God Brings Us Along

Sermon preached Saturday, July 10, and Sunday, July 11, 2021, the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost, at Grace Lutheran Church in Westminster, Maryland. 

Well, there’s nothing like a beheading to start off preaching in a new congregation, am I right?

It’s definitely one of those stories that you finish reading and say, “The Gospel of the Lord…I think? I think there’s good news in there somewhere?”

And, truthfully, when this lectionary text comes up, it’s mostly this part about the beheading of John is the part that tends to draw our focus. That’s the headline. That’s the big take away. But, I don’t know, this time, it hit differently. I meet for text study with a few other pastors and all of us, for maybe the first time, were drawn to the other part of the reading—the part that’s actually happening in real time.

We get a flashback, triggered by the buzz happening around Jesus and his disciples. Herod hears about all these things that the disciples are doing and you can almost imagine the old sitcom blur-out as he remembers John and that night at his birthday banquet. He had John arrested, but was “protecting him,” as the text tells us because he apparently liked listening to him, despite not always understanding.

But, of course, his wife did not. And when push came to shove, Herod’s care for John only went so far. When push came to shove, Herod needed to keep the peace in his home, at this party, and in his kingdom, no matter the cost. And so Herod, deeply grieved, we’re told, but without protest, has John killed and his head brought out.

Yet even in the midst of this violence, John’s disciples were not deterred. They came and retrieved his body and continued his work. The mission continued, despite the efforts of Herod and Herodia.

A similar story is told in Amos. We only hear a snippet of it this morning, but Amos is called to be a prophet, to speak the word of the Lord to a kingdom who doesn’t want to hear it. After many attempts to make people hear this proclamation, he is expelled and exiled and, according to apocryphal accounts, eventually killed by the ones he confronted.

Today’s readings give us just two examples of the ways in which, time and time again, people are called to share the word of God and others reject them because it is too hard a Word. A Word that challenges norms and expectations. A Word that calls for sacrifice and selfless acts. A Word that requires humbling oneself and risking power and influence.

Amos.

John the Baptist.

And, we know, in time, Jesus.

Most of the time, we identify with these prophetic voices—or at least we want to, right? We want to be the ones on the front lines proclaiming God’s Word! We want to believe that we are taking the risks, that we are being vulnerable, that we are on the right side!

…but I think it’s more accurate to say that sometimes that’s us. And sometimes, too often, we are like these folks who run scared, who react defensively or violently, who only believe that something is God’s work if it already aligns with what we believe to be true. I’m not saying that any of us have had someone beheaded, but it’s not always that extreme. When we are faced with something new or something that confronts our own weaknesses or that challenges us to look at something differently, we push back.

How many times to we reject something because it would upset our status quo? And before we get our defenses up, let’s talk about some of the ways in which this plays out, particularly in congregation life. Some might ring true for Grace. Some might not.

How many times do we say, “Well, we tried doing that once fifteen years ago, but it didn’t work, so we shouldn’t try it again.”?

Or, “This is way music has always been done here.”?

Or, “We can’t use that space for that new ministry because it’s always been used for this other ministry, even though this other ministry hasn’t really been very active in recent years.”?

Or, “We’re already welcoming, why do we have to be explicit about who is welcome here?”

Or, here’s a big one for us right now, “As long as they don’t change my worship time, it’s fine!”?

Did any of that resonate with you?

Now, let me be clear, not everything new or different or disruptive is automatically God’s will. That would be unfair and untrue to say. But it would also be unfair and untrue to say that it is God’s will that things be constant forever, that they grow stagnant and stale and that we clutch on to them to the detriment of where the Spirit might be calling us.

No, our God is a moving God, a changing God, a God who is always in conversation with what has been to shepherd us into the remarkable possibility of what could be.

We need look no further than scripture, where we are shown account after account of God leading God’s people into something bold, something new, while never fully abandoning what God has called good in the past.

Even God’s most destructive action, the flood, did not fully wipe out what had been! Humanity and every living creature was carried in safety on the ark.

When it’s put this way, it might be easy for us to get on board, because we know that, in the end, it works out: the dry land reappears after the flood. The Israelites make it to the promised land. The exiled people of God return and are restored. Jesus rises from the dead. The early church and the message of Jesus spreads quickly and takes hold in pockets far and wide.

But we cannot pretend that these things all happened in a vacuum, in a tidy, sanitized bubble that did not require sacrifice and bravery and trust in God. We can’t forget that the flood happened. We can’t forget the wandering in the wilderness and the desire to return to the known quantity of Egypt. We can’t forget that before the disciples began sharing the good news of Jesus’ resurrection, they huddled together in a locked room because they were afraid.

Because there will always be resistance, from within as well as from without.

There will be people who are not part of our community who might deride our efforts, or mock our beliefs or say that we’re overstepping into things a church shouldn’t be involved in and that we should “stay in our lane.”

And there will be people within our community who will worry about how much it will cost. Or who we might offend as we seek to include more in the mission of God. Or who will be more concerned about losing their perceived position of power than with whatever the Holy Spirit has in store.

Yes, there will be resistance, as there has always been.

But we know that we have a faithful God who doesn’t give up on us and who is with us every step of the way—even when we are like Herod, seeking to keep our peace and power at any cost. God will challenge us, comfort us, cajole us, and care for us wherever we find ourselves on this path.

God is always moving forward to new life and renewal and toward the fulfillment of God’s mission—and God desires to bring us along. Sometimes joyfully, sometimes dragging our feet or kicking and screaming.

God is faithful and is there every step of the way.

Amen.