Broken Missionaries

Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost, October 4^th, Year of Our + Lord 2014

Zion and St. John Lutheran Churches, Gwinner and Oakes, ND

Broken Missionaries - Matthew 21:33-46

  

Grace, mercy and peace to you, from God our Father, and Our Lord Jesus Christ.   

     It is a distinct pleasure for my wife Shelee and I to be with you here this morning, receiving God’s gifts in Word and Sacrament, and also telling you a little about our journey to Spain, where I have been called to serve as a Church Planter.  The day to day content of this first part of my missionary call is raising prayer and financial support, by going around, preaching and presenting to Lutherans in America, in order to find the people God will raise up to partner with the Lutherans in Spain.  So, as I stand before you this morning, I have to ask a question of your pastor. 

     Rev. Dr. Richard, “What kind of Mission texts are these?”  The LORD’s lovely vineyard yields wild grapes, so God is going to remove the protective hedge and allow the vineyard to be destroyed?  God seeks justice, but behold, bloodshed; God looks for righteousness, but behold, an outcry?  I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish?  And finally, from the mouth of our Lord, “the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.”?  Where’s the happiness, the Word of the Lord growing, rejoicing in the Lord always, the sweetness and light passages?  Where’s the bold commission text, the fearless servants bravely venturing to the end of the earth?  Come on, Pastor Matt, this is what you give me to work with?  

     I’m kidding.  The readings are not your pastor’s fault.  Indeed, they are not anyone’s fault.  Taking what the lectionary, the reading system of the Church year, gives us to read is good for us.  For pastors to pick their own readings is a dangerous thing, because we all have the parts of the Bible we like, and the parts we like to avoid.  But we need to hear the full council of God, not just our favorite passages, or our pastor’s favorites.  Using the assigned lectionary readings is a good thing. 

     And, despite the harshness they contain, today’s readings are excellent texts for understanding God’s Mission, and our role within His Mission.  Because there is a necessary harshness, a brokenness even, to being involved in the Mission of God.  

     What comes to mind when you hear the word Mission?  Maybe you think first of helping people?  Certainly Jesus helped people.  We are in the middle of a series of readings all set during Holy Week, the days leading up to His Cross.   Jesus does a number of things which heighten the anger of the religious elite, including riding into Jerusalem like a king, accepting the praises of children, and telling very pointed parables against the scribes and priests, as He does today.  But back at the beginning of chapter 21, you’ll also notice Jesus was healing the lame and blind.  Helping people in need has always gone hand in hand with God’s Mission. 

     In fact my new boss, Rev. Ted Krey, Area Director for Latin American and Spanish Missions, and also a missionary pastor in the Dominican Republic, wants every Church within his mission area to also have a Mercy House.  In the Dominican the Mercy House is a home for developmentally disabled youth.  In other places it might be a school for the poor, or an orphanage.  In Spain we are going to be looking for the opportunity to pursue life ministries, as my wife Shelee has years of experience serving women in crisis pregnancies.  This is how it should be.  Christ in his earthly ministry was always caring for the sick and hurting, so Christians share His concern for helping people in their earthly needs. 

     But helping people with their earthly hurts and needs is not the heart of mission.  Jesus healed many sick and lame and blind, but these healings did not save their souls.  So also, while Christian mission is  rightly accompanied by human, earthly care, and while serving our neighbors is an important way we earn opportunities to tell them about Jesus, God’s Mission finally requires something different.  In fact, true Christian Mission requires harshness.  Scandal even.  An offense.  God’s Mission is centered on a rock that either breaks you, or pulverizes you, a stone of stumbling and offense, of scandal.  Certainly harsh.    

     In fact, as strange as it seems, Jesus is doing mission work as he verbally attacks the elders and scribes and priests.  This is the harsh part of mission work, the preaching of the law, in this case the declaration of the truth that these religious leaders were in truth working against God’s mission.  Despite their outwardly religious  appearance, the Pharisees, Elders and Chief Priests of the Jews all rejected God’s way of salvation.  They were fine with a certain amount of helping the neighbor, and very happy to go about appearing pious and law-abiding, making a show of setting a good example.  And they thought they were very much a part of God’s mission in doing these things. 

But no, says Jesus, they are wicked tenants, who have abused God’s vineyard, abused their positions of authority in His Church, and rejected the central point of God’s Mission of Salvation – the offense of the Cross.  When prophets speaking God’s truth came to Israel, calling them away from their sin, again and again, the people of Israel, leaders and people, rejected the message and abused the messengers.  Being a prophet to God’s people was never an easy calling.  And as in all things, Jesus is the greatest prophet, God’s final Word to His people, and the world.  So the Jewish religious leaders reject Him most of all.     

     Jesus is the rejected stone of Psalm 118 which becomes the chief cornerstone.  Jesus is the stone of stumbling, the rock of offense, of scandal.  In Jesus God fully reveals the central mystery of His plan of salvation.  And this mystery is one we sinners quite naturally reject.  Yes, it’s not just the chief priests and elders.  We all like to sidestep, ignore or outright reject the scandal that is Jesus, because it is unpopular with the world, or maybe because of what it says about us.  The fact that saving sinners like you and me required the unjust execution of the sinless Son of God is crushing news to our spiritual egos.  But it is the truth, a truth without which we cannot be ready for the Gospel.    

     And so we see Jesus is the rock.  He will either break you, or He will pulverize you.  Jesus said, “the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him."  This is His warning to the chief priests, scribes, elders, to anyone who is proudly confident that by their own contributions and efforts and goodness they are earning their place in the kingdom of God.  If you persist in your self-righteous, stubborn resistance to the cornerstone, you will be crushed. 

     The alternative to being crushed doesn’t sound much better.  The alternative is to be broken, but then restored.  That is, everyone of us must be broken on the rock that is Christ, in order to be restored and brought into the kingdom.  For we are all sinners, naturally opposed to God and His Way.  To complete His Mission of Salvation, God must break us from our love of sin.  Consider Peter, broken by his threefold denial, as the rooster crowed, broken by his inability to follow Jesus to the Cross as he had sworn.  Or consider Paul, an enemy and persecutor of the Church, broken by the light, the blinding appearance of Christ to him on the road to Damascus, asking him Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?  Consider Martin Luther, torturing himself in a monk’s cell, trying to earn the favor of God, until the Word of God broke through, revealing that God gives righteousness as a free gift, received by faith, for Jesus’ sake.  

     As for all these famous Christians, so also for you, and for me.  We must be broken out of our complacency, or out of our pride and self-assurance.  We must be broken from our habit of loving earthly pleasures more than God and His Word.  We must be broken of our love of sin.  We all must be broken by the Law, both at conversion, and also throughout our earthly lives, broken so that with His Good News, with His Gospel of forgiveness and mercy, Jesus can restore you to wholeness, and present you to His Father, whole and blameless and beloved. 

     Jesus is the cornerstone of the Church, which is a building made of living stones, sinners who have been broken, but are now restored, made new, and joined to Jesus.  And as in all things, Jesus leads the way.  For He has already given Himself into brokenness, in our place.  Jesus is One man who had nothing to be broken for, the One with no sin for which to suffer.  But out of love for His Father, and love for us sinners, Jesus chose to be broken, even crushed, by all our sin, the sin which requires our death and punishment.  Jesus, the sinless one, the Son of the Master of the Vineyard, Jesus, Almighty God become a man, was crushed, becoming the sinner in your place, body broken and blood shed on His Cross, in order to restore you, with free and full forgiveness.  You are forgiven, all your sins are washed away, by the blood of Jesus.   

     This is the Mission of God, restoring broken humanity through the once broken but now resurrected body of the Son, Jesus Christ.  The Cornerstone is now set.  Jesus Christ, the head of His body the Church, now rules over heaven and earth. By His Spirit He now empowers His mission, which takes the Lord’s marvelous doing out into the world, proclaiming peace between God and sinners.  And, when God has brought us through the harsh things, then there is great joy.  Being caught up and involved in God’s Mission is wonderful, amazing, the best thing in the world.  It is also the one thing in this world that lasts forever, the gift of righteousness and eternal salvation delivered to a sinner, today, by the power of God’s Word. 

     This is the message that God has called Pastor Richard here to preach to you.  This is also the message that I have been called to preach in Spain, a land that very desperately needs to hear this truth.  For in Spain, the way of the Chief Priests and Scribes and Elders, the way of human pride and human accomplishment, the way of human works required to complete salvation, this false way is, sadly, the way the Christian faith has been presented for centuries. 

     Spaniards through their history have been taught a very works righteous misunderstanding of Christianity.  They are very much in need of the pure Gospel, and, since 2000, the Lutheran Church of Argentina, with LCMS support, has begun proclaiming it.  The Lutheran Mission in Spain is small, and spread out.  But Lutheran Mission is there, and the people are hungry for more Good News.  My particular task in Spain will be to come alongside the first Spanish Lutheran pastor, Juan Carlos Garcia, who serves a small congregation in Seville.  I am very much looking forward to working with him to reach out with the Gospel in Seville, and then see God grow His Church. 

     But first, my work is finding partners, Lutherans in America who want to partner with the Lutherans in Spain, and see the Gospel spread there.  God will raise up the partners He has in mind, prayer partners, and financial partners.   My wife and I are very thankful for the commitment you have already made to this work as a congregation.  As we rejoice in our shared restoration, I ask you to ask God how much more He might want you involved. 

     Are you feeling a desire to be more involved in God’s Mission?  Being involved is pretty straightforward. 

     Step 1, be fed, be filled.  As you are doing today, hear the Word, receive God’s Absolution, take, eat, and drink, for the forgiveness of all your sins.  Be filled with the Gospel, for this is how God prepares His people to be of service in His Gospel Mission.  When you are filled to overflowing with the Good News of God’s love in Christ, His Spirit then moves you to be a part of giving the gift to others.  Step 1, be filled, and keep on doing step 1.  The more you are filled with the Gospel, the more you will be ready to be involved in God’s Mission.   

     Step 2, attend to your own congregation’s mission first.  Zion/St. John Lutheran Church is God’s mission in this place, for God is always working through congregations, pastors and people together.  Step 2, attend to home first. 

     Step 3, look beyond.  Ask God how you can best be connected to efforts to proclaim His Law and Gospel to a world so much in need of God’s Truth and Love, revealed in Christ.  By your invitation for Shelee and I to join you today, and by the prayers and commitments you have already offered, you are already doing step 3.  I will go to Spain as your missionary, and that is an honor.  What more might God want to do through you for Spain? 

     As we move forward together in service within God’s Mission, first, last and always, rejoice in the righteousness of Christ that God has given you, rejoice that Christ has made you His own.  Marvel at the Stone the builders rejected, who has become your Cornerstone.  And the Peace of God, that passes all understanding, will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, Amen.  

Mercy, Not Sacrifice

St. Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist, September 21^st, Year of Our + Lord 2014

St. Peter and St. Paul Lutheran Churches, Belfield and Beach, Montana

Mercy, Not Sacrifice, Matthew 9:9-13

     Jesus said, "But go and learn what this means, 'I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,' for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners."   Jesus confronts the self-righteous prejudice of the Pharisees, who are offended when our Lord eats with tax collectors and other sinners.  In this confrontation, our Lord  quotes from the Prophet Hosea, where the Lord teaches that He desires mercy, not sacrifice, from His people.  Given that the sacrificial worship life of Israel, the Temple and all the appointed animal and grain sacrifices, were instituted by God, this passage from Hosea has always confused.  God orders us to make sacrifices, and yet says He doesn’t want our sacrifices?  God commands sacrifice, but He really just wants us to be merciful?  Well, which is it?  Is the life of the child of God to be filled with making sacrifices to please God, or not?  If we just need to be merciful people, why did the Lord appoint so many sacrifices, of bulls and goats and lambs and birds and grain?  They are a lot of work. 

     It might not even dawn on us that while simply being merciful sounds easier than making sacrifices, the reality is we don’t do mercy very well, either.  Regardless, through the ages, people have wondered about sacrifices, wondering what role exactly they play in God’s plan. 

     This question persists still today.  It is an honor and a pleasure to serve you this morning with God’s Word, and tell you a little about God’s reign in Spain, about my call to be a missionary to Spain, to go and join the work already started there, the work of telling the people of Spain about God’s mercy in Christ Jesus.  My prayer is that you will be moved by God to partner with the work in Spain, to be connected, to pray for the Lutheran mission in Spain, and to support it financially.  But first, we have this text, which we will do well to understand rightly, lest all our efforts, here or across the sea, be in vain. 

     Understanding this text rightly is very important in Spain, where Christ is named, but the Good News of His gift of free salvation is understood and trusted by few.  It is important in Spain, and in North Dakota too, since every one of us is driven by our own sinful nature to think that we can, and must earn God’s favor. 

     Happily for me in my efforts to find partners for my missionary call to Spain, there is a great movie that shows very well the dominant understanding of Christianity in Spain, and why the Lutheran mission there is so needed.  The movie is from 2010, and it is called “The Way.”  The setting is northern Spain, and it focuses on four travelers, who join the thousands each year who walk from the border with France, 500 miles across Spain, to Santiago de Compostela, following the ancient pilgrimage route that  has been walked by millions of Christians over the centuries, El Camino de Santiago, the Way of St. James.  This is a sacrificial journey to the church in Compostela, where it is claimed, the bones of St. James the Apostle are kept.  How the bones supposedly got there is a whopper of a story, too long to go into here.  But the central point is that people have been told over the centuries, by the Church, that if they make the arduous pilgrimage to Compostela and then worship before the supposed bones of St. James, they will receive mercy from God.  It is as if a translator got today’s text totally wrong, totally backwards.  Jesus said: I desire mercy, not sacrifice.  But it’s like someone instead taught God’s people that Jesus said, I desire sacrifice, and if you make enough sacrifices, I will have mercy and compassion on you. 

     The main character in the movie is an American named Tom, a lapsed Roman Catholic, who is walking the Camino carrying the ashes of his son.  Tom’s son had come to Spain to walk the Camino, but had died in an accident in the mountains his first day out.  Angry with God, and feeling guilty because of his bad relationship with his only son, Tom embarks on the journey, torn spiritually and emotionally, seeking escape on the Camino.  At the climactic moment, Tom approaches a cross that stands next to the Camino, near to the end of the pilgrimage.  This particular Cross, La Cruz de Ferro, is surrounded by a mountain of stones, placed there by travelers who have carried them from France.  Tom too, has a stone, given to him at the start of his journey, for what reason he didn’t really know.  Now, at La Cruz de Ferro, Tom suddenly desires to practice his religion again.  So, standing at the foot of the Cross, Tom tosses his stone on the pile, and recites the following prayer:  “Dear Lord, may this stone, a symbol of my efforts on the pilgrimage, that I lay at the feet of the Cross of the Savior, weigh the balance in favor of my good deeds that day, when the deeds of all my life are judged.  Let it be so, Amen.” 

     Could the irony be any thicker?  It would be laughable, if it weren’t so eternally tragic.  The Cross of Jesus is right there.  Tom even refers to our Lord as the Savior.  But in Tom’s mind Jesus is not a Savior who really saves, apparently.  Standing at the foot of this Cross, a symbol remembering the Roman Cross where the once for all sacrifice was made, Tom reveals His understanding of Christianity.  Christianity for Tom, and for many people in Spain, and all around the world, is all about doing what it takes to make amends with God for our sins.  The whole journey has been, Tom hopes, a sacrifice to atone for his sins, in order that at Judgment Day, the Lord might have compassion, mercy, on him.    

     But Jesus said, "go and learn what this means, 'I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,' for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners."  Tom, like the Pharisees before him, hopes to make himself righteous by doing sacrificial acts.  But Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector, a Jew who worked for the hated Romans, a traitor despised by all.  Jesus calls unrighteous Matthew not merely to be a follower, but to be one of the Twelve, one of the Apostles upon whom Jesus would build His Church.  All of this is part of Christ’s effort to help people understand that God does not desire our sacrifices, but rather the Lord delights in mercy, in compassion.  And, (spoiler alert), God does both, sacrifice and mercy, on His Cross, for us.   

     Now, I need to be clear.  God does not desire our sacrifices, but He did demand them.  The command to make sacrifices for sin in the Temple was not a cruel joke, not a mistake by God, who changes His mind in the New Testament.  The Temple sacrifices are very much part of God’s plan of salvation.  But the sacrifices God commanded His people to make, indeed, the sacrifices God continues to demand His people make, are not the main thing.   Our sacrifices have never saved anyone.  Rather, our sacrifices, from those of the Temple in Jerusalem three thousand years ago, to our sacrifices of praise today, are all intended to point us and others to the Main Thing, which is the once for all Sacrifice that Jesus made, of Himself, on His Cross, in order to have mercy on sinners. 

     The Old Testament sacrifices were commanded by God, as the heart of the worship life of His people Israel, to teach them that blood must be shed to atone for sin, because the wages of sin is death.  But these commands to sacrifice sheep and oxen and goats were given to a people God had already made His own.  First God made promises, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to Moses and all the children of Israel.  Only after He had rescued them out of slavery in Egypt, only after they were His people, only then the Lord gave them the sacrificial system, to point them to the coming Sacrifice of Jesus.  The Old Testament sacrifices were only good and right when they were made by people who believed God’s promises, people who trusted not in themselves and their works and sacrifices, but rather who trusted in the mercy of God.  The imperfect sacrifices of the Israelites served true faith, by pointing to the coming perfect sacrifice. 

     All of the Temple sacrifices God once commanded were fulfilled, swallowed up, superseded, and set aside forever, in the once for all sacrifice of the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.  The Cross ended the Temple sacrifices, and also fully revealed their purpose.  For the blood of bulls and goats could never atone for the sins of the world, but the blood of God’s Son could, and has.  The promise that the Lord would save us Himself served to cover the sins of the people of Israel, until that perfect day when Jesus washed them away, forever, with His blood.    

     Always remember, the name ‘Jesus’ means ‘the Lord saves.’  The Lord promised to save, and in the Cross of Jesus, the Lord has saved.  This is the proper meaning of the Cross, the meaning that Tom the pilgrim on the Way to Santiago completely missed.  This true meaning of the Cross, that there Jesus has saved us sinners, completely, this the message that the people of Spain so badly need to hear, the message that every sinner needs to hear. 

     But what about life now?  Do believers in Christ make sacrifices?  Absolutely, but never for sin, for faith knows that all our sins are taken away, by Jesus.  The  sacrifices Christians have to make are never for sin, but rather are sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving, and also sacrifices of love. Christians are called to give of themselves, to sacrifice time and effort and resources in service to the neighbor, and especially to give time and talent and treasure to support the proclamation of the Gospel.  But all of these sacrifices are pleasing to God only when they flow from, and are founded in, the mercy of God for sinners.  We can only make worthy sacrifices when we are trusting in the mercy poured out in the once for all sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross, mercy poured out for you, and me, and for the people of Spain, mercy for all people, all sinners, everywhere.  Mission starts, and lives from, the Cross of Jesus. 

    It is hard for us to keep this straight.  It’s easy to pick on Roman Catholics and their error in teaching that Christians must make ongoing sacrifices for sin.  This is especially easy in Spain, where a purely works righteous understanding of Christianity is very prevalent.  It’s easy to pick on Roman Catholics, but we must watch ourselves, lest when we think we stand, we fall.  Because we all do it.  We all think that when we sin, we better fix it, or God’s going to get us.  Sadly, it is part of our sinful nature to believe we must, and we can, do what it takes to atone for our sins.  But we can’t.  Our sinfulness trips us up before we even begin.  Our daily imperfections mean our sacrifices are not perfect, and so are not an acceptable atonement for sin.  We can’t make an acceptable sacrifice for sin.  So God in Christ has done it all, for us, so that we can be His own. 

     We struggle to keep this teaching straight, and God knew this would be a problem for us.  So He has never left us.  Where two or three gather in Jesus’ Name, wherever the teaching of the Apostles is proclaimed, there is Jesus Christ Himself, giving His Spirit, and delivering us to His Father.  And along with the Apostles, the Lord has given His Church gifts, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God.  By His Preached Word, and in Holy Baptism, and in the Supper, Jesus comes seeking not the righteous, but sinners, like you and me.  Jesus comes correcting our Pharisee ideas, reminding us that only one Sacrifice is good enough.  Jesus comes forgiving our sins, even again today, here, forgiving, and restoring, freely.  Because the Sacrifice that was needed because of our sin is complete, finished.  Jesus by His death and resurrection has made peace between God and sinners, and so God comes  to us in mercy, compassion, and love, again and again. 

     This is the Good News that I was called to preach in Sidney and Fairview for 10 years, the Good News that Pastor Hojnacki is called to preach to you here.  Now I have been called to preach in Spain, to preach to a people who have for centuries heard that Christianity is all about you making yourself righteous, a people who most definitely need to hear the clear, pure, life-giving Gospel. 

     Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today.  Now I ask you, “Will you partner with the Lutherans in Spain?  Will you serve your neighbors in Spain, Lutheran Spaniards who have taken a great leap to leave Roman Catholicism, and the other Spaniards God has in mind for this mission?  The Good News of forgiveness in Christ has brought you here today.  Will you partner in the work of getting the Good News to Spain, by financially supporting me, so that I can go and preach Good News to them?  Will you partner in prayer?  Will you partner in telling others about God’s new work in Spain?  Maybe you know someone with a connection or interest in Spain.  Can you tell two others about the work in Spain?  By praying, telling, and through financial support, you will be supporting the work already begun in Spain by our Argentine partners.  Most of all, you will be supporting the Spanish people.   

     I pray that you will be moved to partner with the Spanish people.  And I know that God will raise up the partners He has in mind.  For ultimately it is always God who raises the support needed for the spread of His Gospel.  It is in His hands.  Good thing, too.  All things are in His hands, and so, rest in God’s peace, the peace of knowing that the sacrifice for your sin is complete, the righteousness of Christ covers you, and Jesus rejoices to dine with you, today through Word and Sacrament, and one day face to face, with the Father and Holy Spirit, at the very throne of God in heaven, forever and ever, Amen.