LGBT Message

My name is Mark Hanson, and I am presiding bishop of the largest Lutheran church in
North America -- the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

I am a father of six and a grandfather of four.

I’ve listened with pain and shock to reports of young people taking their lives because
they’ve been bullied and tormented for being different, for being gay or perceived to be
gay, for being the people God created them to be.

I can only imagine what it’s like to be bullied for being lesbian, gay, bisexual or
transgender.

But I do know how bullying can destroy someone.

One day, I came home and found our daughter curled up in the fetal position on the floor
weeping uncontrollably. She was struggling to know who she was as a bi-racial young
woman.

She felt bruised by words people had spoken about her, words that ate away at her sense
of identity and self-worth. I sat down by her on the floor holding her in my arms.

Words have the power to harm and the power to heal.

Sometimes the words of my Christian brothers and sisters have hurt you. And I also know
that our silence causes you pain.

Today, I want to speak honestly with you and offer you the hope I have in Christ:
You are a beloved child of God. Your life carries the dignity and the beauty of God’s
creation. God has called you by name and claimed you forever. There’s a place for you in
this world and in this church.

As a Christian I trust that God is working in this world for justice and peace through you
and through me.

It gets better.

“For I’m convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present,
nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation,
will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

May it be so. Amen.

"The Long View" by Archbishop Oscar Romero

It helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God's work.
Nothing we do is complete, which is a way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No program accomplishes the church's mission.
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
This is what we are about:
We plant the seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.
This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord's grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.
We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own.

Pastor Doug's Sermon 10/10/10

Luke 17:11-19
October 10, 2010


Did you hear the one about the 10 HIV infected men and
a crazy man of God,
getting together in the middle of Joseph Avenue?
Oh it was quite a scene I would imagine…..
Not quite sure how the HIV came about in the 10 men.
Probably not in a way that the staid and steady church going crowds would approve.
And as for that crazy man of God?
Well, your guess is as good as mine as to how he found himself in such an unsafe and quite frankly, a rather invisible neighborhood – at least invisible to the ones who count for something in this world.
And speaking of invisible neighborhoods, why would anyone who doesn’t live on or near Joseph Avenue, find him or herself in such a dangerous place – a no man’s land – an urban desert of fear and neglect if you will….
Surely there are safer and more profitable places to go if one is looking for more people in the pews and more dollars in the offering plate on a Sabbath morning.
Certainly there are more important things for this “holy man of God” to be doing than hanging out on the wrong side of the Inner Loop with people who clearly have gotten themselves into a bad situation…
I bet that’s what the religious crowds in the temple pews were saying about Jesus when they first heard Luke’s story of
10 Lepers and
A crazy man of God…
Meeting in the middle of nowhere.
And why not? For those who see religion more as “sales” than “service” it doesn’t make sense for Jesus to be wasting his time in that part of town.
Certainly the magnificence of Pilate’s Mediterranean coastal oasis at Caesarea Maritima would have more lucrative crowds for your mission. Folks from all over the civilized world come and go through that splendid city. Pilate even has a pretty decent Oceanside swimming pool for himself there. And let’s not forget the sales potential in the roman hippodrome. Captive crowd in a stadium – Can’t go wrong there….
And what about the literal glow and splendor of that great city on a hill: Jerusalem: The religious and cultural epicenter of the universe? Boy, if you wish to bankroll your religion,
those are the places to go…
those are the people that statistically speaking are going to bring success to your ministry.
And yet something tells me that though Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, it is not to rub shoulders with the rich and pure…
Nor is it to build up the balance in his Galilean bank account – if he ever had such a thing.
No, as much as I might not approve of the places Jesus goes and the company he keeps, Luke tells me that in Jerusalem there is no glow.
In Jerusalem, there is no crowd waiting to put their tithes in the Jesus Ministries Bank Account.
Instead there is a cross.
A cross of shame..
A cross of weakness…
A cross of death….
Oh yeah, Luke warned me about that right from the beginning when on Mary’s lips came the confession that in Christ, God has
Brought down the powerful from their thrones..
And lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things…
And sent the rich away empty.
Lifting up the lowly…
Filling the hungry…
Now I get it! Now I know why Jesus is in the place he is
and with the people he is with. Now it makes sense.
And lest we think that Jesus is just a really compassionate social worker, Luke reminds us again and again, that the One who lifts up the lowly, will himself be lowly on a Cross.
That the One who fills the hungry, will himself hunger and thirst upon the hardwood of a cross ~ the cruelest instrument of execution known to humanity.
So who better to not only walk with the lowly, but to heal the lowly, than Jesus – The One who being born in lowliness, becomes the lowest of the lowly by pouring himself out on a Cross?
Kind of changes the Leper story this morning doesn’t it? Kind of makes it a little less tame…Makes it a little more dangerous… A little more scandalous…A little less Norman Rockwell at Thanksgiving.
Scandalous….
Not only because the tables are turned on the power structures which sustain us day by day… (You know the mighty being cast out and the lowly being lifted up)
But scandalous because the appropriate response to God’s gift of healing comes not from one of the temple priests or parish pastors, who should know how to respond to God, but from an outsider…
Someone from an unacceptable faith tradition…
Someone to whom I have given the label, “Enemy”.
“Then one of them, when he saw he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him”.
When one of the ten returns to Jesus after being healed, Luke tells us he does more than just say “thank you”.
First he turns…
Next he praises (The Greek word there is Doxa from which we get the word, “doxology” which literally means, “gives glory to God”)…
Following this, he worships (literally “falls on his face”)…
and then finally he gives thanks (the Greek word there being Eucharisteo – from which we get the word, Eucharist.)
Turning…
Praising…
Falling on your face…
And giving thanks…
According to Luke, that is how the faithful respond to God.
Turning…
Praising..
Worshiping..
Giving Thanks…
The Shepherds do it at the news of Jesus birth…
The Centurion does it at Jesus’ crucifixion…
The Disciples do it when they witness Jesus’ ascension…
And now we are told that this dermatalogically-challenged one…
This unclean Samaritan outsider knows where his healing has come from and does something about it:
He returns and gives praise.
We can learn a lot from a leper. We can learn a lot from those who reside on the outside…
Outside of our piety…
Outside of our comfort zones…
Outside of our assumptions of how God works and how God could not possibly work.
What would it look like for us, as individuals and as a congregation, if we actually did learn something from this leprous Samaritan…
And we actually returned and gave praise to God for the gift of Jesus?
Maybe our eyes would be opened to see that what we do here on a Sunday morning in worship is not an optional event where I come a few times a year and learn how to be a good person but instead we see worship for what it is: An event where we return over and over again praising God, falling on our faces and giving thanks that we too are recipients of healing, wholeness and eternal life. And all the while measuring the worship’s value not by “Timex time” but by “God’s Kairos Time”.
What would it look like if we returned and gave praise to God for the gift of Jesus?
Maybe life on the edge wouldn’t be so scary…
Maybe our eyes would see beyond the pews of today to the see the pews of tomorrow steeped in meaningful outreach helped in part by our own generosity today…
What would it look like if we returned and gave praise to God for the gift of Jesus?
Maybe, just maybe we would be a church whose bottom line value is determined not by the size of our savings but by the size of our serving.
So let me ask this question one more time.
Did you hear the one about the 10 HIV infected men and
a crazy man of God,
getting together in the middle of Joseph Avenue?
What about the 10 lepers and
A crazy man of God,
Getting together on the road to Jerusalem?
What about the saints and sinners of a local Lutheran church and
A crazy man of God,
Getting together in the middle of the city…?

NALC Is Wrong...

On page 8 of the latest Lutheran Magazine, is an article describing the formation of the North American Lutheran Church back in late August. In this article leaders of the newly formed NALC are quoted as saying they will "uphold confessional principles". Boy I don't know about you, but I sure can rest easier at night knowing that some group of Lutherans are upholding confessional principles because obviously the rest of us 4.5 million ELCA folk are not. Give me a break!

The last time I checked my Lutheran label and the one here at Incarnate Word, we still confessed belief in God the Father, creator of heaven and earth. We still confessed belief in Jesus Christ his only son our Lord who was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary, who suffered death and was buried and on the third day rose again from the dead, who will come to judge the living and the dead. Oh yeah and the last time I checked under the Lutheran "hood" here at Incarnate Word, we still confessed belief in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. And we even say the word "amen" after that.

Oh yeah and as far as the Sacraments go, we still acknowledge the gifts of forgiveness and eternal life through the real presence of Christ as Luther put it, "in, with, through and under the elements..." Hey NALC folks: What confessional principles are we not upholding?

Since that pathetic argument doesn't hold up, our NALC friends tell us that we do not hold Scripture as authoritative. Wrong again my friends. Not only do we hold Scripture as authoritative, but also as normative.

Check out our Evangelical Lutheran Worship book beginning on page 1154 where it describes our understanding of Scripture and Worship. There you will find 69 separate parts of Scripture listed which are the basis for what we do each and every week around the altar of God's love. Do I have to list them all for our NALC detractors? Well okay...

Joel 2:15-17; Matthew 18:20; Acts 2:1-13; Matthew 28:19; Psalm 103:2-3; Psalm 136:1; 1 John 1:8-9; John 8:34; Matthew 22:37-39; Psalm 119:47; Psalm 25:4; John 20:22-23; Ephesians 2:4-5, 3:16-17; Jeremiah 17;13; Deuteronomy 32:18; Psalm 27:1.

Had enough yet? No?

Psalm 149:1-4; Luke 17:13; Luke 2:14; Philippians 2:11; Isaiah 25:6-9; Revelation 5:12-13; 2 Corinthians 13:13; Luke 1:28; Isaiah 55:10-11; John 1:1-5, 14; Colossians 3:16; Jeremiah 2:4; 1 Timothy 4:13; 2 Peter 1:20-21; Revelation 19:5-6; John 6:68; Psalm 119:41,42; Numbers 14:18; 1 Timothy 2:1-2; Luke 23:46; Matthew 5:23-24; John 20:19; Romans 16:16; Acts 2:42; Isaiah 58:6-7; Matthew 25:35; Lamentations 3:41; 2 Thessalonians 1:3; Isaiah 6:3; Matthew 21:9; 1 Corinthians 11:23-26; Matthew 6:9-13; John 1:29; Luke 24:30-31; Luke 2:28-32; Matthew 28:19; John 20:21; John 13:1-15; Numbers 6:23-26; Romans 15:5,13; Luke 7:50; Romans 12:11; Galatians 2:10; Matthew 10:7; 1 Corinthians 15:57; Romans 6:3-4; 1 Corinthians 1:30; 1 Corinthians 3:23; Galatians 3:27; Isaiah 11:2; Ephesians 1:13-14; John 8:12; Matthew 5:16.

What parts of these Scripture verses aren't authoratative? Let's call the North American Lutheran Church for what it is. An anti-gay, single issue church which falsely accuses the ELCA of heresy because we choose to model Christ's radical inclusivity to all. If that is why you must leave the ELCA, then fine, I'll even hold the door open for you. But don't proclaim to the national media and anyone else who will listen to your rants that the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is neither scriptural nor confessional.

Perhaps other leaders in our beloved ELCA are content to let the North American Lutheran Church define us as unfaithful. I'm not. So while our departing NALC friends are crying in their milk about our unfaithfulness, the men, women and children here at Incarnate Word will continue to do what we do so well: Gathering around God's Word and Sacrament; clothing the naked and feeding the hungry: All in the name of Christ.

By the way at the bottom of page 8 (directly underneath the NALC article) is a picture of our ELCA reaching out to the 20 million people affected by the devastating floods in Pakistan. Does that sound unfaithful to you?


Your Faithful Partner in Christ,
Pastor Doug