The Word Became Flesh And Lived Among Us

CHRISTMAS EVE SERMON
I want to open by reading to you the opening passages from the Gospel of John:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.  He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.  He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him.  He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth.

Now unless you have a theology degree, that all may seem a bit confusing and like a lot of redundant talk.

But these first fourteen verses of the Gospel of John embody the essence of Christmas – of the light of the world breaking through the darkness of human despair and suffering and evil in the world. Of God becoming flesh and coming down into the world.

What Did You Expect?

Scripture: Luke 11:2-11

When I was about three years old… we had a mouse in our kitchen. My mom hated mice. She screamed, jumped up on the counter – terrified me. I was absolutely terrified of whatever this “mouse” beast was that had invaded our kitchen. So I jumped up on the counter with my mom and screamed as well. I refused to walk into the kitchen after that. To get to the dining room – I walked the long way around. During dinner that evening, we heard the trap go off.

My grandfather gets up from the table, and goes and takes care of the mouse. Now, having never seen a mouse, I was most intrigued… now that it was dead, I was ready to face this fearsome creature. My heart was beating – my palms were sweating… here it comes…

The Unexpected Guest

Scripture: Matthew 24:36-44

I’m curious – how many of you here like it when someone just drops by your house unannounced?

OK – there are a few. But most - maybe not so much? Why don’t we like guests stopping by announced? We find it rude… house isn’t clean – that’s my big one. I confess, I don’t always keep the best house when I’m not expecting company.

They catch me unaware and unprepared. I feel this need to suddenly rush and pick up the clothes off the bathroom floor – toss those dishes that have been soaking in the sink into the dishwasher... things like that.

It’s uncomfortable when we have unexpected guests – so we try to make sure to let all our friends and acquaintances know – if you’re going to stop by – please call first. Let us know you’re on your way.

The Dangers of Comparison

Scripture: Luke 18:9-14


I want you to take a moment and think about what sin you’re really glad you don’t do or haven’t done.

Now, I’m going to guess at least a few of you are glad you’ve never killed someone. Because surely that is the worst possible thing you could do. We do that, don’t we? To try and justify our actions? “Well, at least I didn’t kill anybody…how bad could what I did have been?”

Well – guess what? Moses was a murderer. Samson was a murderer. David was a murderer. Paul was a murderer…

Hmmm… oops?

Why Are We Blessed?

Scripture: Luke 16:19-31

Well, it’s pretty obvious that for many of us… this is a disturbing text—on many levels. One, it’s disturbing because it suggests that once you’re across that chasm, all hope of redemption is completely gone. Two, it’s disturbing because my guess is very few of us sitting here today can identify with Lazarus.

There’s a saying regarding the Bible – every passage contains both Law and Gospel – whether you hear it as law or as gospel, depends on who you are and how you identify with the story. If we were all Lazarus’ – it would indeed be good news. But… if we see ourselves more like the rich man... not so good news.

Martha, Martha...

Scripture: Luke 10:38-42

I remember hearing a sermon on this text one time with my mom. The sermon talked about how Mary was doing the better thing by studying and listening to Jesus rather than doing the work that Martha thought needed to be done in order to be a good hostess.

After church, my mom and I came walking out, got in the car, and she sat there for a moment, a rather perturbed look on her face, and went, “Hmmph. I guess you’re the Mary and I’m the Martha.”

I wasn’t honestly sure how to take that comment… as I don’t think it was totally meant as a compliment – despite what the sermon had said. The sermon unfortunately fostered a lot of resentment – that my mother’s gifts of organization and cleaning, etc. were somehow being shot down and pushed to the side as less meaningful and less necessary gifts than the seemingly more “lazy” Mary who just sat at the feet of the Jesus and listened. Now I’ll grant you – it’s obvious Mary and Martha had different priorities. My mom and I frequently also had different priorities – but was one priority more pressing than another? Should Martha have not been a good hostess and cleaned her house, made food, etc. for her guests?

A Funeral Sermon for Adeline

Scripture: Romans 8:31-39

Let us open in prayer,

Gracious and heavenly Lord, we thank you for the gift of Adeline – for the lives that she touched, for what she meant to both her family and to this congregation. May we find comfort in your words of promise and hope this day as you take our grief and sorrow and turn it into rejoicing. Amen.

I unfortunately did not have the privilege of getting to know Adeline the way many of the people here remember her. I know she was an active member of our congregation for many years who helped out with our children’s and women’s ministries. We have Vacation Bible School going on right now in case you hadn’t noticed from all the decorations, and her family felt that it was very fitting to have her funeral during a time when it could be represented by the ministries she loved so much.

But I think the two things that have stood out for me as I have listened to people talk about her was her deep faith and gift of hospitality.

Adeline was usually the first person to greet a new member and invite them over for coffee. Her relationship with God was lived out through her relationship to others. Inviting and welcoming, and being Christ to those who encountered her.

Her daughter, Marcia, stated that she used to serve our Golden Agers group… even when she, herself, was well into being a Golden Ager. She continued to show up to tie quilts with the Priscilla circle – one of the women’s circle groups here at church – even when she could no longer physically actually do the work.

As certain faculties were slowly taken away from Adeline – her hearing, her sight, her mobility, and eventually her memory – some things just could not be removed. The ability to always be the gracious hostess never left her. Even though she could no longer get up and make that cup of coffee – she still would feel she should.

And though she never knew who I was exactly or would remember who I was from one visit to the next, even I noticed this gracious sense of hospitality in Adeline. Whenever I would visit and then go to leave – she would smile, pat my hand and say, “Thank you for coming.”

And as many from our visitation ministry, our HATS group, know – Adeline’s faith ran very deep and was a central part of her being. While her dementia may have robbed her of many things – her faith was not one of them. If you started to say the Lord’s prayer, Adeline would jump right in there and lead that prayer with a bold and firm confidence. Nothing could separate her from her faith and love of God, nor His love for her.

Which brings to mind the Romans text we just read. “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

It’s hard for us to remember these words sometimes when we see the people we love being separated from us – especially bit by bit. For many, Adeline’s failing memory and inability to see and hear clearly caused them to feel they had lost Adeline long ago. That they had been separated from the Adeline they had known for so long. Upon her passing from life into death – that separation seems as though it is now complete.

But Paul reminds us – this is not the case. While many things in this world seek to separate us from God and one another – nothing can separate us from the love of God. Nothing – not even death itself. The separation we now feel from Adeline – that’s temporary.

We are reminded in this letter to the Romans that God’s love is the ultimate security. That the cross is the strong evidence of how much we are loved. It is in this love that we find our identity. It is in God’s love that we find what we thought was lost, what we thought was being taken from us - is actually being restored.

Adeline knew she was loved by God, that she was embraced by the God who made heaven and earth. A love that calls across the dark intervals of meaning, reaches into the depths of human despair, embraces those who live in the shadow of death, that challenges the rulers of the world and shows them up as a sham. A love that looks at the present with clear faith and at the future with sure hope. A love that overpowers all powers that might get in the way and declares to the world that God is God, that Jesus is the world’s true Lord, and that in him love has won the victory – the victory over all powers in the world – including death itself.

Paul points out to us and asks many questions: “Who is to condemn? Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution or famine, or nakedness or peril, or sword?” Paul’s answer is always the same – none of these things – whether cosmic or worldly – has more power than God’s love for us. We have Christ who intercedes on our behalf when it comes to all these things that seek to separate us. He joins us back together with Christ. That which is broken, he heals and puts back together.

So while it may have felt as though Adeline was slowly being taken away, that we were being robbed of her gifts and presence here with us – Paul assures us of the exact opposite. That while, yes – these things happen to us during our pilgrimage in this world – God is at work creating anew – that none of these things – not even death itself – can separate us from his love and from the power of the resurrection.

Paul asks in his first letter to the Corinthians, “Where o death is your victory? Where o death is your sting?”  For death, dementia, blindness, deafness, memory loss – all these things have been swallowed up in Jesus Christ. They will be remembered no more.

Adeline’s faith kept her connected to God so that nothing could ever separate her from Him.

Adeline knew this to the very marrow of her being – and would pray with confidence and certainty – “thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Her last words to her family were in the form of this prayer. Her final utterances were about her sure and certain hope in God’s love and God’s kingdom… something she could never be separated from.

I know we will pray it again later in the service – but I feel it only fitting that we should now, again, together, pray the prayer that she was never separated from:

Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever and ever, amen.

Everyone Sins... So Who Cares?

Scripture: 2 Samuel 11:26-12:10, 13-15 and Luke 7:36-50

This week we have two very different texts from our Old Testament and New Testament. On the one hand, we have the story of David and Bathsheba and God’s anger at the sinful actions of David. On the other, we have a much more loving view of God that forgives. However, I think we need both stories in order to get the fuller picture of what is going on.

In case you don’t remember the whole story of David and Bathsheba – essentially, it went like this. David was roaming his palace – being a pretty poor military leader actually. He was at home living it up while his men were out fighting and dying in battle. It’s late afternoon, and he goes out on the roof of his home, which was naturally higher than any other house in all of Judah – and he spies a woman taking a bath. Deciding he must have this woman, he summons her, sleeps with her, and gets her pregnant. His private little escapade is now about to become extremely public.

Lord of Compassion

Scripture: 1 Kings 17:17-24 & Luke 7:11-17

I have to admit – I don’t honestly know how I would react if I were at a funeral, and the deceased suddenly rose up from his or her coffin and started talking. A miracle – yes. Frightening? Oh yeah. I imagine when Jesus raised this young man from the dead, there were probably a few people who screamed, probably fainted – and it’s something of another miracle that someone didn’t have a heart attack that Jesus would have needed to heal as well.

We read these stories sometimes with the eyes of familiarity – yeah, okay, so Jesus walks in, raises the dead, and moves on. I think we’ve removed the shocking nature of this resurrection story. Someone who is dead is now alive. I just want you to picture it for a moment. You’re here in First Lutheran, attending funeral of someone you love and care about. Suddenly, some stranger walks, orders that person to get up – and… they DO! They sit up and just – start talking.

Three in One: The Mystery of the Trinity

Scripture: John 16:12-15

There are two things in the Christian faith that are the most difficult concepts to wrap your mind around. 

The first is eternity – the mere idea of eternity is something that boggles our mind. We have no concept of it, we cannot grasp it – because for our reality – there is always a beginning, and always a middle, and always an ending. But not so with eternity. Yet – the idea of eternal community with God is the cornerstone of the hope we have in Christ. Even though we can scarcely comprehend it.

The second concept that we seem unable to comprehend is the trinity. Seems only fitting that an eternal God would Himself be just as incomprehensible as his longevity. This idea of “three in one.” 

Now before you yawn and go to sleep – I’m not going to attempt to shove all kinds of Trinitarian doctrines down your throat that will probably fall flat – or try to come up with an analogy that will ultimately wind up being a heresy because it can never accurately demonstrate or illustrate the true nature of the trinity – I’m simply going to talk about the trinity in terms of how we experience God, of how God has revealed Himself to us – as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 

Where Are We Headed?

Scriptures: John 14:23-29; Acts 16:9-5; Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5

We Christians tend to live in difficult times. We aren’t part of that early church movement that got to experience the ministry of Jesus, like in our John text, or even experience the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and how it moved and shaped the early church like it does in our Acts text. Nor are we at the end, seeing the glorious Holy City where God and Christ dwell among us fully and completely – God’s presence in our lives being a tangible reality.

No, instead, we are – somewhere in between. The church has been well-established for over 2000 years. The vision of Revelation 21 and 22 is something that is yet to come.

Triumph or Tragedy?

Palm Sunday 
Scripture: Luke 19:28-44

Well, this Sunday, the lectionary wanted me to preach on the last supper and the crucifixion of Jesus – but I felt that was getting ahead of ourselves a bit. That to jump to Good Friday the Sunday before would miss the point and impact of Holy Week. We call it Holy Week because there are seven days between now and next Sunday – and there is a lot that happens in these seven days. Today is the start – as we remember Palm Sunday, and Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

The Hometown Prophet

This sermon was first preached January 23/24, 2010 at First Lutheran Church in Kearney, NE.

Scripture: Luke 4:14-30

So how many of you have ever asked, or been asked, the question, “So what’s your favorite scripture passage?” Most of us have some passage that always sticks out to us, something that we always remember – even if it’s one of those “oldies but goodies” like Psalm 23, or John 3:16… I’m a bit of an odd-duck, my favorite passage is from Exodus 33, when God gets irritated with the Israelites and tells Moses: “Go up to the land flowing with milk and honey. But I will not go with you, because you are a stiff-necked people and I might destroy you on the way.”

Seems like an odd verse to like, I know – especially to have it be one of your favorites… but I like it because it reminds me that when I get annoyed with people, it’s okay to sometimes be annoyed. Even God got annoyed with the people he loved.

When Bad Things Happen

Scripture: Luke 13:1-9

Shakespeare may have thought “To be or not to be” was the question that preoccupied humanity – certainly was what preoccupied Hamlet, but I’d argue that “Why do bad things happen to good people” is right up there with questions that weigh heavily on our mind.

When people ask me that question, Luke 13 is exactly where I go. In this passage we see that the disciples were keenly aware of both the evils perpetuated by humanity – such as Pilate mingling the blood of a group of Galileean pilgrims with his pagan sacrifices, as well as the random acts of nature, like the tower of Siloam that fell and killed eighteen hapless Jews.

The disciples ask the question: Why do these things happen? What have they done to deserve that?

Transforming the Beast

Scripture: Luke 9:2-36; 2 Corinthians 3:12-4:2

People frequently ask me – because I used to work for Disney animation – what my favorite Disney movie was. My answer is always simple – my two favorite movies are Mulan and Beauty and the Beast.

And the reason I love these movies is because they’re movies about transformation. Beauty and the Beast in particular, if you remember right, started off with the handsome prince being turned into a horrible looking beast – the point – to make his outside reflect what was on the inside. A beast. An angry, ugly, snarling beast that cared nothing about anyone but himself. And the only thing that was going to change him back was to act in love towards another. His was a self-serving love at first—he wanted someone to love him so that he could change back—but that wasn’t how it worked. The beast soon discovered that unless he acted out of genuine self-lessness—that when he genuinely loved someone other than himself, it perhaps meant not having things the way he wanted them.

Named and Claimed

This sermon was first preached on January 9/10, 2010 at First Lutheran Church in Kearney, NE.

Scripture: Luke 3:15-22

You know, when I was a kid, I used to get called “Thunder thighs.” Yeah, wasn’t one of the best names in the world to be called, and admittedly, once I started being called that – that was really how I began to see myself as well.

What we are called makes a difference in our lives. Let’s face it – people who are called loser, pathetic, no good, etc. all their lives eventually begin to see themselves as that and begin to live as though that were true. What people call us is what molds and shapes who we are. We may say “sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me,” but we know that’s not true. Words – and in particular names – are an integral part of our identity. It’s an integral part of how we relate to one another.