Genesis 12:1-9
Romans 4:13-25
Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
Well, Abram took quite a leap of faith now, didn’t he? I mean, look at his situation. There he is, living in the countryside, maybe looking after some sheep or something, living off the land with his family. Things are pretty comfortable for him - he’s married, his parents are nearby, his aunts and uncles and cousins are all around. It seem like a pretty good life. Than, all of a sudden, this god that maybe he’s heard of before, tells him to up and leave everything and go off to some far away land that he may have heard of but has certainly never visited. And then this god makes some outlandish promises to him, like how this god will bless all the families on earth because of Abram. All the families on earth - all of them? And this god says that all the land in this new place will go to Abram’s children. Abram doesn’t even have children - he’s seventy-five!! And what does Abram do? He does it!
Abram does what this god says - he leaves behind his parents and brothers and sisters and everything he knows - at an age when he should be in retirement, no less - and sets off for this unknown place. It’s crazy! But he does it. For some reason that we don’t really understand, Abram defies all logic and puts aside all reason, leaves everything he has, and follows God without question. Now God fulfills all that has been promised to him - God gives Abram children and grandchildren, the whole land of Canaan, and makes him the father of nations, but that’s not the point for this sermon. The point is that Abram didn’t know that God would do this when he left. Abram really took a leap of faith. If only we had that kind of faith.
I think that’s one of the most common secret fears of Christians - that we don’t have enough faith. Or that our faith isn’t strong enough, or it’s not the right kind of faith, or it’s not public enough. After all, Lutherans are a fairly unobtrusive bunch when it comes to displays of faith. We don’t speak in tongues, heal people with our touch, or fall down in the aisles in the middle of the service. In fact, we rarely even clap along with the hymns. I know that I don’t say grace in restaurants, I don’t sign my emails with “God bless,” and I would be too embarrassed to put a bumper sticker on my car that says, “Jesus loves you.” I’m very private when it comes to my faith. And sometimes that bothers me. Even before I became a pastor, I wished that I could be more public about my faith. That I could just walk up to strangers and tell them about Jesus. That I could argue with the Jehovah’s Witnesses who always seem to come to my door in particular. I sometimes think that my faith isn’t strong enough for God - that sometimes I’m not a very “good” Christian. At these times, I compare myself to Abram. After all, in Romans, Paul writes that “No distrust made Abraham waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what God has promised.” I gotta tell you - there’s no way I have faith like that! And if, as Paul says, our salvation is dependent on faith, then I’m doomed! My faith just isn’t going to stand up to the test! Compared to some believers I know, my faith is nothing.
In the reading from Matthew today, we see Matthew portray the Pharisees as making a similar assessment regarding the faith of the followers of Jesus - that their faith is nothing. According to Matthew, for the Pharisees, material success was connected to spiritual success. Matthew was basically accusing the Pharisees of having a wealth-and-health kind of theology, which, I have to note, was probably based more on Matthew’s hatred of the Pharisees than on what they were actually like at the time. In any case, the Pharisees, as interpreted by Matthew, believed that if somebody was poor, or physically deformed, or suffered from a long-term illness, it was because these people didn’t have enough faith in God. And so Matthew’s “Pharisees” couldn’t understand why Jesus would want to spend time with people like taxpayers, or lepers, or even prostitutes - people who were not only unsuccessful in their earthly lives, but apparently complete failures in their spiritual lives, as well. Why would Jesus, who professed to have such an intimate relationship with God, hang out with people who appeared to have abandoned God?
Well, Jesus tells his opponents very clearly that he is not interested in those who are successful. He has come specifically to be with those people who haven’t got it together. He has come to be not with the so-called righteous and faithful, but with the sinners and doubters. And we see, throughout the gospel of Matthew, that Jesus specifically reaches out to those people who seem less than worthy of his love, who seem to be complete failures when it comes to God - to the lepers, and the sick, and those burdened with demons. We see Jesus’ actions prove that he did not come to call the righteous, but those the world considers unfit - to those who serve money, like the tax-collectors, to the sinners. Jesus did not come to call the faithful, but those who seem to have no faith.
But why? Why would God want such faulty believers? Why would God want followers who are at the bottom of the religious totem pole? Who don’t seem to have any faith? Well, as Paul puts it so nicely in Romans, “If it is adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void… For this reason, salvation depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace.” In other words, how can God save us if we think we already saving ourselves? How can God give us real faith, true faith, if we think we already have it? How would we recognize that grace comes to us as a gift, if we think we already deserve it? We would be relying on what we do, and on what we believe, to get us to God. And that never works, because we can never believe enough. (You know, I think Paul must have been a Lutheran.) In any case, Paul is reminding us that salvation comes from God alone, not from us, not from what we do.
And thank God for that. Because if we had to rely on our own faith, we would be floundering. But, fortunately, God gives us the faith we need. We know, because God gave Abram the same faith. I mean, I really think there’s no way Abram could have responded so quickly and so unquestioningly to God’s call without some doubts or misgivings. Abram was not perfect; he was human like us. And so he must have had a human’s faith, which is never steady, gets distracted by inconsequentials, and tends to falter quite a bit. Abram had our faith. And yet the story tells us that Abram went, as the Lord told him.” And Paul says that Abraham’s faith was counted to him as righteousness. But there is only one faith that is so strong that it can be counted as righteousness, and that is the faith of God. The faith that Abram had was given to him by God. That’s what enabled him to accomplish such an incredible journey, that’s what allowed him to follow God with complete trust and obedience. That’s what made his faith perfect.
And this same faith, the faith of Abram, is the faith that you are given. Now that’s not to say that you won’t have times of doubt, times when struggle with your faith. So did Abraham, on several occasions. When that happens though, it doesn’t mean that God has abandoned you, or that God has taken God’s faith away from you. God’s faith is forever, and so is God’s commitment to you.
The faith that you have is the faith God has given you. If you are quiet in your faith, that’s the gift God gave you. If you’re outgoing in your faith, that’s God’s gift, too. You don’t need to compare yourself to other Christians, to judge your faith by Billy Graham’s or Mother Theresa’s or Abraham’s. Your faith is a gift given to you in baptism, through the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit doesn’t give weak gifts. Martin Luther said it best, in his explanation to the third article of the Creed, when he said, “I believe that by my own faith or understanding I cannot believe in Jesus Christ or come to him, but that the Holy Spirit has called me through the Gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, made me holy and kept me in the true faith.” Your faith is the faith of God, and it is something. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Sunday, June 08, 2008
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Love on God's Arms
Isaiah 49:8-16a; Matthew 6:24-34 - University Lutheran Chapel
So, I have the word “Love” written on my arm this morning, as some of you may have noticed. As far as I know, there are over 250,000, if not more, people running around Canada and the U.S. this week who will have “Love” written on their arms. The people have passed the word around amongst themselves, through online social-networking, and by word-of-mouth, and they’re all taking a big fat pen and writing this tiny little four-letter word on their arms.
The reason is to draw attention to the problem of teen suicide. And so that’s what I’m going to do very briefly this morning. Now, I need to begin by being very clear that I am not a professional when it comes to this issue. I have no professional training, I am only someone who cares deeply for teenagers and what they go through. I house-sat for a woman whose teenage daughter was on anti-depressants and tried to kill herself. I had a co-worker whose step-son killed himself at the age of twenty, and I remember as a young teenager one particular time when I wanted to die (although, you can’t go to heaven if you kill yourself, or so I believed, and so I never did anything), but - again - I have no professional experience with this. I hesitate to even talk about it this morning, because it is probably something that has deeply touched various individuals in this congregation, and I feel a bit as if I’m bumbling around, but I think it’s better to risk saying something than to risk saying nothing at all.
Because the risks of teen suicide are too great. Just to give you some brief fact: It is the third-highest cause of death among young people. Suicides are higher among teenage boys than girls, although girls attempt it three times as often. Native American teenagers have a depressingly high rate of suicide, as do African-Americans and Hispanic teenagers. I’m sure most of you are aware that teens who identify as bi- or homosexual are at a higher risk for suicide than those who identify as hetero. Teens who talk about killing themselves are, contrary to popular understanding, very likely to attempt it, and a significant number of them are the victims of some kind of abuse. They may be popular, smart, athletic, and seem happy-go-lucky, but they may also be the complete opposite.. In 2004, the latest year I could find numbers for, 1,700 American teenagers killed themselves. Factor in to that the fact that one out of five teenagers actually thinks about killing themselves, and we are faced with a heart-wrenching picture of this country’s youth, youth who carry so much despair in their hearts that the only thing they can think about is ending it by ending their life.
So why do I bring up such a depressing topic this morning? I could have chosen to talk about not serving two masters at once, or what happens when you love wealth, or how we shouldn’t worry because God takes cares of birds and flower. But the thing is that, as Christians, we are called to enter into the pain and suffering of those around us. We are called to stand with those who are marginalized in our society, and - don’t let popular culture fool you - teenagers are marginalized today. Teen pregnancies, teen drug use, teen sex parties, teen vandalism and theft - teenagers get blamed for all of society’s moral failings and never receive any praise. They stand to inherit a seriously messed-up world and don’t get any credit for being able to handle that responsibility. They are discriminated against en masse - have you ever noticed those “No more than three students at a time” signs in stores? They are marginalized and powerless and so, as Christians, we are called to side with them. We are called to enter into real conversation with the teenagers we meet, to listen uncritically to their complaints, to listen without judgement (that’s Paul from this morning), without judgement to their stories, and to listen without flinching to their pain. It isn’t always easy, I’ll grant you, because sometimes their complaints are about us, and their stories paint us in a bad light, and their pain, we come to realize, is caused by us, but nevertheless, the Holy Spirit is calling us to be there for this country’s teenagers, and to lighten their loads in whatever way we can, even if it means more pain for us.
We can do it because Christ has done it for us. Christ, in becoming human, came to understand what it means to suffer, doing so voluntarily in order to ease our pain. He entered into this world, and through that move, has entered into our lives, into your lives, taking into himself the pain and suffering that you have experienced throughout your life time. Christ didn’t flinch from doing it, or hold back because things were too intense. He walked alongside of those who were in pain, those who were dying, those who were marginalized. He has walked alongside of you in those moments when you have wondered what there is worth living for. He walked until he reached the cross, and Christ walked all the way to the place of the dead, not so that we would follow him to that ultimate point, but so that we wouldn’t have to.
And he did it, not because he had to, not because it was the “right” thing to do, although it was, but because of this word on my arm - because of love. Christ loves those teenagers. Christ loves you. No matter how unloved you feel, no matter how unloveable, no matter what you have done in life, or what has been done to you, Christ loves you. Even at the very bottom of the bottom, when we think about ending life, Christ’s love is there, too. Your pain doesn’t stop Christ from loving you, your suffering doesn’t stop his love, nothing can.
Even before Jesus, God has loved you. We hear it this morning, in the reading from Isaiah, when God says, “See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands.” Now the writing on my arm will fade, but inscribing in Isaiah’s time was something far more permanent. Inscribing was how you got words into stone, not just writing with ink, but hacking and chiseling away at it. Ink rubs off very quickly from the palms of the hands. Tattoos, even, don’t last very long there at all - usually only a couple of days. But inscribing, that will last a good long time. And so God has marked you permanently on the palms of God’s hands, as a sign of love, to be constantly with God, involved in all the works of God’s hand. So you do not fade from God’s hands. And teenagers, with all of their imperfections and annoyances - yes, teenagers can be annoying, just like two-year-old toddlers and eighty-year-old seniors can all be annoying in their own way - but with all of that, teenagers, especially are written, inscribed, carved into the palms of God’s hands.
Love is written on God’s palms. Love is written on Christ’s arms, those arms stretched out on the cross at Calvary. To tell you that you matter to God, to reassure you that you are loved by God. And maybe, if you should happen to cross paths with some young soul who is immersed in pain and despair, you might pass that message of love on. Thanks be to God. Amen.
So, I have the word “Love” written on my arm this morning, as some of you may have noticed. As far as I know, there are over 250,000, if not more, people running around Canada and the U.S. this week who will have “Love” written on their arms. The people have passed the word around amongst themselves, through online social-networking, and by word-of-mouth, and they’re all taking a big fat pen and writing this tiny little four-letter word on their arms.
The reason is to draw attention to the problem of teen suicide. And so that’s what I’m going to do very briefly this morning. Now, I need to begin by being very clear that I am not a professional when it comes to this issue. I have no professional training, I am only someone who cares deeply for teenagers and what they go through. I house-sat for a woman whose teenage daughter was on anti-depressants and tried to kill herself. I had a co-worker whose step-son killed himself at the age of twenty, and I remember as a young teenager one particular time when I wanted to die (although, you can’t go to heaven if you kill yourself, or so I believed, and so I never did anything), but - again - I have no professional experience with this. I hesitate to even talk about it this morning, because it is probably something that has deeply touched various individuals in this congregation, and I feel a bit as if I’m bumbling around, but I think it’s better to risk saying something than to risk saying nothing at all.
Because the risks of teen suicide are too great. Just to give you some brief fact: It is the third-highest cause of death among young people. Suicides are higher among teenage boys than girls, although girls attempt it three times as often. Native American teenagers have a depressingly high rate of suicide, as do African-Americans and Hispanic teenagers. I’m sure most of you are aware that teens who identify as bi- or homosexual are at a higher risk for suicide than those who identify as hetero. Teens who talk about killing themselves are, contrary to popular understanding, very likely to attempt it, and a significant number of them are the victims of some kind of abuse. They may be popular, smart, athletic, and seem happy-go-lucky, but they may also be the complete opposite.. In 2004, the latest year I could find numbers for, 1,700 American teenagers killed themselves. Factor in to that the fact that one out of five teenagers actually thinks about killing themselves, and we are faced with a heart-wrenching picture of this country’s youth, youth who carry so much despair in their hearts that the only thing they can think about is ending it by ending their life.
So why do I bring up such a depressing topic this morning? I could have chosen to talk about not serving two masters at once, or what happens when you love wealth, or how we shouldn’t worry because God takes cares of birds and flower. But the thing is that, as Christians, we are called to enter into the pain and suffering of those around us. We are called to stand with those who are marginalized in our society, and - don’t let popular culture fool you - teenagers are marginalized today. Teen pregnancies, teen drug use, teen sex parties, teen vandalism and theft - teenagers get blamed for all of society’s moral failings and never receive any praise. They stand to inherit a seriously messed-up world and don’t get any credit for being able to handle that responsibility. They are discriminated against en masse - have you ever noticed those “No more than three students at a time” signs in stores? They are marginalized and powerless and so, as Christians, we are called to side with them. We are called to enter into real conversation with the teenagers we meet, to listen uncritically to their complaints, to listen without judgement (that’s Paul from this morning), without judgement to their stories, and to listen without flinching to their pain. It isn’t always easy, I’ll grant you, because sometimes their complaints are about us, and their stories paint us in a bad light, and their pain, we come to realize, is caused by us, but nevertheless, the Holy Spirit is calling us to be there for this country’s teenagers, and to lighten their loads in whatever way we can, even if it means more pain for us.
We can do it because Christ has done it for us. Christ, in becoming human, came to understand what it means to suffer, doing so voluntarily in order to ease our pain. He entered into this world, and through that move, has entered into our lives, into your lives, taking into himself the pain and suffering that you have experienced throughout your life time. Christ didn’t flinch from doing it, or hold back because things were too intense. He walked alongside of those who were in pain, those who were dying, those who were marginalized. He has walked alongside of you in those moments when you have wondered what there is worth living for. He walked until he reached the cross, and Christ walked all the way to the place of the dead, not so that we would follow him to that ultimate point, but so that we wouldn’t have to.
And he did it, not because he had to, not because it was the “right” thing to do, although it was, but because of this word on my arm - because of love. Christ loves those teenagers. Christ loves you. No matter how unloved you feel, no matter how unloveable, no matter what you have done in life, or what has been done to you, Christ loves you. Even at the very bottom of the bottom, when we think about ending life, Christ’s love is there, too. Your pain doesn’t stop Christ from loving you, your suffering doesn’t stop his love, nothing can.
Even before Jesus, God has loved you. We hear it this morning, in the reading from Isaiah, when God says, “See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands.” Now the writing on my arm will fade, but inscribing in Isaiah’s time was something far more permanent. Inscribing was how you got words into stone, not just writing with ink, but hacking and chiseling away at it. Ink rubs off very quickly from the palms of the hands. Tattoos, even, don’t last very long there at all - usually only a couple of days. But inscribing, that will last a good long time. And so God has marked you permanently on the palms of God’s hands, as a sign of love, to be constantly with God, involved in all the works of God’s hand. So you do not fade from God’s hands. And teenagers, with all of their imperfections and annoyances - yes, teenagers can be annoying, just like two-year-old toddlers and eighty-year-old seniors can all be annoying in their own way - but with all of that, teenagers, especially are written, inscribed, carved into the palms of God’s hands.
Love is written on God’s palms. Love is written on Christ’s arms, those arms stretched out on the cross at Calvary. To tell you that you matter to God, to reassure you that you are loved by God. And maybe, if you should happen to cross paths with some young soul who is immersed in pain and despair, you might pass that message of love on. Thanks be to God. Amen.
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