Simply Grace

There’s this passage in our gospel today that is interesting. Jesus says, “You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled under foot by men.”

Some people would take this to mean that if a person doesn’t have faith in Jesus Christ, then they aren’t a full human, and can be treated as disposable. This was why the English, Portuguese, and Spanish Empires used the church and missionaries to sanitize their exploitation of the Americas. The strategy was very simple. Anyone who isn’t a Christian, is like salt that has lost its saltiness, and so they can be trampled under foot, their land can be confiscated, their gold and salt taken, etcetera. 

So the missionaries would be there to offer salvation, to offer the possibility of having faith in Jesus. And anyone who resisted faced a sword or the barrel of a gun. That’s quite a terrible evangelism strategy. So why would Jesus say this? Why would Jesus warn us against not being salty and being trampled under foot?

What if Jesus is saying something altogether different? What if he is saying that we should never underestimate our worth? We forget just how precious salt is, and was in antiquity. Salt was like a miracle commodity. If you could get your hands on salt then you could be a rich person. So there Jesus is talking with the masses, and he tells them, you are much more valuable than salt! You are priceless! You are invaluable! You are amazing stuff! You are a living breathing miracle of profound intelligence and capability! We haven’t the foggiest idea of our worth. We undervalue ourselves something terrible. 

This is our greatest sin. We believe the lie that we have somehow lost our saltiness. In fact it is our two greatest sins. Number one: we don’t know how valuable we are. Number two: because we don’t know how valuable we are, we allow ourselves constantly to be undervalued and underappreciated and trampled on. To say it a bit more clearly is that our greatest sin is that we allow ourselves to be exploited and taken advantage of. 

If you think about it for a moment we know that this is true. Everybody knows that this is true. Some of us get mad at the government, and we think that it is their fault. We resent the fact that after working very hard the government exploits us by doing what? Taxation! They tax us, and it is felt that this is a form of tyranny and exploitation. And indeed it is, especially when they take our hard earned money and squander it while our own children go hungry. Then there is another group of us who get mad at the corporations! They are the ones who are fixing prices, and selling us garbage, with a bunch of empty promises. So which one is it? Big government or Big tech? Neither. It’s big religion! 

Think about it. All day long religious leaders, especially so called Christian leaders say that humans are broken sinners who are going to go to hell. But if humans are so bad, then why do all the religions want the people so badly? Here’s the truth, without regular every day people and lots of them: Business, Government, and Religion would all go out of business. It is the people who are valuable!  Salt never stops being salty. You can’t not be salty!

When we are talking about grace we are talking about the fact that Jesus said you are the salt of the earth. You are that way built into the fiber of your bones. You are valuable. 

I’ve been reading Noam Chomsky lately. Noam Chomsky studies languages. He argues that all of the languages of the world use universal rules. Their differences are minute. It follows that the ability to communicate as we do is almost programmed into our genes, and built into our brains. It has been discovered that deaf communities in isolated communities in impoverished countries develop languages that operate with the same rules as American Sign Language, for example. Furthermore it is an absolute miracle that we are able to communicate at all. The amount of intelligence required to carry on a very rudimentary conversation is extraordinary. What follows from this is that human beings in their wide variety all share an extraordinary capacity for thought and critical thinking. The differences between human beings mostly have to do with the environment more so than internal intellectual ability. 

So the question then emerges. If we all share a universal set of rules for communicating, then why do we so badly misunderstand each other? If we have more in common than we have not in common, why is it that as a society we disagree so profoundly one with another? Maybe it’s because we swim in an ocean of lies every day. Maybe we don’t disagree all that much. Maybe it’s all just a big misunderstanding; and we can quite easily get to the bottom of our disagreements, find common ground, and decide on a course of action that the vast majority of us all can agree to. 

What it means is this. If and when you see somebody getting trampled on, it is not because they stopped being salty. It is for no good reason whatsoever. There is never a good reason for anyone to get trampled. It’s always a travesty of justice. The only way to stop it is for good people to get together and do something about it. 

When we are talking about faith, we are talking about believing in this truth that you are the salt of the earth, as is all of creation. If you truly believe it, and if you recognize it, then you will have the creative capacity to figure it out. To get to the bottom of things, and find a solution.  

And whenever somebody treats you like garbage, know that they are committing a lie. They are pretending as though you don’t matter to manipulate you. Don’t believe the lie. Hold fast to the truth. Especially those who resort to intimidation must understand that they are worthy too. 

So if you or someone you know is being trampled under foot you have a decision to make. Will you go along with it with your head down believing the lie? Or will you lift up your head, intervene, and speak the truth plainly and clearly? You are the salt of the earth. 

Is this person being trampled under foot because God has rejected them, because they don’t have a sufficient faith? Or are the people doing the trampling the ones at fault? Do they lack faith? Do they not see the value of the one they are trampling. Jesus could be saying this: stop the trampling!

Thank you for your sermon Stephen Hale and your service with Inalianable.

Sermon from January 22, 2023

Sermon 15 January 2023

Isaiah says that it is not enough to be individually saved, we must care for all the world. So we had better practice spending time together.

Psalm 40 says that any “god” that calls you to act against your conscience is a fake.

When we talk about God saving us from the miry clay, we are talking about leaving behind a way of life that is morally complicated and exhausting. When we talk about God lifting us up and putting us on a solid rock, and putting a song in our mouth, we are talking about the narrow path of righteousness, of doing the right thing. Even if it is difficult or strenuous in effort, it is joyous and a relief for our conscience to be doing the right thing, it’s like standing on solid ground. 

When we talk about putting our trust in the Lord we are talking about following our conscience. Remember that “LORD” in the Bible is often a code for the holy name of God, the name that God revealed to Moses on Mount Sinai. That name is, “I am.” So we would not be wrong to interpret the verse, 

“Happy are those who make the Lord their trust” as

“Happy are those who make “I am” their trust.”

What this means is that deep within you, you have a conscience, and the ability to do the right thing. I would go so far as to say whether or not you struggle with a traditional belief in God, within your being you have a sense of what is right and wrong. When you are doing the best that you can, when you are listening to your conscience that is fearing the Lord, that is having a healthy fear of “I am.” 

We get into trouble when we ignore or disregard our conscience, that is sloshing around in the miry clay. Happy are those who do not turn to the proud, to those who go astray after false gods. Unfortunately it is quite easy to go astray. There are many false gods who try to trick us into following them and putting our faith and allegiance in them. You can imagine what they are.

Religion can actually be a false god. We must remember that neither Lutheranism nor Christianity, nor Evangelicalism, nor Catholicism, nor any religion can save a person. When we begin to think that one religion is the only true religion we have already broken the first commandment. None of us should be here because we think this is the only way to salvation. It is much more honest to say that we are a free association of persons striving to have faith. I myself didn’t choose to be born and raised in a Lutheran family. If you came to Lutheranism later in life, there were many coincidences that brought you here. So we can’t judge people who worship elsewhere. We can and should judge the traditions and not hesitate to think critically about first and foremost our own religion, especially if we are to follow the first commandment. 

The first commandment says, “I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods.” Notice that there is actually no commandment here to believe in God. The only thing that is commanded is to not believe in any other gods. The real spirit of commandment number one is to be self-critical in preventing ourselves from idolizing anything, especially Lutheran Christianity. In terms of the existence of God, it is given as a declaration, as an offering, as a statement of unconditional love. Listen and think about it for a moment, “I am, the Lord your God.” It is deeply personal and internal. God’s name is I am. You can’t say God’s name without involving your very self totally and completely.  I am the Lord your God, and you shall have no other gods. Happy are those who don’t chase after false gods and get hoodwinked by the proud. 

So let me give you an example of what it means to not have any false gods. Another false god is the bible. Too many people think that to have faith means that you have to accept the Bible as the Word of God, as if it were some perfect and divine document. That’s idolatry. We must read the scriptures critically. 

Take this morning’s reading from John 1:29-42. To be honest with you I find things in this passage that both comfort me, and trouble me. I’ll begin with what troubles me. Two times John the Baptist sees Jesus, who he has already baptized and says, “Behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.” Thinking of Jesus as the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world really avails itself to what is called “penal substitutionary atonement.” The idea is this. When we do stuff that is wrong, God gets mad and offended and requires a punishment, a penalty for the sin we commit. I don’t think that’s what God does at all. 

If God is supposed to reward good people and punish bad people, then God is doing a terrible job. Some of the richest, most powerful people in the world commit terrible crimes and get off scot free. Some of the most saintly caring people suffer tremendously and are in fact punished for doing the right thing. Tomorrow we will commemorate Martin Luther King Junior as one prominent example. He was killed for doing the very things Jesus told us to do. And if that example doesn’t work for you, consider Jesus himself. He was crucified for sins that he didn’t commit. 

Did Jesus have to die? The fact that he did die the way he did means that in the present moment there is no divine justice. Great atrocities have happened throughout history and continue to the present day with little to know recourse. In fact, if we want to see a better world, a world with justice, a world that doesn’t self-destruct in environmental degradation and war, then we have got to be the ones to do something about it. That is what faith is. That is what following commandment number one is all about. No religion, no government, no political party, no person, no business, no technology is going to magically save us from all of our problems. The only way things will get better is if each person takes responsibility for these problems and we work together to fix them. You might think that this is difficult, and you would be right to think so. That is the other side of faith. We have faith in each other, that God is in each of us, and that together we have a tremendous creative capacity. New life can spring up where we least expect it, because there is more than what we currently see. If we spend time together we might see something new.

So the part of the story from John that gives me comfort is the very personal way that Jesus spends time with the disciples. He doesn’t have a formal class for what it means to be a disciple. He just invites them to spend time with him. They get to know each other. If we want to accomplish big things like changing the world and making it a better, more just place, then one thing we can do to start is just practice spending time with each other. It’s enough to start there. Amen. 

A look at the scientific properties of water to help understand the significance of baptism.

Sermon for January 1, 2023

An account of creation from the perspective of a child being born.