Community Church Sermons

October 29, 2006

Reformation Sunday

“Joining The Protest”

Mark 10:46-52

I’m wondering if we have any Lutherans out there today? Raise your hands. Okay, that’s about 10% of you because most Lutherans, according to Garrison Keillor, would rather die than raise their hand in church. Lutherans are an interesting bunch.

Keillor says they are so tied to the liturgy that when they watch a Star Wars movie and the characters say, “May the force be with you!” the Lutherans respond, “And also with you!” He says that Lutherans are the people for whom the word “repressed” was invented. A sign outside a Lutheran church announces the topic of that week’s sermon as “It Could Be Worse!” And if something funny is said in church Lutherans will never laugh, but they WILL smile out loud!

Lutherans, according to Keillor, have a secret addiction to macaroni and cheese and think that ketchup is a cure for just about everything. In a Lutheran church, coffee is considered the third sacrament, and the budget always has a line item for doughnuts. Lutherans are a peculiar people, Keillor says, on his Prairie Home Companion show. And boy, can they sing the hymns! Lutherans love to sing! And Keillor should know – not because he is Lutheran, mind you. He’s not! He grew up in the Plymouth Brethren church! But Anoka, Minnesota where Keillor was born was deeply Lutheran and everyone was influenced by it. When asked if someone in town was a Lutheran, Keillor responds, “Of course she’s a Lutheran. Everyone here is. Even the Catholics!”

Maybe it would be fair to say that, even though only some of us in the sanctuary today are Lutherans, all of us have been changed by them. And let me start off today by thanking you Lutherans for that. Without you, who knows what we would be like as Christians today?

It was an amazing moment in the life of the Christian Church. A young monk by the name of Martin Luther boldly strode through the streets of Wittenberg, Germany right up to the big wooden doors of the Castle Church, and nailed to those doors a document that laid out in 95 points a protest to the practice of selling indulgences for the remission of punishment for sin. This was the biggest church fundraising program of all time, raising funds for the building of St. Peter’s in Rome by letting people pay cash for forgiveness. That’s not an exactly accurate description of indulgences, but I think you get the point. And what a great idea! Maybe we ought to try it! With a group like this, we’d be rolling in the dough!

But back to Martin Luther. There is some controversy as to whether Luther actually nailed the document to the door at Wittenberg because, Garrison Keillor says, a true Lutheran would never ruin a good piece of wood by driving a nail into it. But that is another issue for another day.

It was October 31^st, 1517 when Luther nailed his 95-theses to the door. His efforts would earn him excommunication from the Church. That’s often what happens to those who protest against the establishment – especially religious institutions. You lose your friends. You lose your job. You lose the respect of those who defend the status quo. But Luther’s courage to speak out against a wrong also started a protest movement that has affected all of western Christianity to this very day. Those who joined the reform movement were called “protest-ants” and the result of their efforts was dubbed “the Protestant Reformation.” And because of the Reformation started by Martin Luther, Garrison Keillor has funny stories to tell, and Lutherans have hymns to sing, and you and I have a faith that is centered on the person of Jesus Christ.

Today, on Reformation Sunday, I want to call upon you to join the movement. Now those of you who feel nervous about identifying yourselves with a protest group need to know that the word “protest” really means to testify FOR something! To protest is not to just be against something, but to be FOR something, and what we are FOR is Jesus Christ.

I was struck by something Tim said in his sermon last week. He mentioned the importance of truly hearing what the Bible actually says about Jesus when it teaches that Jesus “gave his life for the world.” Sometimes when we read or hear those words, we think of Jesus’ death. But the Bible does not say Jesus gave his death for the world, but rather his life. Jesus’ LIFE – his WHOLE life - from birth… to death… to resurrection and even beyond is what has been given us for salvation. Everything that is needed for salvation is found within that life, Luther said. You cannot sell forgiveness because forgiveness has already been freely given. It is not ours to sell! Everything we need to become whole and happy people, and to transform this world into the beautiful kingdom of God is centered in the LIFE of Jesus Christ.

The central focus of our faith – from which we draw our values and our way of living as Christians – must be Jesus above all else.

That’s what Martin Luther was trying to do. He was pulling the eyes of the Church back to – the life of Jesus. And the reason it was so hard is because the Church of that day, like the Church in our day, was very prone to construct all sorts of human traditions between people and Jesus.

Think about some of the things religion teaches: you need a priest to mediate between you and God; you need fundamentalism or liberalism or orthodoxy to interpret Jesus for you and tell you how to live and what to believe as a Christian; you need the government to save the meaning of Jesus’ birth; you need the Jewish ten commandments posted in public buildings to preserve America as a “Christian nation”; you need to film campaign commercials in church sanctuaries to prove you are a Christian and to attract Christian votes; and, of course, true Christians vote Republican – or is it Democrat? I can’t remember what Jesus said about that, or how he voted, or what he taught about the Ten Commandments, except to say that they are all fulfilled in the one great commandment to love your neighbor as yourself, and no one seems interested in hanging that one up anywhere.

The Christian Faith in our day sometimes seems like a hodgepodge of manmade traditions that bear little or no resemblance to Jesus and how he lived and what he taught. It’s sort of like a McDonald’s hamburger these days – lots of bun but darned if you can find any meat.

So we need to fasten our eyes and our ears and our hearts on Jesus!

He is the embodiment of God’s relentless love for all God has created. He lifts up a little child and proclaims that kids are the greatest in the kingdom of heaven and reminds us old people that we’ve got great responsibilities for nurturing the children among us. He meets a rich young executive whose affluence is choking his life, and Jesus loves him and points the way to salvation. Jesus works for the healing and well-being of lepers, and people with disabilities, and those suffering with mental illness. Jesus empowers women to use their gifts and even calls Mary Magdalene to become the first preacher of the Easter message. He embraces people across all divisions – racial, religious, ethnic – and even across the deepest divide of all – sin. Jesus eats with sinners and tax collectors and builds bridges of forgiveness and change. Jesus reconciles people with God, and people with each other.

Jesus – with his life – demonstrates how you and I can find true life, and reveals the path that leads to the kind of world both we and God want the world to be.

That’s the heart of Martin Luther’s protest. We must center our lives, build our faith, and focus our eyes on Jesus.

How would Jesus respond to the war in Iraq? We know what the pundits and politicians are saying, and that would be enough if they could save the world. But God did not so love the world that he gave us a politician. God gave us God’s son, and told us to listen to him!

What would Jesus teach about immigration? Where would Jesus stand on capital punishment? What would Jesus say about abortion? How would Jesus develop a church budget? What would Jesus’ view be on megachurches? Stem cell research? Other religions? Homosexual persons? $100,000 birthday parties for 15-year old girls? Or even owning more than one pair of shoes?

I’m not proposing answers to any of these questions. I’m just inviting you to narrow down your focus to Jesus – how he lived from the day he was born to the Friday afternoon he died…and to the resurrection and beyond – and out of what you see in Jesus, to come and join the movement.

One day, outside of Jericho, Jesus and his disciples hear the cries of a blind man named Bartimaeus. What a confusing world it must be to be blind. How would you know to go to the left or the right? How would you know the way home? Those of you here today who have visual impairments know how confusing the world can be without sight.

Bartimaeus cries out for Jesus. Jesus hears the cries. The disciples bring him to Jesus. Jesus gives him what he asks for. Jesus gives him back his sight. All of a sudden, the shadows part, the blurriness clears, the invisible becomes visible. And the first thing Bartimaeus sees is…Jesus!

Then the Bible says this: he “…followed Jesus along the road.”

In the blindly confusing world of October 31^st, 1517, Martin Luther saw that the focal point of our faith can be none other than the life of Jesus. And nailing those 95-theses to the door of Wittenberg’s Castle Church, Martin stepped out away from the manmade traditions of the Church and onto a new and frightening path. Like Bartimaeus before him, Martin Luther decided that – despite the cost – he too would follow Jesus along the road.

And in the blindly confusing world of this Reformation Sunday, 490 years after the first, I find myself wanting to join Bartimaeus – and Martin – and all those Lutherans - in centering my faith and my life on Jesus and only Jesus.

I hope you’ll join the protest, too!