Why Lutheran?

 Lutheranism is a kind of confession.

A confession about what the Holy Spirit did within the Church those 505 years ago. 
A confession of God’s amazing acts in the lives of the Lutheran Reformers.

Confession that usually includes 95 Theses, Heidelberg Disputation, A Mighty Fortress, Luther’s Death Mask, and the Book of Concord…

            But today I’d like to give you all a bit different confession of the faith… 
Today I will answer, 
for myself at least, 
Why Lutheran?…

Why, when I look at this tradition that is over five centuries old, do I feel it echo in my soul?
Why can I affirm, “yeah, that’s it… that’s a faithful description of what I know God to be doing”?
Why Lutheran?

 

Prayer

            Why Lutheran? Because I was welcomed into the Faith through Baptism. 
Three days old, a life-threatening heart condition, 
they brought in a chain smoking Chaplain who happened to be Lutheran. 
She baptized me in the triune name, and that was that
—the start of being Lutheran.

 

            Why Lutheran? Because I encounter God in scripture. 

I lived in a very religious community out in Wyoming, 
and my father, God bless him, 
gave me a used Red Letter King James Bible, 
so I could read it and see if it said what preachers and other proselytizers said it did. 
Inside the Bible, I didn’t find the End of the World, or a list of people to hate
—but instead I experienced its words as Law and Gospel…

In the Gospels, when you read about people first encountering Jesus, almost inevitably it leads to moments of rejecting Jesus, or repentance that leads to life
—Law or Gospel, as we Lutherans might say, 
and I found that in spades, in the Bible
—an encounter with the profoundly strange, yet compelling God, 
who reveals himself to us in the Word.

 

            Why Lutheran? Because of Grace.

            Once bitten by this God bug, I rushed to find the Church, 
a community connected to the Bible, 
and more importantly, connected to the God that the Bible bears witnesses to, points to. 

Soon enough, I had “accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior” at a summer VBS, and was overjoyed… 
but one summer later… that joy was taken from me…
we same kids who had said the sinner’s prayer and accepted Christ, 
were asked to do it again, 
as a way to peer pressure the younger kids into doing the same… 
they’d engineered a religious experience
—I’d built my understanding of salvation on being MANIPUTED… 

If I wasn’t a Lutheran before, 
that experience was a “Here I Stand, I can do no other” moment, if I’ve ever had one… 
my salvation, 
the state of my eternal soul, 
my very self in its fullness,
I knew then, was God’s alone
—God’s choice, 
not my emotional state, 
or pedigree, 
or anything else... 
God’s grace alone holds me fast.

 

            Why Lutheran? Because faith is more than cognitive ascent, 
but a matter of the heart, 
trusting God. 

My parents didn’t exactly know what was wrong in my childhood church-search, 
but on a hunch my mom took me to the faith of her childhood
—a Lutheran Church, 
Christ Lutheran in Cheyenne Wyoming
—and there Pastor Sarah preached grace, grace, 
always grace, 
and it was only in such an environment that I could trust it to be true, 
to have the sure confidence that God is for me, not against me.

 

            Why Lutheran?  Because we are the hub of the Ecumenical wheel
—the Lutheran definition of “Church” is radically simple 
“a gathering where the gospel is taught purely and the sacraments are administered rightly,” 
everything else, 
from worship style to church governance, 
is considered an indifferent thing. 

This opens us up to all kinds of partnerships and relationships and re-interpretations of the faith
—it lets us be Church in whatever culture or time in which we find ourselves… 
And in my time in college and then over in England, 
I was able to join with Christians from all over, all types, 
hearing their traditions’ particular duet with God
—be it in haunting plainsong, reworked French monastic chanting, booming charismatic Gospel, or Scottish brogue, 
each different, and yet each beautiful and faithful.

 

            Why Lutheran? Because all roles and relationships can be a holy calling. 

I’ll never forget that funeral at Tabernacle Lutheran in West Philly, it was the first one I’d done as any sort of official in the Church
—a Field Education Student
—and I arrived 45 minutes early for the viewing
—and couldn’t find a parking spot, 
and wheeled around block after block, 
only to realize there was a line going all the way from Malcolm X Park to that little Lutheran Church there (13 blocks). 
You see, the man they all honored was a bus driver
—one who’d stop for you!
One who treated every passenger as he would Jesus Christ himself. 
He was a Lutheran, so he had known that everyone has a vocation, 
be you a bus driver or the pope, 
teacher or parent, you have a calling!

 

            Why Lutheran? Because the incarnation matters, 
the physicality of the sacraments matter… God showing up in the world as it is, matters!

My first week as Vicar of St. John’s Pimlico in Baltimore, 
someone jimmied open my mail and stole it all, 
I witnessed a shooting, 
and I got mugged by knife point. 
And then, that Sunday when I knelt down and received Holy Communion
—I realized that bread and wine, body and blood
—were as real as crowbar, a bullet, and a knife, 
a physical promise from God 
“for you.”

 

            Why Lutheran? Because when I married Lisa that thing I’d seen in Philly
—that vocations matter to God, became more concrete
—God doesn’t just care what kind of Pastor I am, 
but what kind of Husband I am, what kind of Uncle
—those roles too are holy.

 

            Why Lutheran? because, I came for the Grace, 
but I stay for the Theology of the Cross. 
God in the last place you would think to look
—God enthroned on a cross, 
God in weakness and poverty and pain, God with us when we really need him… 
And as a Pastor it is one of the greatest privileges, 
to see the life of a congregation through cross shaped glasses. 
Christ showing up in the mundane and transforming them into the profound, 
God hidden in plain sight. 

Seeing God acting, not in triumph or glory, 
but at hospital bed tables turned into altars, 
those quiet friendships that help folk get through hell, 
the protection and care of children, 
the steady plodding that is rarely recognized, 
painful choices that are faithful… always the cross.

 

Why Lutheran? Because, from Baptism to Vocation, Cross to the centrality of the Word, it’s the truest thing I’ve ever known.

Adele… all of you, 
I pray our way of being faithful to God
—this way that trusts only in God’s faithfulness,
will serve you well your whole life long. A+A