"Witnesses To Jesus' Resurrection" Easter 7 May 28, 2006

(First read the text for this sermon: Acts 1: 15-17, 21-26

I was baptized on February 7, 1954. That is when God commissioned me for ministry – even though I was only a nine-week old infant! But, as the prophet Jeremiah heard God to speak, so is this is true for you and me as well: “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you;…” In Jeremiah’s case, God “appointed [him] a prophet to the nations.” That was his calling. When you read through the book of Jeremiah you find that, even though the prophet resisted that vocation mightily, he could not avoid it! It was work that God gave him to do.

So it is for you and me. When were you baptized? That is when God commissioned you for ministry!

Obviously, infancy through youth through adulthood brings many, many changes in our life situations. We are in discernment, to varying degrees, throughout our lives when we are attentive to the calls that come from God, to do the work God gives us to do. It is a matter of discerning, again and again: What is that work? Where am I called to do it? Among which people?

This is not something restricted to pastors, discerning a call to ordained ministry. For each one of us, our baptisms are our commissioning for ministry. Any vocation can be a calling from God.

Luther emphasized that when he taught about “the priesthood of all believers.” Tim Wengert (who teaches at the seminary in Philadelphia) likes to paraphrase Luther by saying, “If you don’t see God in your work of changing diapers, then you won’t see God anywhere.” God’s calling can be to any vocation – be it electrical engineering, or parenting, or plumbing, or teaching, or running an office, or medical care, or volunteer board service, or grounds keeping; any vocation can be the ministry to which God has called a person.

It could be that the work you’re doing is not your calling! Indeed, when a person is restless in her work, God is moving in that restlessness. There is a call there to be discerned. So – if you are restless, what gifts is God calling you to use that you’re not using now? What work is God calling you to do? Would that mean a career transition? Or is it work that you can do as a volunteer, in addition to what you’re paid to do? Discerning the answers to questions like that is not an easy thing to do! Indeed, it’s nearly impossible to do on your own. We nearly always need the help of trusted friends and guides of deep spirituality to help us see how God is moving through our restlessness. (That’s why Spiritual Direction is so important, to give a commercial for one aspect of the work that I have been called to do.)

Now. I’d like you to pull out the bulletin and find the listing of St. Stephen’s church staff. This something that’s in the bulletin each week. I’d like you to pay attention to what’s at the top of the church staff list. What do you see? “The Baptized People of St. Stephen – Doing Ministry in the World.” That comes before any of the names in the church staff list – because your ministry “in the world” is more important than the work being done by anyone working within the church.

The congregation is a center for mission. The work done by the pastor and the church staff is for your nourishment. It is to support you and equip you to do the work that God has given you to do, among the people God has given to you, because that’s how God’s mission is advanced.

This is your ministry. God has placed you on the mission field, where there are daily opportunities to bring the compassion of the risen Christ to those who are in need or despair.
Are you aware of that work God has given you to do? Are you aware, through the compassion and grace you exhibit, through your daily work, that you are witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection?

Ben Campbell writes, “The resurrection of Jesus…is a worldwide event, stretching across geography and centuries…to bring about the Kingdom of Heaven. The resurrection is the beginning of the Second Coming of Jesus….[Jesus] has been involved in his second coming ever since, meeting people in spirit day after day, year after year, place after place.”

All of this has basis in the verses we read this morning from the Acts of the Apostles. As many of you know, Acts is the second volume in a two-part story, written by the same anonymous author who produced the gospel of Luke. At this point in the story, Jesus has just ascended into heaven, and his followers have returned to Jerusalem. In the verses leading up to this morning’s reading, 11 male apostles are named (Judas, of course, being the one omitted). There is also mention of women who are gathered. (That would have been shocking to 2nd century readers, making it clear that this is a tiny community that is witnessing to Jesus’ resurrection by breaking barriers!)

The reading begins in this way: In those days Peter stood up among the believers (together the crowd numbered about one hundred twenty persons) … Now, think of that. At this point in the story, the entire Jesus movement comprises about as many people as us gathered right now in this room! This struggling assembly of Jesus people is meeting to respond to the situation created by the apostasy of the traitor, Judas.

There is a strong sense in the passage that God is working, even through this tragedy. Peter says to the others: "Friends, the scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit through David foretold concerning Judas, who became a guide for those who arrested Jesus”; and he quotes from Psalm 69 to give Biblical grounding to what he is saying. Peter and the others feel a need to restore the number of apostles to 12, probably because Jesus had talked about restoring the 12 tribes of Israel, in Volume One of the story, the gospel of Luke. Peter says, “So one of the men who have accompanied us during all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day when he was taken up from us -- one of these must become a witness with us to his resurrection."

So they proposed two, Joseph called Barsabbas, who was also known as Justus, and Matthias. Then they prayed and said, "Lord, you know everyone's heart. Show us which one of these two you have chosen to take the place in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place." And they cast lots for them, and the lot fell on Matthias; and he was added to the eleven apostles.

Neither Justus nor Matthias is referred to again in the story! Such biographical and historical details are not important to the story. What is important is the theology: that it is God who is working in these events. It is God who has chosen Matthias to be a witness to Jesus’ resurrection in this way. It is God who has given this work to Matthias, and who has called Matthias to the work, and Matthias discerns that call through the community of the Jesus people.

We too can be a community of discernment for each other! Through our baptisms, you and I have been commissioned by God for work as witnesses to the resurrection, because we have been baptized into Jesus’ death and resurrection. Hear some words from the new liturgy for baptism, in the upcoming Evangelical Lutheran Worship book:

God, who is rich in mercy and love, gives us a new birth into a living hope through the sacrament of baptism. The power of sin is put to death in this holy flood, and we are raised with Jesus Christ to new life. We are united with all the baptized in the one body of Christ, anointed with the gift of the Holy Spirit, and sent out in mission for the life of the world.

Listen to another passage from the new liturgy:

In baptism God frees us from sin and death by uniting us to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Through water and the Holy Spirit we are reborn children of God, we are made members of the church, the body of Christ, and we are commissioned for Christ’s ministry of justice and peace.

That ministry is what you and I are called to perform, in our daily work.

What joy there is, in responding to hungry people who need to be fed, with spiritual or physical nourishment.

What satisfaction we receive, in ministry to impoverished people who need the Good News brought to us by Christ.

What fulfillment there is through the hard work of establishing peace when we encounter conflict.

Through our actions and words of compassion we teach the faith!

What delight there is, in being witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection!

In the name of God, who is Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.


Pastor Andy Ballentine
St. Stephen Lutheran Church
Williamsburg, Virginia

"Living And Loving In The Mystery of God" Easter 6 May 21, 2006

(First, read the text for this sermon: John 15:(1-8) 9-17)

I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. The words we read last week, as from Jesus, in the 15th chapter of John, are necessary context for this morning’s gospel reading.

Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. And then: I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.

Here is part of the mystery that is God: God is relational within God’s self! God is interconnected. God is Father and Son and Holy Spirit, in divine relationship, all proceeding from the “stuff” that is God.

And here’s more. This imagery of a vine and its branches describes the Christ and his followers, and so you and I are included in the relational mystery that is God. I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. … Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. It is Father and Son and Holy Spirit – and you and me! We are as branches, receiving nourishment from the essence that is God.
It is mystery – that God would be that relational.

(I use the word, “mystery,” not in the sense of an Agatha Christie mind-twister, with a riddle that’s figured out at the end of the story. The mystery that is God is impossible to fully comprehend or conceive. That’s because God is so far beyond what we can understand. We are drawn by God to explore the mystery that is God is, through contemplation and prayer and love. That is how we come to know God – in that mystical and experiential way!)

Here is part of the mystery of God: that God is not aloof, apart, far removed up in the clouds. Instead, according to the witness of the Bible, God is interconnected in love and in relationship with us, as intimately as a vine is intertwined with its branches!

I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. What is that fruit? That’s what we discover – as we move from last Sunday’s reading to this morning’s verses in John.

Listen to how it goes. "My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love.” Love! Then we read: “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.” And now, here is the result of keeping God’s commandments! “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.” Joy! The joy of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit! Joy that is complete, from following God’s commandments to love!

The mystery of God is made up of joyous love. It’s mystery worthy of prayer and contemplation, because this isn’t anything even resembling romantic love. This love has nothing to do with the romantic illusions we construct of ourselves or of another person with whom we have “fallen in love.”

This is the mystery of joyous love that is commanded! "This is my commandment,” we read, “that you love one another as I have loved you.” It is the mystery of love that is modeled after Jesus. It is love that is self-giving. It is love that is ultimately demonstrated by Jesus’ self-sacrifice for us: “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father.” What is accomplished by Jesus’ self-giving love? We are made friends with God! And others – even those we don’t like – are made friends with God. (It’s all God’s initiative.) And so, we are called to love even those we don’t like – because God has made them friends!

In this love, God includes us. God incorporates you and me in the mystery that is God.

Living as a Christian means surrendering ourselves more deeply into the mystery that is God. Then, our actions, of Christian compassion, come out of our surrender into the love that is God.

I think that points us towards understanding the whole idea of “commandment” in this reading from John. “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. … This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” It seems obvious, from the context of the passage, that Jesus is not commanding us to do something that we don’t want to do! Our obedience is not that of servants, an alien and grudging obedience. It is, rather, that of friends. When friends serve each other, it is in the spirit of encouragement. It’s what we want to do. (I think that is the way to understand any Biblical commandments: that we obey them as response to the love that is God.) Love arises out of obedience, and obedience out of love. It all begins with God’s initiative, through Jesus’ self-sacrificial love. And as we respond in obedience, by doing works of love towards others, we bear fruit, as branches of the vine.

It is love and obedience and friendship, all intertwined, living and loving in the mystery that is God.

It is incomprehensible!

It is mystery that can only be entered into and experienced.

It is joy! “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.”

Thanks be to God, who is Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.


Pastor Andy Ballentine
St. Stephen Lutheran Church
Williamsburg, Virginia

"Knowing God By Loving God" Easter 5 May 14, 2006

(First read the text for this sermon: 1 John 4:7-21)

Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Think of all that would be transformed – if followers of Jesus the Christ simply lived according to that verse from First John! What if all the leaders in this nation and around the world, who profess to follow Jesus the Christ, lived according to this verse? How many wars would not be started? How much money would be directed to providing food for the hungry? The world itself would be transformed!

Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Think of this: If followers of Jesus the Christ simply lived according to that verse from First John, how many church fights would end? How many denominations would become cooperative, rather than competitive?

Each person’s religious practice is transformed too, when we who follow Jesus the Christ simply live by that verse. How often are you motivated by what you should do? What you ought to do? What you’d feel guilty about, if you didn’t do it? Think of all those negative motivations – transformed! – by living according to the love described in these verses from First John. [E]veryone who loves is born of God and knows God. Love as the motivation for religious practice! And, through that practice, knowing God by loving God!

Knowing God by loving God. This is transformational stuff. This is every bit as mystical as the text we sang for the first hymn, and the text from Julian of Norwich that’s printed in the bulletin this morning for Mother’s Day. Could it be that the author of First John is correct: that we do not come to know God by accumulating facts about God; but that we come to know God by loving God? What if it’s not “Christian education,” (in the sense that there are Christian SOLs that need to be mastered), but that we receive Christian formation throughout our lives from the Holy Spirit, through loving God?

Think of this. When you love someone, you yearn for your beloved. You have a longing for your beloved. You endure separations if you have to, but you want to be where your loved one is! Love means a desire for union with your beloved (which is why sex is a sacred gift from God, since love comes from God). Here’s the point: You come to know who your beloved is through loving him or her!

It is the same with God. Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Think, for instance, of how that transforms worship for you, when you are here because you yearn for God, because you long for God, because you desire unity with God, and you seek that during worship. When that is the case, worship is not something you fit in, if your calendar allows for it. Instead, worship each sabbath becomes a necessity for you because you long for God in love! Daily prayer becomes necessary, because you desire God so deeply each day.

Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Conversely, the author of First John writes: Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. And then: God's love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.

All of this is God’s initiative, you see! It doesn’t depend on us! God has loved us first, and primarily through Jesus. We read, In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

What if all who follow Jesus the Christ loved God as much as God loves us? Simply put, the world would be transformed – because others see God when we love! Here is what the author of First John writes: No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.

What explains the tragedy of those who call themselves Christians who do not display such love? Perhaps it’s because all of this is so terrifying! It’s so much easier to be judgmental! There’s so much less ambiguity in creating straight edges between “right” and “wrong” – when you know that you’re right and the other person is wrong; and when our political leaders know that our country is “good,” and it’s other countries who comprise “the axis of evil.” Love does not allow for such doctrinaire distinctions. It is hard to be doctrinaire, for instance, about the “evil” of homosexuality – when someone you love turns out to be gay.

Think of how the world would be transformed – if all who follow Jesus the Christ showed who God is, through their love. Make no mistake: the Biblical teaching on love is not sentimental. It’s not the same warm fuzziness of a Hallmark card. Anyone who has dealt with someone who is abusive, or who has been part of a family system with an alcoholic, knows that God’s love is tough love, when that’s what it takes to move someone to health.

This morning’s text, and the entire Bible witnesses to love that moves us towards health, and openness to God, and the joy of union with God. Love that is from God is not manipulative, or smothering, or competitive. Love that is from God is freeing.

Security and confidence and delight are all rooted in love because we are secure and confident and joyful in God’s salvation. Listen to verses from First John: God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. We love because he first loved us.

God yearns for us. God longs for us. God desires union with us. All of that is because God loves us.

When God forms us by that love, we respond by yearning and longing for God. Deeply and profoundly in love, we do not want to be separated from God! And that love motivates our work each day. And so, here’s what we read in the passage: We love because [God] first loved us. Those who say, "I love God," and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.

The teaching ends up in the form of a commandment! But it can’t be a matter of “shoulds,” and “oughts,” and guilt. How can you command someone to love?

In love, it’s what we want to do. It’s what we’re drawn to do. We are drawn to act on behalf of the hungry, on behalf of any who are in need – those we are sitting beside right now, those who are total strangers – because we love them. We have received that love from God. And in that love, we know God!

Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.

In the name of God, who is Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.


Pastor Andy Ballentine
St. Stephen Lutheran Church
Williamsburg, Virginia

"Being Shepherded" Easter 4 May 7, 2006

(First read the texts for this sermon: Psalm 23 and John 10:11-18.)

“I am the good shepherd.” What beloved words! What a comforting image. Isn’t it wonderful to think of being shepherded?

I have a photograph in my office of a shepherd and his sheep. It’s a beautiful shot that was published in the New York Times this past fall, and it just captivated me. I googled the photographer, found his web site, sent him some money, and he sent me a copy!

In the photograph, it’s early morning in Vermont and very misty. (The photographer has captured droplets of water, on the fences and the grass.) The scene appears to be entirely peaceful and pastoral. The shepherd is leading his sheep out of their barn. You can distinctly see the features on the faces of the sheep closest to the camera. Then, behind, there is a stream of sheep following; those towards the back fade into the darkness of the barn’s interior.

The shepherd is walking, and the sheep are following behind him. It’s just like the Biblical image! Here’s something that’s striking. The sheep are all bunched together, but as they follow behind the shepherd, the sheep are walking along furrows, pathways that they have worn each morning, day after day. (In between the furrows, there’s lush green grass! The sheep obviously never walk on that grass!) Again, that’s a comforting image, isn’t it? The sheep, following the shepherd, along the same pathways, day after day. (Remember the line from Psalm 23? He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake.)

But I want to avoid a common temptation on this annual Sunday of the Good Shepherd: to turn this into “Fuzzy Lamb Sunday.” Because all is not cute and cuddly. When the sheep leave the barn, they leave safety behind and they step out into danger.

There’s a hint of that in the photograph on my office wall. In fact, the shepherd is not the first figure in this procession that I’ve been describing, leading the sheep out into pasture. Do you know who’s going out first, even before the shepherd? It’s the dog!

I’ll bet this is not a gentle dog – at least, not where the sheep are involved. A sheep dog is no-nonsense. A sheep dog quickly gets after a sheep that’s wandering away, to bring it back to the herd. Why? Because there’s danger out there, for a solitary sheep. If a menacing animal approaches the herd, how do you think the dog will react? (I don’t think the dog will extend a very warm welcome.)

Of course, there are all kinds of parallels that we could draw from that photograph to our daily lives as sheep, being shepherded by the Good Shepherd. How often, for instance, do you and I walk along the same worn furrows, each day, in our day-to-day routines? We could go off in that direction. And (avoiding the temptation to turn this into “Fuzzy Lamb Sunday”), we could speak about the comparative dangers that threaten us. There are literal, physical dangers. There are spiritual temptations that would lead us down pathways towards despair. There are dangers of addictions to destructive chemicals that we put into our bodies. It is spiritually dangerous for us when we isolate ourselves from the community of others.

And so, there is danger just below the surface of this morning’s readings from the Psalms and from John. In John, we hear those first, comforting words. But then listen to what follows. "I am the good shepherd. Then: The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away--and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep.”

This, of course, describes what Jesus did, ultimately, in his role of good shepherd, laying down his life for the sheep. I am struck, especially, by these words: I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me,… In the midst of daily dangers, there’s an intimacy here. There’s deep love between the Christ and his sheep.

We find the same comforting intimacy in the first verses of Psalm 23:

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures;
he leads me beside still waters;
he restores my soul.
He leads me in right paths
for his name's sake.
But then follows the acknowledgment of the danger that surrounds us each day:
Even though I walk through the darkest valley,
I fear no evil;
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff--
they comfort me.

“Your rod and your staff.” What are they? When you think about these familiar and beloved words, you recognize that a rod and a staff are used by the shepherd as weapons, when necessary, to defend the sheep from a predator! There’s comfort, in the thought that we’re being protected by God. But does God protect us from all dangers? Tragedies do occur. Bad things do happen to good people.
Are you and I free from the fear of any evil? Instead, aren’t we often full of fears and anxieties?

Here’s how a preacher named Kimberly Bracken Long comments on this:

“This is the life to which we are called – what it means to follow the good shepherd, to be part of his flock. To sometimes receive and sometimes give – to know not only in our minds but in our guts security in the face of danger, joy that crowds out sorrow, and love that overwhelms fear. It means being led along paths we would not choose for ourselves, to be prodded by the shepherd who knows our needs better than we know our own, to be blessed so thoroughly and so richly that we would not have even known how to ask for it.

“Knowing a shepherd like that changes things – it changes us – for to follow this shepherd is to trust – profoundly and completely – that in every circumstance we are protected and led by the one who stands guard against the worst the world can do. It does not mean that death will not come, that tragedy will not strike, that our hearts will not be broken. But it does mean that whatever befalls us, we may sing this psalm, too:

“Even though I walk through the corridors of the ICU, I will not fear death…

“ Though I pass through the valleys of depression or delusion, I will not be alone…

“Though people may taunt me or shun me, I will not lose heart…

“For you anoint me…guard me…love me….”

That’s a good description, I think, of what it means to be shepherded by the Good Shepherd. We are loved by God. And there’s something more. You and I are shaped by God’s love to love one another, as the writer of the First John passage puts it this morning. And so, we shepherd each other along those same pathways. We sheep take care of each other, even when our life journeys take us through the darkest valley, the valley of the shadow of death.

You who have e-mail have been reading dramatic descriptions of that, from those St. Stephen folks who have been working in Katrina-ravaged Louisiana, and who are on the way back home as we speak.

I am always touched by the love-shaped actions of someone who sees another person struggling, physically – and who simply stops and helps! (Much more frequently, people feel too pressed for time to help, or they worry about invading the other person’s privacy.) What love there is in just stopping to help someone struggling through the dark valley of physical disability.

One person told me recently that she thinks those who have suffered are those most likely to be alert to help others who are suffering. Being shepherded by God shapes us in God’s love, and it leads us to shepherd others who are experiencing the darkest valley.

Sometimes the shadow of death in that valley becomes real. Even then, God’s shepherding does not end, but extends beyond human death. Here is what we pray at the conclusion of the funeral liturgy: words rich with the imagery of this morning’s Scripture. “Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servant. Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you, a sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your own flock, a sinner of your own redeeming. Receive her into the arms of your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious company of the saints in light. Amen.”

What comfort there is, in being shepherded by God.

What love there is, in being shepherds for others.

In the name of God, who is Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.


Pastor Andy Ballentine
St. Stephen Lutheran Church
Williamsburg, Virginia