Sermon for June 27, 2021

Day of the Church Year: 5th Sunday after Pentecost

Scripture Passage: Mark 5:21-43

We are not strangers to illness and death.  Many of us struggle with grief and various ailments, me included.  We might be having strange symptoms or currently getting tested.  We might be awaiting surgery or recovering from surgery.  We might live with a chronic illness and chronic pain that we have managed for years.  We may be grieving the death of a mom, a coworker, a partner, a friend or the loss of a home, a job, or an opportunity. 

Honestly, when I first opened the Bible to discover this week’s Jesus story, I sighed grumpily.  An unintentional healing story within a raising-a-young-girl-from-the-dead story just seemed...unfair.  While so many people I know are still sick.  While so many people I know are grieving the death of loved ones.  Why does one touch of Jesus’ robe heal the woman who had a hemorrhage for 12 years but not heal the ones among us who have received rigorous medical treatment and much prayer on their behalf?  Why does Jesus raise Jairus’ daughter from the dead but not our beloved ones? 

In an attempt to make sense of Jesus healing stories, contemporary biblical scholars routinely delineate between curing and healing.  Curing involves the end of a debilitating illness, relief from pain, a definite medical shift.  Healing, by contrast, involves connection to other people, peace and joy, freedom from fear.  Healing may or may not include a cure.  A cure may or may not include healing.  In today’s Jesus story, Jesus cures, and Jesus heals.

You see, the ancient people of New Testament scripture saw the world in categories of pure and impure, clean and unclean, honor and shame.  Men talking with and touching women beyond their immediate family stained them much in the same way that touching a dead body required ritual cleansing at the temple.  The recipients of Jesus’ compassion in today’s story were, in the eyes of their culture, impure, unclean, shameful.  The woman who touched Jesus’ robe who spent twelve years of her life receiving ineffective treatment, spending all she had, enduring much suffering, also suffered because her illness isolated her.  And the daughter of Jairus, upon her death, became untouchable, even by those who came to mourn her.  Death in the ancient world was yet a mysterious phenomenon, one people sought to avoid.

Despite its impurity, uncleanliness, and shame, Jesus, far from reviling the woman who touches him, praises her faith: Daughter, he says, your faith has made you well.  Go in peace and be healed of your disease.  In the middle of a crowd of people, Jesus names her one of his family, legitimizing her touch, saving her from public ridicule.  When Jesus arrives at the home of Jairus to find the daughter already dead, not only does Jesus raise her from the dead.  He takes her by the hand!   

The truth of this life is that we don’t always get better.  Treatments sometimes fail.  Some diseases cannot be cured.  Despite amazing advancements, medical science does not answer every question.  And even when we pray, sadly, confusingly, and perhaps unfairly, God does not always intervene with the hoped-for miracle.  But healing is possible, and Jesus shows us the way with a declaration of relationship and a touch of his hand. 

Quite simply, dear people of Grace, Jesus calls us into strong, healthy, loving relationships as a way of participating in his healing ministry.  We can’t cure others’ illnesses, and we can’t prevent death.  But we can be there for one another, be there to listen without offering fixes, be there to have fun together, be there just to be there so that we and others don’t have to be alone.  This means nurturing friendships, now, today, not just when things get tough.  This means risking asking people to hang out, people we find fun or interesting or who share common interests.  This means, on a really practical level, doing stuff with other people, showing up for our conversations with one another, being fully present and listening deeply to what others are sharing.  This means allowing others to know us.  A cure is not always possible, but even when we are sick and grieving, God reaches through us to others to share healing, to be connected, to know peace and joy, to free us all from fear.  Empowering us to build strong, healthy, loving relationships is not only God’s way of healing the world; it is God’s way of healing us.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.

Phoenix Fusion Racial Justice Book Study

Book Study on The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson

Thursdays, July 8 & 29, 6:30 pm, via Zoom

For two evenings in July, the Phoenix Fusion Racial Justice Team will host, and Pastor Kristin Rice will facilitate discussion on the book The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration written by Isabel Wilkerson.

In this beautifully written New York Times bestseller, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author chronicles one of the great untold stories of American history: the decades-long migration of black citizens who fled the South for northern and western cities, in search of a better life. From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of almost six million people changed the face of America. Wilkerson compares this epic migration to the migrations of other peoples in history. She interviewed more than a thousand people, and gained access to new data and official records, to write this definitive and vividly dramatic account of how these American journeys unfolded, altering our cities, our country, and ourselves.

Please read parts one through three before the first discussion night. Click here to join.

The GLOW Show: How Can I Keep From Singing with Pastor Sarah

Over summer 2021 on The GLOW Show, we hear about the favorite hymns and songs of members of the Grace community. Hymnody and praise music are two ways we articulate our faith and have our faith formed. If you would like to share about your favorite hymn or praise song, please be in touch with Pastor Sarah. Today, we hear from Pastor Sarah who loves, among many other hymns, Soli Deo Gloria, hymn #878 from our Evangelical Lutheran Worship hymnal.

Sermon for Sunday, June 20

Day of the Church Year: 4th Sunday after Pentecost

Scripture Passage: Job 38:1-11

The book of Job asks the perennial and age-old question, the one we ask in many different ways, the one question that, finally, seems to matter more than almost any other: why do bad things happen to good people?

Job is blameless and upright, fears God and turns away from evil. Job is wealthy in land and animals, goods and family. When God lifts up the righteousness of Job in conversation with Satan, Satan challenges God: Job only serves and praises you, God, because you have blessed him. And God accepts the challenge, allows Satan to take away everything from Job, everything except his life. In all this, Job does not sin or charge God with wrongdoing. When Job’s wife declares, “Do you still persist in integrity? Curse God and die,” Job responds, “Shall we receive the good at the hand of God, and not receive the bad?” Now, Job grieves his losses, deeply, agonizingly, descriptively. Job’s friends interrogate his faith and trust and acceptance. For over thirty chapters of scripture, Job and his friends go back and forth. And then, God answers Job out of the whirlwind saying: “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely, you know!” God continues with what reads to me like sarcastic demands of knowledge and power—knowledge and power that God well knows Job does not possess.

Why do bad things happen to good people? We struggle with this question because we believe God is good—all the time. All the time—God is good. We believe that God is almighty, powerful beyond measure, more powerful than any other force in the universe. We believe that God is omniscient, sees all, knows all, understands all. If God were only good and powerful but not all knowing, evil could result from God’s ignorance. If God were only good and all knowing but not all powerful, God might not have the power to stop evil or suffering. If God were only powerful and all knowing but not always good, God might sometimes take action that allows or even demands suffering. But my guess is that we do not want to let go of our steadfast faith in a good, almighty, and omniscient God. I know I don’t...want to let go of my faith in a good, almighty, and omniscient God.

Some of our sisters and brother in faith read the book of Job and declare Satan the problem. Evil entered the world incarnate in Satan, and the world has been topsy-turvy ever since. An angel at one shoulder, the devil at the other, good and evil influences close at hand. Except that in this view of the world, God’s power is limited. To suggest that evil is a match for God is to suggest God’s hands are tied by a power greater than the creator of heaven and earth.

Reformer of the church Martin Luther read the book of Job and the apostle Paul and declared the bondage of the will the problem. Luther did not believe that we have free will in the sense of the freedom to choose right or wrong, good or evil, God’s way or our way. Rather, he believed we cannot choose not to sin. More simply, we will choose to sin. Not always, not in every situation, but persistently, regardless of our growth in faith because we are not perfect. While I personally find this argument compelling, the argument raises questions about God’s power and goodness. God created us with a capacity to sin, with a capacity for evil, with a capacity for systemic brokenness. Why?

Scholars, theologians, and people of faith from every walk of life read the book of Job today and wonder. The agonizing response to why do bad things happen to good people is simply more questions. Questions about why we were created with a capacity to do evil. Questions like: What is a good person? How do we distinguish “good” people from “bad” people? How do we determine whether an action is good or bad when we don’t know what effect it may have long term? And we live in a world filled with what appears to be bad things. Gun violence here in the valley this week, staggering heat and wild fires that diminish air quality and lead to heat-related illness, illness and death that leave us sad and angry and scared, and a whole variety of injustices. God’s right. We don’t understand—not just the evil in the world but the many mysteries of the world itself. Even as our knowledge of the world grows exponentially, we continue to wrestle with the wisdom to truly understand how our knowledge can and ought to be applied to every aspect of our personal and communal lives.

Job questions God just as we do: deeply, agonizingly, descriptively. We want to know not just why bad things happen to good people but why bad things happen to us. Sometimes, there is a good reason rooted in a series of choices—made by us, others, or a broken system—we can clearly see and understand. Other times, there is no good reason, and we are bereft. Even when there is a good reason, we are led back to the questions raised by Luther’s argument about the bondage of the will. Why give us the capacity and sin and evil in the first place, God?

God’s response to Job’s agonizing inquiry does not answer his questions but instead reveals the depths of Job’s limitations. He won’t understand how God works in the world because he’s not God just as we won’t understand exactly how God works in the world because we’re not God. The expanse and mystery that is God cannot be understood, at least not in its entirety. In the vast sea of all that we do not and cannot know, one thing remains: God answers. God answers Job. The creator of heaven and earth answers Job. The one who laid the foundation of the earth, who laid the earth’s cornerstone, who shut in the sea with doors, who prescribed bounds for the sea, this One answers Job. The One who is good all the time, the almighty, the omniscient, this One answers Job. Which means this One hears Job, listens, considers, loves, cares for Job and each one of us. In the expanse and the mystery of a God and a universe we cannot fully grasp, the One who does understand listens to our cries, our questions, our hearts. And for that, we can say: Thanks be to God! Amen.

The GLOW Show: How Can I Keep From Singing with Mike

Over summer 2021 on The GLOW Show, we hear about the favorite hymns and songs of members of the Grace community. Hymnody and praise music are two ways we articulate our faith and have our faith formed. If you would like to share about your favorite hymn or praise song, please be in touch with Pastor Sarah. Today, we hear from Mike Holsten about his favorite hymn Be Thou My Vision. Enjoy!

Sermon for Sunday, June 13

Day of the Church Year: 3rd Sunday after Pentecost

Scripture Passage: Mark 4:26-34

Each Sunday morning, Lutheran preachers around the world set out to proclaim both the law and the gospel.  The law is what God calls us to do, the gospel what God does for us.  The laws calls us to action; the gospel declares God’s action.  Through our Lutheran lens, the gospel always trumps the law for we worship a gracious God.  Most weeks for me as I prepare to preach and probably for most of us when we read scripture, the law arises with ease as we study a passage.  What is God calling us to do?  Even when we don’t like the answers, even when we would rather not do the thing God commands, the law can be like a pair of comfortable old slippers.  We are accustomed to scripture commanding, teaching, guiding; we are accustomed to musts, shoulds, and oughts.  The gospel, on the other hand, can make us squeamish.  Being loved just because we are, goodness poured out for no reason, freedom, forgiveness, and grace when we don’t deserve it—and all of this not just for us but for every single person.  The gospel of Jesus Christ is downright uncomfortable, confusing, and astonishing.

Dear friends in Christ, prepare to be uncomfortable, confused, and astonished this morning.  For when Jesus teaches in parables to describe the kingdom of God, it’s all gospel.  In today’s first parable, Jesus tells the crowds who gather around him that the kingdom of God is like scattered seed that sprouts and grows mysteriously, the farmer does not know how.  The earth produces of itself first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain.  In Greek, the original language of the New Testament, the word we translate as “of itself” where the earth produces “of itself” is actually the Greek word automate which is where we get the English word automatic.  The kingdom of God, Jesus says, sprouts and grows automatically.  And the farmer does not know how. 

Two thousand years later, farmers know a little more about how seeds sprout and grow.  Still, placing a seed in soil, in the sun, watering it, and then discovering sprouting and growth still feels like a miracle, out of our control, mysterious.  About two months ago, I carefully followed the detailed instructions I found online about how to plant ginger.  You know, that funky shaped root sold in the produce section of grocery stores that you dice and add to east Asian food.  Or if you’re me, you add to nearly any food.  As described in the article, I purchased organic ginger, cut off the required pieces, and sat them in the fridge for 24 hours to scab over.  Then, I excitedly and carefully placed them in the soil on the other side of chicken wire from my ravenous chickens.  Every other morning for three weeks, I watered the spot and hunted for signs of sprouting.  When something green popped up in the general vicinity of my planting, I got excited only to realize it was an arugula volunteer.  But I purchased another bag of organic ginger and tried again, this time in a pot in the front yard.  Again, I watered every other day, and lo and behold, within just a few days, the ginger sprouted and grows to this day!  This morning, even after yesterday’s 111 degree heat, it stands 8 inches tall with half a dozen leaves.  The kingdom of God is like summer-planted ginger that sprouts and grows, the gardener does not know how.

And neither do I or any of us know how the kingdom of God grows among us.  How is it possible in a culture plagued by individualism that ordinary people would take not an insignificant portion of their time to dig up the entire sprinkler system here at Grace and replace it (that’s a true story!), sing or play in the choir or praise band, deliver food boxes every Saturday, or get up early in the morning to make pancakes for someone else’s breakfast?  How is it possible in a city as large and diverse as Phoenix—especially political diversity that usually leads to division—that neighbors would watch out for neighbors, neighbors would share garden produce and even groceries, and neighbors would help one another whenever help is requested?  How is it possible that at a time when people engage in physical conflict over mask use as just one example among many that so many people also go out of their way to care for others in small, concrete ways?  The pharmacy tech who figures out how to lower the cost of a prescription not covered by my insurance, the friend who offers a ride to another friend for a medical appointment, the brother who flies across the country to help out during a difficult time.  Sometimes, it seems this world could not be more fully saturated by bad news, and then, grace and kindness, generosity and forgiveness spring up, unexpectedly.  The kingdom of God sprouts and grows, we do not know how. 

The kingdom of God is the work of God.God shows up here, in our world, right in the middle of this mess, a mess of injustice and brokenness, illness and death.God shows up here, in our fear and anxiety, in our anger and sadness.God shows up here, in what we can’t fix. God shows up here—in and through us. Why there is so much injustice and brokenness, that’s a sermon for another day, questions Jesus addresses with other parables. But today, it’s all gospel, and the gospel is this: the kingdom of God has come near, sprouting and growing even in the heat of summer. Thanks be to God! Amen.

2021 Heat Respite

2021 Heat Respite officially kicked off June 7, 2021. Monday through Friday from 9:00 am until 5:00 pm, Grace opened the courtyard to people in the community trying to get relief from the heat. Participants enjoyed snacks and sack lunches every day. Thank you to the congregations that prepared the sack lunches and donated snacks! Donors have piled in the water; Devalyn, Christine, and Eileen prepared a delicious chicken meal on Friday. Participants doubled as volunteers, helping to set up and clean up. Thank you to all, who have made sure that Grace is a safe space for people this summer. Please enjoy pictures from the first week of fun at Grace’s 2021 Heat Respite. If you would like to volunteer or donate, contact our Outreach Coordinators (Phyllis and Adrienne) at outreach@graceinthecity.com or (602)258-3787.

Sermon for Sunday, June 6

Day of the Church Year: 2nd Sunday after Pentecost

Scripture Passage: Genesis 3

My first semester of seminary in one of the core required classes called Pentateuch which just refers to the first five books of the Bible, we essentially read Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy from beginning to end.  I think it was on day one that Dr. Klein declared the story of Genesis 3, among others, a myth—which is a common understanding among contemporary biblical scholars.  While I didn’t disagree with him, I raised my hand and asked, “How do we know this is a myth?”  And Dr. Klein responded: “For starters, there’s a talking snake.”  Indeed.  As a myth, this story from Genesis 3 would have been shared at campfires and among circles of women spinning wool, part and parcel of the common, human story.  Myths surface as a result of big questions, both moral and historical.  Myths help us make sense of the world.  Myths are not meant to be read literally or historically, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t true. 

Genesis 3 opens with a discussion between the crafty serpent and the woman in the garden of Eden.  The woman, whose name we later learn is Eve, reports to the serpent God’s word about the danger of eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  The serpent denies the danger and declares eating of the tree will open her eyes and make her like God, knowing good and evil.  So she eats the fruit of the tree and shares with her husband, and their eyes are opened.  At the time of the evening breeze, Adam and Eve are nowhere to be found, and God who is walking in the garden calls out, “Where are you?”  Adam confesses he ate from the tree but blames Eve and even God because, Adam says: God, you were the one who gave me this woman.  Eve confesses that she ate from the tree but blames the serpent.  At least the serpent is silent before God.  After describing the consequences of this betrayal of trust between God and Adam and Eve, God sends them out of Eden but not until God provides clothing for them and a capacity to “eat bread by the sweat of their brow.”  This capacity is named as part of Adam’s consequence, but it is also gift because it means he can survive in the world outside the garden. 

The questions and themes of Genesis 3 are wide and deep and the theological commentary on these questions and themes through two thousand years of Christian history even wider and deeper.  Within the church, Genesis 3 has traditionally been interpreted as the birthplace of “original sin,” the idea that humans are born sinful, not because newborns intentionally choose sinful action but because the inherent condition of all humanity is one of brokenness.  Still, this is not the only thing the church teaches about Genesis 3.  This story is also about God creating humans with a capacity to choose something God would not choose for us.

It’s about humans not taking responsibility for our actions but instead blaming others.

It’s about humans wanting to be like God.

It’s about humans’ vulnerability and limitations.

It’s about the brokenness of human relationships.

It’s about the brokenness of humans’ relationship with God.

Genesis 3 leads me to wonder: In history, why is Eve so consistently blamed for this transgression?  Or when she is not, why is the serpent blamed?  But so rarely Adam who does the same thing and rarely God for creating a world where such a transgression is possible.  Also, why is this story so often framed as being about who is to blame? 

Genesis 3 leads me to wonder: Why do we so rarely view Adam and Eve through the lens of compassion?  Why do we call their transgression “original sin” and not simply a mistake born of human vulnerability and limitations?  Why do we go so far as to say evil entered the world that day in the Garden of Eden instead of focusing on this very first biblical response to human error, namely a God who holds them accountable and also shows compassion?  This will be the pattern of God for the rest of the biblical story: accountability and compassion.

Finally, Genesis 3 leads me to wonder: to answer what moral and historical questions led the ancient people to tell this story around campfires?  For instance, I wonder if the people were wrestling with why bad things happen and what started the human journey of broken relationships. 

Our question of the day is: What do you wonder about this story from Genesis 3?  What questions does it raise for you?  To read the questions of the Grace community, go to the Facebook live stream worship for Sunday, June 6.

What do I really think this story is about?  I think this story is about the relationship between God and the ones God created from the dust of the earth and Adam’s rib.  I think this story is about a disappointment and a betrayal in a relationship so close and intimate that God walks in the garden in the cool of the evening with them.  In the Garden of Eden, there is only one rule: do not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  And they don’t follow it.  I don’t think God is angry so much as sad that these beloved creatures would cross the one boundary God had laid down.  God loves these first, mythic people so much that, even when they disappoint God, God provides for them.  In an imperfect, broken world, this myth tells a truth about God: that brokenness, sin, evil, disappointment, betrayal can’t keep God from showing compassion.  And for that we can say: Thanks be to God!  Amen.