Readings for Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany(A)

• Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18 
• Psalm 119:33-40 
• 1 Corinthians 3:10-11, 16-23 
• Matthew 5:38-48

Crazy Love, Pastor Fred (I am endebted to The Rev. Dr. Kim L Beckmann for some of the ideas and content of this sermon, as well as the Julio Diaz NPR StoryCorps story)

Julio Diaz is a social worker in New York City.  Like many here in Chicago, he has a long daily commute, and a favorite eatery.  Julio shared this story on NPR’s StoryCorps.

One [cold] spring night [a few years ago], Julio Diaz stepped off the train, as he always did, one stop early, so he could go to his favorite diner. But as the train pulled out from the nearly empty platform, and Diaz walked toward the stairs, a young man approached, and pulled out a knife.

“He wants my money,” Julio said.  “So I just took out my wallet, and offered him the whole thing.  ‘Here you go.’”  he told him.

Most of us, at this point, if we were able to walk away unharmed, would just sink to our knees in gratitude, that it ended that well.  But something told Julio Diaz to go an extra mile, to actually reach out to his mugger.  "Hey, wait a minute,” he said.  “You forgot something. If you're going to be robbing people for the rest of the night, you might as well take my coat to keep you warm."

The would-be robber, looked at his would-be victim, like he was crazy.  "Like what's going on here?  He asked me,” Diaz said, 'Why are you doing this?'"

And Diaz said: "If you're willing to risk your freedom for a few dollars, then I guess you must really need the money.  I mean, all I wanted to do was get dinner, and, if you really want to join me ... hey, you're more than welcome.”

Maybe it was the social worker in him.  Maybe Julio just felt he really needed some help.  And maybe, that’s all the robber did need, because he went.  He went into the diner Julio frequented for dinner every night.  And on this night, together, they sat in his booth.

"The manager comes by, the dishwashers come by, and the waiters come by, to say hello," Diaz said.  And "The kid was like, 'You know everybody here!  Do you own this place?'"

"No, I just eat here a lot," Julio says, he told the young man.  And, "He says, 'But you're even nice to the dishwasher.'"

Julio replied, "Well, haven't you been taught you should be nice to everybody?"

"Yea, but I didn't think people actually behaved that way," the young man said.

Julio asked him, what he wanted out of life.  With a sad face, the young man just looked down at the table. Unable or unwilling to answer.

They finished their meal together, and when the bill arrived, Julio told his robber, "Look, I guess you're going to have to pay for this, 'cause you have my money.  So, if you give me my wallet back, I'll gladly treat you."

The young man didn’t even think about it.  He returned the wallet.  When Julio got it back, he opened it, and gave his robber $20, figuring he needed the money.  But Julio then asked for something in return — the knife. And the mugger gave it to him.

Apparently this is just the kind of guy Julio is, and you can see why he might have gravitated to social work.  When he got home and told his mother what happened, she said, "You were always the type of kid, that if someone asked you for the time, you gave them your watch!"

And then Julio finished the StoryCorps piece by saying:  "I figure, you know, if you treat people right, you can only hope that they treat you right. It's as simple as it gets in this complicated world."

Simple, yes – and also really hard!  Loving your neighbor can be difficult enough.  But loving your enemy – that's crazy and hard! 

I wasn’t sure I should use this story today.  I don’t want to suggest that any of you try what Julio did.  But I like it, because, not only is it moving, but it illustrates the good-news of the Gospel, which can lift us up, past the many ways we would otherwise feel victimized.

In the situation of the gospel, those who heard the Sermon on the Mount were being squeezed, and told by the religious elite of Jerusalem, they were nothing but unwashed sinners.  But under Roman Occupation, any of these things could happen anytime.  For example, a soldier could compel you to carry supplies… for up to a whole mile.   It reminds me a lot of the arbitrariness of life under occupation in Palestine still today. The check point may be open or closed when you get there, to try to go to work, or bring your produce to market.  You may be detained, or not.  Your house can get demolished at pretty much anytime.  You can take it to court, but most would rather settle first.   Most of us don’t live exactly in this kind of disorientation and uncertainty, like a police state.  But in some cases, some of us may know what it's like, to be shown, in no uncertain terms, who the boss is, who has the power, and it keeps us off balance.

And, physical harm that can come out of nowhere, isn’t culture bound.  Domestic and sexual violence and abuse.  School bullying.  Mugging.  Someone can steal our bike right out from under you.  Or your wallet.  Or your wedding ring.  Or your I-Phone, taken right out of our hands on the train.  We’ve given up a lot of dignity and civil liberties in our fears of terrorism, and the new scanners make us feel exposed.  Cancer and heart disease seem like evil personas that rob us of our family members and friends.  Alzheimer’s can take away our loved ones, right in front of our eyes. 

In Jesus’ examples today he has someone going to court who’s been ordered to even surrender the shirt off his back to pay his credit card bill, and ends up down to his skivvies.  Homes are being foreclosed. Our pensions are being reneged on.  Services are cut to the most needy. Almost any of us can walk into work one day and receive a pink slip… stripped of work we love, stripped of livelihood, out pounding the pavements for years.  It seems like there is nothing we can do about it but put ourselves out there, brace ourselves for the rejection, and pray things turn around soon.   Many of us live today in circumstances where we feel both our physical livelihood and our human dignity is challenged, and our basic trust is at risk. 

Who wouldn’t just hunker down?  Who wouldn’t just swallow the shame?   I guess the other alternative would be to defy, retaliate if you can. Sink into bitterness. Make a way of life out of victimization.  Sue.

But Jesus seems to suggest another way.  The way of love that flavors the salt, and powers the light.  He talks about a certain way of generosity and living large above and beyond, in the midst of it all, that rises up and restores our dignity by not accepting the terms of the humiliation and belittling.  By letting it go, as a world that is passing away.  But I say to you – said Jesus – live in this new world…

Julio said:  "I figure, you should be nice to everybody – you know, if you treat people right, you can only hope that they treat you right.  It's as simple as it gets in this complicated world."

"Yea,” the young man had said, “but I didn't think people actually behaved that way."

I just keep thinking about how, in the face of fear and violence, Julio didn’t lose his humanity.  He didn’t lose his ability to consider the other, even when he himself was under attack.   He knew, in his core, who he was, and that the violence of this world cannot fundamentally destroy the light and life within him.  He didn't think of himself as a victim, because he knew he was not powerless, even under knife-point, to love.

It’s not the way of the world – this world, anyway.  But Jesus, who had enemies, who knows what it is like to be oppressed, teaches this way.  Jesus, who will know what it is like to be at the mercy of the man, and the muggers, and the crowd, and the crucifiers, who will be forced to carry his own cross, and will be spat on and humiliated, and yet reaches out to the thieves beside him, and prays for those who put him there… blazes the trail to a way of standing up for ourselves, to the life that is Life, and not losing ourselves, in the midst of all that would seek to cut us down and snuff us out.  

Wow.  It’s really hard.  It’s almost crazy.  But so is God’s love for us in Jesus!  You are the salt of the earth.  You are the light of the world. 

Lord, show me the way to love – to open up, and not close down – in a complicated world. 

Readings for Sixth Sunday after Epiphany
February 16, 2014

• Deuteronomy 30:15-20
• Psalm 119:1-8  
• 1 Corinthians 3:1-9  
• Matthew 5:21-37

Choose Life, Pastor Fred Kinsey
“Thou shall not…” 

That has a real ring to it, doesn’t it!  But I don’t want to talk about that – yet.  Not that I want to avoid discussing the way Jesus addresses the 10 Commandments –as we’ve just heard them read in the midst of our gathering-  but if I might, let me start in another place, first?!  Really, I’m not trying to weasel out of it!

So, you’ll just have to trust me – when I start with the 1st Reading from Deuteronomy, as far away as I can get, really – that I’m not trying to avoid the gospel! 

But this is good stuff too – in the first five books of the bible, the Pentateuch.  Moses has led the Israelites for 40 years, wandering in the desert, and now finally, they were on the verge of entering the Promised Land.  In this penultimate Farewell Speech, Moses gives a passionate plea: “See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. If you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I am commanding you today, …, then you shall live and become numerous, and the LORD your God will bless you …But if your heart turns away and you do not hear, but are led astray …, I declare to you today that you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.”

Life, or death?  Prosperity, or adversity?  Your choice!  But, says Moses – literally on the other side of the Jordan River, on the eastern bank, at the doorstep of the Promised Land, which he himself will not enter, his work now  almost complete, and realizing a new work must be acknowledged by the Israelites and re-covenanted with their God – I say to you, says Moses, “Choose life!”  “Choose life so that you and your descendants may live… so that you may live in the land that the LORD swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” 

But the most curious thing about this speech from Deuteronomy – the last of the Five Books of Moses, that started in the beginning with Genesis, and continued through Exodus, the Laws of Leviticus, and the number of sojourners in Numbers, then Deuteronomy, meaning “a second Law” – is that it was actually written 100’s of years later, when they were exiled in Babylon!  Really!  Not kidding!  Of course it was in development since the time of Moses, especially as an oral tradition.  Some parts of Deuteronomy were written down, even as the threat of destruction by Babylon was imminent, which took decades.  But these last chapters, from which we’ve read today, came together and were compiled in their final form, not until Israel had already been carted away, and so, had lost everything – their homes, their government, their land – and become captives again, slaves to King Nebuchadnezzar, in Babylon. 

And what they needed now, most desperately, was somehow to have hope for the future, in the midst of this Exile, this second wilderness wandering.  At their lowest ebb, the theological speech to save them, was this sermon from Moses, offering them a choice between life or death, to choose if they wanted to re-covenant with God, and live lives of justice and peace – or to turn their hearts away.

Where do we get our hope for the future, today?  In the midst of a never ending snow storm in our social system and lives – a never-ending state pension crisis, high unemployment, or, fully employed and still living under the poverty line, gangs disproportionately infecting people of color and our youth, health care still controlled by corporations instead of doctors, schools abandoned in already underserved neighborhoods, and a pervasive structural racism in our institutions, as we wander in the wilderness of a false American Dream which exists mainly on TV and not in real people’s lives, and that cleverly covers-over our sins, and continues to widen the gap between the haves and have-nots, the rich and poor – In the midst of this snow storm in our lives, where do we get our hope for the future? 

Jesus offers us a new interpretation of the Law (see, I told you I’d get to it!) – not to abolish it, but to fulfill it.  “You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder…’ but I say to you that if you are angry… if you insult a brother or sister… if you say, ‘You fool,’” you have already violated the Commandment not to murder.  Four times in these verses, Matthew quotes Jesus using this same formula, “you have heard that it was said… but I say to you…”  This second interpretation of the Law in Matthew, or third, even, if you count Deuteronomy, was written at the end of the first century, about 90AD, addressed to a whole new crowd, a much wider audience, some three generations after Jesus. 

For those followers of Jesus who were then forming the church, this new interpretation of the 10 Commandments was meant to permeate their lives, and social institutions, with the kingdom of heaven, that Jesus had already ushered in.  You have heard it said that you should not murder, but I say to you, you should not even harm the reputation of your neighbors.  In this, they were partners with synagogues, as well as, churches.  For Jesus knew the temptation of every people, and every time, to want beautiful temples and buildings of all kinds – state houses and schools, skyscrapers and bungalows, fire houses and alderman’s offices – without fulfilling the spirit of the Law, God gave us in the generosity of Covenant.  “Choose Life, for that means life to you and length of days, …”

Jesus took the “thou shalt not’s,” that we use as a bludgeon against each other, in the name of God, and transformed it into a new covenant that placed the responsibility for life in the midst of the people of faith, to live as lights for the world.  God does not delight to punish, and the violence we do to one another is not, of God.  When we sin, we need to be accountable.  And the only thing that can help us, before, and after, is the gift of the kingdom and realm of God, Jesus gave to us.  Murder, is not usually one of our biggest temptations.  But anger and insults we can all relate to.  Living the kingdom life, in the realm of God, refuses to live by the letter of the law, but strives in all things to live by the Spirit of the Law, and within the safe boundaries God gives us, so that all may have life and length of days. 

Jesus’ Deutero, or even, third giving of the Law, created an opening for a new Covenant between God and the Gentiles.  It was built on the original rock-solid Hebrew foundation, but sprang up anew, in the self-giving grace of the cross, so that it could not fail to bring new life – the choice, to choose life.  And so it continues to teach us to build on those foundations of justice and love. 

Recently, in my never ending quest to see every Oscar nominated film, for the Academy Awards, I saw the powerful, “12 Years a Slave.”  And after watching it, you can’t help but have questions about the foundation our country is built on.  Based on a book written by a free man sold into slavery, we feel the injustice with new clarity, a wound that still lives with us today.  Even our text books today, have a difficult time admitting the foundations of human trafficking that existed in the highest levels of American society.  I didn’t know till recently, for example, that of our 44 Presidents, 1 in 4, were slave owners, and that the first, George Washington, when deciding on plans to have the White House built, in order to save money on the project, let go the European craftsmen, and – we can’t really say “employed” – but used, slave labor.  And so, how can we get a grip on the structural racism that still exists today, if we can’t first be honest about the foundations of our institutions we hold in such high esteem. 

Jesus came not to abolish the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfill them.  He asked us to live every aspect of our lives, built on the foundation of justice and love, leaning in to the gift of life God offers us in the kingdom of heaven – right now.  In a word, Jesus says – from the cross, and journeying with us by the power of the Holy Spirit – “Choose life.”  

Readings for 2/9/14, Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany

• Isaiah 58:1-9a (9b-12) 
• Psalm 112:1-9 (10) 
• 1 Corinthians 2:1-12 (13-16) 
• Matthew 5:13-20

Making Headlines
The Chicago Tribune headline on Wednesday read, “Drivers Fume over Suburbs' Low-Salt Diet.”  And the roads were truly a mess!  No one predicted this winter, one of the coldest and snowiest on record.  And now everyone, is running out of road salt.  On Wednesday, commute times were astounding!  Not quite the standstill Atlanta had, where drivers just left their cars on the freeway and walked home.  But take the worst commute you can remember this past year, and double it!  On average, we’ve had a measureable snowfall every other day, this winter.  So, when plow-trucks were put on a low-salt diet last week, even on the major highways, drivers couldn’t see their lanes, and from the Eisenhower to the Kennedy, and from the Dan Ryan to the Jane Addams, traveling descended into chaos! 

 

It’s not that salt is scarce exactly, but local municipalities just haven’t budgeted for any more.  Salt has been seen as a low-cost answer in keeping winter roads clear for decades.  But now, in the first study of its kind, Minneapolis-St Paul found, the stuff doesn't just disappear when the snow and ice melts, but 70% stays within the region's watershed, washing away into lakes and streams and seeping into groundwater supplies.  Once it gets there, the contamination is difficult and expensive to remove, making for salty drinking wells, and dead-zones – which becomes not only a health issue, but a largely invisible environmental danger. 

 

So, because ‘extreme times call for extreme measures,’ help may be on the way!  Don’t laugh – but maybe it’s time to try the recipe used in Polk County Wisconsin, which, coincidentally, isn’t far from the Twin Cities.  The Highway Department there has been blending liquid cheese brine, a mere waste product in the dairy industry, into the county’s salt supply, for the last 5 or 6 years.

 

Emil Norby, the Polk County Highway Department’s Technical Support Manager explains: “For each ton of road salt, we inject anywhere from five to 12 gallons . . . of cheese brine, and that saves us approximately up to 30 percent of salt usage.”  Norby swears by the cheese brine, which he says activates the salt faster, and works better in colder temperatures.”  And, says Emil, the brine – used to store cheese in its curing and cooling process – is free!  It’s a win-win, as the dairy farms in the area are saving about $25,000 a year in disposal fees.  No report yet if the badgers, bear, and other critters have discovered their free lunch, on the Polk County roadways!

 

 

The headline for Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount today is, “You are the salt of the earth!”  Jesus had gone up the mountain – more like a hill to us, probably – to spread his salty message.  Using a little Jewish branding, Matthew’s description of the mountain, was a clear sign that this was a Moses kind of thing, like going up the mountain to get the 10 Commandments.  Salt and Light are also known as Hebrew symbols for God’s Covenant or Law.  In 2 Chronicles, God gave David and his descendants the kingship of Israel forever, with a covenant of salt.  Salt, of course, has always been a well-known preservative for food.  And salting the covenant, or promise, between God and God’s people, meant it would last, it would be preserved. 

 

On the mountain, Jesus started his Sermon, his teaching, with the Beatitudes.  He offered blessings, not just to the well-off – the 1% who because they were at the top, assumed they had divinely earned it.  But he blesses the poor in spirit, the meek, the merciful, those hungering and thirsting for righteousness, and the peacemakers.  Jesus is a new Moses, but he does not eclipse Moses.  He brings a new Law, to include a wider circle of the people of God, but it does not eclipse, but fulfills the Law and the Prophets, and the expectations of all those who are all eager to for the Messiah and Anointed One.  "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets” said Jesus; “I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.” 

 

How do we keep and fulfill the law of the Lord?  How do we keep our saltiness and spread it around, and continue to make it effective in today’s ‘low-salt diet’ world? 

 

The headline in the sleepy little village of Sochi, Russia on Friday, might have been, “A city built on a hill cannot be hid!”  Did you see the 3 hour Opening Ceremonies of the Winter Olympics which culminated in the dramatic lighting of the Olympic Cauldron?  Like the mountain slopes surrounding the city, where the competitions are taking place, the flame, from the Olympic Torch bearers, climbed up its own spectacular fiery slope that lit the huge Olympic Cauldron, and set off Olympic rings of fireworks around the town.  Sochi was lit up, for all the world to see! 

 

Yet it’s hard to see Jesus showing up for these festivities.  I suspect we could have found him in the nearby village, in solidarity with the meek and the poor in spirit, who had little or no water due to the massive construction project in Sochi, and the new road that ruined a pristine wilderness area as well as that little town of the humble working poor.  I imagine Jesus would have told them, you are the salt of the earth.  And, if we have eyes to see, we’d be able to recognize that, they are the light of the world, not the offering of fireworks lighting up the skies of Sochi. 

 

Jesus asks us: How can we be the salt of the earth, and the light of the world, in today’s steady diet of glamor and glitz?

 

Just as salt and light do not exist for their own benefit, but are gifts for the good of all of God’s creatures, so the local community of Jesus’ followers, does not exist for itself, but rather, comes together and comes alive, to incarnate and become, God's reign of forgiveness and justice. 

 

Jesus came to fulfill the law and the prophets, not the least of which we heard today, from Isaiah (58).  When the people of his time complained that God didn’t notice, and reward them, for their good works of fasting, Isaiah declared God’s answer: “Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day, and [you] oppress all your workers. … Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the LORD?”  Perhaps this has a familiar ring to us, as we argue over increasing the minimum wage, while 20% of our children, one in five, live below the poverty line!  But God was not finished: “Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, … to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?  Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, …Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly.”

 

Is this not what it means, for us, to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world, even today?  If we lose this vision, if we give in to other values, if we forget God's longing for justice, has our salt not lost its saltiness?

 

And so, in today’s world, we find we need to be creative when it comes to being the salt of the earth.  We live in a country that is sometimes merciful, but also sometimes complicit in oppression.  Sometimes we need to add cheese brine to our salt to find a new way to be lights for the world, and salt of the earth.  We must be creative as the called people of God, spreading our salt over every highway, further and further.  Standing in solidarity with the farmers in Texas whose land is being destroyed for the XL Pipeline, and with the people of Lawrence House, just blocks away, being evicted to make room for a heartless developer’s rehab.  A light on the hill may not turn out to be the most glittery firework in the sky to best announce the Good News about Jesus.  It may be, a more complicated CFL, Compact Florescent Light, warming up slowly, but lasting longer – burning cooler, yet getting more out of every watt. 

 

Jesus is our teacher on the mountain, standing in solidarity with the blessed poor and the hungry seekers.  And, of course, we don’t need to fast when Jesus, the Bridegroom, is with us.  Which is why at the banqueting table of Our Lord, we celebrate the "high" every week, dining together on the feast of justice and love – in this meal that transforms us, one person, one village, at a time – in this humble walk of faith with our God.  And then, from here, we are Sent out, where we become, the salt of the earth, and the light of the world.  And through us, God will be writing a new headline, for the salvation of the world. 

Readings for Presentation of Our Lord
February 2, 2014

• Malachi 3:1-4 
• Psalm 84 
• Hebrews 2:14-18 
• Luke 2:22-40

Light to All, Pastor Fred Kinsey
Simeon was promised by the Holy Spirit, before he died, that he would see God’s Messiah, the anointed one.  And so, when he saw Jesus walking into the Temple, well actually, Mary and Joseph carried him in, as he was just 40 days old, Simeon was overjoyed, and so, praising God, he said,

“Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace,
According to your word;
for my eyes have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples,
a light for revelation to the Gentiles
and for glory to your people Israel."

I don’t know, that Jesus really understood what all the fuss was about!  He was human after all.  The gospels don’t tell us that Jesus was somehow all-knowing… as an infant.  There are no Comic Books of Super Baby Jesus having some kind of adult super-consciousness at that age – he didn’t weigh-in, for example, on how tight his swaddling clothes were, or how pleased he was that Simeon was making such a big deal of him, in the Temple! 

And so in that sense, this story is no different from the baby stories, we tell each other.  It emphasizes what we know to still be true today, that new-born children are special – to their parents, and to their family and friends – and special to us all, in so far as they are little miracles of creation.

Simeon and Anna, we might argue, even in their advanced age, were Jesus’ best friends and family, on this day.  Simeon was guided by the Spirit.  And Anna was a prophet.  And they recognized these very gifts, in Jesus.  And so, in a way, they are his closest kin, speaking for this, not quite 6 week-old child, for Jesus, who can’t yet speak for himself.  Jesus, this little Jewish baby, in the Temple of the Lord, is proclaimed, a light for revelation to the Gentiles.

How could they see that?  Can we see that?  I suppose we can, if we know, even a part, of the rest of the story, or if someone, somewhere, along the way, has clued us in.  Or, maybe if we’ve asked questions about why this new-born child is destined for the falling and the rising of many – in his own time and place – and also for us today. 

Did someone tell you?  How do you know the story?  Have you ever had the opportunity to give that gift to someone else?  Perhaps with a child, or a teenager, or even an 84 year old, like Anna? 

So far in Luke’s gospel, the only ones to have recognized Jesus as Messiah, besides his parents, and now Simeon and Anna, are the Shepherds, keeping watch over their flocks in the region of Bethlehem, King David’s birthplace.  But the question Luke asks us, today, and will continue to ask us, is: Who else will see the salvation of Jesus, prepared for all peoples? 

And so Simeon was like Moses, the one who led the long wilderness journey, 40 years in the desert.  The one who longed to come home, who had waited all his life – Moses, who is so deserving of seeing Israel’s glory, finally is able to see the Promised Land, before he dies on Mt Nebo, the precipice overlooking the Jordan River – and later, the place of Jesus’ baptism.  Simeon, like Moses, is given his Mt Nebo experience:  “Master,” prays Simeon in the Temple, “now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word…” 

What a wonderful statement of faith! …that Simeon believed and trusted he had seen, and held, the anointed one of God, who was to be the light who would reach out to the whole world – welcoming everyone!  In that, he was so happy, so satisfied, so excited and relieved, his life was so fulfilled, that he was ready to die, right then and there, without regret. 

Like Mary and Joseph, who presented their child in the Temple, presented him to God, as if they were willing to give him back – so Simeon was ready to turn his life over to God, and rest in peace. 

In baptism, whether as infants, or as adults, we too turn our lives over to God.  At the font, we rejoice God has called us, and named us, as God’s own -- we are, the children of God.

And yet, in the midst of all this amazement, Jesus, held so proudly, was oblivious!  On the 40th day of his life, he was still a vulnerable ‘infant lowly.’  He was not yet able to speak for himself, and had some growing to do.  And so, Anna and Simeon spoke for him, and declared exactly what God had in mind for him. 

Luke concluded, “When Mary and Joseph had finished everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.”

And, the very next story, in this gospel of Luke, is about the 12 year old Jesus, the suddenly learned pre-teen, who sits with the rabbi’s and scholars in the Temple, discussing, with surprising wisdom, his own interpretation of God’s Word.  And somehow his parents never think to look there, before leaving Jerusalem for Nazareth.  ‘What did you think, mom and dad, of course I’d be in my father’s house!’ is how that one goes.  Jesus, we find, soon speaks for himself!

We, all of us, have great potential.  Parents and friends, even strangers, see things in their children, when they are but babes in arms.  On this day, the Presentation of Our Lord – Jesus didn’t know what was being said about him.  There’s a lot of teenage years missing from his story, perhaps things that weren’t worth printing!  And of course, that too, would be like us.  The story continues, if we read on, many years later, when Jesus reaches age 30, or so.  Then Jesus is baptized, and begins to fulfill everything that was said of him in the Temple, at his Presentation.  He is, a light for revelation to the Gentiles; the bringer of salvation.  And we are proof of that!  He was, and still is, the measure by which many rise and fall. 

Today, here at Unity, after the next hymn, we will welcome new members with the Affirmation of Baptism service.  These friends come to us from various places and church traditions, with unique, yet overlapping faith stories.  They have experienced the falling and rising that churches and congregations can put all of us through, helping or hurting.  And they probably never thought they would end up here, in this place. 

And yet, to the extent they are able to call this place home, a respite on a life’s journey, a safe and welcome place, even as we don’t know what tomorrow holds for them, or us, a promise has been fulfilled.  Unity Lutheran Church, 109 years old this year, has seen God’s salvation.  We didn’t know that God would send these new friends to us.  But here they are, and today, they are lights to us – reminding us, encouraging us, renewing us by faith – that we exist to be a light to all people.  "Master, now you are dismissing your servant/s in peace.”  Send us forth as your lights, rejoicing, and living in the world to which we are called, that we may burn  brightly, with your grace and love.