Wait for it. . . Year C, Advent 1, Luke 21.25-36,

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

The world in which we live is warming.  Global warming is not some future event that might one day happen.  It is happening now and is evident in concrete and measurable effects.

Here’s a bit of information from NASA’s website:

“Global climate change has already had observable effects on the environment. Glaciers have shrunk, ice on rivers and lakes is breaking up earlier, plant and animal ranges have shifted and trees are flowering sooner.

Effects that scientists had predicted in the past would result from global climate change are now occurring: loss of sea ice, accelerated sea level rise and longer, more intense heat waves.

Scientists have high confidence that global temperatures will continue to rise for decades to come, largely due to greenhouse gases produced by human activities. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which includes more than 1,300 scientists from the United States and other countries, forecasts a temperature rise of 2.5 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit over the next century.

According to the IPCC, the extent of climate change effects on individual regions will vary over time and with the ability of different societal and environmental systems to mitigate or adapt to change.

The IPCC predicts that increases in global mean temperature of less than 1.8 to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit (1 to 3 degrees Celsius) above 1990 levels will produce beneficial impacts in some regions and harmful ones in others. Net annual costs will increase over time as global temperatures increase.

"Taken as a whole," the IPCC states, "the range of published evidence indicates that the net damage costs of climate change are likely to be significant and to increase over time." 

Some of the specific effects of this warming are:

·         Rising temperatures

·         Longer growing seasons

·         Changes in precipitation patterns

·         Droughts and heat waves

·         Stronger and more intense hurricanes and other storm systems

·         Rising sea levels

·         Melting of the polar sea ice

Here in the Northwest we can expect ”changes in the timing of streamflow reduce water supplies for competing demands. Sea level rise, erosion, inundation, risks to infrastructure and increasing ocean acidity pose major threats. Increasing wildfire, insect outbreaks and tree diseases are causing widespread tree die-off.”

A couple of personal observations:

If you visit Glacier Park, one of the things you’ll immediately become aware of is that the glaciers are themselves almost gone.

My own cousin is feeling the effects of global warming.  He farms in  Northeast South Dakota, where the rising levels of the lakes has claimed over 1/3 of his farm, which is now underwater.

And finally, all you have to do is watch the high water level of the spring runoff just down the road on the Spokane River.  Thirty years ago the high level of spring runoff occurred well into June.  Now that is happening earlier and earlier.

There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Now, just when we are duly uneasy and concerned about the effects of global warming, there is another potential disaster on the horizon:

People who are into apocalyptic predictions of the future point to the Yellowstone super volcano.  A massive eruption such as has occurred about every 600,000 years could bring about a volcanic winter, where the ash shades the earth from the sun, causing in the worst case scenario a total failure of the crops worldwide.  This, these futurists muse, could be the end of humanity.

What doesn’t make the tabloids, is that the chances of this happening are very remote, and may never occur again.

Feeling good about the world and life in general, yet?

What do we make of Jesus’ ominous warnings of the tribulations that are to come?

Well, for starters, the good news is that what Jesus was likely warning his disciples about occurred shortly after his words of warning were uttered.

“Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all things have taken place.”

What indeed happened just forty years after Jesus was that the Romans destroyed the temple, and then in another forty years, thoroughly destroyed the nation of Israel.  Israel remained scattered across the face of the earth until the reestablishment of the nation of Israel in 1947.

So, take a deep breath, and a sigh of relief.  Jesus wasn’t predicting the end of the world, but rather the end of the nation of Israel.  That happened.  Old news.

There’s another thing to give us hope when faced with the dire warnings and predictions of cataclysmic events on the horizon.

Jesus says, “Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

These words remind me of the Exodus and Moses’ words to Israel.

They had just left Egypt and were at the shores of the Red Sea.  Pharaoh’s heart had been hardened and he sent his chariots after the Israelites.

And so there they were, caught between the Red Sea on the one side, and the advancing armies of Egypt on the other side.  They feared their death was imminent.

Moses said:  "Do not be afraid, stand firm, and see the deliverance that the Lord will accomplish for you today; for the Egyptians whom you see today you shall never see again.  The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to keep still."

One of the major themes throughout the Bible is “deliverance”, and God’s saving his people from one calamity after another.

It’s like a good news/bad news joke, though it is no joke.

The good news is that God will deliver you.

The bad news is that there will be difficult times ahead as we await that deliverance.

It’s like when a pregnant woman shows up at the hospital in labor.  The good news is that the pain she is experiencing will soon be over.  The bad news is that it is going to get worse before it gets better. 

You see the thing about this theme of deliverance in the Bible is that God does not promise to spare us the suffering that is an inevitable part of this life, but rather that he will bring us through the suffering to a new day.

We will face many struggles in this life, some great and some small. 

Some of these struggles will be our own personal struggles, some will affect our families, and some will affect the community as a whole.

There may even be epic times of great difficulty that impact the whole of humanity, like world wars, or famine, or diseases and the like that render us all vulnerable.

Sometimes the difficulties we face will be of our own making. 

When that is the case, it is possible that what we have done we can also undo, but not always. 

At other times we will face suffering and crises that come upon us through no fault of our own whatsoever.

There is innocent suffering in this world.

But the promise remains the same.

“Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

The one issue that all of us will experience in due time, is our own deaths.

Sometimes that will come without warning.

At other times the signs that the end for us is coming will be clear and foreboding.  It may be a cancer diagnosis, or heart disease, or Alzheimer’s, or any number of other things that affects our mortality.

No one is spared that day.

An old saying is “Everybody has got to die, but I have always believed an exception would be made in my case.”

The bad news is that there are no exceptions.

But there is redemption and new life.

In Romans 8 Paul writes:

I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; 23 and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.

Labor pains.  Suffering.  Redemption.

That’s the cycle of life.

One final thought.  One of the deepest regrets that I have regarding the pastoral care I offered over the course of my career was the counsel I offered to my youth director and her husband.

They were in my office one day, alarmed because Ben was losing his strength in one leg.  I tried to reassure them that most often we fear the worst, and yet it ends up being not nearly as bad as we fear.

It turned out that Ben had a glioblastoma, a fast growing brain tumor, and in a few short weeks he died.  Yeah, it was that bad.

Sometimes the signs we see are indeed warning signs of a great and looming tragedy.  Denying that possibility is not where we find ultimate hope.

Our hope is in the redemption that Christ has promised.

We will not face the worst that life has to offer, or death itself, alone.

But the sufferings that we will endure are but birth pangs, and the hope that we have is of the new life that is ours in Christ Jesus.

Amen

Year A, Proper 8, Romans 6.12-23, Slaves of Righteousness

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

“Freedom” is actually an illusion.

We are not free.

We never have been free.

And in fact, the more we attempt to be free, the greater our bondage becomes.

We are slaves.

The only question is “Who will we serve as Lord and Master?”

Paul writes:   “Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?”

And again:  “But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification.”

You see, we will always have a Lord and Master, the only question is what Lord and What Master.

To claim Jesus as Lord, is to be set free from our bondage to sin, yet we are bound to obedience to our Lord Jesus Christ.

To deny that Jesus is Lord, is to willfully accept the reign of Sin in our lives, and to be bound to that which will one day kill us.

We live in turbulent times.

There is no where that this is more evident than in our nation’s politics.

And one need look no further than the reaction to our current president, and our former president, to see the intensity of the turbulence.

He is the best president we’ve ever had.

He is the worst president we’ve ever had.

The problem is that we can’t agree on which is which.

I think that underlying this problem is our illusion of freedom.

People are free to believe whatever they want to believe.

The result of that freedom is that there is no moral compass guiding us, no common understanding of what is good, no consensus about what is right.

If there were in fact, some shared values about these things, we’d actually be able to agree about whether a particular president was the best or the worst, but we can’t. 

We are that divided.

But this freedom to believe whatever we want to believe is in fact slavery to our own natural inclination to sin.

It is in our human nature to seek that which benefits us the most.  This selfishness is a bondage, a slavery, which leads to death.

But we don’t want to admit it.

“You do realize,” God says, “that the path down which you are walking will lead to your destruction and death, don’t you?”

And our response is to claim our freedom, and to continue doing whatever we want to do, thinking that we are free when in fact we are enslaved like no other. 

There are many example of this.

When I was drinking I used to love it when Karla would be gone for a few days because I was then free to drink however much I wanted without having to listen to her complaining.

The truth is I was not free at all, I was simply blind to the slavery I was experiencing to alcohol.

Oh, and that slavery, almost killed me.

Now, I am no longer free to drink, and yet this new ‘slavery’ to sobriety will let me live. 

Slave to the bottle?

Or slave to sobriety?

One leads to death, the other to life.

That was the choice that had to be made.

Scientists warn us today, about the effects of our lifestyles on the planet and the environment.

There is little debate within the scientific community that the planet is warming.  Glaciers are melting.  Weather patterns are getting more severe.

Perhaps the world’s scientists are wrong.

As we hear the dire predictions that they are making, one can even hope, that they are wrong, because if they are right the future may look bleak for many parts of the world.

But what if they are right?

We are so enslaved to our lifestyles that it is almost impossible for us to change.  We don’t want to.  We want to be free to live as we please.  But we are not free at all.

We are in bondage to a way of living that will one day kill us.

I was part of a conversation recently in which someone was maintaining that the scientists were wrong.

Another person, my brother, responded to that person saying “I hope you're right, that the scientists are wrong, but in refusing to listen to what the scientists are saying you are risking the future of our planet.”

Think about it—

What better definition of slavery, of being in bondage, is there than this:  that we are so compelled by our sinfulness to act in a certain way that we will continue to do so even if it kills us.

And yet we are not bound to be slaves to that which kills us.

That is the point that Paul is writing about.

You have been set free from your bondage to sin, that you might be slaves to righteousness and servants of God.

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We will be slaves, one way or another.

Slaves to sin.

Or slaves of God, offering our lives to him in obedience.

To be ‘redeemed’ means that we are set free from our slavery to sin, and we might serve God as slaves of righteousness.

Did you know that the term ‘redeem’ actually comes from the institution of slavery.  To purchase a slave was to redeem that slave.  And once redeemed, the slave was now under obligation to serve the new master.

What does it mean to be slaves of Christ Jesus?

“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”

“Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.”

This seems so simple and straight forward.

Except for one thing.

We remain so deeply in bondage to sin, that on our own we cannot come close to agreeing what is loving, and what is not.

Another example from our current political environment.

We consider ourselves to be a great nation,.

We are a nation that has a substantial Christian majority.

And we who are Christians, at the very least, should feel compelled to do that which Christ commanded us to do, namely to love one another as Christ first loved us.

But, what does that mean?

What does that mean with respect to Health Care?

The current debate in Washington over health care reform shows how difficult it is for us to agree on something as simple as what it means to love one another.

We can put the question bluntly.

Should our health care system be loving, or cruel?

Most of us would say, “Well, loving, of course.”

But what does that mean for health care?

Does that mean that we should have universal coverage for health care, so that everyone has access to medicine and the care they need, even if it means that all of us would have to pay for it?

Or does that mean that people should be free to purchase whatever health care options they choose, even if that means that some will not be able to afford to buy insurance?

I wonder if the proposals for health care reform would be different if those writing these laws could only do so while sitting beside a loved one in the hospital.

Our intuitive sense of what is loving is probably most evident when we are sitting face to face with a loved one in need of care.

So imagine, sitting beside your child in the hospital, and what decisions you would make then regarding their care.  Love tends to make a difference at moments like that.

I could go on and on.

The point is that issues of life and death are not issues that we are free to do whatever we want.

We are slaves.

We are not free.

We never have been free.

Freedom isn’t the choice.

The choice is whether we are going to be in bondage to sin, which will lead to death.

Or slaves of righteousness, obediently serving our Lord Jesus Christ, loving as he commanded that we love, loving as he first loved us, which will lead to life.

It should be an easy choice to make.

But it isn’t.

Our slavery is real. 

And only Christ can set us free from our slavery to sin in order that we can live in righteousness with him.

Amen

Year C, Proper 18, Deuteronomy 30:15-20, “Choices”

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

Choices matter.

Choices have consequences.

And to not make a choice, is to choose.

Moses puts before the people of Israel, in the strongest terms possible, the choice that was before them.

“Choose Life!” was his admonition.

Of course the alternative is to choose death.

Underlying that choice is both a promise, and a warning.

It goes without saying that we are more comfortable listening to a promise.  Promises are good.  Make the right choice and wonderful things will happen.  We especially like the second part of that sentence:  “wonderful things will happen”.  “The Lord will bless you” Moses says.  We’d like to leave it like that.

What we often overlook is the first part of that sentence.

If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today, by loving the Lord your God, walking in his ways, and observing his commandments, decrees, and ordinances, then you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess.

If you obey –

If you make the right choices –

Then you will be blessed.

Choices, you see, matter.

They have consequences.

And we bear some responsibility.

Take, for example, the fourth commandment that God gave us:

“Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.”

This commandment is not about children obeying their parents, though that may be what we think about when we hear it.  This commandment is about how we take care of the elderly.  Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.  God promises a long life, if we honor our parents.

The flip side of that is the warning about what will happen if we don’t honor our parents.  Our own lives will be impacted when we are old.  Choices have consequences.

It’s not that God is hell bent on punishing us if we make the wrong choice.  God warns us of the consequences of making the wrong choice.

Let’s fast forward from ancient Israel to today. 

How do we honor our parents and care for them in their old age?  And what difference does that make?  And how will the choices we make today, affect our lives tomorrow when we are old?

Now, I’m going to tell you what you all know.  There are two major issues facing everyone as they grow old.  The first is how will they survive financially, when they are no longer capable of working?  And the second is how will they be cared for as they face the health issues that always come with old age?

Do you realize, that our answer to these questions is specifically related to the fourth commandment, and honoring our fathers and mothers?  God cares about these things.

To begin with, we have sought to address these issues as a society in two primary ways:  we have “Social Security” and “Medicare”, and if needed, “Medicaid”.

You know the basics:

We all pay into Social Security so that each of us will in turn receive at least a bare minimum income during our retirement years and into our old age. 

And likewise, all of us pay into Medicare and Medicaid so that as we age, we too will be able to receive the medical care that is needed.

On the surface, it would appear that we have “honored our fathers and mothers” by providing for these two basic needs.  But anyone who listens to the news knows that there are also problems.

We are making choices that will have consequences.

One of the choices that we are making, for example, is whether we raise taxes to pay for the increased cost of health care for the elderly, or simply reduce the benefits.

I learned a bit about this when the congregation I served in Sandpoint built Luther Park, a senior housing facility.  One of my dreams was that we’d be able to offer the best in senior care for everyone, regardless of their ability to pay.  And then the painful reality set in.

What I discovered was that there were two major problems facing our residents.

The first was finding a doctor.

We had many residents who moved to Sandpoint from out of the area, and of course, when they got here they had to find a primary care physician.  The problem is that many of the primary care physicians in Sandpoint simply could not accept anymore Medicare patients.  It’s not because they didn’t like old people. The problem is that Medicare does not reimburse doctors enough to pay for the care that seniors require.  Doctors, as a result, can only allow a certain percentage of their patients to be Medicare patients, otherwise they will go bankrupt.  I have a friend who did go bankrupt because he could not turn away the elderly.

Second problem:  The high cost of care for assisted living and nursing homes is beyond what many seniors can afford.  The average cost of assisted living is between $3,000 to $3,500 a month, and if one needs nursing home care, you can easily double or triple that.  After a few years, what assets a person has are often gone, and then they are reliant on Medicaid.

But, there is a problem with Medicaid.  The amount Medicaid reimburses is not sufficient to cover the cost of providing that care.  Luther Park, for example, can only afford to have a few residents on Medicaid.  Otherwise it would have to shut its doors.

And so what happens to our fathers and mothers?

That’s the question.

Now what is the point of all this?

The point is:

Choices matter.

Choices have consequences.

And to not make a choice, is to choose.

Moses puts before the people of Israel, in the strongest terms possible, the choice that was before them.

“Choose Life!” was his admonition.

Of course the alternative is to choose death.

It would be nice if God would simply make everything right, regardless what choice we make, but it simply doesn’t work out that way.  The choices we make have consequences.

And God, in his love, warns us of the consequences.

God, you see, loves us enough that he would like to spare us the pain of dealing with the consequences that come from poor choices, and so warns us.  It’s not that he wants to punish us.  It’s that he doesn’t want us to suffer.  And so he puts the choice before us, and hopes that we will choose life.

There are all sorts of examples of choices that we will make that will have consequences.

Many of our young people are concerned about things such as Global Warming.  They, you see, strangely enough, are concerned about what the world we live in will be like in 50 years, because, unlike many of us, they will actually be alive in 50 years. 

It is easy to say that this is a political issue and to frame it in the differences between liberal and conservative politics.  Actually, it has nothing whatsoever to do with politics.

Either the oceans are warming, or they are not.  It doesn’t matter if you are democrat or republican.

Either the ice on the polar ice caps is melting, or it is not.  It doesn’t matter whether you are liberal or conservative.

Either the weather patterns throughout the world are changing or they are not.  It doesn’t matter whether you live in a democracy, or a communist nation.

And either the choices we are making are having an impact on this, or they are not.

The reason scientists are warning us about global warming is that they actually stick a thermometer in the ocean and measure the temperature.  Novel thought.

The question that drives many of our young people crazy is whether we are willing to take responsibility for our actions, or not.

When God puts before us a choice, are we willing to base our actions on the promises he offers, and heed the warnings he gives? 

A number of years ago, I received a very personal warning.  I share it because it gets to the point of this whole matter.  I was going through a very deep depression, and my doctor was understandably concerned.  Suicide is too often the tragic outcome of depression, and so the doctor had a warning for me.  “The likelihood of dying from a self-inflicted gunshot wound is much higher if you actually have a gun.”

His point was that my choices, at that time in my life, might make the difference between living and dying. 

Make the right choice was his admonition.

Choose life!  God says.

Choose life, and surprisingly enough, you will live.

One of the gifts God gives us is freedom.

We have the freedom to choose. 

And our choices make a difference.

We are not the helpless victims of fate. 

God gives us his law to guide us in making the right choices so that we might live a good and blessed life.  But in the end, the choice is ours.

“See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today, by loving the Lord your God, walking in his ways, and observing his commandments, decrees, and ordinances, then you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess.”  “Choose life so that you and your descendants may live.”

Amen

Year C, Proper 18, Deuteronomy 30:15-20, Choices

"If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today, by loving the Lord your God, walking in his ways, and observing his commandments, decrees, and ordinances, then you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess. But if your heart turns away and you do not hear, but are led astray to bow down to other gods and serve them, I declare to you today that you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess."

Our God is not a punishing God, but one who in love, shares with us the real and inevitable consequences of our actions.  

There are choices that will lead to an abundant and prosperous life.  And choices that will lead to death.

It is as though God is writing the warning label on products and behaviors.  "Smoking may cause cancer."  It is not that God punishes smokers by striking them down with cancer.  He doesn't.  It's an inherent risk associated with that behavior.  And God wants us to know that.

Drive in an unsafe manner, speeding, running stop lights, driving drunk, and you will die (or perhaps you will kill someone else).  The natural consequences of these behaviors are pretty straight forward.  And God would not have us experience those consequences, and so warns us.  Like a parent who warns their child not to touch the hot burner, God warns us.  Just don't do it.  Trust me, don't do it.

Unfortunately for us, we have this rebellious streak within us that refuses to heed the advice of those wiser than ourselves, opting instead to learn from our own mistakes, if at all.  And God, patiently, persistently, and all too frequently, must sit back and say "I tried to tell you, but you would not listen!"

For all of God's fatherly advice, we are still prone to jump to the conclusion that God punishes for the sake of punishing.  Its like a teenager who ends up in jail for drunk driving and is convinced that their parent called the cops on them.  Rather than accept responsibility for their own actions, they seek someone else to blame.  

Choose life and you will live.  Choose death and you will die.  Sound advice.  But we don't like to admit there are consequences to our actions.

Scientists predict dire consequences for our planet if we do not take action of climate change.  Global warming is directly related to our actions.  But we are deaf to the warnings.  We don't believe the warnings.  We refuse to accept responsibility.  Perhaps when cities like New Orleans and Miami are underwater, we will become believers.  Or perhaps we will simply blame the Core of Engineers.  

Choices have consequences.  And all our loving God can do is warn us of the consequences and hope, beyond hope, we will make the right choice.