This is Expensive (Reflections on Pentecost 13, Year C 2022)

 

"Moses Viewing the Promised" Land J. Tissot (French, 19th Cent)

²⁵Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, ²⁶“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. ²⁷Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. ²⁸For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? ²⁹Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, ³⁰saying, ‘This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.’ ³¹Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? ³²If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. ³³So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions. (Luke 14:25-33) 

Whenever this Gospel lesson comes up I like to start with a standard disclaimer: The word “hate” in verse 26 doesn’t mean hate. My man Luke is writing in a first century Greek, a language that has a whole boatload of words to describe different types of love, but only one word for “not loving.[i]” In English we translate “not loving” as “hate,” but the real opposite of hate is actually indifference, don’t you think? Jesus is saying you’re not really a disciple if you care more about your stuff or financial gain or the opinion of people—even your family—than you care about following him. It’s still a pretty tough ask, but not as nasty as asking you to hate your mom or dad. 

The good folks who composed our Revised Common Lectionary hooked up this Gospel lesson with a lesson from Moses (Deuteronomy 30:15-20). Okay, it’s not really from Moses. The book of Deuteronomy[ii] was probably written around the eighth century BCE. This was centuries after the time of Moses—about eight hundred years give or take. The book was composed at a time of political crisis when the governments of Judah and Israel were seen to be corrupt and lots of folks were languishing in poverty. It seems the rulers were more into holding onto power and filling their own pockets than helping out the poor and destitute (Sound familiar?). Some unknown religious guys figured the Hebrew people really needed some reforms, so they cooked up this book and made Moses the hero. After all, what self-respecting member of God’s Chosen People would want to go against Moses? Their point was pretty clear: Love God, put God first, obey God’s commandments to love others, and you’ll save the nation. Keep being greedy, power-hungry slobs and the nation will perish (which it kind of did). 

The problem I always have with the reading from Deuteronomy is that it almost sounds a bit superstitious. It’s like Moses is saying, “Hey! Obey the rules and everything will be groovy. Step out of line and God will squash you like a cockroach.” But I have to ask if it’s really that simple. I’ve said before that trying to influence God is not really religion. We don’t earn our way to paradise in the next world and good fortune in the present by what we do. It’s silly to see ourselves as appeasing an angry God.[iii] I think the lesson we should always take from this reading from Deuteronomy is a lesson more for society as a whole (but not wasted on American voters) then for us as individuals. Mercy, compassion, fairness, and justice work well for a nation. Greed, intolerance, domination, bigotry, and corruption don’t. 

But for us as individuals these passages are still rather prickly. Moses tells us to do right and be rewarded, but what happens when we do right and get screwed anyway? Jesus talks about the cost of following him, which always makes me think of the great Lutheran martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his book The Cost of Discipleship. Bonhoeffer wrote this masterpiece of Christian theology in 1937 during the reign of Hitler and the Nazis. In it he argued that sacrifice was essential for the life of a Christian: 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline. Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.” 

And

“Costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart. It is costly because it compels a man to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him.” 

Bonhoeffer put his money where his mouth was. He could’ve stayed in the US when the Nazis came to power, but he returned to Germany. He could’ve kept his mouth shut instead of speaking out against the abuses of that regime, but he openly preached confrontation. The result? His church was shut down by the police and he was officially prohibited from preaching, speaking publicly, or publishing. He could’ve just taken his punishment and kept quiet, but he joined the underground opposition, aided the Jews, and was imprisoned and ultimately hanged for his trouble. His discipleship cost him everything. 

I certainly can’t promise that obedience to Christ will be a day at Disneyland. We all have to accept that, at some time or another, it’s going to cost us something. 

As I muse (and I frequently muse) about the future of the ELCA, all I see is a metric ton of sacrifice ahead of us. We’re going to have ask ourselves if we love the Gospel more than we love our gorgeous church buildings with stained glass windows dedicated in memory of dead Lutherans. Are we ready to do away with organ music masses? With professional paid clergy? Can we part with the smug superiority that comes from preaching we’re going to Heaven and godless heathens aren’t? Are we willing to create new spaces based primarily on mission to neighbors who may not share our story? 

There are two things we’ll have to embrace: First, there will be sacrifices we won’t want to make. Second, Christ promises us the sacrifices will be worth it. 

Keep the faith, my friend. Thanks for reading.

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[i] The word in Greek is miseo (misew for you Greek lovers out there!)

[ii] Fun fact: The word “Deuteronomy” literally means Second Law. The Ten Commandments appear in the book of Exodus, but the guys who wrote Deuteronomy really wanted to put a contemporary spin on the Law of Moses. Sort of Ten Commandments 2.0.

[iii] It’s also very un-Lutheran!

We Don't Choose Our Seat (Reflections on Pentecost 12, Year C 2022)

“For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all those who humble themselves will be exalted.” (Luke 14:14) 

The Church Lady at Saint John’s Mamaroneck, NY looked askance at me when I showed up as a supply preacher that Sunday morning. “You’re not Dr. Pfoonmann,” she said. 

“Should I be?” I asked. 

“If you want to cash the check you’ll have to be,” she replied. “It’s made out to him.” 

Oh, boy, I thought. It looks like Pastor Marv screwed up. He’d arranged for me to sub for him months ago, but he must’ve forgotten and called another pastor. This was pretty discouraging. I was a fourth year seminarian and my pecuniary circumstances relied heavily on supply preaching gigs. Plus, I’d driven all the way up from Philly and paid tolls on the Jersey Turnpike and the George Washington Bridge. I’d also spent time writing a sermon which it looked like I wasn’t going to be able to preach. As I was pondering how much Pastor Marv’s mistake had just cost me, the Reverend Doctor Pfoonmann[i] drove up. Church Lady and I explained the mix-up to him. I figured if I left at that moment I’d have just enough time to drive up to Yorktown Heights and catch the late mass at my old internship congregation.

 “Don’t go,” the Reverend Doc said. “We’ll do the service together. You can preach and I’ll preside.[ii]” Church Lady said she’d see to it that I’d receive a check in the mail. That sounded good to me. After church Dr. P. complimented me on my sermon and gave me a piece of advice. “When you get ordained,” he said, “be sure to get on a lot of synod committees. Get yourself known. This way you’ll be considered for better calls or positions on the synod staff when they open up.” 

This sounded like good advice for someone making a career in the Lutheran Church. The only issue with it is I’ve never seen being a pastor as a career. It’s supposed to be a calling. There’s a big difference between the two things. 

Some years ago I attended a retirement party for my closest Lutheran neighbor, Pastor Kevin. He was leaving his parish after twenty-four years of service. In those twenty-four years Kevin never did anything sexy. He never wrote a book or published an article. He didn’t create a popular podcast. He didn’t serve on a synod committee. He didn’t found a new social ministry organization. He didn’t serve an underserved population, build a new church building, or get arrested for protesting social injustice. He had no need to blast his own kazoo. He knew who he was and what God had called him to do. He just served his congregation faithfully and well. And they loved him for it. 

Kevin had no desire to move up the ecclesiastical food chain, but neither did he grovel in self-deprecating humility. He just had an honest understanding of his talents. 

In the Gospel appointed for Pentecost 12, Year C (Luke 14:1, 7-14) Jesus isn’t giving us some magic formula for self-promotion. He’s not saying, “Do this and you’ll get that.” If you think what you do will influence God, you’re practicing superstition, not religion. Someone’s false modesty and self-deprecation is really a drag for the rest of us. We keep having to say polite things to buck up the ego of the person who denigrates themself. Just once I’d like to respond to a Uriah Heap-style comment by saying, “Yeah, you’re right. You really are unworthy. Guess it sucks to be you.” 

I think Jesus is calling us all to an honest assessment of our gifts. If we are told, “Friend, move up higher,” it will be because the elevated place is where our abilities and sense of service—not our ego or ambition—calls us. Whether you’re the pastor of the big downtown church or the little country chapel, CEO of a major corporation or the guy who cleans the men’s room, your talent for the service you render is a gift from God. You didn’t choose it. There’s something liberating about honest self-appraisal. It’s a relief when you don’t have to pretend to be important. 

Our Gospel lesson finishes up with Jesus’ advice about throwing dinner parties. He tells us here that, should we feed the poor and disabled, we’ll be rewarded at the resurrection of the righteous. Now, who am I to argue with the Lord? But I think our reward will come a little sooner than that. I’ve been invited to some pretty swanky wedding feasts and funeral repasts, and, as the pastor, I’ve always been given a pretty nice seat of honor and chowed down on some very tasty and often expensive meals. But on the occasions when I’ve bought a bucket of KFC to share with homeless folks who’ve stayed in our church basement through the Interfaith Hospitality Network, I’ve felt the satisfaction of knowing I’d done what Jesus wanted me to do. That’s reward enough. 

Thanks for reading, my friend. Remember: when you’re baptized, you always have a seat at the table.

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[i] Obviously, this isn’t the pastor’s real name. I forget what it was. It was a long time ago.

[ii] In fairness to Pastor Marv, St. John’s didn’t celebrate Holy Communion every week. He needed to call an ordained pastor on Communion Sundays in accordance with Church doctrine. I was still in seminary and lacked the authority to celebrate a mass. I guess he forgot which Sunday it would be when he arranged to have me fill in for him.

Jesus Heals on the Sabbath (A Repeat Reflection on Pentecost 11, Year C)

 I accidentally deleted the post I had written for Pentecost 11, 2022. The post below was published in 2019. Hope you enjoy it all the same.

So Jesus heals on the Sabbath? Good. That’s what the Sabbath is for, isn’t it? The stuffy leader of the synagogue in the Gospel lesson appointed for Pentecost 11, Year C (Luke 13:10-17) seems to have missed the memo. He quotes only part of the Third Commandment as it appears in Exodus: “Six days you shall labor and do all your work (Ex. 20:9),” but he leaves out the whole rationale for the rule in the first place:

“But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, but rested on the seventh day; therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and consecrated it.” (Exodus 20:10-11)

Get the point? The Sabbath is for rest. Rest restores and heals. It’s necessary. Ever go without sleep? Ever deal with something that was so relentless you couldn’t catch your breath? Sucks, doesn’t it? We need the rest. Our souls need it as well as our bodies. The Sabbath is God’s gift so we can be healed. Nothing should be more natural in the world than that Jesus should see the woman who is in slavery to her affliction, and—without her even asking for it—he calls her over and makes her whole. That’s what the Sabbath is for.

Granted, over the years we Christians have made Sundays as dreary and burdensome as the synagogue leader who gives Jesus a hard time in our Gospel story. In one of my favorite novels, Of Human Bondage, W. Somerset Maugham describes a dreary English Sabbath in which a young boy must suffer through interminable Anglican liturgies in both the morning and evening, interrupted by a monotonous Sunday afternoon in which all activity ceases and an oppressive edict of silence is imposed on the household. It’s shear Purgatory. And it was supposed to be good for the soul.

For me, however, the Sabbaths of my youth were always very pleasant times. I got to see my buddies at church, the folks were friendly, the singing and preaching were joyful, and there was always—even well into my adulthood when my siblings and I had moved out of the family home—family time. We’d gather around the dining table in my parents’ home or at a local restaurant. We’d get caught up. We’d talk about the service we’d just attended or whatever else. After Sunday dinner there was our traditional Sunday snooze. I think the whole clan would hit our bunks and doze off until it was time to watch 60 Minutes. The Sunday afternoon nap was as much a part of Sunday as church and dinner. Even when I went away to graduate school, I pretty much kept up our Griffiths family Sabbath routine.

But today, it’s different for a lot of folks. There’s no rest on the Sabbath. Some people have to hold down more than one job to make ends meet. Sales clerks and waiters don’t get their weekly schedules until the last minute, so they can never commit to weekly worship. The “gig” economy has people working seven days, or so dog tired on a Sunday morning that all they can do is stay in bed. America—once home of the “blue laws” which forbade businesses to be open on Sunday mornings and forbade the sale of alcohol on the Sabbath—has effectively killed the Lord’s Day of Rest.

So, okay. The Sabbath doesn’t have to be a specific day. When I was in seminary I knew a Lutheran pastor from Tanzania who had a seventeen point parish back in his home country. It didn’t matter what the calendar said. Whenever Pastor arrived in the village, that day was Sunday.

Martin Luther interpreted obedience to the Third Commandment as hearing the word of God and learning it. This could be done during a lunch break at Walmart or before a shift at the Taco Bell. I think what’s necessary for the Sabbath is not the liturgy or the trappings of a church building (as much as I love these things), but the quiet moment to come to the Word and know that you are loved and valued. If you can couple that with the fellowship of other believers—with your Christian “family” in whatever form they take—and find a few restful, peaceful, healing moments to do it, so much the better.

A Good Sabbath to you, my friend. Thanks for dropping in.

The Great Divide (Reflections on Pentecost 10, Year C 2022)

 

"Jeremiah" H. Vernet (French 1844)

“Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!” (Luke 12:51) 

One of my favorite Hebrew scriptures prophets is Jeremiah. I really admire his determination to talk sense to powerful people who—alas!—appear have their heads stuck so far up their lower GI track (metaphorically speaking, of course) that they’re incapable  of hearing the wisdom the prophet is sharing. In the first lesson in the RCL for Pentecost 10 Year C (Jeremiah 12:49-56), we hear poor old Jerry railing again against popular preachers of his day who spout wacky, sci-fi-type images of the future but don’t seem to understand the peril of the present. The Joel Osteens of Jeremiah’s day are telling the powerful that everything they’re doing is groovy and God will deliver them from any unpleasantness that may arise. 

Jeremiah is telling them exactly the opposite. He warns them that they’re being idiots and heading into a world of hurt. For his trouble he is ridiculed and imprisoned. The poor guy can’t catch a break. Not only does he get into a mess of trouble for his efforts, but he has the heartbreaking experience of witnessing everything he warned about come to pass when the people who are supposed to be shepherding the nation pursue their own interests and ignore God’s commands. 

Bottom line? God’s word isn’t always welcome—and that’s assuming we really know what we’re proclaiming is God’s word. In the appointed gospel reading (Luke 12:49-56) we hear Jesus give us some of his most disquieting words (and Jesus is good at being disquieting, isn’t he?). The Prince of Peace isn’t always going to bring peace. No. He’s going to cause some trouble and division. Why? Because, just as in Jeremiah’s day, the times call for it. Jesus is going to get the family feuding with itself because it’s no time to just shut up and be nice. 

Families fight. That’s an ugly truth. People who are supposed to love and protect each other can often be split apart. It always hurts. 

Lutherans of all people are aware of how families can bicker. Our whole denomination was formed by a dust-up with our Roman brothers and sisters. Today I see a pretty humongous division over the very definition of what it means to be a Christian in America. I feel a little bit of barf coming up in my mouth at the very mention of the term “Christian Nationalism.” Some of our coreligionists use Christian identity as an excuse to promote intolerance, bigotry, and a reactionary mindset which, to my way of thinking, slanders the name of our Lord and Savior. 

I don’t see how “Christian” it is to outlaw abortion while slashing aid to low-income families. I can’t understand how we solve the gun violence crisis by letting everyone carry a gun. And faith in God’s deliverance is one thing, but ignoring the crisis of climate change is putting the Lord Our God to the test—a test we’re not going to pass. No question about it: there are divisions within our family. 

Whether we’re arguing public policy, church doctrine, or if it’s just a squabble between a parent and a child or a couple of in-laws, each of us thinks we’re arguing from the moral high ground. Our challenge should always be to discern if we’re arguing in obedience to Christ Jesus or from our own pride and stubbornness. Is our indignation born out of faith or a desire to maintain a tribal loyalty? Are we trying to help one another or cling to an ideal which no longer exists or even applies? 

What would Jesus do? Can we find it in ourselves to speak and fight for truth but do it out of love? Can there be controversy without contempt? Can we be unyielding without dehumanizing the person with whom we disagree? And are we willing to accept divisions without being complacent about them? 

Faith in Jesus has never guaranteed perfect harmony among believers. Just check out the New Testament if you don’t believe me—it’s full of family squabbles. But the beautiful thing is that in Christ, our squabbles can still be full of compassion.