Sermon on Matthew 24:36-44

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

Blessed Advent, and a happy new church year!

Now that we’ve eaten our pumpkin pie and dusted off our greenery, we’re kicking off this new church year with a reading that doesn’t exactly scream holiday cheer.

In fact, it almost sounds like a horror movie: with your coworkers getting whisked away without warning or as if by closing your eyes even for a minute, you might be left behind.

It sounds kind of like the idea of the Rapture, an understanding of the end of the world developed a little over 150 years ago from a rather obscure passage in 1 Thessalonians that talks about people being “caught up in the clouds” to “meet the Lord in the air.”

Whether you’re familiar with The Late Great Planet Earth or the Left Behind series, the idea of the rapture and the apocalypse has captured the imagination of many in our culture over the years.

But like we talked about a couple weeks ago, “apocalypse” doesn’t mean “disaster” or even “the end of the world.” It means “unveiling” or “revealing.”

So, what’s revealed here?

Let’s start with Noah. Jesus reminds his followers of the people that lived while Noah was building the ark. They were going about their daily lives doing normal things, and then they were swept away.

A global flood is not a happy image, of course, but Jesus is using this story to illustrate that people won’t know the time of Jesus’ return. It’s not about the flood, but about not knowing when something big will happen.

When you consider the people who are working in the field and one is taken and one is left in light of the Noah story, the one who is taken is more like the contemporary of Noah who is swept away than some righteous person who has been raptured. The one who is taken is caught unawares, like the people who weren’t on the ark. The person who is left is still working in the field or is busy grinding meal, just like Noah was busy faithfully building the ark.

Maybe this is what Jesus is revealing here:

No one knows how much time we have left. Tomorrow is not promised to us.

And still, we trust in a loving God who does promise the coming of the Son of Man. In the Gospel of Matthew, the phrase “the coming of the Son of Man” is a way of saying “the fulfillment of the Reign of God” or that time when sin, death, and suffering will be no more, peace and justice will prevail, and God’s perfect love will have won.

These promises are a gift God gives to us. During this Advent, we’re going to get the chance to reflect on many of God’s gifts.

Gifts are signs of love. Part of the excitement of gifts is the anticipation: something good is hidden, and our imaginations run wild with the possibilities of what this sign of love will contain. Part of the joy is in the waiting—the waiting of the receiver of the gift and the waiting of the giver, who is anticipating the delight of the receiver.

Advent is a season of waiting—waiting to celebrate Jesus’ birth at Christmas and waiting for Christ’s coming to us again at the end of time.

But Bernard of Clairvaux from the 12th century wrote of another Advent: Christ’s presence in our lives every day.

As much as our Gospel reading talks about what is far past (the people who didn’t pay attention to Noah) and what will be at some unknown point in the future (the coming of the Son of Man), what Jesus is concerned about is how we spend our days.

Jesus warns his followers to keep watch—to be aware and focused on what matters.

And Jesus also describes people who are at work when he returns. He describes people farming or grinding grain—not people sitting around waiting for Jesus to show up.

Have you heard the tongue-in-cheek phrase about people who are so heavenly minded that they’re no earthly good?

That’s not to say that we shouldn’t meditate on the fulfillment of the Reign of God—far from it! God gave us imaginations for a reason, and how are we supposed to work with God to make earth more like it is in heaven if we can’t imagine what that would look like?

And also, God calls us to work for justice and peace and mercy and love in the world now. Someday, all will be well, but right now, people are suffering, and we are called to do what is in our power to alleviate that pain now.

So, God gives us promises that give us a sense of what the Reign of God will be like. They give us hope that things will be as they should be one day, and they give us a vision of how we can help get a little closer to that reality. These promises are God’s gifts to us.

If much of the delight of gifts is in the waiting, both for the giver and receiver, can you imagine God’s delight in making promises to us?

Listen again to these words from Isaiah and imagine God’s pure joy at sneaking God’s precious people a glimpse of what the Reign of God will be like:

 “2In days to come
  the mountain of the Lord’s house
 shall be established as the highest of the mountains,
  and shall be raised above the hills;
 all the nations shall stream to it.
  3Many peoples shall come and say,
 “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
  to the house of the God of Jacob;
 that he may teach us his ways
  and that we may walk in his paths.”
 For out of Zion shall go forth instruction,
  and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
 4He shall judge between the nations,
  and shall arbitrate for many peoples;
 they shall beat their swords into plowshares,
  and their spears into pruning hooks;
 nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
  neither shall they learn war any more.”

Throughout scripture, God gifts promises to God’s people throughout time and space. God gives us hints at what the Reign of God will be like. God in Jesus gives us a sneak peek at how living into God’s mission in the world can transform our lives. The Holy Spirit gives us nudges and glimpses into how we can participate in making the world a little more as it is in heaven.

Along with God’s promises, God gives us an invitation to create with God a better, more just, more loving world.

Advent isn’t about an idle waiting, where we tap our feet and sigh and check our watches, waiting for Jesus to come back.

Advent is an active waiting—a clinging to God’s promises in the midst of the world’s suffering and putting our gardening gloves on each day to plant seeds of the Reign of God that will sprout in mercy, branch in justice, and fruit in love.

We don’t have to wait until December 25 to unwrap God’s promises to us. They are for us now. Let them flower in your heart as we work together with each other and God to plant seedlings of heaven here on earth.

First Lutheran Church

November 20, 2022 + Christ the King Sunday Year C

Thankoffering Sunday

Luke 23:33-43When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left.  Then Jesus said, "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing." And they cast lots to divide his clothing.  And the people stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, "He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!"  The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, and saying, "If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!"  There was also an inscription over him, "This is the King of the Jews."  One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, "Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!"  But the other rebuked him, saying, "Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation?  And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong."  Then he said, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom."  He replied, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise."

Sermon

“The King on a Cross”

Pastor Greg Ronning

Next Sunday we begin a new church year with the Season of Advent.  But before we can do that, we must properly conclude this current liturgical church year, and as always, we do this by celebrating “Christ the King Sunday.”  Traditionally on this day the church celebrates the Kingdom of God and its King, Jesus the Christ, seated on the throne at the right hand of God, the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end, the sovereign ruler over all creation.  Christ the King Sunday, a grand and majestic conclusion to the liturgical church year!

However, the Royal metaphor, kings and kingdoms, just doesn’t carry the weight it carried hundreds of years ago. As Americans we severed our relationship with Kings and Queens some 250 years ago.  As a nation we don’t have a king or a queen and we don’t really know what it means to have a literal “royal family,” it’s not part of our experience. 

Yet, in some ways, the royal image is still popular, the “myth” is still with us in our culture.  We love watching “The Crown” on Netflix. We still imagine and dream about “Camelot.”  Just down the road at Disney there are all kinds of Kings, Queens, Princes, and Princesses running around to the delight of everyone.  And with the recent passing of England’s Queen Elizabeth, we were able to witness all the tradition, all the majesty, all the pomp and circumstance, that goes along with having royalty.  Kings and Queens are still all around us.

So it is that on Christ the King Sunday, even though it is not part of our daily experience, our democratic system of government; we can begin to imagine Jesus as our King.  And given what we know from England, and shaped as we are by Disney, we might expect the appointed biblical readings for this Sunday to reflect some of that pomp and circumstance, some of that majesty, some of the qualities of “the magic kingdom,” the awe of Windsor Castle, and the wonder of fairy tales; all that we might imagine.

For instance …

Something from the Book of Revelation would be nice, like this description of the throne in chapter four, “At once I was in the spirit, and there in heaven stood a throne, with one seated on the throne!  And the one seated there looks like jasper and carnelian (crystal), and around the throne is a rainbow that looks like an emerald. Around the throne are twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones are twenty-four elders, dressed in white robes, with golden crowns on their heads. Coming from the throne are flashes of lightning and rumblings and peals of thunder, and in front of the throne burn seven flaming torches, which are the seven spirits of God, and in front of the throne there is something like a sea of glass, like crystal. ”Glorious!

The ninth chapter of Isaiah is majestic and poetic, “For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders, and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Great will be his authority, and there shall be endless peace for the throne of David and his kingdom. He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time onward and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. ”Majestic!

And perhaps the Transfiguration story from the Gospel of Matthew, “Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became bright as light. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. …  suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!”  Vivid and Incredible!

But that’s not what we get on Christ the King Sunday. Not even close!  We don’t get an incredible story, a majestic story, a glorious story; - No, we get the crucifixion.  We get someone who has been stripped of his clothes and his dignity, someone who is mocked and tortured, someone struggling in pain, someone who is about to die.  We get someone condemned by the state, someone hanging on a cross between two common criminals, a dead man walking.  We don’t get the fanfare of England, we don’t get the magic of Disney, we don’t get a fairy tale ending, - we get the so called “folly” of the cross.

Theologian Debbi Thomas writes, “Can we pause for a moment and contemplate the paradox that is at the heart of our faith?  This is our king.  This is our king.” 

Yet it is this paradox that saves us!  Because when it comes down to it, we don’t need royalty, we don’t need a King or a Queen, we don’t need a sovereign proxy to intercede on our behalf, we don’t need someone who pities us from up on high; - we need someone who is very present in the midst of our life!  I am not going to be saved by a crown of jewels, I need the crown of thorns.  I am not going to be saved by someone who doesn’t know the struggles of life, I need someone who knows what it’s like to struggle, to be alone, even to die.  I am not going to be saved by a royal proclamation, I need a radical divine incarnation, intervention, that begins in the dust where I live, is present beside me, reaches out to me, and lifts me up.  We need a God who knows what it’s like, a God who has suffered, a God who has endured despite the pain.  We need a God who reigns from the cross, who reigns in humility, suffering, and weakness.  We need a God who reigns in such “descent .”As St. Paul proclaimed, “For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:18)

God’s people, the saints of old, have always found God present in such “folly,” in “descent, ”in the midst of life’s great struggles, in the midst of the human condition, in the midst of it all, in the heart of the cross. Mountain tops always seem to fade, but those who have been found by God, those who sense God’s strange peace and strong love in the midst of the hardest times, never forget that deep and strong presence.  Yes, God is present always, in our joys, in our everyday moments and places, but God is most profoundly present, encountered, and experienced when things are not going so well, even falling apart. So it is that God reigns from the cross.

Today’s “Christ the King” gospel reading comes to us unexpected and perhaps even unwanted.  We’d probably rather have the glory, the majesty, the pomp and circumstance, and the awe. Who wouldn’t, it’s the first impulse of our human nature.  Yet the promises that flow from the cross, the promises of love, grace, mercy, and hope; in the end are more wonderous and everlasting.

Listen to the promises found in today’s Gospel ….

 "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing." A radical word of forgiveness for all of us still caught up in sin and brokenness, for all of us struggling to do the right thing, for all of us, a forgiveness, that is without condition, only a powerful word of love, a word of love that can truly set us free.

One of the criminals asks Jesus, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom." And Jesus replies, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise."  How good it is that Jesus “remembers.”  Be assured that as you walk the road that is your life, a road that is full of ups and downs, a road that can be hard and long, a road the Jesus too has walked; -Jesus remembers you.  And in this re-membering you are gathered up, and re-membered into love, re-membered into relationship, re-membered into the Kingdom.

And of course, “Paradise.”  Christ, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, holds all of life in his outstretched loving arms, and in those outstretched loving arms he will hold us in this life and in the next, now and forever. God has the last word, a word that conquers fear and death, a word that is life, a word for each of us, a word for all of us.

This morning God invites us to trust and believe in the paradox that is our faith; to trust and believe in Christ, who exchanged a golden crown for a cross made of wood.  Christ Jesus, who reigns from the cross, who reigns in humility, suffering, and weakness, who reigns deep among us in wonderous descent.  May we be blessed with the courage to do the same, to lay down, to enter into our own humility, suffering, and weakness, and in faith discover the God who awaits us with the fullness of abundant life.

Christ reigns from the cross.  Thanks be to God, Amen.

Sermon on Luke 21:5-19

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

There are some events that are so significant that they change our understanding of time:

There is a before, and there is an after.

Some are historical, like 9/11 or March 2020. There was before 9/11 and there was after. There was before COVID and since COVID (we still haven’t reached an after, exactly).

You can still tell which movies were made before 9/11 by their airport scenes or if they show the New York skyline.

It was weird in 2020 to watch tv shows that showed people hugging and not wearing masks.

There was a before and an after.

The same is true in our personal lives. Just as there are historical events, there are also personal events that change our understanding of time.

A death, an accident, or a diagnosis can be just as earth-shifting.

And again, there is a before and an after.

And for Jewish people in the first century, there was before the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, and there was after.

The Temple was the center of Jewish cultural and religious life. Its destruction in 70 CE must have felt like the end of the world.

In our story today, Jesus predicts the destruction of the Temple, and his followers are horrified that such a beautiful place would be destroyed.

And also, the writer of Luke wrote down this story after the destruction of the Temple.

It’s like someone in 2022 writing a story about an airport that takes place in 2000. There’s no way to write that story without thinking about 9/11, even though it hadn’t happened yet when the story took place.

Jesus was preparing his followers for the tragedy to come, and the writer of Luke was reassuring people who had lived through it that Jesus was still with them and God was on their side.

Jesus was talking to people in the before, and the writer of Luke was talking to people in the after—people who felt like the world was ending.

We know something of that, don’t we?

We are in our “after” for the outbreak of COVID.

We are in the “after” of the start of the war in Ukraine.

Election Day was earlier this week, and those tend to feel like “before” and “after” situations, too.

Kenya, Somalia, Ethiopia, and Nigeria are experiencing drought and food shortages.

There are protests in Iran and violent countermeasures by the government.

Puerto Rico was hit hard by a hurricane in September.

And those are just some of the historical events. We haven’t listed them all, and we haven’t even mentioned the personal heartbreaks in this community. We’ve had deaths and diagnoses and lost jobs and so many other “afters.”

Our world is hurting. So many of us are living in the “afters,” where it feels like the world is ending.

And still, the world continues. Time isn’t stopping, even when it seems like the world can’t hold any more pain.

Sometimes people blame disasters on God’s judgment on people’s “immoral” behavior. They declare God’s judgment like it’s theirs to dish out.

And if you read our passage in Malachi out of context, it can sound very “fire and brimstone.” It can sound like it supports the idea that God rains destruction on “wicked” people.

But the book of Malachiis more about God calling to account people in power who are abusing their positions.

That’s really different from: “they had an earthquake over there because their cultural practices are different from mine, which are obviously the right ones.”

Both the passage from Malachi and from Luke are apocalyptic. That sounds like a scary word, because our culture tends to use “apocalypse” to mean a big disaster or a very scary way the world ends.

But in the Bible, “apocalypse” means “unveiling” or “revealing.” So whenever there’s something that talks about an upcoming disaster or what it will be like at the end of time, it’s not meant to scare you. It’s not meant to be fire and brimstone and judgment. These passages are meant to reveal something, not tell a scary story or shame people into behaving.

So what are these passages revealing?

The passage from Malachi is reminding people who have become complacent and people in power who are abusing their power that the Reign of God will be fulfilled one day and that God’s justice will be complete. Yes, what is evil will be no more—there will be no more suffering or taking advantage of each other—and God will bring healing to the world. It’s a message of hope to remind people that God will make things right.

And in our Gospel passage, Jesus is saying that disasters and wars and all kinds of terrible things are going to happen, and they’re going to feel like the end of the world, but they’re not.

They might feel like God’s judgment, but they’re not.

They’re things that are going to happen, and people are going to assign all kinds of meaning to them, but they’re just part of what it means to be alive on our planet.

Sure, we should work for peace to put a stop to wars, and we should take care of our planet to minimize the impact of natural disasters, and we should take care of our neighbors when they’re victims of any kind of tragedy.

But, these events that Jesus talks about don’t mean it’s the literal end of the world or that God is inflicting punishment on us. Far from it.

What is being revealed here is that God is present with us in suffering and pain.

God is with us when it feels like the end of the world.

God weeps with us in tragedy and cries out when we experience anguish.

Jesus was preparing his followers for the destruction of the Temple, and the writer of Luke was reminding his audience that God was with them when it felt like the world was ending.

None of this is to minimize the tragedies in our lives and in our world. Things feel like the end of the world because in a way they do end the way the world was in the “before” time. There is no going back once there is an “after.”

But both Malachi and Jesus remind us that God is on our side, not waiting to punish us.

There have been and will continue to be a lot of things that feel like the end of the world, and God is with us in that.

And one day, the Reign of God will be fulfilled, God’s justice on the behalf of the least, the last, and the lost will be complete, and the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings.

Until then, in all your befores and afters,

care for each other,

share your stories about how you see God moving in the world,

and remember that God is with you, no matter what.