September 20, 2026 Genesis 12:1-9 Sarai: The Hope of Becoming

 “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.” 

God does not tell Abram where he is going, which may be one of the most honest things the Bible says about faith. 

Abram is given a command, but not a map. A promise, but not an itinerary. He is asked to leave what he knows and begin moving toward something he cannot yet see. And he goes.

I have been thinking about Abram since last week because of someone I have encountered during my radiation treatments for cancer. Her name is Sarai. Something about that name has stayed with me.

In Genesis, Sarai is the woman who sets out with Abram. She is already on the journey before her name is changed to Sarah. Her story reminds me that sometimes we encounter people not at the end of their story, but in the middle of their becoming.

That seems especially significant to me during my cancer treatment. Radiation has a peculiar way of making life feel measured. One treatment. Then another. Then another. Each day becomes a small movement toward something that cannot yet be seen. There is a schedule, but there is also uncertainty. There is treatment, but there is no immediate visible proof of what the treatment is accomplishing.

You simply keep going. One day. One appointment. One step. One more morning. And perhaps that is part of what Abram teaches us. We don't have to know exactly where the journey will end to take the next faithful step.

Sarai's name has come to represent something to me: transformation that is still unfolding. Becoming. Not arriving. Not having everything resolved.

Becoming. There is tremendous hope in that word. We sometimes imagine hope as certainty about the future: I know everything will turn out exactly as I want. But Biblical hope can be something quieter. Hope can mean: I don't know what comes next, but I will take the next step. Or I cannot see the destination, but I will keep walking.

 Or I cannot control the outcome, but I can remain open to what is becoming. That is Abram's faith. He goes. And when he arrives at Shechem, God says, “To your offspring I will give this land.” Abram responds by building an altar. He has barely begun the journey, and yet he stops to acknowledge God's presence. Altars - there  to mark the way for future sojourners. Perhaps we need those altars along our own journeys. Not necessarily monuments of stone. Sometimes an altar is a person whose name we remember.

Or a conversation that unexpectedly gives us courage. A hand held at the right moment. A card tucked away and reread. A friend who calls. A nurse or receptionist who speaks kindly. A stranger encountered in a treatment center whose name suddenly becomes meaningful. These moments tell us that even when we are traveling through uncertainty, we are not traveling through it alone. We are all potential altars or builders of them,

And then Abram moves again, which is important. He does not build the altar and stay there forever. He worships, and then he goes. The invitation of Genesis 12 for us may be: notice the holy moments, receive the promise, and keep moving. Even through the beauty of that moment,

I don't know what my Sarai's journey looks like beyond the moments in which our paths have crossed each morning. Her name, however, has given me a way of thinking that I am still becoming. We all are.

The diagnosis isn't the final word on who we are, nor is uncertainty or any diminished abilities. There is still a road. There are still people to meet, conversations to have, and things to notice. There is still beauty to encounter and love to give and receive.

There is still becoming. And so perhaps the question God asks is not, “Do you know where this is going? Perhaps the question is the simpler: “Will you go?” Will you take the next step while remaining open? Will you look for the places where grace appears unexpectedly? Will you recognize that even in a season of treatment, waiting, limitation, and change, you are still being formed?

Following Abram's call has implications. Pastor Emillie mentioned its implications for immigration. Blessing and curse are bound up with this call. Blessing being open to life flourishing and cursed as diminishing life's future.

Sarai. A name that calls to mind a person in the midst of becoming. A person encountered on a road I never expected to travel. A reminder that none of us knows the whole story while we are living it.

Abram goes because God calls. Sarai goes with him. And somewhere along the way, a promise begins to take shape. A covenant. Isn't that what hope really is? Not knowing exactly what we are becoming, but trusting that becoming is still possible.

So I keep walking. And building little altars of gratitude along the way. While I cannot see very far ahead, I remember Abram and Sarai, who have the simple courage of taking the next step.

"Go" God says. Not because the road is certain, but because I am with you on the road. For today, that is enough. Perhaps it is more than enough.

Perhaps it is a hope to hold onto.

September 13, 2026 Genesis 6:5-22; 8:6-12; 9:8-17 and Matthew 28:19-20 When the Waters Rise: Noah, Jesus, and Hope in Troubled Times

We are studying Genesis again and, like before, this is another moment when Scripture seems to look directly into our own moment.

Genesis describes a world in which violence and corruption have become so pervasive that God grieves over the creation God has made.

That connection is important. Jesus is not simply telling his disciples to watch for dramatic signs. He is reminding them of what happened in Noah's generation. People went about their ordinary lives, making everyday plans while Noah faithfully prepared for something they could not yet see.

The problem was not simply that people were living ordinary lives. It was that they were living without consequence to that way of living. Genesis tells us that the earth had become filled with violence. Matthew reminds us that people did not recognize what was happening until the flood came.

And perhaps that is one of the most sobering connections for our own time. We live in a country experiencing deep political division, fear, anger and uncertainty. We hear constant arguments about immigration, democracy and the future of our nation. Every day brings another headline capable of making us angry or afraid.

Yet it is possible to become so accustomed to crisis that we stop asking what it is doing to our souls. We can become accustomed to hostility and cruelty. We hear dehumanizing language and see people who disagree with us as enemies rather than neighbors.

The story of Noah asks us to stop and notice what happens when a society becomes saturated with violence. And Jesus asks us to notice something else: Do not be deceived.

Jesus calls us toward. Faithfulness rather than prediction. The days of Noah were not characterized by everyone sitting around waiting for the flood. Life continued. People made plans. People ate and drank. People married. The ordinary rhythms of life continued right up until the moment when the waters came.

Jesus' warning, therefore, is not simply, “Look for signs that the end is near.” It is almost the opposite: Do not become so absorbed in ordinary life, fear, politics, or competing voices that you fail to recognize what faithfulness requires of you now. Noah's calling was not to predict the flood; it was to build the ark.

Our calling is not to predict exactly when or how God will act. It is to build lives and communities that are faithful to God in the middle of uncertainty. And then Genesis gives us a beautiful picture of what happens after judgment.

The waters begin to recede. Noah sends out the dove and the first time, the dove comes back. There is nowhere yet for it to rest. Noah waits. He sends it out again, and this time the dove returns carrying a freshly plucked olive leaf. That tiny leaf becomes a sign that the world is beginning to heal. This is where Genesis gives us something that Matthew's warning might otherwise leave us without: hope.

Jesus speaks about the suddenness of God's intervention, but Genesis reminds us that God's purposes do not end with judgment, and the flood is not the end of the story. The dove is still coming. The earth becomes habitable and life returns.

And then God places the rainbow in the sky. The God who judged the violence of the old creation now makes a covenant with Noah, his descendants, and every living creature. The rainbow is God's declaration that creation will not be abandoned and is why the connection between Genesis and Matthew matters so deeply.

Jesus invokes Noah not simply to frighten us about the future, but to call us to faithful watchfulness. Genesis shows us what faithful watchfulness looks like: Noah listens when others do not and prepares when others continue as usual. Noah waits when he cannot see the outcome and sends out the dove again when the first attempt produces no answer.

And Noah recognizes hope when it arrives in the form of something as small as an olive leaf. That may be exactly what our country needs from people of faith today. Not more people claiming to know precisely what God is about to do. or turning political leaders into messiahs. Not more fear disguised as prophecy, but people who are willing to create communities of mercy, hospitality, courage, and peace.

People who refuse to participate in the violence of the culture around them. People who can disagree without dehumanizing and can defend what they believe without hating those who believe differently. People who remember that no president, political party, movement, or nation is the Messiah.

Jesus tells us that his coming will be like lightning, visible, and impossible to control or contain. Genesis tells us what faithfulness looks like when the waters rise:

Listen. Wait. Watch. Trust. Send out the dove. And when the dove returns with an olive leaf, don't overlook it because it seems too small. A nation healing one relationship at a time may be an olive leaf. A church becoming a place where people with different political convictions can still worship together may be an olive leaf.

These things may not make the headlines, but they matter because the story of Noah teaches us that God's work of renewal often begins quietly.

And then comes the rainbow.

God's promise is still larger than our fear.  God's covenant is still wider than our divisions and God's future is still greater than anything we can see from where we stand today.

Let us keep looking toward the horizon for somewhere beyond the waters, the dove is flying and in its beak may already be the first small sign that God makes and is making all things new.

September 6, 2926 Exodus 20:17; Psalm 119:33-40 & Luke 12:14-21 When Is Enough Enough?

Luke 12:14–21 and Exodus 20:17 meet at a surprisingly deep place: understanding when possessions possess us. 

Exodus says:

“You shall not covet…”

In Luke, Jesus tells the story of a man who has so much that he no longer knows what to do with it. His barns are too small, so he builds bigger ones. And then comes the haunting line: “You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you.”

The two texts ask essentially the same question: When is enough enough? Coveting is often misunderstood as simply wanting what belongs to someone else. But the final commandments expose the restless human imagination that says: If only I had a little more…

And the remarkable thing about “more” is that it never tells us when to stop. The rich man in Jesus' parable never says, “I have enough.” Instead, his prosperity creates a new problem: How can I store everything I have? His barns become monuments not to gratitude but to anxiety, which has become a burden.

The man's question moves from farming. It is about the future. What will I do with all this? How can I make certain that I will be secure?  This is where coveting and anxiety touch one another. Sometimes we covet not because we are greedy, but because we are afraid.

We imagine that if we possess enough, save enough, accomplish enough, control enough, or prepare enough, we can finally make ourselves safe. Jesus' parable reveals the illusion. There is no barn big enough to contain our fear of tomorrow.

Luther's explanation of the Ninth and Tenth Commandments is especially helpful here. For Luther, “You shall not covet” is not merely a prohibition against wanting something that belongs to another person. It is a call to resist the schemes of the heart that seek to acquire what is not ours.

And positively, the commandments teach us to act with generosity rather than manipulation, and to be content with what God has entrusted to us.

That gives Jesus' parable another dimension. The rich man's failure is not simply that he has wealth. It is that his wealth has narrowed his imagination to the point that he can see only himself.

There is no neighbor in what he says. There is no community, gratitude or God. There is only I, me, and mine.

Jesus ends with an extraordinary contrast:

“So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”

Jesus doesn't condemn having treasure. He questions where our treasure is directed. We can accumulate things, or we can accumulate relationships. We can build bigger barns or wider tables.

We can spend our lives protecting what we have, or we can spend them giving thanks for what we have been given. Being “rich toward God” means recognizing that everything ultimately comes to us as a gift.

And gifts are meant to be received with gratitude and shared with joy.

At the end, the man says:

“Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”

But he has confused having enough to live with having enough to guarantee life. He cannot possess eternity. That is why the Tenth Commandment is ultimately spiritual. It asks us to examine the appetite beneath our appetites.

What do we believe will finally make us enough? And what if the gospel answer is: Nothing you acquire will make you enough, because, in Christ, you already are enough.

Perhaps the opposite of coveting is not simply contentment but trust. Trust that there will be enough, that we are more than what we own, and that God's abundance is greater than our scarcity. We can trust that the life God desires for us is not a life spent building ever-larger barns, but a life in which what we have becomes a blessing for someone else.

So Exodus whispers: Do not covet. Jesus asks: What are you storing up? And instead of answering this question tallying how we have, we are free to ask “What am I doing with what I have been given?”

August 30, 2026 Exodus 20:12-16; Psalm 15 & Luke 10:25-37 My Neighbor’s Best Life: Commandments as a Calling to Love

There is a deep wisdom tradition that Pastor Emillie centered her last Sunday's sermon around. The Old Testament offers a beautiful way of understanding the Ten Words given by God: they are not meant to be merely rules that restrain us; they are gifts that teach us how to seek out our neighbor’s well-being. They are a vocabulary of love.

Jesus summarized the law in two great commandments: love God and love your neighbor. The commandments in Exodus 20 show us what that love looks like in everyday life.

To honor father and mother is to build communities where generations care for one another, where wisdom is shared, and where no one is forgotten because of age or frailty.

To refrain from murder is not only to avoid violence but to actively protect life, to feed the hungry, comfort the lonely, welcome the stranger, and work for peace.

To avoid adultery is to cherish trust, fidelity, and relationships that help families and communities remain strong. To refrain from stealing is to ensure that others have what they need for a dignified life and to resist systems that deprive people of opportunity, justice, or hope.

To refuse false witness is to defend truth, speak honestly, and stand beside those whose voices are ignored or distorted. To resist coveting is perhaps one of the most difficult callings of all: learning to rejoice in our neighbor’s blessings rather than seeing another person’s life as something we deserve for ourselves.

We encounter this profound question to ponder: “What would it mean for my neighbor to have their best life now?” A question that transforms commandments from restrictions into a vocation. And perhaps it also transforms our evangelism.

Too often, evangelism has been understood primarily as persuading others to accept a set of beliefs. Yet the gospel spreads most powerfully when people experience communities that seek their flourishing. The early church grew when people saw lives marked by generosity, truthfulness, hospitality, and care for the vulnerable.

What if evangelism first asks: Who is not yet experiencing abundant life? Who is lonely, overlooked, burdened, or excluded? Who needs friendship, encouragement, practical help, or a listening ear?

Creator often shows this. When we seek our neighbor’s best life, our understanding of “neighbor” expands. It includes family members and longtime friends, but also newcomers, refugees, people of different backgrounds, those struggling financially, those carrying grief, young people searching for purpose, and older adults who long to remain connected. It includes people who agree with us and people who do not.

The church becomes a witness to Christ not only through what it proclaims, but through the lives it nurtures and the relationships it builds. In a world shaped by competition and comparison, Christians are called to become people who quietly ask, every day:

What does my neighbor need to flourish?

For in seeking the good of our neighbor, we discover the heart of God, a God who desires life, abundance, and hope for all people.

And perhaps this is one of the deepest forms of evangelism: living in such a way that others can glimpse, through us, the love of Christ and begin to imagine that God desires their best life too.

August 23, 2026 Exodus 20:3–11, Psalm 18:7-14 & Matthew 22:34-40: Daily Bread, Good Government, and the Neighbor

 

The first commandments begin not with politics, economics, or even our relationships with one another, but with God: “You shall have no other gods before me.” Then, almost immediately, the commandments move into the very ordinary structures of human life—our use of God’s name, our keeping of Sabbath, our families, our communities, our work, and our rest.

Martin Luther understood this movement deeply. In the Large Catechism, he reminds us that the commandments are not merely a list of prohibitions. They reveal what happens when God’s gifts become disordered, when we begin to trust something other than God, when we use God’s name to serve our own purposes, or when our lives become so consumed by work and productivity that we forget that life itself is a gift.

This is where Luther’s understanding of daily bread becomes surprisingly political.

In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Luther expands that simple request until it encompasses almost everything necessary for human flourishing. Daily bread is food, certainly, but it is also shelter, health, peace, trustworthy relationships, honest work, a functioning economy, justice, and a society in which people can live without constant fear.

And Luther includes good government among those gifts.

He writes in the Large Catechism that “the greatest need of all is to pray for the civil authorities and government,” because through them God provides daily bread and the comforts of life. That is a remarkable theological claim. Government is not merely an unfortunate necessity. At its best, government becomes one of the ordinary instruments through which God cares for creation.

A loaf of bread, Luther suggested, would be an appropriate symbol for political authority. Imagine that. Not a sword. Not a crown. Not a flag. A loaf of bread.

The image is almost disarming in its simplicity. The purpose of political life, in this vision, is ultimately not power for power’s sake. It is the preservation of life. It is the creation of conditions in which people can eat, work, raise children, worship, rest, disagree without violence, and live with some measure of security and dignity.

This gives us an important way of hearing the First Commandment. “You shall have no other gods.”

The commandment warns us against turning political power into an idol. Government can be a gift of God, but government is not God. A nation can serve the neighbor, but a nation cannot save us. Political leaders can exercise legitimate authority, but they cannot claim ultimate authority over our conscience.

Whenever we expect a political party, a president, a nation, an ideology, an economic system, or even our own political convictions, to provide the salvation that belongs to God alone, we have crossed the line from civic responsibility into idolatry.

The First Commandment therefore frees Christians to participate in politics without worshiping politics. We can care deeply about public life precisely because we do not have to make it our god.

The Fourth Commandment in Exodus 20,“Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy,” offers another profound connection with Luther’s understanding of daily bread. Sabbath declares that human beings are more than workers and consumers. We are not machines whose value can be measured by productivity.

Rest is part of daily bread. So are healthy communities. So are clean water and safe neighborhoods. So are schools, hospitals, roads, fair courts, honest commerce, environmental stewardship, and public institutions that protect the vulnerable. These things may seem far removed from prayer and worship, but Luther would have us see them differently.

They are part of the answer to “Give us this day our daily bread.”

And that means that the prayer is not simply something we ask God to answer for us. It is also something God invites us to answer with one another.

The farmer grows the food. The truck driver transports it. The grocery worker stocks the shelves. The teacher educates a child. The nurse cares for the sick. The public servant maintains the infrastructure. The judge seeks justice. The business owner pays fair wages. The neighbor brings dinner to someone who is struggling. The citizen votes, listens, serves, speaks, questions, and participates.

All of these people can become instruments through which daily bread reaches another human being. This is why Lutheran theology can speak of vocation so expansively. God works through ordinary people doing ordinary things for the sake of their neighbors.

Good government, then, is not simply about politicians. It is about all of us.

And Luther's understanding contains an important corrective to both political cynicism and political idolatry. We should neither imagine that government can save the world nor conclude that government is therefore irrelevant. We should neither blindly obey authority nor dismiss every form of authority as oppressive.

The Augsburg Confession expresses the balance clearly: Christians owe obedience to civil authorities and laws except when those authorities command what is contrary to God. There is room here for both civic responsibility and moral resistance.

Luther himself understood this tension. He could challenge the highest authorities of his age while still affirming the importance of legitimate government. His famous declaration that his conscience was captive to the Word of God was not an invitation to chaos or personal sovereignty. It was a reminder that human authority has limits.

That distinction is especially important today. Christians are called to be citizens, but we are not called to turn citizenship into religion. We can disagree passionately without declaring our opponents evil. We can challenge unjust policies without despising the people who hold different opinions. We can seek truth without assuming that we possess it completely. We can defend convictions while remaining open to reason, dialogue, correction, and the possibility that our neighbor may teach us something.

That may be one of the most important contributions Lutheran theology can make to civic life. The commandments begin with God because God is the center. Everything else finds its proper place when we remember that.

The Sabbath reminds us that our lives are gifts rather than possessions The Lord’s Prayer reminds us that bread is a gift.

Luther reminds us that government can be one of the means through which that gift is distributed. And the commandments remind us that our neighbor is never merely an abstraction. The person who needs food, housing, safety, justice, companionship, forgiveness, or rest is precisely the person whom God places before us.

Perhaps Luther was onto something when he imagined a loaf of bread stamped on our coins.

Imagine seeing a loaf of bread every time we handled money. Imagine seeing it on a courthouse. Imagine seeing it on a government document. Imagine every elected official remembering that behind every policy are actual human beings who need daily bread. And imagine every citizen remembering the same thing.

The symbol would ask a simple question:

Does what we are doing help our neighbor receive the bread of life?

Not merely bread in the literal sense, but everything necessary for human beings to flourish in God's creation.

Exodus 20 begins with “You shall have no other gods.” Perhaps that is precisely what allows us to enter public life with humility. We do not have to make government our god because we already know who God is.

Our task is smaller, and perhaps more beautiful. We are called to love God and to love our neighbor. We are called to seek justice, practice mercy, speak truth, protect life, receive Sabbath, and share the gifts we have been given.

And when we pray, “Give us this day our daily bread,” we are praying not only for ourselves but for everyone.

For the hungry person. For the lonely person, the refugee, the child, and the worker. For the elderly, the stranger, and for the person with whom we disagree.

For the whole community and the whole creation. Good government, at its best, becomes one way that prayer is answered. And good citizenship becomes one way that we participate in the answer.

The loaf of bread, then, becomes more than a symbol of food. It becomes a symbol of vocation, justice, community, and grace. It reminds us that God's gifts are meant to be shared. And perhaps that is the deepest connection between Exodus 20 and Luther's vision of daily bread:

The commandments teach us how to live in right relationship with God, so that we might become people through whom God's gifts reach our neighbors.

That is what it means to pray for daily bread, and then to become part of the answer.

Sermon 

August 16, 2026 Exodus 19:1-6; 20:1-2 Ten Words: Guideposts For How to Live Together as Commmunity

Colloquially they are called Ten Commandments, but the biblical text itself describes them as ten words or ten sayings.

In Exodus 34:28, the Hebrew says:

“He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten words.”

The Hebrew expression is עֲשֶׂרֶת הַדְּבָרִים aseret ha-devarim, literally “the ten words” or “the ten sayings.”

The English phrase comes through the ancient Greek and Latin traditions. The Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible calls them the “ten words” (deka logoi), while the Latin tradition uses Decem Mandata, “ten commands.” From that Latin phrase comes the familiar English “Ten Commandments.”

God tells the people:

“ I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me. ”

This is not conditional.  God does not say, "Keep these rules and, if you do, you may become my people. Instead, these become the ten foundational words as to how God's newly liberated family can "walk" and live together.

God doesn't give Israel ten rules to make them religious; God gives them ten words to teach them what freedom looks like. God provides an instruction manual at Sinai for a way of life.

Then God tells them:

“If you obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples.”
—Exodus 19:5

The Exodus begins as a journey out of Egypt, but at Sinai it becomes a journey toward one another. They are no longer simply a collection of former slaves. They are becoming a covenant community.

The word synod comes from the Greek synodos: meaning syn “together, with” and hodos “way, road, journey.” So synodos literally means “a journey together” or “people traveling the same road.”

I am learning lessons about the syndos being on this congregation's prayer list. There is a tension I am currently uncomfortably navigating. I want to be open and reveal vulnerability without reporting details of my progressive treatment statuses as some poor-poor-pitiful-me updates to garner sympathy. Maybe using the actions of others on the list can help guide this path I am on.

When we walk together generally our perspective may broaden to encompass God's larger vision. When God says "Be fruitful and multiply" in Genesis this blessing goes beyond eating fruit from  the Tree of Life in the Garden of Eden. It is to invite us to be Trees of Life to others. 

August 9, 2026 Esther 7:1-10 & 9:20-22 Inspiring Acts of Faithful Courage

An insight was shared last Wednesday as Pastor Emillie related that it was important for someone to learn she was a pastor at the Pride Parade booth when she was not wearing her collar.

We were discussing not only the ways individual faithfulness can inspire others to act but who those individuals were and their identities. During that exchange, I was reminded of a film I saw years ago called Amazing Grace and Chuck. (Plot summary)   

There is more than a superficial connection between Amazing Grace and Chuck and the Book of Esther, even though one is a Cold War film and the other is an ancient biblical story. Both ask the question: Can one ordinary person's act of faithful courage alter cultural assumptions and behaviors?

The answer in both stories is yes, not because of an individual's power but, rather, one person's conscience can become a catalyst that awakens others'. Both Chuck and Esther begin as ordinary people. Chuck Murdock is not a politician or a celebrity. He is a twelve-year-old Little League pitcher.

Esther is not initially a queen in the sense of having true political authority. She is a young Jewish woman living in exile who is swept into the Persian king's harem through what is essentially a beauty contest. Even after becoming queen, she has little real power. She cannot simply command the king or overturn Haman's decree. Esther seems insignificant compared to the political systems in Susa. Chuck faces the military-industrial complex.

Neither appears capable of changing history. Both refuse to participate in death.  Chuck's defining act is remarkably simple: "I won't pitch." He doesn't attack anyone. He doesn't organize a revolution. He simply refuses to lend his gifts to a world preparing for nuclear destruction.

Esther's defining act is also a refusal. At first she refuses Mordecai's request because entering the king's presence uninvited could mean death. But eventually she refuses something deeper: she refuses to let fear determine her actions. Her famous words, "If I perish, I perish" (Esther 4:16), are not a cry of despair but a declaration that preserving the community's life is more important than preserving her own.

Both characters withdraw their cooperation from a system that accepts death as inevitable. And courage is contagious.

This is perhaps the strongest connection. In Amazing Grace and Chuck, Chuck's refusal inspires Amazing Grace Smith. Grace inspires other athletes. Athletes inspire millions. A private act becomes a public movement.

The same pattern unfolds in Esther. Mordecai first challenges Esther. Esther then calls all the Jews in Susa to fast, and the community joins her. The king's attitude changes. The empire itself is transformed. Neither story depends on a superhero. Both show courage spreading from person to person. God is hidden, and yet present. There is no miraculous intervention in either tale. History changes through seemingly ordinary choices.

For readers of Esther, this is precisely how divine providence often works. God's presence is discerned not through spectacular miracles but through faithful people acting with courage at the right moment. Chuck becomes, in a sense, an unwitting instrument of grace. Esther becomes a willing instrument of God's hidden providence. 

A theology of refusal. One fascinating way to take in these stories together is through the idea that sometimes faithfulness means saying "no" to compliance. Chuck says,    "I will not pitch." Esther says, "I will go to the king." These seem opposite actions, yet they are actually the same spiritual movement. Chuck refuses to participate in a culture of death. Esther refuses to remain silent in the face of death.

Faithfulness is not always doing more. Sometimes it is refusing to cooperate with evil. "For such a time as this", Mordecai's words to Esther propose something that may haunt us in today's world: "Who knows? Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for just such a time as this," could almost be spoken to Chuck or us. in our time.

Chuck did not choose to become famous. Esther did not choose to become queen. Both discovered that the ordinary circumstances of their lives have become moments of extraordinary responsibility.

The question should not be, "Am I important enough?" The question is, "What is my faithfulness asking of me right now? Culture is often not changed not by the powerful, but by ordinary people who refuse to surrender their conscience. Esther teaches that one courageous "yes" can save a people. Amazing Grace and Chuck imagines that one courageous "no" can awaken a nation.

Sermon 

Purim Celebration Cookies     Haman's Ears (shared with others at Purim)