Marriage: God's Gift to Man & Wife - Genesis 2: 18-25

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

The Impressive Clergyman stood up in front of the Prince and his soon-to-be wife and intoned, “Marriage. Marriage is what brings us together today. Marriage, that blessed arrangement; that dream within a dream….”[1] To borrow from his sermon, as we heard in this morning’s Scripture readings, God’s Word about marriage is what brings us together today.

Marriage is a life-long walking together of husband and wife, monogamously united together, one man and one woman, in the one-flesh union that God established in the Garden of Eden. A marriage is not the same thing as a wedding, although most marriages legally begin with a wedding. A wedding is an event, hopefully, prayerfully, a once-in-a-lifetime event. It’s the stuff that girls daydream about have women studying brides’ magazines and websites. With tuxes and dresses, venues and caterers, florists and DJs, weddings are big business. But at the end of the day, it’s a singular event; relatively speaking, it’s just a moment in first chapter of the wedded couple’s life.  A marriage begins as the wedding event comes to its completion.

Marriage began because God saw that it wasn’t good for man to be alone. It would be better for him to have a female companion, a helper, a comforter, someone like him but also different from him, someone to walk alongside him through life. All the living creatures on earth and in the air were brought by God to Adam for them to be named. Do not read into this that God was authorizing some kind of weird, perverted human-animal relationship, the kind that twisted minds today call “love” as if it were the same thing as that between man and woman. This animal roll call and naming process was God’s way of demonstrating to Adam the need for companionship to defeat loneliness, setting the stage, so to speak, so Adam would appreciate all the more the gift that God had in mind for Adam, His son.

After placing Adam into a deep sleep, God took one of Adam’s ribs and used it to make a woman. I say “make,” but I kind of like the literal Hebrew translation better: to build. God built the woman from Adam’s rib. That might sound rather industrial, but think of it this way: while you might make a cake or make a blanket, you build things of significance and power – you build a home, you build a nation. Adam was created from dirt – that is what his name means, Adamah, dirt – created in God’s image of holiness. God builds the woman, carefully, deliberately, from Adam’s side. She is not inferior to him, as would be if she was taken from a bone in the foot; rather, she is built from his side, bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh. It’s an indication of the relationship, literally his side by her side.

Do you know why God created the world? It wasn’t because He was bored, or He was curious to see if He could do it. God is love, and He wanted an object, something, where His love could be directed toward. Thus He created the universe and all that was in it. Do you know why He created man? He didn’t just want something, He wanted someone, in His own image, someone who could receive His love and, in relationship, reflect it back to Him and also to show and distribute that love to His creation. Do you know why God created a woman? So that His love could also be shared among each other, and so that Adam would have someone to receive his love and love him in return, demonstrating God’s love to each other as God loved them.

When God gives her to Adam, his joy at seeing her practically leaps from the page: “At last! Here is one like me!” You will notice there was no wedding – well, at least, not as we think of weddings. There was no cake and punch, no band or brisket, no limo or honeymoon, no wondering what side of the chancel to sit in. But it was a wedding, nevertheless. It was conducted in the most beautiful scene the world had ever seen, the Garden of Eden, where it was, truly, a perfect moment, making it a perfect wedding. Their wedding took place in true innocence, before sin had happened, establishing wedlock to be a holy, God-pleasing estate that should be kept in a holy manner. The congregation of creation on earth and the hosts of heaven watched and listened as God gave His blessing as both Father of Bride and Groom. The pre-incarnate Jesus was the preacher blessing them with His words that a man and woman shall become one flesh and the Holy Spirit stood as witness to the sacred event, having brought the two together and uniting them with love for each other. [2]

What there was, was marriage: God instituting the gift of a husband to a wife and a wife to a husband, establishing marriage as His divinely willed and approved blessing to mankind and creation. And, like very other piece of creation, it was good.

Every time family and friends gather at a wedding to celebrate the marriage-union of man and wife in holy marriage, they do so in the footsteps of Adam and Eve and all of God’s faithful who have gone before, invoking His name and imploring His blessing not only in the wedding, but on the entire marriage that follows the pronouncement of mister and misses, husband and wife. Any other relationship other than the one man and one woman union, is not marriage, regardless what the government or conventional wisdom says and it is not, and cannot, be blessed by God.

I don’t need to tell you that marriage, while a blessing, is also hard work.  The warm fuzzies and flutters slowly morph into normalcy and, if not careful, complacency, taking each other for granted instead of as the gift they are. Statistics tell us that marriage is about a fifty-fifty proposition for success. Every time I pronounce “husband and wife,” I do so with an iota of fear for them, knowing what they face. What do you expect when two sinners are joined together, side by side, stride for stride, under the same roof, sharing the same blankets? At the end of the marriage rite, I say, “What God has joined together, let no man tear apart.” In that moment, satan giggles with glee, already hard at work to destroy what God joined together. He does it sneakily: God’s gifts get turned inward and backward. Love, which is always directed toward the spouse, becomes selfishness; compassion for the spouse’s needs becomes insensitivity; forgiveness is replaced by getting even. And Satan laughs and claps his hands in evil joy while husband and wife, man and wife, weep as what God put together is torn asunder. 

The Old Testament lesson speaks of God instituting marriage. The Gospel lesson speaks of marriages broken. I want to take a moment and speak to four specific people here today.

The first person is you who have lived through a broken marriage. Divorce is hard. It is hard on everyone who loves the couple. I have heard it described as death. That makes sense. If two become one in marriage, in divorce, the one is torn apart. In this morning’s Gospel lesson, Jesus speaks to it, but I want you to understand something about this conversation and its context. It comes because the Jewish leaders are trying to trap Jesus. They were looking for loopholes. They don’t care a lick about the souls of the husband and wife in question; they weren’t worried about the broken-hearted people whose lives are collapsing. They want to get Jesus in hot water, thus the question. Jesus answer, here, isn’t about labeling divorce a sin and branding divorcees with a Scarlet D, to be scorned and mocked. (As an aside, sadly, that happens sometimes in the Church, and for those of us who have whispered, stared, or wondered “what did he or she do?”, we must repent of those foolish thoughts.) What Jesus would do, instead, is identify the sins that led to the dissolution of what God established, and then lead the broken man and wife to repentance and, ideally, reconciliation. Jesus died for those whose marriages died, with the promised grace that even broken marriages are forgiven, the old adam and old eve drowned in the blood of Christ, living a new life as a forgiven, baptized man or woman redeemed in the eyes of God.

The second person is you who are struggling in your marriage. If Adam and Eve are the picture-perfect image of what marriage was intended, I can only imagine what their marriage was like after the fall as they blamed each other and had to wrestle with each other as sinners. To you who are struggling, you are not alone. Too often, struggling husbands and wives pretend everything is fine when, in reality, their marriage is – to use the metaphor – sick. To carry that metaphor, if your body is sick, you go to a doctor for care. If your marriage is sick, do not hide it, do not lie and pretend with yourself, each other, and to others that all is well. Seek help. Your Lord Jesus Christ is the Great Physician of body and soul and of broken lives and broken marriages; He gives gifts of peace – restoration - to you. I invite, encourage, welcome you to come speak with me. Don’t be embarrassed; I will not judge you as “less than” or a failure. I work with sinners, remember, and I face one every day in the mirror; I work with children of God, remember, and I see one every day in the mirror. And, if you don’t want to talk with me, then talk with a faithful Christian friend whose marriage is strong and will offer Godly, prayerful counsel for you and your spouse.

The third person is the one whose marriage is healthy and strong. God be praised for the love and respect you and your spouse share as you live your married life. Lift up those who are struggling and walk alongside them with compassion and humility, that your strength might be theirs. May God bless you, husband and wife, as Godly witnesses of the Lord’s love and compassion for His people.

The fourth person is the one who is single, either by choice or because death has separated you from your beloved. You are also a Godly example of what it is to be a faithful witness and child of God. May He bless you with the strength to resist temptations of this world while also giving you the grace to look forward to the blessed, eternal wedding feast of the Lamb in His kingdom.  And, if you are seeking a spouse, then begin praying now for whomever the Lord will send to you in His time and in His way.

Whichever person you are, divorced, struggling, healthy, single or widowed, remember this: God saw that it was not good for man – or woman – to be alone. He sent His Son, Jesus, to be the perfect bridegroom for the Church, claiming her to be His own. He has washed His bride of all her sins in holy Baptism, making her radiant, resplendent in His holiness and blamelessness. He cares and feeds His bride with His own Body and Blood. When she is hurt, He wraps her in His grace and mercy. When she sins, He calls her back in repentance to His loving, forgiving arms.

This, then, becomes the picture for husbands and wives. As Christ is for the Church, giving Himself for her, He is also for the husbands and wives whom He unites, binding them to each other through Him and in Him.

The Impressive Clergyman’s brief sermon was right, but also wrong. Marriage is not what brings us together. What brings us together is God’s command and love which fills man and woman with love for each other and love for He who united them. His love does not follow; His love leads, enwraps, and holds husband and wife in a union that pictures Christ and His bride, the church. But the Clergyman is right: treasure this love which is ours in Christ our Lord. Amen.

---

[1] Reiner, R. (1987). The Princess Bride. Twentieth Century Fox.

[2] I am indebted to the images in this paragraph from Valeris Herberger, The Great Works of God, vol 1, CPH © 2010, p. 172.

Jesus is Still Lord of All - Mark 9: 38-50

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text is the first portion of this morning’s Gospel reading, Mark 9: 38-41.

I hardly need to tell you that the election cycle is in full boil. Our phones, email, social media, internet home page, radio and tv stations, and whatever other media you use are all beating the drum of political warfare, directly or indirectly proclaiming that the Answer – with capital A – the Answer is this candidate, this party, this platform and that the opposite side of the aisle will bring gloom and doom and destruction, tohu wobohu, sheer and utter chaos, the likes that hasn’t been seen since Sodom and Gomorrah.

Don’t misunderstand: elections are important, from the candidates and platforms down to the ballot you cast. Like me, you have friends who vote straight red and others who bleed blue. Although we are on opposite ends of the spectrum with people whom we deeply and dearly respect, we agree on some things while we disagree on others. I have a few friends who get absolutely jazzed by politics and I have others who want nothing more than for Wednesday, November 6, to arrive so that, at least in theory, the political circus can be over for a while.

I confess I am getting more and more into the latter group. My chief reason is that I very much dislike what politics does to individuals and relationships. I don’t see politics as much a national, state, or community problem, as I see it a people problem. You are probably familiar with the Latin E pluribus unum that is stamped on our money. It means “From many, one.” That sounds great. But more and more, what I see is less about oneness and more “us verses them.” And Satan rejoices. Jesus wept over Jerusalem because of what He knew was coming in its fall. Rather than citizens weeping over this kind of social hostility and separation, what I often see is a zeal to fight the fight, Red vs Blue, Donkey vs Elephant. In decades past, it was about policies and struggling together and alongside each other to advance ideas and solutions to complicated and complex problems of our society, our nation, our world. Now, it seems like it is personal, not politics, and the problem is the other person who is on the other side. Our goal, then, becomes much like Commodore Oliver Hazzard Perry in the War of 1812, to meet the enemy and make them ours.

Yes, God calls us to work for justice and mercy and to use our socio-political process to do this, and yes, He calls us to be good and faithful citizens. But this kind of political talk and thinking elevates The Cause – think capital letters, here – the Cause, the Answer, the Process, The Candidate, The Party to be the next savior and god with the election process to be to their ascendency as Palm Sunday was to Jesus. This is idolatry. Remember: an idol, a god, is anything in whom you place your faith, hope and trust. Listen to how people talk, perhaps even how you speak: we must stand against them; we must hope and pray that our position, our candidate, will win the day against theirs. It’s our only hope to save the nation. Thus, the hope of our country, of justice, the very future of freedom – and then, this extends to the Church of Christ and the Gospel itself (which is a specific idolatry called Nationalistic Deism) – all depend on our working to get this candidate elected, this bill passed, and that bill stopped. And, because there are so many uninformed and uneducated voters out there, we (pick your side) must be the bearer of the message against them. The list of idols grow: my candidate, my party, my platform, me. And, at the end of the day, it all boils down to the unholy trinity of taking power, blocking power, maintaining power, and I gotta do my part. 

But, if we are honest, in the words of the cartoon character Pogo, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

This morning’s Gospel reading picks up from last week’s reading. Last Sunday, we heard Jesus make his second Passion prediction, that He must be delivered into the hands of men who will kill Him (9:31). The disciples were so busy arguing about which among them would be first in the Kingdom (v.34) that they missed it. Jesus talks about going to the cross; they are worried about who’s number one – a “me verses you eleven” way of thinking. Then, in this morning’s Gospel lesson, they are still thinking about confrontation, a “us verses them” mentality. “Teacher, someone was casting out demons in your name,” they reported. It was like they were saying, “Who is in and who is out, Jesus, who is with us and who is against us!” John tries to boast a bit, leaning on their title of disciple to draw a party line, “we tried to stop him because he wasn’t one of us.”

There it is – John shows his colors. His words betray his idolatry. He assumes that because God is working through the Twelve, He can only work through the Twelve. Better shut him down, Jesus; he doesn’t know the secret handshake. John has forgotten that God works through the disciples, yes, but not just the disciples. Jesus’ reply to John, “Do not stop him for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able toon afterward to speak evil of me. For the one who is not against us is for us,” shows that God does not need to gain John’s or the Twelve’s approval before extending His power, might and kingdom. God is at work. The Lord reigns. Jesus is the Lord of His Kingdom and it shall have no end.

Jesus continues, “For truly I say to you, whoever gives you a cup of cool water to drink because you belong to Christ will by no means lose his reward.” Just a cup of cool water. It’s a symbol of, a visual image of the humility of the Kingdom. The Kingdom and reign of God in Christ is not marked by beating an opponent into a verbal pulp, by finding out juicy tidbits from a sordid past, or legislating financial and physical rewards or punishments. The Kingdom and reign of God in Christ comes in lowliness, in humility, setting aside power and might, surrendering, laying down one’s life, dying.

The Kingdom comes when Jesus is arrested, tried and executed – ironically, to the civil authorities who are more worried about expediency and keeping their jobs than seeking justice. Jesus has all power in heaven and on earth, but He sets it all aside, humbling Himself to stand before Pilate. He who spoke all things into existence with “Let there be,” opened not His mouth in defense. The King’s throne is declared: “Crucify Him!” The Kingdom comes as Christ dies on an unholy hill, hoisted between two criminals, trading His life and His holiness for the unholy sins and failings of unholy people who deserve condemnation. In His final cry, “It is finished,” the Kingdom comes and Jesus fulfills the perfect justice and righteousness of God. Peace, restoration, is made with the Father through Christ. In Christ, we are one with the Father through the Holy Spirit. And, united in Christ, we are then one with each other.

You will notice, Jesus does not flex. He doesn’t rally the troops. In fact, when Peter tries to defend Him, Jesus tells him to stop and put the sword away. Jesus doesn’t call for petitions, or elections, or impeaching Pilate and Herod. Instead, Jesus dies. He loves the world with such great love that He is willing to trade places, dying for the world. He surrenders His rights, not demands them, so that we would have unity with Him and in Him.

This was all according to the Father’s perfect will. God is Almighty. You know the old children’s song, “He’s got the whole world in His hands”? That’s absolutely true. The Psalmist declares “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.” As God told Job at the end of Job’s trials, He is working in ways beyond our seeing, our knowing, our control. He is God; we are His people.

So, John doesn’t need to worry about what the others are doing in the Lord’s name. He is simply called to trust in Jesus and do what the Lord has called Him to do.

Here is what that means:

·        John can rest in the fact that the reign of God is bigger than him.

·        You can rest in the fact that the reign of God is bigger than you.

·        John can trust that even when we do not understand what God is doing, or why He is doing it that way, God is still Lord of all.

·        You can trust that even when we do not understand what God is doing, or why He is doing it that way, God is still Lord of all.

As the political seasons continues to push forward and as the world draws deeper and wider battle lines in the sand, remember: you are God’s people whose citizenship rests in a greater Kingdom which is in but not of this world. Behave as Kingdom citizens. Treat others as Kingdom citizens. See things through Kingdom eyes. Work to care for the poor. Work to safeguard the unborn, the weak, those who cannot defend or speak for themselves. Do good, faithful and honest work. Protect your neighbor’s life and property while being content with what the Lord has given you. Speak well of those with whom you disagree. Love those who see you as their enemy. But most of all, greatest of all, seek unity. Work towards unity, particularly the unity that is ours in Christ. Remember: this gift is ours and all who receive His grace by faith – including those who vote differently than you. Labor towards this end, and in this, and in whatever happens at the end of the day on November 5, trust that the Lord reigns. Amen.

The Greatest Is Not Whom You Expect - Mark 9: 30-37

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text is the Gospel lesson.

Who is the greatest? I guess it depends on who you ask, and what you’re debating. NCAA football?  Greatest president?  We have livestock shows to find the best future farmer and rancher, spelling bees to determine the best speller, MVP awards for the best player, and Oscars for best actors. I bet many of you have a T-shirt, or a necktie, or a card somewhere that declares you to be the best mom or dad ever.

The disciples are having a similar argument: who’s the best disciple? I can imagine how the conversation went. Andrew argues he’s best because he was the first of the disciples called – first in Jesus program, first in His heart, so to speak. Peter argues his confession, which Jesus declared to be the foundation of the church, makes him the best, but Nathaniel counters that he confessed Jesus to be the Son of God and King of Israel before Peter ever did. Matthew, a tax collector, says he sacrificed the most financially to become a disciple, but James and John, the sons of Zebedee, think they gave up more when they left their family fishing enterprise and their older father. The other disciples all had their reasons, too, I’m sure.  

We do it, too. Who’s the greatest member of Zion? Perhaps it’s the one who has been a member the longest. Maybe it’s the one with the largest family tree, or the deepest roots in Mission Valley. Maybe the one who has God-given talent to spare, or who seems to be involved in everything, or who never misses a Sunday service, or who has taught Sunday school for years, or the one whom we think gives the most money – they are the most more important.

The danger of considering someone to be the best is that it devalues everyone else. When Tiger Woods was at the height of his professional career, commentators noted how his entry into any tournament changed the aspect of that event. He was so good, so unstoppable that players assumed he would win, so instead of vying for first, every other competitor was trying to come in second. 

Jesus takes this argument of greatness and tips it over 180 degrees. “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.” And He uses a child to illustrate this point. Now, I need you to set aside our 21^st century attitude of children for a second, that they’re beautiful little angels who need to be protected and sheltered and modeled for their innocence and purity. In Jesus’ day, nothing was further from the truth. In the social structure, children were above dogs and below servants. Children couldn’t do anything, they couldn’t fend for themselves. They were completely dependent on their parents, they took a mother’s attention, took up resources, and took up space. Children were things to be tolerated while they were eating you out of house and home and while you waited for your sons to work for you in the fields or in the business, or for your daughters marry off so you could gain the wedding price.

Jesus sits down next to this seemingly useless person, front and center. “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me, receives not me but Him who sent me.”

I want you to notice something. Elsewhere, Jesus speaks of becoming like a child. Not here. Here, it’s to be great receive the child. Think about this. What’s notable about a little child is that he’s little.  To receive a child, you have to get off your pedestal of power, possession, and prestige.  You have to get down on your hands and knees to meet the child at his eye level.

If you want a picture of greatness Jesus’ style, watch a mother or father who is changing a diaper at three in the morning.  Watch parents with their children in church struggling to teach them how to pray and worship.  Go to Sunday School and watch an adult bend down to help a little one learn the Scriptures.  Watch an adult child remind her senior parents that Jesus still loves them. Watch a kid hug another kid that everyone else seems to ignore. That’s the greatness of the cross.

The greatness of the cross is the greatness of self-sacrifice.  It’s serving instead of being served.  Jesus loved to use little children as examples – not because they were cute – but because they were giveable to, helpless, and the least among the great.

That changes things, doesn’t it, to see greatness as the one who is the most needful? Instead of seeing greatness as the one who is the best and the most, instead see greatness as the one who seems to be the least. The greatest, Jesus says, is the one who is weakest, who is about to be overwhelmed, who is completely dependent; the one who has lost or who is losing everything dear, the one in the most danger of being overlooked or bypassed; the one written off by society as irrelevant, the one no one sees as if they aren’t even there; the one thrown aside like detritus, the unwanted and the unloved. To receive them, that is, to serve them, that is where greatness lies in the kingdom.

 You know a person like this. For just a second, close your eyes and imagine that person – perhaps it’s a man, a woman, or a child. The rest of the world sees them, but I want you to look at them closely. Close your eyes. Look…See the pain in the face, the sadness? See the loss and hurt? Look more closely: Do you see the griefs and sorrows? Do you see how this soul is almost overwhelmed to the point of death? Do you see how this soul is as nothing? Keep your eyes closed…now look at the brow…and as you do, you notice something strange – the scars at the hair-line. They’re not big, just a fraction of an inch long, some jagged and some neat small marks. You realize the face in front of you is changing. As you see him, He is also seeing you, his expression filled with compassion and mercy. Now, look down…the hands of this weak soul are held out towards you in a welcome. Notice the hands…gentle, strong…and with a mark in each hand. Now, quickly, look down at the feet and you see a similar mark in the feet. Slowly, he turns his back towards you and you see the lines trace across His back, once angry red, now healed. And, as He turns back toward you, you realize that this one who is before you, the weakest of all, is none other than Jesus Himself. Do you see Him? As your eyes are opened, He speaks.

He says, “I know what it is to be weak and humbled; I know what it is to surrender fully and completely for the eternal wellbeing of those whom I love. I know what it is to have nothing. I know what it is to be hated and despised, a man of sorrows, whom no one loves. I know what it is to be so weak, I cannot carry my own cross. I know what it is to be overlooked until perceived as a threat, and then something to be destroyed. I know what it is to be overwhelmed at the point of death, abandoned by my closest friends, and I know what it is to be rejected even by My own Father. I know what it is to die for people who spat on me, whipped me, and nailed me to the cross.”

That’s what Jesus did for you–He reached down to us.  For we are like little children.  We couldn’t reach up to heaven no matter how hard we would try.  And the smaller the child is, the more we must bend our knees, backs, and egos to meet him. To receive a little child and serve him is to bend down and give to another.  It’s to know the self-sacrificing love of the cross that saved you and made you God’s own child. That’s greatness in the way of the cross.  That’s the Jesus way.  Greatness in the way of the cross is the greatness of humility.

His greatness is backwards of what the world sees. The world sees dying as weakness; Jesus shows strength in his innocent suffering and death. The world counts as least one who refuses to fight; Jesus demonstrates greatness in forgiving those whose sins nail Him to the cross. The world sees crucifixion as the most humiliating and excruciating way of death; Jesus makes the cross into a throne of glory. The world looks at a grave as the period at the end of life’s sentence; Jesus’ resurrection makes the grave to be nothing more than a resting place as we wait for our own day of resurrection.

And, when we see Jesus as the least of all, you see the least of all as the greatest. At the beginning of the sermon, I asked you who was the greatest member of Zion. Does this change your perspective of the greatest?

The greatest member of Zion is the one whose heart is broken, the one whose body hurts all the time, the one who is afraid, the one who is drowning in debt, the one who is to embarrassed to come out of the shadows, the one who is scared, the one who is flirting with grave temptation, the one who is grieved by what they have done and left undone. This is the most important member of this body of Christ.

If you think I am trying to shame you – I am not. You are the most important child of God in this holy House today. Please – don’t hide. Let your brothers and sisters in Christ who are strong walk with you and help you with our prayers, our words of encouragement, our care and our support. And for those of you who are strong, don’t worry – I’m not forgetting you. It’s not that I don’t think you are important. Because the day will come when you will be the least and then, you too, shall be the greatest.

And when you start to change how you see greatness, your whole world view changes. A family had stopped at a fast-food burger joint for a fast to-go meal. Somehow they wound up with an extra burger in the sack. The teenage boy was excited – he thought he was going to get a two-fer that night. While they munched on the fries in the bag, the light in front of them turned red. As they came to a stop, the mom saw a man standing at the corner. He was a mess – shaggy beard, ragged face, dirty. She could practically smell him through the rolled-up windows. And, then, she knew why they had gotten the extra burger. As she rolled down the passenger window, she waved the man over and told her son to give the man the extra burger. The man nodded his thanks, the light turned green, and the family drove away. The son was irritated at first – why did you give away my burger, he demanded. “I didn’t give him yours,” Mom said. She smiled. “I gave him his.”

In the Name of Jesus. Amen.

“I believe; help my unbelief.” - Mark 9: 14-29

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

“The man said to Jesus, “But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.” And Jesus said, “’If you can’! All things are possible for one who believes.” Immediately, the father of the child cried out and said, “I believe; help my unbelief.”

These words from this father echo through the centuries into this very chancel today. You have heard them from the mouths of friends and family members. You have probably heard them from your own throat. I have heard them rumble from my own throat more often than I care to count. Those five words, “I believe; help my unbelief,” perfectly describe the human condition as a child of God this side of heaven, living in faith, under the cross of Jesus. With our eyes, we see the improbable, the impossible. With eyes of faith, we see God and His promises for us in Christ as His beloved and baptized children. I call it the crossroads of faith and life. Sometimes, those are congruent, in perfect parallel to each other in copacetic harmony. But, other times, there is a terrible collision of faith and life at those crossroads in ways that seem to be not only incongruous but diametrically opposed.

"I believe; help my unbelief." I suspect that every Christian prays this at one point or another during their lifetime. I want you to know that this is not a sin to feel this way. This does not make you a lesser quality Christian. It does not relegate you to the church’s minor-team. You should not feel ashamed that you are letting Jesus down, or your church down, or have failed in your Baptismal promises. This is an honest confession of both faith in Christ as Lord and Savior while also acknowledging that our faith, this side of heaven, is far from perfect and not like we wish it could be.

I said it is not a sin to feel this way, but the devil loves to make us think it is. He seeks to condemn us or make us feel condemned even where God does not. “If you are a ‘real’ Christian,” he intones, “you wouldn’t have to add ‘help my unbelief.’ You would simply believe – no ifs, ands, or buts." And he throws that in your face. He shines the light on our heroes of faith in the Bible – Ruth or David, Paul or Dorcas – so you can see your own failed reflection against them. Then he points to those around you who don’t ever seem to struggle with their faith – your wife, your husband, your dad, your grannie, the older couple across the aisle, the young couple a few pews in front of you, your best friend. They all seem to roll along as if nothing ever phases them. “But you” – and here, the devil shakes his head – “you call yourself a Christian…tsk, tsk, tsk…” This leads you into greater despair. You actually start to believe it. “You know, if I were a better Christian…if I had more faith…then I wouldn’t be tempted this way.”

The Christian faith is grounded in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. You confessed it a moment ago in the Apostle’s Creed. It acknowledges we are sinners and Christ, to fulfill the Father’s will, became man so He could live perfectly and fulfill the Law of God for us. He also had to be man so He could die, the perfect sacrifice for sinners. The Christian faith proclaims Christ’s sacrifice was accepted as the full atonement for sinners because of the Easter resurrection, demonstrating the Father’s wrath against sinners was satisfied. We believe this to be true because the Scriptures testify to this. This is the Christian faith.

But faith also has a personal aspect. You said this a moment ago, also, when you confessed the Creed: “I believe in God the Father Almighty…” And, because you believe this Faith that confesses Jesus as Savior, you are saved by God’s grace: your sins are forgiven by Jesus, and they are no longer held against you. This is called saving faith. I think for most of us, this is relatively constant in our day-to-day living under the cross of Jesus. It’s that sense of what we feel, what we trust, where we set our affections. This idea of faith – that which is within me, what I believe; that is, this is my faith -  is not wrong. It is the Spirit-given gift that lets us say “I believe.” But that faith is constantly in flux. Sometimes, the Christian’s faith is a strong, certain and sure as can be, and the confession, “I believe,” is as large as the massive live oak tree out front of the church and rings out like our large, brass bell chiming across the Mission Valley community on a Sunday morning. But, other times, especially when the Christian’s faith is rocked, stunned, battered and bruised. In moments like that, it is tempting to think that if only we had faith the size of a mustard seed, if only our faith was as warm as a smoldering wick, if only it was as strong as a bruised reed it would be an improvement.

This happens when our loved ones are critically ill. It happens when our checking account is empty and the credit card is declined. It happens when the boss says, “I’m sorry….business hasn’t picked up to meet our costs…”, when the doctor says, “I’m sorry; we used all our capabilities…”, when the spouse declares, “I don’t love you anymore….” It happens when we find ourself guilty of a terrible sin against God and against our neighbor and we are left wondering if we are even lovable anymore. It happens at the grave-side of a loved one who died in faith, and you say, “Yes, I believe…” but staring at that grave… It happens when we least expect it.  And when life crashes in and when faith is shaken and rocked and stunned and silenced, and we cannot see how this will end, we find ourselves standing arm-in-arm with the father in this morning’s text: Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.  

Let’s back up for a second. If you are being tempted to focus on the “help my unbelief” part, remember this: those three words are a testimony of faith. Without faith in Jesus, they could not be prayed, cried, or whispered. They are the words of the faithful, baptized Child of God calling out to the Heavenly Father, through faith in Jesus, to come to your aid in the midst of struggle and temptation. It’s admission that you cannot do this yourself. You are confessing your weakness of faith, yes, but it’s also trust in Jesus that He will rescue and save.

When you do this, you are in good company. You can start with the father in this morning’s Gospel reading, one of my personal Biblical heroes because I often find myself standing under his shadow. But don’t stop there. Look through the Scriptures and you see hero after hero of faith whose faith was anything but perfect. We think of Gideon as the brave man who led Israel against the Philistines, shattering jars of clay and shouting “The sword of the Lord and the sword of Gideon!” but we forget that he was so frightened that he hid in a olive press and had to be shown, time and time again, that God was with him before he ever stepped onto the battle field. How about John the Baptizer? Here was a man who called the pharisees “Broods of vipers,” preached repentance, baptized countless Israelites, and then stood against Herod and condemned his adulterous affair, but when in prison, sent letters to Jesus saying, “Are you really the one, or is there someone else?”  Peter – now there’s a candidate for faithfulness, right? We think of his Pentecost sermon or his standing up against those who demanded that Gentiles first had to be bound under the Law of Moses, true. But don’t forget his sinking into the depths of the sea when he saw the wind, or his running away into the darkness when Jesus was arrested, or his three-fold denial of Jesus when quizzed by a servant girl.  

Isn’t it funny – I called all of these so-called heroes of faith --- perhaps more accurately called antiheroes of faith --- as “good company.” How can I call these examples of lack of faith to be good?

Faith is never the sum and substance of itself. Faith always has an object – something it clings to.  So, the Christian faith is never about the strength of your faith, or the quantity of it.  Our Lord never measures our faith with a level to make sure it’s true, or a ruler to make sure it will go the distance, or a scale to see if it’s weighty enough, or a vial to see it it’s full enough. He never uses a grading system to determine if your faith is pass or fail.  He never compares your faith to that of your spouse, or your parent, or your pastor. What a disaster this would be! How unfortunate we would be if our "faithfulness" was what saved! Could you imagine, having to hope Jesus would give a curve? But He doesn’t…He never scores on a curve. Instead, Jesus scores faith with His cross.

His cross is where true faith is measured and tested and found perfect. Not yours; His. Out of His great faithfulness to the Father and the Father’s plan of salvation, Christ died for you.  This morning’s Old Testament reading from Isaiah, one of the Suffering Servant readings, foretold what Jesus would do, actively and passively fulfilling God’s will for Him:

The Lord God has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious; I turned not backward. 6 I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.

Baptized into Christ, clothed in Christ, you are wrapped in His faithfulness. Your belief and your unbelief are made perfect in Christ, so that God sees you as filled with the faith of Jesus, faith without failure or doubt. He sees your faithfulness through the lens of the cross. Your cross-marked faith is perfect in every way. 

The English poet, Robert Browning once wrote, “You call for faith, I give you doubt to prove that faith exists. The greater the doubt the stronger the faith, I say, if faith overcomes doubt.” He was right; but, he was also wrong. The blessing of doubt, in this case, is not that our faith overcomes doubt, but that it turns us from ourselves to Jesus, from our weakness to His strength, from our doubts to His faithfulness, from our shortcoming to His fulness. 

I want you to know something about this sermon. It was written for you, but it is especially written for the person whom I continue to write in prison. I told you about this individual this summer, if you recall. This individual did something and the conscience is so burdened and guilty that it feels as if they are now outside God’s grace, unforgiven, unloved, unredeemed. One letter I received was signed with these very words, “I believe; help my unbelief.” I will be mailing a copy of this sermon Monday. Please join me in praying that it is received; that the Spirit can penetrate into a stubborn heart; that the smoldering wick is able to be stirred into flame and the bruised reed of faith a strengthened stem.

The next time life comes at you hard and you pray, “Lord I believe, help my unbelief,” do so with confidence, not fear; hope, not shame.  Romans 8:1 reminds us, “Now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” God does not look at you in disappointment. Rather He sees you in love, through the cross of Jesus, and acts in His compassion for you. “Lord, I believe, help my unbelief,” is a faith-filled call of hope to the one Whose faith is perfect for me.

God's Word Opens Deaf Ears - Mark 7: 31-37

I suspect that most of us take our hearing for granted, so I want you to think for a moment about all the things you heard this morning. We wake to the sound of our phone chiming an alarm, we go to the kitchen to hear the sound of the coffee pot chugging, we go to the bathroom and hear the sound of the water spraying against the curtain. We get in the car and hear the sound of the motor, the tires on the asphalt, the blinker clicking. We hear the kids in the back seat, we hear the music or podcast, we hear the firetruck screaming. Now, think about what you will hear throughout the day: We hear our spouse ask what is wanted for dinner, that the washing machine is out of balance, and that the cat is stuck in the closet. Dad, want to play catch? Mom, can you help me with my math? Kids, can you help set the table? We will go to bed hearing the air conditioner hum, the dog snoring, and our own steady breathing before we drift off to sleep.

Now, imagine a world of silence, where you hear none of those things – not the voices of your loved ones, not the police car trying to get past you, not the smoke detector trying to get your attention. And, because you can’t hear, you also have a hard time trying to communicate – you don’t know what words sound like, so you don’t know how to form them with your mouth, lips, tongue, and throat.

Thanks to modern technology, there are some incredible things that can happen to help someone be able to hear. Search youtube and you’ll find videos of children hearing their parents for the first time, or a wife hearing her husband say “I love you,” and the joy – the shear joy on their faces as a new world of sounds open up to them.

 But for this man in the Decapolis region, there was no such joy. The man is both deaf and unable to speak. In Jesus’ day and age, the conventional wisdom said that if someone was handicapped it must either have been the result of what that person did or what his or her parents did. If he could have, he would have heard the whispers, the snide comments, the sneering voices wondering what he did, what his parents did, to have deserved such a curse. It was a sign of disfavor with God, a demonstration of His displeasure upon this person. I think, sometimes, people still think this way today. Actually, I know this because I have had people say, “Pastor, I must have done something really awful as a child to deserve this.” They ask, “Do you think this is God punishing me for that night in college?” They wonder, “I can’t help but think if I hadn’t done that fifteen years ago, Jesus might be answering my prayers right now…”  Now, sometimes I think those comments are made in the heat of the moment – just trying to make sense of the situation – and the child of God doesn’t really believe that. But there are other times that the Christian, rocked to his heels, knocked to her knees, is tempted by the devil to believe this: that somehow, in some way, they have so displeased God that He is playing the part of the jealous, vindictive jilted lover.

Notice how Jesus answers that thought: He goes to the man. This man, whom the rest of the people thinks is being punished by God, this man is the target of Jesus’ mercy. If God really was displeased with the man, if God really were punishing the man, if God really wanted nothing to do with the man, Jesus would not have even been in the area! Instead, Jesus goes to the man and takes the man aside, privately. I wonder how that went? Did he wave, “Come here…”  Did He use some kind of rudimentary sign language [point, finger “walk”, etc?]?  Perhaps Jesus simply takes him by the shoulder and leads him aside.

We know Jesus is God, and as God He is able to do all things. He could have just spoken and the man’s ears would have worked and the vocal chords would have produced the vocal quality of Sam Elliot or James Earl Jones. He has done that before. But this time, Jesus does something different and strange. To our ears, ears that are able to receive sounds and brains that can translate those sounds into words and then process their meanings, to our ears this is weird…maybe even gross. But to a man who cannot hear; to a man who cannot speak, Jesus’s actions demonstrate to the man that He, Jesus, is the Lord of Creation and He is the one doing this miracle. It’s not a fluke, or an accident; it’s not Zeus or Apollo; it’s not the waters of Hebron. It’s Jesus and Jesus only.

The actions are important, for they get the man’s attention who otherwise would not hear and know first-hand what was happening.  He touches the man’s ears – these auditory organs that are as lifeless as ears carved on a statue of granite – and Jesus primes the deaf ears to be ready to hear His voice. He spits – indicating that something powerful is coming from Jesus’ mouth – and he baptizes the mute’s mouth so that it will be ready to rejoice.

But what tells us the most about Jesus is when He sighs. The sigh tells the tale – a sigh of compassion for the brokenness of this man, a sigh of feeling the need of this man to be whole, a sigh that the people didn’t understand what the mercy of God looked like, after all. He sighs the sigh of a parent whose child is hurting; He sighs the sigh of a big brother whose sibling is broken; He sighs the sigh of one whose beloved isn’t even able to hear his own crying. And with the echos of the sigh still hanging in the air, Jesus speaks: “Be opened!” It’s only one word in Aramaic, and it’s a word spoken into dead ears, but that one word speaks volumes of life against death.

Jesus’ words always accomplish exactly what He says they will do. What He says, happens. And when He commands deaf ears to hear, they work perfectly. When He commands the muted and garbled voice to speak, it sounds forth with beautiful tone. What choice is there for the dead parts of body but to respond to the God of  Life Himself?

In an instant, the man is able to speak. St. Mark doesn’t tell us what he says, but I imagine he more or less echoed Jesus’ words: “My ears! My mouth! They are opened! Jesus opened them for me!”

When life happens to a brother or sister in Christ and they are so wound up that they think God has somehow become displeased with them (He’s not), or that God has changed His mind about them (He hasn’t), or that their Baptismal covenant is no longer valid (it is); they need to be reminded Jesus is not abandoning them. When they can’t hear the voice of Christ for themselves because of the din of the chaos and confusion around them, Christ hears their sorrow. When the pain is too hard, or the struggle is too deep that it as if they are struck mute, this reading lets them hear that the sigh of Jesus for them.

And Jesus speaks to them and His Word accomplishes exactly what He wants to happen. With His Word, He touches the ears. He says, “You have been baptized in my name. The Father sees you as He sees me. Your sins have been forgiven. You are made holy. Stop doubting and be believing.”

But, even more than that, it’s not just words. So that there is no doubt, Jesus acts. His compassion for us is so great that He refused to sit idly by. His love for us led Him to the cross. If there was ever any doubt of the mercy of Christ for the sinner, one only need to look to Jesus’ own death. There, on the cross, Jesus sighed again. It was just one word but that sigh spoke volumes: “It is finished.” Satan’s power – finished. Hell’s threat – finished. The burden of sins for children of God – finished. The grave’s hold over Christians – finished.

In this morning’s reading, Jesus opened the ears and mouth of this man. Because of His Easter victory, we are able to look forward to the day when Christ returns and all of us who have fallen asleep in Christ will be raised to new life with Him. With a cry of the conquering victor, Jesus will speak, “Ephphatha! Be opened!” and your grave will be opened and you will stand with the resurrected Jesus with bodies made whole. Our ears will hear perfectly, our mouths will sing gloriously.  

“Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy. And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.” (Is. 35:5-6; 10-11)  Come quickly, Lord Jesus. Come.

 

Laboring in Love - Genesis 2: 15 (Free text - Labor Day weekend)

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

The text for this Labor Day weekend is from Genesis 2: 15: “Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.”

There are so many things I want to know about what the Garden of Eden was like. Can you imagine a beautiful place with the perfect temperature, humidity level, and air so clean that allergies cannot exist? Can you imagine being able to pick fruit without worrying about residual herbicide or insecticide contamination, where you can drink from a stream without worrying about e. coli poisoning, where the sun warms you gently, where the breeze cools you perfectly, and where you share the space with all kinds of animals – including snakes, spiders, lions, tigers, and bears, oh my – without fear? Truly, that sounds like the utopia of all utopias.

But what amazes me the most is the concept that Adam was given work to do in the garden, but the work wasn’t hard, the way we know work to be. It wasn’t a burdensome chore. Weeds weren’t troublesome. There were no fire ants or wasps or Black Widow spiders to contend with. Sweat didn’t get in his eyes. It was truly a joy, in every sense of the word, a pleasure, a peaceful, symbiotic coexistence of serving God’s creation as its caretaker while being a recipient of the gifts it offered. In every possible way, it was a perfect existence while working in God’s garden.

That is mind boggling to me because all that you and I know is that work is, well, work. People say, “it’s not work if you enjoy what you do,” but that’s not exactly true, is it? I love my job – most days. I get to tell God’s people about Jesus – that’s a great job – but then there are other days, like when I’ve wrestled with what to say to broken hearts, or what not to say to angry souls, or how to handle conflict, all while trying to compose a sermon that speaks the truth of God’s word and not my own desire to lash out. I love preaching and teaching, but there have been days when sweating in hayfields and fence rows, being sore for days on end, would have been a welcome tradeoff. You know what I mean, because you have those moments, too, when you wish you could have your “Trading Spaces” moment and do someone else’s job – or, no job at all – because it is just so hard.

While we might look back into history with some disdain at Adam and Eve, there is no way they knew what those forbidden bites would do to all of creation, including the gift of work that God had given you in the Garden. With two, delicious but damning bites, creation fell, mankind fell, and work – that peaceful, copacetic relationship of service – became work as we know it. “Cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you shall return.” (Gen. 3:17b-19)

In his novel, The Backpacker, author John Harris describes what work has become.

“Work is a four-letter word. It conjures up the same image the world over: getting up in the morning to do something you don't want to do, day in day out. After a few months work, or years, depending on the person's primeval yearning for freedom, you feel like a robot: alarm clock, get up, wash, catch the train, work, go home, watch TV, go to bed. In that one sentence I've probably just described the daily routine of 95% of the working population of England. It's the same in every other developed country in the world. Routine is the cause of most marriage break ups and social discontent.”

It's a less sanctified way of describing what the Preacher wrote in Eccleasties:

“Meaningless! Meaningless!” “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” ³ What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun?... ⁹ What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

Is that it? Is our work meaningless, destined to be a four letter word for misery and endless struggle this side of heaven?

I have a running joke in Bible class, that the answer to any question is one of three options: Jesus, Baptism, or squirrel. Apply that here: the answer to this question, “Is our work meaningless?” obviously isn’t squirrel, and baptism doesn’t quite fit the bill, so the answer must lay with Jesus. How on earth (literally – how, on earth) does Jesus make our work have meaning?

He redeems it.

We usually think of redemption as having to do with us and our sins. We often say, “We are redeemed in Christ Jesus,” and this is true. To redeem, remember, means “to buy back.” Think of a coupon: the store redeems it from you, that is, it literally buys the coupon from you. You receive it freely, but it is not free: it costs the store or the manufacturer the price of the item. Likewise, you receive God’s grace, that is your redemption, freely, and it was freely given to you, but it was not free. Forgiveness, redemption, salvation is not free to the giver. The cost was great. Jesus redeems you from sin, death and satan by His life. He pays the price for you in His perfect life and innocent blood. He exchanges His life for your life, His holiness for your sins, His grave for your grave. And, He redeems you both now and into eternity.

And, because He loves you to redeem you, He also redeems everything about you, including your work.

In the Christian church, we speak of the doctrine of vocation. Simply, your vocation is where God places you in this life. But, he doesn’t just place you to exist. Vocation comes from the Latin “to call,” vocation, vocation. He called you in Baptism to be His beloved, and He then calls you to service in His name. But He doesn’t just call you to serve in His name with a holy pat on the back, an “attaboy” or “attagirl,” and a go-get-em blessing. He serves in you, through you, to those around you. And, you can have multiple vocations at once. I am a pastor, husband, father, son, neighbor, citizen and more. You can have the vocations of spouse, grandparent, citizen, employer, employee, and neighbor all at the same time. And, in those vocations, Christ fills you with His Spirit so that you serve those around you in Christ’s name and with His love.

So, when you change your grandson’s loaded diaper, your vocation is grandparent and in your loving service, Christ is present, at work in your work. When you write the report for your boss, your vocation is employee, and in your service, in your work, Christ is present, working in and through you for your boss, your company, your client. When you go to school and learn and study, your vocation is student, and in your service, in your studies and homework, Christ is present, serving you, your classmates, and those you encounter as you grow. When you make your spouse dinner or do the laundry, your vocation is to be husband or wife, and your service is the mutual care and support of each other and Christ is at work in you and through you to your husband, to your wife. Whether you are mucking out a horse stall, doing your multiplication tables, cleaning up a patient’s vomit, or washing the dishes, your work, your vocation, is redeemed and made holy in Christ. Christ redeems your work, however hard and uncomfortable and unpleasant it might be at times, and He turns it to make it holy, so that in your labors, His is also at work in you and through you and with Him, you serve your neighbor.

And, the flip-side of the doctrine of vocation is that God serves you through those around you. God heals you through the doctors called to the vocation of medicine. God gives you daily bread through the farmers and ranchers and bakers and store managers and stockers and truck drivers all called to their vocations of providing food to your kitchen table. God speaks to you through the pastor whose vocation is the office of the holy ministry and the Sunday school teachers whose vocation assists that ministry. God helps you, parents, rear your children through the teachers, administrators, and support staff whose vocations all care for your children while God works through you in your various vocations.  And, students, God teaches you through the teachers and coaches and custodians and food service staff whose vocation places them as God’s representatives to you.

Because Christ has redeemed your vocation, your calling, you are never without value. I occasionally hear someone, usually someone who is home-bound or shut-in, lament that they aren’t worth anything to anyone because they can’t do anything. They have bought the lie of the economy of the world: value is the sum of ability plus productivity.  As long as I can do, I am worth something, but when I lose that ability I am worthless. If you see life through the lens of cost-benefit analysis, pretty soon you become as jaded as the writer of Ecclesiastes where its you, not life, that is meaningless. That might be how economists think, but that is not how God’s people are to think.  In God’s economy, your worth is not in what you do but what Christ has done for you. His death makes you invaluable to God; His redemption makes you precious to God; His name, placed on you in baptism, makes you beloved to God. So, when I hear someone, like a shut-in or home bound Christian, lament that they are not worth anything, I am quick to correct that misunderstanding. Sometimes vocations can change. For this home-bound, shut-in child of God, the vocation is now less of serving and more of being served. Their vocation is one that allows others to care for them and, in return, to reciprocate the mercy and love of God with gratitude. In that work of being served, even this is made holy in Christ.

Tomorrow, the nation will mark Labor Day, a day to celebrate the American worker. For the Christian, every day is Vocation Day, to thank God for the gift of work and the opportunity to serve your neighbor. Whether you are busy in your vocation or taking a rest from your labors, whether it is work or work, whatever you do, playing with the kids, making lunch, doing the laundry, or even quietly sitting with your spouse and watching a movie, do it to the glory of God, knowing that in Christ, your vocational work is blessed in Christ Jesus. Amen.

The Scandal of Bread and Wine, Body and Blood - John 6: 51-69

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

When many of the disciples heard [the teaching of Jesus], they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”

They just couldn’t take it anymore. His teaching about His flesh being true food and His blood true drink was just too much. No self-respecting, Torah-living, Scripture-believing Jew would dare talk that way, let alone do such a thing. Eat human flesh? Never! Drink blood? Not only was blood unclean, but the drinking of blood was forbidden. Eating and drinking such a meal would surely put you outside the community, strip you of temple worship, and leave you as unclean as lepers, pig farmers, or even [shudder the thought] Gentiles. For Jesus to speak of Himself this way, for Him to invite – nay, encourage! – His listeners to participate in such a thing as cannibalism, it was just too much to hear, to believe, to follow anymore. And, what kind of foolishness was this disrespectful talk about the manna that the Israelites ate in the desert? Forty years of God-given bread is part of the history of Israel. But the final straw was His referring to Himself with Godly language like Son of Man and being coequal to the Father. 

It was too much; they couldn’t take it anymore. St. John says that “many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him.”

What happened? We’ve been following the story for the last month. After He fed the 5000 with five loaves and two fish, the people wanted to make Jesus their king. Who wouldn’t? Could you imagine: an unlimited supply of food without having to either work for it or pay for it? Oh, wait…the Israelites had that in the wilderness for 40 years, didn’t they, and they grumbled constantly about having the same thing day in and day out. Yeah; that didn’t work out so well. And when Jesus brings this up to the people who have gathered around – both Jewish leaders and his disciples (the larger grouping of people who followed him, not just The Twelve), and then teaches that He is the Bread of Life and those who eat – that is, believe – will live forever, unlike their fathers in the desert, they were taken aback. “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” they asked.

Jesus, in turn, asks them, “Do you take offense at this?” In fact, the Greek word used for our English word, “offended,” is “skandalon” – you can hear our word “scandal,” right? They weren’t just offended…they were scandalized by what Jesus had to say. 

Scandal helps us understand how severe this was. We use the word “offended” all the time, describing everything from politics to haircuts, but generally we get over that mess. But a scandal is something that is literally a stumbling block – a scandal causes me to lose faith in someone. It makes me rethink my whole idea about something. It might change my opinion, force me to rethink my ideology, even doubt what I have believed in the past. We move past an offense; but a scandal is a major hurdle to overcome. 

Jesus asked them, “Do you take offense?” Literally, the question is rhetorical – “You are scandalized, aren’t you?” He knew they were murmuring and grumbling the same way their forefathers had in the wilderness against Moses. They are being scandalized by who Jesus is. He’s not just a bread maker; He is the very Bread of Life itself. He’s not just the son of Mary; He is Bread which has come down from Heaven, meaning, from the very hand of God Himself. They are being scandalized that Jesus instructs them to believe in Him as God in flesh, and that by eating His flesh and drinking His blood – and here, he means in a spiritual sense, not a sacramental sense – one will live forever. A Jew would never dare succumb to cannibalism or touching blood. Such things made one unclean, and that Jesus seemed to be expecting this was simply too much. But the icing on the cake, the idea that made the tabloids of Jerusalem, was the idea that this Messiah would have to die to attain His throne. Body and blood talk is death talk, and – to paraphrase General George Patton – every Israelite knew that no Messiah becomes a Messiah by dying at the hands of the enemy. A crucified Messiah was no Messiah at all because everyone knew that someone who died at the hands of the Romans was not only a criminal but a man cursed by God. 

The scandal was just too much for many of those who had been following Jesus. They had their bellies filled on the hillside, they chased Jesus around the shoreline, they listened to what He said, but all of this bread, body and blood talk…it was too much. It gave them spiritual indigestion. The cross was the final stumbling stone and it put people at a cross-roads: follow, or not follow. When something bothers the tummy, you don’t eat it. This bread, body, eating and drinking talk bothered them so much, it was such a great stumbling stone to their faith, it was such a scandal that they simply could not tolerate it any further. They changed their opinions of Jesus; they turned and walked away.

The Gospel of Jesus still causes offense today. People outside the Church – Capitol C, the Christian church - still walk away from Jesus and His gifts. To those who seek offense, Jesus’ teaching has plenty to be offended by. They are scandalized by His teaching that He is the only way that leads to eternal life. They are shocked that He tells us to receive His body and drink His blood, not only spiritually, but also sacramentally in bread and wine for the forgiveness of sins, and that He is truly present in this meal. They are outraged that there is salvation in no other name under heaven given among men by which we may be saved. They refuse to believe Jesus forgives sinners – you know, like those people. And, sadly, there are some who refuse to believe Jesus’ death is truly all-sufficient, and that by faith in Him one may have eternal life in His name. 

What’s worse, though, is when the church causes people to be scandalized. Now, here, by church I am talking church with a lower-case c – the local church, the congregation. Every congregation has the same struggle: they are filled with sinners, and they are served by a sinner. Put sinful people together in one group and, sooner or later, something sinful will happen. There’s gossip and rumor, suggestion and inuendo, selfishness and arrogance. What does that do to the body of Christ when brothers and sisters in Christ speak of each other in the worst of names. What does that say when little Christs take their baptismal blessings and behave as if forgiveness, compassion, giving the benefit of the doubt, mercy and grace are all dumped in the ditch, and memories of sins past are dredged to the surface, “rights” are espoused, vile and vitriol and sharpened like swords, and hearts grow hard.

People stumble in faith and, sadly, some not only stumble but fall – fall away from the congregation: “I don’t want to be part of a church like that.” Worse, some even fall away from faith in Jesus. “If that’s what the body of Jesus is like, He isn’t much of a head.” 

Our Lord calls us to repentance so that our behaviors do not scandalize His name, or scandalize others in their faith. “Thy kingdom come,” remember? Not ours, not our reputation, He leads us to turn away from ourselves and turn toward our brothers and sisters in Christ with His compassion.  He opens our eyes to see our own sins before we consider those of others. He gives the strength to let gossip die in your ears and seal your lips so that inuendo never passes your mouth. He fills you with His spirit so you speak tenderly, gently, and with understanding. And He leads us to surrender ourselves for the body of Christ.

The irony is there is nothing to be scandalized by. He came to seek and to save the lost; he came to rescue and redeem sinners; He came to give himself for those who had nothing left to give; He came to feed with food that has no expiration date and never spoils or fades. He is the great physician of body and soul Who comes to heal those who could not heal themselves from eternal damnation. He didn't come to establish an earthly Kingdom. His Kingdom, on earth and in heaven, endures into eternity without beginning or end. He doesn't demand foolish allegiance but he does call us to faith in him, trusting that His life , death, and resurrection are the all sufficient payment for all of your sins and mine. He doesn’t come to be served, but to serve and to give His life for many. Simply, this is why Jesus came:  “that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life and I will raise Him up on the last day” (v. 40).

The cross knows no limits. There are no oversized loads at the cross. Jesus doesn’t weigh or measure sins and determine that the cross can’t stand the weight and has to be left on the sinner’s back. Jesus takes them all. He even takes yours. Remember: all sins deserve condemnation. Jesus died for them all. He died for you. In faith, repentance dumps your sin, my sin, their sins at the foot of the cross and says, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You died for this damnable burden, so I am leaving it where You paid it’s price. Strengthen me, so I don’t do it again. Preserve me against temptation. Because You rose, I know that my sins will no longer be held against me into eternity. These are the words of eternal life. I know them, believe them, trust them and rely on these promises and on these promises alone.” 

These are the words you have heard today. Blessed are you. The Father has drawn you, the Spirit has birthed you, the Son has redeemed you. Blessed are you. “Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he will also live because of me. So, to you, Jesus says, “Come. Eat and drink. My body and blood is here, for you.” He fed Israel with manna from heaven for forty years. He feeds you, today, with food that lasts into eternity, with drink that quenches the insatiable thirst for mercy. In the eating and drinking, He comes to you, strengthens you, forgives you.  You take His body and blood with you wherever you go. To your work, to your home, to your grave. And He will raise you up on the last day.