Revelation: I Don’t Think It Means What You Think It Means August 28, 2022

This sermon was proclaimed in the community of Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in Holladay, UT on August 28, 2022. It is the last Sunday in our sermon series Manna and Mercy. The texts were:
Revelation 5:11-14, 7: 9-17, 21: 1-6, 22: 1-5

Young Friends Message: The Center of All Things: Finger labyrinth. Show the children the quilted finger labyrinth. Ask them what they think it is-they might say a maze! It kinda looks like a maze, but it’s not, it’s called a labyrinth. Do you know the difference? I didn’t for a long time either! In a maze you can get lost, and it has dead ends where you can’t go forward any more. And the idea is to get out of the maze as soon as possible. In a labyrinth, on the other hand, you can’t get lost, there are no dead ends, and you always end up in the center, no matter what. In the center of a labyrinth, you can be still, sit down, pray, and connect with God. The whole point of a labyrinth is to connect with God and remember that God is at the center of our lives. But it can be easy to forget that, and like a maze, we sometimes wander around in our lives. Today, I’m talking about a book of a bible called Revelation. Revelation is a confusing book that has lots of ways to get lost for us. But the main point of the book is that God is at the center, of our lives, of creation and of all the universe. Here is a labyrinth for you to have today. We’re going to talk a little more about God as our center.

One of our favorite movies is the Princess Bride. There are so many good one-liners in that movie that we could spend most of the day zinging them out at each other, but the one that has been rattling around in my head this week is “You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.” Inigo Montoya says this phrase in reference to Vizzini’s repeated use of the word “inconceivable.” Revelation is such a word and book of scripture in the realm of biblical study and Christian thought, culture and subculture. It’s probably one of the most maligned books of the bible. It’s been used to exclude, scare, marginalize, oppress and dominate people for centuries. If John of Patmos could speak to us today, I’m willing to bet that he would tell us “you keep using this book! I don’t think it means what you think it means.” So what does it mean or not mean?

To start, I’m going to debunk some cultural mythology around Revelation. One: it’s the Book of Revelation, not Revelations with an “s.” It’s one revelation, one vision of John of Patmos who no, probably wasn’t the John who was a disciple of Jesus, the writer of the gospel of John or the three letters. It’s not a book of prescription, or prognostication of when and how the end of the world will occur. It’s not a book about how some individuals, 144,000 let’s say, will be saved and the rest won’t. And contrary to that unhelpful book series from the 90’s, no one is Left Behind…Revelation isn’t about who’s in and who’s out.

Revelation isn’t about individuals at all, it’s about systems that trap people and creation into patterns of harm. This is what the mark of the beast is about, it’s a symbol of a system that convinces people to care more about themselves, the designer clothing, high tech cars, vacation homes they have. It’s the lure of wanting the status that comes with having the best of everything the world has to offer. It’s a mark of a system that convinces people that they are the center of their lives. The mark of the people of God is not about being saved or free from suffering, but that bearing the mark of God means that God is the center of our lives and creation.

And if that hasn’t debunked what the culture tells us about Revelation, buckle up as here’s one that makes me personally nuts: the pearly gates. Let’s get a few things straight: there is not one “pearly gate” and no St. Peter doesn’t sit at it with a book of who’s in and out. See above.  John writes that around the city of God, there are 12 gates, always open, each with a pearl on top. Three gates on each side of the New Jerusalem to ensure that there is room for all to come in to see God, to walk the golden streets, to sit by the river of life and be bathed in perpetual light. This notion of a gate has been abused in so many ways in our culture. I’ve heard people refer to it for US immigration policy: “there’s even a gate to get into heaven.” Nope, there’s not. All are allowed in. All are welcomed, healed, fed, thirst quenched by living water, cared for, and brought into the oneness of God’s people and creation. How’s that for God’s immigration policy?

Ok, I can go on debunking all day long, and I invite you to read Revelation if you haven’t yet, but I want to talk about what Revelation IS:

 It’s a book that was written in a time of social and political upheaval. The followers of Jesus, in a group called The Way, were tortured, outcast, fired from jobs, removed from homes, jailed, separated from family, and whatever the powers that be could think of to try and get them to assimilate into Roman culture, to fit into the system. The people in The Way, didn’t care about money, status, the unimpeded growth of the Empire’s GDP, having power over people. They wanted debts forgiven, people to have bodily autonomy, the sick healed, the hurting loved. It’s a book that was to encourage and bolster a community who were told that they were naïve, idealistic, socialist, communist, anti-Rome, antifa and just plain out of touch.
It’s a book that named the hard truths of living in the world, using symbols and hyperbole to make a point, that just when they thought the world couldn’t be any more chaotic, the gaslighting, misinformation, disinformation, and straight up lies would ratchet up a notch.

The book of Revelation is prophecy in the sense of Hebrew Bible prophecy. To quote Dr. Craig Koester, one of my NT professors at Luther, “Authentic prophecy is known by what it does: true prophecy moves people to worship God and false prophecy draws people away from God.” (page 169-Revelation and the End of All Things, Koester, Craig, Eerdmans, 2018). As a matter of fact, much of the book of Revelation are direct quotes or concepts from the Hebrew prophets. Nearly none of it is a new idea. God making all things new, Isaiah 43, all nations streaming to God, Isaiah 65,  God will be our God and we will be God’s peoples, Jeremiah 31, the healing of all nations, and God’s throne and the four creatures of different faces, both from Ezekiel. The water of life, John 4, resurrection of people, the entire NT, and the tree of life, creation being one, is from the very beginning, Genesis.

Revelation is prophecy in that it reminds us that God is our beginning and end, the Alpha and the Omega (the first and last letters in the Greek alphabet), the center of all that is and will be. Revelation draws us back into our center, our being, our bodies that started with God and is where we find our completion, our wholeness in God and creation. God marks us and creation with the promises of God, not to escape the suffering of the world, as we can’t, but to know that we aren’t alone in the suffering of the world and to be empowered to resist the trumpet blast of complacency, escapism, separation and division. The book of Revelation takes us back where we started, love. We are marked with love, to be centered in Love. God created in love, sent Jesus in love, and we are drawn back to God and Jesus the Lamb in love. Revelation reveals the promises of God that stand the test of time, the test of our apathy and stubbornness, the test of our ego, the test of our foolishness. God calls us to come, come to the new earth, the new city, to see God’s love on earth, love for the earth, and love for us all. God’s love is revealed, it’s a Revelation, a word that we can keep using over and over to call for love to be our center as we proclaim, Come Lord Jesus. Amen.

Stretch! Sermon on 1 and 2 Corinthians August 21, 2022

This sermon was proclaimed at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in Holladay, UT on August 21, 2022. It can be viewed on our YouTube channel: Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church SLC. We are in a sermon series Manna and Mercy. The texts were: 1 Corinthians 11: 23-34 and 2 Corinthians 8: 1-15.

Young Friends Message: Show me how you can stretch! Oh nice! Now show me how you can make yourself really small. Great job! Stretch again-as we stretch, is it easier to see each other and even give things to each other…if I stretch my arm I can hand you this book! But if we’re small (crouch down) is it harder to see each other and help each other? Yes! Sometimes we don’t want to help each other and sometimes we want to curl up and be small, but God wants us to stretch! When we stretch our arms, we can give hugs, when we stretch our legs we can get to a friend needing help, when we stretch our necks, we can see more people and creation! Living together is about stretching! Just like our muscles like to stretch to be strong, our minds and hearts need to be stretched too! This big table here, stretches all the way to you to remind you of Jesus’ love. God’s love will always stretch to wherever you are! We’re going to talk about that a little more.

I’ve struggled my whole life with physical flexibility. Touching my toes has never really been a thing for me, and runners are notoriously apathic when it comes to adhering to a stretching routine as it just doesn’t seem like a real work out. Until you hurt. Muscles, tendons and ligaments all react the same when injured, they contract in an effort to protect themselves. This contraction is what causes pain. And not only pain in the injured location, but the contraction pulls other muscles, tendons and ligaments and causes secondary pain. To stop the pain, you have to coax them to stretch, to release, relax and open up. When the muscles are stretched, then they can be strengthened, I’ve learned (the hard way BTW). Then connected muscles, tendons and ligaments quit hurting and can be strengthened as well. Essentially, the reflex of a hurt muscle, can cause more pain and suffering around it.
It’s not only muscles that react this way, as we read in Paul’s letters to the Corinthians today, individual people and communities do this contraction when under pressure, stress and hurt as well. While our two passages deal with different topics of angst in the fledgling community of The Way, both situations are the same: how does a community remain strong and resilient in uncertain and tenuous times? The Church in Corinth was new and growing fast. New people, new ideas, new circumstances, new rituals, and the founding members were scrambling to keep up with the new folks joining.  This was a motely crew indeed: rich, poor, sick, slaves, women, outcasts, Jews, Gentiles. Some had a lot, some had none. When they gathered for worship, usually at a home of a wealthier person, and included a full meal, some brought their own food to ensure it met certain standards, some ate in the main dining chamber while the those who came later ate leftovers in the outer patios. They didn’t eat at the same time, the same menu or portions. Some were tightening up rules, expectations, and hearts while others continued to tighten their belts. This tightening was causing pain, and the people of Corinth apparently wrote Paul to receive a diagnosis. Stretch Paul said. You’re eating and drinking to your own heartburn. You forgot to stretch the table of Christ to the entire community and you forgot to stretch your hearts to people in need. Your tightness is pulling on your neighbor, causing discomfort and causing them to be tight as well. God’s call to the table is one that stretches us to reach more and more people with God’s promises of love and abundance. We stretch our imaginations, our ideas of cultural norms to strengthen the whole community. When we contract and only care for ourselves spiritually, emotionally, physically, we not only pain ourselves, but pain the whole community around us.
Like runners running a race, the Corinthians didn’t stay on a stretching routine and coach Paul had to retrain them. Economic times were tough, and they didn’t want to stretch their finances to strengthen the part of the body of Christ in Jerusalem. But Paul wanted them to understand that in stretching themselves, even caring for those they had never met, they were building not only the strength and resiliency of the body of Christ in Jerusalem but building their own resiliency as well. Connected, they were stronger, able to stretch even more, run the race for Christ and be healthy. Even over long distances and uneven terrain.

Two thousand years later, we still don’t like to stretch. In our defense, the world’s coaching is mostly to tighten up. Economic uncertainty? Tighten up your finances. People coming from different countries? Tighten borders. Threat of violence? Tighten security.  New ideas and cultural movements? Tighten our thinking. Ya’ll we are UP TIGHT PEOPLE. Paul wants to coach us through letters written two millennia ago on how to stretch.  When we encounter discomfort from new people, new ideas, and new realities, our culture reinforces doubling down on being tight and we falsely believe this tightening will keep everything in place. When someone doesn’t have enough, our culture tells us that person was too loose-not that the social system was too tight. Conversely that leads us to believe that if we have plenty, that we were appropriately tight in our prowess and ingenuity and not that we started in first place in that same unjust system. Our plenty, has often caused someone else’s want. Our contraction of our muscles of self, have caused pain elsewhere in the body of Christ.

As an institution, the ELCA’s tightness has caused pain in so many parts of Christ’s body. Last week a few hundred folks gathered for the triennial Church Wide Assembly in Columbus, OH, and the pain from the contraction of the muscles of white supremacy, sexism, homophobia and erasure of the indigenous people of North America were on full display. Our unwillingness to stretch, and loosen up, pulled on many innocents. Such as the faithful folks of Iglesia Luterana Santa Maria Peregrina in CA who lost their beloved pastor and worshiping space due to systemic racism in the ELCA. The apology offered was tepid as no plan for how to stretch and strengthen the muscles of anti-racism was offered. The tight grip of not wanting to lose face in the ELCA leadership was evident and the ability of the Latinx congregation to go forward after losing it all, was humbling.
The pain of continued discrimination of LBGTQIA+ clergy and deacons from “bound conscience in our Human Sexuality Social Statement, the pain of racist and gender based discrimination perpetuated by synodical offices, the pain of our indigenous siblings losing their land, are all places where the ELCA as an institution and us as members need to stretch and let go of the tightness that is pulling and paining the body of Christ in our midst.

But the thought of being stretched and loose scares us. Let’s face it who wants to be known as loose in our culture. Well, this is what the first followers of Jesus were up against as well. Jesus constantly hung out with loose women, tax collectors, fishermen, outcasts and the least of these all who had tight societal rules around them. Jesus had loose socioeconomic, gender, piety, standards for those he gathered, he took anyone who wanted to stretch themselves. Jesus was always stretching his followers, the secular and religious leaders, and trying to get them to loosen up so that the entire body is resilient and strong. Being tight with rules, money, rituals, judgments, always brings pain, not only to individuals but the whole community. Jesus was willing to be stretched out on a cross to stretch us to see what God sees, one body, one people, one world, created in love that is on the loose, and stretches to surround us all.
God’s love has always stretched out to creation and stretches out to us today. God’s love stretches us, relieves pain and suffering and loosens us up to be the interconnected, healthy, body of Christ. We coach each other, stretch each other, for the flexibility, health and stamina for the body of Christ to move, include, and go as we are called by the Holy Spirit. Connected in God’s love as the body of Christ, we are stretched, strong and resilient for the future of God’s Church, people and creation. Amen.

This Promise Is For YOU! Sermon On Luke 24: 1-7, Acts 2: 29-42, Acts 4: 32-37 August 14, 2022

This sermon was proclaimed in the community of Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in Holladay, UT on August 14, 2022. It can be viewed on our YouTube Channel: Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church SLC. We are in a sermon series: Manna and Mercy. The texts were:
Luke 24: 1-7, Acts 2: 29-42, Acts 4: 32-37
Young Friends message: Have a basket of heart stickers to give the children, and if feasible to all in the congregation. What is a promise? Yep, a promise is something that we say we’ll do and then should do. Do you ever promise to clean up your room, or put away your laundry and then don’t? Yes, we all promise to do or say things and then don’t do it. Sometimes it’s because we forget and sometimes we don’t because we can’t. Such as I can remember one time when my kids still lived at home, I promised we would go back to school shopping and lunch on a certain day, and then we couldn’t because I had to work. They were disappointed. We did do those things, but on a different day. When someone promises you something and it doesn’t happen, how do you feel? Sad, mad, disappointed, frustrated, yep all those things! That’s normal. Promises are important and matter. Such as, I have this basket of heart stickers. I promise to give you one. Now I’m going to go waaay over here in the sanctuary. Are the heart stickers still there? Yes! No matter how far apart we are, the promise is still good. I’ve been thinking about promises this week after reading our bible texts. Peter tells people that God makes promises to us through Jesus. God, in Jesus, promises that we are not alone, and to be with us always, no matter where we are. That’s a hard one, as we don’t see Jesus, and people have worried about God keeping God’s promise to be with us and love us forever, no matter where we are or what we do. To help you think about that: I’m going to give you all a heart sticker to remember that God’s promises stick to you no matter what and where you are.

As I was telling our young friends, promises are tricky for us as humans. We cling to promises that we make to ourselves and to others, as well as the promises people make to us. Promises are a subset of hope, I believe. When I think about all the promises I’ve made in my life, some inconsequential and some extremely significant, what resonates with me are the reasons I made the promises to begin with. I don’t make promises often, and as I get older, and perhaps wiser, I make them less as I understand the gravitas of promises. Promises are the heart of authentic, trusting and lasting relationships. To make a promise is to affirm that someone or something is meaningful enough in our lives to be in the forefront of our consciousness and central to our lives. I made promises when I married Mike. I made promises at the baptisms of my three children and at Kayla and Ash’s confirmations. I made promises when I was ordained nearly 10 years ago into word and sacrament, and I made promises to you, dear ones of OSLC, when we began ministry together over three years ago and we made promises together to serve God and God’s people. Promises, promises. My track record of keeping promises is ok, not perfect, and maybe should be evaluated by someone other than myself. Knowing that my own ability to keep promises is flawed also makes it difficult for me to believe that someone else will keep their promise. I have had people break their promise to me and so I figure it’s only a matter of time before God does too.

Our texts in Luke and Acts are all about promises made, promises kept and the faithfulness of God despite human capabilities to reciprocate. We read them in reverse chronological order as the promises described in Acts 2 and 4 flows from the promise kept in Luke 24. The empty tomb, the stone rolled away and the kingdom of God breaking into to our world are the promises God made through Jesus. Death, isolation, separation are no more. The promise of a new life in heaven and on earth was kept, and open for all no matter who they were or where they were. This was a new promise, and one that it took some time for the disciples turned apostles to grasp. What does this promise mean?
The book of Acts is particularly about the people of God figuring out how to live together and with God in this new reality of promises kept in a world where promises are often broken. Leaders break their promises by using their positions for power, wealth, status, and self and not care of constituents. Neighbors break promises when we don’t share resources, of food, housing, clothing, and finances. Churches break promises by putting rules over relationships, hypocrisy, coopting into systems of division, fear and self-preservation. We break promises. In this country today, we are breaking promises of community as we allow children to go hungry, without housing, quality education, healthcare, and a lack of general safety, particularly for children of color and the undocumented. We break the covenant of living together as people of one heart and mind when anyone in our midst is in need. At Millcreek Elementary on Wednesday, we gathered with congressional representatives, Granite school district officials, including the superintendent, and media outlets to discuss the broken promises of childhood hunger in our very community. Maybe some folks didn’t know that the promise of community had been broken, or maybe the weight of that promise is too heavy for them to consider. But when promises are broken there are consequences that affect us all-maybe not equally, but the ripple effect is seismic. Broken promises, lead to more broken promises. The ripple effect of God’s kept promises is also seismic. The shock wave of the promise of the empty tomb that first Easter still disturbs us today, 2000 years later. The promises in our baptism to live among God’s people and strive for justice and peace are ones that have power to change lives, creation and the entire world. Promises for life, are for all life. The apostles, the ones sent out to ride the waves of God’s promises in and for the world, proclaimed that this promise is not too good to be true and will never be broken. When we live in God’s kept promises, food is shared, wealth is redistributed, widows, orphans, and the forgotten are cared for, thriving community is created, diversity is celebrated, risks are taken, and the world is transformed.
God’s promise to be with us and creation, caring, mending, and gathering us for abundant life, ripples out from the beginning of time, through hardship, suffering and uncertainty to meet us here, now and is never going away. No matter where we are gathered, in person, over YouTube, or social media, God’s promises meet us and stick to us and stick us to each other. Nothing, keep us from God’s promises, not COVID, not political division, not personal preferences, not our own greed, not our own stubbornness, not even our own inability to keep promises. God keep promises to us as we are always in the forefront of God’s heart and central in God’s life.
God’s promises of the Holy Spirit, grace and mercy free us to love our neighbor so that no one has any need, all have enough to thrive, to know when we have enough and enough to share. Promises are indeed about authentic, trusting and lasting relationships: God’s will for humanity and all creation to be together and one. This promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to them. Amen.

It IS Enough: Sermon on Holy Communion Luke 22:7-38 August 7, 2022

This sermon was proclaimed at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in Holladay, UT on August 7, 2022. It can be viewed on YouTube at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church SLC. We are in a sermon series called Manna and Mercy. The text was Luke 22: 7-38.

Young Friends message: Do you have a special lovie that you must have with you to sleep, relax or leave your house? I did! It was my blue puppy. I cleverly named him Blue Puppy. The genius started early. Blue Puppy made me feel safe, loved and not alone. I bet your special lovie’s do the same! Our Bible story today is about what we really need to feel safe, secure and loved. Jesus shares a meal with his friends that we call the Last Supper- were there any words in our bible story that were familiar to you? Maybe these words? (read Luke 22: 14-23) When do we usually say these words? Yes for what we call Communion! Communion means connection, and each Sunday we come to be re-connected, reminded that in Jesus, we are safe, we are secure and loved. This little bit of bread and juice (have a communion cup and wafer) is like our lovie, it reminds us that we are not alone and we have what we need. Jesus wants us to know that Jesus is always with us-and that we need something to touch to remind us of that. It’s also why we have each other. The most important things we have aren’t our things, but Jesus and all these people who love God and you. We’re going to talk more about this and why

What is one or two things that you can’t leave the house without each day? Yep, we all have those objects that we know if we don’t have it’s going to be rough to say the least. I love the idea of being a minimalist-those people who can pack for a month’s European vacation in a carryon. But alas-I am something of what you might call a self-preservationist or a “what if” person. When I pack, my thought isn’t what are essential items, it’s what might I possibly need in any scenario. So, as you can imagine, I don’t pack light. It doesn’t help that I’m a runner and need extra clothes and food everywhere I go. If you have ever seen me coming into church in the mornings, you already have an idea of this: I will have my purse, my work bag, and my lunch bag. I am literally the bag lady. I mean, what if I need a certain book from home at work? Or what if I need a sweater? Or extra food as I end up working late? I want to make sure I have enough food, enough Kleenex, masks, hand wipes and whatever else the day might bring. The question is always: Do I have enough? These items make me feel secure, safe, and self-sufficient. I will be prepared for any eventuality with all my stuff. They are the weapons I wield to get through my day.

I will admit that when I first read the last peculiar paragraph of our Luke 22 reading for today, I was flummoxed at all this talk of purse, bag and sword. What really struck me, no pun intended, is that Jesus seems to be intimating that weapons will be needed going forward. This is obviously antithetical to everything else in Jesus’ words, actions and prayers, which are nonviolent. What’s going on here? Is it a list of what’s actually needed or, as with my list of what I think I need to leave the house in security and self-preservation, is it an acknowledgment of what the disciples were already doing? And then I realized that the disciples are missing the one thing that I, too, miss on my daily list. It’s the one thing that the disciples, me, you and us already and always have.

After all this time with Jesus, the disciples still quite don’t get it. They are still caught in their culture’s lies of more is more, a little isn’t enough and no one will look for them but them. Jesus is patient and realizes that their physical time together is running out. The disciples, people who attempt to follow Jesus and be a part of God’s realm each day, will need a reminder, a ritual to help them remember what is needed for each day, something more tangible, hands on than the words of a prayer. Meals, with their smells, tastes, and community, create and embed powerful memories in our brains, and if the meal is connected to a well-loved and known story, even better. Jesus gathers not only the 12 disciples, but the many folks who followed him, to the last Passover meal that Jesus would share with them. Evoking the smells of bread, bitter herbs, lamb and wine, Jesus tucks them into a story from the past that will carry them into God’s future. Jesus offers the disciples a list of what they need before they leave the table to live the good news of God’s love for the world, and it’s a short and compelling list: Jesus. You see, dividing the bread and the cup among so many, Jesus is telling those gathered around the table, that their need each day is simply: Jesus. Can I really leave the house each day with only Jesus to get me through the day?
For the disciples and for us, Jesus knows that this is difficult. It’s not easy to trust in Jesus and not in our own abilities. Jesus’ revelation that someone at that very table will betray him highlights this as the conversation that follows moves from Jesus as all they need, to their own greatness and bravado in about 3.6 seconds. They are still at the table, the table of grace, mercy, liberation, and love, when they begin arguing about who is greater, claiming to follow Jesus to prison and death and revealing that they DO have purses, bags and two swords among them to wield against the powers and principalities of their day. Even though Jesus had taught them to do ministry with no earthly possessions and to only wield love to a hurting world. Jesus didn’t change his mind about these things; Jesus acquiesces that the disciples have them anyway. Yes, even swords. And just a few verses later Jesus will tell them to put away after one of them cuts off an ear of a servant of the high priest. Jesus tells them it is enough. Enough. After all they had experienced with Jesus, they still didn’t trust that Jesus and his love wasn’t enough for their lives, it was purse, bag sword, food, ego, self, fear and denial.
It’s easy to be swayed that Jesus isn’t enough in our lives. We forget that each week we come to the table for a bit of bread and wine that is more than enough to infuse us in the promises and love of God. This taste of freedom is enough for us to recall that we are enough, for we come to this table with nothing and receive everything. It is enough Jesus says-those things that you think help you to wield power through your day, aren’t anything compared to the power that God’s love and mercy can wield in your life and in the world. It is enough of our own self-sufficiency. It is enough of trying to outdo each other. It is enough of insisting that if I am right then you have to be wrong. It is enough believing that any weapon is needed in our possession at all. Jesus tells us at this table that it is enough to trust in Jesus, to trust in promises of God for today and tomorrow. It is enough to be in community with one another, creation and God. It is enough that we are enfolded in God’s care.For us we have Jesus with us always-it is enough.