The Self-Destructive Nature of Evil

Scripture: Revelation 17

I remember one time when I was in seminary a Jehovah’s Witness came to my door wanting to talk to me about the book of Revelation. They were determined to show me the error of my Lutheran ways, and wanted to use Revelation 17 to do it.

They asked me, “Do you know what the Harlot is?” I said, “Ummm, a great city?”

“Oh no! Revelation 17 tells us that it’s following a false religion.”

I responded with… “Oh? Really? Ok, let’s look it up…”  I then proceeded to read to them verse 18, “The woman you saw is the great city that rules over the kings of the earth…”

For some reason... they never came back to visit me.

People go a lot of different places with this imagery…

But if we go back to John’s day, we know that the image of a woman riding a noble steed was frequently used throughout the Roman Empire to symbolize the city of Rome.

In the case of Rome, they had coins that had the Goddess Roma… oddly enough leaning back against seven hills.

What John is doing is taking this well-known image and “revealing” its true nature.

John is using satire. He’s taking this familiar image, and making it into a caricature to say something about the nature of this so-called “noble woman” called Rome.

Where Do YOU Stand?

The following is a continuation of our Revelation preaching series at First Lutheran. This sermon was preached by Pastor Meg Sander. 

Scripture: Revelation 6:1-8, 15-17; Revelation 5:1-8

There are many phrases we use that contain the word stand. STAND tall. Take a STAND, make a STAND! STAND by me. STAND by your man or woman. STAND up for yourself! STAND on your own two feet. STAND up and be counted. STANDing in the need of prayer. STAND up for your rights! If you don’t STAND for something, you’ll fall for anything! And at the end of our Bible reading for today…"Who is able to stand?” No one is able to stand when we look at what the text says.

There was a white horse…representing CONQUEST.  And another horse, bright red; representing VIOLENCE. Then there was a black horse, representing ECONOMIC HARDSHIP! And a pale  green horse representing DEATH!  And then later in the chapter we read that there came a great earthquake; the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, and the stars of the sky fell to the earth… Then the kings of the earth…the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid…for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?’

Whoa! Hold your horses! In all that gloom and doom, you ask who is able to stand. Of course nobody is able to stand when they face all kind of destruction and despair. Are you kidding?  When left to our own defenses, we are unable to stand against the perils of this world.

Christ & The Church: Problems of Assimilation, Complacency & Persecution

Scriptures: Revelation 1:4-19 (Daniel 7:9-14; Zechariah 12:10-11)

This week we’re starting something a little different than we’ve ever done before. We’re a Lutheran church… and we’re going to do a preaching series on the Book of Revelation. Bizarre… I know.

Its images and message have been interpreted in a variety of different ways and continue to be used as a “predictor” for current world events.

Where a lot of people go wrong when they open the Book of Revelation is they skip over this opening portion and tend to jump right into chapter six – where the four horsemen show up. After all – that’s when things get exciting.

But if you skip over this opening portion, you miss the entire point of the book of Revelation – because the opening is where we are introduced to the hero of the story. We are introduced to Jesus. A vision of Jesus that draws on and stays consistent with the Old Testament visions.

Wearing Christ

Scriptures: James 2:14-19; Matthew 22:1-14

A week before my wedding, I suppose it’s only fitting that I get to preach on a parable about a wedding banquet. Hopefully I don’t have quite the difficulty in getting people to attend that the king does in this parable.

It really is an odd parable if you think about it. It would be like if you had been invited to Prince William and Kate Middleton’s wedding and every single person who had been invited went, “Nah. I have better things to do that day.”

But the parable’s meaning is pretty clear up until you get to one particular little point. The first part we get – Israel constituted the “special guests” but they rejected God’s Son and thus, didn’t RSVP. And in fact – killed God’s messengers. Similar to the parable last week of the tenants who killed the servants. So God invited everybody else.

Seems pretty simple. Until you get to this disturbing addendum to the parable about the guy who shows up and isn’t properly dressed for the wedding so the King kicks him out where there is “wailing and gnashing of teeth.”

The Cornerstone

Scriptures: Matthew 21:33-46; Isaiah 5:1-7; Philippians 3:4-14

Every parable usually has one main overarching theme or message – to reveal to us something about the nature of God. Whether it’s the prodigal son showing us how God welcomes back the lost, or the parable of the Good Samaritan that tells us who God views as our neighbor.

And then you get a parable like this that makes you start going… “That landowner... he’s not too bright.” Albert Einstein once defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over, but expecting different results.

But that’s how this landowner acts. He keeps persistently sending servant after servant to these tenants, hoping that they will eventually do what they’re supposed to – then finally sends his son, who also is rejected, beaten and killed.

From a worldly perspective – we look at God and say, “Ummm, yeah – not the brightest move.” But on another level, it shows us the patience and persistence of God. How God continually keeps trying to bring his people around, to get his people to do what they were supposed to do – be a priestly nation to the world. His representatives to the other nations. He sends prophet after prophet – then ultimately he sends His son.

But they continued to refuse to bear the kind of fruit God was after.

It's Just Not Fair!

Scriptures: Jonah 3:10-4:11; Matthew 20:1-16

Whenever I read this parable, I always think, “You know… that’s just not fair!” You bust your butt all day, do your work, then you get to see your reward. You earn it.

That’s the way the world works. That’s the way I was raised. It’s that good old fashioned mid-western work ethic. You work hard – you reap the benefits of those rewards. You don’t work hard… well, if life were fair, then everyone who doesn’t work as hard doesn’t get to reap the same benefits.

Right? That’s how we think it’s supposed to work.

However, Jesus’ parable about the workers in the vineyard stands this idea on its head. Those who have worked and toiled in the field all day receive exactly the same benefit and wage as those who were the Johnny-come-lately’s.

Distributing the Miracle

Scriptures: Matthew 14:13-21; Isaiah 55:1-5

As I prepared to write this sermon, I looked up some rather disturbing statistics. Did you know that Americans eat 75 acres of pizza, 53 million hot dogs, 167 million eggs, 3 million gallons of ice cream, and 3,000 tons of candy a day?

Yet on the other side of the world, 11.6 million people in the nation of Somalia are at risk of starving to death due to a drought. Across the globe, there are 840 million chronically malnourished people.

The Department of Agriculture in our own country estimates there are 3.8 million families who experience hunger and up to 12 million families concerned about having enough food to feed their families.

Now we know, for a fact, that people go hungry not because there is a lack of food in our world. Yes, Somalia’s famine has been precipitated by a severe drought that has caused their famine.

But here in America – 40-50% of what we harvest each year – NEVER GETS EATEN. That’s half our food supply just being tossed out.