Second Sunday after Epiphany
January 20, 2019
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

Mary is troubled that the wine is gone and goes to her son about it. Jesus responds, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me.” I want to say, “I’m not sure I like your tone here young man.” I think something got lost in translation yet still it sounds snippy!

Yet, I do think Mary might be blowing things out of proportion. Worrying about wine at a wedding seems pretty trivial when there are so many major problems in the world, then and now. That may be what Jesus is thinking when he says it isn’t his hour to reveal his glory. Maybe he’s anticipating bigger things – soon he will heal a man who is paralyzed, feed 5000, raise Lazarus from the dead, and then rise from the dead himself. Those things are certainly more important than not enough wine at a wedding. Seems to me that Jesus could sit this one out.

Yet, Mary knows better. Mary knows that wine at a wedding is really important. Weddings are the one time the people in her community don’t have to work, don’t have to wonder if they’ll have enough for the next meal. Weddings are much needed respites from the toil and strain of life under Roman occupation. They are week-long celebrations of family, community, faith. Wine plays a central role – not because people are drunk all the time but because wine is the sign of a good harvest, of God’s abundance. Wine represents joy and gladness. It’s a way to show hospitality. So, if the wine runs out, it’s like the blessing of the whole event run out.

Mary knows how important it is for her community to have some joy and gladness amidst the struggles of their daily lives. I would guess she knows that deep in her bones. She knows what people who suffer deeply know – joy has a way of defying the power suffering, of letting you rise above what wants to keep you down. Joy is a form of resistance. Besides, it sounds like this is just day three of seven days with all her friends and relatives. If the wine is gone already, it’s going to be a really long week. Mary knows people are gonna need some levity, some laughter, some joy.

So, Mary just ignores Jesus’ objection and tells the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” She is bold to ask for joy, to expect joy.

Jesus responds. Ordinary water is turned into the best wine. Worry and scarcity do not prevail.  Abundance and blessing flow.

This story becomes really significant – the first of seven signs that Jesus performs to show his glory, according to the Gospel of John. It gets in the top seven with all those seemingly more IMPORTANT things like healing people, feeding 5000 and raising Lazarus from the dead.

And the way the story is told in John, there are echoes of the resurrection too. The story begins, “On the third day there was a wedding”. We’re supposed to hear the resonance there – on the third day God raised Jesus from the dead.

So, it turns out Mary is right (as mothers often are!). Wine at a wedding, joy in the face of suffering is not so small. It is no less important than addressing the MAJOR PROBLEMS in our world. Joy has a lot in common with resurrection.

Joy says to suffering, oppression, sorrow, and grief, you do not have the last word, you cannot keep us down, life and hope will prevail for us, for our world. Joy is a form of resistance.

Yet, often it can feel like the wine of gladness and joy has run out – the jar emptied, the blessing depleted.

Thankfully, it is not up to us to manufacture joy on our own, to make sure we always have a ready supply of what brings gladness.

We have a savior who uses ordinary things to give us the gift of joy – bread, wine, water, words and community. Jesus uses these gifts to assure us of God’s abundance, to shower us with God’s blessings, to nurture our joy always.

The joy Jesus gives is not dependent upon our circumstances, not dependent upon our ability to feel happy or glad. We see it arise in the hospital room, at the funeral, after the natural disaster, in the prison cell.

The joy Jesus gives isn’t an individual gift either; it is given to the whole community. This means that even when joy seems out of reach for us personally, others can hold out hope for joy on our behalf – the way Mary did for the hosts of the wedding.

We can do this for others, as well, when they are enduring depleting circumstances like depression, grief, oppression or violence. We can ask for joy for them and trust in the hope of joy for them.

I see all this happening through the Neighbors Helping Neighbors initiative in our community. This initiative supports neighbors impacted by an immigration related crisis. It works to raise funds and to address crucial needs. But it hasn’t just raised funds, it hasn’t just addressed the MAJOR PROBLEMS.

This initiative has nurtured joy. The immigrant neighbors served have worked with other neighbors to gift our community with a Fat Tuesday Feast last February, the Immigration Fiesta at Pulpit Rock Brewery, and the Epiphany Fiesta earlier this month. These events have raised funds, but they’ve also been occasions of gladness and celebration.

God has worked through these events and through the gifts of tamales, beer, soup, bread and community. God has used these ordinary gifts to remind us of God’s abundance, to assure us that there is joy and blessing enough for all. We need not jealously guard our resources, we need not be afraid.

I see this joy happening in the Decorah Community Meals, as well. Those meals nourish gladness and laughter. People in need are fed, but the meals aren’t just about addressing the MAJOR PROBLEMS. They build up the community so that together we can have joy, together we can resist the forces that lead to hunger and the poverty of both body and spirit.

Joy is so essential, and God gives us joy in abundance.

Today, God comes to you in ordinary things to give you joy. God comes in the water of baptism, the bread and wine of communion, the peace shared, the promises spoken. God comes in the laughter of children, the music freely given, the fresh snow, the sunshine, the food in fellowship hour.

God gives you and each of us these gifts so that together we can hope, together we can resist, together we can nurture joy for one another and for our world.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.

Baptism of Our Lord
First Sunday after Epiphany
January 13, 2019
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa

Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Both our first reading and our Gospel reading today talk about fire and water. Each of these things can be so very lovely and so very powerful.

Many of my happiest memories involve water. A few years ago, I got to spend my late October birthday canoeing the Upper Iowa River with my spouse Matt. It was a brilliant, crisp day – pure gift before dark November blew in. The sky was robin’s egg blue with not a cloud in sight. The water reflected the color of the sky and sparkled with the sun. I felt so content on the beautiful river we get to enjoy here in Decorah.

Yet, this summer someone drowned in our river. And, that river wreaked so much destruction and heartache in the floods of 2008 and 2016, to name just a few years of flooding.

Water nourishes and renews us, helps us relax, lets us play.
Water gives life. We all pass through the waters when we are born.
Water can also kill and destroy.

The same is true for fire. Some of the most meaningful conversations in my life have been held around a fire. When I was a camp counselor, I was amazed at what campers would share in that setting. Kids who never sang anywhere would join in during campfire worship. Yet I’ve rarely felt as frightened as when I had to help evacuate campers when a forest fire came too close to camp. The smoke, the smell, the black sky were all so terrifying.

Fire provides warmth and light, a feeling of coziness. It nurtures intimacy and community. It has fueled so much innovation. It too can kill, ravage, destroy as we saw so dramatically in the Camp Fire last November.

Water and fire are beautiful gifts with tremendous power. We should not take them lightly. John the Baptist tells us that Jesus will baptize us with water, fire and the Holy Spirit. I think this means that being baptized into Christ Jesus isn’t something that we should take lightly.

Baptism isn’t just a lovely entrance rite, not just a sweet ceremony with an infant, or a rite of passage for a youth.

Baptism is not just a ritual. It is a way that our active, powerful God works in our lives and our world.

The images of water and fire also help us to see what God does for us through the gift of baptism.

With baptism, God does for us what water does. We pass through the waters to be reborn and named beloved children of God. We are given new life, we’re renewed and nourished. Baptism also involves drowning and destruction. Our sinful selves are drowned; we die to sin and are raised to new life. We are marked with the sign of the cross, the sign of death and new life.

Through baptism, God also lights a fire within us – a fire of justice and mercy. We’re told to let our light shine, to let our life bring the warmth of love – the fire of fierce compassion. We are also drawn into intimacy and community with Christ and the whole body of Christ on earth. Through baptism, God also burns away the chaff within us. We don’t just get to sit around the campfire sing- ing “Kumbaya”. We are convicted of sin and called to repent. All that is unfruitful and empty within us is burned away. This fire renews us the way a wildfire renews a natural landscape, the way a prairie fire sparks new growth.

We see that baptism does these things through the witness of scripture and through the witness of people and communities of faith throughout the ages who have experienced the power of baptism.

I know it’s hard to believe that a ritual can do all these things, especially a ritual that many of us experienced as infants. But it isn’t the ritual that does all this. It is the power of God working through water and fire and the Word. God uses these physical things to get through to us and not just when we are first baptized. Baptism is a life-long gift. God uses these signs to get our attention, to wake us up, to draw us back to God – over and over again. God works through water, fire, the Spirit and the Word throughout our lives to assure us of what God has done and is doing for us.

This is why we keep the font central in our worship space and focus our attention there as we con- fess our sins and remember our baptisms.

It is why we light the paschal candle at baptisms and funerals – this candle that is first lit in the fire of the Easter Vigil. This candle reminds us that when we pass through the fires and flames of sin and even death, we will not be overwhelmed; God will bring us into new life.

If you haven’t been baptized, know that God is still at work in your life as well. God is always at work through the Holy Spirit. Yet, baptism is such a helpful gift for our lives of faith. It gives us physical assurance and physical reminders of God’s activity for us. It is so powerful to know, in our bones, that God has claimed us through water, fire and the word of promise, and that God will not let us go.

This week, I invite you to pay close attention to water. After you receive communion today, go to the font and use the water to make the sign of the cross on your forehead. During the rest of the week, when you shower or wash your face, remember the power of God to drown your sinful self and give you new life and your true identity – beloved child of God. Say to yourself – I am beloved,

I am forgiven, I am reborn.

I also invite you to pay attention to fire. Today, notice the fire burning on the paschal candle. Let yourself be drawn into the beauty, intimacy and the warmth of that fire. And, pay attention to what the fire needs to burn away within you.

During the rest of the week, notice what fire can do as you light gas burners on your stove or hear the combustion engine in a car fire up. Notice what fire can do and reflect that the tremendous power of fire doesn’t hold a candle to the power of Almighty God.

That amazing power is at work in you – let it burn, let it shine.  Let it empower you to live out the promises we make when we affirm our baptisms: 
To live among God’s faithful people,
To hear the word of God and share in the Lord’s Supper,
To proclaim the good news of God in Christ through word and deed,
To serve all people, following the example of Jesus, and
To strive for justice and peace in all the earth.

God is at work today and always through the word and the Spirit, through water and fire, to do powerful things for you. God is at work to do powerful things for this congregation.

Beloved, you are reborn – let your light shine.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.