Because Love Matters: Sermon on Luke 10:25-37

This is a homily on the Good Samaritan, preached at Camp Nidaros, a pastoral retreat on Walker Lake started in the 1910's by pastors, whose ancestors still utilize the cabins and camp.

Grace and Peace to you from God our Creator, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ, Amen

Who is your neighbor? The lawyer in today’s Gospel asks Jesus… Who is his neighbor? So, I ask you the very same question - Who is your neighbor? Jesus tells us exactly who our neighbor is. It’s exactly who you don’t expect it to be. Exactly who you don’t want it to be. The Samaritans weren’t well liked in those days, which makes this parable that Jesus tells even more profound. Love your neighbor as yourself. The Golden Rule. The same idea that has passed between peoples of different areas and different religions for ages. The Greatest Commandment. It’s the ability to look at one another as human beings, just as you are a human being… and know that they have blood running through their veins, and air running through their lungs…

Love. It’s a complicated emotion that is talked about many times throughout the entire bible, but especially the Gospels. Love. Such a complicated emotion, and yet, it’s rather quite simple, or at least it should be. Compassion. Knowing that the person sitting next to you, living next you, breathing next to you… is just as valued to God as you are. Is just as worthy of all the life, liberty and freedoms you desire and need. It’s about love folks. It’s always been about love. It will always be about love.
Who is your neighbor? Who is deserving of love when others deny it? Who are the voices crying out for help, lying beaten and defeated on the road of life?

I’m going to be honest with you. This has a terrible week to be a law enforcement officer, a terrible week to be a person of color… and a terrible week to be a human being. I mean it. If we can’t look at the events that happened in Baton Rouge, Falcon Heights and Dallas… and see a total breakdown of human existence…. This isn’t how life should be. If we can’t look at the events of Orlando a month ago… In Baghdad… Istanbul…

It seems like life is devolving into chaos, with people at each other’s throats… And it makes me sad. I think it’s safe to say that it makes God grieve as well.

The Psalmist writes in the thirteenth Psalm…
How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?
    How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I bear pain in my soul,
    and have sorrow in my heart all day long?

The nation seems to be in a perpetual state of mourning. It seems that there’s something new every week. A mass shooting here, another minority attacked there, and terrorist attacks in between. It’s almost enough for me to want to get back to hearing about emails and walls…
But maybe not.

Why is this message of love - so hard for us to hear? Love God, Love your neighbor and be the Good Samaritan to help another stranded on the road. Simple. And yet, we fail all too often.
We are the Levite and priest, passing by the man hurt on the road. We are the ones passing by, letting life go… watching Rome burn as we stand and watch. Sure, we say our prayers and thoughts are with the victims… but how often do we stand up for the one on the road? How often are we standing against indifference, and staring at the face of injustice?

Why am I asking this? Because Love Matters. Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the Holocaust and author said, “The opposite of love is not hate, but indifference”

Because Love Matters. When we are faced with injustice, we can either pass by and let it happen… or be the Good Samaritan and stand up against it.

Because Love Matters, the man who called on us to love one another… to love our neighbor as ourselves… the man who lived among, walked alongside of, and preached for the other… the outcasts… Jesus the Christ… died for them, for us, for me, for you… to save us all from ourselves. Our indifference. Our injustice. Our pain. Our sorrow. Our weariness. Jesus the Christ died to save us all... through the unwinnable, unshakeable grace, love and mercy of God - poured out for us all.
Jesus died, through the ultimate sacrifice and the ultimate act of love… Jesus died for the neighbor.
So, I ask you again - who is your neighbor? Alton Sterling and Philando Castile were your neighbors. The five police officers killed in Dallas were your neighbors. The people who pulled the triggers were your neighbors.

Jesus calls on us to love. Because Love Matters. Amen.

Unity in Community: Sermon on Luke 10:1-11, 16-20

My sermon for Independence Day weekend

Gospel: Luke 10:1-11, 16-20

Grace and Peace to you from God our Creator and from our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ, Amen

Tomorrow, we celebrate 240 years of independence from Great Britain. The United Kingdom, of which Great Britain is a part has, in it’s own right, now declared their own independence from the European Union, a move that disrupted trade and stock exchanges across the globe. The United Kingdom itself, is a uniting of four distinct regions: England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. So, therefore, the Uniting of four distinct regions has declared as a whole that it no longer wants to be part of the larger European Union, which has it’s origins after World War II in the late 1950s. Okay - so that was a short recent history lesson all in the purpose of saying… it’s a complicated world out there folks. Finding clarity in muckery is often difficult - and the politics of a country half a world away may yet have far reaching consequences for us here in these United States…

But I’m not up here to give you a history lesson. I’m up here to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ crucified and risen. Jesus sent out 70 people to go out into the country and spread the good news of God’s presence and peace. Jesus told these people that if they are welcomed with open arms, break bread with the Samaritans and spread the good news of God’s peace. If they aren’t welcomed in, Jesus told them to forget about the encounter, and still proclaim God’s peace for them.
Seventy people were sent out. In pairs. Wherever one of them went, the other followed. Wherever the other 68 went, all 70 were doing the same job. All 70 were proclaiming God’s peace and presence. There’s something powerful in knowing that those 70 people, all sent out to different places, all had the same message. Those 70 people were all different, yet all were sent with the same word of peace. Those 70 were united under one cause, and that unity kept them together.

That group of 70 was united in community. A community of believers, much like this church. Much like Zion. While there are more than 70 of us here, and we are all different from different backgrounds and different understandings of the same world… We are united when we bring God’s peace to one another. We start every worship service with a sharing of the peace. We greet one another in a show of our welcome, in the smile or the hug or the handshake. We greet one another in this place, for we are all here for the same purpose - to worship the One who called us here to begin with. We are called to be with one another together in worship and song. We are a community. A unifying presence for a common purpose. We are gathered here today as a community of believers.
Community can be powerful. Even with different opinions and outlooks on the world, we can be united in our calling to live out the Gospel. Even though we are different, in many ways,  we are the same.

Take our country for example. These United States of America are a united community of fifty unique and beautiful states. The Great Seal of these United States has on there a phrase in Latin - E Pluribus Unum - or, out of many, one. Even though we are many, we are one. This uniting didn’t happen overnight. Sure, 240 years ago, 13 colonies declared themselves independent from the rule of a foreign crown… but the Revolutionary War was fought for years after that. After declaring independence, writing our own constitution… Britain came back in 1812 to try to take it back… again… we still have a country. Then a bunch of states were acquired in the Louisiana Purchase, including most of this one… then further land was bought and paid for, then the Civil War happened and broke up the Union that we had and a few more years of war, the country was a little more whole… Then the Transcontinental Railroad happened… and Manifest Destiny, and more states were bought and fought over and paid for and slowly but surely, the fiftieth state was acquired in 1959. We have been a country of 50 states for more than 50 years.

Who knows about Puerto Rico or Washington DC or Guam or American Samoa or all the other regions we kind of call American soil… but aren’t states. Even this country is only mostly united.
We have different places we call home. Yet, we are all American. Last Friday was Canada Day. They celebrated their identity as Canadian on Friday. They were once part of the British Empire too. The British Empire once spanned the globe, and it could be said that the sun never set on the British Empire. Because of their previous foreign dealings, they have an even more complicated system to be united under.

Systems of unity were complicated even long before Jesus was walking around. The tribes of Israel didn’t really get along with each other. Kingdoms were united then divided and warred against each other. Even into Jesus’ day, the Jewish leaders were united by their Jewish identity, but divided on how they interpreted the law. The Roman Empire was united by the Emperor, but even emperors were divided and so on and so forth.

Jesus lived in a world that was constantly changing as well. The Paul and the authors of the other books of the New Testament lived in a changing time… The author of Ephesians wanted to unite the Jews and Gentiles together. The tension between unity and division has been a constant thing.
The disciples were divided as to how they saw their ministry. What united them is the same thing that unites us. Their friend, our Messiah - walked this earth with a diverse group of people, both Jew and Gentile, women and men. Jesus of Nazareth lived in an ever-changing world with an ever-changing group of people, and taught them. Healed them. Loved them. Died for them, for us. Jesus the Christ died on a cross and rose again to save us all from ourselves. Our divisiveness. Our anger. Our hatred. Our blindness to realities out there… Our sin. Jesus’ death and resurrection saves us through God’s grace, God’s mercy, and God’s love. For this God, that unites all under God’s unwinnable, unshakable grace, love and mercy… For we are united in Jesus’ death, and can celebrate together the hope and promise his resurrection means for us all. In a few minutes, we will be united at the table, just as we are united in the waters of baptism.

We have different words that separate us by who we are as human beings, but we are united by our broken humanity. We may have words that describe us as Christians, but we are all united through Christ.

On this Independence Day weekend, remember the sacrifices of all those who made this country what it is. Remember what makes us independent, but yet always strive to remember our  dependence on each other… and our dependence on the One who unites us all.
Happy fourth everybody.
Amen.