Reformation Sunday – Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost
October 28, 2018
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Pastor Marion Pruitt-Jefferson

First Reading:  Jeremiah 31:7-9; Psalm:  126; Second Reading: Hebrews  7:23-28; Gospel: Mark 10:46-52

Beloved of God,

Grace and peace to you from our Jesus, our Savior.

This is a story about a desperate human being whose only means of survival is to sit in the gutter, at the side of the road, and cry out for mercy. It is a story for our time. A story that is intimately connected with all stories of human suffering and despair.

And it’s a story about the power of God to transform human suffering – to bring people from hopelessness to unbounded joy; to lift people up from lives of desperation and futility and give them lives of purpose and meaning. And it is a story about the power of God to take away human blindness and open our eyes to the vision of God’s love and justice for all creation.

As I prayed with and studied the story of Bartimaeus this past week, I thought about the thou- sands of desperate women and children and men crying out for mercy as they make their way north through Mexico to our southern border. I thought about a story Marty Steele and I heard earlier this month about what it was like to hold a 14-month old baby in a detention center in Texas – a child taken from her parents and placed in a for-profit prison run by our government. I thought about the immense humanitarian crisis taking place in war-torn Yemen where parents are crying out for mercy for their children – children who are dying by the hundreds each day. Like you, I watched as hatred and violence once again played out on our national stage in the horrific shooting at Tree of Life Synagogue and in the rash of politically motivated bombings.

What are we to do when the cries of our suffering world come at us from all directions and we feel overwhelmed? Maybe, like Bartimaeus, we just start by crying out to God for mercy. I know it’s not Advent, yet, but I would also cry out, “Come Lord Jesus!” I would pray with the Prophet Isaiah, “Oh, that you would tear open the heavens and come down! Come and make right all that is so terribly wrong in our world.” And because I know that all the problems in the world are not just out there, but also in here, I would cry out for mercy for my hardness of heart … mercy for lack of faith … mercy for failure to live in love.

What did Jesus do when Jesus heard Bartimaeus’ cries for mercy? Well, obviously Jesus healed him. But before that … before that it says that Jesus stood still. That’s remarkable because in Mark’s gospel, Jesus is always on the move. One of Mark’s favorite words to describe Jesus is ‘immediately’ – immediately Jesus did this or that, or went here or went there. Mark uses that word something like 42 times in his gospel. So it’s noteworthy that when Jesus heard Bartimaeus, he stopped and stood still. Jesus stopped what he was doing, which was very important because he was on his way up to Jerusalem where he was going to give his life for the redemption of all creation. But Jesus stepped aside, stood still and listened to Bartimaeus’ cry for mercy.

Maybe, like Jesus, when we hear all of those cries for mercy, we too need to stop and be still. Most of us are really good at doing lots of things and keeping busy. And especially when there are urgent needs, we can kick it into high gear and take care of business. And to be sure, God is at work in all of that.

But there is a deep humility in recognizing that it’s not up to us to save the world. God has al- ready done that in the death and resurrection of Jesus; and God continues that saving work everywhere that suffering and death and evil are present. When the needs of the world over- whelm us, there is deep humility in letting go, in standing still and recognizing our own need for God.

Our worship is just that sort of stopping point – that point of stillness in our over-full weeks. Here in this sacred place the sure and certain promises of God meet the needs of our suffering world and of our own lives. Here in our gathering together, in our singing and in our praying, in our greetings of Peace, and in our sharing in bread and wine we experience God’s invitation to a deeper participation in love – love for God, love for one another, and love for our broken world.

Here we sing ancient words of hope – Those who sowed with tears, will reap with songs of joy!

Those who go out weeping, carrying the seed, will come again with joy, shouldering their sheaves. (And again, I think about the Honduran migrants marching through Mexico, carrying their precious seeds of hope for a better tomorrow.)

Here we listen to the stories of Jesus and we see again that in Jesus the blind see, the hungry are filled, the prisoners are set free, and the dead are raised to new life.

Here, in our open and empty hands, we receive Jesus, who comes to us humbly, hidden in bread and wine. And only then, when we are filled with Jesus’ endless life and unfailing love, are we sent back into the world set free to participate in all of God’s saving and loving work – set free to bring people from hopelessness into joy; to lift people up from lives of desperation to lives of purpose and meaning; to share with all people the vision of God’s love and compassion and justice for all creation.

Lord, Have Mercy.

Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost
October 21, 2018
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.

“We want you to do for us whatever we ask of you,” James and John tell Jesus. They sound like entitled kids from some bad, made for TV movie -“C’mon, just give us whatever we want. C’mon, puh-lease. C’mon, just say yes.”

The context makes it even worse. Jesus has just told his disciples that he will be mocked, spit upon, flog- ged and killed. You’d think they’d maybe show a little empathy – say something like, “Wow that’s tough, anything we can do to help? or even, tell us more.” No, James and John decide, “This is the perfect time to make our demands. Seize the moment when his defenses are down.”

So, they step forward, they get up in Jesus’ face and say, “We want you to do whatever we want” – bad form guys, really bad.

Jesus could have just given them an icy stare and shut them up. He could have turned and walked in the other direction. Instead, he engages them. He asks them the question he uses with people who come to him for healing, “What is it you want me to do for you?”

“What is it you want me to do for you?” Imagine if Jesus looked at you and asked you that question.

I would have a lot to say. I would have a pretty long list. I want to see my preferred candidates win on election day. I want congress to do very specific things. I tell my representatives these things regularly, but maybe God could get through? I’d like help with my arthritis and my sister’s health. I want my kids to be happy. I want to see the US pay more attention to the new UN climate change report. I could go on and on.

There is a lot that I’d really like God to do, and now. I’m guessing you’d have a long list too.

I like to think my requests are more noble than what James and John ask of Jesus: “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” That request is just too much – it’s so over the top and grandiose. And yet it is also too small, too petty. And maybe, honestly, so are my requests. I want my party to win and my needs to be met and my views to prevail and my preferred outcomes to happen. All this keeps me fairly narrowly focused on myself.

Jesus, on the other hand, let go of his own power and privilege in order to serve others. He gave himself in love for the whole world – even the people I don’t like. He is focused on changing us all through love.

Jesus calls us to follow in this way of love.

He wants us to know the greatness that comes when we stop focusing so much on our own agenda, no matter how noble, and instead focus on giving ourselves in love for others. I think this call of Jesus pertains even to our political lives, maybe especially to our political lives. We need to focus on loving others.

That is not to say that we should just try to be nice and say, “Can’t we all just get along.” Often love re- quires speaking hard truths and challenging others. We need to advocate and vote and be politically active with strength and conviction and courage. Yet Jesus calls us to do this with love for others, especially those we find it easy to despise. Jesus calls us to do this with a sense of humility.

It seems we need to keep a larger goal in mind. The ultimate goal is not the advancement of one party or the other, one particular policy or another – all of that is too narrow. Love is the ultimate goal. The goal is for all people to know they are loved and to live with love for one another. That must come before, above every other agenda, no matter how noble. That larger goal must inform all the ways we work in the political sphere.

To follow in this way of love and keep focused on this larger goal, we need to be transformed.

We need to know, deep in our bones, that we are loved always and forever. We need to drink the cup Jesus drinks – that is, undergo a kind of death. Our small, petty, ego-driven selves need to die. And we need to share in Jesus’ baptism – that is death and new life.

We need to be transformed. And this is what Jesus does for us. Jesus engages us as he did James and John.

Jesus shows up here today in word and sacrament to love and serve you and each one of us.

Jesus listens to all our requests, whether they be petty or noble, and receives them with compassion.

Jesus convicts us of our narrow vision and pushes us beyond ourselves into God’s larger purpose of love for all people.

Jesus also gives us the cup of his self-giving love and baptism in his name. Jesus works through both of these gifts to put to death our small selves and raise us up into new life again and again – a new life that is so much larger and more loving than anything we could achieve on our own.

Jesus gives himself in love for you today.
You are loved beyond measure.
May love be your guide.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.