Luke 18:9-14

Humility is a word that has gone out of style in our 21st-century vocabulary. Our world teaches us to look down on those who are humble, to step on them to get to where we think we need to be. We are taught that our self-worth is tied to our status in life, and thus we are called to propel ourselves ahead of others not only with our talents but with our cunning ways and our political savvy. It has become acceptable to not only disagree with someone but to make fun of them and destroy them on a personal level for no other purpose than it makes us feel better, and we get a good laugh. We have become so numb to all that is going on around us that we believe that if something does not directly affect us, then we do not have to worry about it. That, by the way, is the very definition of privilege.

But we read in Micah, what has been called the Micah Mandate, “And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God” (6:8). And we heard at the end of the Gospel passage this morning, “For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted” (18:14b). Being humble is one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and, in my mind, anyway, one of the things that is most lacking in the Church today.

Jesus paints us a picture. Two men are in the Temple, praying. One is exalted by the Church and is the proper and perfect parishioner if you will.  He attends church every Sunday. He serves on several committees and volunteers for everything happening around the Church. He places his envelope in the tray each week and is the first one to return next year’s stewardship pledge form, increasing his previous years’ pledge just a little…. (a short subliminal commercial there). But he comes to the Church, stands in the center wearing his most elegant garments, raises his arms over his head and thanks to God that he is not like others especially this poor wretch over here, and he points to the small man, rolled up in a ball in the corner.

And there he is, the other man in the story whom the grandiose one labels as a Tax Collector. If there is anything more despised in the 1st century Palestine it’s the Tax Collector. I would venture to say that the Tax Collector is more despised than the Samaritans that we always hear about. But here he is in the church standing, as we read, afar off. He is beating on his chest and saying over and over again, “God be  merciful to me a sinner.” So burdened is he with his sin that he cannot even list his eyes to God. These two are quite the contrast between confidence and humility.

The great thing about parables is that those who hear it can place themselves inside the parable. There have been times when we have been the proud one, and there have been times when we have been the poor wretch in the corner. Perhaps we twinge a little when we think of ourselves as the self-righteous one, and maybe we get a little inspiration from the humility of the Tax Collector, either way, we are both people in this story.

But this parable also tells us of the God of mercy and the God who redeems through self-sacrifice. It is also a reminder that our justification comes not through our doing things, even good things. In fact, it is not achieved at all, at least by us. Justification comes through God’s reaching out in mercy to helpless sinners. There is a saying in recovery that “the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.” Recovery does not work if one is forced to go, recovery has to come from within, and the same is true in our spiritual life. Acknowledgment that we are sinners is critical. Now, we do not have to be like the Tax Collector in the story but, a recognition that we have fallen short and we need the help of God in our lives is what we are being asked to do.

1st century Jews believed that strict adherence to the Law was what was needed for their salvation. If they obeyed the Law and followed the Law correctly, they would be justified before God. Of course, that was impossible to do, no one could follow the law accurately, and this caused a great deal of pain. We have seen a similar thing play out in the modern Church with all of the rules and regulations. All of these rules led to corruption in the Church, which, some would say inevitably, led to a reform in the Church. Guilt is a powerful tool that can be used to good and evil, but guilt is never a way to help someone in their spiritual life.

So Jesus came to show us another way. Jesus told us that he was the fulfillment of all of the law and all of the prophets and summarized it all with “love God and love neighbor.” We no longer have to make a sacrifice on some altar in atonement for what we have or have not done for God made that ultimate sacrifice for us by sending Jesus to show us the way and to chart the course for us. We no longer have to wander in the darkness, for God has shown forth his light to lighten the path before us. And yes, we will stray from that path, and we will fall in a ditch or two along the way, but thankfully, that light never goes out, and we can find our way back perhaps with a little more humility.

The humility of the Tax Collector does not require us to wallow in self-pity and regret. The liberation of knowing that God is a God of mercy, and a God of love means we can leave behind our reliance on our achievements in our work or our faith community, These things have their place but not at the center of our spiritual life and our relationship with the God of the cross and the Friend of the poor.

Balance is key. We cannot trust in our ability to fulfill the Law, even the simple law of love God and love neighbor, but we also cannot abandon the Law. We humble ourselves before a merciful God yet are confident in the Lord’s promises. Whether Pharisee or Tax Collector, we all find welcome in God’s Temple, and for that, we can truly be thankful.

2 Timothy 3:14-4:5

Recently I was asked if I thought the bible was the inerrant word of God. What they were asking is whether or not I believed that the bible could be wrong. I usually approach such discussions with much caution as I have learned over the years that when asked such a question, it is typically a trap. I responded by saying that the Word of God is not wrong, but how we interpret that word sometimes is. Then I went on to clarify my position. First off, the Word of God is Jesus Christ, and I get that from the Gospel of John right at the start. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God….” “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” Second, the bible, as we know, it was assembled by a group of men trying to make a point. Let’s fact check that last statement.

The bible as we know it today was compiled round about the 5th century but a group of people representing all of the Christian churches known at that time. The Hebrew Scriptures, or what we would call the Old Testament, began to be written around the 8th century B.C. The Books of the New Testament began to be written around 50 A.D. with the Letters of St. Paul, who was not, by the way, and eye witness to the events that took place and never encountered Jesus. The first Gospel, that St. Mark, is believed to have been written in 70 A.D. or roughly 40 years after the death of Jesus.

Before the Letters of Paul and Gospels being written, what was passed along was oral tradition. This was not an uncommon practice in the first century. The early Church would gather together, coming from the Synagogue to someone’s home, where they would share a meal, and someone would tell a story about Jesus and what he had done. As I have already mentioned, these stories began to be written down round about 70 A.D.

Now, I want you to think about something. If I was to come down and whisper something in the ear of the first person here and tell them to pass it along, by the time it got back to me, what I said would be much different than when I first said it. We all put our spin on things, and that is not a bad thing, and the story gets adjusted and adapted over time by the influence we bring to the story.

The other thing to keep in mind is those who assembled the bible had hundreds if not thousands of writings to choose from, and they limited their selections to the 27 books we have today. We know, for example, there were hundreds of books and letters written by women but, none of those made it into the bible. As far as we know, the Gospel of John is the only one written by someone that witnessed the events that took place, and that Gospel is very different from the other three.

Now, as we know, the bible, as much as we would like to think it was, was not written in English. Greek and Hebrew are the original languages with a smattering of Aramaic and other languages in there. So what we read today is someone’s interpretation of what was written in an ancient language someone 2,000 years plus ago — starting to see my point?

So, let’s take this little history lesson a little further. The first English bible was written in 1604 and was translated from a copy of the bible. Keep in mind that the first printing press was not used until the 16th century, so the bible was copied by hand. Some minor changes might have happened along the way. But the interesting thing is, the 1604 bible is called the King James Bible and was commissioned by King James at the behest of the Puritan and Calvinist reformers. There might have been a little influence placed on the translators to make sure that the English version of the bible matched their theological position and went against others. The King James Version is a literary masterpiece and ranks up there with Shakespeare for its literary beauty and influence on the English Language.

All of this is to say that I do not believe that this book that we call the bible is in any way shape or form inerrant I do think that the folks who wrote all that stuff way back when had the right idea, but even John was writing 70 years after Jesus died, so I am sure some of the things he remembered were a bit fuzzy.

So, where does that leave us? I have said before, the bible is not a history book, nor is it a science book. The bible is a book that speaks of tradition and a way of life that can and should be a guiding principle in our lives.  It’s a book written to a specific group of people at a particular time in history but can of application for today. We heard from St. Paul today, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness.” Keep in mind the “Scriptures” he was referring to were the five books of the law and the prophets and not what we would call the New Testament.  When Paul was writing, the first Gospel had not even been written yet!

As I mentioned, the bible is a guidebook that needs to be interpreted and reinterpreted in the light of present-day circumstances.  I believe that God is still speaking and reveals himself to each generation in a new way, and it is up to us to figure out what that way is. As a Christian, I believe that the “Word of God” is Jesus Christ, the man of Nazareth that left us with a way to follow and that all theological and moral belief needs to be reconciled with the words and deeds he left us with. When I or any other preacher and teacher interpret these words, I do so not only in the present time, but I also want to know what the Church has thought about this passage for the generations that came before me. The challenge is taking a 2,000-year-old document and making it relevant for today.

Last week I mentioned Thomas Jefferson removing the supernatural stuff from the bible as he thought it was a distraction from the moral message of Jesus Christ. These days, biblical scholarship has been reduced to cherry-picking verses that prove me right and you wrong rather than looking at the entirety of what has been written and making an application to life today. Rather than use God’s words to soothe and bring comfort amid the storm, we use God’s words as a weapon to divide and cause much harm to people.

St. Paul says this, “I give you this charge: Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.”

So how do we know what is sound doctrine?  Does it match up with the words of Jesus Christ, that is my first and last arbiter of what is and is not sound doctrine. Even though I stated before that God is still speaking, God speaks with the same voice, and if it does not match up, it’s not God.

Our job is to be able to figure it all out. And with God’s help and the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we can do just that.

Luke 17:11-19

Have you ever been excluded from anything?  Have you ever excluded someone from something?

A few years back, I was invited to pray in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, during the Annual Remembrance Day Weekend.  These events take place in November of each year and draw a rather large crowd of living historians and others interested in the Civil War. Remembrance is focused on the dedication of the National Cemetery in Gettysburg and the address by President Lincoln on November 19, 1863. I was invited to participate by the National Chaplain of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War and asked to pray at a couple of events and to preach and lead the Sunday service.

As you can imagine, this was quite an honor. I have been asked to preach at significant events in the past, but this one would bring all of my passions together, history, history of religion and religious practices, and of course, preaching. I began to work on the sermon and the prayers a few weeks in advance of the event wanting to leave nothing to chance.  One evening, about a week or so before the event was to take place; the Chaplain contacted me to disinvite me from participating in the event. Apparently, and I know some of you will find this hard to believe, he thought I was too liberal.

As one can imagine, I was disappointed and a little upset. I will not go into all of the details of what happened next just to say I am now the National Chaplain of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, and I am grateful to have that position.

In today’s Gospel from Luke, we see Jesus coming face to face with ten lepers. Leprosy was and is a horrible disease that was highly contagious, and so those unfortunates with this affliction were relegated to cave and catacombs outside of the city. They were forced to beg for their bread and only allowed to roam about at night and were often seen in the shadows. They were also cut off from the worshipping community, which meant they could not participate in the liturgical life of that community. That community excluded them because the community was afraid of what would happen. Those appointed to minister to the community did not even minister to them; they were shunned out of existence.

But here they are, standing face to face with Jesus. They have heard of his power to heal, and they have come to ask for help. He tells them to “go and show yourselves to the priest,” and as they make their way, they are healed. Notice, Jesus does not heal them straight away as he does with others; he tells them to go and show themselves. Some would say it was their act of obedience that did the healing but the interesting thing is, the healing of these lepers is not the point of the story.

Sure, the healing is great but, and I often say this, the miracle of Jesus is often just the match that lights the fuse, we have to push past the magic to get to the root of the story and the message that it holds and this is one of those times.

I am not sure if any of you are familiar with it, but in 1820 Thomas Jefferson complied with what is now called the Jefferson Bible. The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, its actual title, is a compilation of the teaching of Jesus that Jefferson complied but taking a razor blade to Scripture to remove all of the bits that he considered the supernatural. Jefferson believed that magic stories just got in the way of moral teaching behind the event, and he wanted to strip it all away. There is some sanity behind doing what Jefferson did by trying to get people to focus on the moral of the story rather than the magic of it all.

Back to the story.

We do not know how far they had gone before the healing took place or if they went to “show themselves to the priest” or not, but, along the way, one of them notices that he has been healed and so he turns and goes back to see Jesus.  He was praising God, and when he came before Jesus, the man fell to his knees and thanked him for what he had done. Remember, there were ten, and only one has returned to give thanks.  But, if that was not astonishingly enough, the man, Scripture tells us is a Samaritan. If this was a movie, this is where the dun, dun, dun music would play.

We all know how the Jews of Jesus day felt about the Samaritans, so I won’t go into that here except to say, this is a big deal. The one, the only one that came back to thank Jesus, was a foreigner, the despised one, the least likely of all of them to return. But here he is, kneeling before Jesus, giving thanks to God for what has just happened to him. He asks the man about the other nine, but we do not know what tone of voice he used in asking his question. But we do know this, this man, a double outcast the most unlikely of all of them, is embraced by God and told that his faith has made him well.

This is not a story of healing; this is a story about faith and a story about gratitude, and this is a story of acceptance. Jesus is teaching about the nature of faith. To have faith is to live that faith and to live that faith is to give thanks. It is living a life of gratitude that constitutes living a life of faith; this grateful faith is what has made this leper, this man from Samaria, well not just physically but spiritually.

It was the man’s thanksgiving that made him well, not magic words from Jesus, and this thankfulness is available to all of us. Notice also that the thanksgiving is directed toward God and not toward Jesus as everything is done from God through others.

The practice of intentional gratitude changes lives, and as we have seen in this story today, but gratitude can transform all of us, this congregation, and through us to our community. It starts here and spreads out from this place to places we may never even know about.

When Christians practice gratitude, we come to worship to give praise and thanksgiving and not just looking for what we “can get out of it.” The mission of the church changes from an ethical duty to the work of grateful hands and hearts. Prayer includes not only our intentions and supplications but also our thanksgiving for all of the blessings God has given to us.

Mark 14:22-25; 1 Corinthians 11:23-25

There they were, all gathered together for one last time. Jesus had called them together from all walks of life. They were fishermen, tax collectors, beggars, young, old, short, fat; you name it they were there. They had been together for three years. They had walked thousands of miles, healed the sick, fed the hungry, clothed the naked, made the blind see, the lame walk, and even raised a man from the dead. No one was ever excluded from what they were doing. They showed love and compassion to all, equally, and without condition.

But here they are those closest to him, gathered in a rented room on the second floor of a house having one last meal together. From Luke’s Gospel, we learn that it was Passover, and so they had just finished a wonderful meal, perhaps others were with them for that meal, but now, as we are led to understand, it is only Jesus and his closest friends. Seated with Jesus at this table is the one who would deny him three times. Also, sitting at this table with him is the one that will betray him and turn Jesus over the authorities that will eventually kill him. Jesus knows all of this yet, there they are, all seated together.

He takes ordinary bread in his hands; he holds it up and asks God to bless it. Jesus then brakes this bread into pieces and passes it around so that everyone might have some. As he gives this bread, made from the elements of the earth, around the table, he says to them that this bread is his body that will be broken and shared for all.

Then he takes a cup, a simple cup perhaps one that he had been drinking out of during the meal, Jesus fills it with wine and again, he holds it up in the air towards the heavens and asks God to bless it. As Jesus passes this cup around the table, he tells those present that what is in this cup is his blood that will be poured out for all, why, for the forgiveness of sins.

From St. Paul’s Letter to the Corinthians, we understand that Jesus said to “do this in remembrance of me.” But what is this that we are supposed to do?

There are many theories about what takes place during the Lord’s Supper. Hundreds of thousands of hours have been spent is discussing what happens. Does it become the actual body and blood of Christ? Is Jesus really present in these elements? Is this just a memorial of what was done during that Last Supper? I am not sure there is an answer or that there needs to be one. I just know that something special happens during that sacred moment.

So important was this time that the Lord’s Supper was singled out, along with baptism by the Reformers as one of two sacraments. Just as a reminder, a sacrament is defined as “the outward sign of an inward grace and the means by which we receive it.” There is a grace given to us by God when was take this bread and this cup into our bodies. We are literally welcoming Jesus into our very existence. Not to be too crude about it, but the normal body function converts those elements into something different, and in a matter of time, it will be flowing through all parts of our body, providing nourishment, not only in a spiritual sense but in a physical one.

There is a saying in Celtic theology and spirituality that heaven and earth are only three feet apart, but there are, thin places where that distance is even closer. There are those places or times in lives when we close that gap between our existences here on earth, and that is heaven, I believe when we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, we are in one of those thin places. Spiritually it is as if heaven itself comes down and meets us, and we are transported, spiritually, to another plane of existence in our lives for the briefest of moments. This celebration of the Lord’s Supper becomes a sacred space where something spiritually awesome happens.

But we still have not answered the question of what the “this” is in the command to “do this in remembrance of me.” Again, theologians have been trying to answer this question, and there are many theories about the bread and the cup, but I think it transcends a simple meal and again has to do with the thin places.

Let’s go back and look who was at that table; those closest to Jesus, those he had called to “follow him” and work alongside him in his ministry. Those gathered with Jesus were simple people, with little or no education but with a desire to seek and find. Again, sitting around that table was the one who would deny him and the one who would betray him. There were those on both ends of the political spectrum and those in the middle. Young and old represented at this table, I also believe, the Da Vinci painting notwithstanding, that there were some women there as well. Surely his mother would have been there and some of the others that followed him. The bottom line is, no one was excluded from that table. So, perhaps the “do this” is do not exclude anyone.

But what about the action of breaking and sharing of the bread and cup? Jesus says that the bread represents his body and what is in the cup represents his blood, does this mean we are to perform human sacrifice? I do not believe so. Or does it mean that we are to sacrifice everything for others, for those in need, for those on the margins, for those in cages, and those in horrible places? Does it mean that we should share all that we have with everyone, including our very lives? I think we might be getting closer here.

In the early days of the church, the communion elements, the bread, and the wine would be brought forth from a room near the door of the church. The people coming to worship on that day would place their offerings of bread and wine and other things, in that room, and at the offertory, those things would be brought forth and placed on an altar or table at the front of the church. All of those items would be blessed and distributed as part of the worship service. That “sacrificial offering” if you will be a large part of what the early church did together. We read in Acts 4:32, “No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had.” They shared everything.

One of the beautiful moments for me, here in our little corner of the world, is when the Sunday School children bring the bags of donates food items forward and place them here at the table. In a genuine sense, we bless what is brought, and we bring it to those who have less than we do. This action of blessing and sacrifice is at the very heart and is the very essence of what it means to “Do this!”

Today, we commemorate World Communion Sunday. World Communion Sunday began as World-Wide Communion Sunday at Shadyside Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1933. The Rev. Hugh Thompson Kerr and his congregation sought to demonstrate the interconnectedness of Christian churches, regardless of denomination. Rev. Kerr appropriately chose the sacrament of Holy Communion to symbolize this unity. “The term Holy Communion invites us to focus…on the holiness of our communion with God and one another.” (This Holy Mystery, The United Methodist Church’s official statement on the sacrament)

Today we are joining others around the world in commemoration of what this command to do this truly means. People are gathering, or have gathered in churches, cathedrals, back yards, beaches, or any place where two or three come together and share from what they have with each other and, for a moment, they bring heaven a little closer to earth. It is nice to think that there are people all around the world, hearing those words of Jesus to “Do this” Maybe, just maybe, the actions we take this day will make the world a better place for all. In a few moments, you will be invited to gather around this table spiritually. The elements will be blessed, broken, and distributed to all regardless of your relationship with God. Our table is open to all who have the desire to become a little closer with God and to create a “thin place” within themselves and allow God to work in and through you. I hope you will accept the invitation.

Luke 16:19-31

I am not a fan of the horror movie genre for many reasons, but the main reason is, why would you go into the haunted house in the first place?  A few years ago there was a commercial for a car company; I cannot remember which one, where the actors were in a scene from a horror movie.  They were running from something, and they have two choices, a barn with all sorts of cutting implements and the safety of an automobile. As they start to move towards the barn one of their number says, “Hey, why not get in the car and drive away,” and the others are like, “no that barn over there will be safer.” The commercial ends but your imagination takes over, and we know what is going to happen next. If they had just listened to that lone voice, crying in the wilderness, their lives might have turned out different.

For this sermon, I am going to leave out the references to lakes of fire and whatnot as I do not find those descriptions of things helpful. Sure, they are there to illustrate and confirm what the parable is saying but, for me anyway, fear has never been a good motivator, but that has not stopped the church from, over the centuries, using fear to attempt to control people and their behavior. So rather than focus on the scare tactic lets focus on the role reversal in the story.

At the outset, we see Jesus using, once again, a rich man as the foil in his story. The use of rich people is not used to condemn rich people but to show that, no matter how much you have or how together your life is, things can still go wrong. I know the temptation, if I get that better job, if I get that better car, if I make just a little more money I will finally be happy. But as we have seen, happiness does not come from external things; happiness comes from internal places.

The rich man in the story ignores Lazarus, admit it, we have all ignored a Lazarus a time or two in our lives, and this is why Jesus uses this illustration because we can relate to it. Sometimes we ignore the suffering of another right in front of us by stepping over the beggar in the street or crossing to the other side. How many times have we been stopped at a traffic light, and someone is walking down the row of cars carrying a sign, and we stare straight ahead, that is Lazarus.

But we also ignore Lazarus when we hear about injustice and we do nothing. We hear about people needing help and we fluff it off by saying things like, “they need to just pull themselves up by their bootstraps,” or, “if they had not made that choice they would not be in that situation.” Or we see or hear a teenager speaking about an issue that she feels passionate about and rather than speak to the issue she is raising we attack her for her looks and her disability. Or we see the way some treat others, but we are willing to look the other way, and even call those standing up against them evil, but because they are doing what we want them to do we are willing to lower our moral standards and look the other way. That teenaged activist, that mother and child at the border, that person being made fun of in an early morning Tweet, that single mother in the grocery store at the check-out in front of you fumbling with her keys, her children, and her welfare card is Lazarus.

As a nation, we are entering a challenging period in our history. Some historians say that the country has not been this divided since before the Civil War. We have come to a point where civility has been tossed aside for partisan rhetoric and morality has all but been thrown out the window. We have come to a point where personal attacks have taken places of reasoned, well researched, and thought out debate. We have come to the point where we do not know who to believe, but if they are on the opposite side then us, they are liars and cheats, and we attack them personally rather than with facts and reasons.

But back to the story of the rich man Lazarus.

The Lazarus and the rich man die, and they go off to their final reward, again let’s leave all the fire and whatnot to the TV preachers, but the rich man is in despair. You see, the tables have been turned, the afflicted, Lazarus has been comforted and the comfortable, the rich man has been afflicted. He cannot figure out what he has done to deserve this; after all, he is rich; he has everything. He tries to strike a deal, after all this is what he has done his entire life, make deals. He tries to strike a deal; he asks Abraham to allow Lazarus, the man he stepped over, to come and cool his tongue from the raging fire. Just so we are clear, he is asking in death for something he was unwilling to do for another in life!

As the story goes, Abraham refuses the request. So, the rich man tries to make another deal; he asks that someone is sent to those who are still alive and warn them to change their behavior. Abraham replies, they have Moses and the prophets, in other words, they have the Scriptures and the Word of God to teach them how to act in their lives, and they are choosing to ignore what Scripture says, or maybe twisting it to suit their needs by saying “if we just look the other way of this and that we can justify it because we will get what we want.”

This is an extreme illustration that points to two things, our religious belief and practice should be to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable, not with lakes of fire but with the word of God. So strong has to be our defense of those on the margins that we have to point out when they are being mistreated. Our love of neighbor needs to be so strong that we come to their defense whether they are next door or in another country. Our religious beliefs and practice should not be to bring ourselves comfort at the expense of others nor bending and twisting God’s word so that it becomes okay for us to afflict others. God demands that if we are going to claim that we follow him, we have to follow what his teachings are without compromise and without putting conditions on that love. God loves us without condition, and because of that; we are commanded to love without condition.

As I bring this to a close I want to draw your attention to the last verse of what we heard this morning; “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.'”

Lazarus was raised from the dead, and Scripture tells us that those in authority tried to kill him to keep him silent. They did not believe…. I will leave the rest to you…