Adult Bible study continues in May with classes being held on Sunday morning in the library from 9:15-10:15. Continuing the theme of lesser-known New Testament writings, we are exploring 1 John, a short letter in the back of your Bibles.
CLICK HERE for a worship video for May 7
Sermon for the Fifth Sunday of Easter – May 7, 2023
John 14:1-14
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
The disciples’ hearts were troubled. How could they not be? Jesus had just told them that one of them would soon betray him. He told them that he would be leaving them, and he was saying it in a cryptic way that sounded ominous. He told them that Peter would deny even knowing him three times before the cock crowed the next morning. Of course the disciples’ hearts were troubled!
And so Jesus said to them, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me.”
Jesus wasn’t merely encouraging them to believe in the existence of God. He was telling them to have confidence in God, and to have confidence in him. He was telling them to have faith in the Father and the Son. He was telling them to trust in them.
Their hearts didn’t need to stay troubled, Jesus continued, because there was a dwelling place beyond the betrayal. There was a place for them beyond the denial – a place for them in the Father’s house. There was a room for them in this house, and Jesus was leaving in order to prepare that room for them, so that where Jesus was, there they would be also.
“You know the way to where I am going,” Jesus said to them. It isn’t hard to imagine the confused looks on their faces. You can imagine them thinking, “Uh, we do?” You can picture them scratching their heads, trying to figure out the way. Thomas alone was brave enough to say what probably all of them were thinking: “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?”
Thomas was asking for directions. He was asking for a map. Even just a place name would have helped. Are you talking about the temple, Jesus? Are you going back to Galilee? Somewhere further, like Syria? Rome even? Where are you going, and how can we know the way?
And Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
This is a boldly exclusive claim Jesus is making here, to be sure. He alone is the way to God the Father. But while this is indeed an exclusive claim, it is also a promise. In the context of these disciples and their troubled hearts, it is good news!
The disciples were anxious and confused. Jesus was talking about going to the Father’s house and saying they knew the way, but clearly they didn’t know the way! What were they going to do? How were they going to figure out the way?
What Jesus said in response to their confusion and their anxiety was an assurance. Jesus said to them, “I AM the way!” They knew the way because they knew him! They didn’t need a map. They didn’t need directions. And they didn’t need to worry, either! Jesus IS the way. No one comes to the Father by their own power or cleverness or sense of direction. No one comes to the Father by their own strength or smarts or spirituality. No one comes to the Father except through Jesus. He is the way, and the truth, and the life, and he will get them to where they need to be.
As part of my seminary education I took a study trip to Brevig Mission, Alaska, which is way up on the Seward Peninsula, north of Nome. Brevig Mission is named after a Norwegian Lutheran pastor named Tollef Brevig, who established a mission among the Inupiak people there. Today it is essentially a village of Alaska Natives who are all Lutheran! They are served by a pastor who also serves the community of Teller, which is just across an inlet of the Bering Sea. When it is above freezing and the water is open, you get from Brevig to Teller by boat. In the winter, you cross that frozen inlet by snow machine. I went in January, so on a Sunday morning I got to ride in the supply sleigh behind the snow machine as we went over to Teller for worship services.
On the way back is when things got interesting. As we made our way out onto the ice for the return trip, it started to snow. Hard. Then the wind kicked up, creating total white-out conditions. At one point the pastor driving the snow machine stopped to try to find the tracks we made on the way over. Those tracks were filling in fast.
You could say at this point that my heart was troubled! I’d read enough Jack London stories as a kid that I could vividly imagine how this could end up. I thought for sure that this was how I was going to die, lost out on this frozen finger of the Bering Sea. I came to Brevig to learn about being a pastor, but I would die instead as a popsicle.
I sure as heck didn’t know the way back to Brevig. There was no amount of smarts or strength or spirituality which I possessed that would get me back to the house. All I could do was hold on and trust that this pastor would get me there. And, somehow, he did.
To believe, to have faith, is to hold on and trust in Jesus. To know the way to the Father’s house is not about knowing a route and then following it, it is about knowing and trusting a person. It is about knowing and trusting Jesus to get you where you need to go. As Jesus explained further to Thomas, he and the Father are one.
And so when Jesus says he is the way, the truth, and the life, he is not giving us an orienteering project for us to figure out. He is not giving us a set of directions and telling us to prove ourselves. He is not telling us to make our own way or discover our own truth or to find life in ourselves. Jesus is calling us to simply hold on and trust him. He is the way, and the truth, and the life.
As Jesus’ disciples today, we often find that our hearts are troubled. During our life-long battle with sin, we find that we continue to betray and deny Jesus in ways both big and small, by things we have done and things we have left undone. Our hearts are troubled by the brokenness of the world. Our hearts are troubled by uncertainty and by loss and by fear.
In fact, in our congregation here it seems like we’ve had more than our share of troubled hearts these last few weeks. We have a number of folks who are grieving. We have several folks who are very sick, and folks who love them who are very worried. We have several brothers and sisters in Christ who are in life situations that are complicated and painful, without a clear path forward.
When your heart is troubled you can feel a little lost, a little disoriented. You can feel cold and afraid and unsure of the way home, uncertain that you’ll even make it home.
Today Jesus says to all of us, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” He says, “Believe in God, believe also in me.” Jesus isn’t just asking us to give our assent to an idea or a doctrine. He is inviting us to trust in God, and to trust in him. They are one in the same, after all, and they are in cahoots to save us from everything that troubles our hearts. Trust us, Jesus says! Let us take care of things! Don’t worry!
Today Jesus says to all of us, “There is a future beyond your sin, beyond your failures. There is a home beyond your fears. There is a dwelling place beyond death. On the other side of all of that is the Father’s house. You will be safe there. I will be with you there. And I am going to get you there.”
Today Jesus says to all of us, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” This is indeed a boldly exclusive claim. Christ alone is the way to God the Father! No one comes to the Father by their own goodness. No one comes to the Father by their own efforts, or because they have earned entry. No one comes to the Father by their own smarts or strength or spirituality. These are all dead-end roads.
No one finds their own way to the Father’s house. No one discovers the truth by defining it for themselves. No one finds life by looking inward.
But this exclusive claim is also a promise: Christ’s work alone gets us to the Father! We don’t need to go down those dead ends, those spiritual rabbit holes. All there is for us to do is to know and to trust in Jesus. When you know Jesus, you know the way. When you believe in him, you know the truth. When you trust him, you will have life.
When Jesus left the disciples, he was indeed betrayed. He was denied three times by one of his closest followers. Jesus was arrested and beaten and crucified and killed. But then on the third day, he rose again. This was how Jesus prepared the way.
By his death and resurrection, Jesus leads us out of sin and into forgiveness and mercy and righteousness. By his death and resurrection, Jesus leads us out of fear and despair and into peace and hope and even joy. By his death and resurrection, Jesus ultimately will lead us out of death and into eternal life with him, so that where he is, there we will be also.
If your heart is troubled today, hold on and trust in Jesus. Even now he is making a way. Even now he is leading you. Hold on and trust him. He will get you where you need to go. He will get you to the Father’s house. He will get you safely home.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church
CLICK HERE for a worship video for April 30
Sermon for the Fourth Sunday of Easter – April 30, 2023
John 10:1-10
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our risen Lord Jesus Christ.
We live in the midst of an increasingly confusing cacophony of voices, all vying for our attention, and it is increasingly difficult to know which of these voices can be trusted.
There are voices on TV news with competing claims to the truth depending on which station you’re watching. While the nation’s news used to come through the trusted voice of a single figure like Walter Cronkite, it now comes through several voices, and they are all saying very different things.
There is a vast array of voices on social media making claims to the truth. Social media companies have struggled to figure out ways to make those online conversations trustworthy by trying to weed out fake accounts and figuring out ways to verify users and by tagging some statements with context or correction.
There are voices on platforms like Tik-Tok, where quick sound-bite video clips with sometimes dangerous or destructive ideas are repeated and multiplied over and over again, warping young minds and spreading social contagions.
There are now more than 150 million podcast episodes floating around the internet, being piped into people’s ears. Talk about a cacophony of voices! And with the increasing sophistication of Chatbots and AI, it is getting more and more difficult to trust that the voices we hear even belong to real people!
Podcaster Joe Rogan recently illustrated this point by having AI generate an entire episode of his show. It perfectly mimicked his voice and the voice of his guest. They engaged in a perfectly natural sounding conversation covering various topics for almost two hours – only none of it was real! It was all AI generated. The voices were completely fake.
For the record, this is not a blanket endorsement of everything Joe Rogan says or does – but this little experiment of his was very telling of what we’re in for as this technology advances. In a world like this, which voices are we to listen to? Which voices can we trust?
There were many voices competing for people’s ears in Jesus’ time too. Even without social media and podcasts and AI, there was a confusing array of voices. There were many religious movements and leaders, all making various claims to the truth. There were different voices saying different things about Jesus, about who he was and whether people should follow him or not.
In the chapter just before our gospel reading for today is the story of a man born blind. He couldn’t see Jesus, but he could hear his voice. He listened to Jesus’ voice and trusted it. By trusting in this voice he not only had his sight restored, he was given an entirely new life as he came to believe in and worship Jesus. In stark contrast to this were the voices of the Pharisees. They didn’t want people to listen to Jesus. They wanted people to listen to them.
It is in this context that Jesus warns people about listening to the wrong voices, and invites them to listen to his voice. And by way of illustration, Jesus points to how sheep listen to the voice of their shepherd. He talks about how shepherds open the gate and call their own sheep by name, and they follow him because they know the sound of his voice.
When I was in my first congregation in Montana, we were invited out to the home of some sheep ranchers. Our oldest son was just a toddler, and we pushed him in his stroller out to the big enclosure where the sheep were. The sheep were all clustered together on the far side of the sheepfold, so we called out to them, trying to lure them closer so our son could get a better look. Well, they didn’t budge. Then the wife of the sheep rancher called out to them. They still didn’t budge. But when the rancher, the shepherd himself, called out to them, they all came running! They knew his voice. They knew the voice of their shepherd and they followed it. What Jesus was talking about two thousand years ago still happens today!
Jesus points out how sheep don’t follow the voice of strangers, because they do not know the voice of strangers. He also warns that some of those voices are dangerous. They belong to thieves and bandits who come only to steal and kill and destroy.
Jesus is warning us too. Jesus is warning us to be careful about what voices we are listening to. He is warning us against following those voices which only lead us into danger. He is warning us against those voices which only want to steal and kill and destroy. Because we are his sheep, we are to listen to his voice.
Jesus says he uses his voice to call his sheep by name. Jesus knows his sheep intimately! He knows them personally! He cares for each of them individually, calling them to himself.
Jesus says that those who listen to his voice come in and go out and find pasture. That is, they come into the safety of the sheepfold where they are protected, and they go out into the pasture where they are fed. It is a picture of both protection and providence, of being guarded and being nourished.
Best of all, Jesus says that those who listen to his voice will have life, and have it abundantly. He has come to give us life with God, a life with God that begins now and continues forever. How can this kind of life be anything other than abundant, overflowing with God’s goodness and mercy and love?
You have heard this voice. In your baptism this shepherd Jesus has called you by name. He knows you intimately and personally. He knows your individual quirks and failings. He knows your specific sins, and he laid down his life for all of them, taking them upon himself. He also knows your specific gifts, and he raises you to new life in him so that you might share them with the world. He forgives you and loves you and continues to call you by name.
As you follow his voice, he leads you into his sheepfold, where he protects you from all those voices which would steal or kill or destroy. He calls you into the church, into Christian community, where he can ward off those other voices which would lure you away from him. He leads you to good pasture, where he can nourish and strengthen you.
As we listen to his voice, as we trust it, he fills us with life! A truly abundant life can only come from listening to the voice of Jesus Christ. He alone can give us an abundant life full of hope and joy and peace and love. He alone leads us into the abundance of eternal life with God.
Just this last week the Wall Street Journal had an article about a poll they had conducted about happiness. Only 12% of respondents in the poll said they were truly happy, and they followed this up with further investigation to try to find out what these happy people had in common. The biggest commonality among those who said they were truly happy was that they were frequent church-goers. They didn’t just identify as Christian in some vague philosophical way. They didn’t just go to church a couple times a year. They were weekly worshippers.
Now I’m sure this 12% of people who said they were truly happy still had problems. I’m sure they still had difficulties. But even so, they said they were truly happy. (Not to quibble, but perhaps a better word for what they were describing would be joy rather than happiness.)
It isn’t hard to see the connection between their response and their regular attendance in worship. After all, it is in worship that they hear the voice of their shepherd. That’s where they join with the rest of the flock to listen to his voice. It is in worship that his voice rises above all those other voices that only seek to steal and kill and destroy. It is within the sheepfold of the Christian church that we hear the Word of God, and in so doing we hear the deepest and fullest truths about ourselves, about our world, and about God. These truths are life giving!
It is a sad correlation to see that as church attendance has been going down in our country for decades, exacerbated significantly by COVID, people are quantifiably less happy. Diseases of despair are on the rise. Deaths of despair are on the rise to such a degree that the average life span in our country is going down. Those voices that only steal life and kill true joy and destroy hope are being listened to and followed far too often, with tragic results.
Let’s not be simplistic. It isn’t that coming to worship frequently is a magic formula that inoculates us from pain and sorrow and struggle. We all know that isn’t true.
But it is true that as our shepherd calls us into this sheepfold, as we listen to his voice, he continues to call us by name. He continues to lead us to green pastures and still waters, restoring our souls. He continues to comfort us when we are in the darkest valleys. He continues to prepare a table for us in the presence of our enemies. He continues to give us the promise that we will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
And so, amidst the cacophony of other voices competing for your attention, continue to listen carefully to the voice of your shepherd. Listen to it and trust it. Listen to it and follow it. For you are one of his beloved sheep, and he has come so that you would have life, and have it abundantly.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church
The OHLC Men’s group and Luth Youth cordially invite you to a special Mother’s Day Tea from 9 to 10:15 on Mother’s Day, May 14th: featuring faux mimosas, pastries, fruit, and other goodies. All are welcome as we celebrate the vocation of motherhood. Come celebrate the mothers in your life and the mothers of OHLC, past and present! There will be a free-will offering to support youth and family events.
CLICK HERE for a worship video for April 23
Sermon for the Third Sunday of Easter – April 23, 2023
Luke 24:13-35
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and savior Jesus Christ, who is risen indeed. Alleluia.
You’ve probably seen it happen. The local sports team is way behind. It looks like they are facing a certain defeat. And so some of the disappointed fans pick up their things and head for the doors. They start streaming out of the stadium while the game is still being played, thinking it is already essentially over, that it is beyond hope. Maybe it is a baseball game or a football game or a hockey match. Whatever the sport, you’ve probably seen it happen. Maybe you yourself have left early when it seemed like your team had no hope of victory.
The two disciples we meet in our gospel reading for today had no hope, and so they left Jerusalem. They thought there was nothing left to see there. They thought Jesus has been defeated, and that there was no point in hanging around any longer. They had seen Jesus being handed over and arrested. They saw him being crucified. They saw his dead body being taken down from the cross. They had heard about the empty tomb, but this was not a sign of victory to them. It just meant that the body was now missing, which just added to their sense of defeat.
These two disciples had no hope. They could only see defeat. They thought it was game over for Jesus. Their hearts were slow to believe. And so they left Jerusalem and headed down the road to Emmaus.
And here is one of the remarkable elements of a story that is chock full of them: the risen Jesus went after them! Jesus chased them down on the road to Emmaus! Can you imagine a quarterback or a closing pitcher running out of the stadium, out into the parking lot, calling the discouraged fans to come back in? That’s just what Jesus did! And these two disciples weren’t even among the twelve Jesus had called. These were two from the larger group of disciples who had followed Jesus around, often at a distance. They were not part of that intimate group, and yet on the day of his resurrection, Jesus went chasing after them. He didn’t want them to leave without knowing about his come-from-behind victory. He didn’t want them to remain in unbelief. He didn’t want them to remain without hope.
They didn’t recognize him at first. We don’t know why. I always picture Jesus with one of those silly big nose-and-glasses disguises on, just waiting for the right moment to take it off and surprise them. There’s just so much irony and even humor in this story that I think it fits. Luther’s interpretation is more serious, and probably more accurate. He speculated that they were so overcome by grief and shock that their brains couldn’t process that it was Jesus.
At any rate, Jesus caught up to them on the road to Emmaus, sidled up to them, and casually asked, “What are you guys talking about?” Cleopas replied, “What do you think we’re talking about? Have you been living under a rock for these last few days? Are you the only person who doesn’t know about the things that just happened back in Jerusalem?” “What things?” Jesus coyly replied. Isn’t that funny? The guy to whom all the things happened asked, “What things?” Cleopas gave his recap of all the things, which, from his perspective looked like a complete and utter defeat. “We had hoped he was the one to redeem Israel,” Cleopas said.
Jesus then gently chided these two disciples, saying, “Oh how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all the prophets had declared!” He told them it was necessary that the Messiah should suffer all these things and then enter his glory. Then he led them through the scriptures, pointing them to all the passages about himself. He interpreted the entire Bible through the lens of all the things that had happened in Jerusalem, assuring them that this had been God’s game plan all along.
Can you imagine getting this Bible study from Jesus himself? I took a literature class in college from Carol Doig, the wife of the acclaimed author Ivan Doig. We read one of his books in class and then he came in to talk to us about it. Here was the author himself in front of us! We could ask him anything about the story or the characters or the themes, and he could tell us exactly what he intended. In the same way, these two disciples learned about the Bible from the Author himself. They learned about the Word from the Word made flesh! And he was telling them that the whole book is about him. The whole book is about his death and resurrection for our salvation. The whole thing is about his ultimate victory over sin and death, a victory he shares with us.
When evening came the two disciples asked Jesus to stay with them. They still didn’t recognize him, but it was evening and the day was almost over, and so they urged him strongly to stay. He did, and when he sat at table with them he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. And now at last their eyes were opened. They recognized him.
Jesus then vanished from their sight. He had done what he came to do. He helped them to see him and know that he was indeed risen. He helped them to believe. He restored their hope.
Now these two disciples knew that Jesus had not been defeated after all. They went back to Jerusalem. They celebrated his victory with the eleven disciples. They shared with them how Jesus had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
We know the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus. We know the road that feels like defeat, the road that feels hopeless. We have walked it ourselves. It could be the journey home from a frustrating or disappointing day at work. It could be the walk through a struggling relationship with an uncertain future. It could be a stroll down a lane of memories which bring regret or shame or trauma. It could be a trip home from the doctor’s office after a devastating diagnosis. It could be the lonely and heartbreaking road home from a cemetery. We know this road. We have all walked it. There are defeats which are much more profound than those in any sporting event. There are defeats which leave us struggling to find hope.
But our risen Lord doesn’t let us walk that road alone. He comes to us. He chases us down. He cares about us – even us who are the least among his disciples. He cares about us too much to let us leave without knowing about the great victory he has won for us.
Our Lord Jesus comes to us through his Word. While he isn’t here in person to lead us in Bible study, he has given us the interpretive key to unlocking all of scripture. It is all about him! Every story whispers his name! He is the seed in Genesis which would crush the head of the serpent, saving us from sin. He is the Lamb of God in Exodus who delivers us from death. He is the suffering servant in Isaiah by whose wounds we are healed. We know the meaning of scripture because it has been disclosed to us by the Author himself. We know the Word because it has been interpreted to us by the Word made flesh. And in our hearing of this Word, our hearts begin to burn within us. Faith is kindled. Hope is lit in us.
Our Lord Jesus also reveals himself to us in the breaking of the bread. He shows himself to us in bread and wine, his body and blood. He opens our eyes to his presence among us, literally feeding our faith. And once our eyes are opened to his presence among us in his Holy Supper, we can look back on the road we’ve been walking and begin to see that he was with us all along, even when we didn’t recognize him.
At some point in our lives we all walk the road to Emmaus. We walk with the assumption that defeat is inevitable. We walk believing that there is no hope, that sin and death have already won – in our world, and in our lives. Maybe you’re walking that road today.
But our risen Lord Jesus does not let us walk that road alone. He chases us down. He comes after us. We might not see him. We might doubt he is there. Our hearts are sometimes foolish and slow to believe too!
But our risen Lord patiently walks with us every step of the way. He points us to his Word, so that we would understand God’s game plan. He reveals himself to us in the breaking of the bread so that we would trust that he is risen indeed.
He turns us around on that road, turning us from unbelief to faith, from sadness to joy, from dejection to hearts burning within us, from despair to hope.
He turns us from the assumption of defeat to the assurance of his victory over sin and death.
So lift up your heads, friends. Team sin and death have taken an L. Our opponent, sin, has been defeated. You are forgiven. Our opponent, death, has been defeated. You have nothing to be afraid of anymore.
So walk in peace. Walk in hope. Walk in joy. Walk in newness of life.
Christ has won, and he promises to share his victory with us.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church