Sermon, "Invitational: Redemption Stories," Luke 5:27-32

Sermon 2/7/16

Luke 5:27-32

Invitational: Redemption Stories

            Over the last few years, I’ll confess that I’ve become a big fan of reading fanfiction. Anybody know what that is? Fanfiction is stories that fans of original works write in order to prolong or reimagine or recreate the original story. Sometimes authors imagine what a contemporary story would be like if it took place in some other time period, or vice versa – like if Pride and Prejudice took place in 2015, instead of the 1800s. Sometimes fanfiction writers imagine a character who has an untimely end in a story as surviving instead, imagining what it might be like, for example, if Darth Vader lived longer, for better or worse. Other fanfiction stories are about what would happen if your favorite character fell in love with the character you always wanted them too, instead of the one they ended up with. And another big chunk of fanfiction are stories about what would happen if the bad guy was somehow redeemed, and the villain becomes a hero instead. What if Lex Luthor decided to start working for Super Man instead of against him? What if Captain Hook built a home for all the Lost Boys? What if Cruella de Vil was persuaded to become an animal lover?

            J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series, has written that it’s amazing to her that people keep writing stories where one of the villains, Draco Malfoy, is more nuanced, becomes a hero. She doesn’t understand why people persist in seeing something in Draco that she hasn’t written there. But I don’t find it surprising at all. We love redemption stories. We love that what once was lost can be found! In fact, I thin, it is our favorite story. It certainly seems to be the favorite story of our scriptures. They are full of stories of people like Paul, who, when we first see him, is looking on with glee while followers of Jesus are stoned to death. But Paul has an encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus and ends up giving himself heart and soul to the furthering of the gospel. Or there’s the Prodigal Son in the parable Jesus shares, who squanders everything, and comes back to his father, begging for forgiveness, seeing the value of all he had treated as worthless. There’s King David, meant to be a beacon of godliness, caught up in a web of adultery and lies, repentant and humbled. A bandit, crucified next to Jesus, seeking forgiveness at the last. We love redemption stories. “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see!”

            I think, though, that as much as we love redemption stories, when we imagine ourselves in the story, most of us, we’re not seeing ourselves as the one who is lost and needs redeeming. Instead, we’re the ones who love and see the good in those who need redeeming. We’re the ones in the story who can see how much someone else is failing, how much help they need, how they struggle – and perhaps even inspired by what we can see in them, we can witness their redemption. We’re Luke Skywalker, not Darth Vader. I think, especially for those of us who have basically tried and succeeded in walking more or less on the straight and narrow of life, when we think about redemption, someone getting their life together after things being a total disaster, we see ourselves in the role of the helper. The one who can help others get things on track. It’s not a bad impulse – this desire to help others, of course. But we should be wary. Because when we cast ourselves in the role of one who leads others to redemption, the role we’re really giving ourselves is the role of savior. There are many savior-figures in literature, in books, in movies, in TV shows – heroes. Superheroes, even. But when it comes to our journey of faith, if we’re so busy saving other that we don’t need redeeming, is there anything left for Jesus to do? 

            Last week, we talked about the calling of Simon Peter, as Jesus directed he and his fishing partners out into the deep waters, telling them that now they would fish for people. Remember how Peter responded to Jesus sat first, after the great haul of fish: He said, “Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man.” Simon Peter didn’t fully know yet who Jesus was, but he knew he needed redeeming. So he follows Jesus. Just after he and a few other become disciples, Jesus preaches and teaches and spends time healing – a man with a skin disease, a paralytic man, and many others. Then, we arrive at the start of our text for today. As he exits the house where he’s just healed the paralytic man, Jesus sees Levi, a tax-collector, sitting at his booth. Remember, tax collectors in the gospels were despised not just because everyone hates paying takes – but because they, Jews, worked to collected taxes for the Romans, the foreign occupiers. So tax collectors were considered not only greedy, but disloyal traitors, who chose income from Rome over standing up for their own people.

            So Jesus sees Levi, sitting at his booth, and he says, “Follow me.” Levi gets up, leaves everything, and follows Jesus. This brief exchange is certainly astonishing. Levi responds to Jesus without hesitation. Jesus asks for Levi’s discipleship without, as far as we’re privy to, a single word spoken before he’s asking him for his everything. But maybe it isn’t surprising either. How many people see Levi? How many people saw him and not his position? How many people looked at him and saw promise and hope and a future? Jesus did. He saw Levi, and chose him still. Levi, perhaps seeing for the first time in a long time someone looking at him with something other than disgust, maybe it is a no-brainer that he followed.

            Levi then throws a great dinner banquet for Jesus, this man who saw him and chose him and changed his life. And naturally, who does Levi invite? Other tax collectors! In fact, Luke says there’s a “large crowd” of tax collectors at this banquet. Apparently, Levi doesn’t leave out the religious elite – the Pharisees and scribes are there too. But even though they’re at the same party, they complain to Jesus and the disciples. “Why do you eat with tax-collectors and sinners?” Jesus responds, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance.”

            Jesus basically says: “If you’re not sick, you don’t a doctor. If you’re not a sinner, you don’t need to repent. If you aren’t seeking redemption, you don’t need a savior.” Jesus has come to serve those who are sick and sinners and in need of redemption – because they are the ones who realize that they’re lost and need help! How can he heal someone who insists they are well? How can he find someone who insists that they aren’t and have never been lost?

            Jesus calls Levi to follow him, and Levi immediately invites every other tax-collector in town to meet Jesus. Because Levi has found something that has saved his life! He’s been redeemed. He’s found a savior. And this impact on his life is so great, so significant, so meaningful, that he can’t help but invite everyone else to experience what he has. He wants to make sure everyone gets to meet Jesus, because Jesus has saved him, redeemed him. Levi invites not one or two, but a crowd. Why would he want anyone to miss meeting the man who saved him? How compelling an invitation is that? Come meet the person who changed my life. Come meet the person who saved me.

            Today we wrap up our focus on being an invitational people, just as we turn our hearts and minds to the Lenten journey, traveling with Jesus to the cross and beyond. And as we begin this season of reflection and repentance, here are the questions I’m asking myself, that I’m hoping you’ll wrestle with too. Has Jesus saved me? Have I needed a savior? Have I needed redeeming? Or have I been busy trying to save and redeem others? Maybe the story of Jesus redeeming our lives started long ago, and we need to remember how God found us when we were lost. Maybe, friends, we’ve always considered ourselves redeemed, and so never really dug deep into our hearts to show to God our wounds that need healing. Maybe, even, we’ve been lost, but never willing to ask for directions!

            If you met someone who saved your life, that’s a story you’d want to share, right? Levi sure did. He invited a whole crowd to meet the man responsible for his redemption. What about us? Do we have a savior that we will invite people to meet? Amen.

Sermon, "Invitational: Deep Waters," Luke 5:1-11

Sermon 1/31/16

Luke 5:1-11

Invitational: Deep Waters

           

            I’m fascinated by the fact that for all that we know, as much as we have discovered, for all of the world we humans feel like we have conquered, there are still so many that things that we don’t know and can’t control, so much that we are learning yet, every day. Even today, every year, scientists discover entirely new species of plants and animals. And one part of our world that is rich in things yet-to-be-discovered is in the mysterious fathoms below – the deep, deepest waters of the ocean. In 2015, for example, scientists discovered this Ceratioid anglerfish that lives in the nicknamed “midnight zone” of the ocean. It doesn’t look like other anglerfish – one news article described it as looking like a “rotting old shoe with spikes, a scraggly mustache and a big mouth with bad teeth. And it has a long, angular fishing pole-looking thing growing out of its head.”[1] Or there’s Greedo, named after the Star Wars Bounty Hunter, or these things, which as of late summer, scientists had not yet been able to determine whether they were a kind of jellyfish or something else entirely. They were discovered on the sea floor near Australia. It fascinates me – and let’s be honest – unnerves me – to think there is so much undiscovered in the deep, dark waters of the ocean.

            I had those images in mind this week as I was reading our gospel lesson from Luke, and thinking about deep things, deep waters, bringing to the surface what has been deep, deep down. In our gospel lesson today, we find a familiar scene – Jesus preaching and teaching, the crowd gathered, and the setting – the lake of Gennesaret, where many fishermen would be busy at work. When the scene opens, we read that Jesus is standing by the lake and the crowds are “pressing in on him to hear the word of God.” What an image! They’re impatient – anxious – hungry to hear God’s word – that’s how excited they are about what Jesus has to say. They want the words that he’s about to speak. Have you ever been so eager to hear the Word of God?

            Now, in the chapter before this one, after his baptism, after spending 40 days in the wilderness, Jesus had just begun his ministry, marked by preaching and healing, including a woman described as the mother-in-law of Simon. But we haven’t yet met Simon, really, until this passage we read today. So keep in mind that when Jesus encounters Simon Peter with his boat, he’s already connected with him through the act of healing. So, with the crowds pressing in, Jesus sees fishermen washing their nets and their boats nearby on the shore, and he gets into the boat of Simon Peter and asks him to put out a little way from the shore. This way, Jesus can comfortably teach the crowds from the boat without being smothered by them in their excitement. When he’s done teaching, he turns to Simon, and tells him, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” Not a suggestion – not a question – but a direction, an imperative. Peter responds in a way that I admire, since I think most of us wouldn’t respond so openly. Jesus wasn’t a fisherman; he was a carpenter, and now a teacher; Simon Peter was the fisherman. And Peter knew where to fish. And Peter knew that they had already been fishing all night without catching anything. But Simon Peter didn’t respond that he knew better than Jesus, or that they tried what he said already and it didn’t work, or that this new way wouldn’t work. He said instead, “Master, if you say we should try it, we’ll try it.”

            So they let down their nets, and begin to catch so many fish that their nets are breaking. They signal for help, and another boat comes, and still, there are so many fish that both boats are filled to the point that they can barely stay afloat. Peter, overwhelmed, falls on his knees before Jesus and says, “Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man!” But Jesus responds, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” And with those strange words, Peter, along with James and John, the sons of Zebedee, partners with Simon, leave their boats and nets and everything, and they begin to follow Jesus.

            “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” I’m struck by the phrase, and all the meaning this biblical image holds for us. If we think of our spiritual lives, our souls, as this water, we can find many ways to think about this text. Shallows waters are safe places in our lives and in our hearts, where we can put our feet on the ground and keep our heads well above water, and where everything that is there is easily visible to the eyes. The deep waters – there is so much there that you might never see or know it all, and you can’t touch bottom, and you have to work harder to stay afloat, but some of the most fascinating things are found in the deep water, and you have to be a strong swimmer, or a strong boater, or with someone who is strong enough for both of you, to spend a lot of time in the deep waters. You can spend all of your time in shallow water, but most swimmers aren’t satisfied with that, are they? I spent some years as a lifeguard, and administered many swim tests to young people who wanted permission to swim in the deeper water in the lake, or in the deep end of the swimming pool. Even knowing it was really too much for them, children just wanted to try out that deep water. So if we’re thinking about our souls as the waters of this passage, what is Jesus saying to us? Go to the deep water. Go again. Go deeper. Simon Peter makes it clear they’ve spent all day out on the lake, fishing, without catching anything. But Jesus won’t let them give up, call it quits, move to another spot, or bring the boats back to shore. There are more fish than the disciples will know what to do with in that lake, and Jesus will help them find them, if they trust him and do what he commands.  

Where are we spending our time in the waters of our soul? I think it is astonishingly easy to spend all of our time, all of our lives, in what God would consider the shallow waters. Not taking risks. Not digging deep. Not exploring the unknown. Keeping our feet firmly planted, never heading out to the deep where we’d have to rely on having Jesus in the boat with us in order to make it through. I can tell you that I’m generally not a risk-taker. I don’t like roller coasters. As some of you probably know, I don’t even like statistically safe airplanes. Spiritually, I wonder if I have any more sense of adventure. How easy it is to do the bare minimum instead of giving heart and soul to God. It is easy, sometimes, for me to understand exactly what the scripture is saying, what Jesus is asking, and somehow easier to make a list of reasons why I can’t quite do what is required.

We’ve been talking about being an invitational people – thinking about the invitations God extends to us, and the invitations we extend to others. God’s invitation to us today is to explore the deep waters of our faith. When I think about the dreams for Apple Valley that we’re exploring this year – being fruitful and prayerful and invitational and missional, I see them all as challenges to head to the deeper waters of our faith. So even as we struggle with the straight-forward invitation of asking a friend to come to church with you, I think God is already calling us deeper – not just to invite someone to church, to attend worship, to attend and event, but to invite someone into relationship with God, to invite someone to come and see what God is doing in your life, to invite someone to journey, along with you, in discipleship, in faith. When we talk about being invitational, we’re not talking about attending an event with a start time and an end time. We’re talking about inviting people into a relationship that will change their lives – even as we ourselves again and again say “Yes” as God calls us to let down our nets one more time.

Last week, I asked you to think about how you might do a bit of Show and Tell during worship today. I told you I’d ask if there was anyone who might be willing to talk about something God is doing in their life. Well, it’s next week. So I’m extending an invitation, an invitation to share with us a minute or two about what God is doing, or has done in your life that needs sharing. This is chance to practice – here where there are plenty of lifeguards on duty – going a bit out into deeper water. Would anyone like to share what God’s been up to?

***

Peter’s response is so powerful, so moving. “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” The deep waters are full of abundance that God invites us to discover, and in the life of the church, even when it means letting down our nets for what seems like the millionth time in the same waters, I believe that God promises us a catch of fish that is beyond our imagining.

“When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.” Let us go and do likewise.

            Amen.

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[1] http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/06/us/new-deep-sea-fish-discovered-ceratioid-anglerfish/

Sermon, "Invitational: Come and See," John 1:35-50

Sermon 1/24/16

John 1:35-50

Invitational: Come and See

            My mom watches my nephew Sam every day after school. He gets off the bus at her apartment, and he hangs out there til his parents get out of work. I’ve sometimes been around when he gets out of school, and I like to ask him about his day. But the conversation usually goes like this: “Sam, how was school today?” “Fine.” “What did you do today?” “I don’t know.” “Did you have gym?” “No.” “Music?” “No.” “Art?” “Yes.” “What did you do in art?” “Painted pictures.” You get the point. Pretty much, you have to drag information like this out of Sam. It is certainly possible it was indeed a typical day at school. But it is also possible that there was a parade or a concert or he got an award or the President visited, and his description of the day’s events are likely to be the same. He tolerates school. But despite how easy the learning is for him, or maybe because of that, he doesn’t love it. And he’s probably not going to talk about it much more than he has to.    

            Some years ago at our conference camps, like Casowasco and Aldersgate and Sky Lake, they began giving out beads, color-coded, to children at summer camp. Throughout the week, you might get a blue bead if you go swimming, or a red bead if you help build a campfire. You might get a special bead if you participate in a cookout, or a counselor’s bead if your counselor sees you doing something really thoughtful and selfless. You might get a white bead for Christian leadership if you help design a worship service. The idea behind the beads is two-fold. First, the beads encourage children to try new things. It’s amazing what the incentive of a bead does! But it also helps kids tell the story of camp to their families when they get home. Sometimes, after a week at camp, a conversation with a parent or church member might sound like a conversation with Sam about his day at school. How was camp? Fine. Did you have fun? Yes. The beads can help kids remember and tell the story. I got this bead because of this cool thing that I did. The beads are a tool to help kids share their experiences.

            That’s kind of the idea behind “Show and Tell.” Do they still do Show and Tell? For many of us, our very first experiences of public speaking were in bringing some object to school – a special toy, a souvenir from a trip, a favorite book – and then telling our classmates about it. Letting kids bring something they love already helps kids be comfortable getting up front and sharing. They’re just talking about what they know and love already. Easy.

            I’ve been thinking about this – talking about what we love, telling our story, show and tell, as I’ve studied our gospel lesson for today. Over the next few weeks, as we think about what it means to be invitational, we’ll be looking into a few stories where Jesus invites people into a life of discipleship. And as we watch Jesus invite people into relationship with God, invite people to follow him, we’ll think about how we both respond to Jesus’ invitation and invite others to journey with us. Today, we turn to the gospel of John. We’re at the beginning of the book, still in chapter 1. We find that John the Baptist is standing with two of his disciples, two who had been following John and learning from him and his teaching. John sees Jesus walk by, and says of him, “Look, here is the lamb of God.” Seemingly just at this word, John’s disciples realize they’re meant to follow after Jesus. When Jesus sees this, he asks them what they are looking for. They call him teacher, and ask where he is staying. And Jesus responds, “Come and see.” They do. And this is how Andrew and one other become disciples of Jesus. Andrew, then, invites his brother, Simon Peter. He says to him, “We have found the Messiah,” and he brings Simon Peter to meet Jesus.

            The next day, Jesus sees Philip, and says to him, “Follow me.” And Philip finds his friend Nathanael and tells him, “We've found the one about whom Moses and the prophets wrote.” Nathanael wonders if anything good can come from Nazareth, apparently thinking that it is a place that produces nothing interesting, and Philip responds, “Come and see.” The scene ends with Jesus revealing that he already knows Nathanael’s heart, and presumably, Nathanael, along with Philip and Andrew and Simon and at least one more – they’ve all become followers of Jesus. I notice that Jesus doesn’t give a lot of information and details in this story of call, this story of invitation. He doesn’t need to know what the disciples believe and he doesn’t give them a set of his beliefs. He doesn’t quiz them or test them. He doesn’t give them a lot of instructions. He just says, when they’re curious about him, “Come and see.” Check it out! Come take part! It’s such a welcoming invitation. The message Jesus communicates is that not only will he share with them, but they’ll even get to take part, to participate, engage with whatever he’s all about right away. Come and see!

A few of us attended a District Day with our Bishop last week, and enjoyed a time of worship and praise. One of the musicians said, “worship is not a spectator sport.” Everyone cheered in agreement. Unfortunately, we then proceeded to try to sing songs where no music and no words had been provided. Most people mumbled awkwardly. You could tell exactly where in the room the people were who knew the song already. I know we sing new songs here, but I try to give you a fighting chance with some words or music or a tune you already know! Indeed, we became just spectators.

            It made me think of a lecture I heard last month from Lutheran priest Nadia Bolz-Weber. She shared with us how, at her church, when you walk in the door, you’ll find a number of folders set on a table that contain instructions for how to help with a different part of the service. You might see, for example, the gospel lesson in a folder, or the call to worship, or words to say to collect the offering, or a folder with instructions for helping to assist with communion. Anyone can participate in the service. So if you are there for the first time, and you want to help, you can walk in, pick up a folder, and find yourself reading the gospel lesson that day. That’s something they really focus on in her congregation. Removing barriers to participation. Although you can always learn more and attend classes and workshops and trainings – which are good things for your growth as a leader and for your spiritual development, the clear message that you’ll get at her church is that you are invited to take part right way, that you don’t have to be “special” or holy or ordained or certified to take part in worshiping God, to take part in serving your neighbor, to be part of the community of faith.

I told you before that it’s a challenge to get Sam to tell us about his day at school. But it isn’t that Sam is reluctant to talk about everything. Like many children his age, he gets pretty enthralled by the latest thing that he loves. For a while, it was all Pokemon. Sam could spend hours talking to you about Pokemon, and showing you his cards, and looking at his books about Pokemon. Hours. Lately, it’s Skylanders. Anybody familiar with Skylanders? It’s a video game with matching toys and books and things to purchase, of course. And Sam will say to me sometimes, “Aunt Beth, I want you to ask me any questions you might have about Skylanders. Anything you want to know.” He’s completely serious. I try to explain to him that I know so little about Skylanders I can’t even ask good questions, but he’s so sincere, so eager. He loves this thing, these Skylanders, and he wants to draw you in to the world that he loves. For something really important to Sam, he’s totally ready to say, “Come and see.”

            Have you ever felt that way about something? What do you love so much that the best thing you can think to do is share it? Imagine a new parent or grandparent and the enthusiasm with which they’ll show you pictures of a new baby. What else do you feel like that about? Because that’s how Jesus feels about the invitation he offers. “Come and see!” he says. He hardly says anything else at all before he’s inviting, inviting, inviting. He can’t wait to have you become part of the story.

            What about you? What brings you such joy, such excitement, that you can’t help but want to show and tell about it? What brings you such happiness that you want to tell someone all the details about it? What makes you want to invite someone else to come and see what you have experienced? I believe that among us we have experiences of God’s love and grace and movement among us that are worth sharing. I bet, if we let ourselves get going, we could spend a lot of time talking about how God has been good to us, how following Jesus has shaped our lives. I bet many of us could point to some aspect of our lives and say, “because of Christ,” because of God’s love, because of following Jesus, because of church, because of Apple Valley, and then share a story about God at work in us.

            When we talk about being invitational, that’s what I’m interested in. I want to hear about what God is doing in your life. And I am praying that you are so moved by what God is up to that you just have to say to those around you, “Come and see.” Next week, I’m going to be asking if there’s anyone here who wants to do a bit of Show and Tell. I’ll be asking if there is anyone who might be willing to talk about something God is doing in their life. I thought about asking you to do it right now, today. But I’m giving you a heads up. I won’t call on anybody. Please don’t skip church next week because this sounds scary. I’m just going to extend to you an invitation, an invitation to share with us a minute or two about what God is doing, or has done in your life that needs sharing. It’s kind of a practice, to remind us of how good it is to share with others about what we love. So I want you to think about that this week. What has God done in your life – what is God doing – that you need to share like you need to share the newest pictures of the precious children in your life? God is at work in us, in our world today, and at work here at Apple Valley. Jesus calls to us: “Come, and See.” Amen.

Sermon, "Invitational: The Guest List," Luke 14:12-24

Sermon 1/17/16

Luke 14:12-24

Invitational: Guest List

            When I was a child, we were allowed to have a birthday party every year, but we had to alternate the size of our party every year. One year, we’d be allowed to invite as many friends as we wanted, and the next, we were allowed to invite perhaps two or three friends to do something special with us, like going to Skate-a-while. I’m one of four siblings, and this policy helped to keep birthday party spending under control, since it seemed like it was always someone’s birthday. Either way, big party or small party, determining the guest list was an important matter. Did you invite your whole class? Even the kids you really didn’t get along with? Or did you leave a few people out? What about friends from church? Or friends from camp? And if it was a small party year – how to choose the two or three who were your very closest friends? I remember making lists in my diary, trying to figure out exactly who would be invited.

            It doesn’t get much easier as adults. I officiate at many weddings, and sometimes in the planning process the couple will lament to me that they’re having trouble figuring out who to invite. One couple had their guest list pared down to a certain number of guests, only to have the respective sets of parents add dozens of names to the list that they felt just had to be invited.

            Today, as we continue to think about what it means to be an invitational church, we turn to a parable from the gospel of Luke that centers on, believe it or not, the guest list for a party. The scene of our text today is set at the beginning of chapter 14, when Luke tells us that Jesus has been invited to the home of one of the prominent Pharisees to share in a meal on the Sabbath. Pharisees were religious scholars, interpreters of the law of Moses. And Luke tells us that they’re on the lookout, watching Jesus very closely while at supper, almost expecting him to break the laws governing the keeping of Sabbath, which he is prone to do. He doesn’t disappoint. He heals a man, arguing that doing so is as necessary as pulling someone from danger, helping them up from a fall, things allowable on the Sabbath.

Next, Jesus makes note of how people come in to the dinner table and look to choose the places of honor. He tells people that those who choose the best places for themselves should watch out, lest the host come and tell the guest they must give up their seat for someone more important. This might not communicate to us today when we think of being invited over to a neighbor’s for dinner. But if you think about being invited to a wedding reception, one of the few places where it is common to be assigned seating that might be related to your closeness to the hosts of the event, you get the idea. You wouldn’t want to sit too close to the bridal party’s table, unless you knew that was where you were supposed to be – perhaps unless you were family, or close friends. How embarrassing would it be to be asked to move? Jesus gives this example to make a broader point, a familiar refrain of his throughout the gospels: “For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Jesus continues saying “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.’” The people Jesus lists – the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind – all of these people would have been on the fringes of society. They would not be at the Pharisee’s table. Who people ate with was a fairly regulated affair in Jesus’ day. There were rules to be followed and hierarchies to be observed, just as Jesus’ comments about who sits where suggest. And as we’ve talked about before, even today, who we actually sit down and eat with, share meals with, even today – that tends to be a pretty small group of people. If they weren’t already, the others dining with Jesus were probably getting pretty uncomfortable.

One of the fellow dinner guests, hearing Jesus, responds, “Blessed is anyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God.” It’s hard to tell if he’s agreeing with Jesus, or just convinced that he will be among those dining with God, but his words prompt Jesus to share a parable.

Someone gives a dinner and invites many people. And when the time comes for the dinner, he sends his slave out to let the invitees know that it is time to come to the feast. But suddenly, they all have excuses, and can’t attend. The slave reports back to his master, and that master is angry. He sends the slave back out, to the streets of town, and then further out into the roads and lanes, to invite the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame, inviting more and more until the house is filled. ‘For I tell you,’ the master concludes, ‘none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.’

The party giver in this parable isn’t just mad because people had other plans and didn’t drop everything for his party. When Jesus mentions that the slave goes out to call the guests to come when the banquet is ready, this isn’t the first time they’re getting the invitation. In Jesus’ day, the invitation would have happened in two parts. “(1) the initial invitation some time ahead [of the event], and (2) the actual summons to the meal when it is ready.” You can think of it as the invite to dinner, and then the host actually telling you, “Dinner’s ready,” so that you come sit at the table. The guests the slave summons would have already been invited and RSVPed ‘yes’ to this banquet some time before the summons that takes place in our passage. So their excuses now represent a sudden, last minute change in plans. And their behavior, then, as now, would be considered impolite. For all those people to not show up would result in bringing shame on the host.

The excuses the guests give aren’t very sound, either. The tract of land purchased already would have been examined before this time. The oxen would have been tested. The new groom would have known about the wedding when he was first invited and could have refused then. The guests, one after the other, give excuses, and their excuses, coming at the last minute, after they’d already said they were coming, represent a great insult to the host, and a very weak attempt on the part of the guests to cover their own rude, neglectful behavior.

And when the master sends the slave out to invite more guest, Jesus lists the same group of ‘unwanted’ community members that Jesus mentions before he begins telling this parable – the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. When the master sends the slave out yet again because there is still room, the roads signify people even farther from the center of acceptability. These people would be considered ritually unclean, socially unacceptable. These people, the master invites into his home.

How we understand this parable has to do with what role we assign ourselves in the story. Who do you think we are in this parable? Maybe we first think of ourselves as the master of the house – the one throwing the party. After all, if Jesus was just advising the Pharisees on who to invite to their dinners, that would be a logical conclusion. If we are the masters throwing the party, what’s the message for us? Just, perhaps, what Jesus has already said. Those with an abundance to share ought to share it not with those who already have enough of their own, but with those who are poor in material things. We might conclude that we need to expand our vision, so that we’re seeing not just who is already here, in our lives, in our church, but wondering who it is that might be in the streets of town, who it is out on the proverbial road. I imagine our lives as concentric circles. We’re at the center, with our family, our loved ones. Maybe our church family is next, or close friends. Then maybe co-workers, acquaintances. If we’re the master, Jesus is asking us to figure out who is in these circles way out here, at the edges, and is asking us if we have invited them into our faith communities, into our lives, into our hearts.

But maybe we are simply someone on the guest list, not the master throwing the party. If we’re on the guest list, which part of the list do you think you’re on? Are you in the first round of invitations? Second? Third? If we’re on the guest list, and God is the master, (which sounds a little more likely, doesn’t it?) how do we respond to God’s invitation to us? How do we respond to Jesus’ invitation to discipleship? Perhaps we are like the guests who were on the original invitation list. We said yes to God – that’s why we’re here, after all. But when it came time to actually be disciples…well, something really important came up. Are we waiting for a better offer? Maybe one that doesn’t involve this whole humbling-ourselves thing? Are we letting our lips RSVP yes to God’s kingdom, while meaning for our actions, our lives, to remain unchanged? Do we think that if we are not ready to come, or if we don’t like the guest list, God’s party gets rescheduled? Cancelled? If we can’t be the host, do we just not want to come at all?

Here’s what I think. We are the slave in the story. A servant of God. We’re the messengers. We get to deliver the invitations – but the invitations are God’s invitations. Because the party is God’s. The feast is God’s. God is the party-thrower, the inviter, the host. It’s God’s table. It is not our party, and not our guest list. We’re not the ones in charge. We’re not the hosts. We don’t choose who gets invited or not. We can help out, but it is God who is setting the banquet table. It is God’s role to determine the guest list. And God’s guest list is really long. It contains lots of surprises. Even the kids in our class we don’t like, but God is inviting them anyway.

We’re messengers, sent from God into the world to share God’s invitation to relationship, to discipleship, to the party that is life with God. And sometimes we’re like the slave in the story, returning to God with bad news that some people have declined the invitations, and expecting, perhaps, that God will stop there. But God is going to send us out again and again, pushing us to travel to the places we don’t normally go, sending us with piles and piles of invitations to distribute. God is throwing the party of a lifetime. We have the great privilege and responsibility of serving God and helping to deliver the best invitations people will ever receive. So let’s get to work. There are a lot of invitations to deliver. Amen.   

Sermon for Baptism of the Lord Sunday, Year C, "Invitational: Baptism, Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Sermon 1/10/16

Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Invitational: Baptism

            Today is Baptism of the Lord Sunday. Every year, on the week after Epiphany, the liturgical calendar focuses on the Baptism of Jesus. It is one of the few events in Jesus’ life and ministry that is recorded in all four of the gospels, and in all of the gospels, it seems to be the event that kind of starts things off. Jesus is about thirty years old when he comes to be baptized. And before his baptism, we don’t get much insight into what he’s been doing. Other than his birth, we see him when he is presented at forty days old in the traditional ritual of purification, and then again when he is twelve, when he visits the temple with his family. But aside from those instances, the first we see of Jesus is when he is thirty, and he comes to John the Baptist to be baptized.

We talked during the season of Advent a bit about John and baptism. Remember, baptisms were not a new thing – water rituals that signified cleansing and beginning and renewal were already part of Jewish culture. What John does is tie it to his specific message. Remember, John has told the people to bear good fruit in their lives, advising them how to live by preparing room in their hearts and lives, readying themselves for the work that God is about to do. As a sign of their decision to live in a new way, John baptizes them.

The people start to wonder if John is the Messiah, but he points them in a different direction. John speaks of one who is to come after him. He says, “I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming … He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” And then, Luke tells us in a couple of short but important sentences that Jesus has also been baptized. He writes, “Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’”

I read an essay this week by theologian and preacher Karoline Lewis who drew my attention to one phrase that we find repeated in the baptism accounts. Luke says that when Jesus was baptized, and praying, the “heaven was opened.” In fact, in Mark’s account, it says that the heavens were “torn open.” It is a very deliberate act. In Jesus’ days, people understood that the earth was separated from heaven by a dome in the sky – as described in the creation story in Genesis. The dome in the sky is the line of division between heaven and earth. And for the gospel writers, in the act of Jesus’ baptism, that division is broken in a clear way as Jesus receives a sign of the Holy Spirit and words of affirmation from God – “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased. Lewis writes that the significance of Jesus’ baptism is this: “that which separates us from God is no longer … God is no longer behind the firmament, up in the clouds, at a distance, but here among us.” (1) Jesus’ baptism is the demonstration to the world of what God is willing to do to be close to us – cross boundaries, break down walls, step across dividing lines, tear open the heavens to get closer to us.

I was reading about the meaning Epiphany, not just to share in worship with you last week, but also to share out in Rochester where Epiphany was the topic of one of our weekly faith chats, where we discuss almost anything that comes to mind and try to look at topics in light of our faith. So I learned a bit more about the history of how and when and why Epiphany has been celebrated in the church than we had time for during worship last week. And I was surprised to discover that in the early church, Epiphany focused not only on the visit of the Magi to the Christ child, but also on the Baptism of Jesus. In fact, in the Eastern Orthodox Christian traditions, this is still today the focus of Epiphany – Jesus’ baptism. Instead of focusing God-in-the-flesh, the incarnation of God in Jesus’ birth, Epiphany in these traditions focuses on Jesus’ baptism as the light-bulb moment of God’s desire to be with us in the flesh. And when you think about God opening the heavens in order to set start to Jesus’ ministry with these signs of affirmation, it is an Epiphany moment. How much does God want to be in relationship with us? Enough to break down and break through anything that is in place that might separate us from God.  

Do we have any Harry Potter fans here? I’ve been thinking about one of the first chapters in the first book in the series. In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Harry, just before his 11th birthday, receives an invitation to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Well, sort of. In the world of Harry Potter, mail comes through Owl Post. Owls deliver letter and messages and news. But Harry's aunt and uncle, his guardians, are Muggles - non magical people. And they don't want Harry to have anything to do with the world of magic. So when a letter comes for Harry, delivered by an owl, his aunt and uncle refuse to give it to him. But, somehow, it is known that Harry hasn't received his letter, his invitation to attend Hogwarts. So another owl is sent. And when his family withholds that one from him, another is sent, and another, until owls are coming in through the doors and windows and chimney and every which way. Finally, after Harry's family flees home just to avoid letting Harry receive his invitation, his letter is hand-delivered to him on a secluded island by the Hogwarts game-keeper and half-giant Hagrid. Clearly, for the magical community, it is of utmost importance that Harry receives his invitation. They will do absolutely anything to make sure that Harry is invited to attend school at Hogwarts.

I couldn’t help but think of that scene as I was thinking about Jesus’ baptism, and the message God sends to us in this act. Jesus’ baptism is an invitation to us – an invitation that God extends to us over and over to be in relationship with God. To journey with God. To build a life with God at the center. And God will send us invitation after invitation to make sure we know that God wants us – even to the point of opening the heavens to give us the message. That’s how important it is to God that we know that we are invited.

Over the next several weeks, we’re going to be thinking about what it means to be an invitational people. That’s one of our key words that we’re focusing our ministry on here at Apple Valley. Our key verse for invitational, from the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus is “The Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.” It speaks, again, of God’s determination to find ways to invite us into relationship. Now, over these next weeks, I want us to think about who we invite, how we invite, exactly what it is we’re inviting folks to be part of. But before we move there, we remember that our invitational nature is grounded in God’s invitation to us. And I want us to remember how God invites us, how deeply God wants to connect with us, so that we might embody that as we learn to be invitational in relating to others.

So, today, we remember. We remember Jesus’ baptism. And we give thanks for the invitation that God offers to us – celebrated in our own baptisms, and renewed today, and again and again. There is no boundary, no border, no dividing line, no wall, no obstacle that will keep God from seeking us out. God opens the very heavens to reach us. We’re invited. Remember, and be thankful. Amen.