No Wedding Robe?

THE EIGHTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Year A, Lectionary 28

October 12, 2014

Isaiah 25:1-9

Psalm 23

Philippians 4:1-19

Matthew 22:1-14

Pastor David Tryggestad

Concordia Evangelical Lutheran Church

Duluth, Minnesota

I have had the privilege to officiate at three weddings in the past eight days, and what fun it has been! While all of my efforts in weddings are focused on the marriage service itself, I never cease to be astonished at all the preparation that goes into making the wedding reception a spectacular event. The décor, the table linens, centerpieces, placer settings, individual favors, delicious meals. Everyone has on their finest, giving honor and gratitude to the newly married couple and their families.

This past Wednesday at our weekly Sandwich & Scripture Bible study, someone remembered having seen an article in the paper about a wedding that had been cancelled, and the family of the bride opened up the reception, with all its festivity and finery, to the homeless in Atlanta. The article in the newspaper was entitled, “Atlanta couple hosts ritzy meal for homeless after daughter cancels wedding.”[1] 

 

After Carol and Willie Fowler's daughter called off her nuptials, the Fowlers decided to give the upscale, four-course meal to 200 of Atlanta's poor. A kind-hearted Atlanta couple made the best out of a bad situation by donating their daughter's canceled wedding reception to the homeless. Carol and Willie Fowler decided that the first-rate meal they had reserved . . . at upmarket Villa Christina restaurant shouldn't go to waste — so they invited 200 of the Atlanta's destitute to join them. Bosses at Hosea Feed the Hungry charity initially thought the offer to feed their attendees a lavish four-course meal was a practical joke. But the Fowlers . . . insisted they were sincere — and the event went ahead, albeit with a new list of invitees. "It was my husband's idea," Mrs. Fowler [said]. "We prayed about it. And when he woke up the next morning, he said, 'We're going to call Hosea Feed the Hungry and ask if we can donate it to the needy,'" she added. Many of the guests were not accustomed to the gold plates and crystal stemware at Villa Christina, nor the formal presentation of the food. “The passed hors d’oeuvre were very interesting because the children were wondering, ‘could we take the whole tray, or do we just take one off of the tray?’” . . .

I can’t imagine the wonder on the faces of those 200 guests, especially the children, most of whom had never seen a linen napkin, let alone a gold plate.

Now imagine one of the guests being ungrateful, being rude, or complaining about the menu, or maybe having to sit next to someone her or she didn’t like.

Our Gospel for today is another difficult text. We’re not so sure we want to hear about the king sending soldiers to kill the reluctant guests and burn their city. We’re perplexed by the king having one of the guests thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

In a recent conversation in the sauna at the YMCA, a man who belongs to another ELCA congregation in Duluth asked me how we pastors decide what scripture texts to preach on. I explained that we, along with many other major denominations, share a lectionary, a set of readings on the three-year rotation. I told him that we sometimes are faced with difficult texts, as a result, texts that we might not otherwise choose, had we the choice.

This is one of those difficult texts.

One of the highest honors one could bestow on another in the ancient world was to offer hospitality, especially lavish hospitatality. It was lavish, not to impress the guests and glorify the host (though, no doubt, that was sometimes a motive), but it was lavish in order to bestow honor and dignity to the guest. It was especially gracious to offer hospitality to those who could not repay, who could not reciprocate.

The occasion of the wedding of the king’s son was no doubt something talked about for a very long time, and the guest list would have been carefully deliberated. The wedding parties of the three weddings these past eight days no doubt took great pains to come up with their guest lists.

Imagine no one showing up. No one! Not one! Hardly anything could be more insulting.

Our parable is filled with hyperbole, with exaggeration. The reluctant guests kill the king’s messengers. So the king kills the guests and burns their city. A bit over the top, perhaps. Scholars tell us that Matthew wrote his gospel after the Romans destroyed and burned Jerusalem. Our parable is perhaps a reference to that cataclysmic event.

Meanwhile, the dinner is getting cold!

I offered the blessing at the reception this past Friday night at the Holiday Inn, and the very moment I said, “Amen,” an army of wait staff came rushing through the door from the kitchen into the dining room to serve the first course. Imagine telling the kitchen staff to put the dinner on hold until the king had finished sacking the city of the recalcitrants and then sending servants into the highways and biways to gather everyone they could find.

My stepmother always chafes when my dad prays over dinner, because he tends to pray for everyone in the family, especially those no present, while the dinner is getting cold.

Imagine the cooks in the king’s kitchen holding dinner.

Finally the wedding hall is filled with guests, both bad and good.

It is important to note that the king has declared the first guest list as “not worthy.” They were “not worthy” because they refused the hospitality offered by the king. Now the wedding hall is filled with both bad and good. We can see here that worthiness does not have to do with moral rectitude, with being bad or good. Evidently even the bad are welcome to the wedding banquet. The original guests were not worthy, not because they were bad, but because they were ungrateful.

Now we are once again astonished at the king. He comes into the wedding hall to see his guests and sees that one of them is not wearing a wedding robe, a customary cloak, or something at least clean. I imagine one of the wedding guests at these recent weddings coming to the dinner in pajamas, or just rolling out of bed, not bothering to shower or shave.

The story is outrageous on many accounts. It’s not about our attire; it’s not about having the latest fashions. It’s about coming to God’s marvelous table, to God’s overflowing abundance, with a sense of wonder and gratitude. It’s having a willing and joyful spirit. It’s joining the Apostle Paul in singing, “Rejoice in the Lord always, again I say Rejoice!”

As our Gospel writer Matthew tells this story, it’s much harsher than a similar story as told by Luke. Matthew is seeing the early church take God’s grace with complacency, without gratitude. He is troubled that members of the Body of Christ take discipleship so blithely, so lightly. He grieves that there are those who come to the church to receive its benefits without investing in the health of the ministry of the congregation.  

Our Sunday School children are making Praise Sticks today—those we have been using previously were borrowed from CHUM Church. Coming to worship with your Praise Stick is like wearing your wedding robe. Why would anyone come to worship without their Praise Stick?!

Come to the wedding banquet. And bring your Praise Stick. “Rejoice in the Lord always, and again, I say, Rejoice!”

Thanks be to God!

---

     [1]http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/homeless-enjoy-woman-canceled-wedding-article-1.1464704 (accessed October 11, 2014).

Sermon October 5, 2014 "Vineyards, a Marriage Box, and Us"

THE SEVENTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Year A, Lectionary 27

October 5, 2014

Isaiah 5:1-7

Psalm 80:7-15

Philippians 3:4b-14

Matthew 21:33-46

Pastor David Tryggestad

Concordia Evangelical Lutheran Church

Duluth, Minnesota

Yesterday I had the privilege to officiate at a wedding here at Concordia. Instead of lighting a Unity Candle after repeating vows and exchanging rings, the couple had placed a wooden Marriage Box on the altar, into which they put copies of their vows, their wedding program, and the scripture readings from their wedding. As the years pass, they will put significant mementos of their life together inside the Marriage Box, including photos and letters to each other. As such, each of them will make deposits into this box, which represents their marriage, and they will never withdraw more than they deposit. If one were to do that, the box would be empty, the marriage would suffer; the promises would be broken, and the relationship destroyed.

I have been thinking about the Marriage Box in relation to our readings for today. Three of our texts have to do with vineyards.

In our Gospel, the landowner carefully planned and established a vineyard: he built a fence around it, he dug a winepress in it, and he placed a watch tower inside it. We can imagine that the vineyard produced rich and juicy grapes, an abundant harvest! At harvest time, the landowner sent slaves to collect his portion of the harvest, which constituted his rent, all according to the agreement he had made with the tenants. The tenants had decided, however, not to honor their agreement and rather to keep all of the harvest, all of the produce for themselves. So they beat and killed the slaves. The landowner, being persistent, sent more slaves, and the tenants did the same thing. Finally, the landowner sent his son, saying, “They will respect my son.” In a plot to steal the inheritance, the tenants killed the son. Not only did they refuse to offer back the landowner’s rightful share of the harvest, they attempted to swindle the landowner of the entire vineyard.

If the vineyard were a Marriage Box, the tenants took out more than they had put in. The relationship is destroyed.

Jesus asks the question, “Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.”

If the vineyard were a Marriage Box, the tenants took out more than they had put in. The relationship is destroyed.

Our First Reading from the prophet Isaiah is one of the most beautiful love songs in all of scripture, and it is also one of the saddest. The prophet is singing of his “Beloved”—God—who has established a vineyard:

Let me sing for my beloved
my love-song concerning his vineyard:
My beloved had a vineyard
on a very fertile hill.
He dug it and cleared it of stones,
and planted it with choice vines;
he built a watchtower in the midst of it,
and hewed out a wine vat in it;
he expected it to yield grapes . . . (Isaiah 5:1-2)

We hear a parallel with the story of Jesus, which Jesus told many centuries later. It seems the theme is the same.

But why is this love song a sad one?

. . . he expected it to yield grapes,
but it yielded wild grapes.

God, the lover, has done everything for the vineyard. God asks the rhetorical question:

What more was there to do for my vineyard
that I have not done in it?
When I expected it to yield grapes,
why did it yield wild grapes? (Isaiah 5:4)

If this vineyard beloved of God were a Marriage Box, the tenants, the inhabitants, who were squandering the fruit of the vine, not tending to the vine, would be putting lies into the box, at the same time taking out the love of the other while putting nothing back.

Again, the relationship is destroyed.

What if the vineyard from both our Gospel and Isaiah were Concordia Lutheran Church? What love song would God sing to us?

My beloved had a vineyard
on a very lovely plot of land,

nestled against a nature preserve and a running creek.
He dug it and cleared it of stones,
and planted it with faithful people;
he built a magnificent sanctuary the midst of it,
and hewed out of solid granite

a baptismal font in which to call the people his own,

an altar from which to offer forgiveness of sin,

and a pulpit from which his promises would be proclaimed.
He expected it to yield a harvest of faithfulness,

a harvest of generosity,

a harvest of abundance;

he blessed them that they might be a blessing;

he expected them to yield grapes . . .

If our Gospel for today were Concordia Lutheran Church, the landowner would send messengers looking for a portion of the harvest, the first fruits, from glad and generous hearts. The landowner would not be looking for the messengers to be dismissed and killed and the people of the congregation holding tight to our own harvest, holding tight to what we claim to be ours.

Consider Concordia Lutheran Church a Marriage Box: Are we taking out more than we are putting in? We cannot take out more than we give. A congregation cannot function, let alone be healthy and thrive, when we take out more than we give.

I am intrigued by a certain detail in our Gospel for today:

Jesus asks the question, “Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.”

Notice that it is not Jesus who pronounces judgment on the people; it is the people themselves. The people put themselves in the place of the landowner and pronounce judgment on themselves. We can find relief and hope in that it is not God who pronounces judgment.

The parable in our Gospel is often referred to as the “parable of the wicked tenants.” The focus is on the tenants. But that focus is misplaced. The parable is about God. It is God who is the actor; it is God who is the owner; it is God who comes again and again to us, looking for a response, looking for fruit.

Jesus pronounces judgment on the religious leaders of his day: “Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom.”

When our Lord comes to us, may it be that he finds us producing the fruits of the kingdom.

Thanks be to God!

Sermon September 21: Jonah, the Whale, and the Workers

THE FIFTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Year A, Lectionary 25

September 21, 2014

Jonah 3:10—4:11

Matthew 20:1-16

Pastor David Tryggestad

Concordia Evangelical Lutheran Church

Duluth, Minnesota

Nowhere in the Bible does it say that God is fair. No one knew that better than Jonah.

“Jonah! Go to Nineveh, that great and wicked city, and declare the Word of the Lord that I will give you!”

Now Nineveh lay to the east, some 560 miles from Jerusalem. It was the largest city in the world, in present-day Iraq. Nineveh, capital city of the hated Assyrians, had brutalized Israel, brought it to its knees, and deported most of its citizens. The Ninevites rejected Israel’s God, and they were notorious for their violence.

“Jonah! Go to Nineveh, that great and wicked city, and declare the Word of the Lord that I will give you!”

Jonah loved his God. But he hated the people of Nineveh. So, instead of heading east, he headed west, as far west as the known-world could imagine, towards Tarshish, on the tip of southern Spain. He booked on the first ship that sailed, getting away as fast as he could.

But God was not easily eluded. God sent a storm on the sea. The crew members cried out to their own gods, but nothing happened. They appealed to Jonah, who managed to sleep through the storm—he knew it was from God—and the sailors had figured out that Jonah was the cause of all of this. Jonah instructed them to throw him overboard and, reluctantly, they did. Immediately the storm ceased and the sailors began to worship the God of Israel.

God sent a great fish to swallow Jonah, to save him from the depths of the sea. As that great fish took Jonah to the depths of the sea, Jonah prayed to God as if from the depths of Sheol—the depths of the underworld. Joel praised God for God’s deliverance.

After three days, as if on cue, God delivered Jonah, causing the fish to regurgitate Jonah on dry land.

Now, if Jonah thought he was going to receive a sabbatical to rest and recuperate from his strange and strenuous ordeal, he had another thing coming:

“Jonah! Go to Nineveh, that great and wicked city, and declare the Word of the Lord that I will give you!”

Jonah had learned from personal experience that it does not pay to try to take the call of God into his own hands, or even to ignore that call. This time, Jonah goes to Nineveh and declares the word of the Lord: “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” It takes Jonah three full days to walk through the city, and by the end of the third day, his voice is hoarse and parched.

To Jonah’s great amazement, the people of Nineveh believe in this word of the Lord. They repent—everyone from the king on down to the animals. The king declares to his people: “All shall turn from their evil ways and from the violence that is in their hands.” The people cry out to the God of Israel.

And God forgives them. In biblical language, “God changed his mind.” God forgives Nineveh.

Jonah is furious with God. We can overhear his protests: “What are you thinking?! You know what they did to our women and children! You know how they slaughtered in cold blood. You know how they dragged our people away, never again to return home.”

Jonah goes on with his real complaint: “I ran away from you the first time because I know that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing.”

“Take my life away. I’d rather die than see our enemies forgiven!”

Jonah is pouting now, and he goes out into the hot desert, builds for himself a shelter, and waits to see what God will do to the city.

God appoints a bush to grow over Jonah’s hut to give him shelter and shade from the scorching heat of the day. Jonah is happy about the bush.

As if playing with Jonah’s sensibilities, the next morning God appoints a worm to destroy Jonah’s bush, and God sends a scorching wind, and Jonah is suffering under the heat. “It is better for me to die than to live.”

God challenges Jonah: “You seem to care more about your bush, which sprang up yesterday and is gone today, than you care about the people of Nineveh, a city of 120,000 people.”

Nowhere in the Bible does it say that God is fair. No one knew that better than Jonah.

We are just as indignant about this story as Jonah: those people do not deserve to be spared. Those people do not deserve God’s forgiveness.

This takes us to the heart of the matter: no one, not one, not now, not ever, deserves God forgiveness. No one deserves God’s grace.

In our Gospel for today, the parable of the workers in the vineyard from Matthew, the workers who came at 5 in the afternoon receive the same as those who started at 6 in the morning. It’s not fair!

Now if our parable were about economics, we might say that God intends for some workers to earn twelve times as much as others. Indeed, some folks might try to make the Bible endorse and even bless the incredible gap between the rich and poor.

But our parable is not about economics. It’s about God’s grace, about God’s mercy, about God’s forgiveness.

God wants all people to live in the joy of the kingdom, where there is no violence, no retribution, no “getting even,” where former enemies share God’s peace, where former killers and those they killed dwell in the peace of God, which passes all human understanding.

Today is the International Day of Peace, established by the United Nations in 1981. On this day, let us all turn our hearts and our minds to peace, the peace of God that passes all understanding.

We sing:

Eye has not seen, ear has not heard

what God has ready or those who love him;

Spirit of love, come, give us the mind of Jesus,

teach us the wisdom of God.[1]

---

     [1]Marty Haugen, “Eye Has Not Seen,” Gather (Chicago: GIA Publications, Inc., 1988), 275.

"Where two or three are gathered . . ."

Scripture

“For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” (Matthew 18:20)

Reflection

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus makes explicit, more than once, that he is with us and will remain with us. We see this in our verse for today, from the Gospel for this coming Sunday. We hear it in Jesus’ last words to his disciples in Matthew: “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). In the first chapter of the Gospel, Matthew quotes the prophet of Isaiah: “‘Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,’ which means, “God is with us” (Matthew 1:23). Thus, not only is Jesus with us, but, in Jesus, God is with us.

The context for our verse for today has to do with accountability within the Body of Christ: “If another member of the church sins against you . . .” (vs. 15a). Jesus is realistic in that enmity and division exist within the fellowship of believers, and he offers us a process for reconciliation. Jesus’ promise of his abiding presence provides both the catalyst and the power for that reconciliation.

Prayer

Lord Jesus, Thank you for your promise that you are with us. Keep us in harmony with one another. Continue to be with us at Concordia. In your name we pray. Amen.

Commemoration: Nikolai Grundtvig

Commemoration

September 2

Nikolai Frederik Severin Grundtvig, Bishop, Renewer of the Church, d. 1872

Reflection

Nikolai Grundtvig, son of a Lutheran pastor, left a lasting legacy on his native Denmark. He wrote more than one thousand hymn texts, including “Built on a Rock,” founded folk high schools, which raised educational standards throughout Scandinavia, worked toward the introduction of parliamentary government, and resisted the prevailing spirit of rationalism in theology by leading a revival of orthodox Lutheranism, restoring the creeds and confessions to prominence. In his probation sermon preached before church officials in 1810, he wrote, “Holy men of old believed in the message they were called to preach, but the human spirit has now become so proud that it feels itself capable of discovering the truth without the light of the gospel, and so faith has died.” A contemporary church building in Copenhagen is named after Grundtvig (I played the organ there in 1976).

Danes who immigrated to the U.S. eventually formed two separate church bodies, one the “happy Danes” and the other the “gloomy Danes.” The “happy Danes,” reflecting the more liberal outlook of Grundtvig, eventually merged into what was to become the Lutheran Church in America (LCA) in 1962 (of which Concordia was a part) which merged with other church bodies in 1988 to become the ELCA.

Prayer

God of grace, Thank you for your servant, Nicolai Gruntvig, for his living faith and broad learning. Thank you for his love and respect for the tradition of the church, enlivening the church of his day with new hymns that still speak to us today. We give you thanks for all those who have given us song, that we may continue to lift our voices in praise. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Sermon August 31: "Your Words Were Found, and I Ate Them . . ."

THE TWELFTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Year A, Lectionary 24

August 31, 2014

Jeremiah 15:15-21

Romans 12:9-21

Matthew 16:21-28

Pastor David Tryggestad

Concordia Evangelical Lutheran Church

Duluth, Minnesota

Folks like you who show up on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend probably are the last ones who need to hear Jesus’ admonition to deny yourselves and to take up your cross and follow him. No doubt, all of you might have chosen to do other things this morning than to attend worship.

But I wonder if Jesus’ words might sound and feel different if we were to hear them, not as admonition, but rather as invitation.

More on that later.

I have always been drawn to our prophet Jeremiah’s somewhat strange image:

Your words were found, and I ate them,
and your words became to me a joy
and the delight of my heart;
for I am called by your name,
O Lord, God of hosts. (Jeremiah 15:16)

I cannot but help to hear Jesus’ words to Satan, who is tempting Jesus in his hunger to turn stones into bread: “One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).

Your words were found, and I ate them,
and your words became to me a joy
and the delight of my heart . . .

The image of eating the words of God evokes the adage, “We are what we eat.” If it is true with nutrition, that “We are what we eat,” how much more true might it be that “We are what we eat” when what we eat is the word of God?!

I am reminded of Psalm 42: “As the deer longs for the water-brooks, so longs my soul for you” (vs. 1).

Our souls hunger and thirst for God.

For our prophet Jeremiah, it is not enough to read God’s word; it is not enough to hear God’s word; it is not enough to sing God’s word. Jeremiah longs to eat God’s word.

“We are what we eat.”

Jeremiah goes on, “. . . for I am called by your name, O Lord, God of hosts.”

By what or by whose name are we called? Would anyone know to call us Christians? Would anyone know to call us Christians by our words? By our actions?

What is our “diet”? What words do we read? What words do we hear? What words do we sing? What words do we eat?

“We are what we eat.”

Jeremiah, who lived one of the loneliest and most tragic lives in all of Scripture, found joy in the word of God:

Your words were found, and I ate them,
and your words became to me a joy
and the delight of my heart;
for I am called by your name,
O Lord, God of hosts. (Jeremiah 15:16)

The older I get, the more convinced I am that people are desperate for a measure of joy in their lives, and they search desperately trying to find it. Tragically, we tend to look in all the wrong places. Often, our desperate but misguided search has devastating consequences on those around us. I believe that people are desperate for a measure of joy in their lives. Jeremiah knew where to find it.

Maybe the Apostle Paul had discovered what Jeremiah had also discovered some 600 years or so earlier. Paul had also found that joy. Paul and Jeremiah shared in being persecuted for their faith in God. Yet Paul could write: “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them” (Romans 12:14).

In this light, Paul could go on to declare: “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (vs. 21).

How different might the world look if we responded to evil with good? How might God work though good rather than through evil?

I’d like to return to the question I threw out at the beginning of my sermon: I wonder if Jesus’ words might sound and feel different if we were to hear them, not as admonition, but rather as invitation.

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?” (Matthew 16:24-26).

What if we heard these words as invitation rather than admonition?

I heard an interview on the radio yesterday with Jeffrey Kluger talking about his new book, The Narcissist Next Door: Understanding the Monster in Your Family, in Your Office, in Your Bed—in Your World. He asserts that narcissists are extremely sensitive to criticism because their self-esteem is brittle, contrary to the mask narcissists put on to conceal their extreme self-loathing. But it’s not only narcissists who are driven by self-interest. It’s human nature to be consumed by self.

What might it be like to be set free from obsession with self? Is freedom to be found in self-denial so that we might embrace something larger than ourselves?

One of the potted half-barrels in my garden is filled with Coreopsis “Summer Punch,” an annual with a beautiful, small, bright yellow and deep burgundy flower that resembles a miniature Denver Daisy. Last weekend it seemed all the plants had stopped blooming; all that was left were the many brown and dried up blooms. I decided to cut the plant way back, hoping it would come back yet this fall to bloom again. I remember it was dusk, almost dark, and we were getting ready to go out of town for several days, and I left the cuttings lying on the grass around the barrel. Yesterday afternoon, after I had returned, when I walked through the garden, I saw all these bright and beautiful flowers seemingly blooming in the grass. When I got closer, I discovered they were blooming on the remnants of the cuttings I had discarded earlier in the week.

I thought of Jesus’ words in our Gospel for today: “For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”

Let’s go back to our prophet, Jeremiah, who found his life, though to the outside world it seemed he had lost it. He had found the source of true joy in the midst of his persecution:

Your words were found, and I ate them,
and your words became to me a joy
and the delight of my heart;
for I am called by your name,
O Lord, God of hosts.

The Gospel writer John insists that Jesus himself is the Word made flesh. In the Lord’s Supper, we are invited to partake in eating and drinking of this Word: “This is my body given for you. This is my blood shed for you.”

When we partake in the Lord’s Supper, we become the Body of Christ, individually and collectively.

When we eat of the Word of God, which is Jesus himself, we become what we eat.

Your words were found, and I ate them,
and your words became to me a joy
and the delight of my heart;
for I am called by your name,
O Lord, God of hosts.

“For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes” (1 Corinthians 11:26).

Thanks be to God!

Sermon August 24: "Built on a Rock . . ."

THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Year A, Lectionary 21

August 24, 2014

Isaiah 51:1-6

Psalm 138

Romans 12:1-8

Matthew 16:13-20

Pastor David Tryggestad

Concordia Evangelical Lutheran Church

Duluth, Minnesota

“. . . on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18).

This rock is the faith of Peter, the faith of the disciples, the faith of the gathered congregation, the faith of the church through the ages!

“Built on a rock the church shall stand, even when steeples are falling . . .” (ELW 652).

Our prophet Isaiah shares the image of the rock:

Look to the rock from which you were hewn,
and to the quarry from which you were dug. (Isaiah 51:1b)

Isaiah is comforting a besieged and beleaguered people, a people who have suffered catastrophic calamity and exile. We can’t help but think of the destruction being suffered now, this day, in numerous places throughout the world. A headline in today’s Duluth News Tribune reads: “UN: 4 Countries Face Humanitarian Crises; Worst Since WWII.”

These situations are not unlike what Isaiah’s people had endured. Even as the rocks around them have crumbled into ruin, our prophet reminds them from whence they have come:

Look to the rock from which you were hewn,
and to the quarry from which you were dug.

They were hewn from Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel and Leah, Joseph and his brothers, Moses and Aaron and Miriam, Samuel and David, and the whole host of God’s people, nurtured by the covenant of God’s unfailing promise, which had been with them for centuries.

Our psalmist sings a song of thanksgiving in the midst of trouble and distress. Our psalmist invites us to join in the song: “Lord, I thank you for your faithfulness and love” (Psalm 138, paraphrase). Our psalmist knows the rock from which we were hewn and the quarry from which we were dug.

The Apostle Paul knew the rock from which he was hewn and the quarry from which he was dug. Paul himself experienced endless hardship: unending rejection, arrests, floggings, stoning, shipwreck, trials, left near death. Yet Paul admonishes us: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God — what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2).

Paul knew the rock from which he was hewn and the quarry from which he was dug. It was the rock of Jesus Christ; it was the quarry of Jesus Christ. Therefore, we do not conform ourselves to the world, but rather we conform ourselves to our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” They reply, “Some say John the Baptizer, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

Then Jesus asks the question that he asks of each of us: “Who do you say that I am?”

This is the question that has served as the guiding and driving principle of our year in the New Testament in our Confirmation curriculum: “Who do you say that I am?”

I believe it is the most important question any of us will ever answer, and we answer it every day of our lives. We answer it with our decisions. We answer it with our words. We answer it with our actions.

Either Jesus is Lord of our lives or he is not.

“Who do you say that I am?”

Peter speaks for all the disciples: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God!”

And on this declaration of faith, our Lord will build his church: “. . . on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.”

“Built on a rock the church shall stand, even when steeples are falling . . .”

This hymn is often considered second only to Martin Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.” The lyrics were written by Danish pastor Nicolai Grundtvig, and steeples were literally falling in Copenhagen in 1807 when the English bombarded the city. The title of the collection of Grundtvig’s hymns refers to the carillon that hung in the tower of the Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen, which was destroyed in that bombardment.

Grundtvig experienced steeples falling around him throughout his personal life. In his trial sermon as a pastor, he challenged the establish church, insisting that the word of God had departed from the house of God and that human pride and confidence in reason were preached in its place. He was censured by church officials. He suffered what was called a “nervous collapse” due to what appears to have been “manic depression,” or bipolar disorder. He was married three times. Through it all, it was the rock of the word of God, the Apostles’ Creed, and the Sacraments, that sustained him in his suffering. In his life he penned 1500 hymns, served in the Danish parliament, and founded folk schools, from which the Danish folk school movement was born. One of the churches he served was Our Saviour’s in Copenhagen, which spire we could see from our apartment while Lynn and I lived there for a year.

When steeples are falling around you, remember the rock from which you were hewn, the quarry from which you were dug.

Remember Jesus’ promise: “. . . on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.”

Thanks be to God!