Closing the Gap

Biblical Text: Luke 15:1-10

Again, I am always amazed at how the lectionary serves up a perfect basis to preach to the day. The text really is based in Jesus’ regular habit. He ate with tax collectors and sinners. And the Pharisees hated him for it. Jesus would talk with anybody. He wouldn’t do it from a place of weakness. His proclamation was “repent, for the Kingdom is near.” He was serious about holiness. But the gap between the holy and the profane is not one we can close. That is why he came. To find the lost. To close the gap. And he did this by talking. He does this through the foolishness of preaching. He did this by a table. He does this by the table where his still gives us his body and blood. He does this by making us the body of Christ. And the parables relay to us that this is who God is. He does not give up. He keeps talking. Until every last one is found.

Of course doing this enrages the Pharisees who find their power and conception of self attacked. And while some sinners repent, others certainly feel attacked. Giving up our pet sins can feel like giving up ourselves. Even though the chasm the grows within us gets deeper and wider. Of course those who won’t stop talking are eventually killed. This is a reflection on Charlie Kirk, a man who would not stop talking. But Christ has the last word. And that last word is when we are called from our graves in the resurrection. When Christ closes the gap for all time.

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Law Used Correctly

We know that the law is good when used correctly. ⁹ For the law was not intended for people who do what is right. It is for people who are lawless and rebellious, who are ungodly and sinful, who consider nothing sacred and defile what is holy, who kill their father or mother or commit other murders. ¹⁰ The law is for people who are sexually immoral, or who practice homosexuality, or are slave traders, liars, promise breakers, or who do anything else that contradicts the wholesome teaching ¹¹ that comes from the glorious Good News entrusted to me by our blessed God. (1 Tim. 1:8-11 NLT)

The biblical books of 1&2 Timothy and Titus are called the pastoral epistles. They are called that because they are a basic church order book. What is the purpose of the pastoral office? Who should be placed in it? How does it carry out its purpose? How should the members of the body of Christ understand if the call is being done? (Cross reference God’s complaints in Ezekiel 34, the Old Testament lesson of the day.) The Apostle Paul makes an assertion right up front, “Certain persons, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions, have wondered into vain discussions, by swerving from a pure heart, a good conscience and a sincere faith.” I’ve rearranged the clauses there for a purpose.

There are those who simply want to be known as teachers of law. Jesus points these people out as those who “who like to walk around in long robes, and love greetings in the marketplaces and the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts (Lk. 20:46 ESV).” They like the trapping of the office, the job of the office less so. Liking the trappings of the office but not the job, they never really learn what they are saying. They don’t put in the work. They will say it very confidently, but they don’t understand what they are saying. And the inevitable path when you put such people in leadership positions is “vain discussions.”

What are “vain discussions?” They can come in a variety of shapes. We probably jump immediately to the caricature of “how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?” Of course the answer is as many as God wants. The deeper answers are simply “I don’t know” and “how does this effect how we are live?” But there are other vain discussions. When someone is arguing in bad faith that is a vain discussion. When they refuse to use words as commonly defined that is a vain discussion. You think you agree, but later on find out that yes means no to them. When you don’t care about the person you are talking to as an end, but only as a means to getting something else, maybe the good seats at the table. I’m sure you have had many vain discussions in your days.

How does the called and ordained servant of the word wind up there? By swerving from a pure heart, a good conscience and a sincere faith. The holders of the office can probably often come off overly earnest. But at the root of the entire office is being willing to look personally stupid because you are preaching one thing: Christ crucified and risen. And that is not a vain discussion where resurrection means some metaphor. If it’s a metaphor, to hell with it all. I want to know the power of His resurrection (Phil 3:10).

And what do those things allow one to do? To use the law correctly. The law isn’t for a people who do what is right. If you are doing what is right, you don’t need a law. The law is for us sinners. It is a curb. Those who are in temporal offices need to arrest and punish murderers. Their job is to protect sinners from the worst of each other. The law tells us that we need a savior. It is a mirror we can look in and see our rebellious and ungodly heart. And the law is a lamp to our feet. This is the way our savior trod. This is the glorious Good News. You have a savior, Jesus Christ. And these are the good works he has laid out in advance for us to walk in following his steps.

If the office is justifying jumping the curb or those who might level it. If it is refusing to hold up the mirror. If it puts the lamp under a bushel. You might be in vain discussion. The good shepherd is honest.

The Ask

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Biblical Text: Philemon 1-21, (Luke 14:25-35 as background)

The letter to Philemon is to me almost the proof of the entire bible. There is no way this letter survives without divine shepherding. And it carries the heart of the gospel in it. Faith that there is more than this. Faith that God will provide. The Love of the Saints. The centrality of the cross. How Christianity is not just a philosophy or a religion, but it is a confession that must be lived. How the living of that confession can deepen and is always unique. In the Sermon I use the phrase “The Ask.” If you’ve done sales, or leadership of any types, you know you eventually must get to the ask. Philemon is one story of the Gospel Ask. The promises are given. Are you willing to live them?

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Temporal Blessing of the Land

“The distinction between law and gospel is the highest art in Christendom.” – Martin Luther

When modern Lutherans have thought about Law and Gospel they have tended to do so in two ways. The first is as an individual. The law condemns me; the gospel proclaims my salvation. And that is fine…as far as it goes. The second way is more troubling. We have tended to put law and gospel in contradiction to each other. Because the law condemns me we label it “bad,” while the gospel is “good” because it saves me. And anytime someone brings up the law we dismiss it because we are free in the gospel. Those two ways of pondering the distinction of law and gospel have at least been debated. There are minority reports on the 20^th and 21^st century handling of this highest art which take them to task. There is a third part that just floats under the surface like an iceberg. Everything in law and gospel has been focused upon salvation. And don’t get me wrong, salvation is important. You might even say ultimate. But we are not taken immediately out of this world (John 17:15, 1 Cor 5:10). “How then shall we live” is important. And how we shall live together is also important.

The Old Testament lesson for this week (Deuteronomy 30:15-20) comes from Moses’ final words to Israel after 40 years in the wilderness before they take the promised land. Moses’ worlds are clear law. “If you obey the commandments of the LORD you God that I command you today, by loving the LORD your God, by walking in his ways and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules…”. There are some interesting distinctions made like the gradations in the law – commandments, statutes and rules – which we might think of as the moral law, the civil law and the kosher laws of religious cleanliness. But it is the law which demands that our hearts follow it, but that law has no ability within itself to compel hearts. Israel was always a stubborn and stiff-necked people, like all sinners. But the promise that is attached to this law is neither an individual promise nor a salvation promise. If you keep it…“you shall live and multiply, and the LORD will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it.” The promise, at least this one of the law, is about the here and now, and it is more about the collective.

God in his grace is giving Isreal the land. That is the gospel. God promised that to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and God keeps his promises. Ultimately that gospel promise of the land is fulfilled in the New Jerusalem and the life of the world to come. But the law of God is good and wise. If the society one lives in is one that respects the 10 commandments (commandments), and if that society has civil laws that are both upheld and respected (statutes), and if that society has folk ways that are shared (rules), things will go better. That is not a promise of a rose garden for every individual, but collectively, that is a place where people can live. They are not worried every day about murder and theft and calumny. That is a place where people would desire to have children (multiply). That is a place where “the mandate of heaven” has fallenjoyfully – “the LORD will bless you.” These are not the blessings of the gospel which come to us by grace. No amount of doing these things earns us heaven. But the way the LORD has created this world, these things are part of that natural law.

Sin of course runs in us and we are always looking for ways to take advantage. If everyone else walks in those ways, but I defect from them, I can get all kinds of private benefits. But as everyone defects, it all falls apart. “If your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. You shall not live long in the land.”

The law has no ability to enforce itself. But by grace God has given us the land. God has given us the world to come, and God has also given to us this place. He has both given us salvation and everything we need to support this body and life. And our lot has fallen in a blessed place. As Moses said to Israel, “choose life, that you and your offspring may live.” That you may live in eternity, but also that God might bless our native land and firm may she ever stand.

Will Few Be Saved?

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Biblical Text: : Luke 13:22-30

Questions can come from the variety of places. Especially questions like asking Jesus “will few be saved?” And in Jesus’ answer to the man I hear at least two different assumptions about the purpose of the question. This sermon is structured around a 2×2 box of motivation behind the question. Are you truly asking about others, or are you asking about yourself? And then are you optimistic about your chances or pessimistic? It explores each one of those purposes of asking and how Jesus’ answer addresses it.

Others/Optimistic = In line with many of the promises from Abraham to Revelation

Others/Pessimistic = Redirects away from the fate of others toward yourself. Are you walking the narrow way?

Self/Optimistic = The danger square. Many will say “Lord, Lord”

Self/Pessimistic = You, come up here. The call of the gospel. The last shall be first.

And it is that last one that meshes with its spacial or directional metaphor that meshes with the Old Testament lesson of the day (Isaiah 66:18-23). That last box is also what Lutheranism is really made to address. When you find yourself as Wednesday’s child, you are very near the heart of the gospel.

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Wisdom Lit

One thing Lutheranism has always struggled with is the life of the Christian after their justification. Luther opens this bottle of 100% grace. A proof that strong had not been tasted since Paul wrote to the Galatians. And it was a necessary slug. Christians were wandering around thinking that buying an indulgence would get them into heaven faster. They were praying to relics and saints when prayer is only for God. They were doing what they could and then trusting God for the rest. Never stopping to realize that what we could do without God was nothing. If I have to do it, the work is never done. But justification is God’s works. It is already done. I just need to believe it – faith alone.

The trouble soon manifests itself though. How then do I live? And Lutherans have tended to have two answers to this. The first answer is always a bit like the hippie-commie Acts 4 commune. They all sold everything and held everything in common (Acts 4:32). Live out of the freedom of the Gospel. And like hippies everywhere, they aren’t wrong, if we were living in the fullness of the Kingdom. Unfortunately the story of Ananias and Sapphira comes next which makes plain both our sinful natures and the grace with which we trifle when we give such answers.. Most Lutherans reintroduce the law, something called the third use, as the way that God intends us to live. And this is not wrong. The law is good and wise. The problem tends to be two-fold.

Reintroducing the law after having the 200 proof grace feels like the morning after 200 proof slugs. But the greater danger is that we end up as lawyers back arguing points of the law and looking for ways we contribute. And we lose the grace again. 200 proof watered down to traces.

Our epistle lesson for the day (Hebrews 12:4-24) – focusing on Hebrews 12:12-17 – addresses this problem as Wisdom Literature. Wisdom Literature has always been trouble for the strict Lutheran Law-Gospel thinking. Because wisdom does make demands. Live this way. “Lift up drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees (Hebrews 12:12).” It feels like the law. But unlike the 10 commandments which are equally applicable to everyone, Wisdom Literature is more guideposts. You are living in the freedom of the Gospel, but watch out for this. As this it is less law, but more gospel encouragement.

“Make straight paths for your feet.” That is biblical talk that if you are feeling tired of carrying the cross, if the discipline of the Father feels heavy, walk in clear ways. Simplify. Do that “so that what is lame many not be put out of joint but rather be healed (Hebrews 12:13).” As one who has been limping around for a few weeks because I refused straight paths and things in my feet were put out of joint, I get it. Not every day is spiritual training day. Learn to recognize your pains.

The wisdom from Hebrews 12:14-17 is a bit more complex. The tension in the communal Christian life is established between “strive for peace with everyone” and “and for holiness without which no one will see the Lord.” Striving for peace is easy if you forget about holiness. Just accept everything. But what that ends up doing is denying grace. Because the Christian walk is not about acceptance, but absolution. We all sinned and all have been forgiven. And that grace puts us on the path of holiness. If we are all walking that path together, but there is one who is walking not through grace, but because their sin has just been accepted, that is the “root of bitterness.” And I’ve seen this many times. The one denied grace realizes they are not walking the same path. And often calls attention to it. Those walking under grace will often turn and ask “what about that one?” The examples given are “the sexually immoral” and “Esau who sold his birthright for a single meal”. That root of bitterness in other places might be called a scandal or a stumbling block. There is a great difference between welcoming the repentant sinner, and accepting those who despise and ignore the gathering like Esau or live proud public immoral lives.

200 proof grace is strong enough to absolve any sin. The wisdom is in how to drink it.

The Alien Work

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Biblical Text: Luke 12:49-56

The Gospel lesson for the day often gets put in the “hard saying of Jesus”, but Jesus doesn’t think it belongs there. At least if I’m reading it correctly, he is amazed that we can read the times. And what are those times? They are times of division. The Word of God is proclaimed. That Word does not return empty. It accomplishes what it goes out for. But that purpose ends up being a division. The intention or desire of the Word is the proper work of God. God wishes to “help, save, comfort and defend” his people. But God has not created robots. We have the agency to reject the word. In which care that Word accomplishes the alien work of God. That alien work is the work of the outer darkness.

It is that division of the ages that is taking place today in this world. Christ did not come to bring peace to this world, but division. Because his proper work saves us from the devil’s kingdom. But many will reject that work and demand the alien work be applied to them. The peace comes when the work is completed. It’s a passage for us to understand this existence. To not give up hope. As long as there is breath the Word might accomplish its proper work. But we should not lose heart seeing division. The division is in fact proof of the power of that Word.

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What’s a Prophet?

Prophet has always been this strange class to me. So many people line up to claim the mantel prophet. Cultural prophet, moral prophet, financial prophet, they line up in almost every sphere of human activity. And they line up with a complete misunderstanding of the call. I suppose the biggest thing that gets attached to the idea of a prophet is some kind of future predictor. There is also some romantic ideal of standing athwart some all powerful leviathan long locks blowing in the breeze. But that is a huge misunderstanding of the gig. The definition of the prophet is the one who speaks the Word of the Lord.

Our Old Testament Lesson of the day (Jeremiah 23:16-29) wants to draw some clear lines. And they are lines that resonate down to us. On the one side of the line are the false prophets. And those false prophets have two modes of speech. The first is to substitute their own plans for the Word of God. ‘They speak visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the Lord. (Jeremiah 23:16).” The second is to dull the conscience of those who are listening. “They say continually to those who despise the Word of the Lord, ‘It shall be well with you (Jeremiah 23:17).’”

What is the purpose of each of those modes of speech? The second is that each of us has had the law written on our hearts. Over time we can callous our hearts and make them hard, but we have a natural reaction to sin and evil – to jumping the curb of the law. We know that sin stores up wrath. But because we want to go on sinning, we collect people who will tell us “No disaster shall come upon you (Jeremiah 23:17).” We want to find those voices who will affirm us. The first mode is more complicated. What is the point of listening to someone else’s dream? Yes, we might buy into it. But I think the point God reveals a bit later, “who think to make my people forget my name by their dreams that they tell one another (Jeremiah 23:27).” Mankind lives by every word that comes from the mouth of God. And if you turn away from that meat, you replace it with junk food. Even the absence would remind us of the Word. So to forget it, we find other dreams.

The false prophet’s gig is to run out your clock and make you forget the Word. Contrary to this the prophet speaks the Word. “If they had stood in my council, then they would have proclaimed my words to my people, and they would have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their deeds (Jeremiah 23:22).” The Word of the LORD does not return empty. It carries out what it intends. And the results of the false prophet and the authentic prophet are compared to straw and wheat (probably better translated chaff and grain.) The Word of the prophet is true spiritual food. That of the false prophet only fit for the fire. “And is not my word like fire, declares the LORD (Jeremiah 23:29).” The works of all will be revealed in due time. Don’t get caught on the wrong side of that line.

Jesus the prophet – heard in the Gospel lesson (Luke 12:49-56) – picks up on that. “I came to cast fire on the earth.” The very WORD has come. And that WORD causes the division. Do we yearn for affirmation of our ways? Which will never come. Or do we hear the absolution and turn from our ways toward the ways of the Lord? The prophet is more Firestarter than romantic hero. Be careful if you see a lineup of people wanting the gig.

The Raven

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Biblical Text: Luke 12:22-34

I’ve never really found belief in God to be that big of a problem. A materialist philosophy is so obviously full of holes it requires more faith than any of the world religions. But a base belief is God doesn’t really buy you much. It answers a bunch of questions that ultimately don’t mean much to you personally. It just moves you onto the questions of the character of this god. Is he a Loki trickster? Is he a god that requires child sacrifice? Is he the Calvinist God who would condemn billions on hell without a chance to demonstrate his grace? Or is he the God the prophets proclaimed – slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love?

The Gospel lesson is Jesus in prophet mode. “You are worth much more than birds.” He’s proclaiming the steadfast love of God for his creation. Which still brings on the question, how do we know? We know: 1) because the life of Christ fully reveals the love of the Father. For God so loved the world that he gave his only son. 2) because we have faith and that faith endures and hopes and is not put to shame. If you put that faith in the things of this world, it never returns anything. If you put that faith in god, he gives you the kingdom.

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Interesting Lines

There are some biblical lines that stick out. They seem like throwaway lines. Extra epitaphs added at the end of the story. Like at the end of Moses’ life. “His eye was undimmed, and his vigor unabated. (Deut. 34:7).” Or when Isaac finally finds a place to pitch his tents, “And there Isaac’s servants dug a well (Genesis 26:25).” Or the introduction to Isaiah’s call, “In the year King Uzziah died (Isaiah 6:1).” They seem innocuous enough, until you stop to think about them and realize how deep they can actually be. Moses’ sight might be his physical sight, but it is also what allows him to see the Promised land from afar. He will not enter it, but God allowed him to see it. Moses was always clearsighted in the ways of God. But what exactly did he see up on that mountain? Isaac was a digger of wells. Maybe if as a kid you had been strapped down to an altar, you would find something else with which to praise God. And the water, the living water which bubbles up to eternal life, which is not simple water only, is a deep and eternal well. I’ll leave the puzzling over Uzziah to you.

Our Epistle lesson for the day has a bunch of those phrases, but the one I want to call out is applied to Abraham. “And he went out, not knowing where he was going (Hebrews 11:8).” Normally taking off on a journey not knowing where you are going would be frowned upon. Failure to plan is planning to fail and all that. But then Abraham is the man and model of faith. And a journey is a metaphor for life. When we “go out” do any of us know where we are going? Oh, we might have an idea, a goal, an aim. But knowledge? The younger we are – like elementary kids – we just go out the door each day and whatever we meet that day, there we are. Only a few 8 year olds have plans for the day. Yet most seem to be right where they belong. Trusting that those around them have arranged things just so. Abraham would occasionally try and help God out, but largely he wandered around like an 8 year old. Whatever the day brought, the day brought.

He may have not known where he was going when he set out, but by the end he seemed to have a better idea. “For He was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder was God (Hebrews 11:10).” Abraham’s journey of not knowing took him out of Ur, the original Babylon. It took him all the way down to Egypt. He dealt with Sodom and Gomorrah and the Philistines. In all his journeys in life Abraham had seen every city that man might build. And he knew that none of them were where he was going. He didn’t know where he was going, but he had faith that God would build the city. I imagine Moses’ keen eyes were seeing the same city as Abraham.

At the core of any man of faith is an interesting tension. There is a contentment with where one is for God has blessed us on our way with countless gifts of love and still is ours today. He has provided me everything I need to support this body and life. And yet…and yet there is a longing for a better country. One that we know we cannot see perfectly. One that is not possible in the land we have set out from. And if we want to settle into contentment here in this land, we probably could. But the faith keeps our eyes looking at the horizon, our ears desiring a clear trumpet. For any sign of The City, a heavenly one.