June 20, 2021                                                                        Text:  2 Corinthians 6:1-13

Dear Friends in Christ,

            Some of you have been around since the early stages of the church plant that became our church – Good Shepherd Lutheran.  This morning we look at another church plant that got off to a rocky start.  There were divisions among the members.  A sex scandal involving a member.  There was disorder in worship and confusion about fundamental beliefs, including the resurrection of Jesus.  A painful visit from the Pastor-missionary was followed by a tough letter from this same fella.  This church plant was hanging by a thread.  Then came another letter from the missionary except this letter brought comfort and good news that they needed.

            We know this letter as 2 Corinthians.  The Pastor/Church planter is the Apostle Paul.  The Church in Corinth had been through a lot when they received this letter.  There was even conflict between the church and Paul.

            Paul notes a problem they have.  Their hearts are restricted, confined, closed off.  Their hearts are blocked by a stubbornness that is putting them at risk.  Paul pleads with them and speaks to us . . .

“WHAT CAN HEAL OUR SPIRITUAL HEART DISEASE?”

            We all are aware of physical heart disease.  The hamburger we have piled high from the fast food restaurant or movie theater popcorn with butter is not helping the situation.  Neither is the backside on the couch when a nice walk should be the menu item for the day.  It builds up fat that clogs heart and arteries.  Not enough oxygen is getting through to our cells and we suffer.

            We don’t know if the Corinthians suffered physical heart disease but we do know they suffered spiritual heart disease.  How about you?  Ever closed your heart off to others?  Walked by a person in need?  Conveniently forgot to wash the dishes or take out the garbage and it was left for someone else?  We too suffer spiritual heart disease when we fail to love our neighbor as ourselves.

            What could damage our heart?  Maybe you’ve been hurt by someone and you find it hard to trust?  Someone close to you has died and you can’t understand why God would allow such a thing.  Or could it be a conflict with another person that causes anxiety and you suffer in silence for it? 

            Every one of us in this sanctuary has had affliction and suffering.  No one has a perfect heart.  Like the Corinthians are hearts are restricted.

            The Church in Corinth was not left to themselves to conquer their spiritual heart disease.  Healing was available to them and it is available to you.  Paul proclaimed, “Now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” (v. 2)  These early Christians no longer have to carry around their burdens.  They don’t need to hang on to their shame, their guilt, or the wrong done to them.  Their damaged hearts have been made whole in Jesus.  Paul wrote in the previous chapter, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.  The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”  (2 Cor. 5:17)  A new heart has been created within them.  Salvation, help, and grace, are all theirs because of Jesus.

            We inherit this same help, grace, and salvation as these brothers and sisters.  We are new creations because of Jesus.  Jesus opened his heart and his whole body and came down to earth and became us – fully human.  This sinless Son of God opened his heart and his arms and took our sin to a cross.  Jesus took our spiritual heart disease and, in exchange, gave us righteousness, forgiveness, and clean hearts.

            We are not left to heal ourselves.  We do not become our own cardiologist.  Our healer is the Lord Jesus.  Brothers and sisters in this mission plant of a congregation, now is the favorable time.  Now is the day of salvation when Jesus brings healing for our spiritual heart disease.  There is no waiting.  Come to the altar today for forgiveness, life and salvation through the healer’s body and blood.  You have already had your sins absolved by the authority of Jesus Himself.  You received God’s favor by hearing His Word of Good News.

            Our hearts will continue to be challenged.  We may even suffer some of the things Paul mentions.  Hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger, dishonor, slander.  We may still internalize conflict and grief and broken relationships.  Our hearts are imperfect.  But the struggle does not last forever.  We do not receive the grace of God in vain.  We receive the grace of God fully.  Just as Jesus has risen from the dead, we, too, will rise from our graves on the Last Day.  When He returns our hearts will not be restricted but will be opened wide.  When Jesus comes again, our spiritual heart disease will be forever cured.

                                                                                                                                    Amen. 

June 13, 2021                                                                                                Text:  Mark 4:26-34

Dear Friends in Christ,

            Is ignorance bliss?  Sometimes, not knowing what makes a thing great enhances its beauty. 

            Have you had this experience?  You eat something that is delicious and then you find out it had some ingredients in it you don’t like?  Mom makes a cake and you discover she put sour cream in it.  Should something sour be put in with sweet?  Sour cream helps make the cake moist but you still have a hard time reckoning your taste buds.  Or you are given bread that looks like pumpkin and so you go ahead and eat it.  Did you enjoy it?  Why, yes I did.  I can now tell you it was zucchini!  What? 

            Sometimes a thing is good on its own, and to know too much about it might ruin our appreciation for the good that is in it – ignorance, as they say, is bliss.  Such is the case in the parable of the growing seed that we hear from Jesus today.

“IGNORANCE IS BLISS?”

            It is true sometimes that not knowing what makes a thing great enhances its beauty.  Certainly for the growing seed, ignorance was bliss.  The succinctness of this parable gives it such power:  “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground.” (v. 26)  The kingdom is scattered throughout the whole world.  No distinction is made of the soil like in the parable of the sower.  It is sown in every place. 

            The man then goes about his business day and night and the seed grows without his knowing how:  “The earth produces by itself.” (v. 28)  The Greek term here is “automatically” no further invention is needed or required.  First the blade and then the ear and then the full grain.  Good growth happens even if the man doesn’t know how.  In time, a plentiful harvest will come.

            As prideful, sinful people we are not content with something working without our effort to make it happen.  When churches are dying we want to come up with some program to save them.  When members of our family or friends are outside the Christian faith we ask what can I do to bring them around to the love of Jesus?  How about our own faith life?  We might even take credit there by letting everyone know that we go to worship and Bible study regularly and we pray harder.

            But the truth behind all of these scenarios is not looking at what we can do, but what is done already.  The cake was good the way the baker crafted it.  The Kingdom of God is a beautiful gift because the Creator mysteriously causes it to grow into a glorious harvest. 

            The growth of the Kingdom of God is up to Him, not us.  Jesus highlights that in the parable today.  Man scatters the seed but God causes the growth.  Christ’s death on the cross has redeemed the whole world, and the Kingdom of God is already sown everywhere that the Gospel is preached – in you and me, in the people of God in the Church, in your unbelieving loved one, in your atheist neighbor, when they have heard the Gospel.

            The only growth that is going to happen will occur by God’s design, not by your effort, pressure, stress, or badgering.  It is God who grants the growth automatically.  If it were up to us to accomplish faith and church growth, we would have figured it out in two thousand years – growth would be happening by leaps and bounds.  It happens in God’s time.  Our Lord is more interested in freeing our guilty conscience in his forgiving grace and granting to us a holy and eternal joy.

            The question still lingers – what can be done?  Dr. Fred Craddock was a Professor of New Testament and Homiletics at Emory University.  He had a father who was very critical of the church.  Every now and then the minister would come to the Craddock home to speak with Fred’s dad.  Mr. Craddock would complain they didn’t care about him only his pledge of money.  This would embarrass Mrs. Craddock.  But Mr. Craddock continued this talk for years.

            There came a time he didn’t say it.  He was in the Veteran’s Hospital.  They had taken out his throat.  He was down to 74 lbs. and radiation had badly burned him.  He couldn’t speak.  Around his room were flowers everywhere.  Cards were attached from the Men’s Club and the Women’s Fellowship and the Youth Group.  Every group in the church and many other parishioners had sent cards. 

            Fred’s dad could not speak but he wrote on the side of a Kleenex box a line from Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’:  “In this harsh world, draw your breath in pain to tell my story.”  “Dad, what is your story?”  He wrote, “I was wrong, I was wrong!”

            There are a lot of desperate people in our world who are suffering emotionally, mentally, physically, spiritually.  God doesn’t ask us to be their critics.  He directs us to sow seed.  The Word will do what God wants it to do in spite of us.  He just asks us to share the love of Jesus.  Not to be obsessed with results – just do.  Christ’s love.  We’ve got it to share

            Virginia Laren put it this way:  “There is only one answer to man’s deepest needs, only one source of life.  Therefore, if I know Christ and have studied the Gospels, that makes me either a missionary or a cop-out.”  Where do you stand with this issue?  God bless our trust in the power of the Word.  God Bless our sowing.  Amen.