Lenten Prayer as CtK #follow #lent2015

Prayer: (From Evangelical Lutheran Worship)

The Death of Rutilio Grande, Revised by Matthew Wettlauffer

O God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Thought:
What does it mean to follow. I think that when humans decide to follow something, it is often because it leads them on the easiest way, on the path of least resistance. The mission of Christ, was not a new mission, rather it was a calling to follow the path of God, which as it turns out was full of resistance by sinful human beings. In following Christ, we meet the same resistance, whether it is in the obstruction of others, or most often, by the obstacles of our own disordered desires and knowledge. To follow God, to follow Christ, we must walk the path of truth, no matter these obstacles, there is no easy way to follow Christ, there is only the way.

35 years ago, Oscar Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador was shot and killed while conducting a mass. The Bishop was killed by an assassin, for his opposition to the deep oppression of the people of El Salvador. What called him to follow such a path? It wasn't his position, or his spiritual convictions that ultimately sent him on this journey of faith, it was a transfiguring moment that called him to follow the light in it's confrontation with evil. This moment is depicted in the picture above, it is the death of his friend and fellow priest, Rutilio Grande, who was murdered for his justice work among the poor in El Salvador. At this moment, Romero heard the call he was to follow, saying later, "When I looked at Ruilio lying there dead I thought, 'If they have killed him for doing what he did, then I, too, have to walk the same path."

We do not know where the hand of God will lead us, but we know that Christ, and all his saints, will be there with us.

About Lenten Prayer as CtK:
During Lent, I am inviting all of you at Christ the King, and anyone who would be willing to join us, to engage in praying together, seeking to hear God and be guided by Christ's life in our life together. To guide these prayers, I will be posting pictures centered around a word for the day. This comes from the facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/LENTPHOTOADAY. Please feel free to join me in posting pictures and thoughts to your social media accounts or to the comments of this blog.

Lenten Prayer as CtK #trust #lent2015

Prayer:
Gracious Lord,
Grant us your patience and mercy as we learn to trust you. Help us to see, understand, and share the life that springs forth from your will, and to seek this life, forsaking all else. Give to us the fellowship that can only come from dependence on you. Amen.

Thought:
In God We Trust. The words on our U.S. currency almost get this absolutely correct. My only quibble is that the phrase should be, In god We Trust. Do you notice the slight difference? If we make God lowercase, and change the implied meaning from an outside deity (whether Christian or otherwise) into a generic, human made object of service and desire, then our god and the thing we most put our trust in, money, coincide. Since I can't actually change what's printed on money, I'll just say that our currency is a work of fiction, not fact.

We don't often think about trust, and lack of it as being the impetus of our sin and the death and destruction that it inflicts on our world, but distrust, is at the heart of all our sin. What we don't trust in, is God, and that God, at least as the creator and redeemer of all things has been handed down to us, is very good at managing creation and our lives. Sin leads us astray, so that we take the will of God with a grain of salt, but think that our ways of doing things, are what need to be done. We don't trust that God will provide and so we hoard. We don't trust that God wants peace, so we war. We don't trust that God really is forgiving and merciful, so we hang on to our bitterness and hatred toward others. We don't trust God in the bodies God gave to us, so we dress ourselves up, often trusting that the better we look, the better we are.

The power of sin grips us strongly, and tricks us into trusting ourselves rather than the goodness and mercy of God. To trust in God, is something that is learned, often painfully, and not very well, and yet God continues to teach us, and use us to teach others. Our baptismal rite helps us remember this, as it tells parents and sponsors:
you are ENTRUSTED with responsibilities: to with this person among God's faithful people, bring them to the word of God and the holy supper, teach them the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the Ten Commandments, place in their hands the holy scriptures, and nurture them in faith and prayer, so that your children may LEARN to trust God, (notice trust comes first!) proclaim Christ through word and deed, care for others and the world God made, and work for justice and peace.

About Lenten Prayer as CtK:
During Lent, I am inviting all of you at Christ the King, and anyone who would be willing to join us, to engage in praying together, seeking to hear God and be guided by Christ's life in our life together. To guide these prayers, I will be posting pictures centered around a word for the day. This comes from the facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/LENTPHOTOADAY. Please feel free to join me in posting pictures and thoughts to your social media accounts or to the comments of this blog.

Sermon for March 22, 2015: Our Stressed out Savior

This sermon was preached by Rev. Mark Peterson at Christ the King Lutheran church on March 22, 2015.

Gospel: John 12:20–33

²⁰Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks.  ²¹They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, "Sir, we wish to see Jesus."  ²²Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus.  ²³Jesus answered them, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.  ²⁴Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.  ²⁵Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.  ²⁶Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.

             ²⁷Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say — 'Father, save me from this hour'? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.  ²⁸Father, glorify your name." Then a voice came from heaven, "I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again."  ²⁹The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, "An angel has spoken to him."  ³⁰Jesus answered, "This voice has come for your sake, not for mine.  ³¹Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out.  ³²And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself."  ³³He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.

Greetings to you in the name of Jesus Christ,

I bet, that Jesus’ disciples were getting pretty excited. Big things were beginning to happen, like really big things. Sure, Jesus had done some pretty amazing things, or miracles, before. Miracles like feeding thousands of people with only five loaves and two fish. Miracles like, making a blind man see, walking on water, and even changing water into wine.

These miracles were impressive, but they paled in comparison to Jesus’ latest feat, the raising of Lazarus, from being most certainly dead, to all the way alive. This latest miracle, done in the city of Jerusalem, while the Passover Holiday season was beginning to enter into full swing, was beginning to really stir-up interest in Jesus.

And so, I’m sure Jesus’ disciples, his inner-circle, were pretty excited because now, the time had come for the Jesus Show, the greatest show on earth, to become successful, to go viral, to finally start turning a profit of glory and power for Jesus, and of course those who knew him best.

This is where our Gospel reading for today picks things up. The Jesus, Son of God marketing phase of the campaign was over, and now was the time for the main event to begin. And here come some customers, some Greeks, that wish to see Jesus, the one who raises the dead.

Now was that time, as we hear Jesus saying, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.”

But there were no great miracles, instead, Jesus compares himself to a grain of wheat that must die. Raising people from the dead can draw a crowd, but comparing yourself to seeds isn’t going to keep them coming.

Our Gospel isn’t clear if the Greeks ever got to see Jesus, but it does seem pretty clear that the greatest show on earth, the Jesus Christ Show, isn’t really what we humans would expect. If the time had come for Jesus to be glorified, wouldn’t it make sense for him to continue doing glorious things, like raising people from the dead?

Today, over 2000 years since those Greeks wanted to see the Jesus Show, it seems to me that as we come to see Jesus, our expectations are a little lower. When it comes time to see Jesus, we have different, less miraculous needs that we want to see filled. We want the guy who will restore some sanity to our fast-paced world, and give us some peace of mind in contrast to the images of violence and terror that are plastered all over our various types of media. We want the, bumpers sticker, “Let go, let God” Jesus. Or the country song, “Jesus take the Wheel” type of deity. Maybe, we want the “power of positive thinking Jesus.” The Jesus who, with enough faith, can take away our stress, and replace it with a calm and confidence that everything will work out for God’s glory.  In an age of modernity and convenience, and an area of the world that is about as wealthy as they come, we don’t long to see Jesus the miracle-worker as much as we long to see Jesus the affirmer, motivator, and comforter, who gives us balance and purpose. The one who tells us that we are ok, and that everything will be ok.

Though the needs we want our image of Jesus to meet are often different than those of the Greeks so long ago, the Jesus that actually reveals himself to us remains the same. This is the one who is like a grain of wheat, the One who will be glorified not by his miracles, or his ability to meet every need that each person has, but by his death.

When we long to see Jesus, sometimes he surprises us, disappoints us even, and gives us an image of a God who brings us salvation not by deeds of power, but through the vulnerability his great love for us and all of creation, produces in him. It is hard for us to fully comprehend this image, because we tend to romanticize this sacrifice and take for granted the extent of God’s love. Even today, in our quest for spiritual fulfillment, or satisfaction, we tend to separate the fact that if Jesus could raise Lazarus from the dead, he could certainly find less painful ways to give us what we need, to make sure we act right, or to keep us in line.

But Jesus loves us, and is devoted to us, and, though he doesn’t always give us what we need, or think we need, he is willing to share his life-giving truth with us, even though he knows we’re going to nail him to a cross. Which is really a hard thing even for Jesus to do.

As we read in John, at this time, the hour of his glory, Jesus isn’t in a state of equanimity or mindful balance, his soul is troubled, he’s stressed out over the sin of this world, our sin, and what this sin will cost him in his service to the truth.

Is this, stressed out Jesus, the Jesus that the Greeks came to see? Is it the Jesus that we want to see? Is this the Jesus we want to trust, the one who doesn’t give us all we need, but who calls us to serve and follow him wherever he may lead? In my own life, I like the idea of trusting in God, and depending on a Savior named Jesus who loves us, but on those occasions when I say “here Jesus, you take the wheel”, I grab it right back the minute I see that he’s driving me straight to the cross.

The Good News in all this, is that the Jesus Christ show which has brought salvation to our world, doesn’t depend on me in order to go on. Jesus continues to be the grain of wheat that dies and from this death new and abundant life has been born. This is life so abundant, that it continues to feed us today, with Christ’s body in the bread and wine of Holy Communion. This is the feast that will continue feeding the world with God’s life and love for all of eternity.

When Jesus is revealed to us, in the glory of the cross, it might not be the Jesus we were expecting, or even the one who fills all our needs, but it is the Jesus who loves us so much that he gives his life for us. May this truth, whether it troubles our souls or brings them peace, be enough.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,

Amen

Lenten Prayer as CtK #practice #lent2015

Prayer:
Gracious Lord,
Help us to be faithful and diligent in practicing the disciplines of our faith, so that through these practices we may be conformed to your life, and love. Amen.

Thought:
Recently, my alma mater and former wrestling team, Augsburg College, won the NCAA Division III wrestling tournament for a record 12th time.

This picture is of an Augsburg practice. I'm not sure if this is still the case, but when I was at Augsburg, coach Jeff Swenson would consistently remind us that, "we don't practice for the sake of practicing." We practiced, to improve and get better, and the amount we tried to improve by each day was small, only 1%

I still remember those practices, I remember the consistent repetitions and drills over small movements, so that our bodies would re-learn how to move and respond naturally and correctly on the mat. These drills were not fancy, but they turned us into better wrestlers by the way our bodies were conformed to be in good position.

Often, we think of our Spirit-filled lives, as being ones that connect with some great, otherworldly spirit, that will empower us with abilities, or just general happiness, enthusiasm, and a positive attitude. This is not the way of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit comes to us in disciplined, spiritual practices, worship, prayer, fellowship, scripture engagement, meditation, etc. in order that we may find the presence of God the Father and Son in each place as well, and so that our lives may be ever more open to the grace that God so fully gives us.

In his book, Celebration of Discipline, Richard Foster writes that,
“God has given us the Disciplines of the spiritual life as a means of receiving his grace. The Disciplines allow us to place ourselves before God so that he can transform us.” 

 We don't have to be great to get started in the spiritual life, we only have to take on the practice of engaging in it and let God do the rest with us.

About Lenten Prayer as CtK:
During Lent, I am inviting all of you at Christ the King, and anyone who would be willing to join us, to engage in praying together, seeking to hear God and be guided by Christ's life in our life together. To guide these prayers, I will be posting pictures centered around a word for the day. This comes from the facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/LENTPHOTOADAY. Please feel free to join me in posting pictures and thoughts to your social media accounts or to the comments of this blog.

Lenten Prayer as CtK #hunger #lent2015

Prayer:
Gracious Lord,
Give us this day, our daily bread. Take from us, the bread we hoard, the food we discard, and the waste we call stuff, so that all may eat and be fed, and our thieving souls made clean. Amen.

Sketch of Bridget O'Donnel, Illustrated London News,
Dec. 22, 1849

Thought:
Today is St. Patrick's Day, and it's probably not a coincidence that we ponder the word hunger on this day of Irish celebration. When I think of Ireland, and what I know about it, the seemingly trivial event of the Great Potato Famine comes into my head. I don't know much about this, except that I learned it was a reason why so many Irish immigrants came to the United States in the 1800's.

If you are like me, you have heard that there was some sort of blight, or fungus that catastrophically struck Ireland, and that's about it. I haven't ever stopped to think much about the 1.5 million people that died during this time, the 2 million that were forced from their native land, or the countless others who suffered, in body and mind over the tragedy. The Great Hunger, as it is called, is a side note in our own U.S. history.

One part of this history that I didn't know, was how much worse the death and suffering was made by the ruling classes, responding with brutality and harshness to the poor. We may wonder how people could make others suffer so, how they could be so cruel. We may see this sketch from the Dec. 22, 1849 Illustrated London News, and read the story of Bridget O'Donnel, which  "is briefly this:-- '. . .we were put out last November; we owed some rent. I was at this time lying in fever. . . they commenced knocking down the house, and had half of it knocked down when two neighbours, women, Nell Spellesley and Kate How, carried me out. . . I was carried into a cabin, and lay there for eight days, when I had the creature (the child) born dead. I lay for three weeks after that. The whole of my family got the fever, and one boy thirteen years old died with want and with hunger while we were lying sick." and wonder how this could happen.

This Great Hunger, and the great hunger that we who have too much continue to perpetuate today, is a result of our fear of not having enough, and our selfish vanity which deceives us into thinking that food, and a sustainable life are not a gift from God to all people, but merely a reward for the worthy. When I mindlessly consume and waste, without love and concern for my neighbor who is hungry, I am certainly guilty of treating them as disposably as those who would knock down Bridget O'Donnel's house. Lord have mercy on my soul.

About Lenten Prayer as CtK:
During Lent, I am inviting all of you at Christ the King, and anyone who would be willing to join us, to engage in praying together, seeking to hear God and be guided by Christ's life in our life together. To guide these prayers, I will be posting pictures centered around a word for the day. This comes from the facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/LENTPHOTOADAY. Please feel free to join me in posting pictures and thoughts to your social media accounts or to the comments of this blog.

 

Lenten Prayer as CtK #wander #lent2015

Prayer:
Gracious Lord,
Stir us from lives of comfort and the shelter of what is known. Lead us into the wilderness, so that in our wandering, we may see the wonder of your creation, and learn to trust in your creating hand. Amen

Thought:
Not all those who wander are lost.

This is what the poem that appears in various places in J.R.R. Tolkien's stories about the land of Middle Earth tells us anyway, and I would agree with Mr. Tolkien's wisdom.

Take for instance, Moses, who is wandering around in the wilderness, when God comes to him in a burning bush. Perhaps, it was precisely because he was wandering, and not caught up in the concerns of the day, that Moses was able to notice this strange bush, and hear the voice of God, the saving voice of God in it.

Then, Moses, after helping to lead the Hebrew people out of Pharaoh's hand, wandered with them for 40 years before reaching the Promised Land. We know they weren't lost, because God was leading them in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. (Not to mention feeding them manna along the way.) In their wandering time, God was teaching these people how to live as free people in their new land, as they only new a world of slaves and slave masters.

When we wander, God has a way of giving us new perspectives and insights, and also shows us a creation that is much bigger and awe-inspiring than we could ever imagine. Wandering helps us to see that all that glitters is not gold.

About Lenten Prayer as CtK:
During Lent, I am inviting all of you at Christ the King, and anyone who would be willing to join us, to engage in praying together, seeking to hear God and be guided by Christ's life in our life together. To guide these prayers, I will be posting pictures centered around a word for the day. This comes from the facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/LENTPHOTOADAY. Please feel free to join me in posting pictures and thoughts to your social media accounts or to the comments of this blog.

Sermon for March 15, 2015: Inviting Disbelief.

This sermon was preached by Rev. Mark Peterson at Christ the King Lutheran church on March 8, 2015.

Gospel: John 3:14–21

¹⁴And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up,  ¹⁵that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

             ¹⁶For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

             ¹⁷Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.  ¹⁸Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God.  ¹⁹And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.  ²⁰For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed.  ²¹But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God."

Greetings to you in the name of Jesus Christ,

This morning, I have an invitation for you, it’s not from me, but from God. Here it is, it goes,

Dear person, because I love you, I’ve sent my Son, …his name is Jesus…to bring you to my eternal life party. If you believe this, check yes in the RSVP box, and I’ll see you at some point over the next century.

That’s what the invitation says anyway…oh, and there’s some fine print…if you do not believe, you’re condemned.

So, speaking as your Pastor, I’d recommend checking the yes box, and do it soon, because there aint no party like an eternal life party and an eternal life party, by its very nature, certainly doesn’t stop.

But… I need to stop, and confess that the invitation I’m talking about is really the Bible verse, John 3:16, and more importantly, I must confess that I really, really struggle with this type of reading of John 3:16 and the verses that follow it.

An Invitation from God!

I struggle with the way I’ve commonly heard this verse used because I just don’t find a lot of Good News in a God whose salvation is both dependent and limited to the condition of my belief. I don’t find a lot of Gospel in a God who cannot save anyone, unless they choose to be saved. I don’t find a lot of hope in a God who would create us and claim to love us, yet leave us to eternal condemnation if we make the wrong choice. Actually, I don’t struggle with these things, I just don’t believe them to be true.

Yet, with all that being said, John 3:16 is an invitation, a wonderful, grand, invitation that is full of Good News and hope, and at the same time troubling, and challenging. It is true, that in these words of Jesus, we are being invited into God’s eternal life. But this life isn’t just some great, eternal party that extends our lives into forever once we die. The life that we are being invited to is the eternal life that is here with us, in this place, in this world today. This is the eternal life of a God who is so abundant that he comes to us in a person named Jesus and pours his life out for us not because of our belief, but because of our suspicion, our fear, our hatred, and the suffering and death that this causes us to bring to Jesus, to each other and ourselves.

Through Jesus, God doesn’t invite us to a Godly party, but to a Godly world, a heavenly creation where our lives are filled with goodwill and not suspicion, where there is abundance and not scarcity and need, where there is sharing rather than hoarding, where there is joy and not ambition.

This, as I said, is a great invitation, it is a grace-filled invitation, but it is a troubling and challenging one as well, at least for me. I still have a lot of trouble with believing in Jesus. Of course I have trouble believing that someone could die and be raised to new life. That’s just something I’ve never seen before.

But I have a lot of trouble believing in the things Jesus says and does, and that he actually expects them of me. For instance, when Jesus, who doesn’t seem to have a lot of things, tells the rich young man to sell all that he has and give the money away, so that he may have eternal life, I’m a little skeptical, especially as evidenced by my continuing to have stuff. Or when Jesus says that when we neglect the hungry, the naked, the imprisoned, etc. that we neglect him too, I’m not sure enough about this truth to really change my patterns of behavior much. Or, when we hear Jesus say that he came not to condemn the world, but to save it, when we see him pour his life out not for a good cause, but for the people that are killing him, that’s a little challenging as well. How can we love those who would do us harm? How can we even imagine that those who are involved in the brutality of ISIS or Boko Haram are worthy of love, and forgiveness and mercy?

The truth is, is that this invitation into Jesus’ eternal life is one that I sinfully reject in thought, word, and deed with my whole being. The truth is, is that unless the light that has come into this world serves my own interests, I do despise it, because I am a sinner.

The truth is, is that the good works that I do manage to do, the works that we do, the lives we live and the love we share are not mine, or our actions. They are not our human sign for the world about how great and righteous God has made us. Rather, they are a sign that God can and does bring salvation, and love, and even eternal life to each of us, and to all the world. And God does so, not because of our acceptance of that love, but in spite of our rejection of it.

As the church, as Christians, we have been given the grace to know that our savior has come, and the grace to share the signs of God’s saving presence, the sacraments of Baptism and Communion with each other and for the sake of all of creation. And, with the assuredness of these Signs of Promise, we as Christians, even in spite of our disbelief, have been called to bear God’s Son, Jesus Christ in our very bodies, and continue to bring his salvation to a world in need.

And so, this morning, on behalf of God, in the name of Christ, I invite you to know that you have the gift of eternal life, and to share that gift. I invite you to share it like the women and children who suffered at the Ravensbruck concentration camp in World War II, a place where 92,000 died, did. This was a place where this prayer, this prayer of eternal life, was found scrawled on wrapping paper, next to a deceased child.

Lord, remember not only the men and women of good will, but also those of ill will. But do not only remember the suffering they have inflicted on us; remember the fruits we have brought thanks to this suffering-our comradeship, our loyalty, our humility, the courage, the generosity, the greatness of heart which has grown out of all this, and when they come to judgment, let all the fruits we have borne be their forgiveness.

You are invited, to this eternal life, to this Jesus Christ.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,

Amen