What Pastor Jon Preached on Sunday, April 25th, 2010

Fourth Sunday of Easter
Acts 9:36-43 • Psalm 23 • Revelation 7:9-17 • John 10:22-30

"Now in Joppa there was a disciple whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorcas. She was devoted to good works and acts of charity. ³⁷At that time she became ill and died. When they had washed her, they laid her in a room upstairs. ³⁸Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, who heard that Peter was there, sent two men to him with the request, 'Please come to us without delay.' ³⁹So Peter got up and went with them; and when he arrived, they took him to the room upstairs. All the widows stood beside him, weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was with them. ⁴⁰Peter put all of them outside, and then he knelt down and prayed. He turned to the body and said, 'Tabitha, get up.' Then she opened her eyes, and seeing Peter, she sat up. ⁴¹He gave her his hand and helped her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he showed her to be alive. ⁴²This became known throughout Joppa, and many believed in the Lord. ⁴³Meanwhile he stayed in Joppa for some time with a certain Simon, a tanner."

"At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, ²³and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon. ²⁴So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, 'How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.' ²⁵Jesus answered, 'I have told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me; ²⁶but you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep. ²⁷My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. ²⁸I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. ²⁹What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. ³⁰The Father and I are one.'"

Today our Easter Season of storytelling the origins of how the church began, and who we are continues. Today’s story of the early church from Acts is an amazing story about Dorcas, the only woman named as a disciple in the whole New Testament. Dorcas in Greek means “gazelle”, and so instead of calling today “Good Shepherd Sunday” as we usually do on the 4^th Sunday of Easter, we could call today “Gazelle Sunday.” Today is our commemoration to this female servant leader of the early church. Dorcas’ name in Aramaic was Tabitha. This name is one letter away from being the word from “ta-LI-tha” which is the word Jesus used to raise a girl from the dead during his public ministry. It’s no surprise then that Ta-BI-tha represents for us the power of the risen Christ, as Peter gets her up after she becomes ill and dies.

Tabitha is the first person in the first months of the early church to be raised from the dead. Why her? Why does she get so much focus, with so little mentioned of what she did? She gets attention because God stops at nothing to resurrect her vital ministry at Joppa. Her ministry could very easily have been forgotten. She wasn’t an articulate theologian, a great preacher, or a miracle-worker. She wasn’t wealthy. All Acts says about her was she was “devoted…to good works and acts of charity.” That word used for “charity” can also be translated from the Greek to mean “almseeds.” Tabitha was a seed planter. She planted seeds of care for the needy and forgotten. The seeds of herself she gave away took root in the hearts of widows who longed for belonging that society did not give them. Her ministry was of the behind-the-scenes variety, as she quietly offered her own faith-based initiative to widows by providing the most basic need of clothing to them, all out of her own funds. So often, widows and widowers are the forgotten ones. But with her form of church-sponsored welfare, Tabitha never stopped planting seeds in them, and telling them God had not forgotten them.

I’m sure we could think of some Tabithas we have known here at United Lutheran. In this church’s eighty-one years there have been plenty of men and women who have not been the loudest or most talkative disciples; people who went about serving in small but vital ways that remembered those that could easily fall through the cracks. Who are the Tabithas that have touched your life here? Who have you seen behind the scenes planting seeds of care? The Tabithas of this church send cards to shut-ins; drive the elderly to the church, make health kits for Lutheran World Relief, and give Sunday worship flowers to the sick. These are not the flashiest or noticeable ministries of the church. But they remind us of Jesus, notices the invisible, who feeds the forgotten, who clothes us with compassion. Tabithas are essential to this church as we look to build faith and future for our congregation.

But death wants to put an end to Tabitha. It wants her clothes closet to remain shut. Death does not want her be mentioned in Acts, or for us to be speaking of her today. When death takes hold of Tabitha, it is so profoundly tragic for her community in Joppa, that the disciples summon Peter. He could help. He had already made two men walk: a man paralyzed from birth and another who had been bed-ridden for eight years. When Peter arrives in Joppa, the widows show Peter all the clothes Tabitha had made for them. I can’t help but be reminded of our beloved sister in Christ Pat, who at her unexpected funeral last year had many of her quilts placed on the chancel railing during her funeral. This was the same testament Tabitha’s community made for her. Death wanted Tabitha forgotten, and the life she gave to the lifeless to end.

And the forces of death also did not want Peter coming anywhere near Tabitha. The Spirit was upon him. He knew the power of the risen Christ to heal. The chief priests and elders in Jerusalem had already scolded him for his first healing. They saw that thousands were converted because of Peter’s testimony when he proclaimed that it wasn’t his own power or piety that brought healing, but the strong name of Jesus. The powerful forbid Peter to invoke that name ever again—that name that could do such amazing things. God-forbid, what if someone who was lame walked again? What if someone who was paralyzed got out of bed? I can almost hear the voice of Michael Scott, the boss in the television show The Office played by Steve Carrell, as the chief priests and elders try clumsily to micromanage Peter, and keep the power of the risen Jesus from spreading to more people. But human authority can’t stop Jesus from bringing Easter resurrection. We “cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard.” (Acts 4:20)

Even death…even human authority…cannot hold Jesus back from these chief priests and elders, from Peter, from Tabitha, or from us. As Peter preaches in Acts, “God raised [Jesus on the third day], having freed him from death, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power.” (2:24) God initiates the resurrection of Jesus so powerfully, so resoundingly, cannot only be contained to Jesus. It has the power to break us free from the bonds of the evil one, to crush hell underfoot, and to raise us from death to new life. When Peter kneels down to pray at Tabitha’s deathbed, and he says with James Brown, “Get on up!”, she gets up! And Jesus does not just raise her to new life. He raises a whole community to new life. Tabitha becomes known even more throughout Joppa for her resurrection. The widows and saints see her and begin to dance! And many believe in the Lord because of what Jesus did. Jesus will not let death take us out of the palm of his hand. (John 10:28) And as one person has said, we have every reason to believe that we are in his hands, brothers and sisters, if for no other reason than we are here this morning, and we hear his voice.

This Easter season Jesus is busting loose! He’s busting out because death cannot hold him down. He is busting out in his presence that enters into even the broken pain of our lives; he is resurrecting we who long for his protection, and his care. He’s busting loose on we who long not to be forgotten. Where our soil is dry, and not producing anything ripe, he promises to walk in the valley with us, planting his seeds of resurrection. Jesus busts loose in Tabitha so that she can continue bearing his good fruit in the world. This is how Jesus wants us to remember Tabitha.

Before Tabitha dies and is resurrected, Acts sums up her life in this short and sweet way: “she was devoted to good works and acts of almseeds.” (9:36) In what kind of way would we like to be remembered? If we had to think about one sentence that would sum up our lives, what would we like other people say about us?

Even though we may wish our life told a different headline than what it now reads; even though we believe our story is all too insignificant in the larger scheme of the world…Jesus will never forget us. He will remember us no matter how visible or invisible we are. We don’t have to be flashy or do anything outrageous to be essential to the church. It can be as simple as holding open a door, or offering a glass of water, or giving five minutes to listen to someone who’s struggling. Jesus promises that he will remember even the smallest of almseeds that we plant. Jesus will not let death take hold of them. He will protect them. He will bust them loose so they may grow. And just maybe…someday…we will look up and see a whole field around us where all the grains of almseeds that have been scattered in Jesus’ name have grown into a wheatfield…and we’ll see a gazelle named Tabitha, walking around with the many gazelles of the church, grazing among us…all because of Christ, whose new life could not be contained by death. Amen.

What Pastor Jon Preached on Sunday, April 18th, 2010

Third Sunday of Easter
Acts 9:1-20 • Psalm 30 • Revelation 5:11-14 • John 21:1-19

"After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias; and he showed himself in this way. ²Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. ³Simon Peter said to them, 'I am going fishing.' They said to him, 'We will go with you.' They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. ⁴Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. ⁵Jesus said to them, 'Children, you have no fish, have you?' They answered him, 'No.' ⁶He said to them, 'Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.' So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish. ⁷That disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, 'It is the Lord!' When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on some clothes, for he was naked, and jumped into the sea. ⁸But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, only about a hundred yards off. ⁹When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. ¹⁰Jesus said to them, 'Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.' ¹¹So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn. ¹²Jesus said to them, 'Come and have breakfast.' Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, 'Who are you?' because they knew it was the Lord. ¹³Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. ¹⁴This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.' When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?' He said to him, 'Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my lambs.' ¹⁶A second time he said to him, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' He said to him, 'Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Tend my sheep.' ¹⁷He said to him the third time, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, 'Do you love me?' And he said to him, 'Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my sheep. ¹⁸Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.' ¹⁹(He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, 'Follow me.'"

Many of us have been facing a new crossroads lately. How do we get to where we want to go, now that the Eisenhower I-290 has become a 24-hour rush hour experience? There are so many roads and strategies I have been hearing people say that they will take to get around that mess of summer construction. Which road will we take?

Well this morning, we also stand at a crossroads, with construction putting obstacles in the way of the future of our congregation.


Today we stand with Saul on the road to Damascus. We stand today at the crossroads of the past and future of our congregation. We stand today, at the intersection of all the preparation, and the beginning of the Building Faith and Future Capital Campaign that kicks-off today. We stand at the crossroads as we see our church’s tool for ministry, our building, crumbling before our eyes.

What does a community do when it is faced with these kinds of challenges? What can we do to find some sense of assurance that this community has faced adversity in the past, and has overcome it before? One thing we can do when we stand at the crossroads is to reach back into our past, and tell stories: stories of how we began, of why we are who we are, stories that show what matters most to us, and that remind us of whose we are as we look at the road in front of us.

So that is what we are going to do for the rest of this season of Easter: tell the stories of our origins. For the next five weeks of Easter, from today to the conclusion of the Easter season of Pentecost on May 23^rd—which is Commitment Sunday, the day we make our pledges for the three year Capital Campaign called Building Faith and Future—from today until that Sunday we will be focusing in worship on the lessons from the Acts of the Apostles. Every first lesson in this season of Easter comes from Acts. The Acts of the Apostles is where we hear the origin stories of who we are—of the birth of the church. It is not a book we hear about or talk about often in church, but it is a book full of stories that are treasures that speak to us about who we are and what matters to us, as we stand at the crossroads.

And in addition, we will be telling stories about the origins of United Lutheran Church as well: stories that tell us about who we are and where we have been, that can inform us about what story we want to continue for future generations of disciples at United Lutheran.

Today I’d like to begin the storytelling by sharing one significant story from United Lutheran’s origins that came very early in its history, and that reflect a very similar vulnerability to our own time. United Lutheran opened in 1928, just before the Great Depression hit. There was a significant mortgage for the church to pay during those early years, amidst difficult economic times. Many have said we have not been hit that hard since the Great Recession of 2008 that we’re still feeling the effects of. But God’s people here were eager for the story of this church to continue well past the Great Depression. Several members re-mortgaged their homes so the church could continue making it’s mortgage payments. Many more gave tremendously of their resources during that difficult economic time. And as a result, the church stayed open, and in the 1950’s, United Lutheran paid off its mortgage.

Ten years ago this church had its first Capital Campaign in its history. It happened in more favorable economic times than today, and over $600,000 was raised. Now we face another campaign, but times are much tougher. Today we stand at the place where our forebears stood back when it began as they faced the Great Depression. Those courageous and generous saints stand with us today, as we look at the road before us.

Saul stands with us at the crossroads too. His story is one that defines what the risen Jesus did in the early church. What happened to Saul continues to happen in the lives of people here today. What Jesus does to Saul is remarkable—Jesus changes the road Saul travels on…from a road of authoritative intimidation, to a road of vulnerable, forgiven compassion. Saul meets the risen Christ, not in a manner unlike Martin Luther, as he travels the road to Damascus where he plans to arrest, persecute and jail Christians. But the risen Jesus confronts Saul with the truth: “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” (9:5) In an instant, Jesus changes the road Saul’s life will take…forever. After this remarkably dramatic turnabout, Saul does not go to Damascus full of himself—he goes there full of Christ, who turns his allegiance from his own power, to the power of one who met him at his crossroads. Jesus changed Saul’s road to Damascus into a road not of fear, but of compassion, of a road following Christ.

What are the stories we can tell with Saul of being met by Jesus in this community? When have we met Jesus here, and because of that, what “way” have we taken? What does that road called “Jesus” look like?

Perhaps you have found here an Ananias-like person who has come and taken the scales off your eyes and has put you on a Jesus-directed path in life. Perhaps the way of Jesus opened up to you by the way you were welcomed here—and it made you believe that church wasn’t a social club, but could really be a place where the love and justice of Christ were present.

Whatever road Jesus has put us on, he has been our way…he is our way…and he will continue to be our way forward.

Recently in the Atlantic Monthly magazine there was an article about what brings the most long-term happiness to people’s lives. The top two things were, number 1, belonging to a community, and number 2, a sense of purpose. Isn’t it amazing that the road Jesus puts us on gives us those two things?! Saul doesn’t receive healing from his blindness until God tells Ananias to go and minister to him—he can’t be fully transformed without someone else there, laying hands on him. Community brings about his healing and his repentence. And Saul then goes to join the Damascus Christians as a brother in Christ, a part of their community—because of the road Jesus put him on. And, as Lutheran church consultant Kelly Fryer put it, when Jesus calls his disciples like Saul, he does not say to him, “You are so saved!” He calls Saul to follow him. He says, “Get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.” (9:6)

The call of risen Jesus also comes to Peter. Jesus says, “Do you love me?” three times, and each time Peter responds yes, Jesus tells him to feed and tend to his sheep. Saying “yes” that we love Jesus is important, but it’s not enough on its own; he calls us to back it up with a mission…to those he loves.

As we stand today at a crossroads, Jesus is putting us onto the road of his abundant way of life. A way of a community of faith; a way of tending to his sheep. The road Jesus puts us on is a road of discipleship, for he himself is our Way.

We Lutherans don’t like to talk about discipleship—we think that it speaks of works righteousness. We are so eager to speak of God’s forgiveness and grace that we forget: we are forgiven and given grace to serve and love our neighbor. Our discipleship of Christ—how we grow in our relationship with him—is a very personal thing: it’s how we respond to his call. Discipleship is our witness to who has touched our lives, and to the way of Jesus which we follow.

We do not know where the road of Building Faith and Future will lead. This capital campaign is a road that has lots of construction signs on it. It will take everyone pitching in for this road to be made Straight. We do know as we look at the campaign ahead, we have a purpose, a mission: to proclaim Christ together, and feed his sheep.

What story will future generations tell about this congregation? We do not know. But we do know today, as we stand at the crossroads of our past and of our future, that we stand with Saul, Ananias, the ancestors in faith, the saints of United Lutheran’s past…and Jesus stands with us. Whatever the way forward brings, as people of his way…Jesus promises to keep us on his road of community, his road of his mission to love, a road of his Easter resurrection. Jesus believes that future generations at United Lutheran will be telling stories about how God opened up a new way of life before us—all because we followed the road of Jesus. He is our way. He will lead us to life. Amen.

What Pastor Jon Preached on Sunday, April 4, 2010

Resurrection of Our Lord: Easter Day
Acts 10:34-43 • Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24 • 1 Corinthians 15:19-26 • Luke 24:1-12

"But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they did not find the body. While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them. The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, 'Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.' Then they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb, they told all this to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told this to the apostles. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter got up and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; then he went home, amazed at what had happened."


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Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!

These words are words we hear every Easter season without fail. We come to Easter Day today knowing them well. We come to speak and sing them today: it is our Easter proclamation.

And we do not sing them alone. We sing them with all who know death very

well. These words of praise to Christ were sung by an unexpected group of children recently. A college student relief trip in January witnessed children singing praise songs in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, following the earthquake that had struck there on January 12^th. It was a miracle. Impossible. Unthinkable. Hunger, no shelter, thousands of dead, thousands of mourning. And singing? After such devastation and tragedy? Hard to believe. But the children were exuberant even as they sang hymns through the tears running down their faces. Was their laughter an escape from the suffering they had experienced? Had the students wrongly assumed that these Haitians’ lives were trapped forever in tragic poverty and injustice, in this poorest country in the Western hemisphere? The college students had been absolutely certain that they would find destruction and sadness. They came away amazed. They couldn’t help but join in singing with these brother and sisters. (Christian Century, March 23, 2010, p. 12)

Someone else affected by the Haitian earthquake knew that song of resurrection joy, sung in the midst of death. Long before he died in the same earthquake, ELCA Seminarian Ben Larson wrote a song as he was preparing for ministry whose lyrics were: “If you are in search of certainty, then you are on the wrong ship. If you are in search of control, then you are sailing in the wrong waters. But in this world not all is uncertain: there’s the love of God and my love for you…” (The Lutheran Magazine, August 2010, p. 47) One would think we could be certain that Ben would have sang a tune of despair and sadness as he lay dying in the rubble of a collapsed Haitian building. But instead, his wife heard him singing a song of what he was certain in: the love of God, known to us in the risen Christ.

What was it that made those Haitian children and Ben sing with such joy? Without question it was the risen Christ, who sang a new song into their lives that drowned out death’s song of suffering. The risen Christ brought them in touch with eternal life. But how could they have been certain? How could they have for sure known it was Christ who would raise them from the dead? How could they be singing? How can we be singing today?

They sing with us today because Jesus has trumped what seems certain—what seems to be the only story we see told over and over again in the world: a story of tragic, scandalous death. The resurrected Christ trumps what seems to make us so certain about the way the world turns. Jesus rises, having taken death for a spin and turns our world upside down. Jesus says no to death with his love, no to answering violence with violence. The cycle of death stops at his empty tomb. Jesus rises so that life has the last word. He rises to resurrected life, not to make us defenders of life at any cost, but to erase our fear of certain end at the hands of death. And Jesus’ victory over that future fear now dramatically alters our present.

“Death is a part of life” we often say to those who mourn, as we try to comfort them. “It’s something we have to accept.” “Jesus is risen” exposes these lies for what they are. Death is painful. Death hurts. But Jesus’ rising means he’s conquered it. It isn’t something to fear, because of him. “Jesus is risen” means instead of “death being a part of life”, we can say “our death is now swallowed up in his risen life.” Our death is no longer ours. It is in the hands of the crucified, and risen, Christ.

Resurrection isn’t easy for us to understand. It can take time. But Jesus doesn’t wait for the disciples to understand what his resurrection means before he goes to the cross. He tells them three times he will die and rise again, and they say, “What?!” Jesus rises and the women at the tomb go and tell the disciples what they’ve seen. And you can guess the response. Luke says the disciples though Jesus rising was “an idle tale” (Lk. 24:11); in other words, baloney, hogwash, nonsense!

We like the disciples seek certainty. We want all the answers. We want resurrection to make “sense.” Or more honestly, we want to be certain we have the “truth”, that we can claim the resurrection as “ours.” Or, we want proof. We want to know where Jesus’ body is, since today’s Gospel from Luke doesn’t tell us. We want to know what it looked like for Jesus inside the tomb, pushing aside that stone, seeing the light come into the dark room.

Especially in these challenging economic times, we crave certainty more than we may have in past years. We crave the certainty of seeing our 401k go on a more dependable upward trend; we crave a job we can keep as long as we want; we crave getting back to a “normal” economy. Our confidence in our future is uncertain for these and so many more reasons today.

But maybe today, Easter tells us that the point isn’t being certain. Maybe Easter is not just about knowing the outcome of victory over death. Maybe today isn’t about understanding resurrection. Maybe it’s simply about amazement, and awe, and trusting that somehow, some way, in his rising from the dead, Jesus changes everything. Isn’t amazement why we come today? Isn’t that why we hear “Christ is risen” year after year, and it never gets old?

Maybe we can take a cue from Peter, who goes into the empty tomb to see for himself, and even though it doesn’t make sense to him at all, his response is to be “amazed” at Jesus overcoming death. (24:12) Maybe as we begin this season of Easter, and as United Lutheran begins to prayerfully consider the capital campaign that is now before us, we can enter into this seven week church season as a season of being amazed by God who has Easter-ed us. Maybe, dear Easter people, we can consider during these seven weeks leading up to commitment Sunday on Pentecost, May 23^rd, When have I experienced resurrection here at ULC? When has this church amazed me? How could we join together in God’s amazing work to bring life out of death in the world? It’s amazing to me that last month 15 young adults gathered next door at the parsonage for a potluck first meeting of a new twenties and thirties group at ULC. It’s amazing to me that 3 people were baptized last night at the Vigil of Easter, and 3 more Affirmed their Baptism—all 6 becoming new members of this church. We cannot be certain what our answers will be at the end of these seven Easter weeks. We don’t know what will come. But Jesus, crucified and risen, will amaze us!

Jesus is risen. This is our cry, our plea and our hope. It’s not ours to possess. It’s not truly comprehensible by anyone. But it does make us sing a different tune than the one death would have us sing. We can dare sing “Jesus is risen” with our brothers and sisters in Haiti who with us have been re-amazed by a resurrected Jesus. We can sing with Ben the song of hope that puts Jesus at the helm of our life’s boat, our life that he makes sail on baptismal waters that claim us for eternity. These waters now follow the lead the Lord of our lives to places we have no certainty of what they will look like. But Jesus does promises that wherever these waters lead, we will be singing, as his amazed witnesses, as he leads us home.

Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!