Pentecost 5 – 28 June 2015 - Year B

Pent 5 – B – 28 June 2015

Grace to you and peace from our Lord and saviour Jesus Christ. Amen

The text for our meditation is written in the fifth chapter of the Gospel according to St Mark: Verses 39-42

They arrived at Jairus’ house, where Jesus saw the confusion and heard all the loud crying and wailing. He went in and said to them, "Why all this confusion? Why are you crying? The child is not dead - she is only sleeping!" They started making fun of him, so he put them all out, took the child's father and mother and his three disciples, and went into the room where the child was lying. He took her by the hand and said to her, ("Talitha, Cumi ") which means, "Little girl, I tell you to get up!" She got up at once and started walking around. (She was twelve years old.)

Let us pray: Father, guide the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts, that in your Word of truth we may always find the comfort and reassurance that your abundant love and grace will keep us in a living relationship with you into eternity. In Jesus name we pray. Amen

There is an old Eastern legend about a Hindu woman whose only child had died. Her grief and sorrow overwhelmed her and she could do nothing but mourn the loss of her only child. She went to a holy man to ask for her child back. The holy man told her to go and obtain a handful of rice from a house into which death had not come. If she could obtain just one handful of rice in this way, he promised that her child would be returned to her. She set off going from house to house, asking the question "Is all your family here around the table - father, mother, children - none missing?" But always the answer came back that there were empty chairs around each table where family members had once sat. As she continued on, her grief and sorrow softened as she found the cold finger of death had touched every family and that she was not the only one to grieve the loss of a loved one, death is universal.

I hardly need to say this with the daily heart rending news of growing tragedy and violence here in Australia – carnage on the roads, drug overdoses, fatal attacks young lives extinguished through wanton brutality. I hardly need to mention how those parents and brothers and sisters feel as they hear the news that the life of a young person from their family had suddenly come to an end. I think that most parents believe that they will leave this life before their children, and it comes as a shock when this doesn’t happen.

We have gathered at funerals on a number of occasions over the years to say farewell to friends family. A number of people commented that all they seem to be doing lately is attending funerals. We have been stung by sadness that death brings.

In the reading from Mark’s Gospel today, we hear of a 12 year old girl, just officially beginning her adult life, with all the hopes of a young woman - Being the wife of a loving husband, and a mother of her own children - suddenly stricken with some kind of incurable and fatal disease. Her father, Jairus, is faced with the loss of his beloved little daughter. What can he do to defend her against the sting of death? What can he do to prevent the ache in his heart, as well as that of his wife, that comes with the death of someone so loved?

You know, this Gospel account in Mark is one we can identify with in today’s society. You see Jairus is an important man in this area; He is in charge of the synagogue, the man with the final say, and to make it more interesting he is a significant member of the “Anti-Jesus movement’ – this has really got the attention of the media, and they are right in there getting a scoop on the main players.

Firstly, there are the little girl’s parents, Jairus and his wife, who would go to any length to see their little girl well again – and for Jairus that means putting aside all he stands for and eating humble pie.
There is a little girl whose life it appears, had been cut short.
There are the baffled disciples.
There is the inquisitive crowd in Jairus’ front yard. There is always a deep felt sorrow when someone young dies and the deepest feelings for the grieving family. Some of the largest gatherings are at the funerals of young people taken early in life. This occasion was no exception.                               

Then on the inside of the house are the professional mourners and flute players – they are working in earnest to earn their money. – If it were to happen today there would be choppers with cameras overhead, and the news headlines would be flashing on the TV screens “Jairus’ daughter dies” – I mean lets face it when your dead your dead. – All of a sudden ‘Breaking News’ – Jesus has turned up and has made a statement “This girl is not dead, she’s only sleeping!” – What an insensitive and laughable statement.

But wait, Jairus is not laughing – You see what they don’t know is that Jesus has already stirred the hope in his heart – they told Jairus earlier that His daughter was dead – but Jesus ignored them and reassured Jairus with the words as written in verse 36 “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”

Then Jesus, in amongst all this sadness, the aching hearts, the loud crying and wailing, the tear soaked hankies, speaks  firmly and strongly – "Talitha Cumi" – "Little girl, I tell you to get up!" – Immediately the girl stood up and walked around.

Is the reality of this Gospel account starting to fade for you? Maybe you have begged God to help the sick and dying person as Jairus begged Jesus, and there was no miraculous healing - Maybe you have felt the hopelessness and despair of loosing the one you so dearly loved, and wondered just where God was at the time. If this is the case, then friends I personally do not have any words of explanation, I can only relay to you the words of Paul as written in Romans 14: 8 – 9 “⁸If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.  ⁹For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.”

In Mark’s Gospel, Jesus relates to us His words in Verse 36 “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” – He brings to us the relief and inner peace that comes from knowing that death does not have the last say, that as far as Jesus is concerned our departed loved one is only asleep. All who believe and trust in Jesus will wake to a bight new morning in heaven, just as we wake to a new day every morning, only this time the new day will be something so good and perfect we will be hardly able to believe our eyes.

Just as Jesus took the little girl’s hand and said, "Talitha Cumi" and she opened her eyes and she stood up, so to will He say to us when we close our eyes in human death, "Old woman, young man, little child, newly born infant, all who have left life on this earth, "I tell you to get up – arise to your first day in my heavenly mansion."

For most people, death can be the most terrible thing that we have to face. It is an enemy. It isn’t part of God’s original plan that we have to face death. That came about because of sin and is the punishment God promised Adam and Eve and all who follow in their sinful footsteps. But Jesus came to put an end to punishment and death as we are surely reminded in John 3: 16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”  With His living Word Jesus continually assures us that we have forgiveness for our death-dealing-sinfulness and promised us a place in eternity. John 5: 24 “²⁴"I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life” – John 11: 25 “Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies”

These and many more are the words that encourage us as we say farewell to loved family members and friends; these are the words that helps us to face our own death; these are the words that uphold us when death intrudes into our lives, and threatens to wreck our happiness and fill our life with grief. We know that Jesus is waiting to take us by the hand and say to us, "I tell you to get up"

A family on holidays was driving along in their car, windows rolled down, enjoying the warm summer breeze of the sunny day, when a bee darts in the window and poses a great threat to a little girl who highly allergic to bee stings. If she is stung, she could die within an hour. "Daddy, daddy," she squeals in terror, "It’s a bee! It's going to sting me!"

The father quickly pulls the car over to a stop, and reaches out and traps the bee against the front windscreen and traps it in his hand. Holding it in his closed hand, the father waits for the inevitable sting. The bee stings the father's hand and in pain, the father lets go of the bee.

The bee is loose in the car again. The little girl again panics, "Daddy, it's going to sting me!" The father gently says, "No darling, it can’t sting you anymore. Look at my hand." The bee's stinger is there in his hand.

Paul talked about the sting of death being removed in 1 Corinthians 15:55. He rejoices in the fact that the power of death to destroy us has been broken. "Where, death, is your victory? Where, death, is your sting?"

Like the father in that story, Jesus says to us, "Look at my hands." There we see the mark of the nails - the sting of death and the sting of sin. On our behalf, Jesus took all the pain that death and Satan could inflict on him. He reduced death to a bee that has lost its stinger. That's the victory that Jesus won for us!

At some time every one of us will be confronted with the grief and pain that death brings into our life. It is normal to be upset, angry, sad and to feel empty inside. Even if we were able to have the most perfect faith and trust in God we would still feel the anguish that comes with death. We shouldn’t feel bad about it. But what we can feel good about is the joy that is also ours because we know that the sting of death has been removed and that Jesus will say to those we love and to us, "I tell you, get up".

This is a good story to finish with. A woman was diagnosed with a terminal illness and had been given three months to live. As she was getting her things in order, she contacted her priest and asked him to come to her house to discuss some of her final wishes. She told him which songs she wanted sung at her funeral service, what Scriptures she would like read, and what outfit she wanted to be buried in.

As the priest prepared to leave, the woman suddenly remembered something else. "There’s one more thing," she said excitedly.

"What’s that?" said the priest.

"This is important?" the woman said. "I want to be buried with a fork in my right hand."

The woman explained. "In all my years of attending church socials and potluck dinners, when the dishes of the main course were being cleared, someone would inevitably say, "Keep your fork." It was my favourite part of the meal because I knew something better was coming – like velvety chocolate cake or deep-dish apple pie.

"So when people see me in that casket with a fork in my hand and they ask, "What’s with the fork?" I want you to tell them I said: "Keep your fork. The best is yet to come.” Amen.

The grace and peace of our great Triune God that is beyond all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen

Merv James

Pentecost 4 – 21 June 2015 - Year B

Pentecost 4 – B – 21 June 2015

Grace to you and peace from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

The text for our meditation is written in the 4^th Chapter of the Gospel according to St Mark: Verse 38 – 41:

³⁸Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?" ³⁹He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. ⁴⁰He said to his disciples, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?" ⁴¹They were terrified and asked each other, "Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!"

Let us pray: Father, guide the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts, that through your Holy Spirit, your Word of truth may speak to our hearts and assure us to ‘be still and know that you are God’. In Jesus name we pray. Amen

It was Jesus’ idea to go to the other side of the Sea of Galilee that evening. The fishermen might have had another plan. They knew the shiftiness of the winds that blew across the mountains. They knew how quickly storms could kick up in the evening. They respected the sea, even feared it. Fishermen and sailors tend to be a superstitious lot when it comes to the sea. They know how quickly a boat can capsize and a man can drown. At the time of the text, the sea was symbolic of Death itself, the great Deep, Tehom, the swirling chaotic waters filled with great sea monsters, Leviathan and Behemoth and Rahab. They might have overruled Jesus. What does a carpenter know about sailing, anyway? But this was the Jesus who healed people with a touch and cast out demons with a word. So after seeing what they had, the Disciples decided to go with him and took Jesus into their little boat and set out on the Sea; But, as the air cooled, the winds soon picked up, howling over the hills and blowing like a mighty breath over the water. It was an echo of Genesis 1:3 all over again, when the Spirit of God blew over the swirling, chaotic waters of creation: Or the Exodus, when the breath of God parted the waters of the Red Sea. 

At that point though, the disciples weren’t thinking theologically or even scripturally. They were thinking, “We’re going to sink.” The waves were swamping over the sides; the disciples were being tossed around. Matthew, the Tax Collector, accustomed to the firm ground under his feet, was probably turning a sickly gray-green colour, leaning over the side, contemplating feeding the fish. Even the fishermen were panicked. “All hands on deck! Start bailing! We’re taking in water! Whose idea was it to go sailing, anyway?”
Their eyes turned to Jesus. There He was in the back of the boat, on the captain’s cushion, with His arm draped over the rudder, sound asleep. He couldn’t have been more at peace, but, the problem is He was asleep – Jesus! You have to wake up! Jesus may be a miracle worker, but he can’t save us if He’s asleep. “Rabbi, snap out of it. Don’t you care if we perish?” How can you sleep at a time like this? Wake up and grab a bucket before we go under!

You see, the ancients thought the gods slept. That’s when bad things happened, when the gods were asleep at the wheel or distracted in some way. The practice of many pagan religions involves attempting to rouse the gods up from their afternoon nap. Make a big noise, get their attention. It even creeps into Christianity. Even though scripture tells us “the prayer of a righteous man availeth much,” some figure that more prayers availeth even more. Get lots of people to pray. Never mind what they believe, or even whom they are praying to. Make a big religious noise, and maybe God will wake up to our need! 

The ocean event in our text is not without precedence in the Bible. In the book of Jonah, when Jonah’s ship was sinking, all the sailors on board got together and had an ecumenical prayer service. It says that everyone prayed to his own god. They threw the valuables overboard to lighten the load, and probably to bribe the sea gods as well. But Jonah was below deck, in the inner part of the boat, sound asleep. And the captain of the ship came down and woke Jonah up. “How can you sleep? Get up and call upon your god! Maybe he’ll listen to you and save us.”

There was raging panic on this boat as well. But in this case God’s chosen messenger was in no doubt as to the cause and the solution. When the sailors try to figure out who’s responsible for this mess Jonah has no hesitation in confessing, “I am a Hebrew, and I worship the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the land.” That kind of exclusive talk put the sailors on edge maybe they were appealing to the wrong gods.  …..“So what are we supposed to do?” they ask. Jonah doesn’t tell them to all join hands and sing Amazing Grace. “It’s because of me,” Jonah says. Throw me overboard and the sea will be calm.” The sailors were a bit reluctant to throw a paying customer overboard, so they tried to row their way through the storm but they couldn’t. Finally, exhausted and at wits end, the sailors pray not to their own gods but to the Lord - “We beseech thee, O Lord, let us not perish for this man’s life, and lay not on us innocent blood; for You, O Lord, have done as you pleased.” They tossed Jonah overboard and immediately the sea became calm. And it says, “Then the men greatly feared the Lord, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.”
The rest, as they say, is history. Jonah gets swallowed by a divinely appointed big fish who deposits him up on the beach three days later, and God sends him off to preach to the pagans who all come to accept the great and true Lord.

The certain faith and plight of Jonah was known to the Disciples as it is known to us. Jesus peace or Jonah’s plight goes unnoticed by the Disciples as the wind whips and waves crash over the sides of the boat - they are in a panic. They wake Him up, and Jesus shouts at the wind and the sea the way someone might scold a barking dog. “Be quiet! Be still!” The same words He uses with the demons. “Be still.”  - The wind and the waves know their Master’s voice and are obedient. They have no choice. Jesus is the Word that called them into being; the same word of authority spoken by God to overcome chaos at creation. The same Word God spoke to calm the sea in which Jonah sailed.

That’s the power of Jesus’ Word. It’s a creative and redemptive Word: A Word that creates; a Word that saves; a Word that heals and casts out demons, and calms the storm.
Jesus looks at His disciples - dripping wet, fearful, seasick, panicked. “Why are you afraid? Don’t you yet have faith?” He asks. “Don’t you trust me? Do I have to keep proving myself to you? Don’t you trust that I am who I say I am?”

Mark says the disciples were “filled with fear,” no longer over the storm. Now over Jesus. “Who is this man, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” – Are these Disciples slow or what? As Mark records from Chapter 1, they have witnessed Jesus miracles and authority over demons; he taught them clearly the mysteries behind the parables: He has revealed the Kingdom of God to them. Now they are unsure about this man Jesus and fearful and awe struck.

Who is this man? He’s the Lord of creation, the Maker of sea and dry land, the creative Word. That’s who He is. He’s more powerful than wind and waves; more powerful than cancers and clogged arteries and terrorists and demons. He has dominion over governments and corporations; and all the Disciples saw and all we see emanating from this all powerful God/Man is pure unadulterated love and grace; how could we doubt or be afraid? ……. And yet we are afraid, aren’t we? I am. When my boat is about to capsize. When the doctors say, “I’m sorry but there’s no more we can do for you.” When the economic winds begin to howl and all our safety and security goes overboard, we buckle and start to sound like the faithless disciples. Thank God for these grace filled Gospel accounts; through them we come to know the disciples as men of “little faith.” That changes our perspective on ourselves as “little faith Christians.” We have so much in common with the Disciples: We panic as well, and want to wake Jesus up, forgetting that He neither slumbers nor sleeps.

We forget when Jesus was at His best; when His grace and love prevailed most.  This God/Man Jesus reconciled the whole world to God in the sleep of His death on a Friday afternoon. There’s the power of God to save. When Jesus appears most powerless, most out of it, most unable to do anything constructive. When He’s hanging dead and naked on a wooden cross and all the people are standing around mocking Him and spitting on Him and insulting Him, that’s when He is most powerful to save.

His death is our victory over death. It’s the death of the Lord of all, the Word who subdues wind and waves, who takes up our sin and lets Himself be subdued by Death. Like Jonah thrown into the Deep, Jesus dives headlong into our death so that when we sink, and we all inevitably will sink into the sea of death, we are not alone. Christ is there to catch us. Jesus is with us, so that awake or asleep, we belong to Him. We are safe in His death. Those fearful disciples in the boat; you, me, the terrorised world; we are all safe in the death of Jesus who made peace with the world by dying on a cross.

The question for us here this morning is this: Will we trust a sleeping Saviour? Or are we going to try to rouse Him, impress him with our self righteous actions? Will we trust that the death of Jesus has already reconciled this sinking ship of a world to God and live like reconciled people? Will we trust that sinless Jesus became our sin in His death so that in Him, raised from the dead, we are the righteousness of God? Or will we continue to try to shoulder the burden of our sin, atone for our sin, justify ourselves before God’s bar of justice? Will the love of Christ constrain us to say “Christ died for all and therefore all died,” even when the religious monopolies of the world object and say, “It can’t be that easy.”

Will we dare to proclaim an all-encompassing Saviour in Jesus Christ who atones for the sin of the whole world in the face of religious exclusivist that says “only if you join me will you be saved?” Will we who live in a culture that believes there are many paths and many saviours, put our trust in the God of the living Word and along with the author of Hebrews “hold fast the confessions of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful”?

Friends, there is no doubt that in this life we are in a small boat on rough threatening seas; we live in constant peril, as Romans 8: 36 tells us “³⁶As it is written: "For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered." – This is borne out by our trials, tribulations, our illness; just the sheer uncertainty that for whatever reason our human hearts may not be beating by this time tomorrow. We do our exercise, we take our vitamins, we are aware of obesity, we are safety conscious, and this is great, but in all honesty, there is not one human who can guarantee, that in spite of all that, our human hearts are still going to be beating this time tomorrow. What can we do? – try and save ourselves like Jonah’s shipmates? – Use up all our human effort in an attempt to bail out our boat? Or shall we panic, and blame God for our situation, saying that he is asleep and does not care?  - These were the actions of the Disciples in our text, and Jesus response is recorded in Psalm 107: 19 – 20:  “¹⁹ Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress. ²⁰ He sent forth his word and healed them; he rescued them from the grave.”

Our Triune God is not sleeping, he hears our cries and petitions for help and as in Psalm 107, ‘He sends forth his word and rescues us from the grave’. He sends forth His Word of great comfort and hope in the Holy Scriptures; He sends forth His Word in the sacrament of Holy Baptism; He sends forth His Word in the body and blood of Christ in the sacrament Holy Communion. In Romans 8, Paul does tell of our vulnerability, but he also goes on to tell us the good news of life: ³⁷No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. ³⁸For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, ³⁹neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Yes we are in the bobbing little boat of life, but if we remain in the grace of God’s Word, we can be assured that we will always be in the same boat as our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and with Him at the helm we can be assured of a calm into eternity that is beyond all human understanding.

There is a sailor’s hymn verse that says it all:

Jesus, Saviour, pilot me
When asleep You seem to be.
When death’s waves crash o’er my head
Let me trust the Word you’ve said:
“In my death you safe will be,
By my cross, I’ll pilot thee.”  Amen.

The love and peace of our great Triune God that is beyond all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen

Merv James

Pentecost 3 – 14 Jun 2015 - Year B

Pentecost 3 – Year B – 14 Jun 2015

Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

Our text for this meditation is written in the 4^th Chapter of the Gospel according to Mark: Verses 26-34 and (Ezekiel 17:22-24; 2 and Corinthians 5:1-10)

You know, if it were up to me, all who visit our church would come back every week and become members. If it were up to me, all the people who join our church would never move away and leave us. If it were up to me, our church would have outgrown the building years ago and be in a bigger one.

But maybe that’s asking too much. Perhaps my goals are too ambitious. So let’s make them a little smaller.

If it were up to me, all of us would have a faith so strong it could never be shaken. If it were up to me, all the folks who have fallen away from our church would come back, and all who are experiencing trials and troubles would be made whole and healthy once again. If it were up to me, I would always have the answers to your questions, and always know just the right thing to say when you come to me for comfort or counsel. If it were up to me, you and our church wouldn’t have any problems – no doubts, no fears, no crises, no difficulties, no knock-the-wind-out-of- you surprises. Only joy and peace and all things pleasant and nice. If it were up to me.

If it were up to me, wouldn’t our church be great?

Well actually, no! Because even though I may think such a church would be great, and you may think such a church would be great, and the world may think such a church would be great – the truth is, we don’t know what makes a church great. The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how. Or in other words, it’s not up to me . . . or you. It is God’s Church, and only He can grow it. Only He knows how.

And the good news we heard today is that He is. Through the seed of His Word He is working in the world, He is working in the Church, He is working in your friends and family, and He is working in you. Even if you can’t see it, if the growth is all underground. Even if you don’t know how. Even if it seems as if the very opposite of growth is happening. It is God’s kingdom, God’s Church, and He is growing it.

Which means that God knows when we need peace, and He also knows when we need struggle in order to grow. He grants growth and He prunes. He knows when to make the sun shine, when to make the rain fall, and yes, even when to apply the manure! He makes the seed of His Word grow in His time, not our time. We may want it to grow sooner, and faster, and stronger, and bigger. But we cannot do it. We know not how. But He whose seed it is, knows. And He can grant growth. And His promise to you today is that He will. For as the Lord said through the prophet Ezekiel: “I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it.”

And do we need that promise! For as Christians, and as the Church, how easy it is to lose our confidence in the Lord and in His Word. How easy to think that we know better, that we can do it, or worse, think that we have to do it. Through programs and methods and social sciences. Or, since our District Convention starts this week, by just getting the right people elected or the right resolutions passed. Those things aren’t necessarily bad, but to rely on them . . . that’s when doubt and worry and fear take over; that’s when we become burdened and weary. And not only in the church, but in our lives as Christians. Because we’ve forgotten or lost confidence in His promise: “I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it.”

But did you notice how good that sounded? God is growing His church. And that’s not just now, but think back through the history of God’s people, all the way back to the beginning. We keep messing it up, but did God not do it? Did He not keep and preserve and grow His kingdom? From Adam and Eve, to Abraham, Jacob, and Joseph: did God not do it? From Israel in slavery in Egypt, to the time of the Judges: did God not do it? From David to Solomon to the people of God hauled off as prisoners of war: did God not do it? From a small band of 12 apostles, through persecutions and martyrs, to a little monk in Wittenberg: did God not do it? From communist countries that tried to stamp out the church but couldn’t, to Muslim countries that now try to behead the church, but can’t: is God not doing it? And still today: is God not doing it? For what credit can you take for being here, at this time, in this place? What credit can we take for this church? Did I give my children faith? Did God not do it? Is He not working? And will He not continue?

Now to say that is not an excuse for inaction or laziness on our part. To think that if

God’s doing it, then we can just sit back and not do anything at all. No! Rather, it is an invitation to live our lives and our vocations in faith. To keep reaching out and doing all we can for each other, but to do what we do in faith. To not get discouraged if we don’t see the results, but to scatter the seed of God’s Word, and know that He will grant the growth. It’s His Church, and He’ll grow it.

I guess you could say that the reason we don’t always believe that is that sin has made us spiritually colour blind. When we look around, we don’t always see a kingdom of God that looks lush and green, but sometimes looks downright brown and dead. In us, in others, and in the Church. When we’re going through struggles, when we see what’s happening to others, when we see all the nonsense going on in the Church around the world today! . . . But you know, that’s how it is with God; that’s what we’re going to see sometimes and the way it’s going to seem sometimes, because growth for God starts with death. He kills in order to make alive. That’s what we heard from the prophet Ezekiel in conjunction with God’s promise: “I bring low the high tree, and make high the low tree, dry up the green tree, and make the dry tree flourish.” And the foremost example of that is the cross, where the Son of God was put to death and then planted in the ground. I dare say that things never looked so dry and dead to the Apostles and for the Kingdom of God than that Saturday between Good Friday and Easter morning.

But from that tree of death, from that seed planted in the ground, came life. Life from the dead. And though it may have looked like only a tiny mustard seed in the course of world history at the time, in that dry Good Friday tree made green on Easter Sunday was packed the death of all and the life of the whole world, the entire forgiveness of every sin, the resurrection of all the dead, and the reconciliation of the world to God! You might not have been able to see it at the time, all may have looked dead and dry, but God was planting Paradise again. A new tree of life for the life of the world.

And so it is still today, in you and me and all wherein is planted the seed of God’s Word. For where God plants His Word, He plants His cross, His death and resurrection. He brings you low in order to raise you up. He dries you up in order to make you green. He kills in order to give life. That whatever in us is working against Him - our sin, our pride, our desire for self-sufficiency; our reliance on our numbers, our income, or our members; our desire to be the master of all that we have - be brought low, be dried up, and die, that we may be raised up to life in Him. And no ordinary life, but eternal life. That is why, as St. Paul says, “we walk by faith, not by sight.” For our sight is colour blind! Our sight may judge the work of God wrongly, and think things dry and dead and lost. But faith trusts the promise of God. That things are not as they look or seem, but are as God says they are.

Friends, God is working, and growing His Church. His ways may seem as small as a mustard seed to us, but do not be deceived. The Word of God you speak to others, the water of Holy Baptism, the word of Holy Absolution, and the body and blood of Jesus in Holy Communion are giving life and granting growth. For in all these things is not our power, but the power of the Gospel, the power of God. The power of the death and resurrection of Jesus, forgiving sins, raising the dead, and giving faith. Faith to know it’s not up to me. Faith to believe that what I see today may not be the way things are tomorrow. Faith to rely confidently on Him and His ways to build His Church, and to save me. For only He can do it.

Martin Luther is known as the Father of the Reformation! But to me his greatness came in his profound sense of his own non - necessity. He once remarked, “While I drink my little glass of Wittenberg beer, the gospel runs its course.” That’s faith. He could preach the Word and then cheerfully step down from the pulpit, take off his robes, and have a glass of Wittenberg beer confident that the Word is at work, doing its killing and making alive thing. No frenzy. No worry. He was active, but he knew who he was, a sinner. And he knew who God was, the Saviour. And so he lived in forgiveness, trusting not himself, but the Word to do its work. And even have his little glass of Wittenberg beer in peace.

Herein lies a lesson! There is much to do and much to worry about in this world, but in the end, we cannot even save ourselves, let alone others. But there is One who can, and who has! We have His forgiveness and life. He has planted His Word in our heart and made it grow. And He is keeping us. We have His promise. And though we may feel as small as a mustard seed in this world, and think that all that we can do is just as small – remember that that mustard seed that we have and that we scatter is one powerful seed!

For that seed is the Word and power of God to forgive sin and raise the dead; the Word and power of the cross, the Word and power of His love. So scatter that seed recklessly, sow it with joy, and at the end of the day, sit down and have your little glass of Wittenberg beer. Relax. Trust. Rest in the branches of the cross. Our Saviour is working. In us. In others. In the world. Doing all that is necessary, all that we need. This is the promise of God’s Word, of our Baptism, of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. Amen

Now the peace and love of God which passes all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.

Merv James