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.

 

 

 

 

 

There Is Bread Under the Broom Tree - 1 Kings 19: 1-8

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

The text is this morning’s Old Testament lesson[1], especially these words, “But [Elijah] went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. And He asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life for I am no better than my fathers.”

Hmm. Pretty dark stuff, isn’t it? Not the kind of text one would expect in a Sunday sermon. But it is there, in the story of Elijah, and it shows us just what kind of a place he was in, mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually. It leaves us, as God’s people, wondering, “How did this prophet of God get to that kind of low spot? What happened that he found himself sitting under a tree, praying that the Lord takes his life?”

I would invite you to take your Bible this afternoon and read 1 Kings, chapters 17 thru 19, and read the story of Elijah – it’ll take you 20, maybe 30 minutes. King Ahab and his wife, Queen Jezebel, were wicked rulers of Israel – so wicked that their names are still used today to describe someone filled with evil intent.  The Lord called Elijah to preach a specific message: there will be a massive, lengthy drought in the land because of their leading Israel into unfaithfulness. The purpose of the prophesy of the drought was this: if the drought happened as Elijah prophesied, that served as proof that the rest of his words from God were also true. Three years into the drought, food and water were scarce. When Elijah stayed at a widow’s home, as commanded by God, the Lord provided just enough flour and oil that she, her son, and Elijah had daily bread. But it was when the widow’s son died, and Elijah laid over the corpse, prayed, and the child was raised to life, the woman’s response was one that would be a theme in his prophetic ministry: “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.” The miracles proved Elijah’s divinely given authority to the woman.

But it was the duel at Mt. Caramel that proved for all of Israel that Elijah was a prophet of God and, more importantly, demonstrated that Yahweh, the God of Israel, was the only true God. In what can only be described as a prayer duel, Elijah and the prophets of Baal offered sacrifices and prayers to their respective God/god and whichever would answer would be declared the true God. Despite the false prophet’s best efforts to stir up Baal, their prayers were answered with only silence. But when Elijah called on the name of the Lord, fire fell from the heavens, consuming the wood, sacrifice, even the stone and water that had been poured over it. As the people fell on their faces, Elijah ordered the false prophets be captured and killed. Rain began to fall on the parched land, a baptismal blessing of new life of repentance for the nation.

From any human measurement, this was an overwhelming moment of glory as a prophet of God! His prophetic work was validated; there was rain, water was flowing, and Lord was demonstrated to be the only true God. By any measure, by any mark, by any stretch of the imagination, Elijah should have been floating on a prophetic cloud nine. But then Elijah received word that the wicked and evil Jezebel had ordered that he be hunted down and killed, slaughtered as he had done to her prophets. And Elijah ran. He ran a full day’s journey into the wilderness until he collapsed, tired, hungry, afraid, and then he prayed that the Lord would take his life. He wanted to die.

I do not take that as a euphemism or over-exaggeration to make the story more interesting. I take it as it is written: Elijah had gone from success at Caramel to fleeing for his life. He was exhausted, hungry, and so overcome with what faced him, should he be caught by this wicked, evil woman who would take great pleasure in seeing him die a terrible and painful death, that he wished he would die instead.

Those words resonated with me as I began studying for this morning’s sermon because of the young woman in Cuero two weeks ago, but I also found out that a brother LCMS pastor took his life last weekend. Truth be told, I didn’t know him, personally, only as a friendly face and Godly voice on a Facebook page for LCMS pastors. There is part of us that wants to know the morbid details - that’s why we gawk at accident scenes – and this is no different. The fact is I don’t know any details, and even if I did know, it doesn’t really matter because it would be too easy for us to sit here, thousands of miles away in our own homes, lives, and worlds and not begin to understand what he was dealing with. “What would make him do that,” we would say as we shook our heads, “Didn’t he know what he had to live for, that people loved him, that help was there for him?”

I would suspect that, yes, he did know all those things. He knew his wife and kids loved him dearly and needed him as a husband and father; that his parish was expecting him to return from vacation, rested and prepared to continue serving. Maybe there were family problems, or a crisis in the parish, or an issue in the community, or a combination of them, weighing so heavily on his heart and mind, making the darkness so powerful that no light of hope, joy or peace could penetrate. Perhaps there was a medical condition and he was afraid of being a burden on those whom he loved. Or, maybe he was one of us unfortunate souls whose glass is always half-empty, and no matter how much is poured into it, and no matter how often we read Psalm 23’s promise of a cup that overflows, it just doesn’t seem to make a difference. Perhaps he had even sought help before. I don’t know. What I do know is that this was a man, a baptized child of God, a fellow Christian, a husband and father,  a fellow pastor, a man whose vocation was centered in Christ, the forgiveness of sins, the strengthening of faith, the encouragement of others who are broken, hurting, and half-empty, who baptized, absolved, blessed, distributed the Body and Blood of His Lord, and who believed in Jesus as the Savior of the World and who proclaimed the same. 

But something happened the other day. This was a faithful man of God who strived to be Christ to the least, the poorest, the humblest, the overlooked in the community and in the parish, so they, too, would know that they had incredible and eternal value in the eyes of God, so much so that He gave up His Son for them. But, for some reason, that day, he could not see himself as that one, the broken one, the hurting one, for whom Jesus died and gave hope. Whatever it was, it was just too much, so much that child of God went out and, instead of praying like Elijah, “It’s enough, O Lord, take my life,” he did it himself.

I still remember one of my preaching professors said, “You don’t even talk about suicide in a sermon because it could put the idea in someone’s head.” Satan doesn’t wait for our permission, our decision, our words to put a wicked idea in someone’s head. If we can’t speak of suicide in the church, if we can’t address it from the position of faithfulness, if we can’t call it what it is, then he wins. So, against his admonition, yet with some fear and a wee bit of trembling, I do so today.

Suicide is a sin. Period. The taking of a human life, outside one’s specific vocational duty in the protection of others, is a sin condemned by God. This is true whether it is the life of someone else or taking one’s own life. Don’t let anyone fool you by such polite-sounding words like “mercy-death” or “euthanasia,” it’s suicide. It comes from the Latin: to kill one’s own self. At the risk of great over-simplification, psychologists and doctors tell us that, usually, people choose suicide because they simply want the pain to stop – whether it is physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual, or a combination of them all. Make no mistake, pain that is caused by shame, guilt, and the words of others can hurt even worse than physical pain. The limerick is wrong: sticks and stones certainly break bones, but words cut even more deeply. Often, suicide victims have tried many things to stop the pain – medication, therapy, prayer, blessing, and other treatments – but the pain remains. With seemingly no other answer, a person chooses to take their life.

A generation or two generation ago, the church treated suicide as the worst of all sins because, the logic said, one could not repent: the last cognizant act was a sin and there was no opportunity to change the mind or heart or to live a life of repentance. Sadly, again this was 50, 60 years ago, the church would even bury a baptized Christian who died by suicide outside of the church cemetery – a final, temporal insult to the child of God and his or her family, branding him or her as unfaithful.

How often have you caught your own self, having done something, that when asked, “Why did you do that?”, your answer, truthfully, is “I don’t know…just because.” You weren’t denying Jesus; you weren’t rejecting His love or mercy. In a terrible moment of weakness, the Old Adam makes a sinful decision that, yes, is contrary to the will and word of God and, yes, in the case of suicide, it cannot yield a life of repentance. But the church has also come to understand that in moments of weakness and despair, the old adam and the old eve does things in the darkness that otherwise he or she would not do.

Thank God - and I use that phrase literally - that the church now understands that suicide is often done in weakness and in desperation, not necessarily an abandonment of God, a denial of His love, compassion, strength and mercy, or a rejection of Christ as Savior. As to it being a last, sinful act from which one cannot repent, remember: this side of heaven, you are always a sinner, but as God’s baptized child, you are always forgiven, not because you repent but because Christ died for you and you trust His death as complete for you. Repentance is part of that life, a result of God’s forgiveness for the sake of Christ. Repentance is not the cause for His forgiveness.

But, just because suicide isn’t necessarily eternally damning – it is still a sin, remember - that doesn’t excuse it as a temporal answer for a Christian, any more than grand theft is an answer for being overdrawn or spreading lies about someone is acceptable because you disagree with their ideology.

I want to draw your attention to a powerful detail in this morning’s reading. The past few weeks, we’ve spoken of how God answers prayer. Notice how He answers Elijah’s prayer here. Elijah prays that the Lord takes his life. God answers by sending an angel. Angel, remember, means “messenger,” and this angel’s simple message was wake up, get up, eat and drink the bread and water the Lord has provided you. This was real food, not some kind of metaphorical “spiritual food.” A real angel provides real food for the real man to continue in his real journey towards Mt. Horeb.

We speak of “daily bread.” In his Small Catechism, Martin Luther says daily bread is everything we need for the support and needs of the body. He goes on to list things like food, clothes, shelter, and family. The full list is a parallel to what he describes as First Article gifts, the material blessings that God gives us out of His love as our Heavenly Father. God provides daily bread to us all – again, not just Mrs. Baird’s finest, but everything we need - and that includes to those struggling with depression, melancholy, and deep sadness. Daily bread, First Article gifts include doctors, mental health professionals, therapists, medication, family and friends, pastors and teachers, all gifts and blessings from God. A very old idea in Christianity was to say that if you have enough faith, you shouldn’t need a therapist or mental health medication. That was wrong thinking then, and it is wrong today. That’s as ridiculous as saying if you have enough faith, you shouldn’t need glasses, hearing aids, Tylenol, high blood pressure medication or chemotherapy.  God’s gift of mental healthcare is just as good and valid as his gift of physical and spiritual care. So, if this is you, getting up from beneath your broom tree, getting up and availing yourself to the daily bread of a psychologist or psychiatrist, a primary care doctor, a pastor, a therapist, or even a friend or family member while saying, “Please – I need help,” that is availing yourself to the daily bread that God provides.

I know those four words are not easy to say – especially to us of German and Czech ancestry. It’s even harder for men who, stereotypically, pretend everything is fine when it’s not. I said them to my wife, to my doctor, to my therapist and my pastor in February of 2016 as tears ran down my cheeks and my heart broke in my chest. Those four people, my wife, my doctor, my therapist, and my pastor were gifts of God that He used to help get me well and pull me from the darkness into the light of Christ. That little pill I take every morning? It’s a daily-bread gift of God. Those phone calls and visits I still make, those are daily-bread gifts of God to help keep me centered. And the words I receive, the blessings, and the absolution, those are daily-bread gifts of God that continue to feed me in my daily journey as a child of God, a husband, father, pastor, and neighbor.

For some, that journey is relatively short and a straight line. For others, it is a long difficult path. Occasionally, it will be a lifelong journey that is filled with potholes and switchbacks and successes and setbacks. Whatever your journey, whatever that path might look like, if you need help, the Lord provides daily bread for you. If you need help, call me – my number is on the front of the bulletin. I don’t care if its just the “blahs” or serious, heavy-duty depression. I count it an honor to sit with you, pray with you, or go with you to get other, professional help. And, to the rest of you, if you get that phone call from a family member or friend, reaching out to you for help, be bold, be prayer-filled, and be an angel, a messenger, with daily bread from God for that person.

As Christians, our journey is grounded in the journey of another One. Elijah’s 40-day journey to Horeb is a foreshadowing of Jesus’ own 40-day journey into the wilderness where He was tempted by the devil[2]. Your Savior knows full-well the difficulty in this world and life. He knows what it is to be hungry, to wonder where the next meal might come from and when it will arrive, “Turn these stones to bread…”. He knows what it is to have His identity as the Son of God challenged, “If you really are…”. He knows what it is to be tempted by physical harm as an answer to stopping the hurt, “Go ahead – jump!” Our Lord answered each temptation perfectly by returning to the Scriptures, to the Word of the Lord as the sure and certain means to end satan’s lies. He was placed onto the Tree of the cross, dying for you, and then rising for you. He did this for you, so that when faced with Satan’s lies, you have a Victor who has already conquered satan for you, who lived the perfect life in your place, who suffered the agony of the cross for you. His suffering sanctifies your suffering. His hunger makes your hunger holy. His identity as the Son of God makes holy your identity in Him. His enduring the pain of the cross sanctifies the pain you feel in your body, mind and soul.

I realize this was heavy stuff, and I also realize that for most of you, you’ll never crawl under a broom tree, or a mesquite tree, or a weesatch bush and pray “It’s enough, Lord, take my life.” You might find yourself there with a bad case of the “blahs.” That’s most of you. But, there may be someone listening, here or on-line, or who will read this later, who is there in the darkness.

If you ever find yourself under the broom tree, whether just with a case of the “blahs” or in the depths of deep, dark depression, remember this: Get up. There is daily bread under the broom tree for you. More than that, there is Bread for you on the Tree. It is Christ, and He is risen. He is risen, indeed. Alleluia.

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[1] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+kings+19%3A+1-8&version=ESV

 

[2] Matthew 4: 1-11

"What is it?" The Bread of Life! - Exodus 16: 2-5 & John 6: 22-35

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

It all came about because the people were grumbling. Two months into the wilderness journey, just sixty or so days since they fled from the Egyptians and the wicked pharaoh, and the people were already lamenting how they left behind pots of meat and baskets of fresh vegetables. If you want to talk about romanticizing a situation, this was it. Back in Egypt, they weren’t shopping at Central Market, they were digging in the scrap bins. It wasn’t “Here Everything’s Better” – it was here, everyone was begging for their lives. It wasn’t “Save Money – Live Better,” it was save our necks and live one more day.[1] But their scrap stew and stale crusts of bread seemed like a 5-star Michelin meal compared to the hot air that they were dining on in the desert. What they had in Egypt wasn’t much, they could honestly say, but it beat starvation. And so they grumbled – they grumbled against God and grumbled against Moses. “It would have been better if we died in Egypt than to die out here in the desert,” they lamented.

No. It would not have been better had they died in Egypt. Nor would it do for God’s people whom He rescued to die in the wilderness. How terrible that would be. Could you imagine the laughter back In Egypt, anywhere where God’s name was spoken? “Oh, yeah…that Israelite God. He was strong enough to perform ten incredible plagues over Egypt and part the Red Sea, but he forgot His logistical supply train out in the desert…” No, that wouldn’t do at all. So the Lord, in His grace and mercy, reaches out His hand and rains down blessings upon His hungry, grumbling people.

Manna. In Hebrew, manach. We know what it is, sort of, because Exodus describes it. We talked about it Wednesday evening, trying to imagine it: fluffy like mixed feed for cattle; flaky like frosted flakes; light enough to be left like the dew, like cotton candy; something, somewhere in between. The ancient Israelites had no clue, so the name of this flaky, semi-sweet, coriander-like, bread-ish substance means exactly that: “What is it?” Vas ist das? It’s not exactly bread, lechem, at least not like the bread they had always known, but that’s what God called it. It came to the ground overnight, a left-over remnant after the dew. The Children of Israel were to harvest it in the morning, enough for each person in the family to have enough for three meals in a day – nothing more. If they tried to store up extras, to squirrel away a little manach for a rainy day, so to speak, they were left with a stinky, bug-infested mess. They were to only collect a day’s ration at a time, enough for each person in the household. It was as if God were saying, “I will provide. Do you trust me? You have My word and my word does not fail. Do you trust me? Every day, go collect the daily ration – with the exception of Friday when you collect a double portion for Sabbath – and you will not hunger.” And the Lord did as He promised. Every night the dew lay on the ground and every morning the manna was ready to be picked up.

Ah, yes. Every morning. Every morning for forty years the Lord provided perfectly for His people so their bellies didn’t growl in emptiness. Every morning, three times a day, seven times a week, 365 days a year, times forty. That’s over 45,000 meals of manna that were eaten over 40 years. Every morning, God’s blessing literally appeared on the ground and every day, mana in the morning, quail at night, and the people were fed.

But it was an every morning ordeal. Every morning they had to go pick it up. Every morning they had to go collect the manna so they would survive. That’s 14,000 mornings of going out and gathering manna, 14,000 nights of gathering quail, with a weekly day off. Every morning, baskets of manna to provide the day’s meals. Israel was experiencing God’s curse to Eve in a very personal way: “By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground…” (Gen. 3:19). God was again using bread to save His people, but it was only a temporal salvation that had to be repeated every day until they entered the Promised Land. 

Daily bread. We know about daily bread, don’t we, and the work it takes to have it. Now, by daily bread, I don’t just mean Mrs. Baird’s finest. That’s part of it, sure, but daily bread encompasses much more. Luther says it’s everything that we need to support this body and life such as food, drink, clothing, shoes, house, home, land, animals, money, goods, family, employment, good weather and more. We know about this bread and we know about getting it. We get up in the morning and go to work. For some, that’s going to the plant; for others, that’s planting in the ground. For some, it’s an office or a classroom; for others, it’s an oilfield or a warehouse. For some, it’s driving a vehicle for sales or delivery; for others, it’s crawling under a car to service it. But every morning, except our Sabbath, it’s up and at ‘em, making hay while the sun shines, turning and burning, trying to gather the daily bread that the Lord provides through our work.

But daily bread is just that – it’s daily. It’s fleeting. It passes. Whether it’s the food in the pantry, the clothes on our backs, the health of our bodies, the money in our IRA and 401Ks, or the stability of our families, they don’t last forever. Do we work to live, or live to work? It’s tempting to become jaded. It happens to me, too. I’ve been there, myself. Some days, I understand the words of the writer of Proverbs 1 a little more clearly than others: “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.”  What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun?” (Prov. 1:1-3)

Jesus picks up on this in today’s Gospel lesson. “Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you.” (Jn. 6:27). He is teaching the crowds that followed to stop following Him because of the miracles and the baskets of bread. Instead, follow Jesus to receive the gift that lasts into eternity.

The gift isn’t earned by going to work each day. This is a food that’s given you free, gratis, from the Son of Man, from Jesus, marked in His Baptism as the Son of God and Source of salvation.  Jesus alone, and there is no other.

Jesus our bread; Jesus our drink.  If you’re thinking Lord’s Supper, you on the right track.  But today it’s about trust in Jesus and His work to save you.  So that you don’t doubt, so that you don’t wonder if this bread is for you, He gives you a sign. It’s not changing a lunch into a massive potluck. It’s something greater: His death and resurrection.  That’s how this Bread of Life is baked - in the fiery furnace of God’s wrath against our sin and in the burning heat of His passion to save His fallen creation.  Like wheat ground up by the mill and put into the fire, Jesus endured the cross bearing our sin in order to be our Food, the Source of life.

“I am the Bread of Life,” Jesus said.  Think about it: bread.  Not croissant, not challa, not fancy, crusty gourmet loaves, not a delicacy to be indulged in once and a while.  Bread.  Daily, ordinary, earthy food.  Jesus is manna for sinners - those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.  You, in all the ways that sin has left you empty and hungry.  There is food that endures forever.  A Bread that gives life forever.  A drink that quenches your thirst and soothes your parched soul.  Not “chicken soup for the soul,” but bread of life for your life.  And it is free.  Not earned but given, received.

When I was a student at the Seminary in St. Louis, there was a cooking show on the local PBS station that I loved to watch. The host was a Dominican monk from the nearby monastery in Illinois and his show was called, simply, BREAKING BREAD WITH FATHER DOMINIQUE. I guess I was a groupie – I got his cookbook for a Christmas gift. And, I have to admit, as I was writing this I googled “Breaking Bread with Father Dominique” and I was pleasantly surprised to find that not only is he still baking, but I also found both his blog and his video channel.

One of his first episodes, he was discussing the basics of how to bake bread. Apparently, a lot of people are intimidated by bread because of the yeast involved, and then the kneading process, and the time it takes to bake bread – about three hours, start to finish – so he was trying to soothe first time bakers. Short of killing the yeast, it takes a lot of work to really mess up a batch of bread.  He said, “Don’t worry about the bread. It is your friend. Bread is very forgiving.” 

That Bread is Jesus Himself - Jesus in the Word, Jesus in your Baptism, Jesus in the Bread and Cup.  Jesus, for the full and free forgiveness of all of your sins. Eat and drink, trust in Him, and you will filled with life forever.

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[1] Slogans for HEB grocery and Wal-Mart, respectively.