ADVENT - Isaiah 35: 1-10*     

 

            From Isaiah’s perspective the one who is really on a mission is God.  For the sake of his people, God is set to do something completely new.  Deserts will rejoice and blossom.  Weak hands are going to be made strong.  Feeble, worn out, creaky knees will assume a renewed, youthful vigor.  The vision of the blind will be restored and stopped up deaf ears will hear again.  One might say that God is “heaven bent” on making all things new.  But then what else should we expect from a God who forgives sinners, heals the sick and raises the dead.     

 

        As a congregation, we are called to proclaim God’s love as we worship.  During the season of Advent, our worship is filled with expectation and hope in the coming of Christ who makes all things new.  Trusting in God’s promises, we lift our voices in praise of the one who is able to disperse the gloomy clouds of night and death’s dark shadow put to flight.  As fall gives way to winter the air grows chill, the daylight grows short and the night lengthens, yet we remain a hopeful people who watch and wait.  As God’s people, our waiting is purposeful and filled with great joy because we know the final outcome.  What God has begun in Christ, God will bring to completion at the end of the age.  God won’t stop until all things are made new.  As we proclaim God’s love in word and deed, we share in God’s transforming work for all creation. 

 

God of expectation and hope, prepare our hearts and our lives to receive you and to be made new.  Amen.  

 

 

  CHRISTMAS - Luke 2: 1-14*

 

            Who gets chosen to be the bearer of Good News is almost as important as the message itself.  In the familiar Christmas story, God makes some peculiar choices, an old childless couple Zechariah and Elisabeth, a young pregnant girl named Mary and unreliable shepherds minding their flocks by night, truly the marginalized and outcast.  So, what kind of story is this anyway?  If you want to get something done, if you want to make an impression in the world, time and resources are better spent cultivating the rich and powerful, reaching out to the privileged and well to do.  But our ways are not God’s ways.  Christ the savior of the world is born not in an ornate palace or a fancy hospital, but in a lowly stable and laid in a manger.  There is nothing quaint about these accommodations.  And if we’re going to see Jesus, it won’t be in the comfort of familiar surroundings, but out there in the nitty, gritty world all around us.

 

We are called to proclaim God’s love as a congregation as we serve our neighbor.  We do so for their benefit, to make God’s love known to them, but at the same time, in serving our neighbor in need—the poor, the homeless, the hungry, those on the edges of society whose voices are often never heard, we surely encounter the unexpected gift of Christ himself. 

 

Lord God, your Son Jesus has come into the world.  Give us eyes to see and ears to hear him as we serve our neighbor in need.  Amen

 

 

EPIPHANY - Matthew 2: 1-12*  

 

The season of Epiphany serves as a bridge between the birth of Jesus and his passion.  In this season we as the church cover a lot of ground, from the arrival of the so called Wise Men offering their gifts to the baby Jesus, to his baptism, to the beginnings of his earthly ministry including the awe inspiring event known as Transfiguration.  All this in the course of about six to eight weeks! 

 

January 6^th marks the actual Day of Epiphany, the culmination of our Christmas celebrations as we recall the familiar story of the Magi.  Scripture really doesn’t tell us how many of them there were, just that they brought with them three gifts, gold, frankincense and myrrh, precious, scarce commodities in those days, which made them all the more fitting for a king, not the one who resides up in the palace, but as the story tells us in a simple house. 

 

As the world around us turns away from a season of frantic gift giving, we as the church are left to contemplate the meaning of the wondrous gift given to us in Jesus Christ.  Not that we can ever hope to reciprocate as priceless a gift as he, the story of the Wise Men does lead us to consider our response to what God has done, to proclaim God’s love as we share our gifts.  “What can I give him, poor that I am?”  Asks the writer of the hymn.  “If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb; if I were a wise man, I would do my part, yet what I can, I give him, give my heart.”  We offer ourselves, our time, our possessions, signs of God’s gracious love. 

 

Gracious God, as you led the Wise Men to behold the baby Jesus, so lead us to see in him the gift of salvation you have bestowed upon us.  Our gifts cannot ever repay you, yet may they be signs of your gracious love for the sake of the whole world.  Amen 

 

   LENT - Philippians 3: 8-14*

 

        The season of Lent is a time for us as the church to reflect on our Baptism and our connection to Christ’s death and resurrection.  In the water and the Word, we die to sin and are raised to new life in Him every day.  Themes of the cross and discipleship are evident in our reading of scripture during Lent, words that lead us to consider what baptismal living is all about.

 

        Lent serves as a kind of spiritual reality check for us the Church.  To the Philippians, St. Paul declares, “I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ my Lord.”  Because of what God has done in Jesus Christ, everything is changed, our values, our priorities, our assumptions about our world, ourselves and even God himself.  Life really isn’t about storing up treasures on earth where moths and rust consume, but bearing witness to the love of God in lives that take on the shape of the cross.     

 

One aspect of our mission of proclaiming God’s love as a congregation has to do with the ways in which we support one another.  Caring for one another is not limited to any particular season, but the disciplines of Lent—repentance, fasting, prayer and works of love—provide us with opportunities to be all the more intentional about the ways in which care for one another.   It’s not always easy.  Sin and death are still forces to be reckoned with even in Christian community.  Caring for one another means that we may not always have the answers, that we may be called upon to comfort the dying and stand with the bereaved, that we may find ourselves having to speak the truth in love to an erring brother or sister.  But the good news for us is that by his suffering and death, there is no place that we will ever find ourselves that Jesus hasn’t been.  In the cross he goes to show us the way, to show us what true love is really all about. 

 

Lord Jesus in the cross we see your love.  May we witness to you love as we care for one another.  Amen.    

 

 

EASTER - John 20: 11-18*

 

          When Mary learned who it was that was standing before her there outside the tomb, nothing was ever the same again, for her, for the disciples, for you and me, for the whole world.  Jesus who was dead, stone cold dead in the grave, God raised up again. From that moment on, God declares an end to the power of sin and death.  While they still may be forces to reckon with in our world, sin and death won’t have the final say.  They won’t finally lay claim to us.  Hallelujah!!   

 

To be sure, there is so much more to what God is up to at Easter than any of us could ever hope to learn in a lifetime of lifetimes.  Yet, for us as Christians, the glorious news of the resurrection informs everything about who we are and what God call us to be in the world, in what we believe, teach and confess.  As a congregation, we proclaim God’s love as we learn together.  In Bible study, Sunday school, in faithful conversation with one another we learn of God’s relentless love for us for our world, that nothing can hold God back, not even sin and death.  As Mary learned who it was who spoke to her, who called her by name, she went and told the others the good news.  As we learn together, we hear the same voice speaking to us, calling us by name to go and tell the good news as well, to proclaim God’s love for all the world to hear. 

 

God of life, you raised your son Jesus and put an end to the power of sin and death.  Open our ears and eyes that we may learn anew the power of his resurrection for us and for our world.  Amen.

 

PENTECOST -  Acts 2: 1-8, 12-21*

 

 

          When the Spirit begins to take hold of God’s people, amazing things begin to happen.  The wind starts to blow, not a gentle breeze, but the rush of a violent wind.  Divided tongues as of fire appear and rest upon those whom God has called.  Unlikely people begin to proclaim “God’s deeds of power”, as the Spirit gives them ability.

 

          Pentecost is not so much about the church remembering what happened long ago, but acknowledging how the Holy Sprit continues to do amazing things in ordinary, unlikely people like you and me.  As Luther reminds us, it is the Spirit who calls, gathers and enlightens us in the one true faith.  But you and I aren’t the end of the story.  The Pentecost story as we hear it in the book of Acts shows us that the disciples are filled with the Holy Spirit so that they can speak, speak not just to people like them, but to those who reside in faraway places, those who speak an entirely different language and experience life in a completely different way.  Now we see that all are welcome in the kingdom of God.      

 

            As God’s people at Ascension Lutheran Church, we are called to proclaim God’s love as we welcome all in Christ’s name.  As the wind blows where it will, the Good News cannot be contained.  The Spirit leads us to share in word in word and deed all that God has done for us with neighbors, co-workers, friends, family, all those with whom we have opportunity, people whose speech, whose language, whose experience may be much different than ours.  How the message will be heard, how it will be received is not our responsibility.  The Spirit moves as the Sprit will, but we know and trust that the Spirit is at work in us. 

 

            Come, Holy Spirit fill our hearts and our lives that we may speak God’s saving word, that all people will be welcome into your kingdom.  Amen. 

 Pastor Brian Peterson