Sermon - July 29, 2012

9^th after Pentecost       

John 6:1-21                                                                           

A Miracle Worker - Not One Who Works Miracles

That was a long Gospel lesson.  I hope you were able to retain what happened in the opening verses.  By the time we got to the end, the content as well as the theme has changed so much it is difficult to know exactly where to begin a sermon.  The temptation is to try to deal with it all – but I am not sure you would sit still for that long of a sermon – so I hope you will accept my attempt to compress it all into a few brief paragraphs.

Here is what I make of this lesson – it is all about convincing us that Jesus is who we believe him to be; yet, warning us against doing what we would be inclined to do when we found someone who is who we have come to understand him to be.  Did you get that?  It is a bit of a confusing sentence.  Compression into a few lines is necessary.  We do have a full service. 

Pull your bulletins out, and if you have a pen or pencil you might want to get that out also.  Look with me, first at verse 2.  Note that the Gospel writer not only tells us that Jesus has become quite popular, he tells us why.  It seems that many are following him because they saw the signs that he was doing for the sick.  That is completely understandable, right?   Who would not follow someone who was healing the sick and sometimes even raising the dead?  Nothing wrong that is until you take notice of verse 15.  By this time, it seems, Jesus has become concerned that the people have seen so many “signs” that they are about to do something which he does not want them to do.  Verse 15 reads:  When Jesus realized that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain by himself. 

Let’s go back to my confusing, summation sentence.  I believe that this lesson is all about convincing us that Jesus is who we believe him to be.  This lesson tells us that Jesus does have the ability to feed the multitudes with just a few loaves and fish.  This lesson demonstrates Jesus’ divinity by having him walk on water.  This lesson goes to great lengths to convince us that Jesus is who we believe him to be.  And, yet, this lesson also warns us - warns us - that we should not do that which it seems natural to do.  Jesus will have no part of being captured by the mood of the crow, taken away, and elevated to some earthly title or office.   

That is not who he came to be.  Jesus will have no part of any humanly constructed office.  Jesus takes action in order to ensure that his followers will see him as Christ, and only as Christ.

This is a difficult thing to do.  Once his place in the university is understood, the inclination is to turn to him to solve the problems and concerns which vex the rest of us humans.  We want him to cure our disease.  We turn to him to solve our conflicts.  We seek in him the ability to fill our bellies and satisfy our thirst.  But this is not the office to which Jesus aspires.

Even more strongly than in John, the Gospel of Mark goes to great lengths to preserve Jesus’ Messianic identity.  Over and over, Jesus forbids those who recognize him (typically those considered possessed by demons or those who are living unacceptable lives,) Jesus forbids those who recognize him from telling others what they have come to know.  In Mark 6, when he restores hearing and speaking to the beggar he instructs him to “tell no one.”  In Luke, Jesus cleanses a leper.  He sends him to the priest for the rites of purification.   He also “orders” him to “tell no one.”  “Why,” we might ask, “would Jesus want to keep his most powerful witnesses quiet?” 

He fears the very thing which we read in the 15^th verse of today’s appointed text.  Jesus is concerned that we might start to follow for the wrong reasons.  Jesus is worried that we might make something of him which he was never intended to be.   Jesus did not want to be King; he came in order to be our Messiah.

I am not trying to discredit, discount, or dissuade you from reading the miracles stories in the bible.  They are very important.  These stories give us confidence that Jesus is who we have come to understand him to be.  But let’s make sure that in telling the stories we do nothing to distract from the story which is at the center of our bibles.  The story which is at the center of our bibles is not Jesus’ ability to feed the 5,000 with a few loaves and a couple of fish.  It is not his walking on water.  The story at the center of our Bibles is Jesus’ death on the cross and resurrection from the tomb.  This is the story which defines our Christian faith. 

Jesus works many miracles and accomplishes many great feats.  The Bible is chocked full of stories intended to convince us that he is who we have come to believe him to be.  But the bible also warns us against making him something less than what he is.  Miracle workers are a dime a dozen.  Jesus works the miracle of saving us. 

It is a tight line we walk, between knowing that our Master has all power and authority – and – expecting him to exercise that power on our behalf.  It seems reasonable to expect that he would do all that he can, for us.  And it puzzles us when it seems that he does not.  The Bible uses stories of Jesus’ healing powers in order to assure us that our hope is not in vain.  And that same Bible warns us that it is wrong to seek him out of a desire to harness those powers.

We are, indeed, saved from sin and death and the power of the devil.  But premature baldness, cataracts, diabetes, and lymphoma are not list of things that he assures us he will take away.  We do have the witness, of a multitude of saints who have gone before us, that his grace will be sufficient. 

Amen.

Sermon - July 8, 2012

6^th Sunday in Pentecost – Year B   

Holy Trinity, Raleigh

Centennial Celebration

Mark 6:1-13                                                                      

                                                             Going Home – Or Just Going 

It was a red letter day in Nazareth.  The excitement was palatable.  Everyone, even those who had to travel a great distance, had made the journey back.  There was great excitement.  The local boy had come home.  He was at the synagogue, teaching.

He had become quite the celebrity since he left.  He had healed the sick, he had calmed the storm.  There were even stories of him have raised a child from the dead. 

Everyone was filled with anticipation. It was a red letter day.  Then something went wrong.  What they hoped would happened did not.  What they were anticipating simply did not occur. 

I wonder if I was the only one who cringed, just a little, at yesterday’s celebration lunch, which it was suggested that somewhere around 11:30 this morning the Sharon Freeze and the other members of the Centennial Planning Teams could relax.  Knowing the appointed Gospel text, I realized that our expectations and even the purist of anticipations has the potential to run aground on what actually happens when God’s people gather around the Word of God.

It seemed like a simple thing, there in Nazareth, when Jesus finally comes home and he finally returns to his hometown synagogue.  Ninety minutes or so and everyone can just relax.  But it didn’t happen that way. 

Why didn’t it?  What went wrong?  And more to the point – how can we make sure that this, our red letter day doesn’t go wrong?

Look again at the story.  The verses expose where the missteps were taken.  The sentences expose why this day was doomed from the moment the crowd began to think about what was going on.

If I were in Clemson, with the college students, whom I know well and who have come to know me – I would give a long, uncomfortable pause about now, allowing them to search and struggle a bit.  Sometimes, at the end of such a pause,  I would entertain suggestions – and with each I would acknowledge the insight and validity of the reply.  Sometimes, I even change what I was thinking of saying, when one of the answers is more helpful than the one I had in mind.  Do you still need more time?  Have you located, in these short six verses, a possible explanation for why things didn’t go well in Nazareth that day?

           Look at verse 2 and 3.  As you re-read those, remember the overall mood which has been given to the events of yesterday, today, and the Centennial year being concluded.  It is the message which I was very carefully (and repeatedly) instructed to address.  Enough of a pause:  That day in Nazareth didn’t live up to expectations because those who gathered were more interested in looking backward than they were in looking forward.  They chose to skip over Jesus’ words, discussing instead the years that Jesus had lived among them as the carpenter’s son.   The red letter day was ruined when the folks gathering in God’s house looked to their past rather than hearing where the Word of God was inviting them to go. 

On that greatly anticipated day in Nazareth, things did get off to a good start.  Jesus is teaching, and those who hear him are astounded.  Other places in the scriptures it is said of Jesus that “taught as one who had authority,” not like some hired scribe or preacher.  Jesus begins to teach in the synagogue, and they are taken with what it is that he has to say.

It is dangerous to be critical of the writer of the Gospel, but this another of those times when I would like to have had some of the content of what Jesus teaches.  If only Mark had included what the teacher had said.  Think of how easy that would make my job.  I would have Jesus’ lecture notes; I could stand in front of the class and just read them.  But if the content of Jesus’ instruction were included here we might miss the Word of God being revealed here.  The Word of God is no so much content as it is an experience of God’s hopes and God’s desires.   Remembering and repeating what God has said in the past is the way we open ourselves to the invitation of what God seeks to say to use in the now.

Things went wrong that day in Nazareth because the people who were initially taken with the way in which Jesus made the Word of God present in their lives, shifted out of the moment and sought to understand how this invitation to be present with God could arise from the same little boy whom they all knew as the carpenter’s son.  In trying to understand how Jesus could astound them, they looked to his roots and to his past – ignoring the significance of what was happening to them right now; ignoring how these events (these words being spoken) were to impact their future.

When I got the invitation to share this day with you, (and let me say that there are few times in my ministry when I have been more honored) I turned to the lectionary to see the appointed lessons.  Upon first reading, I wondered why the appointed Gospel text for today covered two rather significant events.  The first six verses of our reading are this story of Jesus and the disastrous celebration in Nazareth.  Then there is that second story, the story contained in verses 7 to 13.  Do you remember what happens there?

In this second half of today’s gospel reading, Jesus gathers the twelve and he sends them out.  He tells them that they are to go to the surrounding villages and that once there they are to proclaim a call to repentance; they are to cast out demons, anoint the sick, and cure those with disease. 

The focus of the folks in that synagogue in Nazareth had been to look at the past, at the relationships which were familiar.  Jesus’ emphasis is for them to forge new opportunities; for them to move forth from where they are to where they might be.

I had not realized, until yesterday, why this was the weekend selected for these celebrations.  If my understanding is correct, it was 100 years ago yesterday (to the day) that this faithful fellowship met for the first time.  How symbolic, that yesterday’s thanksgiving for the accomplishments of the past 100 years would fall on the same calendar date as the original gathering.  More symbolic still, is that it on this, the first day of the new century, is the day that we gather here around the Word of God and the gifts of God’s grace.  You were a bit lucky that July 7 and July 8, 2012 fell on a Saturday and a Sunday.  But you have taken full advantage of this opportunity. 

Yesterday, on the day when you celebrated the past 100 years, you spent most of the time talking, and telling stories, and celebrating all that had occurred.  For those here today that were unable to be present yesterday, there was the obligatory invitation for folks to stand if they had been baptized at Holy Trinity, confirmed here, married here.  The master of ceremonies did a masterful job of helping identify folks who had been a part of this community for only a few years – and welcoming them, as well as celebrating those who had been here for upwards of sixty or even seventy years.  Very well done.  Very impressive.

That was yesterday – the last day of the old century.  Today is the first day of the new century.  How wonderful that on the day which launches the faithful community forward, the format of the gathering is to to praise God, to worship, and to be fed at God’s Holy Table.  Well done!  That is the way to move into the future – not with the pridee of one’s own success nor the arrogance of humanly conceived plans – but with a plea that God would bestow upon us his goodness and his mercy and his grace.

And God will. God always does. God never abandons those who turn to Him with sincere hearts and earnest pleas.

That is really all that I have to say, and I realize that I ought to simply sit down.  The Word of God has been spoken here today, among God’s people.  If I were in Clemson, among those students whom I have come to know and how have come to know me, I would wait right here, for an “Amen.”  Let me try it again.  Let me try it again.  I am done.  I really ought to sit down….  ….but there is just one more thing I would like to call to our attention.  It is about this thing we refer to as the “future.”

Here is what we know about the future, about the only thing we know about the future:  the future is not the past.   We know that the future will look very different from the past.  But that is the way we would prefer it.  I don’t mean to ignore the pasts which were shared with a loved one who now lies in their grave awaiting resurrection.  How many days in the future might we be willing to give for just one day in the past to tell our wife how much we love her, or to tell our father how grateful we are?  I don’t mean to ignore such emotions.  Such emotions are attached to our personal past, rather than our shared past.  The future, toward which we are moving will look very different from the past – and that is what we want it to do – to look differently.  We what it to be different.  We seek a future in which the hopes and promises of God become a reality for us and for all who share God’s planet.  

The future won’t look anything like the past.  But that is okay.  We don’t want a future which is little more than a re-hashing of the past.  We want it to be the future.   

I was gifted with an image this past week.  A presenter at the Campus Ministry Conference at Yale showed us pictures of teams training for the Olympics.  One team was rowing; the other was paddling.  Most of us have seen folks rowing.  They look so sleek and impressive and in sync with one another as they pull on their oars and slice through the water.  They look so smooth.  Paddlers are different.  I am sure there is as much coordination and teamwork involved, but they look chaotic and even frantic.  But here is the difference between rowing and paddling:  rowers are looking backward - paddlers are looking forward.

If you want it to look smooth and even, look back.  But if you look forward, things are more likely to seem chaotic.  But looking forward is the only way to see the future toward which we are moving.

The challenge is to set our hearts at ease as we live into this great unknown.  The difficult thing is not to be scared out of our wits as this unknown future opens before us. 

So long as they looked forward, things were okay.  They were better than okay.  They were great.  Remember that as long as the folks in that synagogue in Nazareth were looking forward, things were okay.  Things fall apart when they began to look back, to see how this carpenter’s kid could have come to posses such insights.  Things fall apart when we forget that it isn’t the wisdom of the speaker but the power of the Word which makes the invitation astounding. 

Holy Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church has a wonderful and powerful history.  It is a history to which I am heavily indebted.  It is a history which has prepared you to ask, “What might God be calling us to in the future.”  Keep your eyes on that mission, and whatever happens is bound to be wonderful.

Amen.

Sermon - Pentecost 5 - 2012

Pentecost 5 – Year B  

July 1, 2012  

Mark 5:21-43 

                                                              Faith – What Kind of Faith 

Do you know that in Turkey, every Imam receives their sermon in the mail, prior to the weekly worship service?  As I was having one flight then another canceled on my attempts to return from Turkey to the US, I thought, “Wouldn’t that be nice.”  To have a central authority tell you what you were to say during weekly prayers.  It would remove all the stress over preparing something (and all the embarrassment over not spending as much time preparing as you ought.)  Gone would be the competition to be the congregation with the popular preacher.  And none of the tension which arises when the preacher says something which steps on the toes of the congregation’s members – always with the accusation that said toe stepping avoids the issue of which the preacher is most blinded. 

But if there was a central structure, providing the text for Sunday sermons, what would they do with today’s Gospel?  I am not really asking a question; I am pretty sure what they would say.  And, what they would say would please most of us; hardly stepping on any toes at all.  (Except maybe mine.) 

This section of Mark’s gospel is all about “Faith.”  Last week’s calming of the storm at sea was about the lack of faith in the disciples.  Today’s reading lifts up the faith of the woman with the flow of blood and a leader of the synagogue.  If there was a centrally prepared sermon, distributed and gleefully read in all of our congregations would no doubt end with, “See, it is possible to have faith.  Now do it!”   

Simple enough.  Easy enough.  Enough said?  Maybe. 

The only fly in the ointment is the identity of the two characters in these stories.  They aren’t just anyone; they aren’t just foils for what the writer of the Gospel wants to say about having faith.  With just a few simple phrases Mark makes it clear that his locus for “faith” is rooted in those who ought not to be lifted up by those with the power to write a centralized sermon on what all this means.  Mark choses a renegade leader of the religious community and a woman whose medical condition rendered her unacceptable in the eyes of the folks who had a reserved pew at the local house of worship. 

Jairus is described as “one of the leaders of the synagogue.”  Remember that Jesus was not welcomed in synagogues.  Recall that it was the religious leaders who arranged for his arrest and took him to Pilot with the insistence that Pilot crucify Jesus.  Whether there had been an official decree by this time is unknown.  We are only in the fifth chapter.  There probably hasn’t been anything official.  But by the time this was written down, everyone familiar with the story knew that synagogue leaders were heavily involved in preventing Jesus from raising any more little girls from their death beds. 

Jairus is the one who comes to Jesus.  One who steps outside the acceptable or accepted circle and invites in the one who serves God. 

The woman, whose faith “made (her) well,” wasn’t even self-confident enough to face Jesus.  She was so convinced of her un-cleanliness that she slips up behind him and touches the hem of his robe.  She is the one who KNOWS that there is something going on here; she also knows that those seeking to control what is going on here won’t let her within miles of the action.   

These stories are about having “faith,” but the writer of the Gospel lifts up an image of what it means to have faith which challenges those of us who feel quite at home and comfortable in our religious houses and neatly pressed Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes. 

I have preached on this text before.  In the previous sermon I outlined the four differing ways of speaking of “faith.”  You have heard all that, so I don’t need to repeat it.  If you don’t remember it, go to my blog and you will find the 1999 sermon posted there.  Today, I only want to review the summary and draw some conclusions. 

We suffer from thinking of “faith” as a concept interchangeable with “belief.”  We have allowed “having faith” to become synonymous with “believing this or giving assent to that.”  There is such an understanding of what it means to have faith, and I have no doubt that such an understanding is what would burst forth from any official, centrally written sermon on this passage.  “Have faith,” is spoken of as “believe this,” primarily meant to communicate “believe what it is that I am telling you in this sermon.”

But that is only one understanding of what it means to have faith; only one possible approach.  

It is an approach which became significantly more important in the 4^th Century.  Remember what happened to Christianity in the 4^th Century?  A guy by the name of Constantine became a believer.  He made Christianity the official religion of his Holy Roman Empire.  As the official religion, it was important that everyone believe the “right” thing, so he began a process of getting folks together to set forth the right thing, then using those statements of what were the right things to determine who was and who was not close enough in their understanding to be allowed to think of themselves as a part of the church of the Holy Roman Empire. 

By the way – two weeks ago – on Sunday – I was in the Church built for the coronation of the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.  I am dying to tell you all about it, but that is a travel-log, not a sermon. 

This kind of “faith” is faith as assensus. It is a faith rooted in believing the right thing.  It happens primarily in our heads.  It is the kind of faith which is clean and pure and well defined.  It is the kind of faith that has the official stamp of the empire – whether that be the empire of Rome, or the empire known as the ELCA, or the Southern Baptist Convention, or if even if that empire is as local as the Congregation in Clemson known as University Lutheran.  This kind of faith would have kept Jairus from ever reaching out to Jesus and it would have ensured that the bleeding woman would not have touched Jesus. 

There are other ways to speak of faith.  And the one with which I want to leave you is Visio.  This way of speaking of faith addresses the way we see the world.  It calls upon us to see the world, not as we are inclined to see the world, but as God sees the world. 

Jesus didn’t see Jairus as a member of the band of brothers which would eventually succeed in having him put to death.  Jesus didn’t see the woman as filthy and dirty.  He sees them differently.  And in retelling this story, the Gospel calls upon us to see differently, too.  It calls upon us to have the faith which allows us to see the world as God sees the world. 

How do we see the world?  Does the faith within us see the world in terms of those who are right and those who are wrong?  Or does our faith encourage us to see the world as God sees the world?

If there was some centralized source for the sermons to be read at this morning’s prayer services – it probably would have been written before the Supreme Court decisions handed down this week.  The official, universally read sermon would have had to allow for any outcome, so it would have been totally useless in addressing the fallout associated with the decisions on Arizona’s immigration laws or the Health Care Reform Act.  It probably would have just avoided mentioning the Court’s actions.  And if you understand the wisdom of avoiding talk about that civil event, why speak of other civil events – like the 4^th of July.  What good does it do to talk about universal ideals of freedom and justice and opportunity unless you are going to speak of where those cherished and costly defended ideals are lived out in the current context? If the gathered faithful are incapable of a civil, respectable discussion on contemporary expressions of the constitution, what makes us think we can talk about the first issuance of that document?  If it is about being right or wrong, then 5 against 4 is “right” and gone is a shared struggle to understand what we are to do.  

In a world where faith is a matter of giving assent to the correct things you cannot risk saying much.  You might be wrong.  Wrong wrong, or at least wrong in the minds of your hearers.  So you say nothing.   

When faith is a matter of the way we look out upon the world, one is free to say, “I think this might work.  It might not.  I am going to act upon my hope and I invite you to act on yours, too.  And, should one of us come to realize our actions aren’t working, then let’s return to this place and come up with new ideas, once more.  And let’s avoid thinking that we were locked into camps with that first attempt and that we can’t return to this spot in order to help each other see the shortcomings of what we have previously offered as a solution.”  

Jairus knew that he was deep sixing his future when he went to the heretic to plead for his daughter’s life.  The woman with the hemorrhage understood that she could be stoned to death for ignoring the purity laws of the synagogue.  But they acted on faith – a faith which said to them, there is another way to see the world, and I am going to follow Jesus and see the world that way.

Amen.

Sermon from June 1999

5th Sunday after Pentecost – Year B      

June 28, 2009    

Mark 5:21-43

 Note:  This sermon is referenced in the Sermon for July 1, 2012.  It is here as background.

            What is “Faith”?

      “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”

     

      There is a simplistic understanding of Jesus’ words - and a very complex understanding of Jesus’ words to the woman who pushes her way through the crowd in order to touch the hem of Jesus’ robes.  The simple understanding is to link her confidence that Jesus could cure what ailed her with an act in which Jesus does indeed heal her.  This understanding is sufficient.  There is no necessity for going any further.  It is enough for us to hear and to come to know Jesus as the one who embodies God’s desire for wholeness in our lives. 

     

      The woman knows this.  Jairus knows this.  Retelling their story is Mark’s way of helping us to know this. 

     

      The Good News – proclaimed this day for all to hear – is that Jesus enters our world in order to do this very thing.  His life among us affirms for all eternity the promise of Lamentations.  The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end.

     

      It is enough; it is more than enough, to hear this news and to rejoice in this news as we gather around font and table to touch and to taste this good news.  It is enough.

     

      Now, if you want to exert a bit of mental energy.  If you feel, anywhere at all in the deep recesses of your heart and mind, the desire for subtleties, then we could go a bit further.  We could – it is up to you.  What do you want to do?  Okay, let’s settle it this way.  If you are not sure you want to pick apart unessential, minute differences in language, you can pull out your hymnal and start to read through the psalms.  Go ahead.  You have my permission.  If you want to think about this a little more, then you might want to get out a pencil and look for some marginal space on your bulletin.  Cause what comes next is less in the order of a sermon and more along the lines of a lecture.

     

      “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”

     

      This whole section of Mark is about faith.  The parts of Mark chapters 4, 5 and 6 which we are reading through for these three week are all about faith.  The cover of last week’s bulletin would have had us to think that the reading was about Jesus calming a storm.  “Not so,” Pastor Hartsell’s sermon pointed out.  The story was about the lack of faith on the part of the disciples.  When they wake Jesus, asking why he is napping in the back of the boat while this storm is about to wash them all overboard and to an early grave, he asks them, “Have you still no faith?”

     

      Same issue with this week’s artwork which suggests that these stories are about a miracle.  But the verse in the center, the comment around which everything else coalesces, is this statement on the part of Jesus where he says as clearly as can ever be said, “It is all about FAITH.”

     

      Danielle will be preaching next Sunday.  Guess what?  She will have the opportunity to answer the question of why Jesus isn’t accepted in his hometown.  Jesus will not be able to any deeds of great power in that place.  He will leave the city, amazed at their unbelief.

     

      The disciples fail to cling to faith;  the hometown folks follow a similar path;  only this unnamed, bleeding woman seems to get it and does what is necessary to position herself to receive what it is that Jesus has to offer.

     

      “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”     “Faith.” It is all about faith.

     

      You already know that, though, don’t you?  You understand that it is “faith” which makes all the difference.  Right?  Simple stuff.  But here is the hard part – tell me what “faith” is?  How do you define “faith”?  What does it mean when some preacher or pastor tells you to “have faith”?  In a few minutes we will baptize Caroline Grace.  We will stand in a circle around the baptismal font and “profess (our) faith in Christ Jesus, reject sin, and confess the faith of the Church.”  What does that mean?  

     

      Let’s try something.  And this will either be a great thing or a terrible flop.  I want you to turn to someone sitting next to you and say what you understand faith to be.  Really.  Make sure no one is left out of a pair.  So you might not get to talk to the person who came with you but with someone else.  45 seconds.  Tell one another what “faith” means.

     

      Okay.  First and foremost – there are no wrong answers.  Second – I would love to have (in writing) how each of you answered the question.  Write it on your bulletin (don’t change it after you hear what I am about to say) and leave it with me or send me an email when you get home.

     

      “Faith.”  What is it?  (Mary and Brian have heard this stuff before, as have many of the campus ministry students.  That is why I can only preach this sermon in the summer when most of the students are away.)

     

      Within the writings of Christianity there are four differing ways of under-standing “faith.”  Each of these understandings has a basis in scripture and each is informative in some way.  My complaint (and the complaint of a guy by the name of Marcus Borg) is that in modern religious speak one of the under-standings has come to overshadowed the other three.  That one does stand somewhat opposite the other three.

     

      The winner in most surveys is to speak of faith as believing that which it would otherwise be impossible to believe.  You are going to be asked to do that in just a few minutes.  You are going to be asked to receive, in faith, a piece of bread and a sip of wine along with the assertion that it isn’t merely bread or wine but that it is for us the very body and blood of our Messiah.  Quite often we hear faith defined as the ability to believe things that others will find impossible to believe.  We do it every time we break the loaves and pour from the chalice.  We do it when we take a few ounces of tap water, transfer it to that ceramic bowl, and pour it over the head of some unsuspecting child.

     

      The Latin word is assensus.  This is where you could write in the margin of your bulletin.  A-s-s-e-n-s-u-s.  It means to give intellectual assent to something that is being proposed.  Faith as intellectual assent is important.  When asked, “Do you believe in Jesus Christ?” it is faith as assensus which is being asked for.  This faith involves our cognitive skills.  It is a faith of the head.

     

      There remain the three other understandings.  Each of these three would better be understood as matters of the heart.  Emotional in nature, they involve faith as Trust;  as Fidelity;  and as Vision.

     

      The Latin word for faith as trust would be Fiducia.  F-i-d-u-c-i-a.  Faith, spoken of this way, is the ability to set aside our anxiety or our worries.  It is the confidence that God has and does take notice of us and our plight.  When Jesus wakes in the back of the boat he asks the disciples, “Why are you afraid?”  As Pastor Hartsell pointed out last week, there were plenty of reasons for them to be afraid.  There was a whale of a storm going on out there.  There will always be reasons to be afraid.  Faith is the confidence that none of those reasons are as strong as the God who says to us, “Be not afraid.”

     

      Next Latin word also begins with an “F.”  Fidelitas.  F-i-d-e-l-i-t-a-s.  In this case, faith is remaining true to the one whom we claim to be our Lord and Master.  Talking the talk is easier than walking the walk.  Walking the walk is faith as Fidelitas;  it is faith as faithfulness to God.  You know all those stories in the Bible which speak of adultery?  Well, some of them are talking about relationships between human couples.  But a whole bunch of them address the relationship between God and those who claim to be God’s people.  If you haven’t read Hosea recently, let that be your homework. 

     

      Faith is fidelity.  Fidelity of the heart, of the tongue, of our hands, of the way we live our lives.

     

      And then there is Visio.  V-i-s-i-o.  Some look at the world through rose colored glasses.  Christians look at the world through the eyes of Christ.  The vision we have is vision shared with Messiah.  When Jesus looked out upon the crowd he didn’t see pick-pockets and pan-handlers.  He saw children harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. 

     

      My complaint with that whole series of books referred to as the “Left Behind” series has to do with visio – with a vision in which the world is seen as threatening and hostile.  Seeing with the eyes of Jesus is seeing sin as the enemy, not the person trapped in sin.  Seeing as Jesus would see is loving persons so that they will be free to change, not expect them to change so that they will be more lovable.

     

      Trust-Fidelity-Vision – these understandings of faith are matters of the heart.  These ways of defining faith are not limited to what goes on inside our head; they are connected to the organ which pumps life to every cell of our body.

     

      I am not discounting faith as assensus.  I hope I made that clear already.  But it can’t stop with the head.  It must move on to the heart. 

     

      “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”

     

      Faith is what matters.  Faith is what Jesus wants to see in his followers.  If you have had times in your life when you wondered if your faith would match up to this nameless, bleeding woman, maybe the problem wasn’t the depth or strength of your faith but your struggle to understand what faith actually is.  It “is” a number of things, to a number of people.  The complex understanding is to embrace faith as all four:  intellectual assent – trust – fidelity – vision.  A simpler option is employed by the woman in Mark 5 and she is the example for all to follow.     

      Join us in affirming the faith of the Church, the faith in which we baptize Caroline Grace. 

      Come to the table, where your faith will receive the outpouring of Jesus presence among us.

      Your faith brings these gifts into your life.  Go in peace, healed of that which disquiets you and puts you ill at ease. 

     

      Amen.