To All Women of Trinity ~

Our women’s organization, known as Trinity Women of the ELCA or
WELCA, has a long-standing goal to share a large portion of our year’s
proceeds with organizations and missions: local, statewide, nationwide,
and internationally. Last year your women’s group donations totaled
$1,200.00. This included $1,095 from the Christmas Stocking and $105
from the treasury. (Receiving $100 donations were: Clinton Care Center, Fairway View, BSC Food Shelf, Hospice Orton/Grace, Global Health Ministries, Project Christmas, LWR, Grace Home, Someplace Safe, UMM Lutheran Campus Ministry, Heifer Project, and Reach Out for Warmth.)

In order for us to continue giving to the chosen organizations and missions,
and because all women of Trinity are members of WELCA, we are asking
you to prayerfully consider giving a monetary donation. A Christmas
stocking is hung in the narthex for your envelope. It can also be mailed to
Trinity Women, PO Box 374, Clinton. We will collect these donations
through December and distribute them in early 2021. God bless your
giving.

And – please consider joining us at our WELCA meetings. The fellowship shared at these meetings is good for the heart and soul.

Your sisters in Christ,

Trinity WELCA

Sermon – May 31, 2020 – Pentecost

            It’s Pentecost, and one would think there would be more birds. It is, after all, the Holy Spirits big day and in his most recognizable appearance in the gospels, at the baptism of Jesus, the Spirit comes down from heaven dressed as a bird. That was the first impression, and it really stuck. If you view the early paintings and drawings of the baptism of Christ, you usually see the same picture, an old man, a young man, and a bird. And many of our Pentecostal hymns sing of a dove or wings. I guess once you take on the appearance of some creature, you are remembered as that forever. Even most Pentecost bulletin you get a dove.

            But today’s scripture lessons today are totally bird less. No birds in Acts, no birds in John, no birds in the Psalms, none in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. And the readings just would not make much sense if you put bird images in them. So no birds in todays readings. Just wind.

            Just wind, and just us, trying forever to grasp the wind. As the book of Ecclesiastes reminds us, is vanity. There are many reasons to cling to the bird image, the number one would be that we could actually cling to a bird. You can see, hold, touch, cage a bird. But you cannot see the wind, you cannot touch it, you cannot hold it, you cannot cage it. It is a mystery that sweeps through our world that has no beginning or ending. Sometimes gentle and refreshing, sometimes violent and devastating, always out of our control.

            And although it is difficult to paint wind into these ancient drawings with young man and old man, grasping wind is a much more accurate description of our relationship with the Holy Spirit than is birdwatching. Our human minds delight in solving problems and unraveling mysteries and decoding codes, we like to figure things out, we like to put our trust in the proven.

            And our faith is hard, because we are asked to put our trust in things we cannot see or understand. We are grasping at wind, finding that we are forever empty handed. I have baptized Brecken and Kollins Dybdahl into the body of Christ and I hope to do many more. When I baptized these twins, no dove from heaven descended on them. Instead, the Holy Spirit hid in the air around them and us, unseen. I invoked the Holy Spirit in the water over the font and the water stayed perfectly still. I traced the cross on their foreheads and declared to them that they were sealed by the Holy Spirit in Baptism. There is no way to display this seal permanently. It is quite a thing to give ones life to an unseen mystery. But that is what we as Christians are asked to do.

What potentially makes it easier is that we do it all the time. We live by the breath of life and we cannot see it. Our souls are sustained by the beauty of music, and we cannot see it. Our bodies are grounded by the force of gravity, and we cannot see it. Our spirit runs on hope, and we cannot see it. Love is the most powerful thing in the universe, and we cannot see it. There is more going on than meets the eye. This Spirit, this Holy Spirit is so close to us, that we have difficulty finding our focus. We live and move and have our being in the Spirit of God. The Spirit envelopes us. The Spirit holds us and sustains us whether or not we believe it. Even though we cannot see it. Even though we cannot hold it firmly in our hands.

            What actually happened in John’s gospel is that Jesus breathed on his disciples. He simply breathed on them. Just air coming from his mouth. The average person does that 23,000 times a day. It’s amazing on how our mysteries are so wrapped up tightly in simplicity.

            Jesus pushed the Holy Spirit into this world through his lips. No birds, just wind. The Spirit moved on the breath of Jesus, entering and leaving and entering and leaving the lungs of the disciples. All of them, breathing together. So the Spirit rolled on every breath they took, and on every word they spoke. Jesus filling their lungs, and Jesus filling their world. Spreading like a virus. Unseen, and impossible to grasp. Unseen, and impossible to stop.

            What actually happened in Acts was a violent wind pushed the disciples out of the room and into the streets. Like a tornado that could not be resisted the Holy Spirit carried them into their mission field to speak the gospel of Jesus into the world, so that what was in them could now be breathed in by others. Jesus filling their lungs, and Jesus filling their world. Spreading like a virus. Unseen and impossible to grasp. Unseen, and impossible to stop.

            You are breathing the same air. Air passed through the lungs of those who came before us. You are held in the same wind. Jesus is filling your lungs, and you are breathing Jesus back into your world. Inspiring those who are suffocating, breathing life into dead places.

            We live and move and have our being in this Holy Spirit. The very atmosphere that envelopes us. We truly are surrounded. And our only recourse is surrender. To allow the wind to blow us away.

            Birds are ok, birds are nice. Dove on a bulletin cover, very sharp. But our destiny is blowing in the wind.

A lot of people today think there is a war going on today, science and the Bible, you can’t have both, you need to choose. As we think about that we have to ask the question, “what is it that the Bible claims?” It may indeed be contrary, contradictory toward science claims. If we are going to try to deal with this kind of topic, we have to make sure we understand the claims we made on both sides, otherwise we won’t be able to assess where we land.                                                                                                                                            And that’s the kind of origin story that has deep theological meaning for us, and would have been the kind that the Israelites would have been likely to tell.                                                                                                        

If in Genesis 1 we have a home story rather than a house story then even something like the seven days is not something about the material cosmos, rather it might talk about how the cosmos became sacred space. For instance, when they built a temple in the ancient world, it took a long time for them to construct the temple, and that structure was being built to be a residence for God, it was being prepared to be a home, but first they had to build the house. When they get to the stage where all the preparation, all the material building is done, it’s still just a house. It’s not a temple, it’s not a home. But then they have a temple inauguration, a ceremony, in which this temple house becomes a home. You would find the origins of the home, that story, in the inauguration, the dedication, rather than in the long story of the buildings construction. We realize then that those inauguration and dedication ceremonies that we have in the Bible, and that we have throughout the ancient near-east, those home stories, those inauguration of sacred space stories often take place in even days. As a result it would be no surprise that in Genesis 1 we have a home story that is structured in a seven day sequence. And at the end of it God rests, which means that God is done ordering it as a home, as sacred space, therefore he takes up his residence and his reign in that sacred space.                                                                                                                     

If you look at a house, for instance, you could address the houses origins question by telling how the house was built. You could talk about the foundation, the wiring, the insulation etc. That would be the house story, and that would be a legitimate origins story. Alternatively, we could talk about how the people who live in the house have made it a home. That would be the home story. That is, how this house became these peoples home. And describing how they made it a home. That is also an origins story. And usually the latter is the story most people looking at a house would be more interested in.                                                                                     

So what is it that we think about when we think about the Bible’s claims in Genesis 1 and 2? To assess that, we have to make sure that we understand that the Bible is indeed an ancient text. It’s not written to us, it is written for us. But God has communicated through Israelite authors, to an Israelite audience, in their terms, and it’s that communication that we can benefit from as we try to understand the Bible’s claims. We should not think that the Bible is going to anticipate our world and our issues and address them, either explicitly or suttlely. We have to read the text for what it is. So when we come to Genesis 1 for instance, we have to ask the question “what kind of origins account is this?”  You could do a number of different approaches to try to understand origins. So we have to figure out what origin account they are telling.                                                                                        

The home story is about how this world was tailored for us, by a loving, creator God, who wants to be in a relationship with us. The home story will talk about how God himself intended to make this cosmos God’s home as well, where he could relate to us. The home story is an important origin story that has significant theology connected to it. And so we would have to ask the question “which origin story are they telling, what do they want to know about?”                                                                                                                                          Theologically the home story is extremely important. We find that most of the cosmologies in the ancient world focus on a home story. A home story talks about how the world is ordered, and how it functions. What role and purpose does it have. And those kind of things were important in the ancient world, and they are important to us as well. The fact that we have molecules and atoms and quarks and supernovas and expanding universe, that’s of interest and important for us to understand. But in the end what we really want to know is God’s involvement in this world and how he made it a place for us, to relate to him. That origin story that we find in Genesis is an origin story that is focused on theology, not so much on science. As such the claims that it is making may be claims that have more to do with theology than with science.                                                     

When we read the Israelite account in Genesis 1 we have to ask the question, well, the same kind of question. Would they be interested in the house story, how the cosmos was constructed by God, because of course it was constructed by God, and they know that and we know that. But do they want the house story, or are they interested in a different origins story, the home story.

Genesis Lesson #2

We discussed last week about the thought of a war between science and the Bible. And how we are in the awkward position of having to choose. This controversy is everywhere.

So, we must decide how we make our decisions. We have to know the claims of each side. So now, we will look at the claims the Bible makes. We will look closely at what the text says. We will look at the text of Genesis through ancient eyes, that is thinking about the text as an ancient document. We have to be careful about reading the Bible as a modern text. We need to find where the Bible’s authority comes from.

We know that God’s purpose is carried out through human purpose. We have a duo authorship going on here, human and divine. And God decided that he was going to communicate through particular human beings, in a particular language, a particular culture, in a particular time and place. This was God’s decision. That means if we are going to get God’s message we have to go through that author. So, there is authority vested in the human author. It is not the human author’s authority; it is the authority of God. But we have to go through the human author to get it. That means we have to try to understand what that human author is communicating, because what he has to say, in his time and place and language, to his audience, that has authority. So, we understand the Bible was written ‘for us, but not to us’. The message transcends culture, but the form is culture bound. We get a message from scripture that we can all benefit from, it is sound theology and is revealing God to us. But the message is culture-bound and that means we have work to do to understand it. We must take our place in that ancient audience. They will not have our questions, our issues. For instance, when they thought of kings, it was not the way we know of in recent history such as the kings of France and England. When we read of cities in the Biblical text, we can’t think of New York or London or Paris, Jerusalem and Babylon are far different places. When we talk of marriage in the Biblical text don’t think love and romance, marriage was not built that way. When we think of slavery in the Biblical text, we don’t find ethnic exploitation or the bigotry that comes with that, because that’s not what slavery was in the ancient times, we have to try to think about the world the way they thought about the world. We have to think this way, so we don’t impart our thinking about the text without realizing it. So we have to see the world the way they did, and we will start taking that up next week.

June 21^st Sermon – 3^rd Sunday after Pentecost

                  A difficult Gospel this week, a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, our foe would be members of our own household. Jesus and his vision of a non-utopian future. A future in which would drill its way even into the foundations of the family unit. A future in which generations would clash over allegiances and values. It is a grim picture indeed.

                  Fortunately in 2000 years of steady progress finds us in a 21^st century utopia in which such talk of division can scarcely be found, int the news, or on social media, or around a family gathering. We so many years removed from these words of Jesus, I’m sure we are relieved to find ourselves in the comfortable state, unaffected outsiders curiously glimpsing the struggles of the first century faithful, it must have been hard. It is almost impossible in modern America to imagine such division. Especially in ones own family, I mean if you take politics out of it, and race out of it, and religion out of it, and opinions generally, the world in which this sort of conflict would happens seems inconceivable. Or perhaps not.

                  It is amazing how timely these 2000 year old texts can be. Jesus is talking to that 1^st century Palastinian audience and he could just as well be talking directly to us, to our nation. To a people who know division all to well. Families are still not perfect. Neither are the individual members and division does happen. Sometimes, despite our best efforts, and deepest desires. But reality makes it no easier to hear these words coming from Jesus. Not just because of our lingering scars and fractured relationships, because not only does Jesus name the thing, in this gospel passage, Jesus owns it. Before listing the divisions I previously mentioned, Jesus says I have come to set a man against his father.

                  This is a difficult gospel passage because when read in isolation it confronts us with a picture of Jesus that feels odd, even disconcerting. How do you make sense of a Jesus who comes to set family members in opposition. With a Jesus who brings a sword instead of peace. With a Jesus who warns his followers to temper their love for their own parent and children.

Lutheran pastor and scholar David Lose remembers that as a child he recalls that this passage always troubled him because no matter how many times he heard it in church and Sunday School, he never could get past the feeling that he really loved his parents more than Jesus. And as a 10 year old he concludes that he is in serious trouble with Jesus. And he confides his indiscretion his mom, who in turn tells her child that she made the same confession to her dad as a young girl. This passage has been haunting Christians for centuries. It is an image of Jesus that tends to clash with those images that most often dominate our Christian piety. The image of Jesus carrying a lamb over his shoulders. The image of a compassionate Jesus feeding the hungry crowd, or touching the lepers clean, or raising a little girl from her deathbed with his gentle hand, or blessing a group of children, it is difficult to see that Jesus in this gospel.

                  Here Jesus says “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth, I have not come to bring peace but a sword.” But also, this is the same Jesus who says “blessed are the peacemakers.” And commands Peter to put away his sword in the Garden of Gethsemene. This is the same Jesus who the prophets named the Prince of Peace.

                  Here Jesus says “I have come to set a man against his father, but this is the same Jesus who takes care of his mother while dying on the cross, who restores dead and dying children to their grieving parents, who gives to his followers the ministry of reconciliation.

                  Here Jesus says “whoever loves father and mother more than me is not worthy of me and whoever loves son and daughter more than me is not worthy of me, but this is also the same Jesus who twice in this gospel of Matthew quotes the commandment to honor one’s father and mother, who once in a confrontation with the Pharisees who he believes do not take this commandment seriously enough, and the same Jesus who asks a rich young man which commandments he must keep in order to enter into eternal life. This is the same Jesus who says let the little children come to me, for it is such as these in which the kingdom of heaven belongs.

                  There is more to Jesus than what we find in todays gospel passage, but this too is Jesus. Earlier in this same chapter of Matthews gospel Jesus sends out his disciples. He gives them their mission, and he promises them a fruitful ministry, they will cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. In short, they will be like Jesus, they will preach his message, they will proclaim the good news of his love. They will do his amazing works.

                  But also, he makes this quite clear, they will experience his suffering. They will go into the world to do good, to proclaim the good news of Christ by word and deed, they will do justice and offer mercy and share God’s love and for their reward they will be persecuted, they will be beaten, they will be disowned.

                  Those who follow in the footsteps of Jesus find that those footsteps end at the foot of the cross. This gospel, this gospel passage is difficult. It is difficult because we want to believe that good things happen to good people. We want to believe that we get what we deserve, we want to believe that folks understand that the Good News is good news.

But then Jesus comes along and his good news causes family strife, his good news breeds conflict, his good news finds him nailed to the cross. Jesus is preaching the good news, but that good news is shaking things up. Redefining family, overturning tables, clashing with powerful people, ruffling feathers.

                  Walter Bruggerman reminds us that the gospel is a very dangerous idea. We have to see how much of that dangerous idea that we can perform in our lives, there is nothing safe about the gospel. Jesus did not get crucified because he was a nice man.

                  The problem with the gospel and why it raises our human defenses is that it is just so bothersome, so confrontational, so disruptive. It brings life to dead places and shines light in dark corners, and heals sicknesses and breaks the bond of addiction. Love could really put some folks out of business. God is making all things new and that is good news unless you are invested in the old stuff.

                  Jesus in the gospel is launching a revolution, a revolution built on love. Richard Rohr writes that it is no surprise that the Christian icon of redemption is a man offering love from a crucified position. Cupid is not our icon of love, the crucified Christ is. Our great hope as Christians is that we share in Christ resurrection, but of course, one does not share in Christ’s resurrection without first dying with him.

                  The goal of the gospel is not to make nice people. It is not to make polite citizens. The goal of the gospel is as C.S. Lewis says ‘to draw people into Christ, to make them little Christs, to live out the love of God until it hurts, and sometimes it will’.

                  This is a difficult gospel passage. And maybe we have been reading it wrong. It is not a prophesy or a threat. It is not just Jesus being realistic. Its obviously not Jesus hope for the world. This gospel is lament. This gospel is the heartbreaking reminder that since the Garden of Eden, since our very beginning, human brokenness has time and time and time again caused us to rebel against God’s love.

                  Jesus revolution was opposed back then and it is opposed now. Nonetheless, God’s love is on the move. God is not discouraged. Its funny how peace brings out our swords. And still God continues to reach out in this world in love, and now through us, sending us out into the world as little Christs. Where there is hatred we sow love. It is good news, God is making all things new, Jesus is leading a movement that promises to overwhelm this planet in his love. But change is hard and not everyone is going to get on board. It wasn’t easy for Jesus, and it won’t be easy for us.

This gospel passage is difficult because it is true. Love in this world is both threat and salvation. And yet this is the work that Christ calls us, this is what we are sent to do. It’s not an easy job, Jesus knows that better than anyone. Those who follow in the footsteps of Jesus find that those footsteps end at the foot of the cross. Those who stand at the foot of the cross will find Truth.

By Minister James Rach

If we get anything from our reading in Acts today, we might have to point out that at times, it seems, angels can be a bit insensitive. While the disciples stand and by accounts dazed and broken by the ascension event, these two in white robes suddenly appear not to console them, but to challenge them. “Why do you stand looking up towards heaven?” I mean, the angels know why, or at least they should. The disciple’s eyes are glued to the very spot in the heavens that just devoured Jesus. And the disciples are trying to keep their eyes on Jesus. That has been a somewhat difficult task in recent weeks. They already lost him once, they didn’t want that to happen again. But now he is gone. For the second time in just six weeks. Once again they are powerless to stop him, and now, all they have left is a limitless empty sky. The second wound stinging even as the first wounds are still fresh in their minds.

Holy Week had affected them deeply. They had just stood by and watched as he was dragged away and killed on a cross. And they thought they would never see him again. But, three days later he returned. And their grief was replaced by a strange mix of terror and joy and confusion. It made no sense, it was nothing they expected. But Jesus had returned, and all the pain seemed to go away. The disciples now thought on this side of the resurrection they would have a sort of invincibility. Their leader was risen from the dead, a proof he could show every doubter by the wounds in his hands and feet and side. Every opponent would fall at his feet. Every sceptic would now receive their gospel message with eager gladness. He was back and they were ready.

But now forty days after the resurrection, the disciples are staring blankly at the sky and Jesus once again has left them with all of their dreams withering away. Of course they were just standing there looking up toward heaven. There was nowhere to go. And then two men in white robes question jarred them out of their daydream and back into reality. There was nothing to see in the sky, there was nothing to see in the heavens. It was time to refocus. To lower their gaze.

It seems a strange thing to say but we celebrate Jesus exiting. Not only do we celebrate it in the church calendar, but we find it in our creeds, and we find it in our prayers. In some ways the ascension lives at the heart of the Christian faith. That we celebrate Jesus’s ascension in this present time, would probably surprise those eleven disciples who watched him leave. This event, to them, did not seem like a cause for celebration. Why not just stay?

And if I was one of the disciples wondering what this strange event meant, I would probably have tried my best to remember the words he had last said, looking for clues. What were the last words Jesus said? After all of the profound sayings and timeless parables, what was the last words he went out with? “You will be my witnesses to the ends of the earth.” And that is the answer, that is why the ascension. That is why he left.

You can take a tiny drop of concentrated food coloring and drop it in a sizable container of water, and when it dissolves it forever changes the color of that water. Jesus left so that his presence would grow. So that the love that once dwelled in a single body, might cover the earth, might fill the universe. So the message would spread, that the gospel would move out to all the world. Jesus leaves, but that is not the end of the story. As he goes up, he sends us out. We have the green light, and we have to get going.

Because the message doesn’t move if we don’t move. The message doesn’t move if the church stands staring at the sky. We are not meant to die looking up, we are not meant to die just waiting. We are sent out. Jesus leaves us with this dismissal. And the dismissal is always a call to mission.

But the truth is most days it is easier to live with our heads in the clouds. Because down here on the ground, it is impossible to avoid the pain and struggle and suffering that will inevitably leave scars on your heart and soul. Down here in the mud, you will see things no one should see, and hear things no one should hear, and think things no one should think, and feel things no one should have to feel. And to escape the chaos down here on the ground you might turn your eyes toward heaven. Maybe you’ll even hum so old spiritual like ‘I’ll fly away’ as you look up and dream of your escape from here.

They say that in heaven there are no more tears. And no more crying, and no more pain. There, children do not die as collateral damage in conflicts, and loved ones do not succumb do a senseless death from a strange pandemic. And peace replaces the anxiety that seems to flood our lives through computer, cell phone, and television screens.

Heaven is the best distraction from this world yet created. And it is easy to turn our eyes away from the things that haunt this earth to the dreams of some distant heaven. But heaven is not interested in your interest. At least not just yet. The angels are quick to break our gaze with their question “why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” And Jesus is quick to remind us that we still have work to do right here on earth.

And it turns out those very things that want to make us divert our attention, the pain, the struggle, the suffering, and the chaos of this world, are the very reason the angels break our heavenward gaze. We want to look up because this world is filled with terrible things. But we are called by Jesus to look into the terror, into the pain, into the suffering.

Jesus did not ascend to hide in the sky. He did not leave to avoid the messiness of this world. Jesus ascended into every broken heart that would offer him a place. He ascended so he could fill every empty space, hold every suffering child, comfort every mourning parent. He ascended so this anxious word could live and move and have its being in the sacred heart of Christ.

The ascension is not an escape. It is God raining down divinity on this world, so no one, no one, would have to suffer alone again.

And we are the witnesses. Jesus is sending us out with this story, this story we have lived and experienced in our lives. And so, we can not stand staring at the sky, we cannot dream away our days thinking about heaven, our mission is on the ground. On street corners, and at crossroads, and at dead ends. Our mission is here, where sometimes our bended knees meet cold pavement, where bodies are broken, where tired souls long for rest.

It is time for the church to lower our eyes. If we are looking for Jesus, he’s not hiding in the clouds. So why do stand looking up toward heaven? If we are looking for Jesus, perhaps we should lower our gaze. We are much more likely to find him down in the muck.

By Minister Jim Rach

It started like no other story, I’m sure you remember it. It started with the rushing wind and then the flames of fire dancing on the heads of those patient followers of Jesus. Those followers who stuck with Jesus through death, resurrection, and ascension. And then were even willing to live in a one room loft, in first century Palestine, with one hundred and nineteen other people, no shower, for what turned out to be a week and a half. And then came the languages, a bunch of uneducated Galileans spontaneously speaking languages so fluently that the crowd thought them the most impressive drunks that they had ever encountered. And if that day were not memorable enough, a fisherman best known by his holy week betrayal, and his many names, Simon or Peter or Cephas or Satan depending on what kind of mood Jesus was in, launches into an elegant, convincing sermon that stirs the crowd. And at the end of the sermon, at the end of the day of Pentecost, that little community of one hundred and twenty, saw their numbers increase by almost 130 times in the water of baptism.  That is a memorable day.

And imagining where the young church would go from there boggled the mind. The momentum was unprecedented. How would the church capitalize on such a dramatic outpouring of the Holy Spirit; there were endless possibilities? They could take this on the road, from Jerusalem to Rome. Within a short period of time the entire Mediterranean could be exposed to the Holy Spirit. And so, what to these followers of the risen Christ do next? They make a church. The non-believers had to be just rolling their eyes at these people.

But the truth is every day can’t be Pentecost. Pentecost was the start of something, it got people excited, it got the movement out of the room. But the church cannot live in that moment forever, anymore than Jesus and his inner circle can pitch their tents forever on the mount of transfiguration. Flaming heads everyday a burnt-out Christian will make. And the church was not meant to be a short story. In needed a next chapter the question then becomes is this the next best step? To hunker down, to fall into a routine.

What they do after the Pentecost moment is devote themselves to the apostles teaching. Some Bible studies here, some sermons there. And they devote themselves to fellowship. And devote themselves to the breaking of bread, following Jesus commandment to do this in remembrance of him. And they devote themselves to the prayers.

Unlike the mass hysteria of Pentecost, the devotional practices that follow feel  to us very familiar. We are not recreating Pentecost on a weekly basis, but most churches can still offer a message, coffee hour and a prayer or two. A little more tortoise than hare perhaps. But, at what cost? Routine and ritual are important, essential, good for the soul. Without routine and ritual everything becomes a short story. And the work of the Holy Spirit in and through the church, in and through every one of us is way too important to be anything other than necessary. We need our rituals, they sustain us. But the comfort of the familiar also threatens to strip from our memories the radical nature of our rituals. We get comfortable and forget how really strange this early Christian community really was. And when we lose site of that. We tend to forget we are called to be just as strange as they were.

When they walked out of Pentecost these early Christian followers of Christ did not set out to establish an institution that would run on committee meetings, fundraisers, schisms, or denominational politics. The first leaders of the church were not looking to be memorialized, or establish a legacy, or get their names on churches.

Instead, they were pretty convinced that the Holy Spirit showed up telling them to do one thing. To carry on the work of Jesus. And the work of Jesus was to usher in the kingdom of God. So, they weren’t looking for an institution, they were looking for the kingdom.

And that kingdom was not to be found in the palaces of Rome. It was not same politics that they held in common. They were not looking for political influence or forcing people to adopt their religious ideology. If Pentecost made anything clear it is that the Holy Spirit was calling them to something new. A new way of living in this old world.

The God of resurrection life was ushering in a reality that undermined the politics of division and death that for so long had dominated. And rather than work through their old systems with their old kings supporting their old forms of injustice and oppression, a new spirit was blowing in a strange new kingdom.

And these lowly followers of a crucified criminal were the ones God chose to be about this kingdom work. And this is what they did. This was their radical move. This was the way of their strange new kingdom. They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. They held all things in common, they sold their possessions and took care of each other. They formed a family, a family in which love was more important than power. In which friendship had higher value than money or stuff. It was a strange kingdom indeed.

It might seem a little naïve, a little strange, this kingdom with it’s crucified king, and alternative values even ruffled a few feathers. This kingdom did not come to play nice with the established order, this kingdom did not come to cozy up to politicians or powerful people. The kingdom is God’s assertion that in the words of N.T. Wright, ”the world of death, the world of injustice has come to an end. And it was this new church, established by the Holy Spirit, that God chose to model the new kingdom of forgiveness and love that will rise in its place.”

The church is not called be some stale institution or political player. The church is called to put flesh on Jesus prayer ‘for the kingdom to come’. To live the values of heaven in this messy world. By devoting ourselves to the apostles teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and prayers, to devoting ourselves to each other, sisters and brothers through the waters of baptism, we provide an alternative to all those things in this world that corrupt and destroy the creatures of God. An alterative to the isolation that plaques our world. An alternative to the separation that confines people to the lives of loneliness. An alternative to the cold individualism that harms the soul. An alternative to the selfish consumerism that reduces people to the value of their bank accounts. Am alternative to the fierce nationalism that denies the image of God in people beyond our borders. An alternative to the racism and prejudice that violates Jesus commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves.

The work of the church is to start living the kingdom of God right here and right now. To give the world a vision of what can be. The kingdom of God is not a one-time event. The kingdom of God is not a short story. The kingdom of God only comes by stubborn efforts of devoted people. People who believe the darkness of this world will give way to the reality of God’s dream. Devoted people who keep showing up, who live the kingdom even when the dream seems like a mere fantasy. Who live in the kingdom because they believe this kingdom dream will one day be this world’s reality.

Those first Christians, they were strange. They dreamed strange dreams of a strange kingdom. The church, at its best, is strange. Still dreaming dreams of God’s kingdom. You are committed to a gospel that commands you to love your enemies, forgive those who hate you, welcome the stranger, and lose your life, that’s strange, that is not a popular message. You are called to take in a new family, break bread with people who don’t vote like you do, to pray to a God you cannot see, to worship a man killed 2000 years ago, and to live as if God’s dream for this world could possibly come true. You are called to hope when things seem hopeless, you are called to dream the dream of God’s kingdom.

Strange dreams, Pentecost was a memorable day and a lot of people came to Jesus on that day. Pentecost was a good first chapter. But it was after Pentecost, the next day, when the church started acting like the church, being about the mission of Jesus, stubbornly living out the kingdom of God, that’s when things really got good.

March 1 Sermon… by Jim Rach

            In C.S. Lewis’s novel, “The Great Divorce,” there was a scene in which a man had a pet creature on his shoulder, who was standing between the man and the destiny that he so desired. And the Angel, I believe it was if I remember correctly, asked him if he wanted him to kill it, for that was the only way that his desired destiny could be accomplished. No, said the man, can’t we just let it live, and in a sense, not have quite so much control. Just a little of it to hold on to.

            When Jesus went into the desert, remember he was human as well as God, it took him 40 days and 40 nights to accomplish what he needed to do. To finally and completely kill it off completely. Jesus was not out in the desert to starve himself physically, although that happened. He was there to starve and kill the one major hurdle that envelopes all of us. He was there to kill .the ego. That part of us that longs to be right, to be great, to be in control, the part of us that longs to be God. Jesus knew the temptations would only intensify beyond the wilderness. Each healing, each adoring crowd, would make it easier to buy in to the hype, easier to trade God’s mission for something more glamorous.

            The devil came to Christ as a tempter, just to give Jesus some alternate possibilities. If this is what this devil looks like, this devil tempting Christ, well, we have all run into this devil. Nothing at all like we see in the pictures, pitchfork, red tail, nasty jokes. This devil just wants to make Jesus great. He just wants to make Jesus think that maybe God, and God’s plan are holding him back. This devil is not mean, he just wants Jesus to be successful. Rich, famous, powerful, what’s so bad about that. It starts innocently enough, how about some bread for a hungry guy, a guy who just survived a fast that should have killed him twice over. Surely Jesus was hungry, and there’s nothing wrong with food. And if he has the gift, why not put it to good use. Undoubtably somewhere along that fast, Jesus saw those rocks turn into bread, we know how hunger works, how our minds work when desperate. You know, making one loaf of bread in the middle of nowhere is nothing special, if a stone turns to bread and no one sees it, did it really happen. Jesus is hungry, but its more than that. If the temptation was merely physical, than any lunch would have worked.

But that’s not the temptation. This temptation is not to Jesus hunger, but to Jesus ego. Turning one rock into one loaf of bread in the middle of the wilderness is nothing. But, what if Jesus could turn stones into bread, and not just here in the wilderness, but in the towns and villages and cities. What if this was a business plan, now we are talking. Money and power and fame would certainly follow, in a world of first century middle east, a land of scarce food supply, a land of stones aplenty, this would make Jesus great, the greatest. He would be like a god. So, what’s so bad about that. That devil just handed Jesus the perfect idea, the ultimate get rich quick scheme. Or if Jesus is not into money, he could give the bread away. He would be adored. He would be the most popular guy in the empire. And the most popular guy in the empire does not die on a cross.

            But Jesus doesn’t agree to this. So the devil ditches the bread plan and pitches Jesus something else. There is, after all, more than one way to become great. Maybe a trick, but not just any trick. A death- defying feat, that would amaze and impress the crowds. Maybe money not the thing, maybe Jesus needs a title. And what better title for a young Jewish man than Messiah, this would be it, Jesus the Jewish messiah. And the Jewish messiah would have his coming out party at the temple. The temple was the heart of the Jewish religion, it was the house of God. Imagine how the crowds would react if God’s angels caught Jesus right before he hit the ground below, Then they would get it, they would all know who Jesus really was, they would have to believe in him. They would fall at his feet. The angels would remove all doubt, he would be loved, adored, accepted, he would be great. He would be like a god. What’s so bad about that.

Jesus is already the messiah, the Son of God, but the messianic plan has some holes. There is a lot of suffering, and not a lot of glory, in God’s plan. The devil’s plan is more attractive. In the devil’s plan, Jesus strong healthy body is held by angels before an adoring crowd. In the other plan, Jesus dead body is held by his mother as passersby insult his corpse.

            And yet Jesus continues to hold his ground. So, the devil takes one more shot. This is the final offer, and it’s a good one. It’s an offer, and the devils been around awhile, an offer no one can refuse. It’s a feast for the ego, all the power, all the money, all the fame, the world, the entire world will fall at your feet. There is only one condition, and it’s pretty simple. All Jesus had to do was fall down and worship the devil. And that sounds like a terrible thing to our ears, because most of us know the Satanism scares, The Exorcist movie and such, but the devil is not asking Jesus to join a new religion, or become a member of a cult. For the amazing price of all the nations of the world in all their splendor, Jesus just needs to alter his alligences. People have traded in God for much, much less. And the devil knows Jesus will never truly be great following God’s plan for his life. And everybody wants to be great.

            It should have worked, the devils plan, it usually does. It has since the very beginning. From the very first recorded temptation, coming to us from the Garden of Eden is the old standard, every temptation throughout history is a variation on the same theme, “You will be like God.” The tempter always aims for the ego-money, power, fame…you can have it all. Adam and Eve took the bait, they ate the fruit, because they were told that fruit would make them great, great like God. And so it went on, generation after generation, after generation. Until Jesus walked into that wilderness, knowing his ego could blow the whole plan for us and our salvation. He also knew that you have to starve it if you want to kill it.

            We always begin this Lenten season in the barren wilderness with Jesus. We start there because or relationship with God depends on it. It is there that we learn that God does not care if we are successful, just faithful. Which really just proves that God doesn’t get it. The devil gets it, this is how the world works, the ones with money, power, and fame are the ones who matter. And you don’t get those things by taking up your cross and following Jesus. God knows the temptations are strong, of course we want to be great, have people think we are smart, successful, and in control. We need to be affirmed. Our egos so desperately long for human acceptance that we will do just about anything to get it. Our ego is so desperate for acceptance that we forget we are eternally loved by the God of the universe, even if everyone you know thinks you’re a failure. We are all saddled with these hungry egos. And the world offers many choices, choices so much more appealing than the cross that Jesus offers. Which is why we drag our egos into this season of lent. Because this season drives us into the wilderness, which we learn to live for something or someone bigger than ourselves. Where we are called to a season of prayer, self-denial, and repentance. And fasting, because you’ve got to starve it if you want to kill it.