Warning: God at Work - Mandarin Lutheran Church

John 2:1-11

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. ²Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. ³When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” ⁴And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.” ⁵His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” ⁶Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. ⁷Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. ⁸He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it. ⁹When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom ¹⁰and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” ¹¹Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

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When I think of an act of God, I think of big grand things. Sometimes when you purchase a ticket to travel or book a conference it will say something like, “no refunds, no cancellations, except in the case of an act of God.” And of course what they mean by that is wild fire, hurricane, earthquake, or some other grand sort of natural disaster that could happen. 

When we think of God’s movement, God’s work, in the Old Testament, we often think of the plagues of Egypt or pillars of fire and smoke, we think of floods and wars being won, walls crumbling from trumpets being blown. Even in the Gospel texts, we think of some of Jesus’ most famous miracles and most of them have some sort of pizazz. Healing the demoniac with the pigs being plunged into the sea, the dramatic healing of children and servants, the raising of his friend Lazarus. They all have a very obvious element of God’s glory to them. Like giant neon signs saying “Look! God is at work!” 

That’s what makes this story seem so odd. It is “the first of his signs” as John puts it. But it isn’t flashy. It takes place in the background. Jesus and his mother are basically playing the role of a really awesome catering company in this story. The wedding party needed wine and they got wine. Simple as that. 

Now I am a part of a lot of clergy groups, and there is a question that comes up every time we have to preach on this text— exactly how much water did Jesus turn into wine? How big were the jars? How much would that have cost? I don’t think they’re asking this just because most of the clergy I know enjoy drinking wine. I think we are curious about this because we want to make this miracle into something bigger, something spectacular. We want to know that Jesus’ first sign really was a big huge neon sign saying “SON OF GOD AT WORK.” Maybe because turning water into wine for some couple’s wedding just doesn’t seem like a “God thing” to do. 

But John says that this sign revealed Jesus’ glory. 

Perhaps those of us who want to know exactly how much wine and how much it would cost are too busy looking for big neon signs, that we forget to notice that God is working among us all the time. This happens to me all the time. I spend a lot of time during the week looking for the big glorious signs and I often miss the more ordinary glories happening around me. 

In every Lutheran Church I have been a part of, we have donned bright gold shirts every fall for “God’s Work, Our Hands” Sunday. In none of those churches did we send plagues on sinners, we didn’t create pillars of fire, we didn’t heal anyone’s physical disability, and believe it or not, we didn’t raise anyone from the dead. 

We did things like raking lawns and painting fences, we baked cookies for firefighters and helped teachers organize their classrooms, we made blessing bags for homeless people, we collected canned foods for our local food pantry. I don’t remember doing anything particularly flashy, and I don’t remember our congregation ever being mentioned on the news. But we still called it God’s work. Because it is. 

The story of the wedding in Cana tells us about our God who lives among us. Jesus celebrates with people, lives with them, goes to their parties. This story tells us about our God who is flexible and accommodating with God’s timing.  When Mary says the wine has run out, Jesus says his time has not yet come. But Mary is faithful and Jesus comes through, despite his hesitations. Finally, this story tells us that God works in the every day, mundane stuff of life. Believing that, trusting it, and actively looking out for it is called faith. 

And that is what we are called to— as individuals and as a congregation. We are called to faith. 

In this story, we should notice Mary’s example of faith. She surveyed her surroundings, was present in the moment, realized a need, assessed the available resources, and asked God to provide. She was looking out for God’s sign and trusted in God’s glory. Even in the ordinary-ness of it all. She trusted in God’s abundance because she had witnessed examples of it over and over again in her life, in the ordinary places and in the extraordinary places. 

This congregation, this church, is an example of God’s abundance and I hope this week and as you go into this journey with your new pastor, you are able to see the ordinary and extraordinary signs of God’s work. In your partnership with campus ministry, in the very fact that you have called a new pastor, in the ministries that have been flourishing here in the past few years— we can see God’s glory. It is my prayer that we can continue to be faithful like Mary, and keep an eye out for these ordinary signs that so gloriously point to Christ in our lives. Amen. 

This sermon was preached by me at Mandarin Lutheran Church in Jacksonville, Florida on January 20, 2019.

God's Reach - Mandarin Lutheran Church

Matthew 2:1-12

In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, ²asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.” ³When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; ⁴and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. ⁵They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet: ⁶‘And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel.’” ⁷Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. ⁸Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.”

⁹When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. ¹⁰When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. ¹¹On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. ¹²And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

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I have been following a lot more church Facebook pages this year, and one of the really fun things I’ve seen some churches do is have “wandering wisemen.” There is actually an entire Facebook page devoted to wandering wisemen and you can watch them traveling around from the beginning of Advent until today, Epiphany. Some congregations are really creative and they give personalities to the wise men, the camel is sometimes the real wise one, keeping the three men en route. They take pictures of them in the church courtyard, maybe the church library, the fire pit, the choir loft. Then eventually they make it to the manger scene on Epiphany, twelve days after Christmas, when we celebrate the wise men arriving from the East to deliver their gifts to the newborn Jesus. While a little silly and not historically accurate, it’s adorable and I really enjoy seeing the pictures every day. 

I was thinking about how fun that would be to do with our wise men at home, especially as our son gets older and hears the Bible stories and the Christmas narrative. 

We have about 15 nativities in our house, so it would be kind of fun to have all the wise men hidden everywhere— but then I would have to make sure I found them all before Epiphany and that would probably be way too much work! 

But what I like about this idea is that it is a tangible reminder of how far this good news of Jesus reaches… it reaches all people, to all the ends of the earth, even the wise men from the East. Everyone receives the good news of Christ’s birth.

And this is no small feat in the first century. They didn’t have Twitter or the 24-hour news cycle announcing things. They relied on messengers, travelers to deliver the news. Gossip was an important part of how news traveled from city to city. That was pretty much the only way news spread back then. If it didn’t seem important enough to spread around town, it quickly stopped and no one ever heard about it again.

I would imagine that news of a baby born in the tiny town of Bethlehem to two nobody parents wasn’t something that was traveling around the cities very quickly. So one has to wonder how, exactly these men from the East learned about Jesus’ birth. 

The reading this morning tells us that it was the stars. The wise men were scientists of their day, astrologists, who used stars to predict patterns, movements, and big events in history. It was common folklore or myth that big events were announced by the skies. We do that a little bit still today— I remember learning the saying, “red skies at night, sailors’ delight; red skies in morn, sailors be warned” to predict storms on the coast. As silly as those things might seem now that we have modern science to explain things like bright stars, it was considered a fairly precise science in that day. Even now, we consider things like blood moons and meteor showers to be, if not royal heavenly announcements, at least somewhat spectacular and worth staying up late for! 

So these scientists, all the way from the east, which church tradition says was somewhere around Persia, come to Herod and ask about the new king that has been born. 

I kind of love this. It takes these foreigners who heard it from the stars from all the way in another country to tell King Herod what is happening right in his backyard. The King, who is surrounded by all sorts of religious leaders, chief priests and scribes, heard the news of the Jewish Messiah from these three foreigners who weren’t even Jewish. I think God is hilarious that way. 

And it just goes to show— God is working outside of our own, very limited lives. God is present and working in all the ends of the earth. From the manger where Jesus was born, to the shepherds, and to the wise men, God’s reach and embrace gets bigger and bigger and bigger as the story goes on. 

I think that is why Herod is so frightened. Not only does he know that he is an illegitimate king— he wasn’t a Jew and he wasn’t from the line of David— but these wise men arriving to share this news was proof that God was up to something big, something life-changing and ground-breaking. And that’s often scary for the people on top. It was certainly scary for this narcissistic, totalitarian king, to hear that another king was born— that he himself was not the true king, he was not in charge, he wasn’t the ruler of the Jewish people. He certainly didn’t want that news spreading— it would threaten his authority. 

But I think it was more than his authority. I think Herod was frightened by what we are often frightened by— the fact that God’s embrace is ever-expanding, and always reaching further and further toward the ends of the earth. God’s love and grace does not stop with us. It doesn’t even stop with our neighbor we don’t like very much, or the homeless man who sits outside of the grocery store. God’s embrace goes further. God’s love, expands to everyone, all people. No exceptions. 

That’s why this story, and so many like it in the gospels are threatening to us. They make us uncomfortable. We think of God’s love as a commodity. In a capitalist society, it’s hard to think of anything as unlimited. We are raised in a supply and demand, some have it some don’t type of economy. If one person has more, it means someone else has less. That’s the world Herod was living in too. If this Jesus person was the King of the Jews, that means Herod wasn’t. 

So we think if God’s grace and love extends all the way over there, that means there is less for me and my family. But God’s grace isn’t pie. God’s love doesn’t function the same way as a capitalist economy. It is unlimited. I know that is impossible for us to wrap our brains around, but it is the truth. God’s love is ever-expanding, even as our world seems to get smaller and smaller, God’s embrace keeps getting wider and wider— across oceans and boundaries, across borders and ethnicities, even, as we hear with the wise men in the East, God is able to work through different religions, tradition, and cultures. 

So what does Herod set out to do when his power and authority are threatened? He wants to neutralize it, eliminate it. Because he thinks that there isn’t enough of God’s grace to go around. There isn’t enough love for God’s people to go around. And he has a feeling he will be the one on the outs if the Jewish people come to power and a Jewish king rises. Instead of using his extensive reach to embrace more people, he uses it to murder innocent babies and turn inward to himself and his own desire for power. 

We can do what Herod did, or we can do what the wise men did. 

The wise men, these foreign non-Jewish outsiders resist Herod’s power and authority. Instead of following orders, they believe their own experience and their own epiphany— that in Christ Jesus, everyone is within God’s embrace. No exceptions. And instead of going back to where they are summoned, they continue on, spreading the news that a kings has been born, extending the news of God’s embrace through their own witness. 

What if we were energized by God’s embrace and ever-expanding grace instead of feeling threatened by it? What if we accepted and believed the fact that God is able to work and abide in places other than where we are comfortable? God can work in foreigners from the East, or North, or West or South. God can and does work through scientists. God can and does work in different religions and cultures. God can and does work in ways other than our own Lutheran liturgy. 

I know it’s scary, and it feels like we have to give some of own grace up in order to say that it extends to all people in every place, all over the world. We don’t have to feel threatened. We don’t have to be afraid that there won’t be enough for all of us. Because God’s grace isn’t pie. God is big enough, and grace-filled enough, that God’s embrace can and does extend to the entire world whether we like it or not. And we can be a part of spreading the good news of that huge embrace, because we have witnessed it. We have seen the extent to which God will go to bring God’s people to Godself. We see it in Christmas, through Epiphany, and into Easter. Unlike Herod, God extends God’s reach in order to be humbled as a tiny baby in Christ Jesus. In Christ Jesus, God’s reach goes all the way to sinners, women, and outcasts, and eventually, all the way to the cross. Where we learn that God’s embrace is for all people in all times and in all places. So on this Epiphany Sunday, when we celebrate the fact that God is grace-filled for everyone, even Gentiles like us and the wise men, let us extend our own arms and invite everyone to these waters and to this table, where Christ is the host and God proclaims us beloved. Amen. 

This sermon was preached by me at Mandarin Lutheran Church in Jacksonville, Florida on January 6, 2019. 

Unexpected stories - Mandarin Lutheran Church

Luke 1:39-55

The Holy Gospel according to St. Luke, the first chapter. 

Glory to you, O Lord. 

³⁹In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, ⁴⁰where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. ⁴¹When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. 

And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit ⁴²and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. ⁴³And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? ⁴⁴For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. ⁴⁵And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”

⁴⁶And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, ⁴⁷and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, ⁴⁸for God has looked with favor on the lowliness of God’s servant. 

Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; ⁴⁹for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is the Lord’s name. ⁵⁰ God’s mercy is for those who fear God from generation to generation. 

⁵¹God has shown strength with God’s arm; 

the Lord has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 

⁵²God has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; ⁵³

God has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. 

⁵⁴The Lord has helped God’s servant Israel, in remembrance of God’s mercy, ⁵⁵according to the promise God made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.” 

⁵⁶And Mary remained with Elizabeth about three months and then returned to her home.

The Gospel of the Lord. 

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This is my favorite Bible story. I love love love this story. There are a couple of reasons: 

First, this is one of the only places in the Bible (besides the book of Ruth) where we have a story of two women talking with one another without any men around. Besides the babies in their wombs, there are no men in this story— just two women and their Lord. It makes it unique and unexpected and I love it. 

Secondly, I love surprises. I think it is my love language. I get this unbelievable thrill out of unexpected things, which is probably why I love working with college students so much, because I never know what is going to happen from week to week with them. College students tend to surprise me with challenging questions and incredible insights. 

This story is filled with unexpected things: 

Mary is pregnant. Of course we know this is a surprise because she is a virgin. 

Elizabeth is pregnant too. We are told that Elizabeth was barren and quite a bit older, but she is pregnant too. This story is filled with unexpected things. 

Elizabeth knows Mary is pregnant even before Mary tells her. If the timeline fits, there’s no way Mary is already showing at this point. But Elizabeth knows. Whether it’s her glow, the Spirit, or womanly intuition, Elizabeth knows not only that Mary is pregnant, but that she carries the son of God. 

Right here, the story should go a different way— Elizabeth could get into a lot of trouble hosting an unmarried pregnant woman in her house. But this is another unexpected part of the story. Not only does she let Mary stay, she lets her stay for three months. By that time even if her pregnancy wasn’t showing, I’m sure the rumors would have reached the town about this unmarried girl being pregnant. The shame could have been fatal for Elizabeth and Zachariah. This story is filled with unexpected things. 

We are told that women the women greet each other, Elizabeth uses her outside voice— the word literally translates to megaphone— she yells her greeting and blessing to Mary, in a world where women were supposed to be quiet, seen and not heard— she yells. 

I have a couple of friends who have been my best friends since high school. We don’t keep in touch as much as we should anymore, but last summer I went to visit one of them in Nashville where she lives and teaches elementary school. It had been over two years since I’d seen her at my wedding and when I drove into her apartment complex, she was standing in the driveway bouncing with excitement. I had barely turned the car off when she flung open the door and practically threw herself into my arms. Then she started telling me everything that had happened in the past two years without taking a breath. We started talking at the same time and laughed when we both got louder and didn’t shut up to listen to the other one. We both had incredible news to share with one another. She couldn’t wait to tell me that she had fallen madly in love with someone. And I couldn’t wait to tell her that my husband and I were trying to have a baby! 

I imagine a similar greeting between these cousins. They both have incredible, unbelievable, unexpected news to share with one another and they are so overwhelmed with joy that Elizabeth shouts and Mary sings. Both are overcome with the Spirit and these two women prophesy to one another. This story is just filled with unexpected things. 

God has chosen these two women, Mary and Elizabeth, who were shamed and lowly, to begin the transformation of the world. Not just because of whose mothers they are, not just because of the babies they carry within them. The transformation of the world begins with their selfless willingness to be a part of God’s grand narrative. It begins with the words they speak to one another in this greeting, because these prophecies are so unbelievable and incredible. 

Elizabeth declares not only that Mary is pregnant— something she wouldn’t have known yet— but she also exclaims that she knows who Mary’s child will be— the Lord. Soon enough Elizabeth’s own son will be the one who prepares the way for Mary’s.

Then Elizabeth blesses Mary, beginning a chain of blessings that will continue by Mary and Zechariah and Simeon, all of them praising God for what God is doing in this incredible moment in history.

Then, unable to contain herself, Mary chimes in with her song, overwhelmed with joy and gratitude for God, who is inviting her into the saving work that is starting even now. This story is filled with unexpected things, and perhaps the most unexpected thing is Mary’s song. 

To understand exactly how unexpected this song is, how unbelievable and incredible it is, we have to understand the world Mary and Elizabeth were living in. About four miles from where Jesus grew up in Nazareth, Rome burned the city of Sepphoris and subjected the Jewish inhabitant to slavery. These two mothers witnessed, or at the very least heard about, this horrific event. 

The Jewish people believed that the only way to overcome the power of Rome was through God’s saving power. Their own rebellions were being crushed, nothing seemed to be improving. It was only God who could save them from Rome’s crushing power. That is where Mary’s song comes in. Mary declares what God is going to do because she knows what God has already done. And God is faithful to God’s people. You see, her song is in the past tense. She is singing about what God has already done. 

⁵¹God has shown strength with God’s arm; 

the Lord has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 

⁵²God has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; ⁵³

God has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. 

⁵⁴The Lord has helped God’s servant Israel, in remembrance of God’s mercy, ⁵⁵according to the promise God made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.” 

All of this is in the past tense… 

God has shown strength. 

God has brought down the powerful and lifted up the lowly. 

God has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty.

Mary knows that God has already done these things and she knows God is doing them again. Somehow even now, she knows that it is God’s son, her son, that will bring about these things again. 

It is in her song, this rebellious, surprising song that echoes social upheaval and economic exploitation, that she declares that God is faithful and times are changing. The Jews longed for a Messiah to bring physical and spiritual healing, the promised one who would restore them to health and shalom. 

This song, this story of redemption and turning the world around, is full of unexpected things. In the midst of Roman oppression, Mary is declaring a new way— a world in which God rules instead of Caesar. And Christ’s salvation does not only concern the Jews in that time, it is not only past tense. And it is not only a declaration about the future, the coming of the Messiah on Christmas and in the future. This song is a song for the present time. God is concerned with not only the spiritual wellbeing of God’s people, but also our social and political life. God has acted on behalf of God’s people, God is acting on behalf of God’s people, and God will continue to be faithful. Saying that God rules instead of Caesar was the ultimate political and social statement. It was the ultimate hope for the Jewish people. It is hope for us now.

Anger does not rule.

Fear does not rule. 

Death does not rule. 

Poverty, hunger, and homelessness do not rule. 

Partisan politics does not rule. 

Racism does not rule. 

Nationalism and patriotism do not rule. 

Anxiety does not rule. 

The hope that Mary’s song gives to us today is that God rules. God is the only ruler. And God is faithful. 

We see it in this Advent season, as even now— God is among us, coming to us in the hymns that we sing this morning. I look at the world today and think about the world that Mary and Elizabeth experienced. A world full of all of these false rulers, kings, and authorities. A world in which we often have to look extra hard to find the goodness. Yet we stand this morning and sing, “Joy to the World.” Because we know that God is among us and God is faithful. God was, is, and is to come faithful to God’s people. And like Mary and Elizabeth, we are calling into the story, to be bearers of the glory of God. People who shout out with joy at the coming of the Lord, ones who are overwhelmed with the excitement of it all.  

So maybe this story is not so unexpected after all— because it tells the age old story, the story of joy and redemption, the story of salvation and faithfulness. The story that tells us that God, and only God, rules our lives with love and peace. God is with us, God has always been with us, and God will continue to be with us to the end of the ages. So let us sing, like Mary, and declare it to the world. 

This sermon was preach by me at Mandarin Lutheran Church in Jacksonville, Florida on December 23, 2018.