immediate thought was, "I should have preached about this.   People are going to wonder about it."

Preachers, does this ever happen to you?  You think you have listened to the Holy Spirit during the week, and as you are reading the gospel, or one of the readings, or as you begin your sermon, you look out at a particular face, and sometimes you even know a story about what that person is struggling with, and you think, I should have preached on this.

I remember thinking about it when I was preparing the week before.  There was plenty to wrestle with in the story, plenty to think about, from "family values" to "a house divided," and of course, "blaspheming the Holy Spirit."  Back during my dalliance with the Pentecostals, this was one of the verses they liked to talk about, since it highlighted the importance of the Holy Spirit.  You can even say bad things about Jesus, and he'll forgive you -- but don't say anything bad about the Holy Spirit!  That's what my Pentecostal friends said.  So there was a lot of speculation about what "blaspheming the Holy Spirit" would actually look like.

Actually, though, as a Lutheran, it's the "unforgivable" part that gets me.  How can there be an unforgivable sin?  Confession and absolution is a non-negotiable part of the liturgy for me.  And you notice that we always say, "In the name of Jesus, I forgive you some of your sins"?  Oh, you notice that we don't say that?    We say ALL of your sins.  Because we believe that words have power, and that the Word has power, and that when I say "your sins are forgiven," Jesus has bound the strong man and thrown him out.

You know what I think the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is?

It is to believe that there is any sin that God can't forgive.