Boy Jesus

Text: Luke 2:41-52

Perhaps, when Jesus and the scholars in the Temple were talking about scripture, they were talking about sea monsters.

In the Hebrew Bible that Jesus knew, there are a lot of sea monsters. As there are in psalm 148 which we just sang. And in Job: the Leviathan that God made for fun.

And other great stories: There are giants in Genesis and Deuteronomy, like King Og (which is a great name for a giant king).

There are battles won with courage, with bravery, with trickery, and with technology (like the one at Jericho). And there are stories of other remarkable twelve-year-old boys, like David, the shepherd who defeated another great giant and who turned out to be a king, or Samuel who was the first great prophet.

The Bible has some terrific stories for a young man or woman of Jesus’ age. Plus, that age is a time of real and intense wondering about God and how the heavens and the earth all fit together. It is not all that surprising that Jesus liked to spend time with the teachers in the Temple, talking about scripture and asking questions and listening to the answers.

This strange interlude on the First Sunday after Christmas falls in the lectionary between two birth stories: the first on Christmas Day with the shepherds and the manger and the second on Epiphany with the arrival of the three kings. So we jump in our readings from birth to emerging adult and back to birth.

This story about young man Jesus appears only in Luke. There is some thought (based on the words and writing style) that it might have been inserted into Luke from some other source. In many ways this story duplicates the one that appears in Luke just before it. That story, in which Jesus is still just a baby, happens in the Temple as this one does. People are amazed at his presence, just as in this one. His parents don’t get it, just as in this one. His mother Mary treasures in her heart the things she hears and sees, just as she does in this one. And in the end, the story notes that Jesus got older and wiser, just as this one does.

So, why is it here? There are other “Jesus as boy” writings, but in books which never made it into the canon of the Bible because of their questionable authority. The best known is called the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. In it Jesus does miraculous and sometimes not very nice things, things appropriate to a energetic, curious child who is a little unruly.

These stories are almost certainly written to help people fill in a not very complete picture of the person of Jesus. We know him from the birth stories in Luke and Matthew, and as an adult preacher, but nothing of the years between that in our own lives are so influential and revealing.

The purpose of these stories is not, as we sometimes suppose, to prove that Jesus as a boy was really God. It is rather the opposite: to show that Jesus whom we now know as God was really a boy. Did boy-things. Was 100% human even as divine, even when a young person.

In the story in Luke, Jesus amazes the teachers and confounds his parents. It does not take a divine child to do that. Twelve-year-old children are amazing no matter what. They are as able as young king David or young prophet Samuel. They know lots about many complicated things. They become geeks (even church geeks, like Jesus) or fledgling scholars or jocks—all at once. They read and remember like crazy. They have sophisticated ideas about things. They ask penetrating questions, as I’m sure Jesus did, and listen closely to the answers, and are good at finding bugs and flaws in arguments.

And they can be adventurous and unruly and as oblivious of their parents as Jesus was. And as mysterious to their parents as Jesus was to his. They did not understand him, it says. Others saw in him what his parents did not, as often happens.

What we celebrate in these stories is not the adult Jesus who is teacher and savior and divine presence among us. There are lots of other times to do that. What we celebrate is the child of promise that is in every human young man or woman. We see and treasure in our hearts the amazing present and potential future in these children. None of us know any more than Mary did for sure what will happen. But we expect and pray that every twelve-year-old, not just the divine son of God, will grow in years and, we hope, in wisdom and divine and human favor.

These stories remind us forcefully that Jesus was human as well as divine. It seems weird that we should have to do that. It would seem that we would be called more often to defend the divinity of Jesus, not his humanity. But Christians have long had a tendency to embrace the God side of “God incarnate” and to deny or evade the incarnate side. Early heresies made it as if Jesus were God in human clothing—or like Zeus, a god disguised as something else—and we sometimes speak and act even now as if that were how it worked. Lutherans can claim to be virtuous in this regard, being especially adamant about the 100% human, 100% God doctrine. But not so consistently that we can pat ourselves on the back about it.

There is in church jargon something called the “scandal of particularity.” What this means is that Jesus was not a general God-presence in the world but a particular person in a particular time born to a particular family. It was scandalous because how could the infinite God be in a finite person. He was a particular little baby, with round cheeks or not, bald or not, chubby or not, cranky or not. He was a particular twelve-year-old boy, doing twelve-year-old things, getting into trouble, knowing stuff, fighting (maybe) with his brothers, amazing his parents and astonishing his teachers in a particular way.

There is no scandal in particularity. All creatures, all humans are particular, individual, great and strange. If God is to be human, God must be, for us, a particular one.

It is important to our faith that we do not let Jesus become a God who is just a kind of divine, magical, privileged tourist in our foreign, human land. We need, and thankfully we have, a God who likes to read about sea monsters as much as likes to create them.

A Tough Kid, God Remembers

Text: Luke 1:39-55

The story of the Bible is the story of God. Not the whole story of God, which starts long before us, and ends long after us, and encompasses much more than we will ever know. But it is the part of God’s story that has to do with people on this earth. Can we tell a story of God that has nothing to do with us? Maybe. But maybe not. What we do affects God and changes God; we are part of God’s story. But can we tell our story without God in it? Probably not, being creatures of God; though we do try.

The story of the Bible is the story of God. The story of Jesus is, for us, a big part of that story. The story of the birth of Jesus is a high point in that story. But it is by no means the only point.

And for Luke, at the beginning of the story of Jesus is the story of Mary.

Mary was a tough kid from a rough neighborhood. Joseph, her fiancee, was a carpenter—not an admired craftsperson but low on the economic ladder, a rung below subsistence farmer. She was probably a young teenager, thirteen or fourteen years old. It was not a good time to be a Jew in Palestine. Roman soldiers walked the streets, crucifixion was common for minor crimes, like not knowing your place or talking out loud about a time when Israel would be restored to its former greatness. Or your hope for a messiah, a descendant of great King David, to rescue you.

We rightly celebrate what we see as Mary’s willingness to do God’s will in the matter of the birth of God into this world. But this is not a no-brainer for Mary. It is clear from the story that Gabriel’s announcement is really more like an invitation than a command. It is a mark of Mary’s character that she agrees: I am the Lord’s servant, Mary answers. May your word to me be fulfilled. And she sings a song, called Mary’s song, which we also call the Magnificat.

The miracle of Mary as mother of God is not that she was a virgin. In those days stories of virgin birth were a dime a dozen. The miracle was that God would choose someone with such low net worth in the currencies that mattered: property, heritage, gender, education, and age. The scandal of Mary was not about her virginity but about her lot in life and her political position. We see a poetic beauty in Mary’s story, but people of Jesus time found the whole thing to be, as one scholar said, just another reason to think that Christianity was bizarre. The only status she had in the world was, it turned out, her relationship with God. This would have been a big reason why her relative Elizabeth was so surprised.

Mary’s song starts with Mary. It is all about her at the start. Me, me, me; the word appears five times in the first four verses. Great things for me. All generations will call me blessed, and so forth. Really, this seems fair. Mary is as non-plussed as Elizabeth was and as future readers would be. But these verses are just joyful preamble.

Mary knows, as all prophets know, that calls like this rarely benefit the prophets. God’s choice of Mary does not stem from some special goodness in her, but rather from some special goodness in God. The world is about to change, and Mary has a part. But as a prophet, Mary knows that the going will not be easy. Even as young as she is, it seems to me that she understands that being the mother of Jesus will be hard and come to a difficult end. She answers the call out of courage.

God is using Mary to change the way things go. Something is out of kilter. The poor are hungry and the rich have much. The powerful abuse their power over the lowly. The poor are not poor because they are just unfortunate, victims for whom circumstance has not been kind. They are instead victims of ungodly acts of others. This was not God’s plan for things in the story of God and us. Prophets had condemned Israel for this before, and God had intervened before.

The hungry, the lowly, and the outcast are needy. They need something. For them, the world is broken. Things need fixing up, they need repair. The people need salvation, which means rescue and healing. The poor and lowly need a savior, someone to see that God’s plan is enacted.

The rich and powerful do not. They have no sufficient need to plead for help. They do not welcome the same savior as the poor. They are proud in the imagination of their hearts, says the King James version of the Bible. In their inmost thoughts, says another. In their haughty thinking of their hearts, say one more. This is not about their feelings; the heart was the center of thought. It is how they think. They think they do not need God or to do what God wishes. They give themselves credit. And they do not think that by oppressing and exploiting others they oppose God. Or they do not care. Either way, it’s an issue.

This imbalance between those who need much and those who have much is a central theme of Luke. As we have heard in the Gospel readings all Advent. And of the ministry of Jesus in general. And before that, of the law and the prophets. It runs through the story of God and us in the Bible.

It is political, for it is about power. But it is not revolutionary in itself. Luke is not hoping for the obliteration of one group of powerful, wealthy people to be replaced by some other group of people who then become powerful and wealthy. The hope is that the vertical becomes horizontal. The distinctions we make that allow the rich and the poor to have such different lives are not distinctions that God makes.

In Mary’s song God remembers God’s mercy, and recalls the promises made to God’s people. It is God’s memory that is being celebrated here. And justice is a part of God’s story and of God’s promise to God’s people. It is the prospect of broken justice repaired that is celebrated here.

We think of this song as a hopeful predictor of the future. Mary sings, we think, because she has high expectations for the child she will bear. But as someone mentioned in Bible study last week, the verbs are all past tense. This is a song about what God has already done. It is hopeful. It proves that our hopes are not foolish or bizarre, but grounded in the story of God and us up to now. God has been effective. We trust God will continue to be.

This song is the reading for this last Sunday in Advent because it anticipates the birth of Jesus. But Jesus is not even mentioned in Mary’s song at all. He appears only by reference discovered by the imaginations of our hearts. All the hopes of which Mary sings are met in the coming child. God continues to be with us.

Christians live under a promise of a new way of being. For some, that seems absurd, yet another reason to think Christianity to be bizarre. Things go on, and what has been is what will be. There may be hope, but to the cynical we are whistling in the dark. But it is part of the fabric of our faith, the plot of God’s story, to be naive enough to think that God has something in store for this world that will save it and will heal it.

Thanks be to God.

The Shame on Us Good News

Text: Luke 3:7-18

You brood of vipers! You sons and daughters of serpents! You children of snakes!

What kind of people would find these words to be good news? What kind of person would take the scolding that John gives them and interpret it as gospel? Who after hearing such reproaches would then turn to John for guidance?

Recognized as a prophet, imagined by some to be the savior of Israel, John draws huge crowds in the wilderness. He preached repentance, a change of direction; and he baptized people in the river. All sorts of people came to see and hear and be washed by him. Crowds of Jews and probably pagans, despised and cheating tax collectors, Roman soldiers enjoying the wicked privileges of an occupying army. All came to hear John.

By calling them children of vipers, John shames them. He makes them ashamed of themselves. John is not trying to create ill will among the crowd, within the people of the crowd. Instead, he is exposing what they already know. John is not creating a feeling in the people that they do not already have. He is naming an unpleasant conviction that they already hold but have forgotten, or have hidden, or are denying.

The people are ashamed because of what they have done and allowed to be done. Sorrows they have caused and injustices they have let happen. Injustices caused and sorrows they have not prevented. They should be ashamed. We should be ashamed. Shame on us that people starve. Shame on us that people have no place to live. Shame on us that people wage war. Shame on us that some have very much and some next to nothing. Shame on us for obscene violence.

Shame is not the same as guilt. Guilt is in the acts done or left undone, and the relief is in forgiveness. Guilt is the result of works. But shame is Sin with a capital “S.” Shame is about our being. It is how we are saints and sinners at the same time. Forgiven and shamefaced at the same time. We are forgiven our sins, but we remain sinners.

We can feel—or be—not guilty, innocent, and still feel shame for our group, institution, nation, or the world.

Guilt moves us to remorse and apology. Shame moves us to seek a new way of being. We confusingly use the one word, repentance, for both things. But the repentance that comes out of guilt is regret and the repentance that comes from shame is transformation.

The crowds do not apologize. Instead, they ask “What then, should we do?” It is revealing and important that they do not argue with John. They do not equivocate or explain or defend themselves. They do not mock his unreasonable idealism. Nor do they fall into despair or discouragement. They are ashamed. They know that John knows them. John has spied them out correctly. Their eagerness to know what to do now comes straight from their recognition that John is right. In that case, they ask, what shall we do? What, then—in that case, and in particular—what then shall we do?

John responds in the spirit of the question. His answers have nothing to do with feelings and nothing to do with belief. They have to do with what to do. There are three groups in the passage—perhaps standing for the large variety of sorts of people. And for each, John has a different answer. To the crowd: Be economically fair. If you have two coats, give one to a person who has none. To the tax collectors—who in these times ran a kind of protection racket: do not use your position of authority to rob from others. To the soldiers: do not use your threat of power to oppress the people and exploit their fear of you. John advises in favor of fairness, generosity, and humility and against injustice, greed, and dominance. But not in the general—which gets us nowhere; it is like saying “be good”—but in the specific.

Lutherans make the distinction between law and gospel. But this does not mean that the law—rules of behavior and ethics—are inferior to and superseded by the Gospel, or are trivial in light of God’s grace and forgiveness. There is good news in the law, and the law is useful. There are lots of exhortations and advice and commandments and teachings about behavior in the Bible and are part of our faith.

The law, things that tell us what is good to do, convict us. That is, they remind us that what we are doing is not always so great. In that way, they shame us as John’s words shamed the crowd. They discover us hiding behind ramparts of privilege and wealth, ancestry (“We have Abraham as our ancestor!” the crowd thinks), and also competence, good will and good intentions and fine gestures. All the things we use to duck from our shame. The law does not condemn these things—they are often a part of us—but it does treat them as beside the point. The laws reveal us inside the ramparts, which is both embarrassing and good.

And the law also keeps us attentive to other things and places and people of the world. If we are to share our second coat with people who have none, we have to seek and see those people. If we are to visit the prisoners—a kind of law Jesus mentions—then we have to find them. If we are to avoid cheating people, we have to see how what we do cheats them. We have to be aware of how things work and, in our world, how we are connected. The law is a pointer in the right direction.

The law tells us how to live good. It is a rudimentary but fundamental set of instructions. We need to know this stuff and pay attention to it.

The reason the crowd responds with eagerness and not with anger or dismay is that what John is saying is calling to them. That—a calling—is the root of the word “exhortation” in this passage. The people are ashamed. They—we—know this deeply. We are called to act, moved by what we already know deep within us and from the conscience of our traditions. We are given instructions, which are a gift to us.

These words are good news—gospel—not so much, or not only, because they are a summary of what John has just said. But because they are an introduction to the story about to unfold.

This expectation of a coming guide, a trustworthy companion, and an unfolding of a new world, is what makes Mary and the shepherds and the kings we are about to encounter in the next ten days so joyful. In times of trouble and shame, they represent a hope that we are at the beginning of a new way to live.

Out of the Puddle

Text: Luke 3:1-6
Other texts: Luke 1:68-79

In the middle of today’s psalm there is a hinge. On one side, the song looks back at God’s promises to God’s people. A reminder to us and to God. A quoting of past prophets. On the other side, it looks forward to the fulfillment of that promise. A new prophet. A new way.

The psalm connects the past to the future. The psalm sits in the middle of the story of Zechariah and Elizabeth and their new son John. In the verses before it, the mood is dark. There is sadness in Israel, occupied by Rome, living under a repressive power. There is sadness in the family of Zechariah and Elizabeth, who wish to have a child but cannot. The story is seamed with national and personal doubt, disappointment, and discouragement.

Into this mood steps an angel, Gabriel. Gabriel announces that Zechariah and Elizabeth will have a son, even though they are old. Gabriel announces that their child will restore Israel, even though it is defeated. Zechariah does not believe the angel on either count, and for this he is rendered mute. He cannot speak.

Yet things change. Elizabeth becomes pregnant, and gives birth to a son, and Zechariah, now both humble and joyful, is freed to speak, and he sings the song that is the psalm.

Zechariah sings a song both of memory and of restoration. In the first half, he gently reminds God in our hearing that God had promised to protect Israel and keep it safe from its enemies. He mentions Abraham and great King David. He recalls God’s oath to free Israel so that it might worship in freedom.

Yet, by the time Luke’s Gospel was written, it was pretty clear that things had to change, were changing. Conditions that had prevailed for centuries no longer did. Things that had once worked no longer did. Trying to do the same things over and over and expecting different results had proved fruitless. The Temple in Jerusalem, God’s house, had been destroyed twice, and for good this time. The land which once was Israel’s was occupied by someone else. Jerusalem, the city of David, no longer ruled. Israel was bullied and oppressed. This was not how it was supposed to be.

So in the second half of Zechariah’s song, he explains that the promise of God is to be renewed. His son, John, will be a prophet to the people. Teaching them how—giving them the knowledge, it says—how to restore God’s people. And John does teach them.

John, after he grows up a bit, preaches, it says, a baptism of repentance. It is the right message for the son of Zechariah and Elizabeth and for the times. Repentance means to change direction. To change one’s thinking, or to discover a new way of thinking.

It was no surprise that John was out in the wilderness. For Israel, the wilderness was a fertile ground for transformation. The wilderness was the stage on which the exodus from Egypt was played. In the wilderness the Law was given to Moses and the people. In the wilderness the people of Israel were transformed from a enslaved, nomadic people into a nation with a permanent home. The home the Romans now occupied.

For Israel, the wilderness represented both a reminder of Israel’s beginnings and a reminder that when God steps in, the world can be transformed.

John preaches about transformation—a baptism for the repentance of sins. For us today, and for the people who heard John, the word repentance has many meanings.

It could mean, for one, personal regret—that you were sorry for something you did or didn’t do. Or it could mean that you changed your mind about something, based on new knowledge. Or it could mean (though not so much these days) that you’ve taken part in a rite of penance. A lot of John’s audience would have heard it in theses ways.

But its unlikely that that’s what John meant.

The word that we translate repentance means a change of mind, a change of thinking. But not just the intellectual mind, also the emotional mind and the spiritual mind. For John, the word means a change in the whole being of a person. To repent means to see things in a whole new way. It means conversion. To repent is to be more than fixed up; it means to be transformed.

In trying to explain what John is doing, Luke quotes Isaiah about road building, about trying to get across valleys and over mountains.

We can fall into places as dark and depressed as a ravine. There we find ourselves with all the trash that gathers around us in our lives. Bits of envy and hatred. Pieces of greed and self righteousness. Tangles of worry and obsession.

And we can be flummoxed by obstacles as tall as mountains. Things that once seemed easy seem difficult. Things that were once challenging seem impossible. We are afraid to move ahead, fearful of the beasts that might lie ahead, imaging what will happen. What if we take a risk and get into trouble? We are not so sure we can find a way through.

It happens, to institutions, to systems, to nations as easily as it happens to us.

It is tempting at times like these to fix things with minor adjustments to the way we have always done things. To make improvements. Or to deny the need for repentance.

For John, and for Jesus following him, repentance is not business as usual, only in a better, nicer way. For John, and for Jesus, to repent means to change what is important to you. To turn your back on those things which so far have demanded your loyalty. It is to turn to God unconditionally and to turn away from all that is against God. Not just things that are evil, but all things that make it impossible to turn to God.

Luke was right to quote Isaiah here. For John, trying to change your life in the ways we usually do is like building trestle bridges over the ravines, constructing hairpin switchbacks on mountain roads, and putting better signs at the confusing intersections. What John preaches is a world in which the ravines are all filled up, the mountains all made low, the crooked roads made straight. It is a world transformed.

What makes Zechariah so joyful is not that his son John will berate people about their past evil—although he does, as we’ll hear next week. The song is joyful because the repentance that John will preach promises—as to Zechariah sings at the end—promises to bring light to those those who live in darkness and despair, and to put our feet on the path of peace.

There is a purpose to John’s preaching, and it is not to make us feel bad. It is to encourage us not to sit in a puddle of discouragement and defeat. It is to remind us that we are not condemned to live out everlasting disfunction.

God visits us, it says in the psalm. We can take God seriously. When God comes to visit, the world cannot remain unchanged.

Kings and Truth

Text: John 18:33-38

Today is the last Sunday in the church year. It is called Christ the King Sunday. You may think it is an ancient feast day of the church, as most of our Sunday feast days are. But it is not. The name (and the topic) was an invention of Pope Pius the XI in 1925. That was a tough time for the Western world, and especially Europe, which had just recently fought the first World War and was on the verge of the Great Depression. Peace and justice did not reign. Pius felt that faithful people needed to be reminded that Jesus was their guide, not only on the heavenly trail but in people’s private and public lives in this world. In a time when earthly kings were falling, we needed a more trustworthy one.

We modern types do not have much respect for kings and kingship. So people have—and I have—sometimes called today the Realm of Christ Sunday, or the Reign of Christ Sunday. In one sense, this is more to the point. Jesus never liked or wanted the title of king, referring when necessary to the kingdom more than the king. He does it in today’s Gospel verses. But in another sense what people are looking for, talking about, and afraid of in the Gospels and especially in John, is King Jesus. A person with power who can command fealty, who is wise, and who leads us with goodness to mercy and justice.

The question of Jesus as king dominates this part of the Gospel of John. In a couple of dozen verses John presents seven scenes declaring or questioning Jesus’ identity or ambitions as king. In today’s verses, the issue puts Pilate on the spot.

Pilate is the emperor’s—Caesar’s—man in Palestine. Pilate seems confused. He walks back and forth. He cannot really imagine that this man Jesus pretends to be a king—or The King in John. Are you the king? You can see Pilate’s disbelief and disdain. How could this poor preacher and teacher be king? Yet Pilate cannot afford to ignore Jesus. What would happen to Pilate if the Jesus movement caught hold? Any threat to Rome is a threat to Pilate.

But when Pilate asks Jesus: are you the king? Jesus responds instead with talk about the kingdom and about truth.

Pilate did not take this answer to be about some future time or some heavenly place. Jesus speaks about the kingdom in the present tense and in the present place. Jesus says his kingdom is not from this world, but it is in this world. Caesar’s authority comes from this world; it is a mortal authority. Jesus’ authority does not come from this world. It is not founded on mortal authority. But it is a kingdom in this world in the sense that it applies to our mortal lives here and now. Pilate is right to be worried. Jesus represents and presents an alternative set of moral and political guides. Different from Caesar’s and his cronies throughout history. More truthful, as Jesus says. Pilate asks about kings. Jesus answers about truth.

To testify to the truth, he says. Jesus is not talking about a competition between ideologies. Not a debate about policies, doctrines, or beliefs. Not true facts. More like trustworthiness. Like being true blue. Or devoted. Like a true friend. To be true is to be in alignment with the world as God created it to be. To move smoothly and effortless with God. Like a wheel that is true.

But things rarely go as smoothly as we hope. At times—maybe most times—life is a little vague. A little foggy. Edges and boundaries are uncertain, and we cannot always tell one thing from another, the good from the evil, risk from foolishness, love for others from love of self. We need a way to see what is true. We need clear vision.

The kingdom of God and truth are related. Jesus relates them. Truth is a good answer to Pilate’s question: are you the king? The kingdom Jesus talks about is a world—this world—in which we see things clearly. The life and teachings of Jesus present to us a picture of the way things are and they way they might be. Rulers of this world present another. The question we have to ask ourselves is which picture seems to us to be a convincing reality? Truth should reveal what actually is, what is real. Which picture seems true?

We humans have had a lot of experience living according to the truths of the world—political, philosophical, cultural institutions. And now here we are. Does it seem to you that we see things clearly? This is a practical issue, not a metaphysical one. Which portrayal of the world is most useful to us and to the world?

We desire to belong to the truth, as Jesus puts it. We long for a kingdom of peace, well-being, and contentment for every person. We are drawn to Christ because he seems to us to be trustworthy, deserving of our loyalty, and a true guide.

The opposite of truth is not falsehood but fantasy. We often live in a way that is at least a little fantastic. We think a lot of ourselves, or too little. We deny the suffering of others. We imagine motives where none exist. We hide from ourselves our own sorrow. These kind of things are the fog machines of life. They blind and confuse us.

The opposite of truth is fantasy, but the enemy of truth is indifference. If it makes no difference, why bother? What good is truth in that case? If the truth does not change me, what good is it? If the truth does not lead me to action, what good is it? If the truth does not guide me, what good is it?

We are mere creatures. Truth guides our actions. We need to know what to do day to day. We need to know at each crossroad where to turn. Left, right, straight ahead, or turn back. We need to know when to speak up and when to shut up. We need to know when to take risks and when to play it safe.

Pope Pius was right in a way. Maybe not about kings, but about our need for something like a king. About our need to know how to live.

Peace and justice do not reign. Who comes to guide us? Who says the truth? Whom shall we follow?

Apocalypse Revealed

Text: Mark 13:1-8

In a learned discussion about this reading a while ago, the general consensus was: What the heck?

For two thousand years we have been hearing the same old predictions about the end of time. The signs of things to come by now are cliche. Nation against nation. Famines. Earthquakes. How can these be signs? Wars and rumors of wars, hardship and hunger, natural disaster, and let us add disease—these are the story of civilization.

Buildings are not supposed to fall down. Floods are not supposed to wipe out villages and cities. Crops are not supposed to be lost to drought and bugs. But they do and they have always done. For centuries people have tried to fix the end of time by using events like this as markers. But the events are so common that they do not distinguish one time from another.

When these particular words were written by Mark, chaos ruled. They were probably written during, or just after, the First Jewish-Roman war, in which Israel attempted to rebel against the oppressive Roman occupation. It was not a successful revolt. The result devastated the Jews. Many fled Palestine, and many others were enslaved.

Like hicks visiting the city, the disciples earlier had been amazed by the grandeur of the Temple and the size of the stones. But the stones were pulled down, just as Jesus predicted, by the Romans, a prophecy that Mark in hindsight was confident reporting. The Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed. This massive and elaborate structure was God’s house and the geographic and spiritual center of life, and had been standing for five centuries.

Jerusalem had been the center of commerce, politics, and faith. Imagine New York, DC, and—I don’t know—the Vatican rolled into one. To see Jerusalem destroyed was to see the end of a nation, and the certain end of an era—a centuries-long era. It would have seemed like the end of the world. There would have seemed to be no more future.

When the things and people at the center of our lives are destroyed and taken away, clocks stop ticking. The future disappears. Day follows day, but nothing advances.

People who suffer trauma—wars and floods and fires, but also loss of someone they love—feel that the ground under their feet is no longer trustworthy. The things that keep them safe cannot be counted on. The seawalls will not hold. The skies are no longer innocent. There is no shelter. There is no protector. Things are no longer in their right places. It is chaos.

You can therefore see how the prospect of the end of time might seem to be not horrible but comfortable. A relief from suffering and from the struggle against suffering and from the exhaustion of hoping.

The destruction of the second Temple was, it turned out, the end of something old and the birth of something new, just as Jesus foretold. The center of faithful life continued its slow turning toward the rabbis; and some instead chose to follow a preacher, prophet, and healer named Jesus. Little ended up to be the same as it had been. It was a new age. Just not the one people expected.

Events need to have meaning. We are not comfortable thinking that things just happen for no reason. Not one stone was left upon another; all were thrown down. But here we are, two millennia later, living ordinary lives. Life does go on.

Yet to know this would not have helped the people in Palestine. It was not the continuation of the world that they longed for—but rather some scheme that would place their present mess in God’s context. When you see all these things, Jesus tells them, do not be alarmed. These are not just bad things. They are part of a larger plan. They are just the beginning of a new beginning. (Not even the labor pains, but just that beginning of contractions when you think it is maybe time to get the hospital suitcase out of the closet.) They—these events—make sense because they point to the future.

When there seems to be nothing more than day to day, when every day seems to be a copy of the dark day before, then even a tiny glimpse of the future—any future—is life-saving. That day when you see that tomorrow might be different from today is the day when you can begin to hope for salvation and healing.

When we read scripture, we have to think: where do I stand in relation to this text? Is it written for me? Is it about some particular thing or some general principle? Apocalyptic texts like this one in Mark—the whole chapter is like this, not just the verses we heard—texts like this make us ask those questions more urgently.

We might decide that we are only observers to a long-ago event. It’s a story. The lesson we take then is what it tells us about Jesus with his disciples. It tells us about how what kind of leader Jesus was, for example.

Or we might decide that since Mark was written decades after the death of Jesus, it only tells us what kind of thing the writer Mark was interested in about Jesus. That Mark sees the events in Jerusalem as having to do less with Jewish-Roman politics and more to do with the nature of Jesus. Events in history are subordinate to the story of Jesus and are more like props in that drama.

Or we might decide that this text describes something not so much in the life of Jesus but in our lives. That the text is prophecy for us. It describes a time in history, but it is our history. If we do that, as some do, we search for clues in the words that help us determine when all this is going to happen and, in particular, whether it is soon. So Jesus’ advice to his disciples—be aware! watch out!—is really advice to us. We need to be attentive.

Or instead, we might decide that the text is (for us) not about Jesus’ time or Mark’s time or our time. It is rather a way for us to know God, to know who we are, and to get an idea of what we are to do. It is grist for the mill of our faith. It has the same force and effect as the parables Jesus tells, the words from Paul in his letters, the stories of king David, the songs of the psalm. We might decide, then, that this apocalyptic story is timeless, just as all those other ways we hear God’s word are. No more, and no less, than those other ways.

Our response to this story and other apocalyptic stories like it in Daniel, for example, or in Revelation, reveals much about us: it reveals our own deepest hopes and most profound worries about God. It tells us about ourselves as well as about God. It tells us about guilt and shame and about gratitude. About whether we accept God’s forgiveness. And about where God is.

So you might in the end decide that this particular story tells us the same old thing, the same old thing that the Bible has been telling us for more than three thousand years. That God is here in the workings of the world. That all things in the world are God’s. And that God is good.

The Trust Network

Text: Ruth 3-4; Psalm 146

Put not your trust in rulers. This from today’s psalm is hard advice to hear after just finishing an exhausting but resolved election campaign. Though some are unhappy with the result, the ferocity of the campaign tells us that most people are willing to put their trust in rulers; the only question being which ones.

Psalm 146 is usually described as a psalm of trust. God is trustworthy because God keeps God’s promises, brings justice, feeds the hungry, lifts the downtrodden, and frustrates the wicked. Yet in another way the psalm is about distrust. It starts with the admonition about rulers, which it extends to all living creatures, or at least all humans. We and our thoughts perish. We are mortal, short-lived, and imperfect. And because of that, not worthy of trust.

Yet, we are creatures of the earth. The sun rises and sets, fortunes change, unexpected joys and troubles find us. We need to eat. We are social creatures, binding ourselves to others or fighting against them. Is it even possible to trust God without trusting humans? If we never trust other people, how can we actually in our day to day life trust God? When we trust others, we trust God.

Ruth is a foreigner, from Moab, married into an Israelite family. Yet when her husband dies, her mother-in-law Naomi, urges her to return to her own people. Ruth will not, and she famously says to Naomi, “Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried.”

There is a two-way connection of trust here. Ruth trusting that she will be safe with Naomi, and Naomi trusting that Ruth will act as a daughter to her. But it extends beyond these two protagonists. Later, Ruth trusts Naomi’s family to provide for her, which they do. And in today’s story, Ruth trusts Naomi’s scheming ways, which turn out in the end to be good for everyone. Naomi trust’s Boaz’s good nature and sense of duty. Boaz trusts Ruth’s good will and in God’s providence. It is a complicated network of trust. God is hardly mentioned in it—just in passing, really—yet trust in God is its foundation. Just because God is hardly mentioned does not mean that God is not present. Just because we do not always talk about the work of God’s hand does not mean that we do not feel it to be there. Too many negatives in that sentence; let’s try this: we know God’s hand guides us even when we do not chatter on about it.

There are strong cultural, local, and family connections in the story of Ruth. In the story of the Bible, for that matter. There is a tension between—or better to say a cooperation between—between the personal and the community in our relationship with God and what we hope from God. The church (not this church, the whole church) has been arguing for centuries about whether personal piety—one’s individual connection with God, with Jesus—or community behavior—how we as a culture are guided by God—is more important. But clearly the answer is Yes. Salvation is both singular and plural.

The community welcomes Ruth, an outsider, gathers around her, and takes her in, and feeds her (it is no accident that so much of the story has to do with grain, food, and drink). She and her mother-in-law Naomi are redeemed, it says, meaning claimed. As a consequence, the family line is extended on to David, Israel’s greatest king, and according to Matthew’s Gospel, on to Jesus.

Ruth and Naomi come to the story with nothing. They are impoverished and without stature. The widow who trusts Elijah in the second reading has nothing. Just enough food to eat one last meal. The widow in the Gospel story has nothing. Just a little to give all of it away. We don’t know what happens to that woman. But we do know that Elijah and the widow, and Ruth and Naomi, survive. They do so because of a mixture of God’s intervention plus God’s actions implemented in the actions of other people. People acting together and trusting one another as much as they are able.

In the Gospel reading, Jesus has contempt for the scribes. They are both arrogant and cruel, devouring widows’ houses and who knows what else. In their cruelty, they deny God’s commandment, reiterated by Jesus, to care for those who are in need. In their arrogance, they forget that God is the creator and source. They congratulate themselves, patting themselves on the back, think themselves especially worthy of respect and places of honor. They imagine themselves to be responsible for their lives of abundance.

They do not recognize how they are the product of God’s grace and the many graces of the people of the culture in which they live. They forget somehow—something that the characters in the story of Ruth would never forget—that people are interdependent. The fortunes of each of us are tangled up with the fortunes of all of us. The scribes in Jesus’ story are the rulers the psalm warns against.

The genealogical line from Abraham to Jesus that begins the first chapter of the Gospel of Matthew goes through Ruth. This is remarkable. Ruth is an outsider, a Moabite. The rules and tradition among Israelites against intermarriage were very strong. Yet Ruth marries Boaz, and they give birth to a child, even though Boaz is getting on in years. And that child becomes the grandfather of great king David.

The line runs through Ruth plus three other gentile women: Rahab, Tamar, Bathsheba, plus Ruth. Without these foreigners, these people otherwise despised, there would be no line. (In fact, Tamar is remembered by the townspeople as they give a blessing to Ruth). The righteous scribes need to remember that they would not have wealth and power without these four women.

We can conclude from Ruth’s story and the story of the others that God is not inclined to stand on ceremony when something needs to get done. It is not so much that God has a plan and finds the best people to implement it. It is rather that God makes good use of the people who happen to be there. It seems that God extracts the plan from the events that have already unfolded.

A corollary to this is that God works in the daily lives and decisions of people, and lots of different kinds of people—even leaders. And also that the interdependence of people is a form of God’s grace. A means of grace.

I’d like to say a word about Veterans Day, which is today. It used to be called Armistice Day, when the first World War ended. The eleventh hour on the 11th day of the 11th month. It was meant originally to celebrate the end of war in general. We see how well that worked out. But hoping for an end to war especially on this day is not foolishness.

We continue to hope for peace because we learn from these stories and others that even the very unlikely—the inconceivable—is possible with God. Using us, God’s children. And showing us again and again that we are all in this together. And teaching us to trust in God by trusting one another, God’s daughters and sons.

Bookends

Text: Revelation 21:1-6
Other texts: John 11:32-44, Isaiah 25:6-8

The Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. These words open and close the book of Revelation, the last book of the Bible. I am, says the voice from the throne, the A to Z, the start and the destination, the first and the last.

To understand the end, we have to look at the beginning. The very beginning, the book of Genesis, the first book of the Bible. Chapter 1, verse 1. “In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep.” The universe was not created from nothing. It was formed from chaos, from the deep, from the cold void. Out of chaos God formed order, making boundaries between one thing and another. Making distinctions, creating meaning. Naming things. Dividing night from day, sky from earth. A story begins.

We who live in an infinitesimal fraction of all time see time as orderly and directional. Clear in the moments but indefinite in the epochs. Cosmologists postulate a moment of creation of the universe about fourteen billion years ago, but which in the end probably gets colder and slower forever, or nearly so. That is one way to talk about it.

We who live in God’s hands see time as intentional and passionate. Clear in total but only partially revealed in the moments. In this language—which is parallel to the language of physical cosmology, describing the one, same universe—the world has a beginning and an end that are both marked by God’s will and presence. There are two ends: Genesis and Revelation, not by accident being bookends to the story of the Bible in between. We start and end with God, seeing God no matter in what direction we look.

God is in the personal as in the cosmic. In this vast time we live in our own short times. We have our own Alpha and Omega. We are formed from will and love and out of the miscellaneous atoms of the earth—who knows where any of these tiny building blocks come from for any one child? And in the end we let all that substance go back into the earth for the creatures that follow. From dust to dust, we remind ourselves. Like all creatures, we are created and we die.

We are not designed to live forever in this body. Often times that is a blessing, and ashes to ashes is a blessed promise. Weariness and the burden of memories (both regretful and joyful) and the increasing disorder of our systems makes an end welcome and moves us to pray to be taken home.

But also often: not. People go before their time. Accident, disease, violence claim our moments and cut them short. And even when some persons might be glad to leave, those of us who remain grieve their loss and mourn their company. And are left deeply disturbed, as Jesus was, standing beside his friends Martha and Mary and in front of the tomb of his friend Lazarus. Jesus was angry, it says. Troubled, the way we are at the death of someone we love. Or at anyone’s death. We report how many people died from hurricane Sandy, or in a bomb attack in Syria, and hearing that, we are distressed. Today we light candles in honor and grief, and as we do, the others who watch each of us are moved because they know.

Even in the face of the Resurrection, Christians cannot ignore the affront that death is, and its sorrow. Even if the true significance of death is less than we feel, it is not nothing. Death signifies something, even if we are not sure exactly what, or how it all works.

When Jesus comes to meet Martha and then Mary, they are understandably desperate. Death is powerful and voracious and has swallowed up Lazarus. Yet their complaints to Jesus—Lord, if you had been here, they each say, Lazarus would be alive—show a realization that maybe, probably, in Jesus there is a countervailing force. They and everyone seem to be confused about what is possible—could Jesus have saved their brother? He stinks in the tomb; is it too late? Can Jesus save him still? If so, does that mean now? Or at the end of time?

It is not clear why Jesus cries. It is overdetermined. Is it because he waited? Because Martha and Mary are brought to their knees in grief? Because he put his obligations of his mission ahead of his friendship? Or because he is just plain sad at the death of Lazarus? Are these tears of shame, or frustration, or regret, or grief? As ours might be. What is clear is that Jesus is angry at death and indignant (described much too weakly in our Bibles as disturbed). Mary and Martha and we share his indignation. He is not fond of death.

The story of the Bible begins with the creation of life and ends with the destruction of death. And in between, are God’s presence and promise in the face of death. The passage we heard in Revelation quotes the passage we read in Isaiah. When the tears remain, God will wipe them away. But in the end—and the end is what Revelation is about—in the end God will wipe away death altogether. God will swallow up greedy death. No more crying or mourning or pain. Death is hungry, but God is more hungry for life. God has wished us into being and wishes us to be.

The story of Revelation is in one sense a long undo, a long rewind of the story of creation. The first heaven and the first earth made in Genesis are the story in which we now live. It is not quite right. For whatever reason, things have not quite worked out as God intended, and death brings sorrow. In Revelation, the story is played back to the beginning, to a new heaven and a new earth. But in this second version, even the chaos that existed before creation will be gone. The sea—the dark abyss—is no more, it says. There will be no evil left to seep in and pervert God’s will for creation. Not this time.

The world of the story of the Bible goes from A to Z. As in the Dr. Seuss book, it turns out there is something good beyond Z. But that seems to be another story that we only get a hint of. In Genesis, a story begins. It does not end in Revelation, but a new story begins. Heaven resides on earth, mourning and crying and pain will be no more, and God lives here, too.

Around the altarpiece here are the words—in Swedish—the words “the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” Marking the beginning and the end of that promise are two letters. Alpha at one end and at the other not Omega, but Omicron. In Greek, Omicron is in the alphabet just beyond the middle, as O is in English. Omega is the end. Omicron is not the end.

Perhaps this was a mistake by those who painted the mural. But perhaps not. Perhaps it it good theology—a reminder to us. We live somewhere between Alpha and Omega, in a time both of sorrow and of hope. Ours, and God’s.

The Bible from beginning to end is a long love story, about God’s love for us and for all creation. We, all of us and each of us, live in a story that begins and ends with God’s hopes and God’s promise.

The Times They Are A-changin'

Text: Readings for Reformation Sunday

In 1454 the invention of printing using movable type came to Europe. It was a technology whose time had come. Within thirty years, there were printing presses throughout Europe, and especially in northern Italy and central Europe.

In 1492, Columbus came upon a world across the western ocean. Vast lands and cultures that until then were completely unknown to Europeans suddenly appeared. It was amazing and disconcerting.

In the centuries just before, the temperature in Europe increased, the summers were longer and the winters more mild. As a result, crop harvests increased, and people ate better and had more free time. Fewer people were needed on the land, and more people congregated in cites. Political power began to fragment just a bit.

At the same time the Church of Rome, having abused its power, was increasingly the target of complaints and protests. There were calls—quashed by the Church—for reform.

Into this time of adventure, discontent, and sense of new possibility stepped Martin Luther. Unhappy law student turned monk and teacher, Luther was the right man at the right time. On the eve of All Saints Day—that is, on Halloween—he wrote a letter to the bishop titled “Disputation of Martin Luther on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences.” In it were ninety-five statements and questions—the Ninety-five Theses—arguing against the church’s abusive and wicked sale of indulgences, which were a kind of relief connected to penance. This document is surprisingly dull, but contains gems like “the treasures of the Gospel are nets with which [the church] formerly [fished] for men of riches. The treasures of the indulgences are nets with which they now fish for the riches of men.” And you can detect in this document the clarity, power, and heedlessness of Luther’s thinking.

The document was said to have been posted on the doors of All Saint’s Church in Wittenburg. That would have been the end of the story in a different time. But in these agitated times, it was not. The document was, first, translated into German—the language of the people—from Latin—the language of the clergy. And second, it was printed on those printing presses.

The press was the internet of its day, and worked in many of the same ways, only a lot slower. Each town had a press. A document like Luther’s would be printed in one town; a copy would be sent to the next town, where the printer would re-set the type and print out another run, some copies of which would go to other towns, where the process would repeat. For the first time in history, there was a way to disseminate a lot of copies of a document quickly and, more important, without approval by a central controlling authority. It turned out that Luther was both a beneficiary and a master of this technology. A man like Luther in a time like his in a political and technological environment like that—it was a great recipe for the upheaval and change that was the Reformation.

Today is Reformation Sunday, always the Sunday before Halloween. It is Reformation Sunday, not Martin Luther Sunday. And for Luther, it was never about Luther. Well, that is not quite right—Luther was bombastic, earthy, impulsive, courageous, and prolific. He had a lot to say and did not hesitate to say it. Often. Nonetheless, there were two results of his actions and words that he would not have wanted to happen. First, he did not want or expect the church to split into two churches (and eventually into many). He wanted to reform the church, not break it. And second, he did not see himself as the hero of a moment. That there is now a worldwide denomination called Lutheran would have not have pleased him.

There were a lot of theological implications of the Reformation. The arguments fought and the positions defended then have become dogma now. The insights have become mottos. Faith apart from works. Sola scriptura. The infinite contained in the finite. Saints and sinners both. This is a good thing, not to be mocked. What was argued so forcibly then have by now become the foundations for a clear way—and being Lutherans, we think a better way—of being with God.

And the social implications of the theology fit with the changing culture. A more dispersed division of power (but not yet very democratic). Worship (and scripture) for the first time in many centuries in the language of people. Holy Communion for lay people. A new kind of accountability.

But even so, these were more a part of a bigger move toward a re-vitalized church. A church that does not change risks ignoring the call of God inviting it into the future. When a church thinks about preserving what has been accomplished and defending itself, and discarding what it sees as enemies within, it shows an arrogance that denies the ongoing work of God in the world. Something for sure was happening in Europe at the time. Just like now. We need, as Luther was fond of repeating, to be watchful for the work of the devil. But not so watchful that we cannot see the work of God.

The readings for Reformation Sunday (and they are always these same readings every year) could be seen as campaign buttons for Christian Protestantism. But it is more helpful if we see them not as about the church and church-going and more about God’s presence here with us in this world. What they, the readings, have in common is a sense of intimacy with God and closeness even in the face of God’s hugeness in space and time. This realization was not new to Christians, but maybe it had been pushed into the corner a bit. The Reformation took it out of the corner and put it in a place of honor in the middle of the room. God is not far off. God does not need to speak to us or we to God through attorneys secular or religious, or with special words or in special postures.

God is in the midst of the city. God abides in us and we in God. God is here. Here in the community of faith, here in the world, here in our day to day life, abiding here in our hearts.

We Lutherans need to remember that the Reformation did not create or even discover new doctrine. That’s why it is called the Reformation and not the Revolution. Instead, it restored to us a way of seeing God; it gave us new eyes. Or opened the ones we already had, perhaps. It helped us to see God in the events of the times, in the people, in changing politics. And in our own experiences. To see the hand of God as always meddling—in a good way. And encouraged us to keep our eyes open for God here and now.

There is a danger of successful movements as the church has been to become stiff and creaky and curmudgeonly. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But first, it is almost always broken some way. And more important, it is not up to us to preserve the church. The church is God’s. And if the Reformation demonstrated anything at all, it is that God it still engaged in its future. Maybe more than we are.

Servant Drama

Text: Mark 10:35-45

There is a little three-act play almost exactly in the center of Mark’s Gospel. And in each act, there is a three-part dance. The dance is the same, with some variation, in each act. For those following along, they appear in chapters 8, 9, and 10. We just heard the third and final act and saw the third dance. Jesus and the disciples are the dancers. And the dance goes like this.

In the first movement of the dance, Jesus tells the disciples that the Son of Man, whom we read to be Jesus himself, is to be handed over to the authorities. They will condemn him to death, and he will be executed. Three days later he will rise again.

In the second movement, the disciples are non-plussed. The do not understand what Jesus just said to them, or do not want to believe it, or rebuke Jesus for even mentioning it, or pretend like he did not. That’s the case today, where James and John, after hearing Jesus discuss his death, say as if they never heard him at all: Thanks for sharing; now, when you come into power, can we have the best and most prestigious and most influential seats? They hear the bad news and without missing a beat, ask Jesus for special favors.

And in the third movement, Jesus makes the disciples sit down while he explains what he said and what it will mean to them. Which is that things will be different. The last will be first, the first last. In today’s reading: if you want to be first, you have to be slave of all people.

We traditionally call the three acts “the Passion predictions of Jesus,” because they say what we readers know is about to happen. You will see a title like that in your Bibles. In our Bible, its says “A Third Time Jesus Foretells His Death and Resurrection.” But those heading are not actually part of the Bible. They are titles stuck in by the editors—a kind of interpretation. It is true that there is some predicting here—about the handed over, execution, and resurrection part. We are used to thinking about that. And though it was a shocker when Jesus said it, it does not shock us so much. Because we know the story.

But in each case, there is also the first and last, slave and servant, gaining and losing part. That has to do with the kind of messiah Jesus might be and what kingdom the messiah might bring about. Which is doubtless harder to think about. So perhaps it would be useful to instead name these three acts: “what kind of messiah Jesus says he is.”

And what Jesus says is that he is a servant. And that the kingdom of God will be filled with servant people. That is how he describes himself and his mission. The Son of man came not to be served but to serve.

The Isaiah passage we heard is called the Suffering Servant. We recognize Jesus in this passage. Not because Isaiah was talking about Jesus, but because the words in Isaiah seem to us to be a really good description of Jesus, a good description of the way we think of Jesus, and what we teach about Jesus. At Faith we emphasize Jesus as the good shepherd—thus the mural—but the shepherd is not the boss of the sheep but rather serves the sheep.

And being a servant is the way Jesus lives. And it is the way he describes the way his disciples must live if they are to follow him, to be his followers. If you are to be first, he tells them here, you must be slave of all. This is the third movement of the dance repeated almost identically in the each of the three acts. If you want to be a leader in the kingdom that Jesus preaches, you must think of yourselves not as people enjoying the benefits of great power but as the people who are humble servants. It is explicit and it is scary. To be a servant to another—and it comes down in the end to one real person at a time—is purposely to make that one real person superior to you. This is not super palatable to the disciples or to us.

To be first you must be last, or a servant. This—being first—is about leadership, which is what makes it so odd. We call political leaders public servants and they say they want to serve the people—and they might. But we do not believe it. We do not really expect our leaders to be humble, and they rarely act that way. And being an oppressed people in Palestine, the disciples probably did not expect them to be, either. So there is a kind of “I’m not sure I heard you correctly” moment in these stories. “You don’t really mean that.”

I read an article about this passage in which the scholar said that the best response to our tendency to think of ourselves first—which for sure we have—the best response to that was to be “cautious and self-reflective about our motives.” I’m sorry, that is just equivocating baloney. It is not what Jesus is saying at all. Jesus says that the best response to our tendency to think of ourselves first is to deny ourselves. The scholar did not like hearing that any more than the disciples did or we do.

Jesus teaches humility. To deny oneself means to deny that we ourselves are the most important thing, that we are the most deserving of life, riches, love, what have you. To deny that we are the most wise and capable, and therefore the one who should be listened to and relied on. That we should not let opportunity pass by but rather seize the day because if not us, then who?

And though this all sounds like a problem of arrogance, it is instead more about being greedy. The opposite of humility is not pride but greed. To serve others adequately is to be willing to give up everything in order to serve them. To keep nothing for ourselves. James and John are not proud, but they are greedy, not only for power and prestige but also for affection and admiration.

Jesus instructed his followers—instructs us—about a new a way of living. There is a plan here, a proposal for an alternative way of relating to people and things. It is hard plan to swallow. In two thousand years, we have not accomplished it.

Why is that? We have to ask ourselves whether we believe Jesus when he says that being humble—being last, having little, serving all others before ourselves—is the way to a better life in this world, and a better life for this world. If yes, they why aren’t we doing it? And if not … well, certainly the alternative—that is, business as usual—has not worked out so great so far.

The Gospel of Mark pivots around this three-act play. The disciples evidently begin to understand what Jesus has to say—Jesus no longer has to explain it. The messiah is a servant to all. It is an important pivot in our faith as well. It is a hard concept. The question Jesus asks the disciples we ask ourselves: can we commit our lives to a humble king? Can we follow such a leader? Will we take his word?

Interpreting Jesus Differently

Text: Hebrews 1:1-4, 2:5-12

God speaks.

God speaks to us. Long ago God spoke through the prophets. In many ways and various ways, says the writer of the book of Hebrews. Now God speaks to us in an additional way. God’s words are more than just information. The power of the words of God created the universe: God said … and it was. Hebrews reminds us of the power of God’s word in the opening sentence. Three things—God’s words at creation of the universe, God’s words as the creator, guide, and comforter of Israel, and God’s words conveyed to us by God’s son—are all part of one thing. The thing is the story of the world.

Jesus is more than the conveyer of God’s message, more than a conduit through which we hear God’s words. Jesus himself is one of God’s words. Like a word, something delivered to us that we should attend to. Jesus is not just an entity or event, a person who existed in time and space. This book, Hebrews, is not about human history, but salvation history. It is the history of God’s grace, from creation to the end of time.

Like words, as a word, Jesus is open to interpretation. We know that because we see in scripture, and in tradition, and in theology, different ways of seeing and understanding Jesus. And we know it because we each tend to see our own Jesus.

Hebrews presents an interpretation that is unfamiliar to most of us. The book of Hebrews is unlike any other. It is not a letter, though it is sometimes called a letter. It has no greeting, no salutation, no letter-like overture of what is to come.

The Jesus of this book is not like the Jesus of the Gospels. In Hebrews, Jesus is not the healer of the sick and tormented. Jesus is not the rabbi, speaking in sermons and parables. He is not the political radical confronting the existing powerful and corrupt oppressors. Jesus is not the spokesperson for the poor, not the one who, as in the magnificat, casts down the mighty from their thrones and exalts the humble. That is Jesus interpreted by the Gospels.

The Jesus of this book is not like the Jesus of Paul’s letters, either. In Hebrews, Jesus is not the second Adam. Jesus is not the way for gentiles to reconcile with the God of Abraham. Jesus does not eradicate the boundaries between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female. We are not baptized into his death. Jesus in Hebrews is not Jesus Christ, Jesus the Messiah. That is Jesus interpreted by Paul in his letters.

In one sense—in a simplified sense—Jesus of the Gospels is a man of the earth. Though preaching the kingdom of heaven, he spends most of his time in the mundane matters of health and eating and money and worship. He teaches about how to deal with the people in the neighborhood and across the borders. He knows what weighs men and women down, how we suffer in the day to day.

In the same simplified sense—oversimplified, no doubt—Paul’s Jesus is a man of the heavens. It is Christ crucified and raised that interests Paul. Jesus conquers death in his own death and resurrection. His ministry on earth is of little consequence in the scheme of things.

But in Hebrews, the incarnation of God—God as human Jesus—and the glorious Jesus who existed from the beginning and sits with God for all time, are more balanced. The earthy humanity of Jesus is as essential to what he is to us as is his glorious divinity, and the two are connected through his suffering. For a while, it says in Hebrews, he was a little lower than the angels but now he is crowned with glory and honor.

What we name things is important. What we call Jesus tells us what we think his essence is, his substance, what we think his mission is, and what he has accomplished. We might call him rabbi, or healer, or preacher—jobs of care and guidance. We might call him Christ, Messiah, redeemer—jobs of rescue and salvation. Or we might call him, as we do on Christmas—king of kings, lord of lords, mighty God—jobs of power and victory.

But in Hebrews, Jesus is called neither rabbi nor messiah nor king. Here, in these first verses, Jesus is called creator, reflection of God, sustainer, sanctifier, pioneer, and heir. But his most excellent name—better than those of the angels, it says—his best name is Son. In Hebrews, Jesus’ most important name tells us not what he does but who he is. He is God’s son. And it is only because he is God’s son that his work and death have such cosmic implications.

This is not exactly a statement about Jesus as God. God speaks to us, it says, by a son. Not The Son in capital letters. This is not about the Trinity. What is important is that a son—any son, but the one we happen to be talking about right now here in Hebrews is Jesus—a son is special. God speaks through prophets. God works through angels. Prophets and angels are wise and good. But they are not family, so to speak. They are assistants and workers.

Jesus is family. You can see the resemblance, Hebrews says. He is the exact imprint of God’s very being. He has the same character as God. He is of the same substance as God. From the same stock, you might say.

The word of God that comes via Jesus carries extra weight because of his position. Prophets spoke. What they said was true; it has not been invalidated. God speaks by the prophets. But when God speaks by Jesus, it is a different thing altogether. We cannot—or Hebrews does not—make Jesus just another prophet, or just another good person doing God’s work.

For a little while, but not forever, Jesus was a little lower than angels. Just like all humans. But his suffering made him perfect, it says, a word that does not mean flawless or really excellent, but rather means complete. It was fitting; part of the job. Now he is once again superior to the angels. Jesus did something and now he is done.

Hebrews is a strange and a hard book in many ways, and a lot about what Hebrews thinks Jesus did has to do with sacrifice and priests, but that is later in the book, not here in these first few verses.

What is in these verses is that Jesus is the heir to all that God has—heir of all things, it says. And because Jesus claims us as brothers and sisters—humans together—we are heirs as well. We are all in the same family. The one who makes us holy—Jesus—and the ones who are made holy—us—all have the one same father. We will never be cut off, cannot be cut off, from God. We will all be God’s children by Jesus’ embrace of us.

Hebrews quotes Psalm 8, the one we just sang together. When we look at the universe that we can see, we think: who are we? We know that there are many more stars and galaxies now than the ancients could have imagined. What is a one man that God should care for him? What is one woman that God is mindful of her? The God of the creation of the universe cares for individual humans—minuscule, nearly irrelevant in the vastness, almost invisible. Yet God favors us. We have each been welcomed—not just as loved by God and not just as a worker in God’s kingdom, but as a daughter or a son of God.

God speaks. It is a blessing and a strength of Christianity that we have heard and do hear God in so many ways. And that there are many interpreters of Jesus, the one whom we follow.

There are times when we need to hear Jesus call us to action, to help others, to love our neighbors and enemies, to work for justice. There are times when we need to remember that Jesus enables for us eternal life through faith.

But there are times what we need most is to recall that Jesus is our brother, and that each of us, with him, is a child of God.

At the Border

Text: Mark 8:27-38

Here we are at Caesarea Philippi, on the border, an outpost of the Roman empire and the northern limit of the territory of Israel. Here we are, almost exactly in the center of Mark’s Gospel, at the hinge between Jesus’ healing ministry and his journey to death on the cross. We are at the cusp in this tragic story. Here we are, at a moment when the hint of the divinity of Jesus is strong and the humanity of Jesus is equally strong. Here we are, where the disciples learn of their mission and their fate, and must choose it or not.

For reasons unknown, Jesus asks his disciples about his own identity. After some false starts, Peter declares Jesus to be the Messiah, the hoped-for king in the manner of David, a rescuer of Israel and a restorer of its former glory. Peter’s declaration is surprising. There has been nothing in Mark up to this point that indicates that Jesus is or will be or wants to be anything like a king. We modern Christian readers take Peter’s guess as true. But Jesus himself neither denies or confirms it.

Instead: he tells them that suffering and death lie ahead—plus resurrection, but they seem not to hear that part. Jesus’ prediction of trouble, unlike Peter’s declaration, is not surprising. Jesus has been on a course of healing those who suffer and of annoying those in power. He is a radical kind of guy, preaching a radical message. He was not the first or only political radical of his time. It would not take divine prescience to see that this path will end in a bad spot for him.

Not surprisingly, Peter objects. We don’t know what Peter says, only that he rebuked Jesus. People often figure that Peter objects to the idea of a suffering Messiah. But it seems more likely to me that Peter’s response, and Jesus’ response in turn, is about more mundane matters.

You know Peter. He’s the one who speaks before he thinks. What he says is not about the divinity of Jesus but about his humanity. Jesus is Peter’s friend. Not even the most politically committed person wants his friends to march to their death. Don’t do it!

Jesus is tempted. Get behind me, he says to Satan—not to Peter, but to Satan—the same Satan that Jesus met in the desert way back in chapter one of Mark. The tempter. Jesus, the human being, is being tempted not by Peter’s human weakness but by his—Jesus’— own human wishes. Can we say that Jesus—100% human as we are taught—can we say that he wishes to go to his death, that he does not wish to live a good and satisfying life with his friend, imagining them, perhaps, sitting rocking on the porch in their old age, reminiscing, grandchildren at their feet. These are deep human desires. Human things.

But they both know it is not to be. These are tumultuous times. Times of political change. Restless times in Palestine. Times of hopes and of violence. Jesus is a leader, a man of justice and mercy, teaching against the authorities, drawing rowdy crowds. A cross clearly lies ahead—take up your cross and follow me, he says—it lies ahead for him and those who wish to follow him.

There is no pleasure in this cross. It is pain and sorrow. Jesus is not eager to be crucified. But he is willing to be. He is not willing to abandon his mission and ministry out of fear of the cross. But make no mistake: the cross is a very bad thing.

We should not diminish or sentimentalize or domesticate the cross. The cross is not a sign of personal fortitude. It is not a great inconvenience or something that tries our patience. Nor is it a metaphor for general suffering. And it certainly is not an excuse for indifference to the suffering of others.

Each person who follows Jesus has his or her own cross. Take up your cross, says Jesus. Our cross is that hard thing that results from our being followers of Jesus and workers for justice and mercy in the world. In the face of whatever that turns out to be. Even death—but probably short of that. You see a type of this willingness—but not eagerness—to undergo suffering for the sake for others (even to death) that parents can have for their children, or sometimes siblings for each other, or maybe spouses, or more generally a soldier for his or her comrades, or ideally but rarely a leader for the people.

But more often than not, we do not know what our cross is. It is not always as obvious to us as it was to Jesus (and to Peter, if he had taken a moment to think about it). We come upon it as we proceed without fear until fear of it stops us. It is the thing that finally prevents us from following Jesus, doing justice and loving mercy. It is the barrier to our freedom. But the barrier is not insurmountable.

Jesus instructs us how: Those who wish to follow him must deny themselves. This denial is not about denying ourselves some thing. It is not about cutting back on some privilege. It is not about living an ascetic or dreary life. Those things might or might not have anything to do with it. It is not about turning away from pleasure or lightheartedness. Or requiring us to choose the most distasteful thing. It is not about something that is only within the reach of the great saints. It is not in the dative: it is not denying something to us.

We are the object. Deny you. It is not about our powers of self-control, or self-denial. It is not about our power at all. It is about giving up our self as the boss. And giving up the idea that how an action affects us is the most important criterion for judging that action. What happens to you is no longer the most important thing. The word that Jesus uses means to disown. To deny ourselves means firing ourselves as the boss. We no longer accept ourselves as either the guide or the judge.

And the surprising result is this: that we become free. The freedom of a Christian is a result of living—of doing what we do—because of Jesus, for the sake of Jesus, as he says. By denying ourselves we make ourselves free from any other power. Other powers lose all their leverage. That is, when we are free, there is nothing that anyone can do to us or threats anyone can make or enticements that anyone can offer that can divert us; and for Christians, that means divert us both from the commands of and life in Christ and also from the pleasure in God’s creation. It is fear for our selves that keeps us timid and cheerless. By denying our selves, we become free for service and for joy.

Those who lose their life because of Jesus save it, Jesus says. The word means to heal and to be made whole. What had seemed a cost turns out to be a benefit.

Here we are at Faith Lutheran Church. Jesus calls the disciples together with the crowd—and us. Some at hinges in our own lives. Jesus offers all who would listen the same invitation: to follow him, to go forward in the face of fear, to deny ourselves, to be free, to save our lives.

Good Work

Text: James 2:1-17

Faith, not works. This is the motto of Protestant Christianity and especially of the Lutheran brand. Martin Luther popularized it. He took a remark made by Paul to the Romans specifically regarding Jewish and pagan Christians and expanded it. He took what was in many ways a political analysis and transformed it into a way of thinking about our personal relationship with God. The fruits of this were many, including the Reformation. And also a welcome emphasis on God’s grace and unconditional love for each person, no matter what.

To know that we are loved by God unconditionally is very comforting. God does not try to persuade us to be good through guilt and shame. God desires that we be joyful and at peace. All this makes us feel good.

But it can also make us a little queasy. As Robin said last week, there is a danger of turning God into what I think he called a kindly uncle. Someone who loves us, and is occasionally amused by us, but who is not really engaged with us or our real lives. Someone who can be easily forgiving because he lives far away. And who has little stake in us or our world. It is an unconditional love that comes from low expectations.

This is not quite what Luther intended. Luther feared that the world—and the church in particular—were depending on their actions to gain God’s favor. People thought—and were taught—that they had to earn God’s love through acts of service and piety. Such a thing was both impossible and unnecessary. And being unable to be perfect meant that God could not love us and we would be cursed.

The tendency to think this way was so strong that Luther had to speak strongly against it. There was no wiggle room here. As soon as there is one thing that you have to do to earn God’s love, the whole thing falls apart. That’s why Lutherans in particular are so adamant about the primacy of God’s grace, which is liberating. It is also why Luther so disliked the letter of James, our second reading today. Luther had a difficult and controversial point to make and didn’t want anyone weakening the argument with subtle details. Sort of like political speeches.

That was good for Luther and for our faith lives. But we know that God does have expectations and hopes for us. We know because God gives us commands. We have lots of hints about what God wants. Jesus tells us, among other ways. We know that there is something about a life a faith that requires or leads to a life of service. We know this in our bones. The motto “faith not works” can make us queasy because we have a deep-seated conviction that James was right. Faith without works is dead.

What good is it, James asks, if we pat someone on the head—“there, there”—and offer them words of blessings and do nothing to supply their physical needs? If they have no home and are hungry and we do nothing, what is the good of that? Some—maybe. Not much.

James is not talking here about our own worth or character. This has nothing to do with our goodness. Or generosity. This has nothing to do with the goodness of the deed. The phrase he uses—what is the good of that—means “how effective is that?” or “what can that accomplish?” Good as in “what good are chopsticks for eating soup?” “What good is a tax credit for someone who has no income?” James is asking not a moral question but a practical one. It is not about currying God’s favor or responding gratefully to God’s good gifts.

Yet it does have to do with our life in faith. Helping others bodily is one sign of our Christianity. Our love for others—friends and enemies both—is a response to the commandments, and example, and teachings, of Jesus. It is one way that people know we follow Jesus. It is how we are taught by Jesus to live out the life we have received through the grace of God. So James’s doubts when he asks his readers whether they “really believe in our gracious Lord Jesus Christ” come from how they treat others.

You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The royal law, as James calls it. Central to Christians and Jews and people of many faiths. The summary of the law according to Jesus, equal to the command to love God. The point of the parable of the Good Samaritan. And illustrated in the life of Christ.

And easily breached, easily violated, in actions both cosmic and trivial.

A person walks into the assembly—a synagogue, it says, but for us, let’s say a church. The person is rich, well-dressed, and everyone is kind and welcoming. Another person arrives. A poor and disheveled person. And everyone is polite (or not so polite) and cautious. “Are you lost? Can I help you?” The rich person is honored, respected, given the benefit of the doubt for no good reason. The poor person is dishonored, disregarded at best, treated with suspicion for no good reason.

James tells this story because it is a good example of a larger problem. The example is good one for the poor—most of his readers were poor—because they can easily recognize the event and the injustice in it. They are those whom the rich have oppressed, as James reminds them, the ones whom the rich have dragged into court. It is good for the rich because they need to be reminded to see the injustice and the suffering. For the rich and the poor, this is business as usual. But for the poor, it is a bad business, as usual.

If the royal law is to love your neighbor as yourself, what is royal evil? Not to hate your neighbor—though that’s not so great either. If the greatest commandment is to love your neighbor, then according to James, the greatest evil is to deny that another is your neighbor. When we make distinctions between those who are our neighbors and therefore call us to be obedient to the royal commandment and those who are not neighbors and therefore let us off the hook, we succumb to evil thoughts. Making distinctions between us and others that God would not make is a sin.

If you show partiality, James says, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. Being partial to one group—people like us, mostly—over the other—other disturbing people, for example—is not just a social faux pas, or something to dismiss with snide jokes, and certainly nothing on which to base policy. This is not something to take lightly. Though this is not a matter of our salvation or whether God loves us, it is a very serious deal. It is as OK to do this, James writes, as it is to commit adultery or to murder someone. That is, it is not OK at all.

We think that making distinctions based on all the things we use to make distinctions—wealth, style, education, smarts, race, culture—is scientific. That is, that is is based on observations of physical facts. This person really is wealthier than this other person. This person really is smarter. This person really parties differently. But scales like these are infinite and arbitrary. Everybody really is different from other people in hundreds of ways. But the things we pick to pay attention to are things that we pick. Making distinctions therefore is a moral decision, an act of morality. It is a action of the soul.

The question James asks at the top of these reading: with your acts of favoritism do you really believe in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ? is not a question in the original. It is a command, in the imperative. It says more exactly but more awkwardly: don’t hold your faith in Jesus while being partial to one over the other. That is, in your faith, don’t make those distinctions just as Jesus did not make them. You do not have the authority to pick and choose who you neighbor is. Love your neighbor as you love yourself. Act accordingly. Faith with works is a living faith.

Staying and Going

Text: Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18
Other texts: John 6:51-66

[Last week and this week we heard the same passage from the Gospel of John. Today’s remarks carry on from last week’s.

Last week we heard that Martin Luther considered Holy Communion to be daily sustenance in the fight against evil. We talked then mostly about the sustenance part, and how the body and blood of Christ feeds a hunger that we all share. This week, we’ll talk more about the daily part. Last week we talked about how the followers of Jesus were put off by what he said, and many left. This week, we’ll talk more about those who remained.]

“Lord, to whom can we go?” asks Peter. Jesus has placed his disciples at a crossroads. Go one way, or go the other. Go with me, or don’t. To both those who left and those who stayed, their choice was the obvious correct one. For Peter and his eleven friends, the obvious choice was to stay with Jesus. We approve of that choice, which seems obvious to us, also. Peter’s words have become a part of Sunday worship in many Lutheran churches, where they introduce the Gospel reading. They are like a street sign that confirms that we are walking the same road that Peter and the disciples took.

But for Peter, choosing to go with Jesus was not like choosing the main street but taking instead the little dirt path off to the left. Following Jesus was unusual and risky. When Peter asks “to whom can we go,” the word he uses makes it clear that going to something implies going away from something else. “To whom shall we go from?” would be more accurate but more awkward. Peter gives up some other way of life to have a life with Jesus.

In this sense, Peter is not following Jesus so much as turning toward Jesus. Lord, to whom shall we turn? is more like it. It is a question of orientation. Changing direction. As Peter lives his life, which way will he be facing?

The same question is presented by Joshua to the Israelites. Make a choice, says Joshua, between God and the other gods. There are a lot of gods in the world, he says. Go with them or go with God. You can serve the Lord or you do not have to. It is up to you. Make your choice; follow whom you want. But as for me, Joshua famously says, as for me and my household, we will serve God.

The people answer: Far be it from us that we should forsake God for other gods. This is the answer to Joshua’s version of Peter’s question. For Joshua and his people, there is no other way to turn. This is God, who freed the people from slavery in Egypt, did great things, and protected them from all dangers. To whom else, we can hear them say, to whom else can we go? We will turn to face our God, they say. They declare: We too will serve the Lord. And yet, Joshua immediately tells them—in verses just beyond our reading—tells them they won’t. And he is right. As time goes on, they don’t.

Joshua is not condemning them, or invalidating their promise. Their promise, like Peter’s, is not some potion that makes other gods disappear or makes them less seductive. Their promise, and Peter’s, is a vow. Like a marriage vow, it binds people together in good times and in bad, in times of bliss and times of hardship. Sometimes it gets so bad that the promise is all that remains, for a while. A thread between two people, or between us and God. Joshua is validating their promise, praising its power against the powers of other inevitable attractions.

Following Jesus, being a Christian, is not a one-time decision but an ongoing and recurring one. The story of faith in the Bible is a story of good intent followed by betrayal, then revival followed by faithlessness. The choice placed before the people by Joshua—serve God!—is the same choice placed earlier by Moses—choose life!—and placed later by Jesus before the disciples.

It seems that the choice once made must be made again and again. We cannot just declare ourselves for Jesus once and be done with it. Peter, who here declares un-rivaled loyalty to Jesus later denies him.

Following Jesus is at best adopting a new way of life. To see things as Jesus seems to. To be a peacemaker, as Paul writes in the second reading today. To love one another. I am the way, Jesus said. The early Jesus movement was called the Way. It is a habit of existence more than a one-time statement of loyalty. It requires constant maintenance, nurtured not by our will to be good and true—which will always fail, as Joshua said of the Israelites—but by the spirit of God, and reminders of our promises, and the support of others. The same things that nurtured our spiritual ancestors.

This is the reason we repeat these same stories about God and humans. This is the reason why we share in the body and blood of Christ each Sunday. Why we gather each week to confess sins, pray, praise God, recite dogma. They are reminders. Our pattern of worship echoes the story of Joshua: gathering, re-hearing the word of God, responding, re-committing, going out again. We affirm the promises we made in baptism. We repeat the creed, and the Lord’s Prayer.

There will always be authorities and powers of evil, as Paul describes them. Competition for our souls. Ways of life. There are lots of other places to go, in spite of Peter’s proclamation. There will always be other gods. What they are for you, you’ll have to say for yourself. You know them.

Our task is not to destroy those gods. But rather to put them aside, to put them away as Joshua says. Out of sight and hearing. Not literally burying them, as Joshua meant—though that might work for some of the material gods that command our allegiance. But to turn our faces away from them. To turn to Jesus for guidance instead. To think: whom am I serving by doing this or that? Am I serving God? Whom am I following? I have made a vow to Christ. Is this thing that I am about to do in line with that vow? Am I still on the way?

Joshua and Peter are both rhetoricians, great public speakers, good politicians. They make it sound like choosing God over other gods, choosing to go to Jesus from some other way, requires nothing more than a good heart and firm resolve. But to describe what people do here is as choosing is misleading. We cannot keep a vow to always be true.

To follow Christ turns out to be not an act of will, but a willingness to make a risky promise. God offers us daily invitations to a new way of living. A new way of seeing. By declaring that we follow Jesus, we can make this vow: to accept those invitations—with the help of God and as much as we are able—one day at a time, again and again.

Not As Difficult

Text: John 6:51-69

There is a magical realism in the Gospel of John. It makes John both the most-loved and the least-liked of the four Gospels. Things happen in this Gospel that happen nowhere else. The most magical stories of Jesus are in John. The conversion of water to wine. The raising of his friend Lazarus from the dead. These are works of divinity. But also in John, Jesus is the most earthy and human. He is annoyed at his mother at the wedding at Cana, and he weeps before the tomb of Lazarus. John is full of seemingly opposing pairs: divine and human, light and dark, body and spirit, concrete and figurative.

What, then, are we to make of today’s passage about eating flesh and drinking blood? What is this? Is it metaphorical or literal? Is it magic or real? This teaching is difficult, so say the disciples, and two thousand years of Christians after them agree. Can we dismiss it—as often has been done—as fantastical? Just another one of those over-the-top things that Jesus says. In the category of turning the other cheek, loving your enemies, giving away all your money. Can we, as we sometimes do with the other difficult sayings of Jesus, domesticate it and change the subject?

There are a lot of weird things about Christianity, and this is one of the weirdest. On hearing this teaching, many of the followers of Jesus left him. “They no longer went about with him,” John writes. Only the twelve were left. His followers went from thousands surrounding him at the beginning of the chapter, wanting to make him king, to just a dozen. Yet for Christians in our day, eating flesh and drinking blood is central. The body of Christ, given for you, we say. The blood of Christ shed for you.

Martin Luther said of this passage that Jesus could not mean it literally. Surely he does not mean, Luther said, that one man should devour another. That seems right. Jesus does not follow this speech up with an offer to take a bite out of him right then and there. Luther also said that the passage was not about the Eucharist, about Holy Communion. We’ll talk in a minute about how, in spite of Luther’s opinion, it might have been.

But perhaps Luther was right. There is no mention of a meal here, no Lord’s Supper. The story does not take place before the crucifixion (as in the other Gospels), but rather after the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand. The emphasis here is on life, and the life-giving properties of food and drink. What Jesus asks us to remember here is not the presence of Jesus in our midst, as in the Last Supper, but instead the provision of manna in the wilderness—the original bread from heaven—and that God provided nourishment for God’s people. In some way the physical body of Jesus is like that.

We are creatures that eat. We cannot create our own energy or substance. We steal them from other things—plants and other animals. As a consequence, we need to eat or we die. Eating and drinking are not optional. To compare our need for Jesus to our need for food is to say that Jesus is essential for human life.

Since we are creatures that eat, we are not our own. That is, what we eat becomes us, and we become in some small part what we eat. Its substance is our substance. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me and I in them, Jesus says (here and elsewhere). There is a kind of biology science going on here. In spite of John’s interest in the divine side of Jesus, Jesus nourishes us—according to this passage—not primarily in a spiritual way but in a physical way. How that works, it does not say.

The church—people, followers of Jesus—tries to make these theoretical words of Jesus practical. That is, if we are to follow Jesus about eating flesh and drinking blood, without actually gnawing—the earthy word that Jesus uses here—on his limbs, we must learn a way to do this that is physical, mundane, and convenient.

Which brings us to Holy Communion. In spite of Luther, the Eucharist is a possible way to interpret these words. And it may have been how the readers of John saw it. Because by the time John was written, followers of Jesus had been sharing the Lord’s Supper for decades. Using the words we use every Sunday—called the words of institution—that come from Paul, who wrote his letters long before John wrote his story of Jesus.

When we eat the body and blood of Christ in Holy Communion, we honor and obey the words of Jesus spoken both at the Last Supper and here in John. We eat bread and wine. How this becomes body and blood, no one can say. Or at least, no Lutherans can say. There has long been a theological debate about this, but Luther said we should leave all that to the philosophers. It is interesting but neither urgent nor important. “This is my body” Jesus said; and Luther said that was all we need to know.

Luther also said that the bread and wine as body and blood of Christ was essential nourishment, needed daily (“given,” he said, “as a daily pasture and sustenance”) to get the strength to fight the devil. It is food. God gives us this food of Jesus to sustain us.

Our worries about this strange thing that is happening with body and blood and bread and wine turn out to be unfounded in practice. At least in practice among Christians. We do not judge it theologically but instead from our own experience. There is something physical going on and something mystical. We feel it when we share Holy Communion. Something of the flesh and something of the spirit. In our experience, the sacrament is effective. That is, it has a real effect.

We come forward to the altar, we kneel, we eat bread—hearing the words “the body of Christ given for you”—and we drink wine—hearing the words “the blood of Christ shed for you”—and we return, some to quiet prayer, and eventually sent out thankfully into the world—“go in peace, serve the Lord.”

None of us has to do this. None of us has to be here. We are here because we know that we need to be nourished and because we have found ourselves nourished here. The sacrament works for us.

The difficulty imagined by the disciples (and by us) turns out to be exaggerated. The uneasiness that we feel regarding these words in John is in fact not carried over into its effect in the Lord’s Supper. We might feel Holy Communion to be powerful, mysterious, comforting. But the weirdness that people sometimes find in it, though understandable, is at odds with our own personal experiences. Many of the followers of Jesus left after Jesus spoke these words. But twelve did not. We are heirs of those twelve who did not.

Christianity is based on the conviction that God became incarnate—literally, made into meat, into flesh—in the person of Jesus. We share with Jesus flesh and blood, life and spirit. Our whole self hungers for food in order to live. When we eat the body and blood, the bread and wine, it is as real as hunger is, and as magical as life is.