Seven Deadly Ones

I guess I’m just not made for Vegas. My favorite thing about it is the food. Every culinary school grad with dreams of being the next celebrity chef I think moves to Vegas. The net result is that even in an outskirts of town “resort” hotel casino the food is fantastic. Nothing comes from a bottle or a premade bag. Everything is hand made from ingredients delivered that day. It’s a Glutton’s paradise.

But our evening off was a Monday which unfortunately was the day that most of the shows took off also. Unless you wanted to indulge Lust at Magic Mike, the Thunder from Down Under, or the generic Cabaret, the pickings were slim. Although it was interesting that libidinous female shows greatly outnumbered those aimed at men. There might be a story about our current moment in that. Female lust is celebrated while male is slightly embarrassing or just tacky. Although nature still has a say as we will all probably find out as what goes on at Cornell doesn’t stay at Cornell.

When the shows didn’t pan out, after I engaged in a bit of Envy over someone who could drop $250 per ticket to get into the Sphere without blinking, Sloth took over. Hotels used to be known for terrible mattresses. Not anymore. It has been a long time since even the cheapest place I stayed in had a mattress that crooked my back. So instead of hunting for the highlife, a two hour nap mid-afternoon indulged my inner slug. And I felt a tinge of Wrath at the conference organizers that the schedule started at 8AM. They could have at least pushed it back to 9 AM. Then I could have indulged both sloth and gluttony in the same morning.

So, I suppose that leaves me two deadly ones. I certainly understand greed, but the flashing lights of the slots and video poker hold little attraction. A few years ago sitting at a blackjack table brought a little frisson, but looking at one this time all I could think was “that’s not going to pay the mortgage.” The Monday Night Football game (GO Bears) might entice both my greed and pride. I could tell myself a story that I have just enough math skills left that I’d be part of the “smart” money. And the payouts at the sports desk are definitely better. As it turns out I should have bet my Bears and their 3^rd string QB. It would have paid for the trip. But alas, I’m a glutton, not a greed head. And writing that I just indulged my pride. Although not as much as if I had the winning ticket to prove it.

I suppose after that tour of the seven deadly sins I should address the subject of the conference. A subject sure to break anyone’s pride. Sitting there amid the temptations of Vegas talking about addiction. And specifically porn addiction. You don’t have to go to Vegas anymore to indulge lust. Maybe that partially explains the lack of male aimed shows. Why see the cabaret when your phone is a portal to a different world? Now the conference was full of medicalizing terms – dopamine cycles – and warnings – three stages of addiction. And without judgement upon the reality of them, that’s the way our culture allows us to talk about it without shame. Because that is the natural outcome of indulging sin, shame. Adam and Eve recognized they were naked, stitched together fig leaves and hid.

And you can’t address the sin, until you get past the shame. God called out “where are you?” and asked “who told you, you were naked?” And eventually he made them clothes. Fig leaves don’t last near long enough. The medicalizing that we do that helps past the shame, though I believe it has a wrong aim. It’s aim is management. The worst of it can be an attempt to normalize it, reference “minor attracted persons.” It’s what I call the problem of the church of acceptance. We admit we are sinners, and we just accept it. The gospel is not about acceptance. It is absolution. Sin and shame take their toll. We die. But Christ has freed us. We can drown that Old Adam and his addictions and the new man can arise to live forever. And yes, it is a daily struggle. And yes we will often fail. But we are not just sinners. We are saints. God not only gave Adam and Eve clothes, He gave them a promise. That snake would die. And in Christ it does.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Acceptance vs. Absolution

I don’t know if any of you are podcasts fans. The Rest is History is an occasional rabbit hole, and it isn’t a nothing as it boasts 20 million downloads a month. It is hosted by two decent British Historians – Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook – who together have an easy repour. Maybe it is because neither has anything left to prove academically, they are both willing to cover “popular” historical eras and they are willing to indulge in what used to be called moralizing. The entire reason history as a subject exists was moralizing. The Greek and the Roman historians wrote so that current and future leaders might emulate the good and avoid the bad. They drew conclusions about their subjects and their times. Something that fell out of favor among modern academic historians. In a recent work of his, Dominion, Tom Hollard put forward a thesis that is both undeniable and yet shocking to actually state. Christ changed the world. Things that Homer or Caesar took for granted as the way of the world were flipped upside down. The Rich Man’s treatment of Lazarus at the time not only would not have been remarkable, it would have been thought appropriate. It is Christ who commanded the care for the poor, the least, the unfortunate. It is Christ who claimed to be the servant of all. It is Christ who redeemed suffering. And as much as someone my age might lament what feels like a complete loss of Christendom, Holland’s book points out just how Christian we all are. The release of the movie The Odyssey this summer had some talk about this. Many Classicists complained that the director Nolan Christianized Odysseus and the story. And Nolan’s reply was rather blunt. You couldn’t tell it any other way and be understood. Straight Homer doesn’t make sense to us anymore. Christ flipped the world upside down.

That’s a long introduction to something I’ve been pondering which I think is woven through our lessons this week and that is the concept of sin itself. I’ll use Freud as the historical marker. The concept of sin prior to the therapeutic concept was both well developed and personal. As we say in the corporate confession “we have sinned in thought, word and deed.” And a mere catechism lad could have expounded and identified his sin in textured ways. And over all of that would be spoken the absolution from the cross and the call to life in the Spirit. “I lay my sins on Jesus” to “How clear is our vocation Lord when once we heed your call.” That’s the progression in our hymns this week.

But the therapeutic concept pronounces all of that morose. The therapeutic tends to remove personal responsibility and cast blame on social faults and systemic injustice. At the extreme, sin itself is just the internalization of some oppressor’s unjust rule over you. They no longer even have to be present because you have internalized their judgements. And the therapist is not present to grant absolution. The therapist is not there is set you free from your sinful condition by the indwelling of God. The therapist is present to free you from your own mental shackles. You are good enough, and you have every right to strive for full self-actualization, however you want to do that. And anything that gets in the way, any institution be that Family or Church or State, anything that demands loyalty at the expense of personal expression must be torn down. The therapist is present to pronounce acceptance.

And I can understand the appeal. Things are not my fault but the fault of impersonal forces beyond me. I am not the bad person and any bad I feel is just my struggle to be authentically me against the oppressor. I can be who I am without any necessary change and that is just ok. But here is my problem. To Hell with acceptance. I know what the authentic me would do. And I don’t like that guy. And I certainly don’t want to live in the world that looks more like straight Homer. What I need is that absolution. What I need to the Word of God that says this suffering is not meaningless. As Joseph says to his brothers, “you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good (Genesis 50:20).” And then brothers can live in harmony and not fear. To the therapist there are no sinners, but the Gospel of Jesus Christ is only for sinners. Jesus sinners doth receive.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Closing the Gap

091425 Sermon Download

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.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Different Audiences (Ash Wednesday)

I didn’t capture the recording, but here is Ash Wednesday’s Sermon with a little reflection about a recent commercial embedded…

Text: 2 Corinthians 5:20-6:10

I’m often stumped on Ash Wednesday or in the season of Lent itself. Here is my general thinking why. Lent is supposed to be this penitential season. And Ash Wednesday has this extremely heavy call to repentance. “Remember that dust you are.” And maybe my history or understanding is off, but in the days of Christendom, the days with a name – like Ash Wednesday – were days of Holy Obligation. Everybody showed up for services. So the Christendom preacher actually got the chance to proclaim to those far off, “Repent, for the Kingdom of God is near.” And the beginning or the renewal of Faith is always repentance. A holding before sinners the cross of Christ. “We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

But today, the preacher rarely gets such a chance. Today, those who show up for Ash Wednesday, or a midweek service, are most like those who already keenly feel their poverty of spirit. The law has already done its work. Proclaiming “repent” again feels like whipping the defeated. It risks turning the deadly serious into play acting.

This is the tragedy of the “He Gets Us” Superbowl add, but reversed. It is not exactly that the ad’s message is wrong, but it misses its audience. I can take that ad and proclaim it here tonight completely. “We appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain.” Today is the favorable time. All those failures that have brought us here with our cry to God. Today He has listened to you. What those later Ashes represent – our death due to our sin, “now is the day of salvation.” Christ has become sin, that we might have his righteousness. He had washed your feet already in those waters of baptism. He washes your feet every time we receive the absolution. Don’t receive the grace in vain – but believe it. God has heard you and has saved you. Let that mighty work of God strengthen your faith. There is nothing that Satan or the World can do that shall take the Grace of God away from you. Not afflictions, or hardships or calamities, beating or imprisonments. Honors or dishonors, slanders or praise. There is nothing in all creation that can separate us from the grace of God – from the absolution of all our sin by that cross. Receive the grace of God for you – today.

But broadcasting that message to those who have not repented is proclaiming acceptance, not absolution. And that also makes vain the grace of God, just as much as not believing it. If God just accepts there is no need for sacrifice, there is no purpose in the cross. God wishes to absolve us, so that in Christ we might become the righteousness of God. God does not say “poor child, I know that you will never be different” and leave us in that sorrowful state. For that is ultimately what acceptance would do, leave us in our sins. It would not really be a listening and certainly not a day of salvation. But the grace of God has come to us and creates a clean heart and renews the Holy Spirit within us. And does this so that we might become righteous. To the extent “He Gets Us” is proclaimed to the unrepentant, it confirms us in self-righteousness. Not the righteousness of Christ. It says don’t worry about repentance or holiness or receiving the Grace of God, because you are just fine. It makes the cross vain.

An old saying from the world of salesmen, “stop selling when you get to yes.” Stop preaching the law when people are desperate enough to show up mid-week. Today, you are reconciled to God. The Father has heard and sent Jesus. The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. The one through whom all things were made, who will gather our ashes and remake us on the day of salvation. Amen.

Reformation Conundrums

Full Sermon Draft Download

Biblical Text: Romans 3:19-28

Reformation Sunday in a Lutheran congregation can have three flavors. Vanilla is a simple celebration. We assume that everyone knows the greatness and key points of the Reformation. We just celebrate it. Chocolate is to complicate that celebration. You do that by asserting that we don’t know it or we’ve lost the Reformation script or something about it is no longer relevant. This sermon has at least a scoop of Chocolate. Strawberry is the last and a little rarer flavor. It is an attempt to make us feel Luther’s anfechtung, his problem with sin and righteousness. If you can do that, you don’t have to worry about he Chocolate, because it is immediately relevant. This sermon is an attempt at a lot of strawberry. It is an attempt to rip away the veils of the age that hide the same problems Luther wrestled with. They are there. Our veils just worked for a while. So do the veils of the Papacy for a while before Luther.

The primary veil that we depend upon can be summarized in the word acceptance. We treat acceptance as the gospel, when it is no gospel at all. Acceptance doesn’t desire or achieve righteousness. It just overlooks sin. The Gospel is absolution. The sin is no more because we have been given the righteousness of Christ. This sermon attempts to take off the veil and encourage the reception of righteousness from outside ourselves.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Office of the Keys

The Symbol to the left is one that you used to find in both Roman Catholic and what were called the Magisterial Protestant churches, which is everybody but the Baptists. But depending upon your Pastor, you might not have been taught this in catechism. It is the symbol of the office of the keys. It is the fifth part of the Small Catechism. Sometimes called confession. And the one most often skipped. Why skipped? It makes an audacious claim. It claims that ministers can forgive sins. But probably even more scandalous is the claim that the office has the authority to withhold forgiveness. Hence the two crossed keys. One of them to loose and one of them to bind.

How are sins forgiven? Why do we believe any of them are? The first biblical story to deal with such forgiveness is the crippled man lowered through the roof by his friends to Jesus (Matthew 9:1ff/Mark 2:1ff). When Jesus first sees the man, he tells him “your sins are forgiven.” Nice, but probably something of a letdown from expectation of the miracle worker. But Jesus has his point. He strikes up the question with the Pharisees watching who were saying he was blaspheming. “Only God can forgive sins.” He tells the man to pick up his mat and walk as proof that the Son of Man also has authority to forgive sins. And this is roughly where the Baptists like to stop the story. Forgiveness is between me and my personal Jesus. And they are not completely wrong. Jesus sinners doth receive. There is nothing that you can’t take to Jesus. But the story doesn’t stop there.

In three places (Matthew 16:19, Matthew 18: 18 and John 20:22) Jesus gives this authority to different groups. If you are Roman Catholic you love our Gospel text for today, the first one, because in that passage the words are said to Peter. Ta-da, the first pope is the owner of the keys. Hence the papal seal to the right. If you are most flavors of protestant you love the Matthew 18 version a couple chapters later in which the same words are given in general to “brothers and sisters”. The Eastern Orthodox and our Catechism like the John passage because the recipients of the saying appear to be the apostles as a group. The interpretive leap in each is the preferred sources of forgiving sins: The pope and those in communion, members of the church, and those called and ordained.

I can’t remember if I’ve referenced it before but this is where I love Luther in a largely forgotten part of the confessions, the Smalcald Articles Part 3, article 4 on The Gospel. “God is superabundant in his grace: first , through the spoken word, by which the forgiveness of sins is preached in the whole world…second through Baptism. Third through the Sacrament of the Altar. Forth through the power of the keys. Also through the mutual consolation of the brethren.” Luther’s answer is “Why not all?”

But that doesn’t address why these keys have a tendency to disappear. Which goes back to the catechism questions. What is confession? Confession has two parts, first that we confess our sins and second that we receive absolution. It is never the use of the loosing key that causes trouble. I’ve never run across a Christian who complains about forgiving a repentant sinner. Yes, I know the parable of the prodigal and the older brother. Yes, I do recognize that people can have trouble with forgiveness. But at least in my experience that eventually thaws. What all kinds of people do have problems with is the necessity of confession for absolution. The binding key is not really a power of the office but a duty – to call sinners to repentance. And sinners who don’t think they have can often respond, “just who do you think you are?”

It is much easier to say your sins are forgiven. But if you are only using one key, you might be like the prophets declaring “peace, peace.” We will see if what they say happens. But the called office has both keys for reason. So that we might be confident in the grace of God through all of his means of grace.

Sedes Doctriae (Seat of Doctrine)

Full Sermon Draft Download

Biblical Text: John 20:19-31

Within the larger Thomas story is one of the the seed beds of Christian Doctrine. There are three places in scripture where Jesus gives to certain people the authority to bind and to loose sins. And it is really all three of them working together that gives us the full picture of God’s “superabundant grace and goodness.” This sermon starts from the seat in this text and preaches the forgiveness of sins specifically understood through the Office of the Keys and the Pastoral Office. With special attention paid to God’s both/and when we often desire an either/or.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

The Keys of Grace

Biblical Text: Matthew 18:1-20
Full Sermon Draft

Jesus’ predictions of His passion each elicit responses by the disciples. Those response are often quite telling. They highlight some false idea which the disciples are clinging to. But there is something else that swirls around the first two – Jesus offering what the church calls the Keys. What you bind is bound and what you loose is loosed. The first offer of the Keys leads to the passion prediction which Peter responds roughly “not going to happen”. In this second passion prediction Peter doesn’t directly confront Jesus, but in this sermon’s conceit starts succession planning. The sermon of Jesus that follows talks about what the Kingdom of Heaven looks like which is nothing to start succession planning over. Instead of leading with the offer, Jesus ends with the offer of the Keys. His followers will be humble or childlike or little enough to not demand the law or their due with each other. The church instead is based on confession and absolution. The church is based on offering and receiving grace.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Walking to Jerusalem/Marching to Zion

Luke 13:22-30
Full Draft of Sermon

I received more comments about this sermon than almost any in 5 years. The pessimist in me is saying “and you are going to pay for each one of those comments.”

In the worship service as a whole there was an interweaving of hymns and songs including one of my favorites, I Walk in Danger all the Way, Some of the VBS kids shared with us a couple of the songs from the week including “Stand Strong” and the one I reference in the Sermon Marching to Zion. But you don’t need that thicker worship setting to get the sermon.

The gospel point, the core of the text, is that it is Jesus alone who is walking to Jerusalem. And that walk ends outside the city walls. At the place of the skull. We can’t march into the city of God. We only enter through the narrow door, at the foot of the cross, through repentance. There is no “we” marching to Zion. The question is are you walking there? Is your walk with Jesus all the way?

The audio will be added later. Our guy who volunteers to convert the files (and has the stuff to actually do it) took a much deserved break. His son did the recording (thank you!), but the digital conversion is coming.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

The Deleted – No Longer

Text: Luke 24:1-12
Full Sermon Draft

He is Risen. Alleluia!

So much in our world we deal with by deleting, or attempting to delete by shoving in some memory hole. We delete everything from pixels to inconvenient people. And we all eventually become inconvenient.

God does not delete. God does not deal with problems by covering them over. God deals with problems (like sin) by absolution…by transfiguration…by resurrection. That is the conflict of Easter and the triumph of our Lord. Sin, the World and Satan want to erase, delete and hide. Christ rolled back the stone and lives.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download