Twentieth Pentecost
Reformation Sunday
John 8:31-36, Romans 3:19-28; Jeremiah 31:31-34
Where do you live? One of the first things that every child learns even before they begin school is their address and telephone number—It is important to know where you live—Some of us have lived at a number of places over the years—A few of the addresses I remember include 1016 Garfield Avenue in Albert Lea, Minnesota—3900-8th Avenue in Rock Island, Illinois—2481 Como Avenue in St. Paul, Minnesota—1430 West 100th Place on Chicago’s Southside—and 15550 Badger Lane in Lockport, Illinois. But the most important address is now the one I live at—74 Elmwood Lane in Lincolnshire. As the old tag line has it—everybody’s got to be someplace. What lies at the center of the question “Where do you live?” is a much deeper question of roots, identity and meaning. From where do you base your life? Where do you begin and end each day? It is a question not only wondering where we hang our hat—but where do we place our heart? This is a question that is most fitting for this Reformation Day—most fitting because it is at the core of the Reformation and at the center of our Gospel lesson for today. When Jesus tells the people “If you continue in my word…” he is actually making an address reference. The New Jerusalem Bible translation of these words actually reads—“If you make my word your home”
Clearly Jesus knows that some people live elsewhere than in His word—hence the question for our sermon today—“Where do you live?” We know too well that there are homeless people in the world—that’s one of the reasons we participate in PADS—Public Action to Deliver Shelter to the homeless of Lake County. But there are other kinds of homelessness—equally challenging and devastating to the well-being of a person. There are actually some homeless people in the world who live in very beautiful houses—It is not that they lack a roof over their heads—but rather they lack a place from which to live their lives. They simply exist as any homeless person at PADS will tell you—exist from minute to minute—day to day. Life is simply the time spent between a date of birth and a date of death—in between those two dates it is simply a matter of embracing a Madison avenue philosophy of life—grabbing for all the gusto we can—buying the things that may not make us happier but we believe they make us more comfortable in our existence—for existence is really all that there is. At the extreme of this kind of life are those who believe there is not God—no meaning for existence—no future after death—those who see life as Shakespeare’s Macbeth describes it—as “but a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing.”
Those who live at this address tend to want to make their lives the best they can—by acquiring all the things that they think will make it better. Jesus knew these people of his day—He talked of those who were only interested in saving their lives through the things they did and had as possessions.—Friday night during the confirmation lock-in we looked at some of the parables Jesus told of those who were only interested in saving their lives—Parables that described people who were more concerned about their property or their spouses than they were in attending the great feast given by the king. Clearly from the way our confirmands acted out these stories late into the night—they grasped that Jesus did not tell these stories to burden us with yet more guilt but rather to announce a new way to live in God’s word. On this Reformation Day we need to be reminded that there are many people who live out their lives with no spiritual home.
Last Sunday I was part of an interfaith forum at Temple Am Shalom in Glencoe—At the center of this morning for interfaith couples was a discussion of the importance of knowing where you live—What is the faith address that you call home? At one point in the presentation I found myself commending those who were gathered for being willing to look at the questions of faith. What does it mean to call Judaism home or Roman Catholicism or Lutheranism? I reminded those gathered that the majority of our neighbors are homeless—at least in matters of faith. Listening to the faith stories told by those who were gathered— It became clear that a number of them had become faith homeless at some point in their lives due to their encounter with people or institutions that should have provided a home but instead drove them away from God’s word and into a faith homelessness. There are many who claim a great faith heritage—who know where they were born—were raised in a faith home but then wandered off—getting lost in a world of doubts and hatred for God’s Word. Without a clear home in the faith today the temptation is to live in the past—I was born a Lutheran—I was born a Catholic—I was raised Methodist—My father was a Jew. Such was the response to Jesus in our Gospel lesson—“We are descendants of Abraham…” The proud proclamation misses the fact that Jesus is not interested in past history or physical descent—This is a question of the dwelling place of the soul the freedom and purpose at the very center of our being. Everyone has to be someplace—the question is—“what will the place be that we call home.”
Is it enough to simply provide an address or do we want more—expect more—need more? Some years back there was a book published by O. Hallesby entitled Religious or Christian that explored the idea that many live in the house of religion but they do not know the master of the house. The fact that 90 some percent of Americans believe in God yet less than half worship at least once a month suggests that we are increasingly a society of homeless people when it comes to matters of faith. Like the man who responded to Jesus—there are claims of a long line of spiritual ancestry—descendents of Abraham—or maybe the church that people remember from their youth—But Jesus questioned the current address—Remembering where and how you once lived may inspire you today—as is common among many first generation immigrants to this country—But what every new resident of this country covets most is an address—a proof of residence that is real. It is not just a matter of claiming to believe in God or being religious—What matters is living in the word—dwelling in this place that has been given to us by Jesus as the word made flesh—made real in our lives. One of the problems many have with religion is that it is too often defined in negative terms—The decision reported in the news media this week of Wheaton College deciding to allow dancing on campus after almost 150 years—too easily fulfills the non-Christian’s understanding of what religion is all about—the listing of things that are not to be done. You shall not do this and you shall not do that. We have had the law for a long, long time.
But what the early Christian community really celebrated was not a new law which would have been just fresh paint on the old address but a new found freedom—a new address where the guiding principle was not intended to be defining the limits of life through laws and rituals but rather the possibilities of God’s love. A new freedom to embrace those previously limited to the margins of society—A new understanding of the extravagance of God’s grace and the power of forgiveness beyond human limitation. And at the center of it all is Jesus stressing the importance of continuity—of abiding in the word. This is why one of the greatest gifts of the Reformation was the Bible—the Bible translated initially into German and placed in the hands of the people—no longer locked in the churches away from the eyes of the faithful—This is why one of the great results of the Reformation was the opening of schools to teach all to read God’s Word and Martin Luther stressed the expectation that every household would have parents who would instruct the children in the catechism and teach the prayers that whole families might live centered in God’s Word—This is why the Reformation declared freedom from traditions that excluded people from God’s table of grace and the nourishment of the household of faith—No one is excluded who would enter into God’s Word and affirm the simple truth that in, with and under the bread and the wine Christ’s real body and blood are given to us as proof of our abiding presence in His Word. This Lutheran church today is a home for those who truly want to live in God’s Word—A place of grace—An open table for those who need to be nourished for the journey of life—A home to which to return each week after wanderings into the world. It is important that there is no one way to build a home in God’s Word.
Some may come to know Christ in the flash of light—through a sudden conversion experience like Paul’s—while others experience a more gradual growth into discernment of the Spirit’s calling as happened for Paul’s young companion Timothy—The important thing is that Christianity is a place from which and in which we live our lives. The kind of emotional high that stirs us for a moment and then fades into nothingness is not the dwelling place of faith—no one lives in the world on only emotional highs. Anyone who drops by a house once in a while is a visitor—not a resident. Anybody can feel religious now and then—but being Christian means being a resident in God’s house—abiding in the word. I am reminded of Mark Twain’s character Tom Sawyer who was sick and had to stay in bed for a week—And during that week a tent revival came to town—And when Tom got well he went out to find that all of his friends had gotten religion and wouldn’t have anything to do with him—Tom was disconsolate but as Mark Twain puts it—In a week or two everyone recovered and things returned to normal. Jesus is not talking about that kind of religion—a passing mood altering moment—or a fresh coat of paint—to continue in the word is to find a permanent new address This is no ideal home—there will certainly be days of greater and lesser sensitivity to the Gospel truth—some days we may feel closer to Christ and his words then on other days—but our faith is a way of life—time and again the picture used in the Bible to describe Christianity comes from life images—living stones, seed ripening to harvest, vines bearing fruit—a way of existence—not an end in itself.
What matters is where we live our lives. On this Reformation Sunday it is particularly appropriate that our text invites us to make our dwelling place God’s Word—this is the center and one of the defining points of the protestant reformation. Martin Luther called the church back to the Word Alone—Not Word and ritual or Word and tradition or Words of Law—but the wholeness of God’s Word—filled with the challenges of historically conditioned observations and eternal truths that rise above history, culture or even context. Through out the history of the Christian faith there have been no people that have taken the Word of God more seriously than the Lutherans—We are the ones who have chosen to make the Bible our address—and we shared that great gift with the rest of the Christian community—filled with curious neighbors and eccentric characters. This is not an easy place to live—words challenge us—but they also unite us—So it is that Jesus proclaimed this great truth of living in His Word as he prepared to depart this world—He knew that the very thing that could divide us could also bring us together—if we truly live in and through the Word revealed in the Christ. Where do you live? As a church we are committed to helping everyone find a faith home—Throughout holy history God has provided shelter for his people—And when it became harder for the people to hear the word or see the words then God fulfilled the prophet’s words and wrote them into our very being—this is the gift of grace—the key that unlocks our new home provided by a loving God. Where do you live? Here at God’s table of grace we are invited to enter into God’s word And to make it truly our home.
Amen.