Believe!

The following is a sermon I preached at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, Butte, Montana, on June 29,2014 on the occasion of the baptism of our youngest grandson, Colin Aaker.


“There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, "Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him." Jesus answered and said to him, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."
 Nicodemus said to Him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
"If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? "No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven. 
John 3:1-13

Indeed, how will we believe?

The Aaker family is overdosing on World Cup soccer these days. Every four years we get involved as spectators of this world-wide event - of a sport that is even catching on in the US as millions of fans get on this roller coaster of high hopes and gut wrenching endings of matches.  Hoping to go on to the next round...

The mantra tweeted around the internet on social media and chanted at the matches is:  I BELIEVE.  I BELIEVE THAT WE. I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN! 

As the camera scans over the  enthusiastic US fans in Brazil we see large signs that say BELIEVE!!.

The team, the coaches and the fans are convinced that if their belief is strong it will help bring about the desired outcome.  Bob Green would tell us, I suspect, that a coach has to believe in the team, and help them believe in themselves... The idea is that Believing helps make it come true. This is one use of the word believe..

Now, the verb believe and the noun faith are used extensively in all forms of Christianity..  I believe and We believe stand at the beginning of the creeds used by most Christians in worship.  

If I were to ask you this morning about your associations with the word believe, ask what that word brings to mind, I believe there would be quite a variety of responses... though since this is church, we would perhaps tend to talk about our belief in God, and what that means to us.   

But outside on the street maybe it would be more like the soccer fans or others who would say things like these:

o   Seeing is believing", or

o   "When I say, I believe you, it means that I believe you're telling the truth"   or

o    "There are some things you can know, and other things you can only believe."

o   "Well, I believe the capitol of New Mexico is Albuquerque" - but of course it isn't.

And in our modern secular world, where more and more people claim to be spiritual but not religious, and don't believe in organized religion, I have heard responses like these, 

"I believe there is an energy in the universe that..."

or, 

  "I believe all people are basically good at heart" - which flies in the face of reality - those people haven't been reading the news papers

In his book, "Speaking Christian", Marcus Borg writes that the "modern meaning of the word believe is very different from its meanings in early Christianity" until the seventeenth century. In early times the verb believe always had a person as its direct object, not a statement.  It didn't mean believing that a statement is true, but more like what we mean when we say to somebody, "I believe in you"   This implies a relationship.  

The meaning in Old English was be loef, which means to hold dear, or to belove another person.

So it is more than believing that a set of statements about God are true, or somehow believing that  God exists but doing nothing in response to that belief. 

Thinking about it this way, then, to believe in Jesus does not mean that we believe that a set of statements about him are true, or that he indeed once walked the earth, but it means to belove Jesus. It means to be in relationship with Him. 

Remember! when Jesus spoke about the great commandment he did not say,

"You shall believe that these statements about God are true"..  What did he say?  

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all you mind and with all your strength" (Matt. 22:37.  That means all of me.

I want to introduce you to our newest grandchild, Colin Silliman Aaker.  He’s three months old.  I’m sorry that you in the back probably can’t see very clearly this little picture I’m holding up.  (But, believe me, he is beautiful ...just like your children, grandchildren or nieces and nephews!)   

After the service this morning there will be a special time for us, since Bret and Rachel his parents, together with Janel Morgan, as sponsor, and us grandparents are bringing Colin up front to present him to Pastor Tim Christianson for the sacrament of baptism . 

In the Gospels the words believe and be baptized are marks of the Christian. In the baptismal service we will sing the hymn "All who believe and are baptized, shall see the Lord's salvation".  

I don't know for sure, but that may well have been the hymn that was sung at my baptism some 75 years ago.

Baptism is the key event in the life of a Christian, although I concede that it might not feel that way to most of you here today.  Maybe some of you were baptized in one of the churches that require you to be old enough to make your own decision about baptism.  Or maybe you were baptized in the Lutheran Church, but as an adult rather than as a child.  If so, you will remember all  about your baptism and about what it meant to you. 

 But the rest of you who – like me – were baptized in infancy may be asking, “How could baptism have been the big moment in my life, since I was a little baby and I don’t remember anything about it at all?”  

What does believing and having a  relationship with God have to do with Colin now... he is really not capable of holding any beliefs yet...

But certainly he is beginning to know in some deep and mysterious way the love of his mother and father.

And consider this: you don’t remember anything about being born either, yet it was a key event in your human life.  

And the DNA we inherit from parents determines much about the persons we are today (your body type, your hair and eye color, whether you are right or left-handed, and a lot more) – even though you didn’t have any choice in the matter whatsoever.  You didn’t pick your parents, and you didn’t decide to be born.  It just “happened,” and you’ve been dealing with the consequences ever since.  

For Christians, baptism is regarded as somehow analogous to physical birth.  That is to say, it’s not optional.  If you’re to have a human life, you must be conceived and go out into the world nine months later through the waters of the womb. 

  If you’re to have a life in Christ, at some time you have to pass through the waters of baptism... which early Christians called “the womb of the church.”   Jesus said to Nicodemus, No one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit.”  Certainly Nicodemus had difficulty understanding that, as we probably would have to admit that we do too.

We take it on faith, that is, we believe that Baptism is the Sacrament of New Life in Christ. 

Babies enter this new life in Christ because someone decided to bring them to be baptized, a gift given by the Grace of God..  but the children – as they grow older – will work out the  consequences of life in Christ for themselves in exactly the same way that they will make decisions about things in their natural life.  

Those who have been given a new life in Christ through baptism ultimately have to figure out what this new life will mean for them about relationships, education, work, leisure activities,  and their spiritual lives  ...in short, everything. 

While baptism is mystical, it isn’t magic.  It’s a new beginning, just as being born is a new beginning, in a new context of relationships – with Christ and with the Church.  (The emphasis here is on beginning.)  

Just as the birth of a baby makes that little human being the member of a biological family, baptism makes us members of a family of which God is Father, the Holy Spirit is the life-giver, and Jesus Christ is the first-born elder brother, always ready to show us the path to follow.  

Nothing can change the facts of our human heredity.  We’re always our parents’ offspring.  

Likewise, something equally real on the spiritual plane happens in baptism.  Nothing can ever dissolve the relationship created by our passage through the sacramental water. 

In the baptism ritual, the pastor anoints the newly baptized person with holy oil and says, 

“You are sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism and marked as Christ’s own forever.”   

Forever!!

That’s what we believe.....

Pastor Tim with Colin

What are you doing here?

Do you remember the story of Elijah fleeing into the desert in fear after he was threatened by Jezebel?   He was a stressed and fearful man. The first night he stopped to rest under a broom tree and an angel of God provided him with food to sustain him on the journey which took him another40 days until he came to Mt. Horeb where went up on the mountain and lodged in a cave -  It was there that the word of the Lord came to him with the question “what are you doing here, Elijah?” and Elijah was told to go out on the mountain and stand before the Lord.

Then came the powerful wind that smashed rocks and trees… but we read, God was not in the wind; then the earthquake that shook the foundations of the very ground upon which he stood; then the fire – and only when it was quiet – in the silence – there was a light whisper … sometimes said to be the still small voice of God , and Elijah again hears the voice of God.. “What are you doing here Elijah?’ 

This is a good question –not only “what are you doing here, right now?”  but also, “What are you doing Here – with your life?’

I’d like to share with you three short snapshots from my own experience with the fire, the earthquake and the wind. 

Snapshot #1.  Fire

1967.  It’s early morning in a small village in the highlands of Vietnam.  Tension is in the air, people are scurrying down the usually quiet street that passes by our house. We inquire and find that a battle has erupted in the hills a few kilometers from town… We see people rushing out one end of town while large military trucks full of soldiers of the local militia.. made up of young Koho tribesmen, is speeding out the other direction toward the battle.   

The Koho people have suffered much from this war… and these are the people we have come to serve.  

We hear the deafening blast of big guns on the hill above us and small arms fire in the distance.  We go to a hill at the edge of town to observe.  Later screaming  jets fly overhead that drop their hellish load of napalm that creates great fire balls and the inferno consumes everything in its path. Then on the horizon we see dozens of helicopters advancing toward us and we hear the familiar “whop, whop, whop,” of the choppers ferrying more combatants to the scene.

The sounds of war and chaos continues throughout the day – but strangely, with darkness comes an eerie quietness… interrupted only by occasional bursts of gunfire from a jumpy sentry.  We sit in our house feeling vulnerable; praying and wondering about the death and destruction of this day, one single battle amongst many of this terrible war.  This was the silence after the fire – when God speaks to our numb and fearful hearts   The question comes to me from within… “what are you doing here, Jerry?   I barely hear the tentative response..  “you are here for a purpose”. 

And so the next morning I get up and step into the day to see what can be done… I go up the hill again … and there I see one of the military trucks returning, now with a gruesome cargo of bloodied bodies of Montangard soldiers - 30 - 40 of them… And I hear another sound of war… the awful wailing and crying of mothers, wives and children..   Maybe my purpose now is simply to be here.

 

The war was frequently nearby the normally peaceful village where we lived causing great disruption and suffering for the people - both Vietnamese and tribal.

Our team offered comfort and direct aid as possible to the Koho people - Here Betty, a Canadian public health nurse visits a Koho family with a sick child.

Snapshot #2.   Earthquake

Christmas, 1972.  We hear the news report as we drive down a street in Minneapolis. A huge earthquake has leveled the city of Managua, Nicaragua… thousands may have been killed, more injured and tens of thousands of newly homeless fleeing the burning city. We had experience with earthquakes before, in Peru.  Soon a call from New York… “will you go to Managua and mount the response of the churches to this huge humanitarian disaster?”  

Arriving a few days later I am driven from the airport through the rubble and wreckage of a destroyed city and in the coming days my heart is overwhelmed with the plight of so much human loss and pain – During those first days and nights I rush around trying to coordinate in the midst of such chaos. 

Then, sometimes in the quiet at night when I awaken to another tremor of the earth,  the only sound I hear is the beating of my fearful heart within.  Again the question comes in the silence - “what are you doing here, Jerry?  

 And in the light of day, as I join with a dedicated group of Nicaraguan Christians, we proceed on… slowly but surely mounting our response – “We are here to be Your hands, O Lord – give us strength and sustenance for the journey ahead".  

 

 Together we build an organization for service to the people of Nicaragua, an organization that has lasted until this day.

In Latin America an earthquake can bring down thousands of buildings in a matter of seconds. This is the destroyed city of Huarmey, Peru, where I worked. This earthquake, May 1970 killed over 60,000 people.  The Managua earthquake of December, 1972 killed an estimated 28,000. In complex humanitarian emergencies the Church needs to respond quickly, but more importantly accompany the people to rebuild long after.

Snapshot #3.   The Wind

1974: Hurricane Fifi, one of the most devastating hurricanes to ever hit Central America, devastates  the north coast of Honduras.  We were living in Nicaragua at the time and when we heard the news of this disaster my friend Peter said, “let’s load up the van with as many bags of rice and beans as we can carry and head up there”.  

 We did just that. But when we saw the destruction that the wind and rain had wrought on the lives of tens of thousands of people we are a bit overwhelmed.  We knew our offering was tiny in comparison to the need.  But we already knew that - that wasn’t the point.   

By this time in our life’s work we had had enough experience with wars, earthquakes and grinding poverty to know that what was most needed was to stand alongside people after the storm, or in the midst of poverty and say we were there to help… not just an immediate response and quick fix, but for the long haul.  We tell them that it will not be easy, but we are here to accompany you and your churches and communities. "You can count on it". 

Honduras is one of the poorest countries in Latin America.  The Church has accompanied the poorest of the poor through long term projects such as those of Lutheran World Relief and Heifer International, two of the organizations I had the good fortune to work for many years.

Finally, a thought about living our faith boldly, but at the same time with humility.    

Sometimes the prompting of the Spirit calls us to confront the overwhelming needs of the world and we may feel like retreating and going into a cave.  It is probably a normal and good thing to be wandering around in the wilderness for awhile –times when we listen to discern God’s purpose.

 But, as in the case of Elijah, we may need to find that quiet place of rest (under a broom tree), and in the silence after the storm ask God direction and courage to move ahead. We will need

sustenance for the journey ahead. Whether facing the storms and fires of an humanitarian disaster or a personal crisis and need, or that of someone we know, we still can hear that question, "What are you doing here?"

When that question came to me so often, “what are you doing here, Jerry?” – the fact was that God already knew the answer to that question… but God may have been putting me to a test to struggle with the question myself and articulate my own response, and then, with the leading of the Spirit, move into the future to do God's work the best I could. 

Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.… Mathew 11: 28,29

Breathe Deeply

I practice a routine called "Stretch and Pray" first thing most mornings. Murray Finck, the author of a little book by this title, gives guidance for a series of stretches and prayer positions that help get the accumulated stiffness and aches out of the body. This is a good way to get centered to start the day - appreciating life, turning attention to God; thankful for this new day and mindful of the needs of others.. Very importantly, along with each stretch and prayer position, Finck counsels the practitioner  - "don't forget to breathe".

Seems obvious, of course, that we shouldn't forget to breathe. After all, inhaling and exhaling air is a basic necessity for life.  But I find that remembering to breathe deeply can help turn attention to the fact that I am alive and for this I am thankful.  The words for breath and spirit are very interconnected in Hebrew and Christian spiritual traditions.  To breathe means we are living and our breath is a gift from God; something we have in common with every living being.

The phrase from an old hymn comes to mind, "Breathe on me Breath of God, Fill me with life anew"

I have been with several loved ones during their last days and hours on earth and have noticed how shallow their breathing became as life ebbed away and they "gave up the ghost".

These scattered thoughts came into my mind the other day when we got an email from an old friend and colleague from our long ago days in Vietnam.  Bill Herod, who has lived in both Vietnam and Cambodia for many years, has great compassion for the people of Southeast Asia and has dedicated his life to service and peacemaking.  I copy his short reflection here with his permission:

      "Years ago in Viet-Nam, I was helping out at the little hospital in Tam-Ky after a ferocious battle. The     place was overflowing with casualties. 

     Suddenly, a nurse and I saw a man rushing toward us carrying a young woman. She was unconscious, but still breathing.  We put the 17-year-old on the ground and began CPR. As the nurse did the compressions, I started mouth-to-mouth. 

     An odd calm settled in as we went through the procedures. I filled her lungs with my breath, then felt the breath rush out against my cheek.

     After a few moments, the nurse sat back and said, “She’s gone.”  “But she’s still breathing,” I protested. “No,” the nurse countered, “you’re breathing. She’s not.”

     Whose breath was it I felt on my cheek? Hers? Mine? Yours? It was ours. All of us are inextricably interconnected. We are surrounded by birth, life and death. We all breathe, but whose breath is it? It is ours and that of all those who have gone before and all those who will follow.

Each breath we take is part of the whole mystery of creation. Breathe with care."

Bill Herod
Sen Monorom, Mondulkiri, Cambodia

My aunt, Minerva Aaker, took her last breath on March 15 this year at the age of 95 - the last of all my uncles and aunts. Here she is with my sister Jean and me a year ago.

Just two weeks later on March 28th, our grandson, Colin Aaker, took his first breath as he came into this world in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

For everything there is an appointed time ... a time to be born and a time to die...                  Eccleiastes 3:1

Colin with grandma Judy

Genevieve's advice

We recently spent a weekend in Amarillo in the pan handle of Texas - think drought, strong wind, flat land and the odor of feed lots.  The reason for the visit was to spend time with an old friend, Carolyn Kelly, whom we first met many years ago in Peru. 

One afternoon we visited Genevieve Olson Miller, a 95 year old widow who lives alone in a small house on a farm about 30 miles from Amarillo.  Out at her farm that day the wind was blowing great billows of dirt into the air, bringing to mind images I have seen of how that part of the country looked on an average day during the dust bowl back in the 1930s.

Genevieve was born and grew up on a farm near Oslo, Texas - a town settled by Norwegians in the early 1900s.  Back in the first decades of the century ads were published in papers in the North enticing Norwegians to visit and buy land in Oslo in order to establish a prosperous Norwegian community and congregate with the local Lutheran church in the area.  Now the population is much reduced but I understand there is still a small Lutheran church in Oslo.  My grandfather, Olaf Aaker, went with a neighbor by train to Texas to check it out - about 100 years ago.  Luckily he didn't bite on the sales pitch and came home to the rich soil of his Minnesota farm.  That was the longest and only major trip he ever took.  

Genevieve is a well read and engaging personality.  Upon entering her house one is struck by the large number of books piled high on tables and stacked on book shelves.  She keeps up on theology, politics, environmental issues, and current events - local and global.  Within the first minute of our conversation she was into a discussion about water and the dire situation the country is facing given prolonged droughts and the depletion of the aquifer.

She had just read Lester Brown's latest book,  Full Planet, Empty Plates: The New Geopolitics of Food Scarcity (2012).  She needs a magnifying glass to read these days, but she said she finished reading this book in four hours.  I have read some of Lester Brown's books, but have not read this one nor have I been good at keeping up with global issues recently -  Certainly I would not be able to compete with Genevieve's reading program these days. 

After about an hour of conversation Genevieve invited us to partake in coffee and a piece of delicious homemade chocolate cake and continue talking around the table.  She is very distraught about the dismal level of civil discourse in the country at present, and the lack of long term thinking for the common good. 

I told her I am preparing a talk on the topic of living our faith boldly in daily life in the modern culture.  I asked her advice on how I might broach the subject.  With hardly a pause she suggested I might consider Martin Luther's explanation of the eighth commandment.  Then she proceeded to quote it from memory, just as she had learned it some 80 years ago in confirmation class.  Wow!

The 8th commandment is ....

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor

What does this mean?  (Luther's explanation)

We should fear and love God that we may not deceitfully belie, betray, slander, or defame our neighbor, but defend him, [think and] speak well of him, and put the best construction on everything.

A bit of an updated translation of Luther might read like this:

We should fear and love God, so that we do not lie about, betray or slander our neighbors, but excuse them, speak well of them, and put the best construction on everything they do.

If we followed this commandment wouldn;t we be in a better place politically and religiously in this country?

In a recent article about the ten commandments Pastor Peter Marty wrote, "However feebly we may grasp the commandments, they are worth fresh attention in our congregations and households.  We can keep them from becoming artifacts of a distant past."

Genevieve certainly gave me something to think about and I went back to re-read and think about the ten commandments, something I haven't done for a long time.  There is much value and practicality for daily life in the wisdom of the ages, even though many people in the post-modern age don't know much about the ten commandments.  Or care.

Indeed, I found much to think about and appreciate in Genevieve's wisdom and advice.

 

Genevieve

In the Silence

This week we went to a place called Flathead Lutheran Bible Camp here in Montana.  It is an incredibly beautiful retreat center set on the shores of a gorgeous lake, framed by immense snow-capped mountains.  Such places prompt a movement within us as we say things like, “awesome” or “isn’t this beautiful?”  We search for words to form a prayer of appreciation.  But often we don’t find our words to be adequate.  

In the summer this place is filled with the sounds and movement of hundreds of campers and staff, making it a joyful and active place to nurture young people in the faith AND experience lots of fun – accompanied by the sounds of clapping, talking, singing, laughing, squealing, and prayer – even loud praying, and maybe even crying. 

But this week was different for our small group who gathered for an “Adult Spirituality Retreat”.  We had the place to ourselves and we were there, at least in part, to set aside some time from the loud sounds and demands of the world – at least for a couple of days.

So in the first session on Monday morning a dozen of us sat in silence for twenty minutes. That doesn’t sound like much, does it?  But, have you tried twenty minutes of intentional silence in a group lately?  In a normal setting, say a worship service, just a few minutes of silence makes many people uncomfortable. 

This was a prayer method called “centering prayer” in which one is prompted to pray without words, trying to brush away the distractions of the “to do” lists or other concerns circulating in our minds. 

Praying without words?  That sounds counter-intuitive to conventional approach to prayer – for we usually pray with words directed to the divine presence asking for help, intervention, direction, or giving thanks.  We do all the talking and not much listening.

During those hours we experienced silence together as well as quiet meditation on solitary walks – (several walked the Labyrinth).  After the time in centering prayer I asked the group members to comment on and talk about the experience of silence. Some talked, but at least two participants later said the experience was such a deep and personal time with God, they had no words – in fact they didn’t want to talk then.

We had among us some who are “experienced prayers” and others who are shy about praying out loud.  One session was a meditation on Romans 8:26-28 where we read that “we don’t know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words”.  Intuitively we know this to be true.

Later our friend Janis Hansen, who attended the retreat sent this poem:

PRAYING

 It doesn't have to be

the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones;

just pay attention, then patch
a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn't
a contest but the doorway
into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.

 ~ Mary Oliver, from her collection: "Thirst," (Beacon Press, 2006)