The story of the Garden of Eden is about shame, but not so much about sin, at least not in the sense of explaining the cosmic origins of sin. Rather, it's a description of the way that our shame instincts of hiding and blame cut us off from healing and push us into distrust.  Healing comes from the willingness to be vulnerable and accept forgiveness.

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Sin Story, Sitcom, or Something More Important?

One of the most pernicious dangers for people of faith is assuming that Jesus's moral instincts match our own. Sometimes this looks like assuming that God hates the same people we hate (nope - God loves them, the same as God loves us). Other times that looks like assuming our moral justifications would earn God's sign-off (nope - God is perfectly ready to challenge us to do better). In both instances, our challenge is to remember that while we always see only in part, God sees the whole. And much as this challenges our biases and self-justifications, this reality is actually really good news. Because it means that even when God is rebuking us, this correction is a message of love. It is an invitation to expect more from God and from ourselves. 

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Not Putting God (Or Ourselves) In A Box

Humanity tends to be drawn to the simplicity of binary categories: yes/no, right/wrong, allowed/prohibited. It can be easy to apply this kind of thinking to Jesus' rejection of legalistic readings of the sabbath laws in his interactions with pharisees in the gospels. But in other places Jesus makes it clear that he has not come to overthrow God's laws, much less one of the "big ten." Jesus simply wants to law to serve the purpose for which is was intended, which is always the practice of love and freedom. To impose modern categories to this ancient story, he understands that sabbath-keeping is about healthy boundaries, rather than legalistic bondage. Which means that even if we reject binary thinking we have any easy way to honor sabbath-keeping law. We just need to ask if our sabbath-keeping serves the needs of love and freedom for all. 

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Boundaries, Not Bondage

Grace is a freely given gift - something we do not need to earn or deserve. Discipleship is different. It is a life of commitment to the way of Jesus that will radically change us. It can also mean steep sacrifices and a reorientation of our priorities. So, if such commitment is not the prerequisite to salvation, why would anyone choose discipleship? Because it is a choice to the fullness of life, a transformation that helps to heal the world. 

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WHY Would We Choose Discipleship?

A church festival that focuses on the cross might seem like an awkward Sunday to baptize a sweet baby. A week marked by gun violence and the remembrance of 9/11 might seem like a difficult Sunday to preach a message of hope. John 3:16 might seem like a verse on which it is difficult to say anything that feels new or transformative. And sometimes things are not what they seem. If can let go of our expectations and let the power of story and metaphor call us into learning, we can find the power of looking full in the face of all that is wrong with the world and finding that this kind of honesty is exactly where healing and hope begin. 

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Lifted Up

Story-telling is one of the most powerful tools for invoking new learning, especially when it comes to seeing truths that we do not want to see. Jesus uses this power when he tells a parable in which none of the characters are sympathetic and the moral seems to contradict our expectations about just rewards and punishments. The story unbalances us, and in doing so it invites us to consider whether the message might be not so much about the characters in the story themselves but in our reactions to them. Maybe what we most need to learn about faithfulness is the way in which our snap judgments of others can be our biggest barrier to faithfulness to the task Jesus has set us. 

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An Uncomfortable Mirror

Some of the most poignant moments in the gospels come when Jesus calls a person by name, but it only happens once in all the many parables he tells. Most parable characters are identified by the role they play, standing (or falling) as representatives for the purpose of teaching a lesson. But Jesus names one character whose identity is repeatedly dismissed and devalued by his foil in the story. Lazarus is given a name, and in that decision his humanity is emphasized. That focus also calls our attention to the lies that can cause us to dehumanize others in the same way that the rich man does to Lazarus. 

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The Lies that Dehumanize

Faith is, presumably, a quintessentially human experience, and yet blessing of the animals Sunday provides the chance to consider  unique proposition: the dogs might actually have something to teach us about the attitude of faith. Whereas humans express a desire for "more" as dissatisfaction with what is, dogs express it as a desire for what is good to continue. Whereas a human "now" is a demand for things to happen, the dog's now is a contentment with living in the moment. Perhaps most importantly, whereas humans resist a relationship of dependence and service, dogs rejoice in any time with their master. Strange as it may seem, faith calls us to learn from the habits of our dogs, and to find in those lessons a depth of joy and transformation. 

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Lessons on Faith from Dogs

In an historical moment marked by tension and division, especially as it relates to "foreigners," the story of Jesus's affirmation of the faith of a foreigner offers us a compelling picture of what it looks like to be an agent of healing. Instead of avoiding conflict, he intentionally inhabits the in-between spaces. Instead of doing everything himself, he intentionally engages the religious people in the uncomfortable work of bearing witness. Instead of downplaying, he names the prejudice and then rejects it. This is the work of healing the engages all of the layers of pain and division at work in the world. 
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Seeing Our Calling

When Jesus' disciples are confronted by the contrast between Christ's vision of peace and wholeness at the end of time, compared with the reality of injustice and pain in the here and now, he tells them a story about persistent advocacy. The knowledge of God's plan for healing gives us strength to not lose heart with the hard work of calling for justice and love in a world that needs to hear that challenge. 

Art: Pittman, Lauren Wright. Tangled Blessing. Non-commercial use permitted.

Sometimes Faith is a Bit of a Brawl

If, as Jesus promises, the truth will set us free, what is the lie that has us enslaved? The witness of the Reformation's initiator, Martin Luther, suggests it might be the lie that the eradication of evil from our own hearts is under our control. There is an instinctive human longing to see evil as something outside of ourselves, something that we can segregate and eradicate. But we all have both good and evil inside of us, and the longing to pretend otherwise drives much of the evil action in our world. The truth of God's grace, however, can free us from that lie and thus empower us to live more fully into the love the Jesus commands. 

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Freedom in the Truth About Ourselves.

Welcome to the sermon feed for Abiding Peace Lutheran Church: Journey of Faith. We would love to have you with us for worship, but if you can't join us on Sunday mornings, we hope these messages bring the challenge and grace of the gospel to your life.