What are you looking for?

In the very first chapter of the Good News of Jesus Christ according to John, Jesus asks this question of the very first disciples. “What are you looking for?” This might call our attention to something that happens throughout the Gospel story of John and really in our own lives: everyone is looking for something.

Isn’t that true? If you are here today, you’re probably at least curious about looking for God…but even those in our lives and in our community that maybe wouldn’t say they’re looking for God…they’re probably looking for something, right? I guess I can’t speak for all people, but I can say that even in times in my life when I wasn’t looking for God, per se, I was looking for…something.

Jesus brings this question into focus when he asks, what is it, then, that you are looking for?

Well, maybe you, like many in the crowd of today’s Gospel, have caught a glimpse of an answer through Jesus. Maybe you got a portion of bread that he blessed. Maybe you heard from a friend that he can bring healing.

Beginning last week, and continuing for the next few weeks, we are a crowd of people following Jesus, looking for more morsels of understanding. Last week we glimpsed and maybe tasted that Jesus is abundance. That whatever Jesus is doing…there seems to be enough for all of us. Today, Jesus pulls us deeper into what that means.

Jesus is the Bread of Life, the Word of God, the I AM

After feeding the 5,000, Jesus gives the crowd the slip: he uses his water-walking special ability to leave without notice. But they are persistent and they find him on the other side of the sea. They, like us all, are still looking.

Jesus responds, though, by saying,

Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. (John 6.26–27 NRSV)

It sounds like an accusation, but I think Jesus here is just helping them clarify the answer to the age-old question… what are you really looking for? And it works because the crowd and Jesus go back and forth in dialogue as the real issue becomes more clear.

Jesus tells the crowd not to seek food that’s here today and gone tomorrow, but to look for food from God. Food that is more nourishing — and eternal. So the crowd says, fine, what do we have to do to get? Jesus says, well, it’s not so much what you do, but what God does — so trust in his work, not yours. So the crowd says, fine, what sign can you give us so that we can be sure that this is right. And Jesus says, and there you go again, making this all about you and your certainty. Jesus says, what this is all about is not you, but God. What you are looking for is for God to sustain you with the bread of life.

And now the crowd, through this dialogue, has come even closer, and they finally say, Yes, that is what we’re looking for. Give us this bread of life, then.

And that’s when Jesus says, I AM the Bread of Life.

I AM right here. In person.

Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection is your encounter with the living God. You have experienced the father through Jesus. He is the bread of life.

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Bread imagery is used in this story to connect with people at the most basic level. Food is just something you need. Jesus will also go on to say that he himself is the light, the truth, and even life itself. The Gospel is full of water and breathing. The first chapter tells us Jesus the word made flesh came to dwell with us. Food, water, breath, shelter. In choosing his metaphors, his signs, Jesus focuses on the essentials of life.

In other words, Jesus is not just bread. “What you need for life is available in me.” I AM what you are looking for.

If Jesus spoke today, I wonder what signs and images he’d use. Surely food and hunger are still issues with us today. There are hungry people around us in the world, even in our local area. But as one of the speakers from the Youth Gathering reminded us:

“Hunger is not caused by scarcity; hunger is caused by inequality…” Mikka McCracken #RiseUpELCA

People aren’t hungry because there isn’t enough food in the world…they’re hungry because we still haven’t learned how to share. And maybe the need that we have that’s driving inequality and our fear to share isn’t the need for food, but the need for security.

[alarm … I’ve never even had an alarm before, but somehow without it, I felt unsafe.]

Like any other need, humans tend to go haywire trying to solve it. It’s behind this need that in our country we’ve filled our prisons with people, and it’s why unarmed people keep being killed during routing traffic stops.

We know something is haywire because black folks are three times more likely to be killed than white folks in those situations. All people, regardless of skin color, are looking for security & safety.

I AM your security. I AM your safety.

Now, just like the crowd did not stop eating after Jesus said I AM the bread of life, I’m not going to cancel my insurance plan because Jesus is my security. I’m not going to stop locking my doors at night, and I’m not recommending that you do either.

But I do hear Jesus asking me, What are you really looking for?

Our security, our food, our life goes deeper than our bread for the day, our safety for the day, our health for the day. Those things are an essential part of our life and we can’t deny them, to be sure. If you just tell a hungry person that Jesus is the bread of life…he will still be hungry.

And of Jesus didn’t do that. Jesus fed the hungry with actual bread. He healed the sick of real diseases. But he also didn’t stop there.

We all have hunger. We all need safety. Every single person on earth has these needs. Together, we are all looking for something.

Jesus connects us to one another at this most basic level: bread, water, wine…but also calls us to share with our brothers and sisters on a deeper level.

Yes, you and I will be looking for food, shelter, and security today and tomorrow. In Jesus, we find something deeper. We find an end to hunger. We find a safety that goes beyond locking our doors…

We may be looking for bread, but in Jesus we find the sustaining word of life. We may be looking for security, but in Jesus we find peace.

Being connected through Christ to our neighbors means that their hunger comes closer to us. Their insecurity becomes our insecurity. But it also means that Christ draws even closer.

If you are looking for an encounter with God, it is closer than you think. Jesus is the bread of life. Jesus is the word of God that will stand forever. And Jesus is as close as the person next to you.

Martin Luther, the founding pastor of the Lutheran flavor of Christianity, wrote with his last dying breaths: we are all beggars, this is true.

We are all still looking for something. But in Jesus Christ, God has already found us and fed us.

Here we are in the middle of the summer, and it’s time for a good ol’ sermon series. Actually, this sermon series is already laid out for us in the Revised Common Lectionary (the three year cycle of readings that many churches use to hear a wide variety of scripture together) which assigns five Sundays in a row to a journey through the sixth chapter of the Gospel of John in which Jesus is described as the Bread of Life. If you remember ever sitting through an entire month of sermons about bread, now you know why! Besides making my stomach growl, this series of readings about Jesus and bread is a rich collection of remarkable statements about who Jesus really is.

I was recently talking with a young person in the congregation who asked me, “How can Jesus be God and God’s son?” Great question. And while I clumsily struggled to explain what was an unsatisfying answer, the Gospel of John draws us into a deeper understanding of…a belief…a faith in Jesus Christ.

There are certainly more than these, but here are five claims about Jesus that the sixth chapter of John makes:

• Jesus is known in abundance, not scarcity…faith, not fear
• Jesus is the Bread of Life, the Word of God, the I AM
• Jesus is God-with-us, somehow mortal & immortal
• Jesus is a never-ending feast for all people
• Jesus is offensive (and also the Holy One of God)

So first: Jesus is known in abundance, not scarcity…in faith, not fear.

I’ve been thinking about scarcity recently… [Story of dinner panic at the Gathering]

So, as I reflected on this story of Jesus feeding the 5,000, the first thing that stuck out at me was the big crowd of hungry people.

I have to confess that I’ve always thought about this crowd of 5,000 as a humongous church picnic. Smiles, relaxation…maybe some face painters and folks walking around making balloon animals for the kids…But maybe my experience at last week’s Gathering is weighing on me…because now I’m seeing this crowd differently.

Now I’m seeing five thousand people who were tired, hungry, and in many cases, suffering from diseases, disabilities, and other crises all assembled around Jesus — wanting something from Jesus. Some were local, many others had showed up from out of town. This was five thousand of some pretty socially undesirable people that were gathering in public. If you’ve ever been to the Straz Center for the Performing Arts in Tampa…this is twice as many people as can fit in that theater. I have no doubt that if they were to gather in our day, they would be labeled a mob and the National Guard would be called in for crowd control.

Whenever you have a large group of people hungry and desperate for anything, things can get out of hand extremely quickly: In 2014, fewer than 5000 people who were waiting on a specialty craft beer at Cigar City Brewing Company in Tampa sparked a riot when there wasn’t enough — that’s right — fancy beer for everyone. The police were called, and fortunately, no one was seriously injured.

So I’m imagining that there would be some cause for concern among the disciples when they realize they are standing in the epicenter of a 5,000 person strong mob of hungry and distressed persons, and all they have to eat is five loaves of bread and two fish. I would be afraid.

The power of scarcity is strong. It creates fear. It causes us to make bad decisions. I know that just missing one meal can turn my happy family into enemies. I like to think of myself as civilized and balanced, but if I’m honest, I’m mostly held together by the fact that I’ve got extra snacks stored in my desk drawer, a credit card in my wallet, and an address book of people that would help me in an emergency. What if I didn’t have those things? And even with that safety net, I know that I still make decisions guided by fear.

It’s not just a scarcity of food that drives us. We fear that there won’t be enough recognition of our good works. We fear that there won’t be enough love to go around. Maybe if we don’t secure and maintain our place in society, in the market, than someone might take it from us.

God operates at a level — and invites us to operate a level where scarcity is not the driving factor, but rather abundance.

Knowing full well that the disciples perceived scarcity, Jesus still asks them about how to feed all these people.

“Philip answered him, “Six months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.”” (John 6.7 NRSV)

Philip focuses right on the scarcity, the fear. I have to wonder if Philip is a little angry with Jesus on this point. “Jesus, you’re the one that asked us to give up our PAYING JOBS to follow you, and now you’re asking us to host the world’s most expensive dinner?”

Although he doesn’t fully believe it…Andrew, another disciple, takes a step forward. He notices a gift in the middle of scarcity…a boy with five loaves of bread and two fish.

And then, my favorite part: in the midst of a desperate mob, in a desert of resources, in the middle of 5,000 needy people, Jesus actually takes a laughably inadequate portion of food and gives thanks. To my eyes, and probably to your eyes, five loaves of bread and two fish looks like an insult to 5,000 people. Jesus gives thanks and starts distributing, and distributing until each and every person has enough.

Jesus operates in our lives to create abundance — I believe that to be true. I have seen it again and again. But it’s not the abundance we are usually tempted to think about. When I think of abundance, I’m tempted to think of a bunch of stuff with my name on it. I think of a diversified portfolio of stocks and bonds that belongs to me and supports my family. God also think of abundance — but not quite the same way. I believe that God sees abundance in this way: it’s you and I fully using the gifts we have — even if they seem insultingly small. Not abundance in accumulating more and more, but abundance in being more and more who we are called to be. Doing more and more what we are called to do.

This is the general idea — certainly the biblical idea — behind the congregation, the church. God does not measure our abundance in how large our building is, or how complete our bank account is. God promises us abundance as we channel our gifts and use our love for the neighbors around us. There is the real potential for this same kind of feeding-of-the-5000 miracle to take place through Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd.

[Story about Joyce]

Our abundance will not look like a tall tower of glory reaching into the sky, but rather a broad circle of love reaching out from this point and sharing daily bread with our neighbors around us. And standing at the middle of that point is Jesus. This is who Jesus is. Jesus is abundant love.

“Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:5–6 NRSV)

How can we know the way? This is the question that the disciple Thomas asked of Jesus. How can we know the way? Maybe it’s also a question you’ve asked yourself at some point…maybe out loud…maybe silently. How can we know the way:

• when life changes?
• when sadness seems overwhelming?
• when someone close to us is no longer here?

Maybe today you are asking yourself, how can we know the way — to know what to do, to find meaning, to find hope after a beloved husband, beloved family member and friend, George has died.

You might be able to relate to the disciple Thomas who first asked Jesus this question. And I hope you don’t feel guilty for asking it; it’s an important question.

There may be very well-intentioned people who have tried to answer it for you. But when you lose someone close to you — a companion of 60 years — the short answers aren’t very satisfying:

• God needed another angel
• It’s just God’s plan
• He’s in a better place

Even if you want to believe those things, they don’t really answer the question; they don’t really help us to know the way.

Even if it’s not as easy an answer, the only answer that can satisfy is the answer that Jesus gives to the question, how can we know the way?

Jesus says,

I am the way, and the truth, and the life.

The way to find meaning, the way of hope is not a step by step plan, it’s not a list of things you have to do, it’s not a list of things you have to say, it’s not even a list of things you have to believe. “I am the way,” says Jesus. It’s not a requirement we have to meet; it’s a relationship. It’s God’s relationship with us. It’s God’s own beloved Son whom he sent to be born with us, to suffer and grieve with us, to die with us. And to rise to life again — with us.

God grieves with you today. And baptized into God’s kingdom, George lived, struggled, and died with Jesus. And just like Jesus, George will not be held by death. He will be led by the Good Shepherd of the Sheep. He will be gathered up into the arms of God. He has come face to face with the way, the truth, and the life.

One distinctive mark of Lutheran preaching is to separate God’s word into two functions: the Law and the Gospel; Bad news and good news; words which convict us, and words that forgive us. If you were to look at today’s Gospel lesson through that lens, you might wonder if it could be called Gospel at all. There are confusing rumors about Jesus, and Herod is afraid. Part of Herod’s fear stems from an event that we heard as a flashback: Herod throws a wild party for the upper crust of Galilee. Shamefully, he puts his own step-daughter’s body on display for everyone there, and in fact, is seduced by her dancing enough that he foolishly promises in front of everyone to give her whatever she wants. In consultation with her mother, who is Herod’s wife (although really shouldn’t be since she is technically married to Herod’s brother), the step-daughter asks for the execution of innocent John the Baptist. The story turns from exploitation to murder. Heard any good news, yet? (If the whole Bible were made into a movie — it would be rated R.)

Now, feeling trapped in the power that he had been abusing, Herod realizes he has to order John the Baptist’s death (even though a person as corrupt as Herod knows that John doesn’t deserve it). He sends a guard to do it, and then, probably the creepiest part of the whole story — John’s severed head is handed directly to Herodias, the girl. Now, I realize that she asked for it (on her mother’s orders) but it’s still terrible.

It’s true that today’s Gospel lesson is all bad news. It’s a testament to the corruption of power. It’s a cautionary tale of fear. It really has no good news to share.

I mean, seriously — in what kind of sick world is John’s head actually placed in a girl’s hands?

Well… in our world.

A quick survey of our world might very well reveal a similar diagnosis of no good news. Precious and ancient art and history is being destroyed in the Middle East by ISIS. Entire species of plants and animals are being lost at alarming rates. Politicians fight dirty on and on. Men, women, and even children are shot every single day. And all of it can be traced to the same impulse that drives Herod — fear of losing power.

Well, today’s Gospel is all bad news, and today’s newspapers are all bad news. Maybe some things never change. The story of Herod’s party might still be extremely relevant… but is it helpful?

The truth is that the Gospel of Mark was never meant to be read in just short snippets. So I’m going to cheat and fill you in on what happens right after this disgusting party that is recounted in the Gospel of Mark. It’s actually another party, but a very different one.

Jesus and the disciples try to sneak off to rest a little bit from all the healing and demon-out-casting they’ve been doing. But people from all over find them anyways and gather around Jesus and the disciples with the hope that they could improve their lives. This is a very different crowd than the one that attended Herod’s party. Where Herod surrounded himself with the wealthiest and most important people in Galilee, Jesus is surrounded by the least of these. They are like sheep without a shepherd. They are hungry; they are desperate.

Instead of merely entertaining the crowd, Jesus teaches them. He shares Good News with them. And it turns into a party.

Herod’s party was all about him. He threw it so that he could gain power. The better the party, the more highly he would be regarded. Jesus’ party on the other hand was all about the people that came to it. In fact, they’re the ones that threw the party — Jesus and the disciples were just trying to catch some rest, actually. But even in the midst of a deserted place, a place with no spread, no amenities, no glamour, no honor… Jesus presides over a feast. This is a party for those whom we might be tempted to say didn’t deserve one. They probably didn’t work. Or when they did, they often relied on socially unacceptable sources of income. These are folks who had no hope of ever attending a Herod-style party. They might have been people that had been pushed out because of a mental or physical disability. They might have been people that had certain stereotypes connected to them: weird, smelly, lazy, criminal.

But Jesus has no fear of them. Jesus has no fear of feasting with them. And it’s a party where everyone has enough. No one is left out. And it’s a big party, in fact, you may have heard about it: five thousand people feasted together at this party that started with just five loaves of bread and two fish. In the middle of nowhere. In Christ, there is always enough.

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In one way or another, all of us hold some kind of power. Obviously there are people that have much more than others. But each of us here today has power, or else you wouldn’t be here. I recognize that I have a certain amount of power — you can tell because I have this large wooden platform, and a microphone, and you are more or less expected to be quiet while I talk — although, for the record, I certainly wouldn’t mind if you spoke back a little bit. But in my role alone, I hold power. And indeed, there are an atrocious number of examples of pastors who have abused their power.

And there are many kinds of power out there. If you arrived here today strapped to a gigantic metal engine with wheels (known as a car), you have power. If you get to choose where to have lunch after worship today, you have power. If your pastor starts speaking too boldly from the pulpit and you threaten to leave the church — that’s a kind of power, too.

The Bad News of today’s Text reminds us that power can and will be abused. Unfortunately, you didn’t even need to hear the Gospel to already know that’s true. But what’s more, it reminds us that no earthly power is great enough to protect us from fear. In fact, Herod, the most powerful person in the story, also seems to be the most afraid. You and I are probably not in a position like Herod’s. But maybe we are at his party. Or at least wish we could be invited to his party…

But the Good News — and there is Good News! — is that Jesus Christ frees us from the fear that comes from fighting for power. It assures us that there is always enough in Christ. Even if we are hungry now and worried about tomorrow, Christ beckons us to share. Just when we think the bad news has won the day, just when the Herods of the world seem to have a monopoly on power — Jesus offers himself to us as bread. So much bread that we not only eat forever, but we share with the rest of the world.

Jesus and his band of disciples are on tour. Jesus leads and the disciples follow him from place to place, town to town, as he teaches and heals and performs miracles along the way. And at the beginning of this Gospel that we’ve read today, Jesus is making a stop along his tour in his own hometown.

As Jesus takes the stage in his own synagogue, you might think this would be one of the greatest shows on his tour. You might think that his hometown would be the center of his fan club, the proud locals who would brag about knowing Jesus before he was famous.

But, that’s not what happens. Whereas in other locations, Jesus was ‘that stranger who could do these amazing things’…in his hometown he was ‘the kid who must think he’s better than us.’

I remember when I worked in show business…

Maybe you’ve had the experience of no longer being welcome in an old group of friends…

There is some of that same feeling going on here as Jesus returns to his hometown. “Well, what makes you so special?” “Where do you get off acting so important —- we know you, we know your family, we know your history, we know your social class, and you are not important.”

Needless to say, Jesus could not put on a great show in his hometown. In fact, Jesus heckles the crowd right back saying, “prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown…” Or, in other words, “you wouldn’t know a prophet if one was standing right in front of you.” Which he was.

But what happens next is so striking that even Jesus himself was amazed: because of their lack of faith, Jesus could not even perform. The power of the Gospel which had freed the captives, opened the eyes of the blind, and even raised a girl from her deathbed, was absent when this crowd refused to put their faith in their hometown prophet.

Let’s talk about faith:

faith required for Jesus’ deeds is not mental understanding faith is not a private matter faith is public

faith is a social, externally manifested, emotion-filled behavior of loyalty, commitment, and solidarity. Loyalty and commitment to the God of Israel, solidarity with others bent on obedience to the God of Israel.

In other words, the kind of faith that is talked about here is not the sum total of your innermost thoughts, but the kind of trust in God that permits you to stand next to Jesus and stand with the people that Jesus loves, even when the going gets rough. Faith is our confidence to follow — not based on our skills or reputation, but based on God’s faithfulness to us. It’s the faith of that beautiful prayer:

Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Faith is lived out loud.

And the people of Jesus’ hometown have clearly failed. Spectacularly. Jesus is actually amazed at their lack of faith.

And, let’s be clear —- these aren’t people who are just ‘not sure’ about Jesus. This is not a condemnation of people who have doubts. In fact, walking downs paths of which you cannot see the ending, facing perils unknown, not knowing where you’re going…these are not failures of faith, these are prerequisites of faith.

At almost every turn of the Gospel, the disciples make clear that they have absolutely no clue as to what they’re doing —- except that they continue to follow Jesus.

But the people who have failed at faith are the ones here that are sure. They are sure that hierarchy, and social class, and profession are what’s most important —- not God’s ability to do something new.

And so you might think that Jesus would have no choice other than to rain down fire on these unbelievers…you know, give them a real show that they’d never forget. Scare that disbelief right out of them. Show a sign of power too big to ignore.

But he doesn’t.

Instead, he does about the weakest thing you could think of. He splits the disciples up. Jesus sends them out two by two. And he instructs them to go out with no food, no bags, no money.

This is Jesus’ response to apathy and scorn: face to face relationships. Not show-stopping sell-out performances, but…smaller miracles. Two by two the disciples are sent to engage in holy conversations and healing.

Really, Jesus’ model for disciples is always sending. It’s no coincidence that when Jesus sends his disciples out two-by-two that he talks about them ‘entering a house.’

Jesus sent his disciples into homes. Think about that for just a moment. The mission that Jesus gave his disciples was not to build a newer, more-improved temple so they could put on the greatest show on earth…the mission was to go out into homes.

And even more amazing, how they were sent…without material supplies, without much training.

Talk about living faith out loud. Their marching orders (take no bread, no bag, no money) required them to go with faith: trusting in the faithfulness of God.

And God provided. The power of the Gospel was made perfect in weakness.

This is still the model for discipleship…but we are so well-trained —- I am so well-trained to think of the power of the Gospel as something like a show that we have to put on inside the church, something to surround with the finest special effects and then invite people to come see it.

But instead of just gathering in public places to celebrate our private faith, Jesus sends us, his disciples, into private settings to celebrate public faith. To live our faith out loud at home, at work, at play. To trust God enough that we can invite the Gospel into holy conversations we have among friends, decisions we make in our households, disagreements we have with our co-workers, or neighbors…

We live in a big country. Maybe you celebrated this weekend with big slabs of meat, or big fireworks, or big orchestras playing big patriotic music. Or, if you were really lucky: all three.

These past few weeks have felt to me like a time of big moments in our big country. There’s been a nationwide conversation on race and violence. There have been big Supreme Court decisions affecting millions with regard to health care and marriage rights. Many celebrated these things as finally catching up to where we should be progressing as a nation. Many others, though, felt like their country was leaving them behind. Whether or not we agree with the big things, our hope is in the little things. Our strength is made perfect in weakness.

In moments that we lay down our strength, lay down our certainty in being right, and listen to someone else. When we leave room for the Gospel to surprise us in new ways, in new places, from new people.

Trusting that as we go out, the Gospel does too, but not as a performance that only we can put on for others, but instead, Jesus, the living Word goes out with us as a promise that where we encounter others, Jesus will be there. The Gospel will be there among us, in our meeting.

No equipment required, no excuse too big, no strength too small.

We are given faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that God’s hand is leading us and God’s love supporting us; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

• Bishop Eaton’s Public Statement
• Story from Anti Racism Training
  • two people shoulder to shoulder
  • woman was laughed at, and assaulted
  • we didn’t want her story to be true; but it was

Today’s Gospel lessons brings together two stories about two people who are very different.

One is a man named Jairus. Jairus is a leader of the synagogue. Presumably well educated and fairly wealthy. We don’t know about Jairus from before this story, so we can’t be sure, but I think it would be a safe bet to assume that as a leader of a local synagogue… he would have been pretty skeptical of Jesus. He likely shared the feelings of many religious leaders at the time: “I’ve got this religion thing figured out…I don’t need whatever the prophet Jesus is talking about.” Except… Jairus’ daughter becomes deathly ill. Jairus is at his wit’s end. Like many parents could attest to, he’d do anything for his child…even, apparently, swallowing his pride and asking for the help of Jesus. After all, his daughter is so sick, she is nearing the point of death.

As Jesus goes along his way to meet Jairus’s daughter…we encounter a different character. We meet a woman whose main public identity is that she has been sick — hemorrhaging blood, or having ‘a flow of blood’ — for twelve years. Unlike Jairus, she is not wealthy, in fact, she’s spent all her resources on her health care, and it hasn’t even worked. We are not told of any family members, and we can presume that her condition has isolated her from the community. A woman like her would have been an outcast in that time. Maybe she still would.

Within one walk across town, Jesus has encountered someone among the most privileged and someone among the least privileged in the community.

These two are in very different positions in society. But both of them are in great need.

The woman with the flow of blood needs healing, both for her physical condition, and to restore her social life which has been cut off because of her hemorrhaging. She’s already been to see doctors —- but probably not the kind you’re thinking of. The doctors she would have tried would be better described as wannabe miracle workers. Each claiming to have some kind of power, but a limited supply, so for a price, they could share it with you. She probably supposes Jesus is also this kind of miracle worker, but without money to pay him, she tries her last resort: she reaches out to receive a little of his power by touching the cloak of Jesus as he walks by.

While this is going on, Jairus’s daugher’s condition has gone from bad to worse. In fact, just as Jesus encounters the woman with the flow of blood, some people come from Jairus’ home to explain that the daughter has already died. Even as Jesus enters and tells them that the daughter is not dead, but sleeping… the power that death has over them is so strong that they actually laugh at Jesus. But really, they’re just being realistic.

Both Jairus and the woman with the flow of blood find themselves without any other options. One at the margins of her society, and one with all the power to lead the synagogue, but powerless in the face of his daughter’s illness.

As different as these characters are, they are exactly alike in this regard: they both fall down at the feet of Jesus. They both recognize their need for a loving, forgiving God. They both ignore the others who would place barriers between them and the Kingdom of God and they put their faith in Jesus.

And Jesus shows them just how close the Kingdom of God really is.

The woman is healed the instant that she touches even the cloak of Jesus, and when she is discovered and singled out for her action, Jesus does not accuse her of theft, or demand payment. Instead, he says it was her faith that healed her.

And even as others laugh with scorn, Jesus calls out the daughter who rises from her deathbed. Faith is stronger even than death.

And in Jesus Christ, two people from across the spectrum are united in the grace they receive.

Faith connects the powerless with the powerful. Faith connects the sinner with forgiveness. Faith connects the dead with life. Faith connects us.

Don’t we do that here? We come before a table set before us by a God that loves us, even in our brokenness. We approach the wine and the bread with open hands that say “I am not worthy to receive you Lord, but say the word, and I shall be healed.” And when we do, we may find ourselves shoulder to shoulder with someone that is very different from us. Someone that annoys us. Or someone that is disconnected from us because of economic class, or age, or skin color. But shoulder to shoulder we approach the throne of grace united by faith in Jesus Christ.

And, it’s not just at the Communion table that we enact this kind of faith.

• Shoulder to Shoulder Confession at Anti Racism Training

They connected not because they shared the same culture, not because they instantly understood each other — they connected because they could both admit that they each were only standing in that room shoulder to shoulder because of the Grace of God. Their faith in Jesus Christ healed them. Their reliance on God, their faith in Jesus Christ made them well.

Our faith in Jesus Christ heals us, too. It places us shoulder to shoulder with people of all cultures, races, economic levels. Our faith acknowledges that we only stand in one another’s company by the Grace of God.

It’s when you fall down, trembling before God that you know the truth.

Not the strength of your arms, not the security of your finances, not even your best intentions makes you well. But when you find yourself having fallen down at the feet of Jesus — your faith makes you well. Go in peace, and be healed.

For a very long time, it has been a Christian tradition to think of the church as a boat. A lot of church buildings are actually designed to resemble an upside down boat. Actually, even the word for this part of the building — nave — means ‘boat.’

So, in that same thinking, through the years this gospel text came to represent the church — a story of disciples, with Jesus, travelling through all kinds of weather, travelling with a purpose, finding safety and comfort in the fact that even when great storms arise, Jesus is there in the boat to protect his followers.

So what can we say, my sisters and brothers, when the safety of that boat can be violated by an agent of hate? When nine faithful disciples can be gunned down within the very ship that Jesus promises to remain in?

I’m assuming you know by now that on Wednesday in Charleston, South Carolina, a young man, fueled by the teachings of White Supremacy entered into a church very significant to African American history, and shot to death nine folks who had gathered there to pray.

This horrible event has gripped me personally for a number of reasons.

As a pastor it terrifies me that in the midst of prayer, within the sanctity of a church…

As a Lutheran pastor, it grieves me that Mother Emanuel AME’s pastors, Clementa Pinckney and Daniel Simmons, who were victims of the shooting, were graduates of the Lutheran Southern Seminary. I have friends who were classmates with Pastor Clementa…

As a Lutheran churchgoer, it chills me that the perpetrator of the violence was on the roll of an ELCA congregation in Columbia, South Carolina.

But more importantly, and even more personally, I am tied to this event by way of the racially motivated hate that caused it. I cannot deny a connection to this disaster because I share the privilege afforded to me by the color of my skin that allows this kind of violence to continue in my country.

Up until Wednesday evening, I had a very different direction planned for this Sunday’s sermon. Since then, I’ve tried to not be too quick to speak about the meaning of what happened on Wednesday night. I’ve been listening (online, mostly) to the voices of people of color to help me understand the context of the situation, and to see things that may have been invisible to me.

I have heard some of those voices cry out with the words of scripture that we don’t read all that often in Lutheran churches…from the book of Habakkuk. I’ll bet at least some of you didn’t know there was a book of Habakkuk.

In the first chapter, the prophet cries:

“O LORD, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save? Why do you make me see wrong-doing and look at trouble? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. So the law becomes slack and justice never prevails. The wicked surround the righteous— therefore judgment comes forth perverted.” (Habakkuk 1.2–4 NRSV)

The wicked surround the righteous like a storm surrounds a boat.

Here’s where this gets uncomfortable: It is true that the wicked surround us. And the wicked overwhelmed the righteous praying within Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. But the wicked is not just a person. It is not just the young white terrorist that perpetrated this particular horrific crime. We cannot do justice to the meaning of either of these texts until we come to terms with the fact that the wicked — the evil — is a part of each of us. Not just out there, threatening to spill over the sides of the boat, but in our hearts.

The storm surrounding us is different in this way from the one that produced terror in the hearts of the disciples in the boat with Jesus. This storm is not a quick and powerful windstorm caused by the unusual geography of the sea of Galilee. This is a storm of human origin. The fear caused by this storm is not just incidental or accidental: it is intentional. It is perpetrated.

It’s important to name the sin of racism and white supremacy. And to name the fact that these things aren’t just the delusions of a few lone wackos out there. These things are built into our culture and laws and history. If you share the color of my skin you have benefited from white supremacy, even if you have never told a racist joke, never discriminated against someone based on the color of their skin, never harbored an evil thought toward someone because of ‘that’ culture.

By coincidence, last week on the same evening of this attack, youth of this congregation met to prepare for a trip to Detroit this summer and our task on was to investigate the evil effects of racism in Detroit. Just hours before hearing the news out of Charleston, I was so proud of the way that these young people investigated news reports and documentary material and then responded in thoughtful ways about the way that unfair housing practices and laws led to problems that still divide Detroit by race.

That’s right, the same group of kids that we accuse of playing with their phones too much or not taking things seriously had an extended and considerate discussion about a Christian response to racism. They did.

In that study and conversation, that they were confronted with a truth that is really painful and uncomfortable to most Lutherans, a denomination that is about 98% White: that no matter how polite we are, we are all complicit in the sin of racism, and we have a calling to help dismantle it.

The good news is, we are equipped to do just that.

We belong to a God that not just calms the water around us, but remains with us even as the storm overcomes the boat. We have a God that knows what it is for evil to enter in, and for death to find its way even into the most sacred places.

We have a God who shows no partiality anyone, but loves each human being.

We have a God that calms our fear with forgiveness — not so that we can feel comfortable — but so that we can be free to acknowledge our mistakes, and commit to correcting them, confident in God’s Grace.

This was a dark week for many, my friends. But we are in this boat together. God has called us out across the waters in faith. Disciples of Christ will face many storms. The sin of racism is a big storm. This will not be a comfortable journey.

But then again, Jesus doesn’t call disciples into easy journeys. Together, the church is called out into the rough waters. We have a calling; a purpose; we have a Gospel of radical love that needs to be heard in every land, every household. Jesus comes with us to share this message, but the going can get rough.

One more saying about boats. Jesus didn’t say it, but it’s still true; perhaps you’ve heard it:

A boat in a harbour is safe, but that is not what a boat is built for.

Let’s show the world what this boat is built for.

The tree is a powerful image.

These texts about great trees remind me of the Good Ol’ Days. You know, the Good Ol’ Days. Whenever those are in your imagination —- I think the Good Ol’ Days are probably different for different people. When the texts talk about ‘noble cedars’ and ‘flourishing palms,’ I think of ancient groves of giant trees providing shade long before the invention of chain saws and bulldozers. Maybe I have too active an imagination.

Tree image common in scripture and it’s easy to see why…

Before skyscrapers, trees were pretty much the tallest thing around, even on top of mountains

Trees still impress us —- people hike to natural areas; Mayan ceiba tree; it’s not hard to imagine these wooden braces around us as symbolizing a grove of trees that gather together under

Trees are powerfully symbolic. Actually, what’s surprising is that there aren’t more of them … (blame Asherah)

But still, trees are just too good an image, too wonderful a creation to not get wrapped up in helping us think, sing, and talk about God

The story of Scripture begins with the book of Genesis in the Garden of Eden: the original Good Ol’ Days. Growing in that garden was every kind of tree, including two important ones in the story, the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil.

And one of the final images in the last book of the Bible, Revelation, tells again about the Tree of Life. Reborn, replanted, healing for all the nations.

So it should also be no surprise to us, then, that Jesus uses images about seeds, plants, wheat, fruit, and trees to help teach his disciples about the Kingdom of God.

Often, these botanical images that Jesus uses are found in parables. Parables are a clever method for teaching that Jesus uses.

Parables aren’t just simple metaphors, though. The more you pull them apart, the more provocative or unsettling they get. (Think of the Prodigal Son…) The thing about parables is that they aren’t meant just to explain something to us. They are meant to surprise us.

Even within the context of parables, though, this mustard seed is surprising… you might imagine that Jesus would use an example of a small seed that turns into humongous tree. Actually, that’s what I thought this parable was actually about… But, at least in this Gospel of Mark, the Kingdom of God never becomes more than a shrub.

Both for people that Jesus preached to who thought the Kingdom of God might look like an overthrow of their government to us who think the Kingdom of God might look like a really powerful world religion … I think we all expect more than a shrub.

So what’s this parable trying to surprise us with?

As always, the Kingdom of God is not as we expect. Jesus always seems to be in the last place we’d look.

This is the same Jesus that sends us to our neighbor in order to encounter God.

This is the same Jesus that leads by washing his followers’ feet.

This is the same Jesus that shows us his power by revealing his weakness —- and leaving his life in the hands of his enemies, and leaving his hope in God.

God is at work in the Kingdom whether we ‘see’ it, or ‘feel’ it.

Jesus calls us to see power not just in skyscrapers, but in forgiveness, around dinner tables, in a few honest words exchanged with a neighbor.

Jesus calls us to see the Kingdom of God at work not just under the great trees of our churches —- but also in moments of discipleship in our lives that spring up like new saplings.

God’s not as interested in the Good Ol’ Days. God’s interested in New Creation!

“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!” (2Corinthians 5.17 NRSV)

Anyone/anything in Christ … new creation

_ in Christ?: New Creation

a bad day; a hurting relationship; this congregation

God is in charge of New Creation. It’s not a new creation because you went back and did it right this time… There are days you can’t get back. There are words you can’t take back. There are times and ways of life —- the Good Ol’ Days —- that, no matter how hard we try, we can’t bring back.

But in Christ, everything is new again. In the Kingdom of God, maybe quietly, maybe surprisingly, a new thing has grown — without us knowing how. Without us in control. The seeds that God has planted have grown —- maybe not always into the gigantic oaks or cedars we imagined —- but into a new shrub, surprisingly capable. Bearing fruit.

God has planted seeds of the Kingdom of Heaven in your heart. It may surprise you. It may look different than you imagined, or that others imagined for you. It’s not the Good Ol’ Days … It’s New Creation.

I have an important question for you: when you eat your meals, do you like to keep each item separate…or do you like it when the different parts mix together? Ok, so it’s not that important of a question — but I am going somewhere with this. I’ve noticed that some people like to blend their food together on their plate, and some that very intentionally keep their foods from even touching. And, if you really like to keep the parts separate, you can use those plates that have the divided compartments for each food.

Now, I’m not going to tell you how to eat.

But I like that image of the divided plate to think about something that happens to all of us to a certain extent. We get our lives into little sections. I’ve got my faith section here. And my finance section here. And my family section here. Each in its own spot.

(This will probably be one of those sermons that I’m mostly preaching to myself, because I really struggle with this…my plate often has all my faith stuff neatly placed inside my ‘professional’ tray, and gets separated from the rest.)

And then Jesus comes along with words like those found in today’s Gospel and it really messes up my plate.

Isn’t this story uncomfortable? Jesus is inside teaching his followers and he gets word that his own flesh and blood family is outside calling for him — and he seems to dismiss them. His own mother and brothers and Jesus ignored them! This is our Holy Scripture! It’s a good thing we’re passed Mother’s Day.

Although most of this Gospel lesson sounds weird to our modern ears (after all, it talks about both demons and Jesus being mean to his family) there is a lot going on here that would have been made an important point to someone in the time of Jesus.

The driving force is that Jesus is being deviant. To the people around him, his preaching and teaching have come from nowhere…he wasn’t born into a family of pharisees or religious leaders or even highly educated people. Which meant in his society that he had no business teaching about God.

And then there was the role of the family in Jesus’ time: your position in a family was the most important part of your identity. The difference could be illustrated with this question: what’s more important now, if you were to introduce yourself to a stranger…would you tell them about you first, or your family first? Most of us would start with our individual identity, and then maybe go on to share our family history and background.

It was the opposite in Jesus’ day…

Every family had a certain amount of honor. It was more important than money. And acting outside of your ‘place’ meant losing that honor. What Jesus is doing is putting himself and his family at risk, which is why they try to restrain him.

The truth was that your biological family meant everything at the time of the New Testament. It was the divider that you could not cross. And everything that you did, and everything that God did was believed to have to respect that compartment.

Now, we modern folks don’t have that particular barrier for the most part anymore. We think of ourselves as our own persons now, regardless of who our parents were. But we still struggle with that compartmentalization that splits our faith into just one category of our life. We’re so good at keeping separate the way we act professionally from the way we act with our family to the way we act while shopping that we can start to think of our relationship with God as just one of those categories. Our faith life becomes just what we do on Sunday morning.

This is how worshippers can drive to lunch after church and yell at their waiter for bringing the wrong soup. This is how Christians can be so moved by a sermon on Sunday and then lie and cheat and steal on Monday. Compartmentalization. It doesn’t cause us to do those things — we’d do them anyway — but it’s what makes them so easy to do:

If I can just keep God over there, in that tray with the peas, then I can enjoy these mash potatoes however I want. And I can neglect those lima beans over there without even feeling guilty!

We like to stay in control by keeping everything in separate trays, but really we become fragmented. And distracted. And each separate part of our life becomes its own religion with its own God. And so many competing rules for each one. And even 2000 years ago, Jesus said “a house divided cannot stand.”

…

Jesus reminds us that God’s Grace pours out over our plates, flooding every section, breaking down whatever divisions we’ve made, and bringing Good News to even the smallest fragments of our lives.

Even the section of family is broken and opened up. Jesus asks: “Who are my mother and my brothers?” And looking at those who sat around him, those who were not within the biological family compartment, Jesus said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”

Jesus is not anti-family, but he refuses to let the family become an idol. Jesus does not let us turn our family or our loved ones into God. This is good news if you have ever felt to the pressure to have the perfect family, but maybe didn’t quite fit the mold. Didn’t have exactly one mom plus one dad plus 2.1 children… Didn’t feel like you were the perfect family member…

Yes, God works through families in wonderful ways. But families are not God.

When I work with a couple preparing for marriage, one of the things we talk about is how the ideal marriage, and especially the ideal wedding is one of those sections of the plate that we like to keep real nice and clean and special. And we’re taught and told that the wedding is the special day just for that couple — it’s own stressful challenge and if it goes well, its own reward. I invite the couple to see it differently: to see marriage as not just for its own sake, but for the sake of the world.

I invite them to see their marriage as more than just for their own happiness. All families — whether they are one person or twenty one — have something to offer.

Martin Luther described a certain flow of God’s love. Luther, that pastor after whom our church is named, was also a deviant in his time: while others were focused on what we can do to earn our way up to God, Luther knew the flow worked the other way, that God’s love always comes down to us into our lives.

But it doesn’t stop there.

God’s love fills us up and overflows whatever sections and dividers and trays that we’ve built and spills out across our lives — and beyond. Out of ourselves. Out of our households. Out of our churches into the world.

God’s love pays little attention to the compartments we’ve set up. God wants to make a radical difference in every part of your life. From the public meetings to the private discussions at home, being a follower of Jesus becomes radically inclusive of every facet of life.

So when we join together around this table today, imagine that the bread and wine that we share spills over the table, over the rails (much to the surprise of the altar guild) and through you out the doors of this building and into your lives, and beyond.

How will you pray during your next meal after communion, knowing that God’s gift of food and forgiveness is yours every day, not just Sunday? Since our trays are overflowing and our cups runneth over, whom might you share a meal with this week?

What compartment in your life is next to be flooded with God’s love?

Nicodemus is one of my favorite characters in the Gospel of John. Not only because he has this somewhat humorous conversation with Jesus that goes back and forth, but also because he shows up exactly three times in the Gospel —- and changes each time. The first time, he is curious about Jesus, but challenges him with the questions that we heard in today’s reading. The second time, he is second-guessing his opposition to Jesus and especially that of the rest of the Pharisees. By the third time we meet him, Nicodemus is lovingly and solemnly helping prepare Jesus for burial.

By the end of the Gospel, Nicodemus gets it. There’s hope for him. He grows.

But today, we heard about the first meeting between Jesus and Nicodemus. Nicodemus does not yet get it. Typical of other religious leaders, Nicodemus seems to have a fundamental misunderstanding about what Jesus is all about. Jesus talks about seeing the Kingdom of God; Nicodemus approaches him at night, under the cover of darkness. Jesus talks about being born ‘from above’; Nicodemus misinterprets it merely as being ‘born again.’ Jesus talk about the Spirit; Nicodemus is perplexed.

It’s like Jesus and Nicodemus are talking on two totally different levels.

This weekend, many Christian congregations will be looking at these same texts (RCL…) and will be marking this particular Sunday as ‘Holy Trinity Sunday’ to commemorate the classic identity of our God as three in one, one in three, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Many preachers will try to explain to their listeners about the mysterious doctrine about a God that is somehow both three and one —- not three parts of a whole, but totally three, and at the same time, totally one.

I have to think that there is a whole lot of talking happening at different levels. Either because the preacher is well-versed in this mystery and is preaching to people that really can’t tell what he or she is talking about. Or, more honestly, a preacher and a people down on one level, trying to understand a God on a different level. (By the way, a good litmus test for your understanding of the Trinity is that if it makes perfect sense, it’s probably actually a heresy!)

It could be that we’re all as perplexed as Nicodemus, preachers and listeners alike! After all, God can seem pretty far up there, if you’re talking about levels. The first lesson we heard today described God as sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and just the hem of his robe filled the temple, and winged creatures are above were singing ‘Holy, holy, holy!’

From our Psalm:

“The voice of the LORD breaks the cedars; the LORD breaks the cedars of Lebanon. He makes Lebanon skip like a calf, and Sirion like a young wild ox.” (Psalms 29.5–6 NRSV)

It can sound like a God who, upon finding out that you have an incorrect understanding of the Trinity, or maybe just a bad attitude, would zap you with a bolt of lightning.

Which is why I love Paul’s letter to the Romans, a portion of which we heard again for our second reading. It describes less what the one-in-three and three-in-one nature of God is, and more what it does.

“For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father!” it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ—-if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.” (Romans 8.14–17 NRSV)

Do not fear. It’s not what you know. It’s who you know. Or really, it’s who knows you.

The Trinity is not a chapter in the catechism that you have to understand, it’s a relationship that God invites you into.

It’s God punching a hole through the sky … from the almighty God, to…you. And sending not a lightning bolt, but an inheritance. Calling you a child of God.

We do not worship an idea. We do not worship a beautifully constructed theological doctrine. Lutherans believe in salvation through God’s Grace alone, not salvation through avoiding all the wrong heresies about the Trinity.

Now, maybe we like our distance from God. After all, this is a God who has the power to rip trees out of the ground and to make entire countries tremble, or even skip like an ox, apparently.

Maybe we hold beliefs like Nicodemus did that keep us safely separate from God.

Maybe we’ve even turned this beautiful doctrine of the Trinity into a mental exercise that tries to keep God up in our heads, and out of the rest of our lives.

But like Nicodemus, we experience the Good News of Jesus Christ in our lives and it changes everything.

God punches a hole in the sky (and whatever other barriers we’ve put in the way).

No matter what anyone has ever told you about whether you belong in God’s temple; No matter what anyone has ever told you about your identity; No matter what you’ve told yourself:

God falls down through the levels and gives us —- gives us —- the spirit to cry “Abba, Father.” To call God, “Our Father,” and mean it.

Story from one of my professors

My mother grew up in Milwaukee in a mixed religious household. Her father had been brought up Roman Catholic and her mother Lutheran. However, as the youngest of eleven children, she had never become a member of any congregation. So, in her early twenties, she finally began instruction to join a Lutheran church. When her schedule as a nurse and her pastor’s schedule fit together, she would take the streetcar from her house to Bethany Lutheran Church to receive personal instruction from Pastor Beiderwieden, whose daughter was one of her best friends. She went for weeks. Then one Saturday as she made her way back to the streetcar stop, it suddenly struck her: Jesus Christ died for me! The insight was so overwhelming that she kept repeating it. In tears, she turned around and walked all the way back to the church. Bursting in on the unsuspecting pastor, she blurred out, “Pastor Beiderwieden, Jesus died for me!” He looked up from his desk, “Yes, Janet,” he replied with a broad smile. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.

When we experience what it means for the creator of the universe to also love us, as a person, we understand the Trinity better than any professor could explain it.

It really is about who knows you. It’s about God who so loved the entire universe he created that he sent Jesus to break through to us so that each and every one of his children would know that even though our world is giant, and even though it can be easy to get lost, that we, too, are loved. That our neighbors are loved. And that together, through the spirit we cry out to God, “holy, holy, holy.”

Amen, amen, and amen.