Reflction for the Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost

“Therefore encourage one another with these words.”

(1 Thessalonians 4:18)

As we enter further into November, the holiday season seems to loom greater and greater on the horizon. Already stores are displaying their Christmas items. Though so far they are mostly the items you might need ahead of time – gifts appropriate for shipping and the things you’d need for crafting and creating projects that take time – it is still clear that the festivities which mark the end of our calendar year will be upon us soon.

And yet, the week after All Saints Sunday, I am reminded that the holidays and festivities approaching us are not signs of grace and hope for everyone. For some, Thanksgiving, Advent, and Christmas are reminders only of their grief or isolation. For others, the busy-ness of the season is only another weight: another chore, another set of errands, another cost of living in a materialistic society. All these weights on already weighed down bodies, minds, and hearts, can create quite a strain.

Everyone has the pieces they like and dislike about the holidays, and for whatever like or dislike you have, I can almost guarantee there is someone who feels opposite. Do the stores start carrying Christmas decorations too soon or too late? Do the songs start too quickly or too slowly? Are there too many family traditions or not enough?

And, somehow, in the midst of the busy-ness (or not busy-enough-ness) there are emotions: joy, anticipation, thanks, praise, hope, celebration, grief, fear, frustration, forgiveness, peace.

Our second reading for this Sunday comes from Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians. He spends some time reminding them of the impact of Christ’s resurrection, and our connection to it, and the reading ends with the simple line, “Therefore, encourage one another with these words.” Encourage one another. What can we do in these weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, before the real hustle and bustle of Advent and the Christmas season begin, to encourage one another? What simple note sent or patient smile given could have ripples of effect?

Our God is with us in all we say and do. Our God knows exactly how we feel about the upcoming holidays, and is already there ahead of us, waiting to welcome us into the season, to remind us of God’s love, no matter how busy or distracted the commercialism of the holidays may make us. And God has already sent God’s most encouraging Word, Jesus Christ, who knows and loves us, who has died and risen for us, binding us to his death and resurrection through baptism. What then is a spare moment of our time, given to other around us, who may be more in need of encouragement than we could ever know?

May God’s Spirit wash you anew this November, and remind you always of God’s grace and mercy.

Thanks be to God.

Amen

Reflection for All Saints Sunday

“Simul justus et peccator”

The phrase above is one that is known throughout Lutheranism. It is a major component of Luther’s theology and what we as Lutherans believe today. It is Latin, and means “simultaneously saint and sinner.”

            simul       = simultaneously

            justus      = justified/saintly

            et            = and

            peccator  = sinner

We are, at the same time, both sinners deserving of God’s punishment, and saints, forgiven and saved by Christ. In the waters of baptism we are saved, we are forgiven. In the bread and wine we are saved, we are forgiven. And yet, as we know all too well, we are all still human, and fall short of what it would truly mean to deserve God’s love.

No one is perfect.

No one, no person, no human being, is worthy of God’s love, and there is nothing that anyone can do to get to a point of worthiness. Even the thought that we would be worthy is prideful and knocks us down. However, we are not worms in God’s sight, either. To only ever degrade ourselves and to talk only about our sinfulness is not honest to our relationships with God.

We are, at the same time, both saints and sinners. We are sinful saints who can never do enough to earn God’s love, and we are saintly sinners, loved and forgiven.

What does this mean for us? Well, it means that we are free to see the world in this way as well. We no longer need to look on the world as only a sinful, horrible place, but as a place that is loved by God, made beautiful by God’s love. That does not mean that we turn a blind eye to the difficult and painful parts of the world, but that we can hold them with love that comes from the love that God has for us.

To be called saint alone or sinner alone would, in both cases, be difficult. To be called a saint only would put incredibly high expectations on us. To be called a sinner only would be just seeing the painful and awful parts of being. Recognizing that we are both together, simultaneously saint and sinner, means that we know that we have no power to earn God’s love, and yet we have it anyway.

Thanks be to God!

Amen.

Reflection for Reformation Sunday

“If the Son makes you free, you are free indeed.”

Today, we celebrate Reformation Sunday, that day when we celebrate the entire Reformation, from Martin Luther nailing his 95 these on the door of the church in Wittenberg, to the lives of all those who continue in his footsteps today. That’s right: the Reformation has not stopped. It continues in the lives of all who receive God’s grace and recognize it for what it is: pure grace, and who stand up in the face of the world saying, “no, you must have to earn it,” and say again, “no, it is pure grace.”

The theme of the ELCA’s most recent churchwide assembly was, “Always Being Made New,” a theme that reminds us that, though we are a people of tradition and culture and history, we are a people who trust in God the Creator, who are indeed a part of a continually created creation. When we speak of God the creator, we are speaking of the God who constantly creates: creation is not a single event that happened once, but one that happens every day, every moment, in all our lives. It is the same with baptism, which is also not really a singular event that happens to us once and then is done. We are continually baptized people, as we are continually created people, who are constantly experiencing the benefits and rewards of the water having touched our heads, and the Word of the triune God being proclaimed over us. It is why we do not believe in needing to be baptized by water more than once: once we have been touched by the water and the Word, that grace and promise is forever.

So, we are people who are always being made new, in creation and in baptism. And today, we celebrate Reformation Sunday. Yes, it is celebrated on (or, in this case, near) the anniversary of when Martin Luther nailed his theses to the door of the church. We celebrate the fact that this one man had the courage and creativity and attention to the Spirit to stand up and say, “No, we are not saved by what we do, but saved by our faith. And, further, faith isn’t even something that we do on our own, but a gift of God through the Holy Spirit.” It may make sense to us now, but in Luther’s day, to say that one doesn’t not have to DO anything in order to receive God’s love… well, this was quite an odd and difficult thing. And so, we celebrate, both that one event, and how it affects us even still today.

But, what does this really mean for us in our age? Does it mean that, since God loves us no matter what, we shouldn’t do anything? Should we, as Paul asks in his letter to the Romans, “Sin the more, that grace may abound?” Well, again quoting Paul, “By no means!” Instead, we respond to God’s love with more love. The Son has indeed made us free: free from sin, free from fear, free from punishment, free from danger to our souls. And so, being free, we are free indeed: free to love all God’s people, free to work for justice in all the world, free to serve our neighbors, free to love our enemies, free to give all we have to the One who is continually creating us, free to reach out to those who are sick or hurting, free to stand up, like Luther, for those who have no voice that is heard by the ears of those in power. WE have been made free, and so we act in that freedom: not in order to earn God’s love or to get a step closer to heaven, but because we are already loved, and love is the only response we have to give.

There is nothing that we can do to earn God’s love: we already have it. There is nothing we can do that would make God stop loving us. There is no “if… then…” in our relationships with God. There is no “if you do this, then God will love you.” There is no “if you don’t…,” or “you have to…,” or “once you have…” in our relationships with God. God already loves us through Christ by the gift of faith which comes from the Holy Spirit.

Now, we don’t believe it. We want to have the power ourselves to control our relationships with God, but it isn’t possible. God is constantly creating us, constantly forgiving us, constantly washing us in the waters of baptism, constantly prepared to feed us at this table, constantly loving us. There’s nothing we can do. Well, nothing but return love for love.

Thanks be to God.

Amen