Sermons for the Month
THOSE RADICAL LUTHERANS!
DATE: October 28, 2001
“To all of you Saints here this morning, grace and peace to you from God our Father, from His Son, Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit. AMEN
October 31, All Hallow's E'en, has been celebrated for centuries by Lutheran Christians as the Festival of the Reformation. It marks that date in the year 1517, when on the day before the All Saints Day mass, Professor Martin Luther posted 95 propositions for debate on the doors of the Castle Church which happened to double as the Wittenberg University bulletin board. As the Protestant Reformation unfolded in years to come, Luther's followers came to see this as a pivotal moment worthy of marking a celebration of the whole Reforming movement in late medieval Christianity, much as in the United States we celebrate the events of July 4, 1776 as the representation of all our ideals as a nation. In recent decades, churches of the Protestant tradition in North America have come to celebrate the last Sunday in October as the festival of the Reformation, and so here we are today. My favorite Reformation Day story comes from Garrison Keillor, host of a "Prairie Home Companion" on Minnesota Public Radio. In one of his stories about life in his mythical hometown of Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, Keillor explained that the Lake Wobegon High School chorus would sing once a year at each of the two churches in town, at the May Festival of Our Lady of Perpetual Responsibility Roman Catholic Church; and on Reformation Sunday at Lake Wobegon Lutheran Church. Garrison Keillor himself has become a Lutheran as a adult, but both in real life and in his Lake Wobegon saga, his family belonged to a small independent house church, so his first year in high school chorus, he was confused by this Lutheran festival. In fact, he says, when he first read the concert schedule, he thought it was pronounced RE-FORMATION Sunday, and so he concluded that it is the day when the Lutherans receive their new Sunday worship seating assignments for the coming year! How many of US are sitting in exactly the same place as we were last week, or last month, or even last year? Keillor's story is a funny commentary on our tendency (and it's not confined to Lutherans) to settle into our favorite spots, into our comfort zones, where we can enjoy the same perspective to which we've become accustomed. How antithetical to the spirit of the Reformation! Reformation Day, or Reformation Sunday, is not the day we celebrate because once-way-back-when, "WE got religion right -- nyah, nyah!" Nope - it's the opportunity, at least once a year, to have our perspective jolted at least a little bit, and to remember that Lutherans are a revolutionary, radical people! We are the ones who continue to claim, as to did Martin Luther in the face of all opposition, that a person stands before God justified by faith in the grace of God, and quit apart from his or her good works, or lack thereof. Luther did not invent the idea; he was a teacher, and a great student of, the Holy Scriptures, and in the Gospels, in the letters of the apostles, in the Psalms, in the prophets, in the history of Israel, Luther discovered the promise (and in Jesus Christ the fulfillment) of God's New Covenant with His human creation, a covenant initiated and maintained by God Himself and established totally upon His unfailing mercy and love. Those of us who have been Lutherans for a long time are used to hearing this "justification by grace through faith" stuff that I think its revolutionary quality goes right on by us. What a shame! I could envision a new liturgical/worship practice, such as everytime the words "justification by grace through faith" would be spoken in worship, the whole congregation would jump up and change seats as a physical reminder of our revolutionary perspective (sort of a musical chairs without the music and without taking away anybody's chair.) Others of us, who are newer to this tradition, might be a bit uncertain as to the meaning of "justification by grace through faith," and are even less certain that we would use the words "revolutionary and radical" to describe Lutherans! "Justification by grace through faith" is a phrase that tries to describe the experience of the baptized and believing child of God, and the Bible gives us a variety of images. "Justification by grace" is like committing a crime, being duly convicted, exhausting the appeals process, expecting and deserving to go to jail - and instead receiving a full pardon. It's like being a slave, and one day being informed that a complete stranger has purchased your freedom, no strings attached, and you're free to walk away and begin a new life. It's like having accumulated a huge credit card debt, and one day, all the statements arrive with a "zero" balance (like some people were hoping would happen with Y2K!) When we set up the word processing program to "justify" it arranges the letters and spaces so that the margins come out even, the way we need the text and space to be arranged. God makes things "come out even," the way we need them to be, in spite of our slavery to sin, in spite of the wrongs we have done, the debts of life and of relationship that we've piled up, in spite of the disregard we've shown Him. God gives us the freedom for a new beginning, and another, and another, without anything carried over from the last month, or even from the previous line. "Justification - by grace - through FAITH," and "faith" is another words which tries to capture an experience. "Faith" is not just a "head" knowledge, an agreement with a set of intellectual propositions. "Faith" is not an eternally optimistic attitude, a constant cheerfulness, a "praise the Lord" with never a doubt. "Faith" is nothing more, nor less, than taking God at His Word, holding Him to His promise that no matter what kind of a mess we've made of ourselves and of our lives, and no matter what doubts, what pessimism in which we can wallow as a result; that no matter how far away we feel we have wandered from God, no matter how angry we are that HE seems to have walked out on us, even if at the moment we just don't even CARE what He might expect of us - taking Him at His Word, holding Him to His promise that in all of that, we are justified by His grace and righteous in His sight. That's pretty radical - but it's still not all. We Lutherans go on to say that even faith itself is a gift, something that God works in us. We're not Christians because we thought it over and decided that all things considered, it sounded like a good deal. We are believers and children of God because in the circumstances of our individual lives, through a variety of people and events, God's Holy Spirit got through to us and created faith in our hearts. It's as if, and this too is a Biblical image, God "fell in love" with you and me, and set out to win our love in return; and He keeps on trying and trying, even when in our words and actions we say, "leave me alone!" It's God's constant hope that His persistent love for us will create a fumbling and fleeting, and then a growing and ever-stronger response of love for Him in return. It's hard for us to understand a love so steadfast; so persevering; so willing to risk. It's hard for us to understand receiving something for nothing, becoming a part of something without having to DO anything, without our having to measure up to some minimum standard of behavior. How radical and revolutionary it is to say, to believe, and to demonstrate to one another that "whatever's going on with you, God loves you like you can't even imagine! Yet that's what is meant by "justification by grace through faith," which is the heart of our unique Lutheran witness. We are never abandoned to our own efforts; there is nothing we can do or that can happen to us that will diminish God's love for us; in the deepest darkest hole into which we can dig ourselves, God is working to pull us out, to hug us to Himself, and then to send us forward with a whole new perspective. When you come in next week, you might want to think about getting a new seating assignment, just to see what difference it might make. And during the week, keep an eye out for one another; because when God is in here, His Holy Spirit shaking us up, readjusting our attitude and realigning our perspective with His, then you know it's going to make a difference out there. Watch for your fellow revolutionaries, committing acts of random kindness - behaving with radical righteousness - displaying indiscriminate mercy - senseless grace - all of that springing from the joy of being infinitely loved, and continuously justified by an infinitely kind, merciful, and gracious God. How radical can you GET! How radical can you get?? AMEN