40 Negative Propositions about Lutheranism

 Lutheranism is not…

1.    About what we do, but what God does.

2.    Morality or ethics, but grace and response, grace and response

3.    Bound, but is freed in Christ

4.    About being upright, but being made right by Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection

5.    About self-reliance, but relying on God as a mighty fortress

 

Lutheranism is not…

1.    The Way, the Truth, and the Life, but witnessing to the one who is all those things

2.    Private, but Evangelical—the impulse to share the good news of Jesus!

3.    Ashamed of the Gospel, but embrace a living daring confidence in God’s grace

4.    Spiritual, but instead embodied in the profoundly common

5.    Triumphant, but students of the God found on a cross

6.    Fundamentalist, but the experience of God’s Word as a two-edge sword

7.    An ‘ism, but a relationship with Jesus

 

Lutheranism is not…

1.    All Casseroles and Coffee, but receiving the Bread of Life, for you!

2.    Monolithic, but a great variety of people found by God’s grace

3.    An ethnicity, culture, or nation, but a people gathered by God.

4.    Theology, but continual failures to fully name the Divine

5.    A Style of Worship, but whatever actions will make Christ known

 

Lutheranism is not…

1.    The Only Church, but a spoke of the ecumenical wheel affirming the historical creeds, the Word expressed as Law and Gospel, and sacraments administered rightly

2.    A denomination, but a mustard seed planted for all to find rest within

3.    The point, but compost & leaven to enliven the whole church

4.    Parochial, but Catholic, Global, Universal

5.    Perfect, but always reforming

6.    Limited to Luther, but encompasses all who take his writings and insights to heart

7.    A form of Church Government, but whatever form that allows us to be faithful

8.    Independent, but interdependent with the whole body of Christ

 

Lutheranism is not…

1.    Having our own way, but respecting one another as God’s Children

2.    A museum of saints, but a hospital for sinners

3.    Putting our heads in the sand, but engaging with the world around us, thinking through faithful engagement with our world with social messages and statements on everything from peace and policing, to education and the economy

4.    Words without actions, but 2% of people in North America are assisted by some sort of Lutheran Social Ministry each year

5.    Exclusionary, but inviting and listening and trying to understand each other

6.    Afraid of questions, but begin our faith life asking, “What does this mean?”

7.    Self-righteous, but trust that God is for us

8.    Anti-Semitic, but repenting and repairing the breach between us and our Jewish friends

9.    Politics, but vocation, roles and relationships lived faithfully

10. Afraid of change, but it is one of our core values

 

Lutheranism is not…

1.    The purview of our great great great grandparents, but springs from their faith and faithfulness

2.    Old, but always being made new

3.    Frozen, but passionate about matters of life and death, and life again

4.    Dying, but more alive than ever, thriving around the world!

5.    The Past, but for you, right now in this moment, and for everyone who chases after the Holy Spirit into God’s future

Made Right by a Merciful God

          There is a story told in “A Treasury of Jewish Folklore” worth repeating:

“Once there was a rabbi who was at the point of death, so the Jewish community proclaimed a day of fasting in the town in order to induce the Heavenly Judge to commute the sentence of death.

On that very day, when the entire congregation was gathered in the synagogue for penance and prayer, the town drunkard went to the village tavern for some schnapps. When another Jew saw him do this he rebuked him, saying, "Don't you know this is a fast-day and you're not allowed to drink? Why, everybody's at the synagogue praying for the rabbi!"

So the drunkard went to the synagogue and prayed, "Dear God! Please restore our rabbi to good health so that I can have my schnapps!"

The rabbi recovered, and it was considered a miracle. He explained it in the following way: "May God preserve our village drunkard until he is a hundred and twenty years! Know that his prayer was heard by God when yours were not. He put his whole heart and soul into his prayer!"

 

         Jolting isn’t it? 
A little politically incorrect, kind of uncomfortable… 
that’s exactly how Jesus’ parable ought to make us feel...

 

         If that story doesn’t transport you into today’s parable, try this:

         The Economist recently did a survey to find out what the two most respected professions were
—they were nurse and solider. On the flip side, the two least respected professions in America were 
used car salesperson and politician.

         So, there once was a combat medic and a car salesman turned Senator who both entered the national cathedral. 

The Combat Medic prayed, “I’ve got people out of hairy situations from Granada to Mogadishu to Kabul
—I’ve patched up the unpatchable, 
and on top of that I’m a tithing member in good standing at my congregation, 
and I just thank God I’m not some creepo, 
like that guy over there.”

         That guy over there, was of course, the senator-car salesman, and he simply prayed, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

         Get this, it was the second man that was made right.

Let us pray

         I offered those two brief re-tellings of Jesus’ parable, because there is a peril in reading a 2000-year-old story flat, without accounting for all that time it traveled to get here.

         “Pharisee” is now often used as an insult, right? 
But in Jesus day the Pharisees were the folk trying to ensure everyone, 
whether they lived in Jerusalem, or hundreds of miles away, whether they were priest or pauper…
were able to be faithful to God. They re-interpreted scripture so it was accessible to everyone… some people go so far as to argue Jesus himself was a Pharisee… 
so when Jesus is telling this story, we’re supposed to hear this first character as an upstanding individual.

         Likewise, while there is often some grumbling about tax collectors every year around April 15^th, 
in Jesus’ day there was a lot more than grumbling… 
Tax Collectors were Jewish agents of Rome, 
sympathizers, 
quislings, 
lackeys getting rich off their kin-folk’s cruel repression.

 

         The upstanding religious man exalts in his good name, 
he is self-satisfied and confuses his respectability with righteousness. 
More than that, it divides him from his fellow worshipper, 
it makes him think himself better than the other man…

         It makes you wonder how religion
—seeking to be bound to the Holy
—can get so twisted… 
as Jonathan Swift, the author of Gulliver’s Travels once penned: “We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another.”

 

         The man of disrepute, however, knows his lack, 
the ways he has fallen short; 
he acknowledges his own unrighteousness. 
It strikes him to the bone. 
But he does not hide it
—he does not try to put his best foot forward out of fear of God, 
he does not try to curate his life for God’s sake … 
no, he knows all is not well and comes to God without mask or costume… 
just as he is.

         The Tax Collector, unable to do anything but repent, 
is able to trust… 
perhaps simply hope… 
that God is merciful. 

Maybe he remembered his grandmother reading him a Psalm about birds resting on God’s altar, 
sparrows and swallows nesting in God’s temple
—finding home, finding rest there for weary wings… 

         There, at the temple, he is made right, he goes home justified… 
the humble are exulted
—this is par for the course for Luke
—Luke who records Mary’s song, “God my Savior shows favor to the lowly, 
the proud are scattered, 
the humble are uplifted.”

 

         You don’t need to hide your true self, 
though your troubles and trials, sins and missteps, may be many
—God already knows them, and does not reject you.

         Pastor Sarah, my Pastor growing up, used to always say, “Whenever you draw a line in the sand meant to exclude, you’ll find Jesus on the other side.” 
I thank God for her wise words
–growing up is hard enough, without thinking God is against you too!

         God does not reject you, instead when he finds us just as we are, 
God is moved and makes things right, 
justifies us, 
because God loves us! 

The comforting embrace of Love is the only space from which meaningful transformation can occur—not fright or self-righteousness or punishment or judgement… only love transforms!
By the power of the Holy Spirit we’re able to trust that promise
—able to come before our loving Father and pray to God as Martin Luther prayed all those years ago:

 

 

         Behold, Lord, an empty vessel that needs to be filled. My Lord, fill it. 

I am weak in the faith; strengthen me. 

I am cold in love; warm me and make me fervent, that my love may go out to my neighbor. 

I do not have a strong and firm faith; at times, I doubt and am unable to trust you altogether. 
O Lord, help me. Strengthen my faith and trust in you. 

In you I have sealed the treasure of all I have. 

I am poor; you are rich and came to be merciful to the poor. 

I am a sinner; you are upright. With me, there is an abundance of sin; in you is the fullness of righteousness. 

Therefore, I will remain with you, of whom I can receive, but to whom I may not give. Amen.