Reverend Amy Zalk Larson – Good Shepherd Lutheran Church – Decorah, Iowa

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

When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing … That phrase has captured my imagination this week. Fiery John the Baptist is in prison! The one who showed that change is possible, that God is still active – he’s in prison? But he inspires such hope!

When John first cries out, “Repent, the kingdom of God has come near”, his call resonates throughout the land. People feel deep in their bones that yes, now is the time for change. Maybe now we’ll be freed from the Roman Empire, from Rome’s puppet king, Herod. Maybe now God will act. We will turn from despair and apathy and our narrow focus on ourselves. We will  hope in God once again.

All of Jerusalem goes out to be baptized. It’s a mass demonstration of repentance, hopefulness, and resistance. Then, John even calls Herod to repent! He speaks truth to power after Herod married his own brother’s wife. The town buzzes with anticipation. Things are really going to change now! But Herod doesn’t repent. He sends John to prison. The talk of the town changes abruptly. Herod captures the news cycle yet again. Hope is held captive by injustice, yet again.

Despair and defeat press in, yet again. 

What presses in upon you these days?

What constricts your life, your hope?

What limits your capacity to resist the forces of evil and injustice?

Herod controls John and dominates the news cycle. Yet still in prison, John hears what the Messiah is doing. Word gets to John. Or rather, THE Word, the Word of God, reaches John. There is a power at work that Herod cannot contain. The Word of God gets into very unlikely places. It reaches into this sanctuary, into our homes and our hearts. It speaks into prison cells and even into wombs.

Earlier in his life, when John is safely contained in his mother Elizabeth’s womb, the Word reaches him there. A pregnant Elizabeth is greeted by her cousin Mary, who is newly pregnant with Jesus, the Word of God. As Elizabeth hears the greeting, the child in her womb leaps for joy, leaps in recognition that the Word of God is alive and active.

Later, in prison, John finds himself in a very different enclosure. He won’t emerge from this one into life, as when he left the safe confines of his mother’s womb. Instead, this enclosure will lead to his death at a gruesome dinner party. Yet even when things look bleakest, especially when things look bleakest, the Word is alive, active. John hears what the Messiah is doing. What wedge of hope, freedom, possibility this news must have stirred in John? What chains fell away? What light gathered there in his cell?

Still, he has questions. Of course, he has questions. And he persists in asking them. Even in a deadly confinement, John persists in listening, looking, and preparing. Even in his enforced enclosure, John turns to Jesus to seek and inquire. Jesus responds, tell John what you hear and see. Tell him: The blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are made whole, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them. The Word of God is alive, active. I wonder if John leaps for joy, once again, when he hears this news.

Today the Word of God reaches out to us, to you to open up hope, freedom, possibility. The forces of this world may still hold sway. The powers of injustice and oppression may dominate the headlines and the dinner parties. Evil may persist in controlling and even destroying lives. Yet there is another power at work. The Word of God is on the loose. It cannot be contained. It may be easier to recognize the Word in times of joyful anticipation when we are expecting new life. When it feels like hope is being born, then we easily join John in leaping for joy – well, within our hearts at least.

Yet even when hope is held captive, especially when hope is held captive, the Word of God is alive and active. The Word disrupts the power of fear and despair, constriction, sin, apathy, even death. The Word opens our eyes, makes us whole, raises us from death again and again so that we may be good news for the world. The Word calls us to turn our attention beyond our own walls, beyond imposed limits. The Word calls us to listen, look, prepare, seek, inquire. When all that feels difficult, know that the Word is always reaching out to you so that you may hear and see past what presses in upon you, so that you may know hope no matter the circumstance, so that you may share hope.

The Word of God gets into very unlikely places. Today it meets you through YouTube. It meets you in bread and wine, song and promise, and the gathered community.

See and hear. Go and tell.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.

Reverend Amy Zalk Larson

Good Shepherd Lutheran Church   

 Decorah, Iowa

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

How are you?

How are you really?

How is your body? Your mind? Your spirit?

When you look at your life these days, what do you see?  What do you hear?

Are you experiencing life-giving, holy disruption?

Do you feel unsettled by unwelcome changes? 

Where do you sense hope?

Is your weariness cured by a good night’s rest; or is it deeper, more difficult to tend?

What do you need?

Advent is a season for truth telling. It’s a season that asks How are you? and refuses to let you leave with a hurried fine. 

Advent looks you in the eye, reaches out to touch your shoulder, pulls you in for a strong hug when your eyes begin to brim with tears. 

Advent sits with you in the silence as you struggle to express your deepest yearnings, your most peace-stealing fears.

And on those days when Christmas lights bring a gentle joy, when music makes your heart soar,  when a simple kindness stirs hope and warmth enough for the coldest days … then Advent rejoices with you. It invites you to see and to hear even more signs of God’s love for you, assures you that yes, this is God’s dream for the world, this is the way life is intended to be, this is the way life will be … peaceful, joyful, abounding in hope.

The wolf shall live with the lamb, Advent promises, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.

For us today it might be less surprising to see a wolf live with a lamb than to see partisans work together for the common good. It might be less surprising to see the leopard lie down with the 

kid than to see our hurting families get along. We need this shoot to come out from the stump of Jesse, abundant life to emerge once more from the very place where it was cut down. We need to see that death and destruction is never the end in the dream of God. In the realm of God in which we live, a stump is a thing of promise, a new beginning, the perfect place for God to work. Advent asks Where are the stumps in your life and in the life of the world? What has been cut down? Re- moved? Destroyed? Broken? Look closely, Advent whispers. Those are the places where God is at work. New life will emerge there. Watch. Wait. Trust. Believe. 

Jesus is coming, Advent proclaims. Jesus is coming. There’s a Carrie Newcomer song that comes to mind. She sings: 

From the muddy ground comes a green volunteer. 

In a place we thought barren new life appears. 

Morning will come whistling some comforting tune, for you. 

You can do this hard thing.

Advent, too, proclaims: Morning is coming, the dawn is near. Jesus is coming, morning is coming whistling a comforting tune for you.

That tune is the song of the angels: Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace. 

It’s the song of Mary: God has brought the powerful down from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly.

It’s the song of Zechariah: By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.  

It’s even the song of John, the biting song that ultimately brings comfort by way of conviction: Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.

By now I’m accustomed to John’s colorful song. What still surprises me is how people flocked to hear him. Maybe when we’re in the wilderness we can finally welcome the truth-tellers. We can see that we need to turn around. The call to repentance can be heard because we see that what we’re doing is not working, our lives need to change. In the wilderness of our lives, we need a call to repentance and the burning up of all the chaff to which we cling so stubbornly. We need Jesus.

Jesus is coming to clear the threshing floor that is this world. All the fear, injustice, violence, and disease that keep this world from abundant life will be burned. Jesus will bring a most holy disruption in the form of this fire. Jesus himself will tend to the fire, and he will not let the wheat be swallowed up by the flames; he will not let you be destroyed by his judgment. As the Gospel of John sings, Jesus comes not to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Morning is coming, whistling a comforting tune for you. A new day is dawning. This promise of new possibilities is not a commercial jingle touting salvation through spending. The promise of new possibilities is grounded in the Word of God made flesh, the Word of God embodied and alive within you and beside you. 

Jesus is coming and is already here in the assurance of forgiveness, in the peace we share, in the bread and wine that makes us full with love, and hope, and joy. Whatever you need is here.

Advent stands fast and sings for all the world to hear, sings for you to hear: 

New life is sprouting.

A new day is dawning.  

Your savior is coming, is here.

A new song of hope can arise within you.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.

Reverend Amy Zalk Larson – Good Shepherd Lutheran Church  – Decorah, Iowa

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

This reading would be jarring at any time, but it sounds especially dissonant as we prepare for cozy celebrations of Jesus’ birth. Instead of glad tidings of great joy, we’re startled by the noise of a thief in the night. Windows shatter. Footsteps sound on the stairs. It’s time to wake up, pay attention, take action.

This isn’t what we expect in the holiday season. Yet maybe it’s what we need for the good news of Jesus to get through to us. The good news is not just that baby Jesus was born long ago. The good news is that, in Jesus, God broke into our world in a most unexpected way. Jesus came not with power and might, but as a vulnerable baby who then lived as a peasant, ate with sinners, and died at the hands of the Empire. He lived and loved radically, disrupting the ways of this world. The world tried to stop him and put him to death. But God disrupted even the power of death, raising Jesus from the dead.

Christ Jesus is alive, breaking into every aspect of our world to make all things new. Christ is always working to disrupt the sin and brokenness and injustice that is within and all around us and bring in God’s reign of peace and well-being. Yet, Christ works in sneaky, undercover ways. And it is not always easy to perceive what God is doing. There is so much that gets in the way.

We can get overwhelmed by floods of despair and fear as we see this country, families and communities torn apart in these difficult days. We can get stuck in ruts and routines, nose to the grindstone, and miss Christ’s presence. We can get lulled to sleep by apathy and overindulgence, settling for coziness rather than life-giving change. It can be hard to see and respond to what God is doing. So Jesus comes to us, again and again, to say wake up, rouse yourself, pay attention. I am doing a new thing for you, for the world.

We especially get these calls in the season of Advent. Some Advent wake-up calls are quite harsh. They sound as unwelcome as a thief in the night. The Gospel reading from Matthew today is like that. It’s intended to sweep us out of our comfort zones. It’s meant to unsettle and even uproot  patterns, routines and relationships. Scriptures like this seek to break into our lethargy and in- difference, to startle us to attention. Christ is disrupting the world. Keep alert, be prepared.

Other scriptures in Advent function more like an alarm clock, meant to rouse us to action in the morning. The passage from Romans today is like that: ”You know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep … the night is far gone, the day is near. Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us live honorably as in the day.” Scriptures like these seek to get us up and going to help bring in Christ’s new day.

We need these kinds of wake-up calls. Yet if all we had were the sounds of a thief in the night or a shrill alarm clock, we could get overwhelmed. This could make us want to install a security system to be safe from God’s intrusions, make us want to hide our heads under our pillows and push snooze on the alarm clock for a bit longer. After all, our world is full of strident calls to action – of people sounding the alarm that it’s well past time to rouse ourselves to address climate change, racism, violence, injustice. Sometimes these get us going. Sometimes they lead to despair. 

So thankfully other scriptures in Advent wake us in a kinder way, more like the sun pouring into our window at daybreak and falling gently upon our faces. Scriptures like our Isaiah reading today shine into our hearts with the light of God’s new dawn to stir us to hope, to rouse us to joy.

We hear of a great and glorious time in which nations will no longer learn war, in which swords and spears will be beaten into farm tools. We’re awakened to the promise of this new day. We’re called to look forward to it and live in it’s light even when we can’t yet feel the warmth of it on our faces. 

This sunlight can feel so distant as bombs explode in Ukraine, as mass shooting deaths continue to mount. Yet it is there for us. And we desperately need the light of these promises. We need them to show us the path and guide our steps forward so that we can live differently in a violent world. We need to be assured that God is doing this and we are called to join. It isn’t all up to us. This is God’s work. As we walk in these ways, we are healed and we help creation to heal.

Advent’s disruptive scriptures may not be what we want in December, but they are what we need to experience the good news of Jesus. Advent wakes us up so that we can stand in wide-eyed wonder as hope is born at Christmas. It opens our eyes to see how God continues to come to us in un- expected, mysterious ways. It rouses us to attention, action and hope so that we can participate in God’s subversive work of making all things new.

Wake, awake says God to you today. See what God is doing for you, for our world.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.

Reverend Amy Zalk Larson – Good Shepherd Lutheran Church   – Decorah, Iowa

Click here to read scripture passages for the day

Children’s sermon

What is your favorite holiday?

What is another important day for you each year? 

What are some other fun days that get you excited? … birthday, first day of school, snow days, long weekends from school, family vacations …

What is your favorite season?

Today we have a special day in the church, Christ the King Sunday, and next Sunday we start a whole new church year with the season of Advent. These can seem like strange days and strange seasons, but they can help us to think about our days and about how God is part of all the happy and regular and hard days of our lives.

Let’s pray,

Thank you for all our days,

And for all the seasons.

Help us see you all the time.

Amen.

As the kids go back to their seats, I want to hear from the rest of you about the days of our lives.

How many of you struggle with Mondays? How many of you love Mondays now that you’re re- tired? What are other important days or seasons on the calendar the kids didn’t mention? I’m thinking of one that happens on April 15th… Veteran’s Day, Labor Day, Black History month …

As we think about important days in the culture and in the church calendar there is some overlap. Halloween comes from All Hallows Eve, a holy, hallowed eve. There’s Christmas and Easter. How many days ‘til Christmas and why do you know? When is Easter and how is the date figured out each year? Then there are some days that in the US are only marked by the church. What are some of the days?… Epiphany, Pentecost, Ascension, Ash Wednesday, Holy week: Maundy Thursday, Good Friday … Christ the King …

The Christian calendar is different, maybe a little odd in the eyes of the world. Today is Christ the King Sunday, the end of the church year. Next Sunday we begin a new church year with the season of Advent. Advent is odd because it puts the church out of step with the larger culture that’s al- ready singing about Rudolph and Mistletoe. Everywhere else the Christmas party is already in full swing. Yet, the Church waits in anticipation. In a culture that’s all about instant gratification, Ad- vent shapes us to be people of hope, people who long for comfort and joy, not just for ourselves but for the whole world. It is different and it is good. We’re people that live with the promise, “you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you different.”

Case in point:  It’s Christ the King Sunday, a day we celebrate that Jesus is Lord! Hurray! We recognize Christ’s triumph over the grave, his defeat of the powers of sin, death and evil. Today we celebrate VICTORY! Right? Yes, and … it may sound a little different than we expect. See what you notice as we hear the Gospel. (We rise for the Gospel Acclamation.) What? That doesn’t sound like a conquering king, hanging there on a cross with people making fun of him – that isn’t right!

I’m picturing the little boy in The Princess Bride movie as his grandpa is reading him a fairy tale.

Whenever something doesn’t seem to be working out, when it looks like evil is winning and true love won’t prevail, the boy stops his grandpa to say, “What, that can’t be right!” If this story was a movie, just as the cries of save yourself got loud enough the king would reach out to summon his magic hammer or leap down from the cross. His followers would fling off their robes revealing swords and more appropriate fighting attire and kick butt.

Christ is a very different kind of king. Rather than conquering and knocking skulls, Christ gives of himself and forgives. Christ promises a criminal, an outcast, and all of us: There is a place for you in God’s kingdom. Rather than escaping the suffering, Christ stays present to it, to us. Christ shares all of what it means to be human in solidarity with us. Even the worst of what we humans do can’t stop Christ from loving, forgiving, and helping us to experience paradise, even today, in the presence of God. Rather than lording his power over others, Christ uses his power to be with, and for, and ultimately within each of us by the power of the Holy Spirit. Christ changes hearts and changes the world from within.

This changes how we can move through the days and seasons of our lives. Today, and every day, Christ is with us so we can experience a sense of paradise, now, in the presence of God. We don’t have to wait until we die. Because of Christ’s presence with us, all of our days are opportunities to practice love, mercy and solidarity. In all times, we can use our power with and for others. We can experience and help others to experience God’s kingdom where well-being and justice, safety and righteousness flourish.

We have a different kind of calendar, a different kind of King, a different way of living in and through our days.

Thanks be to God.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.

For Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Decorah IA, 11-06-2022

          Good morning, friends! It’s my honor to share with you this morning just a few brief words, at the invitation of our Stewardship Committee. This is the time of our church stewardship appeal, the theme of which is “Fruit of the Spirit: Gathering and Sharing God’s Abundance” as you can see from the beautiful and informative handout which you received this morning. The request to me might seem a bit surprising, in that Dave and I are really relatively new members of the Good Shepherd Church family. But then perhaps that was exactly what was being asked… from our experience of being new to this place…What drew us here…. and what has caused us to stay: to linger, to put down our faith roots, along with yours.  And how do we hope to grow and share together in this place. 

          Last spring Dave and I took our first “real” road trip in many months, driving to Sedona AZ… a trip that had been abruptly canceled in March of 2020.  As we hiked high among those beautiful red rocks of this stunning place in God’s creation, it happened often that we would become unsure of our direction, perhaps take a wrong turn, or even lose the path altogether. We would pause, look around, try to get our bearings….  And then we would spot off ahead of us a “cairn,” ~ a small tower of rocks alongside the path built to serve as a marker, a waymark, a signpost, of the direction we should go.  These were assembled by human hands to help guide less experienced hikers who followed, in the right direction to proceed. I pondered then, as I hiked, of the human “cairns” throughout my life, who served as guides and direction pointers, the very significant people from my past ~ and I also thought very specifically you, of the good people of our church family.

          What drew us here, sharing this faith path with you? For what do we give thanks? Once, in a time of discernment for me, my brother had offered me this guidance: “You need to go where your faith is fed.”  And for us, in this time, that place is here … at Good Shepherd.

          So who are my “cairns,” direction pointers in faith?

      Pastor Amy’s true and faithful invitation to Communion each and every Sunday, as we gather around the Lord’s Table: “there is a place for you here, YOU are welcome here,” touches me deeply. And I think that it flows from our shared faith and worship, that we desire to share our lives and our gifts from God’s Abundance with one another here, and with our community and beyond. At Good Shepherd we are thankful for the vibrancy of worship, in spoken Word and music, and for opportunities for members, young and old, who share their gifts in instrumental music, jazz worship, bell ringers, cantors, hymns, choir, and band, worship leaders, which we anticipate each Sunday and which enhance our worship. 

          Welcomers.  I am grateful to those who offer to serve as greeters and welcomers and ushers at worship,~ and following worship to the hospitality providers, for the generosity with which they provide fellowship time following worship, allowing for opportunities for relaxed conversations, deepening our sense of welcome and belonging.  Last week it humbled me and gave me joy: witnessing two young children folding napkins, carefully arranging silverware, and pointing out “this is how we do it” … I am intimidated by the coffee machines, and Pastor Melissa’s courage to dive right in: “let’s just read the directions!” and observing two new friends at the more senior end of the age spectrum lingering long after coffee, connecting, and sharing fellowship. I recall Harland Nelson inviting us to one of our first fellowship times, when we might otherwise have anonymously slipped out a side door:  saying, “Come join us, it’s almost a complete brunch!  The only things missing are the eggs!”

          I am thankful for the inviters. There were, and continue to be, gentle and sincere invitations from you inviters to participate in the vibrant life of the congregation, in service to the church, to fellow members, to the community, and to the world at large.  In the words of my husband, a career coach, “at Good Shepherd, no one is relegated to the bench.”  We found ourselves invited and welcomed to join in efforts that met our interests and talents ~ choir, circle, Bible study, St. Grubby’s Day (Bob, I was so touched when you invited us to stop and pray before we took to cleaning the church with dust rags and soapy water!), lawn mowing, Mission Green, ushering, committee work, Vacation Bible School, MealTrain, painting, baking communion bread, Sunday School support.  My heart was touched by the young middle school boy who prayed for me, for my “rose” and my “thorn” as is their practice in faith formation class … and activities that stretched us:  krumkake making! (and I can testify that the committee can truly teach ANYONE to make krumkake! ~ though I have to acknowledge that my stamina was related in direct proportion to Al Andersen’s patient coaching and positive encouragement! “Some people Like theirs brown, Kris!” ☺ ) 

          There are those of you who have the gift of being visionaries ~ and those who see tangible needs in our neighbors and the world, and move out in practical ways to advocate and address these … Deep gratitude and respect to those of you working for social justice, peace, anti-racism efforts, environmental stewardship, and providing much needed food  and infant kits, school kits, and donations to advocacy organizations.

          Thank you to the teachers, 

           the gardeners, 

          the knitters and crocheters,

          the technology-savy, 

                   the encouragers,

                    the shepherds,

          Thank you to the pray-ers,

           the writers, 

          the poets, 

          the dramatists,

                   the composers

 who undergird all that is Good Shepherd…

          So You see, through the eyes of a newbie, to one just learning the “Good Shepherd way” to serve as the church, you each serve in your way as a faith “cairn,” … to someone…This is my opportunity to stand up and share this love letter to Good Shepherd, to say “thank you” to you for being the church where the Word is taught, where the welcome to the table is extended to all, where our faith is nurtured, and where we can partner together with you to serve, to bear fruit, and to grow in faithful stewardship of God’s Abundant gifts.               Thank You.