Dear friends in Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Prepare our hearts, Lord, to receive your Word. Silence in us any voice but your own that in hearing we believe and in believing we obey your will revealed to us in Jesus Christ. Amen.
It’s good to be back among you after my recent knee surgery. As many of you total-knee-and-hip-replacement veterans know, the surgeons have the easier part. It’s the physical therapists who really earn their money by working us hard to make good progress. As many of you assured me: every day is better than the day before. It’s also good to be preaching again.
When my wife noticed the Bible passages for today, she saw a little knee-surgery humor in them: the second lesson, of course, refers to a part of the body that hurts, and our first lesson comes from the book of Knee-emiah!
Anyway, I want to thank Mark, Sonia, and Rick for the great job that they do here at church, and especially during my recent recovery. As you know, they are a great blessing to this congregation and help us all do a better job of living out our calling to love God and our neighbors as ourselves.
Last weekend our very good friends, Vicki and Pat Michel, from Tacoma, WA, flew up to give Carolyn a break in taking care of this ornery patient. And, as always when they come to visit, worship at Gloria Dei is a must. They are good church-going people—faith in Christ is part of the fabric that keeps them content and secure in life. So I’m always interested to hear what they have to say—especially their perceptions about our family of faith.
At lunch after church, they shared a couple of things that I’d like you all to hear. First of all, they truly enjoyed their worship experience here—the spiritually warm and welcoming atmosphere, the music and singing, etc.
They also said that they really appreciated listening to Mark preach. In fact, I think their exact words were, “we’d be happy to be members of whatever church he serves as a pastor.” Certainly, that’s a great compliment to Mark: his talents, spirit, and personality (even as I think it’s a compliment to his lovely wife Mollie and her positive influence on her husband!).
But I also believe it’s a compliment to the rest of us as well—and the good job we’re doing as a teaching congregation for the intern pastors that the Church has sent us. Granted, we’re probably teaching them a number of bad habits along with all the good, but I’m really pleased with everyone’s support and involvement in this ministry.
I mention these things because I think they’re also good examples of the other ways in which we do our little part of the Body of Christ in the world.
Whether we’re
• passing out bulletins or praying for a friend;
• placing a check in the offering plate or the Lord’s Supper in the hands of our neighbors;
• coming here seeking a spiritual blessing from God or going out into the community to serve a stranger in need—any or all of the above—we, you, and I, together, are living examples of the body of Christ.
And that is exactly the message that comes to us from our lessons for today. Now many, if not most, of us feel that we don’t do all that much in the grand scheme of things. We may wonder about the impact our little financial donations have on the local ministries in our Alaska synod, or in the face of overwhelming need in places of tragedy like Haiti.
We also wonder if all the time and energy and resources that we put into our children will do them any good. And, sometimes, we wonder if our prayers make any difference in the lives of people who struggle with disease or depression, anger or angst.
The temptation is to think that the only gifts, the only acts, the only efforts that count are those that change the world, that are proven successes, that demonstrate some lasting effect on the pages of history.
In fact, however, we see over and over again in the stories of Scripture a very different truth at work. It’s almost always the case that the best of what God offers to the world comes through the back door or a side window and oftentimes from the most unimaginable places or people possible.
In the Old Testament book of Nehemiah, the city of Jerusalem lies in ruins. Its enemies have destroyed the city’s walls, thrown down its buildings, and scattered its leaders to the winds. Nehemiah prays to God, asking for the Lord’s help to rebuild the city walls, to restore its buildings, and to recall its people and resurrect their relationship with God. That’s no small request.
Indeed, God blesses Nehemiah’s request, but not like a genie granting 3 wishes or some fairy godmother with a wand. Instead, God blesses Nehemiah’s work in selecting ordinary people like you and me. Then each person or family is instructed to rebuild their little section of the wall—the one closest to their home. No one is over-burdened; everyone does their fair share. No one sits idle; everyone has a stake in the goal. No one complains; everyone feels blessed to be a blessing—to themselves and to their neighbors.
That is a great example of the body language of Christ at work in our lives—here at Gloria Dei and in the Church throughout the world. Through our ordinary work of serving and singing, of teaching and training, of preaching and praying, of offering our time and talents and treasures, God is able to do the extraordinary work of blessing us, and through us, our neighbors with the good news of God’s love for all people in Jesus Christ our Lord.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Pastor Scott Fuller